Institutions and Rule-Scepticism

Abstract

In the original exchange with Michael Lynch two things were at stake: first, we disagreed on the best way to analyse science as a social activity, and second, we disagreed on how to exploit the legacy ofWittgenstein's work in the course of such an analysis (see Pickering, 1992). Lynch opts for an ethnomethodological approach, which is descriptive but not explanatory in any causal way; I opt for a form of the sociology of knowledge in which the aspiration to provide causal explanations plays a central role. Lynch sees Wittgenstein's work as constituting a challenge to the sociologist, while I see it as a resource that can be used to deepen and further the sociological enterprise. Although we have a running disagreement about the interpretation of particular arguments in the Philosophical Investigations we agree, in general terms, that Wittgenstein's work is capable of being read in either way. The question is: which is the most fruitful? Predictably, we define fruitfulness differently. The result is that Lynch sees Wittgenstein as an embryonic ethnomethodologist; I see him as a proto-sociologist. I readily concede that the big battalions are on Lynch's side. Most philosophers selectively emphasize the points in Wittgenstein that Lynch deems decisive and share his lack of concern for the points I find most interesting. Wittgenstein was, after all, the patron saint of the 'ordinary language philosophy' or 'linguistic analysis' that dominated Oxford philosophy in the 1950s and 60s. These philosophers said they were doing neither metaphysics nor empirical science, but merely studying the 'logical geography' of concepts. Neither constructive theory building nor causal explanation was seen as necessary just 'analysis' and 'clarification'. Though fashions change quickly in philosophy, something of this spirit lives on in current Oxford readings of Wittgenstein (for example, those of Baker & Hacker, 1984). It is intriguing to find these readings enthusiastically absorbed into ethnomethodology. It has to be admitted that the two fit together very well. But for those of us who cut our philosophical teeth on Oxford-style linguistic analysis, and decisively rejected it, it is sad to see its narrow and self-imposed limitations reproduced and relabelled as a form of radicalism. This is why, in the original exchange, I spoke of a Right-wing