The Old Social History and the New Social Sciences

This essay provides a survey of new research themes, methodologies and empirical and theoretical questions addressed in the other social sciences today and how they can be applied to traditional concerns of social history. Recent trends within economics, sociology and political science especially have generated new interest in historical questions as they relate to the origin, development and role of institutions in defining contemporary societies. Equally new interest in motivation of actors and their interaction with institutions has provided new insights into analysis of personal choice which also offers historians interesting new themes to explore. Thus there is a fruitful area of cooperation which can develop between historians and social scientists because of these new theoretical orientations. An awareness of these trends can help social historians focus their own research just as it allows these social scientists to engage some of the traditional concerns in our discipline.