Nazism and sociology in Europe and America: Conflicting perspectives

Abstract

At first sight the relationships of sociology to fascism and especially Talcott Parsons's stance toward Nazism may appear as remote historical topics appropriately handled by members of the ISA's Research Committee on the History of Sociology. In reality, of course, these themes involve bitter disagreements over the intellectual rationale and the practical purposes of sociology. I will take sides in these controversies with a few observations of my own by addressing two extreme claims: that German sociology flour? ished under the Nazis and that American sociology prospered in the struggle against Nazism and Communism, both of them selling out to the powers-that-be. In my view, sociology is tantamount to free inquiry into the nature of modern society. As an intellectual enterprise it cannot flourish or exist whenever governments suppress regime criticism and wherever party, na? tion or race are sacrosanct. Thus, sociology was not viable under Nazism and Bolshevism, which tolerated neither the independent private scholar nor the institutional autonomy of universities or academies. In western Ger? many sociology as free critical inquiry became possible only after the defeat of Nazi totalitarianism and in eastern Germany in 1990 only after the self destruction of the Communist regime. After 1945 the spirit of free inquiry returned with some of the emigrants and some members of the "inner emi? gration." One of the most remarkable "free spirits" was Ren? K?nig (1906-1992), who returned early to restore cosmopolitan sociology. In re