The Missing Memory of Canadian Sociology: Reflexive Government and “the Social Science”

Abstract

The modest literature on the history of Canadian Sociology takes the appearance of a named academic discipline as its object. Canadian Sociology is held to have had some precursors in the 1880s, but really to appear only in the 1920s. It is described as a foreign import and as an activity first of intellectual speculation and moral reform. Observational and analytic practice are absent before 1880. The activities of state agents and government departments in the social field are not discussed. This article offers a richer account through an examination of the larger field from which Sociology was extracted, "the social science," which was practiced actively in colonial Canada from the early nineteenth century. The social science shaped and was itself shaped by colonial conditions. The article outlines three interrelated moments in social science to carry its claims: inventory-making, the emergence of "population-thinking," and "reflexive government." Attending to the social science underlines the complex and convoluted relations of sociology with state power. Les rares oeuvrages académiques portant sur l'histoire de la sociologie canadienne prend pour objet l'apparition du terme <sociologie> dans le contexte universitaire. Dans cet optique, ils signalent certains précurseurs de la sociologie canadienne dès les années 1880, mais en fait ils affirment que cette discipline n'apparaît que dans les années 1920. Cette discipline est présentée comme une importation académique et, d'abord et avant tout, comme de la spéculation intellectuelle et comme un projet de réforme morale. D'après cette vision, les pratiques d'observation et d'analyse sociales ne semblent pas exister avant 1880, et les acteurs politiques et administratifs sont absents du terrain. Notre article propose un examen plus riche du vaste champ duquel la sociologie académique fut arrachée: <la science sociale> activement pratiquée au Canada à l'époque coloniale dès le début du XIXe siècle. La science sociale forma et fut formée par les conditions sociales et politiques existant dans la colonie. Notre article expose trois moments pertinents et inter-reliés de la science sociale: la fabrication d'inventaires sociaux; l'émergence du <penser population>, et l'exercice du <gouvernement réflexif>. La réintégration de l'histoire de la sociologie canadienne dans la science sociale accentue la relation complexe et incontournable entre sociologie et pouvoir étatique.

The Institution of Sociological Theory in Canada

“…Although Canadian sociology begins as early as the 1920s (Brym and Fox :17), it was not fully formed until the 1960s (Curtis ; McLaughlin :6; Stokes and McLevey ). Canadian sociology is often discussed as “foreign import, a product of the European Enlightenment, French Revolution, […] and industrial capitalist dislocation” (Curtis :205).…”

“…Although Canadian sociology begins as early as the 1920s (Brym and Fox :17), it was not fully formed until the 1960s (Curtis ; McLaughlin :6; Stokes and McLevey ). Canadian sociology is often discussed as “foreign import, a product of the European Enlightenment, French Revolution, […] and industrial capitalist dislocation” (Curtis :205). Sociology in Anglo‐Canada was spearheaded primarily by Porter, Dawson, Hughes, Clark, and Innis, and in Franco‐Canada by Gérvin and Lévesque (McLaughlin :6; Stokes and McLevey ).…”

“…In Québec, sociologists have negotiated their position within international disciplinary currents and intra‐Canadian cultural politics for nearly 80 years. First founded in Université Laval in Québec City in the 1940s, American and French sociology were the formative influences, even as Québec sociologists were actively engaged in local political and cultural issues (Curtis :205). In the 1950s to the early 1960s, the Chicago school and Parsonian structural functionalism influenced the entirety of sociology, Québec included (Brym and Saint‐Pierre ).…”