Bourdieu and Historical Analysis (Politics, History, and Culture) (2013-01-09)

Well delivered

This book well presents the path-breaking work of Pierre Bourdieu, thus contributing to needed changes in socio-historic approaches. In interesting chapters Bourdieu’s main ideas are presented and in part critically evaluated. Overall, this is an excellent book deserving a large audience. One of its advantages is emphasis on Bourdieu as a student of transformation and not only of transmission, as often assumed. But here I ran into an important lacuna in Bourdieu’s oeuvre. As recognized in the book “free, creative action was always the exception in Bourdieu, never the rule” (p. 152P). It seems that his opposition to the subject-object dichotomy and to existentialist philosophy prevented him from realizing the role of “world-historical figures” in bringing about transformations, in culture, science, society and politics. Bourdieu mentions the impact of outstanding persons on inequality and rates of exploitation (p. 346), but this is far from enough. Stating that “It showed genius to lie in the ability to play the game that defines a field as well as in aesthetic vision or originality” (p. 52) ignores the outstanding personalities who create a radically new “game.” A sociological-historical approach which does not discuss the impact of an Einstein on history misses a lot. This limitation is also expressed in the conception of habitus as a set of embodied dispositions, schemas of perception, and recipes for action that are a function of an individual's location in and trajectory through social space (p. 347) and as a “feel for the game” p. 347). This leaves no place for individuals who overcome the impacts of home, education and fields and do “break out” from socially produced a habitus into a radically novel personal one. Examples include charismatic Promethean political leaders. Thus, I asked myself whether the methods and theories of Bourdieu can explain the socio-political phenomena of US President Donald J. Trump, and reached a mainly negative answer. It is always possible to put a case into the concepts of Bourdieu, but on some important matters they are more of a Procrustean bed then an elucidating theory. Another glaring omission is discourse on “force” as a major form of capital, which often dominates economic, symbolic, political and other capitals. If Bourdieu had studies War Lords in Africa with less attention to Paris May 1968, which Fernand Braudel would have views as bubbles on the deep streams of history, he would not made that error. I found most disturbing of all lack of comprehensive discourse on the impacts of science and technology. If he had paid attention to the history of the nuclear bomb, as largely shaped by a few individuals, and its epoch-making implications, his understanding of macro-historic transformations would have been much improved. This is all the more important in the contemporary world when emerging science and technology are phase-leaping the human species into a radical novel socio-technical era (as partly discussed under the term “Singularity”). Therefore the statement in the overall outstanding concluding chapter that “The preceding chapters have given ample proof that it is both possible and fruitful to analyze sociohistorical change in Bourdieusian terms” (p. 327) is only partly true. Indeed, there is much to learn from Bourdieu as well discussed in this book, but I think it should have been more alert to serious lacunae in Bourdieu’s thinking. Professor Yehezkel Dror The Hebrew University of Jerusalem

For Rulers: Priming Political Leaders for Saving Humanity from Itself This book well presents the path-breaking work of Pierre Bourdieu, thus contributing to needed changes in socio-historic approaches. In interesting chapters Bourdieu’s main ideas are presented and in part critically evaluated. Overall, this is an excellent book deserving a large audience. One of its advantages is emphasis on Bourdieu as a student of transformation and not only of transmission, as often assumed. But here I ran into an important lacuna in Bourdieu’s oeuvre. As recognized in the book “free, creative action was always the exception in Bourdieu, never the rule” (p. 152P). It seems that his opposition to the subject-object dichotomy and to existentialist philosophy prevented him from realizing the role of “world-historical figures” in bringing about transformations, in culture, science, society and politics. Bourdieu mentions the impact of outstanding persons on inequality and rates of exploitation (p. 346), but this is far from enough. Stating that “It showed genius to lie in the ability to play the game that defines a field as well as in aesthetic vision or originality” (p. 52) ignores the outstanding personalities who create a radically new “game.” A sociological-historical approach which does not discuss the impact of an Einstein on history misses a lot. This limitation is also expressed in the conception of habitus as a set of embodied dispositions, schemas of perception, and recipes for action that are a function of an individual's location in and trajectory through social space (p. 347) and as a “feel for the game” p. 347). This leaves no place for individuals who overcome the impacts of home, education and fields and do “break out” from socially produced a habitus into a radically novel personal one. Examples include charismatic Promethean political leaders. Thus, I asked myself whether the methods and theories of Bourdieu can explain the socio-political phenomena of US President Donald J. Trump, and reached a mainly negative answer. It is always possible to put a case into the concepts of Bourdieu, but on some important matters they are more of a Procrustean bed then an elucidating theory. Another glaring omission is discourse on “force” as a major form of capital, which often dominates economic, symbolic, political and other capitals. If Bourdieu had studies War Lords in Africa with less attention to Paris May 1968, which Fernand Braudel would have views as bubbles on the deep streams of history, he would not made that error. I found most disturbing of all lack of comprehensive discourse on the impacts of science and technology. If he had paid attention to the history of the nuclear bomb, as largely shaped by a few individuals, and its epoch-making implications, his understanding of macro-historic transformations would have been much improved. This is all the more important in the contemporary world when emerging science and technology are phase-leaping the human species into a radical novel socio-technical era (as partly discussed under the term “Singularity”). Therefore the statement in the overall outstanding concluding chapter that “The preceding chapters have given ample proof that it is both possible and fruitful to analyze sociohistorical change in Bourdieusian terms” (p. 327) is only partly true. Indeed, there is much to learn from Bourdieu as well discussed in this book, but I think it should have been more alert to serious lacunae in Bourdieu’s thinking. Professor Yehezkel Dror The Hebrew University of Jerusalem

This is a useful addition to the Bourdieu lit. The first chapters serve as an advanced intro; the later chapters expand the ways in which we might think with Bourdieu.