Interpretive Sociology
Table of Contents
Interpretive sociology focuses on the meanings people attach to their social world. It shows that reality is constructed by people themselves in their daily lives.
Since sociology was founded as a discipline in the 19th century by the French philosopher Auguste Comte, the study of society has developed in several different ways.
The early rise of sociology was deeply rooted in positivist philosophy favoured by Comte, which relied on scientific methods and techniques to study society.
Interpretive sociology developed as an alternative to positivism.
Interpretive Sociology can be defined as the study of society that focuses on discovering the meanings that people attach to their social world.
In sociology, the study of interpretive sociology, occupies central importance.
This can also be loosely defined as ‘understanding’, rooted in the concept Verstehen (German term which means ‘empathic understanding of human behaviour’).
It is an approach that centres the importance of meaning and action when studying social behaviour and interactions.
This approach diverges from positivistic sociology by recognizing that the subjective experiences, beliefs, and behaviour of people are intrinsic aspects of what we observe or in other words there is no such thing as a purely objective phenomenon.
In simple words, this approach tells us that in order to study and understand society and social phenomena, we must ‘enter or step into the shoes of the other’ and nothing can be understood from the outside.
Interpretive sociology employs rational understanding of motivations. Max Weber (1978) suggested that we understand ‘the chopping of wood’ or ‘aiming of a gun’ in terms of motive.
We know that the woodchopper is working for a wage; for his own use or possibly is doing it for recreation. But he might also be working through a fit of rage (an irrational case).
Similarly, we understand the motive of a person aiming a gun if we know that he has been commanded to shoot as a member of a firing squad, that he is fighting against an enemy, or that he is doing it for revenge.
Differences between Positivist and Interpretive Sociology
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Positivists
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Interpretive
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The concept of positivism was developed by the French sociologists Auguste Comte and Emile Durkheim, modelled along natural or rational sciences- physics or chemistry. |
Interpretive sociology was initiated by German sociologist Max Weber and developed by Georg Simmel and others. |
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Positivist sociology aims to understand social institutions by relying on observation and knowledge or facts. |
Interpretive sociology aims to understand the meaning behind actions through the subject’s position within a system of meanings |
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Positivist sociology sees an objective reality ‘out there’.
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Interpretive sociology sees reality as being constructed by people according to their own understanding of the phenomenon. |
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Positivist sociology makes use of quantitative methods and data. |
Interpretive sociology relies on qualitative methods and data. |
Origins of Interpretive Sociology
- The origins of this approach lie in the contributions of the early twentieth century German Sociologist, Max Weber (1864-1920).
- Weber’s rich legacy of sociological writings includes works on sociology of religion as well as on society, economics, politics and government.
- Some of the notable ones are: The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (1904), The Religion of India: The Sociology of Hinduism and Buddhism (1958) and Economy and Society (1978).
- He wrote extensively on many subjects but focused on developing an interpretive sociology of social action and of power and domination.
- Another major concern of Weber was the process of rationalisation in modern society and the relationship of the various religions of the world with this process.
- His approach to sociology can be seen as an attempt to compromise with positivism and its aims to create a scientific sociology.
- Weber defined sociology as a “science which attempts the interpretive understanding of social action in order thereby to arrive at a causal explanation of its course and effects”.
- Here social action needs to be understood as reciprocally oriented action which is intentional, meaningful and symbolic.
- In contemporary sociology, we can say that the term refers to as interaction.
- Weber introduced a key methodological concept called verstehen which means comprehending or understanding on the level of meaning.
- Weber believed that this aspect lent an advantage to the social sciences over the natural sciences.
- While, in the natural sciences we can only observe and generalize; in social sciences, we can understand the actions and comprehend the subjective intentions of the actors also.
- As a result, it makes for a scientific study of social behaviour in two ways: on one hand, it allows us to directly observe and understand the meaning of actions. On the other hand, it facilitates an understanding of the underlying motive.
- When a chemist studies the properties of a particular substance, he does so from the outside.
- When a sociologist tries to understand human society and culture, he approaches it as an insider, or a participant.
- Being human, the social scientist has access to the motives and feelings of his or her subject matter.
- Social scientists can understand human action by probing the subjective meanings that actors attach to their own behaviour as well as that of others.
- Sociological understanding is thus qualitatively different from that of other (natural) sciences.
- Weber points out that a natural scientist understands natural phenomena from the outside.
- But by using the method of verstehen, the sociologist should be able to and should visualise the motivations of the actor by trying to interpret feelings through the understanding of the situation.
- We can understand that Weber’s contribution to this approach was supreme as he attempted to fuse the concept of social action with scientific sociological explanation.
- And this was only possible through the use of verstehen (interpretive understanding).
- This is the process by which the sociologist attempts to gain access to the meaning of action for the actor.
- For Weber, action is defined as subjectively meaningful human behaviour.
- He also emphasizes on the ‘motive’ present in the mind of the actor as the ‘cause’ of the act.
- Weber argued that the overall objective of the social sciences was to develop an ‘interpretive understanding of social action’.
- Since the central concern of the social sciences was with social action and since human actions necessarily involved subjective meanings, the methods of enquiry of social science also had to be different from the methods of natural science.
- For Weber, ‘social action’ included all human behaviour that was meaningful, that is, action to which actors attached a meaning.
- In studying social action, the sociologist’s task was to recover the meanings attributed by the actor.
- To accomplish this task the sociologist had to put themselves in the actor’s place, and imagine what these meanings were or could have been, known as an empathetic understanding.
- Raymond Aron (1967) discusses the same with the following example: one can understand why the driver stops in front of a red light; He or She does not need to observe how often drivers regularly stop before red lights in order to understand why they do it.
- This is because the subjective meaning of the actions of others is often immediately comprehensive in daily life.
- It was precisely for these reasons that Weber argued, the overall objective of the social sciences was to develop an ‘interpretive understanding of social action’.
- He wanted to develop and express that these sciences were thus very different from the natural sciences, which aimed to discover the objective ‘laws of nature’ governing the physical world.
- He also believed that the primary concern of social sciences was with social action, which involved subjective meanings.
- Thus, the methods of social sciences also had to differ from those of the natural sciences.
- Weber also wanted to establish an alternative approach (to positivism) as it would focus on understanding subjective experience and not be merely based on observation or adherence to facts.
- As a result, the perceived facts that are inherent to the positivist observational method can take on an entirely new meaning from the perspectives of different individuals.
- Weber persistently emphasized the role Interpretive Sociology of interpretation in the cultural and social sciences.
- He also underlined that, social scientists should never be content to just understand the ‘rules’ of a society but they must ‘interpret’ and ‘explain’ the actions and beliefs of social agents.
- Another key contributor to this approach has been Georg Simmel, who was a contemporary of Max Weber.
- He was a very popular early sociologist and has also been recognized as a major developer of interpretive sociology.
- Weber and Simmel both recognized that the positivistic approach was not able to capture all social phenomena, nor was it able to fully explain why all social phenomena occur.
Branches of Interpretive Sociology
Interpretive approach has given rise to diverse theoretical traditions of sociology under the general category of social constructionist approach.
The notion of the social construction of reality lies at the heart of symbolic interactionist perspective Anthony Giddens describes the study of everyday life as telling us how humans can act creatively to shape reality and that social behaviour is guided to some extent by forces such as roles, norms and shared expectations.
He further tells us that individuals perceive reality differently according to their backgrounds, interests and motivations.
In other words, reality is not fixed or static – it is created through human interactions.
Wallace and Wolf suggest that the forerunners and direct contributors to the symbolic interactionist perspective include Georg Simmel and Robert Park.
However, Max Weber’s contribution and emphasis on the importance of Verstehen (interpretive understanding or subjective meaning) for understanding social life was most important. It also demonstrated Weber’s ability to bridge ‘macro’ and ‘micro’ perspectives.
Some of the prominent ones are symbolic interactionism, dramaturgy, phenomenology and ethnomethodology.
Previous Year Questions
- In what way ‘interpretative’ method is different from ‘positivist’ approach in the study of social phenomena? (2014)
- Elaborate the main tenets of interpretative perspective in sociology. (2017)
- Discuss the importance of interpretative understanding of social phenomena and explain its limitations. (2019)
Important Keywords
Positivism, Non-positivists, Interpretive sociology, Auguste Comte, Verstehen, Max Weber, Social Institutions, Quantitative and Qualitative Methods, Process of Rationalisation, Social Action, Social Behaviour, Motives and Feelings, Empathetic Understanding, Raymond Aron, Georg Simmel, Anthony Giddens, Wallace and Wolf, Dramaturgy, Phenomenology and Ethnomethodology.
