Mechanistic Explanations in the Social Sciences

Abstract

Two new concepts have recently made their way into the theoretical market of the social sciences: the concept of mechanism and that of sociological machine. This article offers an analysis of the concept of mechanism and suggests that in itself it is insufficient to rebuild current practice in the social sciences. It then discusses the complementary notion of sociological machine to show that it allows us to go deeper into the solution to some of the problems that mechanisms were unable to solve. The article can be read as a contribution to the old debate concerning the role of mechanistic explanation in the social sciences.

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