The earliest systems of sociological theory formulated in
Europe and the United States did not contemplate a science that
would be anything else than a theory of social evolution, or
progress, or a philosophy of history. Comte, Spencer, Ward,
Carver, and, with qualifications, Small and Giddings, conceived
sociology primarily as the science, or theory, of social evolution.
And if it is true that in the work of Gumplowicz and Ratzenhofer,
sociology began to be treated as the theory of social process,
rather than as the theory of social evolution, at least their concep-
tion of sociology clearly implied the continuous, irreversible
transformation of human society. That human society and the
environment in which its life goes on change continuously is a
fact, whether or not it is legitimate to refer to that change as
"evolution" or as progress; and the fact of social change has been
particularly conspicuous during the century that has elapsed
since sociology was first announced as a separate science by
Comte. It is not surprising, therefore, that the pioneers who
attempted to formulate the outlines of a science of society con-
ceived that their science must somehow take into account, and
if possible explain, the fact of continuous social change. This
tendency of sociological theory was accentuated by the fact that
Darwin and Wallace formulated their specific theory of organic
evolution shortly after the science of sociology had begun to
take shape.

In the beginnings of the American sociological movement,
then, from the publication of Ward Dynamic Socioloqy in 1883
until a quarter of a century later, the subject may be said to
have been conceived by most authorities as the theory of social
progress, or social evolution. The only conspicuous exceptions
to this trend were the theories of Sumner and Ross. So long as
this view prevailed, the theory of social evolution naturally did
not play the role of a specialized division of the larger subject.

-304-