Canadian Journal of Sociology Online July-August 2006

William H. Sewell Jr. Logics of History: Social Theory and Social Transformation.
University of Chicago Press, 2005, 376 pp. $US 27.50 paper (0-226-74918-5), $US 70.00 hardcover (0-226-74917-7) The incorporation of historical ontology seeing human action in terms of temporality and a historical methodology the use of narrative and process tracing is not new to the various social science elds. A perusal of the classics of Marx and Weber, among others, illustrates a point in time when such eclectic incorporation was not questioned. However, during the twentieth century, the social sciences devolved into the specialized divisions of anthropology, sociology, economics, and political science. The development of these branches of social science involved the construction of ontological perspectives and methodologies. In reality, however, such exclusive boundaries never developed to the extent that social scientists in the various elds hoped for. The re-convergence of varied ontologies and methodologies became apparent in the 1970s, when historians and social scientists again borrowed from each other. The author, a historian, relates his personal relationship to this re-convergence by noting his initial work as a social historian. Social history involved not only an examination of non-elitist actors but also the use of quantitative data. This re-convergence is most evident in political science, which Sewell notes, has a tendency to chase headlines. Chasing headlines, not dened or illustrated, appears to relate to his experience that political science fails to institutionalize incorporated ontology and methodology, and this may be the case. For example, Bates, et al.s (1998) Analytical Narratives serves as the tour-de-force of incorporative eclecticism in political science. Bates, et al. use both rational choice and historical narrative to examine various historical events. The rational choice (micro-level) ontology is clearly evident but two major faults become apparent. One fault is visible in hindsight: Bates et al.s rational choice ontology and historical narrative failed to be institutionalized. Analytical Narratives did not produce a succession of follow-up works that would have aided in clarifying the authors perspectives. Another fault is that the temporalities inherent in rational choice and historical narrative are seemingly contradictory. This second fault, a seeming contradiction that has proven incorrigibly difcult to reconcile, is Sewells thesis. His explication of this fault is not conned to a contradiction between rational choice and historical narrative, but extends to the intersection of history and the social science elds of anthropology and sociology. Working out the bi-directional inuence of history, anthropology, and sociology is not a pithy task and the layout of the book attests to that. Logics of History is a collection of the authors essays, the work of a lifetime. One of the major problems that Sewell does an excellent job of working through is the connection of historical ontology seeing human actions and events temporally to the various theoretical perspectives in anthropology and sociology. He conducts an especially erudite and detailed analysis in drawing connections between theoretical perspectives in anthropology and history. However, the connection between history and anthropology is not drawn in a concise manner; instead, it is interwoven into the theoretically oriented chapters on culture and structure. As noted, the work is one of a lifetime; this is reected in Sewells ability to interconnect historical ontology, synchronic temporality, with theoretical understandings of culture and structure. Generally, sociologists and anthropologists have been at odds over the utilization of culture and structure together. Sociologists are not inclined to accept culture as containing structure, but anthropologists tend to accept that structure comes from culture and Sewell implicitly leans towards the anthropological. In his explication, he does scholars an indelible favor by cleaning up the debris

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that obfuscates the relationship between historical ontology and culture and structure. Culture is examined from an evolutionary stance as it evolves in the western perspective towards a practical system of meaning. The practical is illustrated through various examples, the most in-depth of which is the story of the transformation of cultural practices of the inhabitants of the island of Hawaii through an event the sojourn of the British Captain James Cook. The inhabitants of the island of Hawaii had a social structure characterized, in most general terms, by gender and elitecommoner stratication. However, structures are amenable to change a seemingly oxymoronic contention through what the author describes as events, in the example noted this is the sojourn of Captain James Cook. In the anthropological perspective, the culture contains the structure; therefore, the explication has to include how an event altered the semiotic discourse of the inhabitants of the island of Hawaii, which, over time historically synchronically led to a transformation of structure. This process of transformation is illustrated by changes across class and gender. The chiefs altered the traditional meaning of the cultural practice of taboo in order to preclude others from participating in trade with westerners. The murder of Captain Cook by the Hawaiians is presented in a historically synchronic narrative involving beliefs about the return of the god Lono. Captain Cook overstays his welcome by returning for repairs and is ritually murdered. The incorporation of Captain Cooks mana by the chief provides the rationale for war with other tribes that inhabit other islands in the Hawaiian archipelago. Sewells conjuncture of historical ontology and anthropological theory is well done, but tying together sociological methodology sociological ontology is denitively muddled with a historical ontology is more difcult. This is so because sociological methodology is generally not interpretive but causal. Causality implies generality: the ability to ascertain the same cause and effect over different cases. This is done through statistical analysis usually multivariate regression involving the correlation of variables. Interpretive or qualitative analysis is localized analysis; that is, it involves a place or a space depending on the social science subeld. Prezworksi and Teune (1971) tried to deal with this in their argument that social science should employ variable oriented analysis (methodological positivism) for the purpose of producing generalizations by relegating systemic variables to the end of the analysis. In other words, the purpose of social science analysis is to discover generalizations rst, but generalizations do not rule out variation at the place or space level. The author never really produces a solid refutation of the positivist methodology; instead, he argues in the last chapter that the process of analysis might be construed as itself qualitative. Positivist social scientists are reluctant to admit that the process of operationalizing the variables, conducting the analysis, and analyzing the results is far from objective because such an reiterative process might be seen as cooking the data. The author of The Logics of History proposes that sociology can benet from utilizing a historical ontology. This historical ontology involves seeing an unfolding of events over the longee dure. He makes a salient point by noting the ontological lacuna that exists in sociology. But can a historical ontology be compatible with causal methodology? The best example of attempting to combine a historical ontology with a causal methodology is Wallersteins world systems theory (WST). The ontology of WST is the unfolding of events predicated on the relationship of classes of nation-states within a capitalist system, but within the system causal laws exist. This is a determinist and teleological perspective, and Sewell keenly articulates that while strongly disagreeing with it. If we reverse engineer, the author of the Logics of History uses the analogy of the Big Bang, the development of capitalism, we can see a historical unfolding. The problem is in extending the causal elements to the future leading us into the teleological trap. Thus, his conjunction of historical ontology and methodological causality is limited to analysis of systems. In other words, a system

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cultural, nation-state, world system, etc. has a unique historical background, but there are discoverable causalities within the system. Such a perspective, however, is still seemingly incompatible with generalization. A rudimentary way of dealing with this incompatibility problem is illustrated by Sewell through his brief coverage of economics. His address of economics is brilliant because he attacks the perceptions of economics in terms of its actual utility. In other words, he dismisses the ability of economists to actually efcaciously tackle problems using their theories. The laws of economics are real, but their actual application generalization in action is obfuscated by system level differences. This is a thorough and engaging analysis of how utilizing a historical ontology can mitigate problems inherent problems in sociological methodology and anthropological theory. Sociology and anthropology can benet by taking temporality into account. Taking temporality into account allows one to see how structure is not immutable to change and that critical junctures (events) are signicant factors to be analyzed. In other words, history uncovers the dynamics of structural change. History also benets from sociological methodology by taking into account systemic causality. This forces the historian to provide an analysis that transcends story telling. This work is a brilliant expose of the ontologies and methodologies of the various social sciences and is certainly applicable for use across the social science disciplines. The only major weakness is the weak explanation of how history and generalization can t together. On the positive side, this will spur much needed debate and research. I would not doubt that this work nds its place in history as a landmark exposition. J. David Granger Georgetown University jdg26@georgetown.edu
J. David Granger is a doctoral candidate in Comparative Government at Georgetown University. http://www.cjsonline.ca/reviews/logicshistory July 2006 Canadian Journal of Sociology Online