Holding unlimited economic freedom to be nearly as dangerous as physical violence, Karl Popper advocated "piecemeal" economic intervention by the state. Jeremy Shearmur's recent book on Popper contends that as the philosopher aged, his views grew closer to classical liberalism than those...

For seven months after the invasion of Czechoslovakia on August 21, 1968, not only did the reformist leadership remain in power, virtually intact, but many aspects of the reform movement which had disturbed the Soviets actually continued to develop, almost as if there had been no military...

Concepts shape and guide thought, both fruitfully and unfruitfully. Sometimes concepts lead inquiry to previously unimagined depths. Sometimes, they lead astray, or block thought and prevent inquiry from going anywhere. Sometimes the most penetrating and fruitful of concepts become inquiry...

German Abstract: Gesellschaftlich Ordnungen kann man nicht wie Kleidung wechseln. Es mag nicht schwer sein, schwerwiegende Defekte in eine sozialen und politischen Ordnung zu identifizieren. Es ist aber eine ganz andere Sache diese Ordnung zu ändern. Die weit verbreitete Abneigung gegen das...

Most social scientists are aware that ideal types are merely constructs that pick out, indeed exaggerate preselected aspects of social reality. Nevertheless, a widespread tendency remains to hypostatize (reify) them, to treat them as if they referred to real entities existing in the social...

Two years after the Soviet invasion of Hungary, Janos Kadar, the leader installed by the Soviets was already proclaiming that 'anyone who is not against us is for us.' Two years after the invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968, only the highest levels of party and government had been effectively...

Many attempts have been made to create Newspeaks. But in light of what is now known about such attempts, it is clear that not even the most successful of them have come anywhere near to realization of Orwell's projection. Rather than these Newspeaks becoming increasingly fine-tuned,...

Social scientists who take the ideal of a science of society seriously believe that they have adopted only a method, and certainly not a metaphysics. Yet although these prescriptions appear purely methodological, they tacitly assume a picture of the kind of reality to be described....

Addresses the problem of whether an objective, realistic social science is possible or whether any social science is bound to remain merely a form of ideology-that is of systematically false, distorted belief. Formulates some ways of thinking about an autonomous social reality that can serve as...

Non-cognitivism, the belief that normative statements, unlike empirical statements do NOT convey objective knowledge is deeply embedded in mainstream social science methodology and strongly influences the views of social scientists on the status of values in social science. This article...