Sociale diagnose of sociologie? Een dissertatie over onmaatschappelijke gezinnen

Samenvatting

A critique on a PhD dissertation by H. P. M. Litjens-'Onmaatschappelijke gezinnen. Sociologisch onderzoek naar de onmaatschappelijkheld te Maastricht' (Anti-Social Families. A Sociological Inquiry on Anti-Sociality in Maastricht, University of Utrecht, the Netherlands: 1953). The work is said to be 'diagnostically colored'; the author holds that social diagnosis lies outside sociology. Another Dutch sociologist, J. A. Ponsioen, distinguishes between the social analysis of empirical sociology and social diagnosis based upon analysis. The definition of 'anti-soc'ity' (onmaatschappelijkheld) in families is based on the notion of 'level of decline' (vervaltoestand) which brings the fam below 'the minimum level which a society considers necessary and reasonable in each of its families.' Although this definition is meant to be sociol'ly justified, it is actually a social diagnosis, based on moral and religious standards. I. Langnas.