Robert E. Park and the Theoretical Content of Chicago Sociology: 1920–1940*

Abstract

Drawing on the entire body of Robert E. Park's work published in the period 1921–1944, this paper describes his general theoretical system at three points in time: in 1921, between 1922 and 1929, and from 1930 to 1944. Park refined and altered his general theory of society over this period partly because of ambiguities in his original 1921 formulation and partly because of pressure from changing social and intellectual milieux. Park is treated as the leading theorist of the Chicago School of Sociology, and this account of his theoretical system is used as a base for assessing the validity of five different contemporary claims about the theoretical contributions of the Chicago School of Sociology.