1. Briefly answer the questions.

1) What elements are included in the social structure?

Social society, social institutions, social groups, social organizations

2) What distinguishes a stratum from other social entities?

A stratum implies not only a commonality of features, but has a hierarchical structure.

3) What types of social groups do scientists distinguish?

Large, medium, small.

4) What is social inequality?

Some more than others receive something illegally.

5) What areas of social mobility exist?

Vertical horizontal

6) How are social status and social role related?

Status is the real situation in society, and the social role is expected.

7) What types social statuses exist?

Prescribed and Achieved

8) What is the difference between an ethnos and other social communities?

Ethnicity, this group of people, united by common signs, objective or subjective.

A social community, this uniting various populations of people who are characterized by some of the same features of life and consciousness.

9) What behavior is called deviant?

Inadequate.

2. Complete the tasks. In each task, circle the number of one correct answer.

1) On a professional basis distinguish social community

a) workers b) city dwellers c) doctors d) peasants

2) Are the following judgments about the social structure of society true?

AND. Social structure societies are different types of social communities and the relations between them.

B. Social structure reflects social inequality.

1) only A is true
2) only B is true
3) both judgments are true
4) both judgments are incorrect

3) One of the characteristics of an ethnic group

a) constitution
b) common historical path
c) single citizenship
d) common ideology

3. In this series of examples, all but one of them belong to small groups. Find and underline an example falling out of this series.

Group of friends; team of builders; a family ; Internet users school students class.

4. The list below shows social roles. Select and write serial numbers in the first column of the table social roles, common to both the adolescent and the adult, and in the second column are the serial numbers of the adult's social roles.

1) bus driver
2) Internet user
3) voter
4) visitor to a disco

5. Establish a correspondence between behaviors in a conflict situation and characteristics: for each position given in the first column, select the corresponding position from the second column.

Way of behavior:

A) adaptation
B) compromise
C) cooperation
D) ignoring
D) rivalry

Characteristic of the method of behavior:

1) the parties agree on mutual concessions
2) the parties together work out a common solution, discussing each step
3) one of the parties may give up their interests and change their position
4) the parties stubbornly uphold their positions, not wanting to sacrifice principles
5) the parties pretend that there is no conflict

Write down the selected numbers in the table under the corresponding letters

6. Read the text and complete the tasks.

In the US, the theory of the "smelter" was popular. It was assumed that in America, immigrants from all over the world will “melt” into a completely new nation. Indeed, the second and third generation of immigrants have many similarities, for example, english language, a sense of American patriotism. According to sociologists, there are common patterns of development among displaced communities. The first generation often lives in hopes of returning to their old homeland, prosperous and wealthy, which almost never succeeds. The second generation is trying to prove its “Americanity”: it is demonstratively not interested in the abandoned homeland and speaks only English. But representatives of the third generation, who already have nothing to prove, for whom English is their native language, begin to be curious about the culture of their non-American ancestors. They study in language circles, go on excursions to their historical homeland, and usually return with relief to America. However, at home, they try to maintain personal and business relationships with people of kindred origin. Therefore, American society is divided into many ethnic groups, although they communicate with each other only in English.

The desire to “melt” various ethnic elements is characteristic of any state. This applies to countries with originally multinational populations, and countries where it arrives a large number of immigrants. From the middle of the 20th century, a flood of immigrants from former Asian and African colonies poured into the countries of Western Europe, and in the last decades of the 20th century - from countries of Eastern Europe. The number of immigrants is growing like an avalanche. Many of them are not going to give up their usual way of life, their native language. Often they are hostile to a new country of habitat. This often causes conflicts with the local population.

(Based on materials from the Encyclopedia for Schoolchildren)

It was assumed that in America, immigrants from all over the world will “melt” into a completely new nation. Because it was the merging and unification of people and peoples of different nationalities that gave the output of a single American nation.

2) What stages of development, according to the authors, do the migrant communities go through (emphasize the relevant provisions of the text)?

It was assumed that in America, immigrants from all over the world will “melt” into a completely new nation. Indeed, the second and third generations of immigrants have many similarities, for example, English, a sense of American patriotism. According to sociologists, there are common patterns of development among displaced communities. The first generation often lives in hopes of returning to their old homeland, prosperous and wealthy, which almost never succeeds. The second generation is trying to prove its “Americanity”: it is demonstratively not interested in the abandoned homeland and speaks only English.

3) Why does any state, according to the authors of the text, strive to “re-melt” various ethnic elements (emphasize the relevant provisions of the text)? Is a complete “remelting” possible? Explain your answer.

1. When mixing cultures, it is easier to govern the state.
2. Less likely that these elements will request autonomy.
3. unity always interferes with impact.

2) What stages of development, according to the authors, do the migrant communities go through (emphasize the relevant provisions of the text)?

NATURAL SCIENTIFIC AND SOCIO-HUMANITARIAN KNOWLEDGE

At first glance, everything looks simple. The natural sciences study nature, the social sciences and humanities study society. And what sciences study man? It turns out that both. Its biological nature is studied by the natural sciences, and the social qualities of man - by the public. There are sciences that occupy an intermediate position between the natural sciences and the social. An example of such sciences is geography. You know that physical geography studies nature, and economic geography studies society. The same situation is with ecology.
The foregoing does not negate the fact that social sciences are markedly different from natural sciences.
If the natural sciences study nature, which existed and can exist independently of man, then social sciences cannot know society without studying the activities of the people living in it, their thoughts and aspirations. Natural sciences study the objective connections between natural phenomena, and for the public it is important to discover not only the objective interdependencies between various social processes, but also the motives of the people who participate in them.
Natural sciences provide, as a rule, generalized theoretical knowledge. They do not characterize a separate natural object, but the general properties of the totality of homogeneous objects. Social sciences do not only study the common features of homogeneous social events, but also the features of a separate, unique event, the features of a single socially significant action, the state of society in a given country in a certain period, the policy of a particular statesman, etc.
In the future, you will learn more about the features of social sciences. But for all their specifics, social sciences are an integral part of a large science in which they interact with other subject areas (natural, technical, mathematical). Like other areas of scientific research, social sciences have as their goal the comprehension of truth, the discovery of objective laws of the functioning of society, and trends in its development.

CLASSIFICATION
SOCIAL AND HUMAN SCIENCES

There are various classifications of these social sciences. According to one of them, social sciences, like others, are divided into fundamental and applied, depending on their connection with practice (or remoteness from it). The former find out the objective laws of the world around them, while the latter solve the problems of applying these laws to solve practical problems in the production and social fields. But the border between these groups of sciences is conditional and mobile.
The classification is generally accepted, the basis of which is the subject of research (those connections and dependencies that each science directly studies). From this point of view, the following groups of social sciences can be distinguished:
historical sciences(domestic history, general history, archeology, ethnography, historiography, etc.);
economics(economic theory, economics and national economy management, accounting, statistics, etc.);
philosophical sciences(history of philosophy, logic, ethics, aesthetics, etc.);
philological sciences(literary criticism, linguistics, journalism, etc.);
law sciences(theory and history of state and law, history of legal doctrines, constitutional law, etc.);
pedagogical sciences(general pedagogy, the history of pedagogy and education, the theory and methodology of training and education, etc.);
psychological sciences(general psychology, personality psychology, social and political psychology, etc.);
sociological sciences(theory, methodology and history of sociology, economic sociology and demography, etc.);
political science(theory of politics, history and methodology of political science, political conflictology, political technology, etc.);
cultural science(theory and history of culture, museology, etc.).
In profile class special attention paid to historical, sociological, political, psychological, economic, legal, legal sciences and philosophy. Features of history, economics and law are revealed in independent courses. The essence of philosophy, sociology, political science, social psychology is considered in this course.

SOCIOLOGY, POLITICAL SCIENCE, SOCIAL
PSYCHOLOGY AS A SOCIAL SCIENCE

In the broadest sense sociology -it is a science that studies society and social relations. But society is studying different sciences. Each of them (economic theory, culturology, the theory of state and law, political science), as a rule, studies only any one area of \u200b\u200bsociety, a certain specific side of its development.
The modern sociological encyclopedia defines sociologyas a science of general and specific social laws and laws of development and functioning of historically defined social systems, of the mechanisms of action and forms of manifestation of these laws in the activities of people, social groups, classes, peoples. The word "social" in this definition means the totality of social relations, that is, people's relations to each other and to society. Social is understood as the result of joint activities of people, which is manifested in their communication and interaction.
Sociology is the science of society as a holistic system, of the laws of its formation, functioning and development. She studies the social life of people, social facts, processes, relationships, the activities of individuals, social groups, their role, status and social behavior, institutional forms of their organization.
Widespread is the idea of \u200b\u200bthree levels of sociological knowledge. Theoretical levelpresent general sociological theories that reflect the general issues of the structure and functioning of society. On the level of applied sociological researchvarious methods are used: observation, survey, study of documents, experiment. With their help, sociology gives reliable knowledge about specific processes taking place in society. Mid-level theories(family sociology, labor sociology, sociology of conflict, etc.) are the link between general sociological theories and applied research, providing factual information about the phenomena of real reality.
Sociology as a whole is facing modern life. It helps to understand and predict the processes taking place in society.
Political Science (Political Science)is a generalization of political practices, the political life of society. She studies politics in its relationships with other areas. public life. The subject of political science is power, the state, political relations, political systems, political behavior, political culture. Political science studies the relationship of various social, ethnic, religious and other social groups to power, as well as the relationship between classes, parties and the state.
There are two interpretations of political science. In the narrow sensepolitical science is one of the sciences that study politics, namely, the general theory of politics, which studies the specific laws of the relations of social subjects regarding power and influence, a special type of interaction between the ruling and the subordinate, governing and governed. The theory of politics includes various concepts of power, the theory of the state and political parties, the theory international relations and etc.
In a broad sensepolitical science includes all political knowledge and is a complex of disciplines that study politics: the history of political thought, political philosophy, political sociology, political psychology, the theory of state and law, political geography, etc. In other words, in this interpretation, political science acts as a single, integral science, comprehensively exploring politics. It is based on applied research, which uses various methods, including those existing in sociology and other social sciences.
Political science allows you to analyze and predict the political situation.
Social Psychology,as you saw in the classification of branches of social science, it belongs to the group of psychological sciences. Psychology studies the laws, especially the development and functioning of the psyche. And its branch - social psychology - studies the patterns of behavior and activities of people, due to the fact of their inclusion in social groups, as well as the psychological characteristics of these groups themselves. In his studies, social psychology is closely related, on the one hand, to general psychologyand on the other with sociology. But it is she who studies such issues as the laws of formation, functioning and development of socio-psychological phenomena, processes and conditions, the subjects of which are individuals and social communities; socialization of an individual; personality activities in groups; interpersonal relationships in groups; the nature of the joint activity of people in groups, the forms of communication and interaction developing in them.
Social psychology helps to solve many practical problems: improving the psychological climate in production, scientific, educational teams; optimizing the relationship between managers and managed; perception of information and advertising; family relationships etc.

SPECIFICITY OF PHILOSOPHICAL KNOWLEDGE

“What do philosophers do when they work?” - the English scientist B. Russell wondered. The answer to a simple question allows us to determine both the features of the philosophizing process and the uniqueness of its result. Russell answers this way: the philosopher first of all reflects on mysterious or eternal problems: what is the meaning of life and is it at all? Does the world have a goal, does historical development lead somewhere? Are laws really controlling nature, or do we just like to see order in everything? Is the world divided into two fundamentally different parts - spirit and matter, and if so, how do they coexist?
And here is how the German philosopher I. Kant formulated the main philosophical problems: what can I know? What can I believe in? What dare I hope for? What is a person?
Human thought posed such questions a long time ago, they retain their significance today, therefore, with with good reason they can be attributed to the eternal problems of philosophy.In every historical era, philosophers formulate these questions in different ways and answer them.
They need to know what other thinkers thought of this at another time. Of particular importance is the appeal of philosophy to its history. The philosopher is in a continuous mental dialogue with his predecessors, critically comprehending their creative heritage from the standpoint of his time, offering new approaches and solutions.

The created new philosophical systems do not cancel previously put forward concepts and principles, but continue to coexist with them in a single cultural and cognitive space, therefore philosophy is always pluralistic, diverse in their schools and directions. Some even argue that there are as many truths in philosophy as there are philosophers.
The situation is different with science. In most cases, she solves the pressing problems of her time. Although the history of the development of scientific thought is also important and instructive, it does not have as much importance for a scientist who studies an urgent problem as the ideas of his predecessors for a philosopher. The provisions established and substantiated by science take on the nature of objective truth: mathematical formulas, laws of motion, mechanisms of heredity, etc. They are valid for any society, they do not depend on either man or humanity. What is the norm for philosophy is the coexistence and well-known opposition of various approaches, doctrines, for science it is a special case of the development of science, which belongs to an area that has not yet been sufficiently explored: there we see the struggle of schools and the competition of hypotheses.
There is also an important difference between philosophy and science - methods for developing problems. As B. Russell noted, philosophical questions cannot be answered through laboratory experience. Philosophy is a kind of speculative activity. Although in most cases philosophers build their reasoning on a rational basis, strive for the logical validity of conclusions, they also use special methods of argumentation that go beyond the framework of formal logic: they reveal the opposite sides of the whole, turn to paradoxes (when they arrive at an absurd result when reasoning is logical), aporia (insoluble problems). Such methods and techniques make it possible to catch the inconsistency and variability of the world.
Many concepts used by philosophy are extremely generalized, abstract in nature. This is due to the fact that they cover a very wide range of phenomena, so they have very few common features inherent in each of them. Such extremely broad philosophical concepts encompassing a huge class of phenomena include the categories of “being”, “consciousness”, “activity”, “society”, “cognition”, etc.
Thus, there are many differences between philosophy and science. On this basis, many researchers consider philosophy as a very special way of understanding the world.
However, one should not lose sight of the fact that philosophical knowledge is multi-layered: in addition to these issues, which can be attributed to value issues, existential(from the Latin. existentia - existence) and which can hardly be comprehended scientifically, philosophy also studies a number of other problems that are no longer focused on the present, but on the existing. Relatively independent areas of knowledge have long been formed within philosophy: the doctrine of being - ontology;doctrine of knowledge - epistemology;science of morality - ethics;a science that studies the beautiful in reality, the laws of the development of art, - aesthetics.
Please note: in brief description of these areas of knowledge we used the concept of "science". This is no coincidence. Analysis of issues related to these sections of philosophy, most often goes in logic scientific knowledge and can be judged from the standpoint of true or false knowledge.
Philosophical knowledge includes such important areas for understanding society and man as philosophical anthropology -the doctrine of the essence and nature of man, of a specifically human way of being, and also social philosophy.

HOW PHILOSOPHY HELPS COMPLETE SOCIETY

The subject of social philosophy is the joint activity of people in society. Important for the study of society is a science such as sociology. History makes its generalizations and conclusions about the social structure and forms of human social behavior. What is new in philosophy’s understanding of the world of people?
Consider this as an example of socialization - the assimilation by a person of values \u200b\u200band cultural patterns developed by society. The sociologist will focus on those factors (public institutions, social groups) that influence the process of socialization in modern society. A sociologist will consider the role of the family, education, the influence of peer groups, means mass media in gaining personality values \u200b\u200band norms. The historian is interested in the real processes of socialization in a particular society of a certain historical era. He will look for answers to such questions, for example: what values \u200b\u200bwere instilled in a child in an 18th-century Western European peasant family? What and how did children learn in the Russian pre-revolutionary gymnasium? Etc.
But what about a social philosopher? The focus of his attention will be on more general problems: what is the purpose of society and what gives the personality the process of socialization? What are its components, with all the diversity of forms and species, that are sustainable, that is, are reproduced in any society? How does a certain imposition of personality on social institutions and priorities relate to respect for her inner freedom? What is the value of freedom as such?
We see that social philosophy addresses the analysis of the most general, stable characteristics; it puts the phenomenon in a wider social context (personal freedom and its borders); gravitates to value approaches.

Social philosophy makes its full contribution to the development of a wide range of problems: society as a whole (correlation of society and nature); laws of social development (what they are, how they manifest themselves in public life, how they differ from the laws of nature); the structure of society as a system (what are the reasons for highlighting the main components and subsystems of society, what types of relationships and interactions ensure the integrity of society); the meaning, orientation and resources of social development (how do stability and variability in social development relate, what are its main sources, what is the orientation of socio-historical development, in what is expressed social progress and what are its boundaries); the ratio of the spiritual and material aspects of society (which serves as the basis for highlighting these parties, how they interact, whether one of them can be considered decisive); a person as a subject of social action (differences in human activity from animal behavior, consciousness as a regulator of activity); features of social cognition.
We will consider many of these problems in the future.
Key concepts:social sciences, social and humanitarian knowledge, sociology as a science, political science as a science, social psychology as a science, philosophy.
Terms:subject of science, philosophical pluralism, speculative activity.

1) What are the most significant differences between social sciences and natural sciences? 2) Give examples of various classifications of scientific knowledge. What is their basis? 3) What are the main groups of social and human sciences distinguished in the subject of research. 4) What is the subject of sociology? Describe the levels of sociological knowledge. 5) What does political science study? 6) What is the connection between social psychology and related fields of scientific knowledge?
7) What distinguishes and what brings philosophy and science together?
8) What problems and why relate to the eternal questions of philosophy? 9) What is the pluralism of philosophical thought expressed in? 10) What are the main sections of philosophical knowledge? 11) Show the role of social philosophy in comprehending society.

1. Analyze the statements of two German philosophers.
“If sciences in their fields have gained convincingly reliable and universally recognized knowledge, then philosophy has not achieved this, despite its efforts for millennia. One cannot but admit: in philosophy there is no unanimity regarding what is finally known ... The fact that any image of philosophy does not enjoy unanimous recognition follows from the nature of its affairs ”(K. Jaspers).
“The history of philosophy shows ... that seemingly different philosophical teachings represent only one philosophy at various stages of its development” (G. Hegel).
Which of them seems more convincing to you? Why? How do you understand the words of Jaspers that the lack of unanimity in philosophy "follows from the nature of its affairs"?
2. One well-known position of Plato is conveyed as follows: “The misfortunes of mankind will cease no earlier than the rulers will philosophize or philosophers rule ...” Can this claim be attributed to the philosophy of being or what should be? Explain your answer. Remember the history of the origin and development of scientific knowledge and think about what Plato could mean by the word "philosophy."

Read an excerpt from the book of V. E. Kemerov.

Unlike the natural sciences, social sciences are inevitably involved in the “subject-subject relationship” with what they study. Theories and discoveries made within the framework of the natural sciences are isolated from the universe of objects and events that they describe. This ensures that the relationship between scientific knowledge and the objective material world remains “technological”, that is, those in which the accumulated information is applied to independently formed sets of phenomena. In social sciences, the situation is fundamentally different. Here is how Charles Taylor writes about it: “Although natural science theory also transforms practice, the latter is not identical with the content of the theory ... As a rule, in these cases we are talking about the“ application ”of the theory.” In the social sciences, “practice is the goal of theory. Here, theory transforms its own object. ” From the foregoing, we can draw very significant conclusions regarding our assessment of the achievements of the social sciences, as well as their practical impact on the social world.
If we took the side of those who believe that the social sciences should become similar to the natural sciences, the former would undoubtedly be considered insolvent. There is no social science - and for the reasons previously mentioned by us - there will never be
zo *

laws found in more complex fields of natural sciences. At first glance, it seems that the loss of the desire to create a “natural science of society” marks the end of the notion that social sciences will ever be able to influence “their kingdom” - the social world - to the same extent that natural sciences act on their own. By generations, those who supported naturalistic sociology did this on the basis that social sciences should intellectually and practically “approach” the level of the natural. In other words, it is believed that in terms of their intellectual achievements, and therefore practical results, the natural sciences are clearly ahead of the social sciences. Thus, the social sciences are faced with the problem of restoring lost grounds in order to be able to apply their own discoveries in the name of gaining similar control over events occurring in social
mr. World. The program proposed by O. Comte proceeded from this position; subsequently she repeatedly
arose in one form or another.
The following is a typical wording of it, suggesting
the wife of the author, who was otherwise far from being considered a supporter of Comte's ideas:
As social scientists, we, like all properly educated people in our world, are excitedly aware that, by and large, progress in the field we are studying is much slower than in the natural sciences. The discoveries and inventions of the latter contributed to radical changes in society, while ours — at least until now — had much less significant consequences. The dangerous, irreparable "gap", obvious from this comparison, is causing increasing concern. While man’s power over nature is progressing rapidly, but in reality very quickly, the possibilities of his control over society, that is, first of all, over his own attitudes, positions and social institutions, are significantly behind. At least in part, this is due to the slower pace of development of our ideas about a person and a society in which

it exists - knowledge that in the name of social reform will need to be put into action.
At first glance, incomparably greater than in the case of the social sciences, the transformative influence of the natural sciences does not raise any doubts. The natural sciences have their own paradigms, universally recognized discoveries, and knowledge, which are distinguished by a high degree of universality, expressed with mathematical precision. Here the names of the “founders” are forgotten or recalled, if it comes to the founders of ideas that have exclusively historical interest. The merger of science and technology gave rise to astonishing in its scale forms of amazing material transformations. On the other hand, the social sciences are constantly suffering due to numerous disagreements, are not able to ignore their "founders", whose works are considered to be relevant to this day. Sometimes modern authorities turn to the social sciences as a source of information necessary for making strategic decisions; however, all this seems petty and insignificant in comparison with the comprehensive influence of the natural sciences. It seems to us that the higher social prestige of the natural sciences is consistent with their successes and their practical influence.
The question arises: is it fair — as is traditionally done — to consider social sciences “poor relatives”? At the very least, it can be said that it is becoming increasingly difficult to confirm this if we take into account the importance of double hermeneutics. At the risk of repeating ourselves, we note that social sciences are not isolated from the "sphere of their own activity" in the sense in which the natural sciences are isolated from "their own." This fact, of course, jeopardizes the acquisition of a set of abstract knowledge of the type that those who are considering natural sciences as a standard aspire to. At the same time, this means that social sciences penetrate the very essence of the structure of the “own world”, which is completely impossible for the natural sciences.

Let us turn to the following statement:
The sovereign, who received power from the hands of the people, on the contrary, should try to keep his disposition; to achieve this sovereign is not very difficult, since the people strive only to not be oppressed. In the same way, having achieved power with the help of the aristocracy, as if against the will of the people, the ruler should first of all try to put the people in his favor; it is not difficult - for this you only need to take it under your protection. Then the people become even more loyal and submissive than even when they themselves handed over power to the sovereign, because people usually much more value the blessings they receive from those from whom they expect only evil and consider themselves more obliged to them [†††† †††††].
The doctrine proposed by Machiavelli cannot be regarded solely as observations concerning power and the phenomenon of popular support in politics. It was intended and perceived as a contribution to real-life management mechanisms. It can be stated without exaggeration that since the work of Machiavelli became widely known, the practice of leadership has never been exactly the same. It is not easy to trace the influence of the works of this author. To some extent, the derogatory sound of the term “Machiavellianism” is determined by reasons that are practically not related to the actual content of what Machiavelli wrote about, for example, the well-known behavior of the rulers, who in their own way interpret what was said in “Sovereign”. The principles that can be used by the sovereigns can be applied by both their subjects and the opposition. The practical conclusions and significance of scientific works, akin to those written by Machiavelli, are usually complex and diverse. They are very far from the situation when the discoveries of the social sciences are critically examined and evaluated in one environment (“internal criticism” of professional specialists) and “used” in another (in the world of practical
sTI). At the same time, their fate is much more typical of social and scientific knowledge than the picture described in the last passage.
The question of whether we have the right to consider Machiavelli “a specialist in the field of social sciences” is controversial on the grounds that his works were written in an era when reflections on the essence social institutions were not systematic. We turn, however, to the later period of the late XVIII - early XIX century. We can say that this was the time that laid the foundation for extensive empirical research social issues. Some considered this period as the first stage or stage of development at which the social sciences acquired an evidence base that bears some resemblance to the evidence base of the natural sciences. It is striking, however, that the methods of the research and the obtained "information" immediately became an important part of the society for the analysis of which they were used. A sign and at the same time a tangible result of this process is the flourishing of official statistics, the accumulation of which was made possible through the use of systematic methods of social research. The development of such methods is inseparable from the new forms of administrative control allowed through the collection of official statistics. Once appeared, official statistics spawned new types social analysis - study of demographic models, crime, divorces, suicides, etc. In turn, the literature on the problem that has appeared has again been included in the practical activities of those who were involved in obtaining relevant statistics. For example, works on the issue of suicide are widely used by coroners, court officials, and other people, including those who intended to commit or attempted suicide.
Of course, the development of theoretical metalanguages \u200b\u200band the specialization that arose as a result of intensive research into individual areas social life, guarantee that social sciences will not merge with the "subject of discussion" into a single whole. But if we are aware of the complexity, continuity and depth of the connection that exists between
“professional” and unskilled social analysts, we will be able to understand why the fundamental influence exerted by the social sciences on the structure of modern societies is out of sight. Even the most interesting and promising “discoveries” made within the framework of the social sciences cannot constantly exist in this capacity; in fact, the more meaningful they are, the higher the likelihood that they will become an integral element of activity and, therefore, generally recognized principles of social life.
Theories and discoveries of the natural sciences consist with their “subject” in so-called “technological” relations. In other words, the information generated by them has practical significance, being a “means” used to change the independently established and autonomous world of objects and events. In the case of social sciences, this kind of attitude is not exclusively “technological”: their penetration into worldly activities can be considered “technological” only to the smallest extent. Various changes and transformations of knowledge and power are possible here. In order to demonstrate that this is so, let us return to an example in which N. Machiavelli's remarks on the essence and nature of politics are given. The following problems are described, the occurrence of which is associated with his reasoning: Perhaps, for the most part we are talking only about a special form of expression of what many rulers, and not only they, already knew - they could even imagine it discursively, although, most likely would not be able to express their thoughts as meaningfully as Machiavelli did. By writing his works and making them available to a wide audience, Machiavelli discovered a new factor that did not appear earlier when the same things were (if any) known. Those who got acquainted with the ideas of Machiavelli, without resorting to the primary sources, used the term "Machiavellianism" as a curse word. The first English version of The Sovereign was published in 1640, until this time the British considered Machiavelli to be the personification of immorality and perversion.
A type of discourse used by Machiavelli in his writings has become one of the elements or aspects of the fundamental changes taking place in the legal and constitutional systems of modern states. A special, essentially new view of “politics” and political activity in many respects predetermined their further fate. The ruler, who was considered a follower of Machiavelli, seeking to govern according to his commandments and instructions, could face greater difficulties in using the latter than the one for whom the glory of the supporter of Machiavellianism was not entrenched. So, for example, subjects who know the commandment, according to which people usually much more value the benefits received by them from those who expect only evil, may treat these goods with distrust. For the most part, Machiavelli was aware of all of the foregoing and explicitly warned in his work against imprudent and incorrect conclusions. Some of the points we mentioned are even more complicated, because their very awareness has become part political activities.
But why are the views of Machiavelli significant and are today and seriously discussed by us as relevant from the point of view of modern societies, which in fact absorbed them? Why are those who work in the context of social sciences not able to forget the names of the "founding fathers", just as it happens in the natural sciences? The answer to these questions should be sought in the constructive, creative nature of ideas formulated and presented by thinkers, akin to Machiavelli. The latter provided us with a means of sound reflection on the concepts and practical orders that have become in modern societies an integral part of the essence of sovereignty, political power etc., Turning to the works of Machiavelli, we begin to understand the basic distinctive features modern state, for the author wrote about the relatively early stages of its development. There is no doubt that he discovers or puts in a special, discursive form the principles of governance applicable to states of various types. However the main

the reason due to which Machiavelli’s works are not “outdated” is that we are talking about a series of (stylistically brilliant) reasoning concerning phenomena in the formation of which they (reasoning) were directly involved. We are dealing with the presentation of ways of thinking and ways of acting that are relevant for modern societies, not only because of their origin, but also because of their constant organizational form. The outdated natural-science theory ceased to be interesting, as more meaningful and substantiated doctrines appeared. Theories that have become part of their “subject” (although perhaps in other respects they oppose such a merger) inevitably retain significance and relevance that are not available to “antique” natural-science theories.
The development of the critical nature of the social sciences implies a deepening of conceptual ideas about the practical content of their own discourse. That
the fact that social sciences integrate into what they are studying indicates the significance of the history of ideas. So, on
^ example, research by Quentin Skinner (Skinner),
L. sacred to the emergence of modern discursive
ideas about the state of the era that followed the Middle Ages, demonstrates how they (ideas) become
C. Is it a fundamental, inalienable element of what
defined by us as a state. Proving that the civilian population modern state knows that there is a state and how it functions, Skinner helps to understand how specific this form of government is and how it is interconnected with changes in discourse that become part of everyday social practices.
Social sciences are not able to provide (relevant) knowledge that could be “held back” by preparing to strengthen appropriate social interventions where necessary. In the natural sciences, the criteria of evidence and evidence used in the process of selecting particular theories or hypotheses are (in principle and usually in practice, with the exception of cases similar to Lysenkoism) in the hands of practicing practitioners developing them. The latter may
continue to work on a thorough analysis and screening of evidence and the formulation of theories, without intersecting with the world to which these theories and evidence apply. But this is not characteristic of the social sciences - or, to be more precise, this situation is least suitable for theories and discoveries that have the greatest explanatory value. In many respects, this explains the fact that, as is often believed, social sciences provide politicians much less useful informationthan natural sciences. Social sciences inevitably and in many respects rely on what members of the societies they study are already aware of, and also offer theories, concepts, and discoveries that “return” to the world they describe. The “discrepancies” that may appear between the professional conceptual apparatus, the discoveries of the social sciences and the meaningful practices that are part of social life are much less obvious and understandable than in the natural sciences. Thus, from a “technological” point of view, the practical contribution of the social sciences looks and is quite limited. However, if we assess the situation from the point of view of penetration into the analyzed world, the practical conclusions of the social sciences were and remain very solid.