Rethinking Classical Sociology
Series Editor: David Chalcraft, University of Derby, UK
This series is designed to capture, reflect and promote the major changes that
are occurring in the burgeoning field of classical sociology. The series publishes
monographs, texts and reference volumes that critically engage with the established
figures in classical sociology as well as encouraging
examination of thinkers and
texts from within the ever-widening canon of classical sociology. Engagement
derives from theoretical and substantive advances within sociology and involves
critical dialogue between contemporary and classical positions. The series reflects
new interests and concerns including feminist perspectives, linguistic and cultural
turns, the history of the discipline, the biographical and cultural milieux of texts,
authors and interpreters, and the interfaces between the
sociological imagination and
other discourses including science, anthropology, history, theology and literature.
The series offers fresh readings and insights that will ensure the continued relevance
of the classical sociological imagination in contemporary work and maintain the
highest standards of scholarship and enquiry in this developing area of research.
Also in the series:
Crossing the Psycho-Social Divide
Freud, Weber, Adorno and Elias
George Cavalletto
ISBN 978 0 7546 4772 0
Science, Values and Politics in Max Weber’s Methodology
New Expanded Edition
Hans Henrik Bruun
ISBN 0 7546 4529 0
Defending the Durkheimian Tradition
Religion, Emotion and Morality
Jonathan S. Fish
ISBN 0 7546 4138 4
What Price the Poor?
William Booth, Karl Marx and the London Residuum
Ann M. Woodall
ISBN 0 7546 4203 8
Vilfredo Pareto’s Sociology
A Framework for Political Psychology
ALASDAIR J.
MARSHALL
Glasgow Caledonian University, UK
© Alasdair J. Marshall 2007
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system
or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying,
recording
or otherwise without the prior permission of the publisher.
Alasdair J. Marshall has asserted his right under the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act,
1988, to be identified as the author of this work.
Published
by
Ashgate Publishing Limited
Ashgate Publishing Company
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House
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Ashgate website: http://www.ashgate.com
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data
Marshall,
Alasdair
J.
Vilfredo Pareto’s sociology :
a framework for political
psychology. - (Rethinking classical sociology)
1. Pareto, Vilfredo, 1848-1923 2. Social psychology
3. Political psychology
I.
Title
02'.092
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Marshall, Alasdair.
Vilfredo Pareto’s sociology : a framework for political psychology / by Alasdair J.
Marshall.
p. cm. -- (Rethinking classical sociology)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN
978-0-7546-4978-6
1. Sociology--Philosophy. 2. Pareto, Vilfredo, 1848-1923. I. Title. II.
Title: Sociology
HM585.M3457
2007
301.
092--dc22
2007025146
ISBN-13: 978 0 7546 4978 6
Printed and bound in Great Britain by MPG Books Ltd, Bodmin, Cornwall.
Contents
List of Tables
vii
Series Editor’s Preface
ix
Author’s Preface
xix
1 Introduction
1
2
Pareto’s ‘Psychologistic’ Sociology
9
2.1 Pareto and Marx
9
2.2 Pareto’s Elite Theory
10
2.3 A Brief Biography
10
2.4 Pareto’s Italy: Clientelismo and Trasformismo
13
2.5 Pareto and Machiavelli: Similar Theories of Human Nature
21
2.6 Pareto’s Historical Cycle and the Circulation of Elites
25
2.7 Pareto and Parsons: Similar Theories of Social System?
31
2.8 Pareto’s
Residues
37
2.9 Conclusion: Pareto’s Political Sociology
41
3 Social
Personality
43
3.1
Introduction
43
3.2 Social Personality
45
3.3 Cognitive Indeterminacy
51
3.4 Conservative and Liberal Heuristics under Conditions of
Cognitive Indeterminacy
59
3.5 The Evolution of Knowledge through Trial and Error
Experimentation
63
3.6
Social
Complexity
67
3.7
Conclusion
77
4 Pareto’s
Psychology
79
4.1
Introduction
79
4.2 Cultural Conservatism
and Liberal Scepticism
83
4.3 Individualism and Collectivism
89
4.4
Creativity
99
4.5
Risk
108
4.6 Force and Fraud
116
4.6.1 Force
116
4.6.2 Fraud
123
4.6.3 The Dark Triad and Superego Strength
134