Book Review Discussion: Daniel Chernilo,The Natural Law Foundations of Modern Social Theory: A Quest for Universalism

Parsons, in an ASR review of Nisbet’s The Sociological Tradition, drew a distinction between the kinds of ‘intellectual history presented by… [Nisbet’s] book and what … [Parsons called] an historical treatment of theory and its development’ (Parsons, 1967: 640), a reading of theory that transcended the works discussed and resulted in Parsons’ own theoretical contributions. Chernilo’s book (2013) is akin to Nisbet’s work. Here, however, I will formulate an argument as if it were closer in form to Parsons’ own The Structure of Social Action (1949 [1937]). Working from Chernilo’s discussion, which emphasizes the connections between modern natural law and social theory, largely through what he takes to be their related grasp of universalism, I suggest an understanding of social theory that enables us to formulate a defensible natural law argument.

For Chernilo, modern social theory is the natural law of artificial social relations (pp. 203, 220). Modern social theory presupposes that ‘there is something stable in the way in which social relations are produced and reproduced in different contexts and epochs’ (pp. 220–221); this is the primary form of universalism that Chernilo finds in it (p. 207). This contention requires that social theory have a functional dimension, specifying propositions that are held to be valid for all social systems. Second, Chernilo contends that ‘actions always take place in previously structured socio-historical contexts …’ (p. 221). This suggests that the analysis of social relations must focus on specific patterns of interrelationship and that these patterns will differ depending on the nature of the social structure under analysis. Social theory formulates universal-class propositions about more particular types of social structure. Third, and here I think that, in spite of himself, Chernilo introduces religion into his discussion, he contends that ‘the conception of social relations … locates the normative somewhere in between immanence and transcendence’ (p. 221). I argue, instead, that a meaningful characterization of social theory as natural law must posit a theory of social development, where the ‘transcendent’ is characterized in terms of immanent possibilities for social and individual development, and where the last stage in this progression serves as the standard enabling the critical evaluation of earlier stages. Chernilo misses this developmental dimension, even in his characterization of Habermas, in whose work it is laid out clearly.

Barnett has argued that the requirements of organized social life are the principles of natural law. These laws are ‘as fixed and unchangeable as the laws which operate in the natural world’ (Goodrich cited in Barnett, 1997: 658). For Barnett, the (normative) force of natural law is found in ‘if, then’ propositions: ‘If you want to achieve Y, then you ought to do Z.’ As in Durkheim, the rudimentary Y is survival; and as in Durkheim, this characterization of the normative force of natural law requires that sociological theory have a functional dimension, specifying propositions that are held to be valid for all social systems. Barnett emphasizes that this form of ‘reasoning is highly contestable because it depends on what we think are the “facts of human life” … and the generalizations we chose to make from these facts. Having made these factual generalizations (X), it then depends upon a claim that given X, if you want to accomplish Y, then you must do Z’ (Barnett, 1997: 657–660). The contestability of these propositions is, of course, correct, but for contemporary sociologists the claim that there are such functional propositions, valid for all social systems, is itself highly contentious.

Structural analyses articulate the tendential development of a particular social configuration. We may associate them both with a type of social structure (e.g. a capitalist social formation) and the particular cultural configuration of that social formation (that is, not all capitalisms are the same). Most relevant to natural law arguments is the recognition that the dominant normative orientations within each type of social structure vary. The extreme historicist view is that each is unique, incommensurable, and incapable of scientific analysis. The more credible view is that each type of social structure is regulated by a pattern of value commitments; that there is no way of selecting between them, even if we can analyze their effects. Combining this structural argument with a functional one allows us to specify how these values function in conjunction with other aspects of the social order, but it does not allow us to order the values; it does not provide a rationale for choosing one set of value commitments over another.

If a functional theory enables us to say we must do X if we are to avoid social disorder, it does not suggest that we ought to do X. If we are to have hope of providing guidance about how we ought to act, we need to introduce a developmental dimension into our argument. A developmental model characterizes immanent possibilities for social and individual development, where later stages are hierarchically-ordered progressions capable of generating earlier ones, but where the reverse is not the case. The last stage in this progression may then serve as the critical standard judging earlier stages. For those of us (all of us) who do not live in a society at the final stage of social development, natural law is not what we know transparently from within our social order, but what we can learn about our potential social and individual development. It characterizes a standard to which we ought to aspire.

In the third stage, which I call equitable, where Marx and Engels tell us that distinctions between particular and common interests are overcome, decisions are made experimentally, scientifically, and man’s own deed is no longer an alien power opposed to him. Barnett’s standard for natural law is in play: ‘if we desire to accomplish X, then we must select policy Z’. The ‘theory’ that guides our selection, like all scientific theories, is contestable, and must be evaluated in terms of its consequences. This is a social order where those consequences are best known by those upon whom they impinge; they master, if you will, the data, and data trumps theory, that is, decisions are in the hands of the ‘people’ and not the ‘party’.

In an equitable structure, where the actors’ differential expertise matters, good reasons are grounded empirically, in practice, and the social order is structured to enable us to evaluate theoretical claims in light of their empirical consequences. Within this structure, we are able to make ‘if, then’ claims grounded in functional propositions, where those propositions are themselves contestable. Equitable social structures constitute a social order in which natural law arguments might be made effectively, a social order constituted consciously by the women and men who live in it, one that overcomes alienation tendentially, one that, in part because it recognizes the ways we differ, enables humans to reach their full developmental potential.

Does this mean that these natural law arguments have moral warrant? No, at the asymptote, one might still choose death on the grounds that its prevention requires immoral actions in light of values derived from an understanding of God’s commands. May we conclude that social theory constitutes natural law arguments? Yes, but only if we accept the structure of an argument that presumes the successful constitution of functional, structural and developmental theories, and only if we conclude that the final stage in the development of social structures creates a social order in which those theories might be evaluated successfully. A major virtue of Chernilo’s book is to recall to our attention what is at stake when we seek to construct meaningful social theory.