Interpretative difficulties and theoretical problems

A detailed exegesis of Parsons' theory in The Social System could have provided the content for the previous chapter. The detailed exegesis of what Parsons wrote was vital for writing this book. I found that I could not come to terms with The Social System in the way Parsons seems to have wanted it to be read, without writing down my own response to his work as I read it. And this ‘discovery’ confirmed my view of that work as an experimental record – an account of Parsons' ‘thinking in progress’. The Social System in this sense is a consistent development of ‘The Theory of Human Behavior in its Individual and Social Aspects’ (T. Parsons 1922). And having established that essential continuity I could then read his ‘major exposition’ in terms of what had preceded it.

This chapter and the previous one have been the most difficult to write. The previous chapter, no doubt, is very difficult to read. Seen only in terms of its ‘development’, against the background of earlier statements, The Social System appears to be little more than a laborious commentary on how Parsons ‘tuned up’ for new major works. For Parsons, publication of his ‘thinking in progress’ was a convenient analytical sign-post. But The Social System established his preeminence in twentieth-century sociology. As such it needs to be treated as a work in its own terms and not simply as a ‘development’.