Causality,Morality,and Radicalism: A Sociological Examination of the Work of George Brown and his Colleagues

Abstract

The article commences with a discussion of the strengths and weaknesses of the `sociology of sociology' enterprise. It is argued that a careful use of the approach can be illuminating in so far as it relates perceived internal contradiction in a given work to the wider intellectual milieux. The first section deals with the way in which some writers have depicted the strains between individuals and their worlds. I then go on to examine the way in which George Brown and his co-workers have chosen to explain the relationship between the `social structure' and the aetiology of depression in women. There then follow two sections dealing with the ambivalent relationship between two strands in Brown's work - the impulse of `romanticism' and the constraint of `classicism'. This ambivalence it is argued, derives from his assumptions regarding the nature of man and scientific method. The paper concludes with an examination of the way in which an adherence to a `scientific' methodology negates the `romantic', political implications he claims for his work. I do not offer any alternative research strategies, but simply point out that a more self-consciously `political' theory is required with a lesser dependence on clinical classification, if we are to understand the social nature of mental illnesses such as depression in the hope of finding socio-political remedies.