British Idealism and Social Explanation: A Study in Late Victorian ThoughtIdealism became the dominant philosphical school of thought in late nineteenth-century Britain. In this original and stimulating study, Sandra den Otter examines its roots in Greek and German thinking and locates it among the prevalent methodologies and theories of the period: empiricism and positivism, naturalism, evolution, and utilitarianism. In particular, she sets it in the context of the late nineteenth- and early twentieth-century debate about a science of society and the contemporary preoccupation with `community'. The new discipline of sociology was closely tied to the study of and search for community, and Dr den Otter shows how the idealists offered a philosophy of community to a generation particularly concerned by this notion. Dr den Otter investigates the idealist construction - by thinkers such as Bosanquet, MacKenzie, and Ritchie - of an interpretive social philosophy which none the less adopted various strands of empiricist, positivist, and even naturalist thought in its attempt to frame a social theory suited to the dilemmas of an industrialized and urbanized Britain. This study of a multifarious movement of ideas and their interaction with pioneering social groups interweaves philosophical and sociological concerns to make an important contribution to intellectual history. |
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argued arguments Aristotle Benjamin Kidd biological Branford Britain British idealism Cambridge causal century Charity Organisation Christian classical Collini Comte contemporary critical D. G. Ritchie Darwin and Hegel Darwinism and Politics debate defined doctrine Economic Edinburgh empiricism English Essays F. H. Bradley Fabian G. H. Lewes German philosophy Haldane Hegel Hegelian Herbert Spencer History human Ibid idealist social philosophy ideas individual interpretation intuitionist J. A. Hobson J. H. Muirhead J. S. Mill Journal Jowett Kant Kant's Kantian L. T. Hobhouse late nineteenth-century late Victorian laws Lectures liberal Logic metaphysics Mind Natural Rights natural selection nineteenth notion organism Oxford philo Philosophical Review Philosophical Theory Philosophy London Plato positivism positivist Principles psychology Ritchie's scientific Sidgwick social evolution social explanation social investigation social philosophy social reform social science social theory Sociological Society sociologists sociology T. H. Green T. H. Huxley theorists thought tion unity University utilitarian Wallace Webb