Sociology as Scientific Knowledge

Abstract

Sociology is a science with specificities and which can potentially offer a more rigorous knowledge about reality. The goal of this position paper is, by means of a thorough literature review, to contribute to demonstrating the urgency of using a sociological stance in a more complete understanding of the social, as well as of Sociology itself as a science. It is concluded that Sociology, a multi-paradigmatic science, seeks to articulate macro-social dynamics with local processes, allowing to connect the subjective significances with the practices, and which focus on the articulations between systems and actors, between structures and practices, between the reality of the social conditions of existence, and the social construction of reality. As an implication, Sociology as a scientific representation and practice of the social, can be cumbersome by helping to dismantle commonly shared preconceived ideas about the instituted social order.

The Informal in the Formal of Organizations: The Organizational Structure in Sociological Analysis

“…(13) (pp.117). The answers to these and other questions are part of the complexity inherent in the organization (16,22) and are paramount in the scientific analysis of the organizational phenomenon.…”

“…Bureaucracy, the organizational approach originally put forth by Max Weber, as an attempt to rationalize the structure through a high formalism of procedures, materialized in the definition, interpretation and application of written laws, is a good example of the impossibility, ultimately, to totally predict the functioning of any organization (2,(14)(15)(16)(17)(18). One of the main criticisms made to the bureaucratic model has to do with the central and exacerbated importance of rules and regulationsinternal to the organizationthat was ascribed to the rigidity of internal rules and regulations but that could tend to embody, contrary to the predicted, several "dysfunctions" of bureaucracy (19)(20).…”

Sociology: Tension between Science and Militant Activism?

“…Despite various definitions, Sociology can be considered as a science (Michalski, 2020) that -in its theoretical specificities as multi-paradigmatic, object of study and methodological -seeks to grasp social reality in a rigorous manner through empirical information and by applying Durkheim's already classic general principle of explaining the social through the social (Ferguson, 2016;Ferreira & Serpa, 2017;Serpa & Ferreira, 2018, 2019a, 2019bSerpa et al, 2020). In line with Serpa and Ferreira (2019b), Sociology as a science and as a profession (in the diversity of roles and inherent professional cultures) studies the (dis)order of the social world, and deals with interactions, which result from the interaction and have implications in this interaction among human beings, such as objects, practices, representations and values, inserting them in their social context (online).…”

“…This situation may call into question the legitimacy and institutionalisation of Sociology in its scientific and professional dimensions (Ferreira & Serpa, 2017;Serpa & Ferreira, 2019a;2019c;Turner, 2019). Turner (2019), focusing on American Sociology, makes some proposals that seek to boost Sociology's capacity for social intervention (Table 4).…”

“…There has always been tension since Sociology was established over the basic function of this scientific field (Aron, 1994;Cruz, 1995;Javeau, 1998;Mills, 1959;Weber, 1982;Paiva, 2014;Turner, 2019;Serpa & Ferreira, 2019a;Serpa, Ferreira, & Diogo, 2020;Daniels, 2018), exemplarily marked by Turner (2019) as follows: "Should it be an activist discipline devoted to the direct engagement of social problems or a scientific discipline committed to producing verified knowledge?" (p. 457).…”