A considerable amount of research has been devoted to the situation of the natural and technological sciences in the Soviet Union, but the social sciences, hardly a less important subject, have received less attention from students in the West. The present paper, based exclusively on Western sources, cannot pretend to fill this gap. It can offer only a preliminary exposition of the problem, as far as this is within the field of vision of one who is not a Russian scholar, and it can perhaps identify some areas in particular need of research.
The discipline of political science is characterized by compartmentalization into special fields of empirical research. These fields are most commonly treated as a species of contemporary institutional history, and scarcely more attempt is made to identify, test, and correlate key hypotheses and their logical consequences than is made by the historian.
Having passed the midway point of this, the most revolutionary century in history so far--indeed, having plunged precipitately toward the ever nearing future--Americans are greatly conscious of a need to understand what has passed so quickly. They must know in order to have some sense of the world that is and that so soon will be. One of the major traditional disciplines which influences widely varied students of American culture is history, and no aspect of history is more pertinent to students of American culture than intellectual history. And yet, while many practice intellectual history throughout the various disciplines, few have been concerned with attempts to refine the concepts and tools of this study.
Sixty years ago the intellectual world had grown tired of Mill and Spencer, Tennyson and George Eliot... The younger generation today finds it hard to understand the enthusiasm with which the younger generation of half a century ago hailed "Man and Superman," "The Theory of the Leisure Class," "Sister Carrie." Nor can the oldest generation today warm up to its original enthusiasm.
Shortly after the end of World War II, Switzerland began to experience an unexpectedly strong resurgence of foreign immigration, which has been gaining momentum ever since. In any small country a sizable influx of aliens is likely to have important effects on the growth and composition of the population. In Switzerland, where the total population of 5 million is culturally heterogeneous, this becomes especially evident. It is the purpose of this paper to analyze the significance of the postwar flow of Swiss immigration, and to trace its effects on the demographic and social structure of the country’s population.
Conformity is a word that does not necessarily have negative connotations. We all much conform to some given forms of life and thought. Education--even if it has a better ideal than adjustment--aims at giving us a form. And in doing so, it makes us conform to the sources and bearers of such form. There are cultures, highly advanced as well as primitive ones, that in this way produce conformity for long periods of history.
Hans Neisser's article, "Scarce Money," in the Spring 1957 issue of Social Research, impresses me as an excellent analysis of a current political-economic issue. But I feel impelled to question his observations on the rate of interest.
Dr. Schatz points to another tool of 'rationing' funds: the change of the reserve requirements for member banks. By raising the requirements, the desired credit limitation could, he thinks, have been achieved without an increase in the interest rates: 'if the banks had been more dependent on Federal Reserve loans, moral suasion could have had some effect in promoting credit rationing.
Letter in regards to the essay "National Bolshevism in Weimer Germany--Alliance of Political Extremes Against Democracy," by Abraham Ascher and Guenter Lewy, published in the Winter 1956 issue of Social Research.
Review of book by Stanley Hoffmann] [with the collaboration of Michel des Accords, Serge Hurtig, Jean du Tostu, Jean-Michel Royer, and with preface by Jean Meynaud. Paris: Armand Colin. 1956. 418 pp.
Review of book by Frank H. Knight. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. 1956. vii & 309 pp.
Review of book by Manuel R. Garcia-Mora. Washington, DC: Public Affairs Press. 1956. 171 pp.