Book Review: Civic Engagement in Scandinavia: Volunteering, Informal Help and Giving in Denmark, Norway and Sweden

Abstract

unemployment, and health inequalities. The book also includes chapters on Max Weber, Robert Merton, James Coleman and Raymond Boudon, who are usually thought of as more theoretically oriented sociologists. Moreover, Goldthorpe includes chapters on William Ogburn, Samuel Stouffer and Paul Lazarsfeld, American sociologists who contributed to defining sociology as a science. And, of course, a chapter on Otis D. Duncan, who defined sociology as a population science. Where are the women? Goldthorpe acknowledges their existence, which is good, since they often go unnoticed, yet they are few, and they often show up as assistants and/or wives. He mentions Emily Perrin, who worked with Pearson, Margareth Hogg, who worked with Bowley, Marianne Weber, Alice Kitt, who worked with Merton, and Beverley Duncan, who worked with her husband. Defining sociology as a science implies a narrower definition than usual. Goldthorpe (2016) discusses this, and I find his argument strengthened by this book on the roots of sociological science. He explicitly recognizes that his selection of pioneers is based on his present-day view of sociology as a population science. As several of these pioneers are left out of textbooks on sociology or social theory, one might suggest that the power of defining a discipline’s history deserves more attention. I am very sympathetic to Goldthorpe’s intentions, and I include parts of his 2016 book in a theory course at the University of Oslo. I will also recommend this book to everyone interested in sociology. Particularly, this book will give students interested in quantitative sociology intellectual grounding and self-confidence as sociologists. However, I have two reservations. First, defining sociology as a population science leaves little room for qualitative sociological research. Explaining population regularities is complicated, and when developing middle range theories of social processes, sociologists should be open to insights from qualitative research, which can provide more in-depth knowledge, albeit with limited range. Second, Goldthorpe is concerned with sociology, yet many of the pioneers included in this book were trailblazers for all social sciences, including political science, economics, and even social psychology. Establishing an explanandum requires the same tools in our sister disciplines, albeit with slightly different substantive content. I therefore sympathize with attempts, such as by James Coleman and Gary Becker, to find common threads between our disciplines, and I believe more could be found, when defined as social sciences. These reservations are, however, related more to the definition of sociological science than to this book on the pioneers of sociological science. In the last chapter, Goldthorpe discusses some differences between analytical sociology and sociology defined as a population science related to the theory of action, and what he sees as excessive use of simulation models in analytical sociology. He is also critical of the present fascination with ‘big data,’ such as social media data, since we do not know if these data are representative , and if so, for which population. Yet, he argues, when concerned with the future development of sociological science, these differences should not be overstated. We can learn much from the pioneers of sociological science, and they often disagreed with each other. Yet, Goldthorpe argues, they also had ‘the capacity to innovate and consolidate at the same time, so that in this way it may be possible to avoid drawing unnecessary dividing lines, whether of an intellectual or an institutional kind, within what should be a common endeavour”’ (210). There speaks a master of sociology.