2010 Tilly and Bourdieu PDF

Tilly and Bourdieu
Author(s): Mustafa Emirbayer

Source: The American Sociologist, Vol. 41, No. 4, Remembering Charles Tilly (December 2010),
pp. 400-422
Published by: Springer
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AmSoc(2010)41:40(M22
DOI 10.1007/s12 108-010-9114-x
Tillyand Bourdieu
MustafaEmirbayer
Publishedonline:14 December2010
Science+Business
Springer
Media,LLC 2010
similarities
AbstractThe firstpart of this essay discussesthe most important
betweenthesociologicalvisionsof PierreBourdieuand CharlesTilly;thesecond
a criticalassessment
The conclusionthenoffers
of
partsurveysthekeydifferences.
to social science.
contributions
thesetwothinkers'
respective
Political
sociology Civilsociety Modernity
Keywords Tilly Bourdieu Historical
conflictCollectiveaction Cultural
analysisRelationalsociologyFields
Social
Pragmatism
Interaction
order Socialpsychology
Mechanisms
stratification
Symbolicviolence
Bornhardlya year
is irresistible.
CharlesTillyand PierreBourdieu:thecomparison
largelybereftof
apart,raisedin familiesof middlingmeansand in circumstances
with
culturalrefinement
and sophistication;
academically
giftedand accomplished,
of theirrespective
educationalinstitutions
degreesearnedat the mostprestigious
and government
countries
aid); imbuedfroma
(thanksin largepartto scholarships
ofthe
andself-importance
theprtentions
skepticism
regarding
youngage withhealthy
their
scholasticlife,a traitthatwouldmarktheirlaterworkas well,notto mention
obliviousto
wholeapproach
totheinstitution;
withpeersandstudents
andtheir
relations
within
the
themselves
andreluctant
to confine
thepressures
ofacademicspecialization
in
andevenheterodox
andsubdisciplinary
boundsofdisciplinary
domains;innovative
of social inquiry;
to theenterprise
committed
theirthinking
yetalwaysprofoundly
as well as
theoretical
of theircraftin all its dimensions,
practitioners
exemplary
of their
eventhemostaccomplished
to a degreethatastonished
substantive;
prolific
of
theforemost
becamearguably
thesetwosocialthinkers
sociologists
contemporaries:
similarities
In thisessay,I considerthemanyremarkable
thelate-twentieth
century.
betweentheirrespective
sociologicalapproachesas well as some of thesubtlebut
in mind,I also offersome closing
Withsuch comparisons
differences.
important
reflections
on Tilly'slife'sworkinparticular.1
of his familyoriginsand childhoodin Tilly(1985), as well as in Stave(1998).
^illy spokebriefly
Bourdieudiscussedthosesametopicsat greatest
lengthin (2007 [2004]).
M. Emirbayer
(El)
of Sociology,University
of Wisconsin-Madison,
Madison,WI, USA
Department
e-mail:emirbaye@ssc.wisc.edu
& Springer

Am Soc (2010) 41:40(M22
401
I
Both Tilly and Bourdieu came of age intellectuallyin the 1950s, at a time when, at
least in American sociology- and to a considerable extentin France as well- the
scene was dominatedby what Bourdieu would later call the "Capitoline triad" of
TalcottParsons, Robert Merton,and Paul Lazarsfeld, embodimentstogetherof the
opposition then extantbetween theoreticismand empiricism(with Merton as the
mediatingfigure).2Far away in France, Bourdieu sought deliberatelyto resisttheir
influence, which he disdained, while Tilly, not afforded the same benefits of
geographic distance, nonethelessrefrainedwhile at Harvard fromhaving Parsons
serve on his dissertationcommittee.3Both developed a lifelongaversion to abstract
theorizing,even as they also eschewed the positivistictendenciesso prominentin
theirday. Both plunged into studiesof concretehistoricalprocesses, studies focused
on specificinstancesof political dominationand struggle,all the while evincingno
"disdain for patient,painstakingempirical work," as Bourdieu would later put it
(Bourdieu 2007 [2004], 103). In his earlyresearchesin themidstof theAlgerianwar
of independence,such as those collected in Algeria 1960 (1979 [1963]), Bourdieu
invested "the same interestand attentionin drawing up a coding schedule or
conductingan interviewas in constructinga theoreticalmodel" (Bourdieu 2007
[2004], 103), while Tilly spentnine long years in the archivespreparingThe Vendee,
his firstmajor work (Tilly 1964).4 (Ironically,the fourcore chaptersofthat workon the "foursystemsof social relationshipswithinthe [southernAnjou] community,
- nonetheless would
essentially political, economic, religious, and affiliational"
Parsons
's
AGIL
schema
closely parallel
[Tilly 1964, 82].)
- one
From the beginning,Tilly and Bourdieu shared a profoundlyhistorical
better
historicist
As
I
shall
later
discuss
in
might
say
sensibility(Steinmetz2010).
this
extended
even
to
the
of
greaterdetail,
sensibility
problem sociological concept
formation,
althoughin different
degrees in the two thinkers.Bourdieu never tiredof
were "issued out of the historicalwork of succeeding
stressingthatsocial structures
while
even
habitus
were nothing if not history embodied and
generations,"
and
incorporated(Bourdieu
Wacquant 1992, 139). Time was his great obsession,
the elaborationof a radicallytemporalizedtheoryof social life: "The separationof
sociology and history,"he wrote in An Invitation to Reflexive Sociology, "is a
disastrousdivision" (Bourdieu and Wacquant 1992, 90). Such a division could not
be rectifiedsimplyby positinggrand historicaltrajectoriesand then building one's
own sociological theoriesatop them.It is truethatBourdieu conceived of the rise of
the modernworld as a process of the differentiation
and autonomizationof fieldsof
"At
the
foundation
of
the
practice.
very
theory of fields," he wrote, "is the
observation(which is alreadyfoundin Spencer,Durkheim,Weber. . .) thatthe social
world is the site of a process of progressivedifferentation.
. . . The evolution of
2 Bourdieu
(1991a, 378). On mid-twentieth

centuryAmericansociology,see also Calhoun and
VanAntwerpen
(2007).
thathe madeita pointalwaysto takegraduate
coursesthatParsons
however,
Tillyoncetoldthisauthor,
on theprinciple
thatone mustknowone's enemywell.
offered,
presumably
nineyears"in thearchives."He was in Franceforabouta year
Tillydid not,of course,spendliterally
to "nine long years"is
(1955-56) while fundedby an SSRC Dissertation
Fellowship.The reference
strictly
metaphorical.
& Springer

402
Am Soc (2010) 41:40(M22
societiestendsto makeuniverses
(whichI call fields)emergewhichareautonomous
and have theirown laws" (Bourdieu1998a, 83).5 However,he also stressedthat
dedifferentiation
can easilyoccur- andwas alreadyin dangerofoccurring
in certain
realmsof contemporary
culturaland intellectual
life.6
Tilly,too, fromthestartof his career,was an implacablefoe of dehistoricized
ways of thinkingin sociology.These includeda fortiorithe variousformsof
in thesocialsciences,suchas modernization
"historical"
thenfashionable
reasoning
whichhe deridedas "nineteenth-century
in a new
theory,
evolutionary
thinking
was a highlyusefulconcept,"no
garb"(Tilly 1984,48).7 Althoughdifferentiation
he asserted;"we have no warrantfor thinkingof
process is fundamental,"
in itselfas a coherent,
differentiation
general,lawlikesocial process"(Tilly 1984,
irreversible.
49, 48; boldfacein original).Norwas differentiation
(Laterinhiscareer,
he would make the same pointin respectof democratization.)
As farback as
mindedthinkers
at
graduateschool,Tilly cast his lot withthe mosthistorically
suchas GeorgeHomans,Barrington
Harvard,mentors
Moore,Jr.,PitirimSorokin,
and SamuelBeer (Steinmetz
his life,he stressed,
as George
2010). And throughout
Steinmetz
betweenhistory
and
(2010) has notedin thisvolume,thatthedistinction
sociologyis an artificialone- as is, indeed,the verycategoryof a "historical
"thatthe
sociology."8"To theextent,"Tillywrotein As SociologyMeetsHistory,
. . . [any] analysisis
place and timeof the actionenterinto its explanations,
historical"
(Tilly 1981a, 6).9 Sociologicalanalyses"shouldbe concretein having
realtimes,places,and peopleas theirreferents
and in testingthecoherenceof the
structures
and
the
ofrealtimes,places,and
postulated
processesagainst experiences
should
be
historical
in
to
their
people.They
limiting
scope an era boundedby the
of
out
certain
well-defined
and
in
fromtheoutsetthat
playing
processes,
recognizing
- thatwhenthings
timematters
within
a
how
affects
happen
sequence
theyhappen.. . .
at
Outcomesat a givenpointin timeconstrain
outcomes
later
possible
pointsintime"
in
boldface
1984,
14;
(Tilly
original).
BothTillyandBourdieudirected
theiranalyticattention
to theempirical
nexusof
modernstatesand classes.(Thiswouldlead manylaterto associatetheirideaswith
Marxianpoliticaleconomy.)"In the case of Westerncountriesover the last few
5 See also Bourdieu
(2000 [1997], 17-24).
of theculturalfield,see
For a statement
of Bourdieus concernsaboutthepotential
loss of autonomy
Bourdieu(2003 [2001]).
' As AndreasKoller
October2010) has pointedout, this assertionof
(personalcommunication,
Tilly's "implacable"oppositionto modernization
theorydoes not apply as far back as his Ph.D.
in whichthedehistoricized
of thatapproachwerestillmanifest:
dissertation,
"Tilly
ways of thinking
was not as 'implacable'as he himselfwishedto be in retrospect."
Tillyhimselfsaid as muchin a
but it's
"I had a stupididea, whichI refutedin rewriting
laterinterview:
my doctoraldissertation,
view. ... By the
stilltherein thedissertation[.]
... I meanI reallyhad a verysimplemodernization
I was halfwayout of it,but there'sstilla lot of thatapparatusin it"
timeI finishedthedissertation,
the eventual
Stave (1998, 192). It mightalso be notedthat,at least accordingto one commentator,
- The Vendeitself
- stillbore tracesin its conceptualframework
of unhistorical,
publishedversion
"teleological"reasoning.See Sewell (1996).
8 "I wouldbe
It impliestheexistenceofa separatefieldof
happierifthephrasehad neverbeeninvented.
- parallel,say, to politicalsociologyor the sociologyof religion....
I object to having
study
coherentsubject
subdisciplines
emergefromtechniquesand approachesratherthanfromtheoretically
matters"
(Tilly1981b,100).
9
Quotedalso in Steinmetz
(2010, 19).
Springer

Am Soc (2010) 41:400-422
403
hundredyears," Tilly remarkedin his methodologicalstudy,Big Structures,Large

Processes, Huge Comparisons, "the program [of a concrete and historical social
science] begins by recognizingthatthe developmentof capitalismand the formation
of powerful,connected national states dominated all other social processes and
shaped all social structures.The programcontinuesby locating times, places, and
people within those two master processes and working out the logics of the
processes. It goes on by following the creation and destructionof differentsorts
of structuresby capitalism and statemaking,then tracing the relationship of
otherprocesses [to them]" (Tilly 1984, 14-15). Even contentiouspolitics was to
be defined by reference to states- as "claim making that somehow involves
governments"(Tilly 2008a, 7).10 Bourdieu, likewise,conceived of societies as class- his most famous book, Distinction,spoke of society as itselfa field of
structured
social classes (Bourdieu 1984 [1979]) - and stressed that societal strugglesmost
often center around states and aspire to influence them, while states in turn
massively structurethe very termsof (and partiesto) those struggles.11Anotherof
his major works,Pascalian Meditations,ended by identifying
the State with society,
the
Durkheimian
that
dictum
is
God"
quotingapprovingly
"society
(Bourdieu 2000
[1997], 245).
For boththinkers,thisemphasis on statesand classes meanta studiousavoidance
of the idea (and discourse) of civil society.Despite the upsurge of interestin civil
societyduringthe 1980s and 90s, a developmentoccasioned largelyby the collapse
of communismand the successfultransitionsto democracyin Easternand Southern
Europe as well as in Latin America- and despite also the long and distinguished
- neitherBourdieu
pedigreeof thatconcept in the historyof Westernsocial thought
nor Tilly foundit to be verycompellinganalytically."It is not easy," wroteBourdieu
in a late work on The Social Structuresof the Economy,"to determineconcretely
where the state ends and 'civil society' begins. ...
In fact, abandoning the
...
we
have
rather
to
the
dichotomy,
speak
language of differentialaccess to
bureaucratic
resources
law, regulations,administrativepowers, etc.specifically
and to power over these resources,which the canonical distinction,as noble as it is
empty,leads us to forget"(Bourdieu 2005, 163-65). Toward such an end, Bourdieu
developed the concept of a "field of power," or a space in which the dominantsof
society,the preeminentholders of its major assets or varietiesof capital, would be
arrayedand pittedagainst one anotherin a ceaseless struggleforstatepower.12He
spoke also of coalitionsor movementsin which the dominatedamong the dominants
would align themselveswith actors fromoutside the field of power in attemptsto
gain greatershares of resources and influence.Rarely if ever did he speak in a
sustainedand systematicway of the civil sphere or of democracy.
Similarly,Tilly preferredto speak of societal actors' increasingbargainingpower
vis-a-vis states faced with a growingneed for resources in supportof war-making
and war-preparationeffortsratherthan to posit the rise in the modern West of a
sphere of social life organized around the principlesof solidarity,associationalism,
10
wentto emphasize,however,thatthis"by no meansimpliesthatgovernments
must
Tillyimmediately
of contentious
claims"(Tilly2008a, 7).
figureas themakersor receivers
ForBourdieu'stheory
of thestate,see Bourdieu1998bi.
12ForBourdieu's
of thefieldof power,see Bourdieu(1998 [1989], 1996 [1989]).
theory
Springer

404
Am Soc (20 10) 4 1:400-422
and citizenship. States needed to extract the means of rule from their subject
populations,and this helped to accord the lattera capacity to gain in returnnew or
enhanced rights,privileges,and benefits.Where was civil society in any of this?
"The concept of civil society,"Tilly once declared, "is normativelyadmirablebut
analyticallyuseless" (Tilly 1992).13 Even his (not inconsiderable)contributionsto
the historicalsociology of democracy were pitched more in terms of bargaining
processes thanof voluntarismor any imputationto citizens of a commitmentto the
common good.14 In late works such as Contentionand Democracy in Europe, Trust
and Rule, and Democracy, Tilly argued thatthe integrationof trustnetworksinto
public politics was a crucial factorin the growthof democracy.15But not only did
thisinsightdivergefromcivil societytheoryin depictingtrustas a propertyof social
ties ratherthan as an individualattitude,it also retainedTilly's earlierconcernwith
strategic,interest-basedinteraction:statescould be expected to be more accountable
to citizenspreciselywhen the latterorganized themselvesinto extensive,politically
well-connected networks. Like Bourdieu, Tilly approached many of the same
- but in a fashion decidedly unsympatheticto
problemsas did civil society theory
many of its claims.
Tilly and Bourdieu bothfocusedmuch of theirlife's work on thestudyof political
conflict.Even when the specificobject of Bourdieu's investigationshappened not to
not only the respects
be thepolitical fieldper se, he remainedintenton illuminating,
in which that field was a structureof power and a space of (at least implicit)
contestation,but also how politics and the statewere (at least indirectly)influential
in shaping the field's historicaltrajectoryand present-daydynamics.Not even the
most sacralized and loftyrealms of high art- one thinkshere of Flaubert's literary
world- could properlybe understoodwithoutgraspinghow theywere implicatedin
largerand more encompassing scenes of political conflict(Bourdieu 1996 [1992]).
As for Tilly, the signatureobject of his scholarly work was always contentious
politics,the area of studyhe made his own throughsuch classic, paradigm-shaping
works as his primeron collective action, From Mobilization to Revolution (Tilly
1978). Whereas Bourdieu devoted only partof one major work,Homo Academicus
(1988 [1984]), to discussing episodes of political conflict(and even then with a
conspicuous emphasis on "maladjusted expectations,"precisely the sort of socialpsychological explanationthatalways made Tilly nervous), Tilly focused in study
and organizationalelementsunderlyingcollectiveaction.
afterstudyon the structural
mobilization
to
resource
approachesthatunderscoredthematerialbases
Sympathetic
in takingseriouslythe political structures
of social movements,he wenteven further
withinwhich collective action unfolds. One senses that this, too, is the direction
13The occasionof this
talk,as thepresentauthorrecallswell,was a New School forSocial Research
forumto honorthe publicationof Cohen and Arato's finetreatiseon civil society(1992). Tilly's
remarks
stirred
antagonistic
up intensecontroversy.
14Forone
to someotherworksbyTillyon
see Tilly(1990,ch.4). Citations
exampleofsucha discussion,
footnote.
are givenin thesubsequent
thehistorical
sociologyof democracy
15
ofpublicpoliticsfromcategorical
inequality
Tilly(2004a,2005a,2007). Tillyaddedthattheinsulation
to
and the reductionof autonomouspowercenterswere two otherimportant
processescontributing
ofthisview,see thesectionon "PublicPolitics:Civil Society
Fora condensedsummary
democratization.
and DemocracyRevisited,"in Tilly (2009). In sum, trustnetworksand publicpoliticswere Tilly's
alternative
meansof dealingwithcivilsociety.
j Springer

Am Soc (2010) 41:4(XM22
405
Bourdieu would have followed had he concernedhimselfmore systematicallywith

the studyof social movementsand revolutions.
Tilly's similaritieswithBourdieu are evidentalso in theirrespectiveapproaches to
cultural analysis. Both rejected from a young age the structural-functionalist
understandingof culture as a system of shared norms and values, as well as
approaches that take culture out of social relations and interactionsand place it
insteadinside individuals' heads. Both gravitatedtowardmore practice-basedways
of thinkingabout the topic. From the beginning,Bourdieu was more at home in
cultural inquiry than was Tilly, having imbibed Durkheimian thought from his
earliest days at the cole normale suprieure and having immersed himself in
anthropologicaland ethnologicaltheorywhile still in Algeria. He included in nearly
all his substantivewritingsallusions to sacralityand the profane;a core elementin
his work was the idea of symbolic classification.(This was encapsulated in one of
his signature phrases, "principles of social vision and di-vision.") Still more
- symbolic produche showed how what he called position-takings
systematically,
tions of various kinds, such as the artisticstylesand genres he investigatedin The

Rules of Art (1996 [1992]) - derive their significance,like positions in a social
space, from their relations with and differencefrom other position-takingsin a
semiotic system. On the other hand- perhaps also not surprisingly,given his
concernto counterpose,in the spiritof Marx and Weber,a materialistperspectiveto
those who would invest high culturewith the charisma of the sacred16- he never
worked out a fullysatisfactoryapproach to culturalanalysis. Highly inconsistentin
his theorizationof the relation between the symbolic and social, he vacillated
between affirmingthe analytic independence of cultural formationsand arguing
reductionisticallythat social positions are primary.17In most cases, he treated
cultural expressions as reflectionsof socioeconomic differences;as he put it in
Distinction,"tastes functionas markersof 'class'" (Bourdieu 1984 [1979], 2).
For his part,Tillycame to culturalinquirysomewhatlate in his careerand seemingly
moreout of grudgingrecognitionof the insightsand contributions
of the culturalturn
than fromany deep-seatedintellectualconversion.His work untilroughlythe early
1990s was, in fact,markedby a conspicuouslymaterialistsensibility.Not fornothing
has William Sewell, Jr.underscoredTilly's "lack of interestin the contentof the
religiousideas and ritualsthatdid so muchto fueltheVende rebellion,"addingwryly
thathere"thesupposedlyuseless Durkheim'sElementaryForms of theReligious Life
18
might[well] have come in handy"(Sewell 2010, 312). Nor is Sidney Tarrowoffthe
mark in pointingout thateven in the much later Coercion, Capital, and European
States,Tilly was "remarkablyunconcernedwithreligiouscontention"(Tarrow2008).
Afterthe early 1990s, however,Tilly commencedhis own culturaland performative
turn. As Viviana Zelizer observes in her epilogue to this volume, he began to
recognize that even certain of his own signatureideas, such as "repertoiresof
contention,"were "eminentlycultural."19Indeed, he began to produce, in striking
16Foran
of thisconcern,see Bourdieu(1987).
earlystatement
He declared,forexample,that"in a situation
of equilibrium,
thespace ofpositionstendsto command
thespace ofposition-takings"
Bourdieuand Wacquant(1992, 105); italicsin original.
The words"supposedly
useless"are a reference
to Tilly'spaper,"Useless Durkheim"
(1981b,ch. 4).
CharlesTilly,private
communication,
1992,quotedfromVivianaZelizer,"ChuckTillyandMozart,"in
thisvolume.
Springer

406
Am Soc (2010) 41:40(M22
resemblanceto Bourdieu- compare,forinstance,his essays in Identities,Boundaries,

and Social Ties to those of Bourdieu in Language and SymbolicPower (Tilly 2005b,
Bourdieu 1991b)- powerful accounts of boundary-drawingand of the symbolic
constructionof groups and identities.He spoke as well, in the spiritof American
pragmatism,of how culture is actively and creativelydeployed, negotiated,and
as in his late studies of contentiousperformances.Yet even then,Tilly
transformed,
continuedto subordinatehis culturalinquiries to a fundamentallysocial-structural
logic. As Rogers Brubaker (2010) points out, he never satisfactorilygrasped the
analyticimportanceof discourses,languages,and vocabularies,or, forthatmatter,of
ritualpractices.
Perhaps the most remarkablesimilaritybetween the sociological visions of Tilly
- in Bourdieu's case, fromearly
and Bourdieu lies in theirpassionate commitment
on; in Tilly's, fromroughlymidway throughhis career- to what they both called
relationalthinking.Both made the terma catchphrasefortheirlife's work,and both
will forevermorebe associated with the idea of a "relationalsociology." Drawing
explicitly on Ernst Cassirer's distinction between substantialistand relational
thinking,Bourdieu developed a relationalapproach to the studyof social fields,or
of "spaces offerees and of struggles."20As he describedthemin The State Nobility,
these are "network[s]of ... objective relations among entitiesthat,like heavenly
bodies belonging to the same gravitationalfield,produce effectsupon one another
from afar" (Bourdieu 1996 [1989], 132). More specifically, fields, as he
conceptualizedthem,are structuresof relationsnot between concretesubstancesor
entities,but rather,between the nodes those entitieshappen to occupy, the point
being thatone mustanalyze those entitiesnot in isolation,as in the styleof a "village
monograph,"but as occupants of positions withinbroaderrelationalconfigurations.
In Bourdieu's view, the structuralpositions themselves of a field, including its
dominantand dominated poles, are to be investigatedin termsof the distinctive
profilesof capital associated with them.Capitals functionsboth as weapons and as
stakes in strugglesforascendancy.Hence any field (froma synchronieperspective)
is a structureor temporarystate of power relations within what is also (from a
diachronic perspective) an ongoing struggle for domination waged by the
deploymentof relevantcapitals.
For his part,Tilly came to relationalthinkingthroughthe influenceof one of his
HarrisonWhite,who at the time(the 1980s-90s) was elaboratingan
contemporaries,
expansive networks-basedtheoryof society,one in some respects as ambitious as
thatof TalcottParsons.21Tilly was favorablydisposed towardthisapproachbecause
it led away from both holistic or group-centeredways of thinking,as in the
he had rejected since his youth,and the various formsof
structural-functionalism
individualism(rational-choicetheory; phenomenology) which had emerged over
time as its paired opposite. As Tilly put it, "Crudely speaking,general descriptions
and explanationsof social processes divide into threecategories.Systemicaccounts
posit a coherent, self-sustainingentity such as a society, a world-economy,a
20One ofhis mentors
in pointing
at thecole normalesuprieure,
GastonBachelard,was also influential
Bourdieutowarda relational
way of thinking.
11
to thisauthorthatithad made
See, e.g.,White(1992). Atthetimethisbookcameout,Tillyremarked
himrethink
he had learned(or thought
he had learned)his pastforty
yearsin sociology.
everything
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Am Soc (2010) 41:4(KM22
407
an organization,a household, or at the limita person,explainingevents

community,
inside thatentityby theirlocation withinthe entityas a whole. . . . Dispositional
- in this case more oftenindividuals than
accounts similarlyposit coherententities
any others but explain the actions of those entitiesby means of theirorientations
just before the point of action. Competing dispositional accounts featuremotives,
decision logics, emotions,and culturaltemplates.. . . Transactional accounts take
interactionsamong social sites as theirstartingpoints,treatingboth events at those
sites and durable characteristics of those sites as outcomes of interactions.
Transactionalaccounts become relational- anothertermwidely employed in this
context- when they focus on persistentfeaturesof transactionsbetween specific
social sites" (Tilly 2005c, 14; italics in original). There was no doubt as to where
Tilly's own sympathieslay.
For Tilly,the greatmeritof transactionalapproaches was thattheyallowed one to
centersociological analysis around the identificationand delineation of relational
mechanisms.22Here too one findsa deep commonalitybetweenhis way of thinking
and thatof Bourdieu. All the more so in his lateryears, Tilly insistedthatanalysts
seek to generalize, not throughthe development of what he called "invariant
models"- thatis, explanationsfollowingtherecipe: "(1) assume a coherent,durable,
social unit;(2) attributea generalconditionor process to thatunit;(3)
self-propelling
invoke or inventan invariantmodel of that condition or process; (4) explain the
behavior of the unit on the basis of its conformityto that invariantmodel" (Tilly
1995, 1595)- but throughthe invocationof "recurrentcauses" which, singly or in
concatenation, produce variable but explicable effects. The proper aim of
explanation,he held, was "not to give a 'complete' account (whateverthat might
be) but to get the main connections right" (Tilly 1990, 36). In different
"combinations,circumstances,and sequences," "deep causes" would provide the
keys to explanation,thepointbeing to build up an inventoryof such mechanisms,to
specifytheiroperations"withreflectivecare and multipleexamples," and to invoke
themas warranted,much as a hydrologistwould invoke mechanismsof water flow
to analyze specific instancesof flooding(Tilly 1995, 1602).23 In a paper presented
the year beforehe died, Tilly identifiedRobert Merton as a key progenitorof this
mechanismic approach. From Merton, he noted, one learns how to develop
"theoreticallysophisticatedaccounts of social processes somewhere between the
stratosphereof global abstractionand the undergroundof thick description"(Tilly
2010, 55).
In Bourdieu's work, the program of a mechanisms-based social science was
propoundedless explicitlyand insistentlythan in Tilly's. Yet it is fair to say that
Bourdieu's own writingsare also fairlybrimmingwith mechanisms of different
sorts;sociological inquiry,as he practicedit, seeks to generalize fromthe particular
to thegeneralby invokingan arrayof field-specific(and oftenfield-spanning)causal
processes. As an example of this approach, Bourdieu specified and explored
carefully the workings of various mechanisms of vulgarization whereby the
22
his mechanisms
PerhapstheworksinwhichTillymostforcefully
presented
agendawere:Tilly(1998);
McAdamet al. (2001); Tillyand Tarrow(2007); and Tilly(2008b).
thepsychoanalyst
whodrawsuponan arrayofmechanisms
ofdefense
lillymightalso havementioned
to explainspecificinstances
of neurotic
behavior.
} Springer

408
Am Soc (20 10) 4 1:400-422
privilegedmaintaina certainsocial as well as culturaldistancefromthedominated.This

was one ofthekeyanalyticcontributions
ofDistinction.Or, to takeanotherexample,he
investigatedthe subtleand littleunderstoodprocesses of "euphemization,"thatis, of
and sublimation,so skillfullyused by
negation(in the Freudiansense of Verneinung)
philosopherMartinHeideggerin givingexpressionto his contemptforthemasses and
for social welfare,an "impositionof form"emblematicof the way in which any
culturalproducergives voice to his or her politicalstance withoutseemingto do so.
of Bourdieu's monograph,The Political Ontologyof
This was a signal contribution
Martin Heidegger (Bourdieu 1991 [1988]). When one interpreterof Bourdieu
underscoredthe close association of his work with critical realism, a school of
thoughtin the philosophy of science that posits the realityof underlyingcausal
and mechanisms,Bourdieu fullyacknowledgedthe affinity,
structures
that,
affirming
"like [Roy] Bhaskar,whose workhe ha[d] recentlydiscovered,he has been a realistall
along" (Vandenberghe1999, 62).24 (Much the same linkagewithcriticalrealismhas
also been highlightedin the case of Tilly's laterwritings[Steinmetz2010].) Again,
verylate in life Bourdieu also came to realize the hidden similaritiesin this respect
between his sociology and that of Merton (at least in intent),pointingout in a
favorablelightMerton'sabiding concernto "reject . . . both concept-lessempiricism
and data-lesstheoreticism"
(Bourdieu 2004 [2001], 13).
for
both
Tilly and Bourdieu, "gettingthe connectionsright"meant
Strikingly,
to
a
adhering
program of broad ecumenicalism with respect to the use of
tools
and approaches. Bourdieu decried the tendencyof research
methodological
traditionsin his day to crystallizearound this or thatspecific technique,lamenting
memorablythatone oftenfindsin sociology "monomaniacs of log-linearmodeling,
of discourse analysis, of participant observation, of open-ended or in-depth
or of ethnographicdescription.. . . We musttry,"he added, "in every
interviewing,
all the techniquesthatare relevantand practicallyusable, given the
to
mobilize
case,
Watchout
definitionof the object and thepracticalconditionsof data collection
for methodologicalwatchdogs!" (Bourdieu and Wacquant 1992, 226, 227). In his
own sociological practice,Bourdieu was unusuallywide-rangingin his deployment
of different
methods,making use over the course of his career of virtuallythe full
of
panoply quantitativeas well as qualitativeapproaches. For his part,Tilly was less
explicitabout the need formethodologicalpluralism.Yet he did not have to be: he
led powerfullyby example. As one commentatorhas put it,"For him the important
thingwasn't the methodologybut the object to be explained" (Sewell 2010, 311).
From early on, Tilly pioneered the development of quantitativesocial science
history,as in his coauthoredwork, Strikesin France (Shorterand Tilly 1994; see
also Tilly et al. 1975; Tilly 1986a); he also pursued more conventional archival
researches.In lateryears,he also triedhis hand at such formalmethodsof relational
sociology as networkanalysis "see Tilly (1997)".25 In fact,boththinkerswere drawn
powerfullyto the use of relationalmethods,Bourdieu at one point famouslystating
that correspondenceanalysis, one of his favoriteapproaches, was the relational
methodpar excellence (Bourdieu and Wacquant 1992, 96).
24Bhaskar
's seminalworkson criticalrealismareA RealistTheoryofScience(1975) and ThePossibility
ofNaturalism
(1998).
25See also
studies.
of social network
Tillyand Wood(2003). Tillywas alwaysan ardententhusiast
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Am Soc (2010) 41:4(KM22
409
- and practice- was but one

This "whatever works" aspect of their thinking
indicatorof Tilly's and Bourdieu's profoundaffinitieswith American pragmatism.
Althoughtheycame to realize it only laterin life,bothacknowledgedhow close they
were to the pragmatistsin theirconcern to returnto experience (perhaps again in
reactionto Parsons); in theirinterestin relationalthinking(Dewey, James,and Mead
had always made thisa centralthemeof theirwork); in theirconcern to specifythe
causal mechanismsbehindhistoricaloutcomes (as Neil Gross has emphasized in this
volume [2010]); in their interestin practical action guided less by means-ends
reasoningthanby the forceof dispositionsand (largelyunconscious) habits; and in
theirfocus on how people engage in (sometimescreativeand experimental)effortsat
or organizationalproblem-solving.Tilly remarkedin his preface
social, interactional,
to Why?: "If this were an academic treatise,I would surely . . . trace my line of
argumentback throughAmericanpragmatismvia JohnDewey and George Herbert
writersKenneth
Mead," taking pains also to mention the pragmatism-influenced
Burke and C. WrightMills (Tilly 2006a, x). In Durable Inequality,Tilly also cited
Charles Sanders Peirce as an inspirationforhis relationalthinking,togetherwiththe
economistJohnR. Commons, yet anotherthinkerclosely aligned with
institutional
the pragmatistintellectualtradition(Tilly 1998, 18). For his own part, Bourdieu
invoked the pragmatists,especially Dewey, at several points in his life's work,
includingin Pascalian Meditations,where he connected his critiquesof scholasticism with the pragmatists'analyses of theoreticalknowledge; and in Invitation,
where,in even more directterms,he affirmedthat"the affinitiesand convergences
[of his work with pragmatism]are quite striking"(Bourdieu and Wacquant 1992,
122). It is no accidentperhapsthatthe sweeping influenceof Tilly and Bourdieu in
present-daysocial thoughtcoincides so closely with the worldwide upsurge of
interestin classical pragmatistphilosophy.26
II
However intriguingmay have been the similaritiesbetweenTilly and Bourdieu, it is
instructiveas well to note theirsignificantdifferences.These may be categorized,
roughlyspeaking, as theoretical,methodological,substantive,and moral-practical,
with additional differencesas well in terms of intellectual styles and temper.
Theoretically,the key differencebetween Tilly and Bourdieu has to do with their
respective understandingsof relational sociology. As we have noted, Bourdieu
stressedthat configurationsof objective relations among positions in a social or
culturalspace were of paramountimportance.Interactionsbetween discreteentities
or actors(individualor collective) matteredfarless. Indeed, Bourdieu never tiredof
over interaction,
stressingthepriorityof structure
declaringrepeatedlythat"the truth
of the interactionis not to be foundin the interactionitself."27Occupants of one or
several objective positions could have no directrelationswith one anotherbut still
26More
side of pragmatist
complexwas theirrelationto the democratic-participatory
thought,
given
ofthecivilsocietyconcept(and alongwithit,workon democracy
Tilly'sandBourdieu'ssharedrejection
and thepublicsphere),as discussedabove.
l
See, e.g.,Bourdieu(2005, 148).
Springer

410
Am Soc (2010) 41:400-422
be mutuallydeterminative.By contrast,Tilly's relationalismwas as much about

transactionsas about structuredpatternsof relations. In this regard, it resembled
White's thinkingmore than it did Bourdieu's- and was subject to the same
criticismsthatBourdieu, in The Social Structuresof theEconomy,directedat White
and, by extension,at othernetworkanalysts:"Though he sees the [fieldin question]
as a 'self-reproducingsocial structure,'[he] seeks the underlyingprinciplebehind
[actors'] strategies... not in the constraintsinherentin theirstructural
position,but
in the observationand decipheringof signals given out by the behavior of other
[actors]" (Bourdieu 2005, 207).28 Tilly never developed the sort of field-theoretic
approach that marked the social thoughtof Bourdieu. As a result,his later work
(after his relational turn in the 1980s) could fairly be characterized,as Jack
Goldstone (2010) has suggested in this volume, as evincing an interactionist
moments.
undertoweven in its most structuralist
A second theoreticaldifferencebetween Tilly and Bourdieu is closely bound up
withthis divergencein theirrespectiveunderstandingsof relationality.In several of
his final works, Tilly moved explicitly onto interactional terrain, in a way
Erving Goffinan.Early
unexpectedlyreminiscentof his othergreat contemporary,
in his career,he had kept a studieddistance fromthe symbolic interactionists,
who,
as Randall Collins has observed,were, duringhis formativeperiod at Harvard,more
"associated with Chicago and the West" (Collins 2010, 5). However, in his
posthumouswork,ContentiousPerformances,Tillypaid extremelyclose attentionto
"the nuances of human interaction"as displayed in "claim-makingperformances"
(Tilly 2008a, 5). And in related work fromhis later years, he spoke as well of
"contentiousconversations"and of "the theatricalside of contention"(Tilly 2002a,
118). The performativeturn in the social sciences, a development inspired in
considerable part by Goffinan's writings,here seems to have swept up that most
unlikelyof objects: the studyof social movementsand collectiveaction. (Whetheror
not Tilly succeeded in overcominghis earlier tendencies is anotherquestion, for
oftenhe would depictperformancesin a conspicuouslyinstrumentalist
fashion.29)In
two paired works writtenduringthe closing decade of his life, Whyand Creditand
Blame, Tilly moved even more energeticallyinto the realm of "the interaction
order."30In the firstof these works,he examined reason-givingpractices,as well as
the ways in which these vary depending on the social relations extant between
reason-giversand reason-receiversand the effectsof reason-givingupon those
relations.In the second work,he took up questionsnot of the explanationsgiven for
behaviorbut of thejustice or injusticeascribed to it. Having gone two-thirdsof the
way towardcompletingthe full Kantian triad,he stopped shortof examiningthose
acts involved in the makingof specificallyaestheticjudgments.Yet these two gems
of interactionalanalysis amounted to some of the most imaginativework on the
topic since the seminal writingsof Goffinanhimself.
28Bourdieuoffers
toReflexive
termsinAnInvitation
inmoreimpersonal
similarcriticisms
Sociology,114:
to theanalysisof the
has been sacrificed
structures
"In network
analysis,thestudyof theseunderlying
and flows(of information,
services,etc.)
resources,
particular
linkages(betweenagentsor institutions)
whichtheybecomevisible."Once,whenthisauthoraskedWhiteand Tillyfortheirresponseto
through
thispassage,Tillyrepliedsimply:"metaphysics."
29SeeBrubaker(2010).
""
order"comestrom(iottman(iy3).
Tilly(2006a, 2008c). The phrase"interaction
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Am Soc (2010) 41:400-422
411
In all fairness,it must be acknowledgedthatBourdieu,too, moved subtletyonto

terrainin one of his final publications,The Social Structuresof the
interactionist
Economy, in which he devoted a full chapter to examining the conversational
interactionsbetween the sellers and buyers of single-familyhomes. In a forceful
statementpropoundinga dialecticalperspectiveon objectivismand subjectivism,he
argued: "Action or interactioncannot be understoodeitheras a mere mechanical
... or as a communicativeactionthatcould be explained
effectuation
of the structure
withouttakingaccountof the structural
necessityexpressedin it. ... Far frombeing a
mere ratificationof the structureof the economic relation,the interactionis an
- an always uncertainactualization,both in its course,
actualizationof thatstructure
whichis fullof suspenseand surprises,and in its veryexistence.. ." (Bourdieu 2005,
and interaction
175). In otherwords,structure
mutuallypresupposeone another.Given
thisinterrelation,
to investigate.31
theyare,in principle,equally important
Despite these
insights,however,Bourdieu never fullyrecantedon his formulaof the priorityof
structure
over interaction;
his acknowledgmenthere of interactionindicatedmore an
implicitconcessionon his partthan an avowed and explicitshiftin his thinking.As
Alexanderhas observedof mastertheoristsin general,"theoreticalstrainsare
Jeffrey
oftenunacknowledged[by them.]... Yet theyare privatelyexperienced. . ., and as
confront. . . theoreticalcriticismsof [their]work [they]may implicitly
[thesethinkers]
alter[their]commitments.
. . . The problemis thattheserevisionsare ad hoc. . . . They
occurinconsistently,
and usuallyin thetheoreticalinterstices.
As a result,thecategories
will
introduce
be
residual
to
the
main
line
of theoreticalargument"
they
merely
(Alexander1982, 300).
One othertheoretical
respectin whichTillydiffered
markedlyfromBourdieuwas in
the lesser significancehe accorded the social-psychologicallevel of analysis. For
how dominationis perpetuatedlay in the habitus,
Bourdieu,the key to understanding
thatsystemof dispositionsand taken-for-granted
ways of perceiving,thinking,and
that
in
his
as
the
of
served,
view,
feeling
generator strategiesof action(maritalstrategies,
educational
and so forth).Intentionsand choices were not
fertility
strategies,
strategies,
themajorwellspringsof action;rather,
theimportant
sourcewas to be foundin habitual
modes of engagementinternalizedthroughprimarysocialization and tweaked or
theidea
modified,or in rarecases reshaped,throughsecondarytraining.Appropriating
of thehabitusfromAristotelian-Thomistic
and
from
social
thought
twentieth-century
- Boudieu devotedso muchattention
thinkers
such as MauriceMerleau-Ponty
to itthat
it became perhapshis signaturetheoreticalconcept.32No comparablenotionis to be
foundin Tilly'smassivelife'swork.Althoughhe did speak in some of his laterwritings
of identities,he never developed a systematicaccount of the social psychologyof
domination.33Relatedly,his implicittheoryof action always retaineda somewhat
rationalisticcast- despite his expressed misgivingsabout rational choice theory.34
And the studyof everydayformsof domination,to which the habitus concept lent
31VivianaZelizer
October2010) has suggestedthatone of Bourdieu
's early
(personalcommunication,
- a monographon photography
- constitutes
writings
yet anotherexceptionto the generalrule of
structure
overinteraction.
See Bourdieu(1990 [1965]).
privileging
The conceptof thehabitusappearsin nearlyall of Bourdieu
's writings;
it is even anticipated
in his
earliestwritings
on Algeria,suchas thestudiescollectedin Algeria1960.
ForTilly'sperspective
on theconceptof identity,
see, e.g.,Tilly(2002b); McAdamet al. (2001, eh. 5).
" Une sees this
perhapsmostclearlym Tilly(1978).
t Springer

412
Am Soc (20 10) 4 1:40(M22
himnearlyso muchas theinvestigation

itselfespecially,
neverpreoccupied
of largescale politicaldevelopments
and conflict.
Hencean idea suchas symbolicviolence,
- the idea thatdomination
is
perhapsthe verylinchpinof Bourdieu'ssociology
if
in
the
active
of
the
dominated
never
part
through
reproduced
unwitting
complicity
or implicitly,
in anyof Tilly'svoluminous
appeared,explicitly
writings.35
So muchfortheprincipaltheoretical
differences
betweenTillyand Bourdieu.
difference
earlier,in the
Perhapsthefundamental
methodological
lay,as mentioned
the
on
of
causal
mechanisms.
Forthe
emphasestheyplaced
specification
respective
laterTilly,mechanisms
wereall-important.
were
Indeed,afterthe1980s,hiswritings
chockfullof exhortations
to movetowarda fullymechanismic
social science.His
collaborative
writings(withDoug McAdam and SidneyTarrow)on contentious
centered
politics
squarelyon this agenda,one mechanismafteranother,not to
mentionalso compoundedsets of mechanisms,
whichwere termed"processes,"
across
studies.36
identified
those
several
at least in
being
Perhapsthehegemony,
variable-based
Americansocialscience,of statistical
this
analysisprompted concern
(in France,by contrast,
sociologyenjoyednowherenearthesamelevel
quantitative
somewhat
ofprestige
and influence);
closerto home,perhapsitwas thestrategic
or,
in
of statistical
invocation
reasoning highlyacclaimedworksof historical
sociology
suchas Theda Skocpol'sStatesand Social Revolutions
(Skocpol 1979). Whatever
his methodological
while
thereason,Tillymade causal mechanisms
rallying-cry,
less stressuponthem,preferring
insteadto thinkinterms
Bourdieulaidconsiderably
offielddynamics.
(The senseon thepartofmanyreadersofDynamicsofContention
and othersuchmechanism-based
worksthattheyfeature
a disorderly
cacophanyof
in
to
mechanisms
be
not
back to
mechanisms
might traceable, fact, Tilly's
relating
It
that
focused
on
also
be
mentioned
fields.) might
Tilly
"large-n"projectsto a far
than
did
who
instead
to
overcome
theuniversalism/
Bourdieu,
sought
greater
degree
in
so
as
to
observe
bothwhat
fields
divide
depth
by studying
specific
particularism
In Bourdieu,one findsthe
madethemlikeotherfieldsandwhatmadethemdistinct.
visionof a generaltheoryof fields;in Tilly,one findsmiddle-range
generalizations
of protesteventsand
of observations
based on dozens,sometimes
even hundreds,
othersuchinstancesof collectiveaction.37
Substantively
speaking,the divergencesbetweenTilly and Bourdieu were
in developing
considerable.
First,and perhapson accountof Tilly'slack of interest
idea
of
autonomous
around
the
a field-theoretic
one
centered
relatively
approach,
like
of
social
he
never
elaborated
or
microcosms
life,
anything a Weberian
spaces
in
this
unlike
differentiation
of
societal
Bourdieu,who was
respectquite
theory
outa historical
with
in
and
later
his
middle
working
years,
increasingly
preoccupied,
ownefforts
at
that
Parsons
's
also
of
should
be
remembered
(It
sociology modernity.
and colleagues,such
historical
and sociologicalanalysis,likethoseof his followers
Weberian.
On a biographical
as S.N. Eisenstadt,
wereexplicitly
level,thismightwell
a
to formulate
have been an important
factorleadingTillyaway fromanyattempt
out
that
in
must
also
be
fairness
it
of
pointed
although
sweepingtheory modernity,
35Foran
discussionof symbolicviolence,see Bourdieu(2001 f19981).
especiallyilluminating
36
See, e.g., McAdamet al. (2001); Tillyand Tarrow(2007).
37To
in sensibility
and vision,compare,e.g., Bourdieu(1993 [1984]) withTilly
capturethedifference
(1981c).
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Am Soc (2010) 41:400-422
413
his own later works of historical analysis, with subtitles such as "1768-2004,"
"1492-1992," "1650-2000," and even "AD 990-1990," were themselves no less
expansive in temporalscope.38) What one finds in Tilly are historicallygrounded
accountsof large-scaleshiftsin the characterand structureof states;in repertoiresof
contentiondrawnupon by actorsinvolved in political conflict;and in the extentand
scope of processes of democratization.He was far too ambivalent toward grand
theorizingto conceive of anythinglike a comprehensivetheoryof themodernworld.
A second substantivedifference
betweenTilly and Bourdieu has to do with their
of
modes
engagementwith Durkheimiansociology. For Tilly,
sharplycontrasting
Durkheimunequivocallysignifiedstructural-fiinctionalism,
and he respondedto the
former
as negativelyas he did to thelatter,
evenpenningin the 1970s a vigorouslyworded
critiqueentitled"Useless Durkheim"(Tilly 1981b). Meanwhile,Bourdieu,like so many
othersin the Frenchintellectualscene, was deeply influencedby Durkheimand never
feltthe need to repudiatehim. On the contrary,
he made frequentempiricaluse of
Durkheimianconcepts, fromthat of habitus itself(deployed by Durkheim in The
Evolutionof Educational Thought[Durkheim1977 (1938)]) to such ideas as organic
solidarity(Bourdieu characterizedthe innerlife of the field of power as an "organic
in thedivisionof thelaborof domination");39
or thesacredand theprofane(a
solidarity
crucial idea in his theoryof social stratification;
indeed,referencesto "consecration"
processes abound in Bourdieu's writings);or the ritualprocess (in analyses of what
of institution,"
or boundary-formation
Bourdieutermed'*rites
processesthatseparatethe
consecratedfromtheprofanized).40
TheirrespectiveattitudestowardDurkheimalso had
profoundconsequencesforTilly's and Bourdieu's effortsat culturalanalysis.Even as
Tilly moved toward a greater appreciationof culture, he tended to emphasize
performance(symbolic actions) over systemsof classification(symbolic structures).
Bourdieu,by contrast,was concernedas earlyas his youthfulexercisesin ethnology,
Indeed,thebinaryimage
inspiredby Claude Levi-Strauss,to analyzeculturalstructures.
the
Forms
1995
of
(in
[Durkheim
Elementary
(1912)])
religious systems of
classificationprovedof lastingimportanceto him,even as his own laterwork shifted
to the studyof modernEuropeansocieties.
A finalset of substantivedifferencesbetween Tilly and Bourdieu has to do with
their markedly contrastingdegrees of interestin collective action and societal
on the one hand, and social stratification,
on the other. Perhaps
transformation,
has
Bourdieu
been
at
least
in
the
wrongly,
depicted,
Anglo-Americanscene, as a
theorist"
on
account
of
his
relentless
focus on the mechanisms
"reproduction
dominants
in
various
kinds
of
social
worlds
maintain
theirascendancy.His
whereby
work was actually full of engagementswith historicalprocesses and social change,
Homo Academicus set fortha compellingview of historicalruptures
and,in particular,
as proceedingfromtheconvergenceof (originallycausally independent)field-specific
developments(Bourdieu 1988 [1984], chs. 4-5). As mentionedearlier,however,this
was his only sustainedwork on an episode of politicalcontention.And clearly,Tilly
was far more concerned over the course of his career with studyingcontentious
politics than was Bourdieu. The former'scontributionsto the sociological under38See
Tilly(2004b, 1993a,2004a, 1990).
39
discussion
inBourdieu(1996 [1989],386-88).
See,e.g.,Bourdieu
(1993a,25); see also themoreextended
see Bouraieu(jyyib, c); see also (lwo Livyj,102-15).
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414
Am Soc (2010) 41:400-422
standingof revolutions,social movements,and otherformsof politicalconflictwere

of those of any social thinkerover the second half of the
perhapsthe most important
twentiethcentury.Despite fielding challenges from a number of quarters,most
prominentlyfromcollective identityapproaches during the 1980s, Tilly's way of
thinkingabout collectiveaction attainedto a hegemonicstatusin the field,one only
reinforced
further
by his latercollaborationswithMcAdam and Tarrow,among others,
in what came to be known as the "dynamicsof contention"program.41
By contrast,Bourdieu was much more engaged across his life's work with the
study of social stratification.Indeed, virtually the entiretyof his output was
concerned in one way or anotherwith how dominationworks in social life. In
Distinction,The State Nobility,and othermajor writings,he elaborated a vision of
modern society as stratifiedin terms of class, with the differentclass groupings
objectivelydistinguishedfromone anotherby the volume and type of capital they
possess, as well as by theirtrajectorythroughthe social space.42 (The ascendantpetit
bourgeoisie was by no means to be understoodas identical to the declining petit
bourgeoisie,even thoughthe asset structuresof those two class fractionsmightbe
late in his career,
outwardlysimilar.43)Tilly came to the studyof social stratification
althoughit can also be argued thathe had dealt with issues of power and inequality
ever since his earliestwork. In Durable Inequality,he sought nothingless than to
reorient the entire field. Much like Bourdieu, he set out to understandhow
structural
inequitablerelationscan be so enduringeven in the midstof far-reaching
the
status
stratification
research
social
conventional
(e.g.,
change. Rejecting
to the
relational- "These analyses fail ...
attainmenttradition)as insuffiently
extentthat essential causal business takes place not inside individuals] . . . but
within social relations among persons and sets of persons" (Tilly 1998, 33)- he
accountof theproduction
proposedinsteada mechanisms-based,social-organizational
of categoricalinequalities.To date,Tilly's approachhas been picked
and reproduction
up by more thana few prominentresearchers,as Kim Voss (2010) points out in this
volume. Nonetheless, it remains more a specificationof mechanisms one must
consider,a set of tools for exploringsubstantivetopics such as chain migrationor
hoardingby ethnicgroups,thana major new historicallygroundedtheory
opportunity
structuresand processes of modern societies. Why have the
of the stratification
- come to be predominantin
- e.g., exploitation
mechanismswhich Tilly identifies
moderntimes?Unlike, forinstance,Marx in Capital, he does not say.44
Yet another set of differencesbetween Tilly and Bourdieu concerns their
respective stances on normative, moral-political issues. Bourdieu was more
politicallyengaged thanwas Tilly and, by the time of his passing, had become the
leading public intellectualin France. Although some have argued that political
engagementwas woven deeply into the fabricof his thoughtfromthe outset and
let us not forgetthat the Algerian flag, symbol of the Algerian independence
41Goldstone
venture.
tothisvolumeprovidesa usefuloverviewofthiscollaborative
's (2010) contribution
see
weredeemed"secondary
ofdivision
as raceandgender
toclass,suchprinciples
properties";
By contrast
ofthe
inMasculine
Domination
Distinction
However,
(2001[1998]),hisstudy
(Bourdieu
[1984(1979)],114ff).
and
Bourdieuseemedto suggestotherwise,
portraying
genderas farmorecentral
spaceof genderrelations,
enduring.
43See Bourdieu
(1984 [1979]),ch. 6.
44See Marx
(1990 [1867]).
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Am Soc (2010) 41:400-422
415
movementand of anticolonialresistanceto France, was emblazoned upon the cover

of his veryfirstbook, The Algerians- it is certainlyalso truethat,by the end, he had
moved decisivelyinto social commentaryand political intervention,
as evidenced by
the many topical pieces he penned (now collected in Acts of Resistance, The Firing
his leadershipof a collaborativeinquiryintothe
Line; and Political Interventions);45
effectsof neoliberalism in contemporarysociety (culminatingin his best-selling
volume; The Weightof the World[Bourdieu et al. 1999 (1993)]; and his involvement
in collective effortsby European intellectualson behalf of progressive societal
change.46For his part,Tilly began very much as a professionalsociologist, and he
remainedone throughouthis career.Like Bourdieu, he became more involved later
in life in speakingto the key issues of the day, intervening,
forinstance,in debates
on the meaning of 9/11 immediatelyfollowing those terroristattacks; warning
against demagogic reactions; aiming to "identifyerrorsin the public discussion";
and hopingto "stimulatemore creativeand constructivethinkingabout alternatives."
However, he also stressed that he "wasn't advocating anything."In a Weberian,
value-freespirit,he wrote: "When confrontedwith momentouspolitical and moral
choices, social scientists have a professional opportunity and obligation to
distinguishbetween theirpreferencesfor certainactions and outcomes, on the one
on the other"(Tilly 200 1).47 It was clear which
hand, and [scientificformulations],
of these alternativesTilly favored;engaged scholarshipwas to be subordinated,as
always, to conventionalacademic thinking.48
Even more importantthan the sheer volume of theirtopical writingsor political
engagements,however,was the fundamentalsignificanceof normativereasoningto
Tilly's and Bourdieu's intellectualprojects.Bourdieu developed a theoryof what he
called the Realpolitikof reason, in which he staked a claim on behalf of moral and
political universalismwhile suggestingthat the universal advances in history,not
throughthe pure intentionsof scientists,jurists,civil servants,politicians,and the
like,but because, as he put it in Pascalian Meditations,"thereare social microcosms
which,in spite of theirintrinsicambiguity,linked to theirenclosure in the privilege
and satisfiedegoism of a separationby status,are the site of strugglesin which the
prize is the universal and in which agents who, to differingdegrees depending on
theirposition and trajectory,
have a particular interestin the universal, in reason,
themselves
withweapons which are nothingotherthanthe most
truth,virtue,engage
universalconquests of theprevious struggles"(Bourdieu 2000 [1997], 123; italics in
original). Only throughsuch a theoryof reason in history,he claimed, could one
45See Bourdieu
(1998c,2003 [2001],2008 [2002]).
46See
Poupeauand Discepolo(2005).
ForWeber'sclassicformulation
of thedoctrine
of valuefreedom,
see Weber(1949 [1904]). As Zelizer
detailin anotherworkregarding
(2010) pointsout in thisvolume,Tillydid speak in somewhatgreater
Weber'sideaoftherelation
betweensocialscienceandethicalorpoliticalideals.Perhapsinterpreting
Weber
somewhat
toonarrowly
in thatpassage,he arguedthat"muchmore... liesbeyond"themereselectionof
efficient
meansforrealizing
ends:"[S]ocialscientists
havemuchto sayaboutethically
pregiven
implicated
theories
of possibility,
selections
. . . [T]o theextentthatit
amongpossibleactions,and causalarguments.
reliableknowledgeof causes and possibilities^]
social scienceobviouslybearson ethicaland
generates
politicalchoices."Tilly(1996,596).
48In a
humorously
self-deprecating
passagein one of his essays,Tillyonce imaginedthattheactivefile
maintainedon him by the Michigan State Police would include "a single sheet saying STOP
SURVEILLANCE.THIS GUY IS HARMLESS." Tilly(1993b,503).
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Am Soc (2010) 41:40(M22
hope to "extendand radicalizethe criticalintentionof Kantianrationalism"(Bourdieu

2000 [1997], 120).49 Tilly was similarlyconcernedto vindicatethe role of reason at
least in social thought,arguing strenuouslyagainst postmodernisthistoricismand
inveighingin one of his lateressays againstversionsof relativismthatquestion"the
of statementsabout social life," a fallacy leading, in his
verifiability
intersubjective
view, directlyto "softcore solipsism" (Tilly 2002c, 16).50 (His heavy stress on
generalizablemechanismicexplanationsstems in part fromthis very concernabout
postmodernism.)However, despite the vigor with which Tilly assertedhis critiques,
the place in his thinkingof normativecum philosophicalreflectionwas marginal.He
said littleor nothingabout theprogressiverole of theuniversalin history,and even in
where such issues mightwell have been raised,he
his writingson democratization,
chose insteadto proceed strictlyas an empiricaland historicalanalyst.51
Likely because of his abiding commitmentto the idea of a Realpolitikof reason,
Bourdieu was deeply concernedto promotethe practice of reflexivityin scientific
life, to an even greaterdegree than was Tilly, who also sounded that theme on
occasion. Ideally,criticalreflexivity
would make visible the effectson one's thinking
of occupying a certainposition in the social space; of adheringto the doxa that
define specific and delimitedfields withinthatspace; and of being shaped by lifeexperiences marked by distance frompractical necessities (skhol), "of which the
academic world representsthe institutionalizedform"(Bourdieu 2000 [1997], 13).
The last of thesewas especially significant,forsociologists were oftendrawnby the
- and by the intellectualdispositions
conditions of their intellectualproduction
produced by those conditions to elaborate thoroughlyahistoricaland atemporal
ways of thinking.By shedding light on these effects,reflexivitywould mark a
crucial step towardthe opening-upof inquiryand an enlargement,at least to some
Indeed, it would allow scholarsto begin
degree,of our freedomfromdetermination.
forces
otherwiseworkingthroughthem
the
control
over
unacknowledged
gaining
and behind their backs. Bourdieu stressed that such reflexive labor might be
undertaken most effectivelynot by the solitary, heroic intellectual but by a
community of inquirers bound together by a logic of peer competition and
"regulated struggle."52Much as Freud had once declared, "Where id was, there
ego shall be" (Freud 1965 [1933], 71), Bourdieu hoped that this mechanism of
collective socioanalysis would help to emancipate social scientists from the
structuresthat constitutetheir own intellectualand scholarly unconscious. Tilly,
too, was aware of the importance of directing a critical gaze back upon the
assumptionsguiding social scientificresearch.Nothingcould be more congenial to
49On theoccasionofhisfinallectures
itupthisway:"Itis,itseemstome,
hesummed
attheCollgede France,
itas a historical
constituted
becauseI have,quitemodestly,
problem. . . thatI havebeenabletoresolvethe
of reason,a problemas old as
or of thehistoricity
betweenreasonand history
problemof therelationship
Bourdieu(2004
has haunted
andone which,especiallyin thenineteenth
century,
philosophers."
philosophy
[20011),54; italicsin original.
50
- the"assumption
thattheonly
or mentalism
thefallacyof radicalindividualism
Tillyalso criticized
See Tilly(2002c, 16).
historical
eventsorcausesconsistof mentalstatesandtheiralterations."
significant
51
See, e.g.,Tilly(2007).
overtheentirecourseof Bourdieu'scareer,was crucialto him
Thisthemeof reflexivity,
so prominent
with
of"breaking"
theimportance
he stressed
fromtheverybeginning.
As earlyas TheCraftofSociology,
as wellas histeacherat thecole normalesuprieure,
an notionhe derivedfromDurkheim
"prenotions,"
GastonBachelard.See Bourdieuet al. (1991 [1968]).
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Am Soc (2010) 41:400-422
417
him, in fact,than the project of radically questioningthe "standardstories" we so

oftentell about the social world and our own interventions
withinit. However, the
was nowherenear as developed or as prominentin his thinking
themeof reflexivity
as it was in Bourdieu's.53
A finalset of differences
betweenTillyand Bourdieuhas to do withtheirrespective
intellectualstyles.Bourdieu was the more theoreticallysystematicof the two, while
whichhe deplored.
seeking,likeTillyhimself,always to avoid fallingintotheoreticism,
Indeed,he devotedseveralimportant
works,such as Outline of a Theoryof Practice,
The Logic of Practice, Pascalian Meditations, and An Invitation to Reflexive
Sociology, to presentinghis distinctivetheoreticalideas and perspective(Bourdieu
1977 [1972], 1990 [1980], 2000 [1997]; Bourdieu and Wacquant 1992). Perhaps
because of havingstudiedphilosophyat the cole normalesuprieure,he was highly
self-consciousabout theepistemologicalunderpinnings
of his work,therelationof his
ideas to establishedcurrentsin philosophyand social thought,and the philosophyof
science implicationsof his way of doing sociology. Not only were his philosophy
teachers,Gaston Bachelard and Geoiges Canguilhem, referencedthroughouthis
- and withstartling
- to
buthe also alluded frequently
writings,
precisionand deftness
such master thinkersas Plato, Descartes, Leibnitz, and Wittgenstein.Put simply,
Bourdieu's writingswere consistently
morephilosophicallyrichand subtlethanthose
of Tilly, which, by contrast,hewed close to the less exalted, more down-to-earth,
normsof Anglo-Americansocial science writing.AlthoughTilly later came to see
certainlines of continuity
betweenhis own insightsand thoseof variousphilosophers,
such as the pragmatists,
and althoughhe came also to invoke ideas on occasion from
- a discussionof Aristotle'sclassificationof
Westernphilosophy
politicalconstitutions
in
and
8-1
he
was always far too
appears Regimes
Repertoires(Tilly 2006b,
0)54
muchtheempiricalsociologistto devote timeand energyto ponderingthefinerpoints
of connectionbetweenhis own work and the Westerncanon.
This discrepancyalso sheds lighton othernotable differencesbetween the two
sociologists,specificallyin theirwritingstyles and mannersof expression. Despite
producingnotoriouslycomplex and forbiddingprose, Bourdieu fashioned himself
something of the literarystylist,continually seeking beauty of expression and
and achieving,at least forthose patientand persevering
elegance in his formulations
to
the
initial
difficulties,a certain measure of literarygrace.
enough
get past
one
never
in
finds
his
Moreover,
prose lengthystringsof citations (although his
endnoteswere oftenfullof references)or thenames of any but themost fundamental
of thinkers(Aristotle,Kant, Marx, and Weber frequently
appear therebut only rarely
the most recentauthorsin AJS or ASK). A classic exemplar of French intellectual
Bourdieu raised empiricalsociology to a level equal to thatof themost
aristocratism,
exalted academic writingof the twentiethcentury.55
By contrast,Tilly,somethingof
a literarystylisthimself,as evidenced by his lean and vigorous prose interspersed
withtellingexamples and illustrations,
preferredinsteada more punchyand efficient
He
also
liked
to
cite
the
work
of
style.56
relativelyyoung and unrecognizedscholars,
53
See, e.g.,(Tilly2002d,25-42); Tilly(2006a).
See also thediscussionof Aristotle
s theory
of theemotionsin Tilly(1999).
Forsomereflections
on his own writing
stvle.see Bourdieu1996 F19921.177-78Y
56Foran
on social sciencewriting,
see Tilly(1986b).
exampleof Tilly'sthoughts
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418
Am Soc (2010) 41:400-422
thanof an evolving and collaborative

conveyingthe sense less of timelessprofundity
researchprogram.Among the most strikingfeaturesof his writingstyle,moreoverand one that would become nearly inescapable during his later years- was his
reliance upon lists of points. Sentence aftersentence,paragraphafter
extraordinary
paragraph,would be presentedin the formof a list,a mode of expressionthat,while
surelyeconomical, also detractedfromthe pleasure of followinghis complex and
carefularguments.Perhapsnowherewas the stereotypicaldifferencebetweenFrench
and American sensibilities, between the Old World and the New, between
aristocraticand democraticstyles (to invoke the Tocquevillean binary),so clearly
markedas in these literarydiscrepancies.57
Ill
One is temptedto assign Bourdieu to the highest rank of sociological thinkers,
alongside such canonical mastersas Marx, Weber,and Durkheim while consigning
Tilly to the second tier, alongside such influentialand enduring contributorsas
Merton,White,and Goffinan.In Bourdieu, one encountersa remarkableconfluence
of qualities- sheer philosophic and analytic depth, substantivescope, and moralpolitical insightand relevance that Tilly simply cannot match, despite his own
formidableaccomplishmentsof an empiricaland methodologicalnature.58Indeed,
in reading Bourdieu's work, one feels oneself in the presence of an intellectof
superiorrank, one possessed of a degree of subtletyand sophisticationthatmake
social thought.Perhaps the difference
him all but peerless in twentieth-century
can be ascribed to theirrespective formativemilieux, which allowed Bourdieu to
develop intellectually in ways that Tilly could not, to cultivate those added
dimensions one fails to discern in his American counterpart.Perhaps the answer
lies in the tacit expectations Bourdieu encounteredwithin his own professional
context, the peculiar academic consecration (combined with isolation from
graduate students) bestowed upon him by his lofty perch at the Collge de
France. Or perhaps it was the special burden, the unique fate or destiny,he felt
(despite himself)to become a matred penser on the model of a Sartreor a LeviStrauss, on account of the profound obsession with (intellectual) kingship so
distinctiveof French culturallife.
There is also the fact that, in one other crucial respect, these two master
thinkersevolved in differentdirections. It is not simply that, in his later years,
Tilly produced too much too quickly,as is oftensaid of him partlyin admiration
(tinged with envy) and partlyin lament. (He probably did produce too much, but
the dropoffin quality was nowhere near as significantas his detractorswould
have it.) Rather,it is thatthe natureof the work he produced shiftedimportantly
afterthe early triumphof The Vende,his greatmasterpiece.In Sewell, Jr.'swords,
"Althoughhe never ceased to prowl the archives,his laterwork was much more in
57
See, de Tocqueville(1981 [1835/1840]).
basedin considerable
Thisis,ofcourse,an evaluative
parton scholasticvalues,as Bourdieu,
judgment
wouldhavebeenamongthefirstto emphasize.
everthereflexive
sociologist,
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Am Soc (2010) 41:40(M22
419
the mold of previous historical sociology: it reached for broad generalizations

about macrohistoricaltrends,and its archival findsgenerallyserved as illustrations
of those trendsratherthanas means of drillingever more deeply into the operation
of social systems. [One misses,] in the later work, the sense of creative tension
between the particularand the general" (Sewell, Jr.2010, 313). Bourdieu's work,
too, can be said to have become less vital during his final years, at least by
comparisonto the astonishingvitalityof his middle period, thatspan of years that
yielded such colossal achievements as Homo Academicus, Distinction, The State
Nobility,and The Rules of Art. However, Bourdieu was also working on yet
anothermajor studyat the timeof his passing, a book on Manet and the nineteenthcenturyfield of Frenchpainting,which was to have been the companion volume to
The Rules of Art.59And he retainedhis interestin the particular(in relationto the
general) and was continuingto do painstakingempiricalresearch.This concern for
specificity,which seemed to ebb somewhat in Tilly's last decade as he shifted
towardmore of a didactic role (even in his writtenwork), stayed with Bourdieu to
the very end.
To leave it at that,however,would be grossly inadequate, for we would shortthe likely futureimpact of Tilly's unrivaledpedagogy,
sightedlybe underestimating
an impactthatin lateryearsmay well surpassBourdieu's own, much as Merton'shas
surpassednearlyeveryoneelse's. Even beyond his writtenoeuvre, Tilly foundways
of passing down the craftof sociology he had himselfso fullymastered,much as
medieval artisans or Quattrocento painters (to borrow a favorite Bourdieuian
analogy) handed down the trade in theirown workshops.60Reaching back to the
masterteachersof the past, one thinkshere of no less thanDurkheimhimself,or of
RobertPark, or perhaps of Tilly's old colleague at Michigan, Otis Dudley Duncan.
(Closer to our own times,one thinksof HarrisonWhite.) All these figuresexerteda
lasting influence not merely through their publications but also through their
teaching. This is the side of Tilly best remembered in the many compelling
- and also in his various
testimonialsof his studentsand collaborators
pieces, large
and small, on researchpractice.(Even From Mobilization to Revolution,oftenseen
as a scholarlytreatise,was writtenoriginallyas a shop manual for coworkersand
apprentices.)It is not fornothingthatTilly has been called "the foundingfatherof
twenty-first
centurysociology."61In the end, it is difficult,if not meaningless, to
seek to prioritizehis and Bourdieu's respectivecontributionsand accomplishments.
- and the
Social thinkerswill continue to grapple with their far-ranginginsights
bodies
of
work
left
behind
for
decades
to
come.
Both
magnificent
they
belonged to
thatrarebreed: the absolute mastersof theircraft.Today theystand as indispensable
guidesto thesociologicalenterprise.
Tillyand Bourdieuboth:supremeembodimentsof
the art of doing good sociology. Their work will be rememberedfor as long as the
lives on.
enterprise
59Fora
thiswork,see Bourdieu(1993b).
paperthatanticipates
Forthisanalogy,see Bourdieuand Wacquant(1992, 220); see also Bourdieu(1993a), by Beate Krais,
in Bourdieuet al. (1991 [1968],256).
1 Martin
to AdamAshforth.
(2008). The quotationis attributed
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420
Am Soc (2010) 41:40(M22
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Tilly and Bourdieu

Author(s): Mustafa Emirbayer

This content downloaded from 168.176.5.118 on Mon, 9 Jun 2014 18:16:44 PM

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(1991a, 378). On mid-twentieth

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hundredyears," Tilly remarkedin his methodologicalstudy,Big Structures,Large

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Bourdieu would have followed had he concernedhimselfmore systematicallywith

tions of various kinds, such as the artisticstylesand genres he investigatedin The

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resemblanceto Bourdieu- compare,forinstance,his essays in Identities,Boundaries,

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an organization,a household, or at the limita person,explainingevents

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privilegedmaintaina certainsocial as well as culturaldistancefromthedominated.This

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- and practice- was but one

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be mutuallydeterminative.By contrast,Tilly's relationalismwas as much about

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In all fairness,it must be acknowledgedthatBourdieu,too, moved subtletyonto

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himnearlyso muchas theinvestigation

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standingof revolutions,social movements,and otherformsof politicalconflictwere

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movementand of anticolonialresistanceto France, was emblazoned upon the cover

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hope to "extendand radicalizethe criticalintentionof Kantianrationalism"(Bourdieu

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him, in fact,than the project of radically questioningthe "standardstories" we so

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thanof an evolving and collaborative

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the mold of previous historical sociology: it reached for broad generalizations

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Social science and politicalaction,translated