Durkheim any idea that he did not express or any error that he did
not commit; but instead of emphasizing the in some respects inspired
scientific invention that is demonstrated in each of his three major
books, I insist, perhaps more than I should, on the sociological and
philosophical dogmatism that motivated him. I must force myself
to recognize the merits, however splendid, of Durkheim, whereas Max
Weber never irritates me even when I feel most remote from him.
As for Pareto, he no longer provokes me to any strong reaction one
way or the other.

This second volume leads only as far as the threshold of the modern
period, the one that began on the eve of World War II and has been
developing for twenty years. It would only be in a later volume—if
circumstances permit me to write one—that I might attempt an answer
to my original questions: Does the quantitative, empirical, analytical
sociology of today implicitly contain an interpretation of modern so-
ciety? Does it suggest a view of historical development? At what
point does science end and journalism begin? Is it inevitable that the
books that have the loudest repercussions, for example W. W.
Rostow's The Stages of Economic Growth, be judged severely by
professional economists or sociologists? Is the time of the "great doc-
trines of historical sociology" definitively past?

Paris
May 1967

R.A.

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