AN APOLOGIA FOR THEORETICAL HISTORY

In memory of Sir Karl Raimund Popper

1
NIKOLAI S. ROZOV
ABSTRACT
Karl Poppers critique of theoretical history remains formidable but contains serious
aws. Popper held erroneous views about the practice of the natural sciences and created
overly severe strictures for theoretical statements in the social sciences. General theory
and general theoretical statements play a legitimate role in the social sciences. Merton has
promoted middle-range theories and models and Lakatos multiple ontologies. One can
answer Poppers criticisms of either the impossibility or triviality of long-term historical
laws by searching for stable constellations of local or middle-range laws rather than a uni-
versal law. Moreover, the successful use in the social sciences of various types of scales
of measurement rather than an absolute scale shows that quantitative analysis is possible
in history. Investigators need to nd the boundaries, the frameworks of feasibility, in
which historical trends and laws operate. Poppers maximalism plays into the irrationalist
trends that he himself deplored. If historical investigators and theoreticians set appropri-
ate goals for theoretical history, they can practice their discipline responsibly and nd
meanings, if not a single meaning, in history.
Discussions between philosophers and historians about objects of mutual con-
cern commonly have two curious characteristics. On the one hand, one is struck
by the vast differences in their thinking, not only about problems of historical
cognition and the essential meaning of human history, but in the very style of
their thought and language. Not infrequently such differences provoke rather
vexatious mutual incomprehension. On the other hand, historians and philoso-
phers unite in surprising, indeed touching accord in negation of rational and the-
oretical approaches to history: a diapason ranging from vehement criticism to
scornful dismissal. It is not difcult to nd reasons for this, for instance, in the
history of the Soviet bloc. Historians, not only in Russia but elsewhere, grew
accustomed during the epoch of historical materialism and its political dogmas
to shielding their personal dignity and scholarly integrity by devoting themselves
1. This article was written while Sir Karl Popper was still alive. He died on September 17, 1994
after a long illness. Popper, who so strongly inuenced thinking about the philosophy of history, him-
self now belongs to the history of philosophy. It might be an interesting exercise to try to measure his
inuence on recent history through political leaders who valued his ideas. Although critical of some
of Poppers ideas, I dedicate my own thoughts on theoretical history to him who formulated such a
formidable challenge to it.
to purely empirical history. Now they see in all rational schemas, models,
hypotheses, and theories the danger of regressing into ideological dogmatism.
By contrast with post-Soviet historians recuperating from politics, ontologi-
cally oriented philosophers in the classic German tradition simply declared the-
oretical history to be impossible in principle. They arrogated to themselves the
right to dene holistic structures and the goal, meaning, and idea (or spirit) of
history. Analytically oriented philosophers of the Anglo-American tradition took
a different tack: they accused practitioners of theoretical history of essentialism,
holism, and a host of other sins. Currently, postmodern philosophers (in the so-
called Continental tradition) condemn theoretical history for constructing hege-
monic master narratives, for colonizing thought and discourse about history.
Thus, in spite of the vast gulf separating empiricistic historians from these major
philosophical schools, all parties nd common ground and peaceful coexistence
in their disdain for theoretical history.
My article aims to inject some dissonance into this oddly harmonious chorus
by showing that theoretical history is both possible and importantan indis-
pensable link between philosophy and history. It is precisely the task of the the-
ories, holistic schemas, and models of theoretical history to comprehend empir-
ical data rationally; and precisely theory must inspire the search for new histori-
cal data with the goal of achieving, not a mythical completeness (which caused
the crisis of the most respected modern historical schoolthe Annales), but the
testing and repair of hypotheses about complex systemic structures and about the
dynamics and trajectory of world history.
The emerging global intelligentsia of the twenty-rst century will crave nei-
ther masses of data arrived at by strict empiricism nor fruitless, scholastic dis-
cussions about spirit in history or discourse about history. Rather, they will
seek sustenance in empirically grounded, structural approachesschemas and
models of dynamic systems; and they will strive for rational cognition of sys-
temic mechanisms, tendencies, patterns, and trends. In short, by means of theo-
retical history the new intelligentsia will construct a philosophy of history and
orient themselves towards the solution of practical problems of development,
whether national or global. But the notion of theoretical history may still seem
chimerical to those convinced by Karl Poppers formidable challenge to theoret-
ical history. It is therefore important to anyone writing an apologia for theoreti-
cal history to overcome Poppers strictures.
KARL POPPER AND THEORETICAL HISTORY
Popper presented powerful, consistent, and comprehensive criticisms of theoret-
ical history and historicism in two well known books, The Open Society and
Its Enemies (1945) and The Poverty of Historicism (1957). Roughly half a cen-
tury later, some of his criticisms remain unexceptionable, and far more cogent to
this author then those of later and perhaps more zealous opponents of theoretical
history, such as Heideggers followers and the adherents of postmodernism. In
AN APOLOGIA FOR THEORETICAL HISTORY
337
fact, I pursue a methodology quite close to Poppers and thus nd his criticisms
all the more serious an obstacle to my apologia for theoretical history. Popper,
moreover, launches an all-out assault in order to remedy weaknesses in his ini-
tial attack. The general structure of his criticism of historicism and theoretical
history resembles the chain of tropes of skepticism (Pyrrho, Sextus
Empiricus), a similarity that becomes all the more striking if we modify in the
following manner the classical discussion of the skeptics predecessor, the
sophist Gorgias: a) the laws of historical development do not exist; b) if they do
exist they cannot be known; c) even if they can be known, they are trivial and
cannot explain anything. One thus faces a formidable critical structure, recon-
structed in the discussion below (sometimes literally) in ten clear, powerful, con-
vincing, and, in many respects, plausible theses.
Theories or Interpretations
Poppers Thesis 1. What is considered to be a theory in history in fact is only
one point of view, an untestable hypothesis, which it is more correct to call a his-
torical interpretation.
It is possible to agree with the general thrust of Poppers thesis, but only if we
take into account the following: In keeping with his favorite demarcation criteri-
on Popper rigidly connects a theorys scientic status with its falsiability, that
is, the possibility of its refutation. Popper calls all theories that fail to satisfy his
criterion historical interpretations, which he thinks are chosen relatively arbitrar-
ily. One may then ask: In scientic practice and, most particularly, in Poppers
exemplary natural sciences, are all theories or theoretical positions directly
testable? The most supercial analysis shows that in every science there is a layer
of general theoretical statements that cannot be tested themselves, but serve as
the logical foundation for more specic theories and statements that have already
been tested. In physics the law of the conservation of energy and other laws of
thermodynamics, and the initial postulates of quantum theory, serve as examples.
Are the laws of conservation in physics testable in Poppers sense? We must
take into account that general theoretical statements produce two basic types of
logical consequences. First, they establish the absolute boundaries of possible
phenomena; thus, a perpetual motion machine remains outside the realm of pos-
sibility envisioned by the law of conservation of energy. Secondly, within these
boundaries and in certain ideal conditions (usually unattainable in reality) the
general theory explains (and predicts) the characteristics of the transition of an
object from one state to another. Thus, according to the law of the conservation
of energy, when energy is converted from one form to another its total quantity
remains constant.
In what sense, then, is the law of the conservation of energy testable? On the
one hand, all of the many and varied efforts to create a perpetual motion machine
have failed. We notice, however, that according to this criterion, a fundamental
theoretical law of the respected science of physics does not differ signicantly
from that of history, in which one would not be able to nd any society without
NIKOLAI S. ROZOV
338
the reproduction of social relations and institutions, the transmission of cultural
patterns from generation to generation, and so on. To be sure, the law of the con-
servation of energy can be tested in special experimental conditions that permit
more precise measurements of the quantity of energy making a transition from
one state to another in a closed system. Most important for us, however, is the
fact that there is no direct testing of the law of conservation itself, but only indi-
rect testing through intermediate layers of theory and experimental models rele-
vant to various forms of energy: mechanical, thermal, electromagnetic, and so
on.
Thus, there should be a link in the form of a general theory or general theo-
retical statements connecting philosophical presuppositions (interpretations in
Poppers sense) and properly scientic, testable theories. In historical science,
general theories or general theoretical statements, which need not be directly
testable, might exist alongside initial presuppositions (cognitive intentions and
ontological assumptions). Moreover, as of now there are no compelling logical
objections to the possibility of testable middle-range theories and their models in
historical science.
2
Both the possibility and reality of such theories and laws has
already been advanced in the literature.
3
The above position resembles the late versions of Imre Lakatoss theory of
research programs and can be used as the basis for working out the methodolo-
gy of theoretical history. With Lakatoss model in mind we can and should con-
sider ontology itself as a variable and entertain the possibility of working with
multiple ontologies in history. But the question arises, what should the main
social-historical analogues for the general theoretical statements in the natural
sciences be like?
4
Historical Laws and Trends
Poppers Thesis 2. That which is presented in history as a law of development
in reality is only a trend, but a trend does not have a universal, law-governed
character and thus does not explain anything.
Popper presents his classical logical scheme of the explanation/prediction of
phenomena by distinguishing the deduction of judgments based on phenomenon-
consequence from those based on universal laws and initial conditions. Then
he applies this scheme to regular phenomena with observable growth trends or
AN APOLOGIA FOR THEORETICAL HISTORY
339
2. Robert K. Merton, Social Theory and Social Structure (New York, 1968).
3. J. O. Wisdom, General Explanation in History, History and Theory 15 (1976), 257-266; H.
Kincaid, Defending Laws in the Social Sciences, Philosophy of Social Science 20 (1990), 56- 83.
4. In my own view, these laws would have to relate the principle components of a social entity
(environment and social functions, social functions and social modes, social modes and cultural pat-
terns, cultural patterns and human qualities), and the laws of feed-back loops (both positive and neg-
ative). But this is a special topic. See N. S. Rozov, Struktura tsivilizatsii i tendentsii mirovogo razvi-
tiia [The Structure of Civilization and World Developmental Trends] (Novosibirsk, 1992); Rational
Philosophy of History. Resume of the First World Philosophical Congress, August 2228, 1993
(Moscow, 1993).
progress and shows that at every step these trends depend upon specic initial
conditions, which at any moment can cease to exist.
One can fully endorse Poppers position at this point, including his criticism
of the chief error of historicism. Poppers reasoning perhaps deserves the status
of a methodological norm expressed as a prohibition: how not to construct theo-
retical history.
Therefore, trends themselves must be explained by means of general theories.
Popper does not object to this possibility in principle, which leads to the prob-
lematic of the following thesis.
Universal Laws and Middle-Range Laws
Poppers Thesis 3. The trends operating in a given historical period can be
explained through so-called laws, limited by the boundaries of that period.
However, this violates one of the most important postulates of the scientic
method, namely, the unlimited sphere of the validity of laws.
Specic initial conditions, whose regularity is necessary for the continuation
of trends in a given historical period, clearly should be explained by laws whose
validity is limited by the framework of a given period. In other words, one must
speak of local laws (and their corresponding theories) or middle-range laws,
using Robert K. Mertons term. Popper, as shown in the third thesis, believes that
this position violates a major scientic norm. But Popper simplies things too
far, even in his exemplary natural sciences. For example, the laws of the diffu-
sion of light signicantly differ for crystal, liquid, and gaseous media. Ice melts
and then water evaporates; the laws of light distribution change in a given spa-
tio-temporal segment without the help of any miracles. Popper might object that
universal laws of optics do operate here and that the characteristics of the media
can be seen as dependent variables. One might agree with Popper here in princi-
ple, but in scientic practice deductions from abstract universal laws are never
made. Similar arguments can be found in the literature.
5
At the same time, Popper
is right when he says that a new law should not arise like a deus ex machina or
ad hoc hypothesis.
Moreover, one must explain the transition from one group of local laws to oth-
ers, and the explanation must be based on a more general model or models.
Clearly, for human societies such historical variability of local laws is extremely
signicant.
6
Various types of historical systems have their own logic, that is,
their own active laws of development; but we need to account for transitions
from one system to another (trans-systemic changes).
Must Laws of History Be Trivial?
Poppers Thesis 4. Even if there are universal laws, they are quite trivial, unin-
teresting, and can be grasped by the exercise of the most elementary common
NIKOLAI S. ROZOV
340
5. Nelson Goodman, Fact, Fiction, and Forecast (Indianapolis, 1965); Kincaid, Defending
Laws.
6. I. Wallerstein, World-Systems Analysis, Social Theory Today (Cambridge, Eng., 1988).
sense. Accordingly, the revelation of such universal laws is of no scientic inter-
est whatsoever.
Popper writes:
it may be argued that history does make use of universal laws contrary to the emphatic
declaration of so many historians that history has no interest whatever in such laws. To
this we may answer that a singular event is the cause of another singular eventwhich is
its effectonly relative to some universal laws. But these laws may be so trivial, so much
part of our common knowledge, that we need not mention them and rarely notice them. If
we say that the cause of the death of Giordano Bruno was being burnt at the stake, we do
not need to mention the universal law that all living things die when exposed to intense
heat. But such a law was tacitly assumed in our causal explanation.
7
Popper thus gives trivial reasons for Brunos deathre kills all living crea-
turesand for the defeat and division of Poland in 1772
8
a larger army will
always win the battle, all other things being equal.
Poppers thesis about the triviality of historical laws and the above examples
carries little cogency. If an investigator is capable of seeing only trivial laws
when examining a given phenomenon, it by no means establishes the absence of
other non- trivial, interesting, and scientically fruitful laws. A great many peo-
ple had observed falling bodies and rolling balls before Galileo and seen nothing
but trivialities. Aristotelian physics had crystallized the commonsense view:
the heavier the body, the faster it falls. Galileo saw the situation otherwise.
Popper made himself a prisoner of historical atomism, and his judgments and
examples are correct only within its narrow limits. There are a great many clas-
sical as well as contemporary currents of theoretical history, taking as their sub-
ject major systemic structures and/or extended processes and trends (which will
be discussed below). Theoretical history permits us to deal with problems on a
much larger scale. Thus, the division of Poland in 1772 connects with global his-
torical problems related to the long struggle for spheres of inuence between
military-political and economic blocs of European states in the second half of the
eighteenth century: between Austria, Sweden, France and Turkey, on one side,
and Russia, Prussia, and England, on the other. One might ask, why in their bat-
tles do these giants sometimes partition and annex weaker states and at other
times protect their independence?
In the 1990s the map of Europe is again being rearranged. The struggle for
spheres of inuence continues to be rather bitter and erce, despite its somewhat
more civilized appearance. The problems and factors (including local laws)
affecting the self- preservation of small states have great interest and urgency to
new or newly aspiring states trying to survive in such conditions. Thus, one can
agree that there were trivial reasons for Polands cold-blooded partition by three
geopolitical predators. But there should be a non-trivial answer to the question,
in what combination of circumstances do powerful, predatory states nd it more
advantageous to grant sovereignty to weak states? Non-trivial, more general laws
AN APOLOGIA FOR THEORETICAL HISTORY
341
7. Karl Popper, The Poverty of Historicism, (Boston, 1957), 144-145.
8. Karl Popper, The Open Society and Its Enemies [1945] 2 vols. (New York, 1966), II, 264.
underlie ssiparous and unifying trends. For example, Randall Collins managed
to explain long cycles of expansion-contraction and structural transformations of
the Chinese, European and Russian geopolitical ecumene by the combined,
recurrent action of rather simple laws.
9
The recurring operation of such laws over
decades and centuries yields regular, long-term historical patterns which are by
no means trivial. Modern researchers, unlike Popper, may be loath to leave these
matters to the exercise of common sense.
The Problem of Explaining Serial Phenomena
Poppers Thesis 5. There cannot be any laws of long-term development
because at every one of its links a chain of events is subject to new combinations
of laws.
This too is an argument based upon Poppers atomistic approach. He once
again constructs an analogy with the natural sciences, saying that even to explain
the fall of an apple one would need to enlist the actual, particular circumstances,
themselves not part of a law, in addition to the repeating elements cited in laws.
Popper persists in considering as laws only the most universal causal ties such as
the law of gravity in physics, on the one hand, or those of the trivial type such
as, all living things perish when consumed by re, on the other. The previous dis-
cussion of Poppers theses invokes the middle-range laws of theoretical history
and avers that they can be used scientically to explain a variety of important
phenomena. Although Poppers statement may be correct with respect to each
separate instance in a chain of events, it is hardly true for typical chains of events,
for the overall trends of serial phenomena, such as processes of social change.
One must agree with Popper that there cannot be a unique universal law explain-
ing a series of individual phenomena. But this does not rule out the existence of
and search for stable constellations of middle-range laws explaining the typical
trends discernible in such serial phenomena in an investigation of broader scope.
The Holism of Totalities and Holism of Models
Poppers Thesis 6. It is impossible to create a general historical theory by gen-
eralizing from individual observations, but holism (an integrative approach) in
the social sciences, history among them, is impossible, insofar as it is impossible
in principle to grasp all aspects and aspects of a social whole.
Expanding the scale of observation of a subject implies an integral cognitive
approach: holism. But Popper advances particular arguments against holism as
well. In this case his criticism is quite sound. He distinguishes two variants of
holism corresponding to different understandings of the term whole.
There is a fundamental ambiguity in the use of the word whole in recent holistic lit-
erature. It is used to denote (a) the totality of all the properties or aspects of a thing, and
especially all of the relations holding between its constituent parts, and (b) certain special
NIKOLAI S. ROZOV
342
9. Randall Collins, Weberian Sociological Theory (Cambridge, Eng., 1986); Prediction in
Macrosociology: The Case of the Soviet Collapse, American Journal of Sociology 100 (1995), 1552-
1593.
properties or aspects of the thing in question, namely those which make it appear an orga-
nized structure rather than a mere heap.
10
Popper rejects the possibility of investigating integralities as totalities in the
sense of (a), but does not protest the scientic investigation of the integrality of
selected abstract models in the sense of (b). At present, this thesis seems rather
obvious both for systemic approaches and general scientic methodology.
The Problem of Measurement in History
Poppers Thesis 7. Even if we can bring to light some laws of historical devel-
opment, it is impossible to test the corresponding hypotheses, because a quanti-
tative analysis of data in historical studies is either extremely difcult or impos-
sible; moreover, it is impossible to establish the necessary and sufcient condi-
tions for the occurrence of a given historical event.
We have arrived at Poppers most serious argument against theoretical histo-
ry, the importance of which is conrmed by the weakness (not to say, the lack)
of fully achieved, veried, and recognized results in this sphere of social knowl-
edge. Popper did not consider social and historical hypotheses to be untestable in
theory, but he rightly noted the extreme difculty of the quantitative analysis of
data even in a mathematized social science such as economics. However, this
analysis is imperative when some factors that increase and some that decrease
certain variables are at work.
The seriousness of this argument increases vastly insofar as we move from
contemporary to historical economies, for which other than fragmentary and nar-
row quantitative data can rarely be found. We nd an even more deplorable sit-
uation in other aspects of historical knowledgefor example, social, political,
cultural, technological, psychologicalwhere even now, on the whole,
researchers have not determined what should be measured and how. The solution
should be a compromise between two extremes: the maximalist standards of
quantitative testing of the natural sciences, with physics as the model; and an
obstinate rejection of any measurement, or of any comparative evaluation, of his-
torical phenomena. In the methodology of the social sciences, especially in psy-
chology, the following types of scales of measurement (presented in order of
ascending precision) are well known:
The nominative scale, by which things are distinguished and supplied with
names (also, classications, groupings, typologies, clusters); numbers here func-
tion only as names, like the letters of the alphabet;
11
The scale of order, according to which objects are distributed in accordance
with the relative degree of expression of a chosen parameter (each succeeding
object is greater than its predecessor, but this is all that is xed by the given
scale); every gradation of the scale of order (and the objects in it) can be assigned
a number, but only the order is signicant; for example, in history: orders of
AN APOLOGIA FOR THEORETICAL HISTORY
343
10. Popper, Poverty of Historicism, 76.
11. An example of this is Marxs Rent 1 and Rent 2.
phases and stages; orders of ranks in various social or bureaucratic systems; the
order of states in the core-periphery axis of word-systems analysis; the order of
the life cycle of civilizations according to various historians and philosophers of
history;
12
The scale of intervals, where numbers assigned to objects specify not only
their order, but also the distance between them in a chosen parameter;
13
The scale of relations (with units of measurement), shows how much more a
parameter is expressed in one object than in another, for example, in history:
market prices, the population of cities, the size of armies;
The absolute scale (with zero), which makes it possible to measure a parame-
ter independently in single objects and to employ the entire series of real num-
bers. (Full realization of this scale is questionable even in such ideal sciences
as physics. Although measurement of distances appears to be absolute, the
absolute measurement of time or energy is doubtful.)
The maximalist approach requires the measurement of historical data on an
absolute scale (as is usually the case in physics). The rejection of any kind of
measurement, proclaimed by followers of Diltheys science of the spirit is, in
essence, a self-limitation of thought to nominative scales (classications, typolo-
gies, the description of individual phenomena). One may agree that applications
of the scale of relations (not to speak of the absolute scale) in history fall with-
in a very narrow area. But they increase substantially when we lessen demands
for accuracy and move to the scale of intervals, and even more so for the scale
of order.
All historians have always used the scale of order, even though they may not
have known it (like Molieres Monsieur Jourdain, who spoke prose without
knowing it). We are all accustomed to historians making statements about the rel-
ative wealth and political power of one or another estate, or the relative strength
(in terms of skills, organization, equipment) of armies, or about the growth and
development or expansion of cities, countries, and empires (that is, accord-
ing to several parameters, they are greater in subsequent periods than they are in
preceding ones)and in every such case historians implicitly use the scale of
order. But if the scale of order is widely and successfully used in empirical his-
torical studies, why not use it in the formulation and testing of hypotheses in the-
oretical history? It would appear that if the Popper-Hempel notion of universal
NIKOLAI S. ROZOV
344
12. N. Danilevsky, O. Spengler, A. Toynbee and others usually structure the life cycle of civiliza-
tions by means of at least three Scales of Order: time, external power (measured by expansion), and
internal vitality (that is, cultural and moralspiritual strength).
13. Temperature illustrates this scale. We can only measure interval differences of temperature.
The Scale of Intervals is widely used in psychology to measure sensory perception and almost all
measurements of human qualities, such as IQ, are done in the Scale of Intervals.
(or covering) laws has a future in theoretical history, it will be realized mainly by
using the scale of order.
14
The Uniqueness of World History
Poppers Thesis 8. It is impossible in principle to enunciate a law of develop-
ment in World History because it is a single process and one can only make spe-
cic empirical statements about it.
One must agree with Popper that it is impossible to formulate theoretical
hypotheses about World History as a single phenomenon. However, as with the
general theoretical statements adduced in the discussion of Poppers rst thesis,
statements analogous to such hypotheses can be formulated and tested for vari-
ous middle-range aspects of World History delimited by temporal and geograph-
ical boundaries. Thus, in some cases we may assume that hypotheses which are
correct for given regional historical systems are also true, with appropriate
amendments, for all of the other regions in a world-system. This approach is very
popular in traditional empirical history, especially ancient history where, in the
absence of data, a picture of institutions, cities, indeed of an entire society (for
example, Egyptian, Sumerian, Babylonian, Assyrian), is constructed on the basis
of partial information gleaned from analogous phenomena at other sites.
Theoretical history cannot be, and should not be, stricter and more exact than
empirical history. Theoretical knowledge of World History is possible. Granting
that it will never be as strict as that of theoretical physics (and thus not as strict
as Popper would like), there are no basic obstacles to making its methodology as
rigorous as that of empirical history. We should thus abandon the impossible task
of formulating a theory embracing all of World History and instead try to con-
struct and then to combine middle-range theories describing various aspects of
World History and types of historical systems.
The Nonpredictability of Scientic Development
Poppers Thesis 9. In any case, a theory of historical development that claims
to make scientic predictions is impossible, because it is logically impossible to
predict the development of scientic knowledge, which has a signicant effect on
human history. This means that theoretical history is impossible.
In support of this statement Popper deploys the following argument:
(1) The course of human history is strongly inuenced by the growth of human
knowledge. . . .
(2) We cannot predict, by rational or scientic methods, the future growth of our sci-
entic knowledge. . . .
(3) We cannot, therefore, predict the future course of human history.
(4) This means that we must reject the possibility of a theoretical history; that is to
say, of a historical social science that would correspond to theoretical physics. . . .
(5) The fundamental aim of historicist methods . . . is therefore misconstrued; and
historicism collapses.
15
AN APOLOGIA FOR THEORETICAL HISTORY
345
14. See R. Collinss geopolitical laws alluded to above.
15. Popper, Poverty of Historicism, Preface, ix-x.
From the point of view presented here, this argumentation, however logically
rigorous and powerful, is pounding on an open door. One may open it even
wider. No less than by scientic knowledge, historical events are inuenced by
new ideologies, new legal and economic ideas, new directions in religion and
morality, new cultural phenomena, new forms of leisure, new social needs, new
technologies, and so on.
Popper correctly shows that even in those areas of natural sciences where the
most precise measurements can be made, it is possible, on the basis of the knowl-
edge of laws and initial conditions, to give an exact prediction of events only in
articially or naturally isolated situations (for example, in astronomy, events in
the solar system). In other cases in the natural and especially in the social sci-
ences one can scientically predict only the boundaries within whose limits cer-
tain predicted events and processes will occur. One can increase the accuracy of
these predictions, that is, narrow the limits, but never to the point of exact proph-
esy, for which astrologers, cabalists, and other professional soothsayers should
be grateful.
The historical trends and local laws, which are appropriate for theoretical his-
tory and a rational philosophy of history, are neither absolute nor universal (as
suggested in the discussion of the second and third theses). These trends and laws
act only within their own limits, which we may call frameworks of feasibility. A
methodological paradigm of this sort quite clearly allows social predictions (as
well as models for the historical past) and fully accords with Poppers thesis
about the nonpredictability of the development of scientic knowledge.
The solution lies in this: as a precondition for their validity, social predictions
must take into account future scientic discoveries (as well as changes in ide-
ologies, values, etc.), and determine in advance that such discoveries and
changes will not transgress the frameworks of feasibility of the trends and local
laws on which the predictions are based. If, in a given case, it is impossible to
accept such a precondition, one must decide whether or not to widen the frame-
work of feasibility, and thereby render prediction less accurate. When the signif-
icance of a prediction is too great for us to eschew it in favor of rened scientif-
ic precision, then it calls for a reverse action. The example of ecological predic-
tions will be introduced below in support of this point. Some sort of balancing
act is quite normal in scientic methodology. Most important, we must not sim-
ply abandon hope when we nd it impossible to achieve absolute precision in
some scientic venture.
Paradoxically, Poppers elevated sense of intellectual responsibility and strict
rationalism, and the impressive thought that led to his conclusions about the
maximalist version of theoretical history, have had the effect of discrediting work
in this area. Inadvertently, he succored other irresponsible, irrationalist trends
that he himself deplored.
Responsibility for the Future
Poppers Thesis 10. Historicism, which asserts some sort of objective, law-
governed, course of history not amenable to other than minor changes, such
NIKOLAI S. ROZOV
346
as accelerations and retardations, is an ethically vicious doctrine, irrespective of
its status as theoretical history. We ourselves are responsible for our history,
which lacks any fatal course, any guarantee of progress, and any meaning.
We ourselves are free to give one or another meaning to history and we shall
do it much better as we become more fully aware of the fact that progress rests
with us, with our watchfulness, with our efforts, with the clarity of our concep-
tion of our ends, and with the realism of their choice.
16
The last of Poppers arguments presented here has an ethical and existential
character that, one should say, does not make it weaker by comparison with the
epistemological and methodological arguments advanced earlier. But it does not
militate against the kind of theoretical history advocated here. Poppers protest
against an objective course of history is beside the point if we reject any
absolute, unconditional laws and trends in history, and any corresponding fatal-
ism or predetermination, and accept the idea of limits of feasibility for middle-
range laws (see the discussion of theses 1, 3, and 9).
For example, there are in the contemporary world quite powerful destructive
trends in technology affecting the atmosphere, soil, rivers, and oceans. Were we
to consider these trends fatal (in both senses of the term), we would fully deserve
Poppers criticism because we would remove from ourselves the responsibility
for any sort of ecological action to counter such trends. But we know that such
trends have been reversed. Pollution in Tokyo had been growing at a menacing
rate some twenty to thirty years ago. Today, to be sure, Tokyo does not have ide-
ally clean air (something hardly to be expected in a megalopolis), but the air
quality is acceptable by public health standards. In Tokyo, as elsewhere, the
reversal of the trend was accomplished within the frameworks of feasibility of
the growth and reduction of pollution. Practically, the reversal was carried out by
a persistent, long-term municipal strategy calling for annual growth of penalties
on the producers of atmospheric pollutants, and intensied investment in the eco-
logically relevant technologies and projects. Many other cases in which pollution
has been reversed might be adduced, but what has been achieved at the local
level has thus far not been achieved on a global scale. Ecologists have given us
fair warning that global destructive tendencies are either very close to limits of
feasibility or have possibly exceeded them. We cannot shirk responsibility for the
future.
The issue of progress is somewhat more complicated. To be sure, the idea
that history develops toward a preset goal (the Kingdom of God, Communism,
the Omega point, etc.) carries little cogency. Judgments about progress always
depend upon some sort of accepted set of values. Needless to say, history inter-
preted according to any system of values will be full of progressions and
regressions. One is then burdened with the complex methodological task of
abstracting and of arriving at a higher level in order to bring to light and eval-
uate the most general trends and results. The problems become even more com-
AN APOLOGIA FOR THEORETICAL HISTORY
347
16. Popper, Open Society, II, 280.
plex if we take into account the culture-bound character of value systems, many
of which are incompatible. Moreover, in spite of the hopeful vision of the Kant-
Windelband-Rickert-Scheler tradition, all value systems are historically change-
able.
17
The naivet of Enlightenment and nineteenth-century ideas should by no
means be preferable to twentieth-century nihilism about progress in history.
Rather, what is called for is a new eld of investigation in which ethical, theo-
retical, and empirical historical problems of progress and regression are exam-
ined on the basis of a specially constructed, general ontologya new para-
digm.
18
Thus, one must agree with Poppers calls for responsibility and a critique of
any unconditional and absolute law of progress in history; but this does not mean
that one should abandon the investigation of historical progress. To the contrary,
one should try to reestablish the eld on a vital new basis.
METHODOLOGICAL CONCLUSIONS
These general methodological conclusions are proposed in behalf of a rational
philosophy of history and theoretical history. In order to achieve these goals, it is
necessary to do the following:
to distinguish clearly ontological, general theoretical, and strictly theo-
retical positions which meet different demands, rst of all, with respect to
testability;
19
to take into account the possibility of and justication for multiple
ontologies; and to pose and solve the problem of the relation of this multiplic-
ity to classical notions of the uniqueness of scientic truth;
to avoid absolutizing any ontology, paradigm, or general theory; and to
generate criteria which, despite their untestability, can be used to modify or
even replace unfruitful general theoretical and even ontological positions;
to reject strictly a method of testing like the selection of examples con-
rming a chosen ontology and theory (a method misused by, among others,
Oswald Spengler, Arnold Toynbee, and Lev Gumilev); to the contrary, to
strive to nd anomalies and counterexamples, whose absence would be the
NIKOLAI S. ROZOV
348
17. N. S. Rozov, Constructive Axiology and Intellectual Culture in the Future, Studia
Humanistica, I, no. 2 (Prague, 1990), 55-72.
18. One possible starting point for such a paradigm is the presentation of a structural description
of the course of World History (its main stages and types of system and their changes: for example
ecumenes, world-empires, world-economies, civilizations, societies) to be explained by the dynamics
of World History (various mechanisms described by law-like statements about the causes of long-term
processes: for example, cycles, trends, growth, transitions, and transformations).
19. Imre Lakatoss The Methodology of Scientic Research Programs provides a useful model. See
also K. Boulding, A Primer on Social Dynamics: History as Dialectics and Development (New York,
1970); I. Prigogine, Values, Systems, Structures and Afnities, Futures (August 1986), 493-507; E.
Laszlo, The Age of Bifurcation (New York, 1991); Christopher Lloyd, The Structures of History
(Oxford, 1993), and the bibliography to Lloyds book; the forum on chaos theory in History and
Theory 34 (February, 1995).
best conrmation of a theory, and whose presence would be a stimulus for its
revision, modication, or replacement;
to concretize universal laws for all human communities in (local) mid-
dle-range laws, which not only vary for different communities, but may also
vary over time for any given community;
to take into account the dependence of historical trends on the frame-
works of feasibility of the underlying laws;
whenever possible, to reveal and to specify for each trend, cycle, or trans-
formation these frameworks of feasibility and the factors determining their
transformation;
to investigate how the level of local laws is dened by the range (in a gen-
eral systemic sense) of their frameworks of feasibility; in which case a com-
munity dened by given local laws, in due course can escape their limits and
enter into the operational zone of new local laws;
to explain the transition from one set of local laws to the other by mod-
els (or laws) of a higher level;
to recognize that, despite the possibility that causal explanations of atom-
istic historical phenomena may be trivial, the explanation of large-scale chains
of facts and their consequentiality cannot be trivial, but precisely the kind of
explanation that is signicant for theoretical history;
to consider under these kinds of explanations the laws pertaining, at least,
to the following: a) the existence of a historical system of a denite type as a
whole; b) its reproduction and development in history; c) its transformation
into another type of historical system;
to recognize the impossibility of explaining a long chain of phenomena
by means of a single law, and at the same time to take into account the possi-
bility of persistent constellations of laws explaining the similarities of typical
chains;
to set as the goal of theoretical history, not the advancement of a single
theory of World History as a unique phenomenon, but the creation of a com-
plex of multiple interconnected theories, explaining the course and interaction
and, perhaps, general patterns of multiple historical trajectories;
to recognize that theories of historical development cannot be used to
predict events, but only the shifting boundaries of processes, with the assump-
tion that the frameworks of feasibility of these theories and their laws do not
change;
to eschew judgments about the end of history, and to take as its task
clear judgments about such problematic notions as progress and regres-
sion with the help of clearly formulated, undogmatic evaluative criteria; and
to recognize that these judgments do not relieve us of the responsibility for the
future and for the very values used to dene it, insofar as we preserve the free-
dom to determine our history.
In view of the above methodological agenda, the skeptical reader might ask:
why bother with abstract proof of the possibility of theoretical history? Where
AN APOLOGIA FOR THEORETICAL HISTORY
349
are the more concrete approaches, investigations, results? In the rst place, in
spite of the obvious inadequacies of many of their positions, the works of Karl
Marx, Max Weber, R. G. Collingwood, Arnold Toynbee, Pitirim Sorokin, Alfred
Kroeber, and Carroll Quigley, for example, have made a remarkable contribution
to theoretical history. Secondly, considerable progress has been made in the last
decades in the theoretical grasp of historical dynamics, structures, and laws. The
following is only a brief list of some important directions and areas of investiga-
tion:
the systemic and cybernetic approaches to historical dynamics, social
change, and the transition from one historical whole to another, and more gen-
erally, their use in the analysis of historical structures;
20
the reproduction and development of large historical systems in the
diachronic, comparative analysis of world systems;
21
comparative analysis of the genesis and development of civilizations;
22
geopolitical theory, changes in global military-political and economic
hegemony, study of long geo-political cycles and global wars;
23
social revolutions, social evolution, transformations of ruling regimes,
the development of technologies of power.
24
Third, we might ask if it is possible to nd some basis for bridging the theoreti-
cal distance separating the various paradigms. The discussion of such issues in a
community of scholars dedicated to their study is the traditional way to seek
common ground, but new technologies make communication signicantly easi-
er and, one hopes, will facilitate the exploration of theoretical history.
25
THE MEANING OF HISTORY (IN LIEU OF A CONCLUSION)
We have arrived at Poppers last argument concerning a most obscure, but at the
same time exhilarating problemthe meaning of historya problem belonging
NIKOLAI S. ROZOV
350
20. See the works of Prigogine, Laszlo, and Lloyd cited above.
21. F. Braudel, Civilisation matrielle, conomie et capitalisme, XVXVIII sicle. Tome 3. Le
temps du monde (Paris, 1979); Wallerstein, World-Systems Analysis; Charles Tilly, Big Structures,
Large Processes, Huge Comparisons (New York, 1984); D. Wilkinson, Central Civilization,
Comparative Civilizations Review 17 (1987), 31-59; Christopher Chase-Dunn, Global Formation
(Oxford, 1997); Giovanni Arrighi, The Long Twentieth Century (London, 1995); S. Sanderson, Social
Transformations: A General Theory of Historical Development (Oxford, 1995).
22. See the Comparative Civilizations Review.
23. L. Hepple, The Revival of Geopolitics, Political Geography Quarterly 4 (1986), 21-36; P.
Kennedy, The Rise and Fall of the Great Powers (New York, 1987); K. Rasler and W. Thompson, The
Great Powers and Global Struggle, 14901990 (Lexington, Ky., 1994); Exploring Long Cycles, ed.
E. Modelski (London, 1987).
24. Theda Skocpol, States and Social Revolutions (New York, 1979); Daniel Chirot, How Societies
Change (London, 1994); M. Mann, The Sources of Social Power (New York, 1986), I. Other impor-
tant contributions might be adduced, and one should not fail to note that a dogmatic form of histor-
ical materialism did not prevent the appearance of signicant work in these areas in the authors
homeland. See especially Igor Diakonov, Puti istorii [The Pathways of History] (Moscow, 1994). He
offers an eight-phase analysis of world history with diagnostic attributes for each phase and brief but
well done empirical conrmations.
25. The Internet facilitates discussion of the above matters. PHILOFHI (PHILosophy OF HIstory
and theoretical history), organized in April 1994, now has more than 220 members from thirty-ve
countries. See, http://wsrv.clas.virginia.edu/~dew7/anthronet/subscribe/philophi.html
not to theoretical history as such, but to the philosophy of history. Popper brave-
ly attacked the problem:
Poppers Thesis 11. Although history has no ends, we can impose these ends
of ours upon it; and although history has no meaning, we can give it a mean-
ing.
26
These trenchant remarks can evoke either horror or admiration, depending on
the reader. No matter what emotions they inspire, they force us to reect about
the problem of the relationship of human beings to history.
From a purely logical point of view, one can hardly fault Poppers position.
Things in themselves, including human histories, are quite meaningless unless
they are in some relationship with human beings, their cognition, their practices,
and their world views. Clearly, observers of history will nd it devoid of any
meaning, insofar as they lack any sort of ontological or evaluative presupposi-
tions concerning it. One may ask, however, do we have the right to take tabula
rasa as our point of departure, that is, to assume a total absence of such presup-
positions, when discussing the meaning of history? For all of our differences, we
are not creatures from another planet, but actors creating the very history whose
meaning we are trying to determine, something noted by R. Collingwood and K.
Jaspers, among others.
27
Thought tends to stay on the beaten track, and in philosophical traditions we
nd at the ready two major alternatives. The rst, a dogmatic, traditional, holis-
tic paradigm, provides authoritative answers to all questions. To this paradigm
belong almost all of the religious and idealistic historical doctrines, and some of
the quasi-scientic ones (such as Spenglers and Toynbees). For them historys
riddles are solved. History is objective, known; it is Gods work, or the product
of the Absolute, Nature, Culture, or some other God-term. If people do not rec-
ognize this or deny it, they do so out of ignorance or wickedness. The second par-
adigm, brilliantly set forth by Popper, embraces sophists, skeptics, agnostics and
empiricists, and is relativistic, voluntaristic, and individualistic. History itself has
no meaning, and each and every human being has unlimited freedom of choice
to give it a subjective meaning.
These polarized alternatives share one curious feature: complete indifference
to the content of history. No matter what new knowledge we acquire about the
human past, about peoples lives in the past, about the rise and decline of soci-
eties and civilizations in various centuriesnothing can change a dogmatically
found or voluntaristically imposed meaning of history. However, investigat-
ing history for the sake of demonstrating general truths is the business of ideo-
logues and propagandists; it is unworthy of practitioners of science and rational
philosophy. Evidently, it is logically impossible to deduce any idea of history
from empirical researchfrom historical facts. But contrary to the above
views, the variety and mutability of our cognitive aims and world views with
AN APOLOGIA FOR THEORETICAL HISTORY
351
26. Popper, Open Society, II, 278.
27. R. Collingwood, The Idea of History [1946] (Oxford, 1961); K. Jaspers, Vom Ursprung und
Ziel der Geschichte (Zurich, 1949).
respect to history may signify the variety and mutability of historys meanings,
but not their absence. Such meanings must be based on the results of theoretical
history, on investigations of the dynamics, structure, and course of world histo-
ry, subject to falsiability through empirical ndings. The appearance of invari-
ant positions might reasonably lead to the conviction that corresponding invari-
ant meanings of history exist; and these in turn might be synthesized into the long
sought universal meaning of history. Perhaps no such invariant positions exist. If
so, there can be no legitimate case for pursuing such a synthesis. At the very
least, we should keep the eld open for fruitful philosophical reection about the
meaning of history, all the while acknowledging the complexity, vagueness, and
vacillation in our treatment of the problem. Surely, without human beings histo-
ry has no meaning. But human beings are not free capriciously to impose any
meaning whatsoever on history or to deny that it has any sense at all. The mean-
ing of history has a dual, subjective-objective character, and is evidently both
multiple (hence meanings should be the subject of the sentence) and mutable,
changing with the very course of history, with transformations of human quali-
ties and human values, and with peoples changing grasp of their own history.
If, after this labyrinthine discussion the reader still clings to some shred of
hope that the author can offer clarication about the meaning of history, alas, I
must confess I cannot. Rather, by rising to Poppers challenge and debating with
him I have tried, however inadequately, to present in brief outline the methodol-
ogy of theoretical history and a rational philosophy of history. It will require the
efforts of generations of scholars to pose and solve problems of this magnitude
adequately. Poppers brilliant challenge deserves no less.
Novosibirsk State University
Russia
NIKOLAI S. ROZOV
352