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POSXXX10.1177/0048393114525860Philosophy of the Social SciencesBjerre
Article
A New Foundation for

the Social Sciences?
Searles Misreading of
Durkheim
Philosophy of the Social Sciences

2015, Vol. 45(1) 5382
The Author(s) 2014
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DOI: 10.1177/0048393114525860
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Jrn Bjerre1
Abstract
The aim of John Searles philosophy of society is to provide a foundation for
the social sciences. Arguing that the study of social reality needs to be based
on a philosophy of language, Searle claims that sociology has little to offer
since no sociologist ever took language seriously. Attacking Durkheim headon, Searle not only claims that Durkheims project differs from his own but
also that Durkheims sociology has serious shortcomings. Opposing Searle,
this paper argues that Durkheims account of social reality is still viable and
that Searles attack backfires on his own theoretical project.
Keywords
Searle, Durkheim, philosophy, sociology, mind, downward causation
Despite numerous attempts to build a bridge between sociological theory and
philosophy, the two fields remain constituted by parallel discussions when it
comes to understanding social reality. Anne Rawls (2011, 412) recently
regretted this gap, emphasizing that the job of both sociology and philosophy is the same: to explain how people make sense, how they know reality.
Received 27 November 2013
1Aarhus
University, Aarhus, Denmark
Corresponding Author:
Jrn Bjerre, Department of Education, Aarhus University, Niels Juels Gade 84, Building 2110,
8200 Aarhus N, Denmark.
Email: jbje@dpu.dk
Downloaded from pos.sagepub.com by guest on November 15, 2016
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Philosophy of the Social Sciences 45(1)
John Searles theory of social reality constitutes an extreme case of a philosopher embarking on what has been a sociological project for at least a century,
without taking sociology into account. As Searle (1995) moved from the philosophy of language, via the philosophy of mind, to his quest for developing
a theory of social reality, the contributions of classical sociologists such as
Durkheim, Weber, and Simmel were summarily dismissed. Searle declared
that the sociologists lacked the necessary tools for understanding social
reality. The missing tools, according to Searle (1995, xii), were his own theory of speech acts, intentionality, and performatives.
Neil Gross later commented on Searles book that it is very Durkheimian,
and even that the core claims of [Searles] book do not advance all that much
beyond those which Emile Durkheim staked out a century ago (Gross 2006,
46). Not only did Searle reject Grosss claims but he also made a direct attack
on Durkheim, arguing that he is a bad philosopher and that his contributions
are riddled with shortcomings (Searle 2006). Commenting subsequently on
Searles reply, Steven Lukes noted that Searle was unfair to Durkheim on
certain points; however, Lukes (2007, 196) accepted Searles main argument
as fair enough.
This paper argues that Durkheims account of social reality survives
unscathed by John Searles critiques, and more importantly, that Searles
attack on Durkheim backfires on Searles own philosophy. Searle fails in his
attempt to answer the basic questions concerning human civilization using an
a-temporal, conceptual analysis of language.
1. Why Searle Finds Nothing Like That in

Durkheim
Searle constructs his argument by stating the core claims of his own theory,
then proceeding to demonstrate that there is nothing like that in Durkheim.
Before expanding on the problems involved in this method, I will introduce
Searles list of Durkheims shortcomings (Searle 2006).
According to Searle:
1. Durkheim does not provide an adequate account of the ontological
unity of the universe.
2. Durkheim does not provide an adequate account of the structure of
intentionality, either individual or collective.
3. Durkheim did not grasp the distinction between observer-relative and
observer-independent phenomena, or the distinction between the
ontological sense of the objective/subjective distinction and the epistemic sense.
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4. Durkheim implicitly denies the distinction between brute facts and

institutional facts.
5. Durkheim does not have an adequate conception of the assignment of
functions and consequently fails to see the observer-relative ontological status of functions. More importantly, he does not have the concept of status functions.
6. Durkheim does not make a distinction between regulative rules and
constitutive rules.
7. Durkheim has no account of deontology.
8. Durkheim fails to see the constitutive role of language in the structure
of society.
9. Durkheims notion of coercion prevents him from understanding
the special role of desire-independent reasons for action and the consequent presupposition of free will and rationality in the functioning
of society.
10. Durkheim lacks a notion of Background.
However obvious Searles method might appear, given the fact that he is
accused of making the same claims as those of Durkheim, Searle, in fact,
misses his target. The real issue is that Searle raises the agenda of sociology
while claiming to have constituted a new field. The issue is not whether philosophy of language and sociology use different terminology. Instead of
addressing the limitations of sociology, and demonstrating how these limitations could be overcome by philosophy of language, Searle addresses the
same basic problem as his predecessor.1 Rather than developing the existing
conceptual understanding, Searle produces a parallel conceptual cosmos,2
1In his 1995 book, Searle confronts what he sees as the false dilemma promoted within
philosophy, according to which one has to choose between reductionism, on the one
hand, and a super mind floating over individual minds on the other. Searle (1995,
25-26) clears the ground for his contribution, by stating that this is a false dilemma
since the collective intentionality referring to a we may be situated in the individual mind. It is much the same dilemma Durkheim confronted in 1895 in The Rules
of Sociological Method, where Durkheim proposed a third path between two positions
dominating the philosophical debate at the end of the nineteenth century: One was
either a scientist and accepted that society was reducible to individuals, or else one
was proposing a metaphysical dualism (Sawyer 2002, 227).
2Searle speaks of status function, Durkheim of function; Searle speaks of constitutive rules, whereas Durkheim uses the word rules and has an implicit assumptions about the constitutive functions of rules, as discussed by Rawls (2012); Searle
uses the term institutional facts, while Durkheim speaks of institutions and social
facts; Searle uses the word deontology, while Durkheim uses duty.
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which not only runs into some of the same problems as the older theory but
also returns to precisely those fallacies that Durkheim sought to correct.
Confronted with this critique, Searle aggressively defends his project but in
so doing reveals his own inadequate understanding of classical sociology. He
therefore fails to convince an audience of social scientists about the necessity
of following his model and abandoning Durkheim.
This paper opens by debating Searles eight claims on which the rest of
Searles claims are founded: if Searle fails to prove that language is constitutive of social reality, the justification for approaching social reality through
the analysis of language falls away.
I then address Searles metaphysical claims (claims 1, 2, and 10). It will be
argued that there are obvious reasons why Durkheim avoided asserting the
trivial point that we live in only one world, since he was focused on the more
important task of demonstrating that social reality follows laws that are different from the laws of nature. Further, it will be argued that Durkheim had
good reasons for avoiding the concept of intentionality and no reason to
invent a concept of background: In building his version of sociology,
Durkheim tried to avoid the use of metaphysical assumptions, such as that of
intentionality, and qua his methodological collectivism, he viewed social
reality as a background, which structures human action and therefore did not
need the notion of Background (Searle writes this word with a capital B).
Following this, I discuss the claims that are based on Searles misunderstanding of what Durkheim meant by a social fact (claims 3-7 and 9). It will
be shown that Searle misunderstands Durkheim in several of the following
claims: that Durkheims notion of coercion prevents him from accounting
for deontology, distinguishing between different types of social motivation,
seeing the special role of desire-independent reasons for action, distinguishing between regulative rules and constitutive rules, and accounting for status
functions. And further, that Durkheim is unable to make the distinctions
between observer-relative and observer-independent phenomena, brute facts
and institutional facts, the ontological and the epistemic sense of the objective/subjective distinction.
Finally, I will show that the real issue that distinguishes Searles and
Durkheims competing models lies in their basic assumptions: Searle assumes
that it is possible to study civilization by an a-historical analysis of language,
whereas Durkheim assumes that social reality is historical. According to
Searle, the foundations for the social sciences should be laid out by a priori
speculation, whereas Durkheim demands empirical study as the way in which
concepts should be developed. It is certainly possible, if not desirable, to
debate the foundations of the social sciences and the elementary forms of
civilization by analyzing the logic of ones own language. However,
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Durkheims argument against this method is relevant in relation to Searle:

one ends up learning more about how Searle thinks civilization has evolved,
than about civilization. Let us, therefore, begin our critique of Searle by his
assertion that social reality is language-based.
2. Language and the Social Construction of Social

Reality (Claim 8)
Searles approach certainly has the potential for making important contributions to the study of social reality, due to the fact that Searles understanding
of language exceeds that of the sociologist. However, instead of demonstrating how sociological theory might profit from a philosophy of language perspective, Searle bypasses sociology and develops a competing sociology
based on the assumption that social reality is effectively constituted by language (Searle 1995, 2010).
For Durkheim, language had a somewhat less central role. In the words of
Rawls (2004, 294), he basically saw language as the mirror of the society
and what it knows.3 However, it should be noted that Durkheim also saw
language as an institution, which makes the existence of other institutions
possible, and that language thereby constitutes a precondition for human
society (Durkheim [1917] 1982, 248). This Durkheimian argument concerning language was later developed by Peter Berger and Thomas Luckmann
(1966) in their influential book on The Social Construction of Reality. And if
it is not surprising that Searle does not mention Durkheims theory of language, a discussion of how Searles theory relates to Berger and Luckmanns
theory would have been expected given the fact that the title of Searles first
book on social reality is a twist on Berger and Luckmanns original title.
Whereas Berger and Luckmann argue that reality is socially constructed,
Searle (1995, 59) argues that this socially constructed reality itself is essentially constituted by language. The two contrasting views may be integrated
into an understanding of the social construction of social reality, which is, in
fact, Berger and Luckmanns project. Searle, however, does not see the
importance of the first social. He fails to accept the fact that the context in
which social reality is constructed through language is social in a material,
structural, relational, and embodied sense of the term. Searle is certainly
3Theories
of the role of language in the construction of social reality already existed

in the nineteenth century. Heymann Steinthal, Moritz Lazarus, and Wilhelm Wundt
among others theorized how language and psychology must be studied from the historical and social perspective of a Vlkerpsychologie, since customs, norms, and
other social phenomena contribute in the formation of mind (Jahoda 1992).
58
correct when he says that language constructs social reality, but he overlooks
the more important issue of how language co-evolved with other institutions,
such as religion, thus making his claim too exclusive.
2.1. Confusing Dependency with Identity

Social thought from Aristotle through Durkheim, Weber and Simmel to
Foucault, according to Searle, fails to explain language while simply taking
language for granted (Searle 2010, 62). This failure also applies to modern
social theorists such as Bourdieu and Habermas, who claim to be oriented
toward the role of language. This is because the sociologists do not see that
any account of the ontology of society has to begin with the philosophy of
language because language is presupposed by all social institutions (Searle
2006, 65; emphasis in original). The argument being,
You can have a society that has language but does not have governments,
private property, or money. But you cannot have a society that has governments,
private property, or money, but does not have a language. (Searle 2010, 62)
This argument confuses dependency with identity. The implied logic is as

follows: because human institutions depend on language, they are essentially
linguistic, which again is used as a condition for claiming that social reality
should be studied by language philosophy. The rule behind the logic is that
the analysis of a phenomenon should begin by analyzing what it is dependent
on, which is absurd, since social reality is dependent on so much else than
language, such as bacteria, bodies, air, water, and food.
And Searles (2010, 63) claim that all human institutions are essentially
linguistic (emphasis added) creates a vicious circle of self-reference in the
sense of Bertrand Russell; language is itself an institution and thus logically
belongs to the class of institutions of which it is supposed to be the essence.4
And further, to justify the claim that one thing, B, can be essentially another
thing, A, one has to demonstrate that the status of A is exclusive; otherwise,
B would not be essentially A. In other words, Searle would have to demonstrate why other aspects, such as power structure, status differentiation, and
moralityalso aspects of human institutionsdo not qualify as equally
essential as language. The methodological problem with any such search for
essentials is that it runs into problems of logical regress. Thus, rather than
solving the problem of defining society and human institutions, Searles
4If one member, A, of a classA, B, C, D, Econstitutes the essence of the other members, then that member, A, belongs to a class on a different level than member B, C, D, E.
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claim that language is constitutive of human institutions regresses into the

question of what language is, and further, what is constitutive of language.
What, for example, is constitutive of syntax and semantics? Which cognitive
operations? And, in turn, by which neurological processes are these operations constituted? How is life constituted?
Pointing out a dependency is not the same as explaining a phenomenon:
while it is evident that we cannot have language, cognition, or society without biological life, this does not prove that language, cognition, or society can
be explained by explaining biological facts. As we shall see further ahead,
this is one of the central inconsistencies of Searles philosophy: the logic of
his own argument forces him to postulate identity between different orders of
reality, such as society, mind, and brain, while needing the conceptual distinctions between these entities to formulate his argument.
2.2. Questioning Searles Identification of Language with

Symbolization
Searle is well aware of one of the major problems related to his assumption
that language is constitutive of social reality, namely, that we know that social
realities existed before language and that nonlinguistic animals have all sorts
of social groups. Searle (1995, 60) solves these problems by claiming that a
society must have a primitive form of a language and that language is logically prior to other institutions (emphasis added).
Defending these claims, Searle explains that what he means is that language is partly constitutive of institutional facts (emphasis added, but why
only partly here?) and that institutional facts essentially contain some symbolic elements in the following sense of symbolic: there are words, symbols, or other conventional devices that mean something or express something
or represent or symbolize something beyond themselves, in a way that is
publicly understandable (Searle 1995, 60-61; emphasis in original).
To defend the assumption that studying language will give us knowledge
about social reality, Searle thus introduces a third element, namely, symbolization, while claiming identity between language and symbolization.
Whereas language and symbolization can be dissociated only artificially
in any modern understanding, Durkheimin his study of The Elementary
Forms of Religious Lifeargues that social symbolization exists prior to both
mental symbolization and language. According to Durkheim ([1912] 1995),
it is by associating the social psychology of the group with the symbolic representation of the group in the form of the totemic emblem that mental life
emerged. Thus, whereas language becomes the dominant mode of symbolization, it is not the origin of symbolization but a much later development. This
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Durkheimian argument aligns with the theories of leading archaeologists and

cognitive theorists (Bellah 2005; Deacon 1997; Donald 1991; Mithen 1996),
whereas Searles argument finds little support in the archaeological accounts:
why should language be prior to institutions such as group bonding, rules of
interaction, meal-sharing, family, cave painting, or ritualization?
Even if the foundations of Durkheims theory are disputed,5 it is methodologically sound, whereas Searles argument remains paradoxical, due to the
fact that it attempts to deal with issues of origin, based on an a-temporal
analysis. Searles answer to Neil Gross (2006), who drew attention to this
fact, demonstrates the problem of Searles method. According to Searle, posing questions to him about the historical character of the development of
institutions is an invalid critique. This is, as Searle (2006, 67) states, accusing
him of not answering a set of questions that I am not in any sense attempting
to answer. However, the problem is not whether Searle asks the questions or
not; the question is whether it is possible to develop a conceptual framework
of a historical reality without debating the correspondence between concepts
and historical reality. It is the fact that Searle combines a conceptual analysis
of a historical reality with the claim of direct realism, which is the problem;
since not taking himself to the task of answering questions concerning the
historical character of the institutions about which he is theorizing amounts
to a refusal to justify his own claim, namely, the claim that his concepts correspond to real institutions.
3. Debating Searles Metaphysical Claims (1, 2, and 10)

Since Searles one world assumption, and his notions of intentionality and
Background, are metaphysical assumptions, the argument that Durkheim
does not share them may be explained by the simple fact that Durkheim tried
to avoid founding sociology on metaphysical assumptions. Searles assumptions imply what Durkheim called a materialistic monism, which according
to Durkheim ([1903] 1982, 177) should be avoided, since it makes human
life, whether of individuals or of societies, a mere epiphenomenon of
5Durkheim
argues that it is within religionin ritual actionsthat the origin of the

human mind should be sought and, therefore, consequently also the origin of the
mental/social categories, logic, and language (Durkheim [1912] 1995; Rawls 2004;
Schmaus 2004). His account has been attacked, due to both its logical argumentation and its empirical references (Needham 1963; Rawls 1997; Thomassen 2012);
and even today, new research on cognition raises debates about Durkheims theory
(Bergesen 2004; Bjerre 2012).
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physical forcesand therefore renders both sociology and psychology

useless.
According to Searle (2006, 59), the fact that we live in exactly one
world, implies that such things as nation-states and balance of payment
problems are part of exactly the same world as hydrogen atoms. Searle
thereby conflates world and reality, thus inferring from the trivial truth of
one world to the complex issue of reality/realities. The fact that only one
world exists does not prove that only one order of reality exists.
In contemporary debates on human evolution and reality, the assumption
of identity between biological, psychological, and cultural orders of reality is
being replaced by the search for consistency between explanations of different orders of reality (Hass et al. 2000; Machalek and Martin 2004). The
Durkheimian approach aligns perfectly well with this type of argument, contrary to Searles monistic argument, which is forced to assume that mental
phenomena are caused by lower-level properties.
Both conscious and unconscious mental phenomena are caused by
neurobiological processes in the brain and are realized in the brain, and the
neuronal processes themselves are manifestations of and dependent on even
more fundamental processes at the molecular, atomic, and subatomic levels.
(Searle 2010, 4; emphasis added)
Here, Searle is arguing for a version of upward causation from subatomic

levels to conscious and unconscious mental phenomena. This explanation
resembles the theory of epiphenomenalism, which was already considered
obsolete by Durkheim as he discussed mental causation in the end of the
nineteenth century. Even the psycho-physiological school itself, Durkheim
([1898] 1953, 2) argued, formally rejected the idea, while adding his own
essential point: even if mental phenomena are caused by upward causation,
once they are caused, they are in their turn causes (Durkheim [1898] 1953,
4): even if we accept the idea that mental phenomena such as the representation of money, presidents and nations-states are caused by neurobiological
processes, these phenomenaonce causedthemselves become causes:
once money becomes a mode of exchange, it produces possible actions and
thoughts that did not exist before. The sociological account of social reality
begins with this fact, arguing that we are dealing with observable social facts,
that is, realities, which have emerged through historical processes as enacted
reality. Once this enacted reality became institutionalized, it began to cause
and thus create mental images, which, as they became shared by the use of
language, began to exert causal effects on the mind. This is what Durkheim
means when he argues that social facts are something external to our brain.
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Just as the brain adapts to its natural environment, it also adapts to a world of
representations that are collectively shared. The consequence of this latter
mode of adaptation is that individuals, to become able to interact fluently
with others, are forced to construct their individual mental systems according
to a structure of collectively accepted ideas, categories, and representations.
These processes are what constitute social reality, and while being part of the
same world as hydrogen atoms, they clearly follow different lawsand,
accordingly, should be studied by the use of different methods. Recognizing
that the law of gravity applies to bodies but not to morality is not an ontological statement about the existence of different worldsbut a proof that we are
dealing with two different types of realities that follow different laws. The
same goes for Durkheims argument: that one cannot infer directly from the
law of natural selection to an understanding of social life (Durkheim [1898]
1953, 1).
3.1. Searles De Facto Dualisms

Due to the fact that it conflates world and reality, Searles material monism
becomes inconsistent. As already demonstrated by Kaufmann (2005, 451),
while Searle is defending a single natural ontology, he endows consciousness with a specific subjective ontology and thus implies a dualism
between a subjective and objective brain. According to Kaufmann (2005,
451, n.3), Searle fails to account for why some properties of the brain are
accessible to the surgeon while others remain accessible only to consciousness. Thus, Kaufmann (2005, 456) concludes, Searles attempt at solving the
mind-brain problems remains a pseudo-solution that reveals itself to be
empty, and insofar as Searles account for upward causation of mental processes fails, so does his methodological solipsism, the idea that mental life
can function according to an internal causal circuit. And since Searles argument, that intentionality can be explained independently, depends on this
idea, even the justification of Searles fundamental concept falls away
(Kaufmann 2005, 456). In fact, Searle ends up with two de facto dualisms:
between partly physical and purely mental states and between internal minds
and the external world, both logically inconsistent with Searles one world
assumption.
The problem here is not whether Searle solves the mind-brain problem.
The problem is that he does not have a consistent position from where he may
assert that Durkheim fails to be able to account for the ontological unity of
the universe or intentionality. After Kaufmann has rejected Searles attempt,
and looks for more reasonable alternatives, she turns to Durkheim, arguing
that the analogy between the relationship brain/mind and individual/society
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that Durkheim [1924/1996] drew many years ago still stands (Kaufmann
2005, 470).
While Durkheims theory has been, and still remains, the object of critique, the consequence of his argumentthat we must distinguish between
what is ontologically given, that is, that we live in one world, and the fact that
mental and social realities constitute different types of realitiesremains a
necessary condition for understanding social reality.
3.2. Intentionality
Searles claim that Durkheim does not provide an adequate account of the
structure of intentionality, either individual or collective, should be interpreted in light of two conditions. First, as already mentioned, Durkheim
sought to avoid metaphysical concepts, and since intentionality, as an innate
property of consciousness, is a metaphysical assumption, there is no reason
why Durkheim should be held accountable for explaining intentionality.6
Second, Durkheim would have had no problem explaining the directedness
or aboutness of mental states, which is how Searle (2010, 26) himself
defines intentionality. Durkheims argument for founding sociology as a science was his understanding of the fact that the mental states of the individual
are already directed by their participation in social reality. Contrary to the
metaphysician, basing his argument on a methodological individualism,
Durkheimian sociology, basing its argument on a methodological collectivism, do not need a concept of intentionality. Durkheim already views the
individual as integrated into a system of shared beliefs and practices, which
exert downward causational effects on the individuals mind.
Searle overlooks the fact that the individual mind is already directed by
the categorical and representational universe that structures it, and when
intentionality is shared, collective and individual intentionality blend into
one another; hence, pure individual intentionality exists only as an extreme.
Conceptually, Searles concept of collective intentionality competes
with Durkheims concepts of collective consciousness and collective
representations. Unfortunately, Searle (Searle 1995, 25) fails to acknowledge this, due to the fact that he operates with a popular misunderstanding
of the concept of collective consciousness as some kind of a super mind
floating over individual minds. In fact, Durkheim has argued that the
directedness of mental states should be explained by referring to social
facts. On the contrary, due to his material monism, Searleas argued by
6The
concept was already used by contemporaries of Durkheim, such as Franz

Brentano.
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Viskovatoff (2003, 26)is forced to deny the perfectly obvious and simple explanation of collective intentionality as a result of acculturation.
Following this, Searle has to argue that collective intentionality is biologically primitive and, thus, that it should be studied as a fact of the brain.
This argument, according to Meijers (2003, 177), fails to incorporate the
idea of sharing intentionality (emphasis in original) and is unable to account
for the normative relations usually involved in collective actions and collective intentionality. And as argued by Johansson (2003, 248), Searles monadological construction of social reality is contradicted by true we-intentions.
Searles argument for a biologically primitive, innate we-intentionality thus
cannot explain examples such as the intentional states involved in the military defense of a nation; these mental states of directedness derive from a set
of emotional commitments to the identity of the group, living on a given territory, and the normative pressure created within the group that is directed
towards the individual.
Whether the individual risks its life to save the nation or to conform to the
normative pressure, the commitment of the individual and the social pressure
should be viewed as types of social facts that can be subject to analysis, not
as types of biologically primitive intentionality. I will, therefore, turn to the
notion of social facts, after a discussion of Searles
10th claim: that Durkheim lacks a notion of the Background; this 10th
claim relates directly to Searles notion of intentionality.
3.3. Background
Searle (1995, 129) defines Background as a set of nonintentional or preintentional capacities that enable intentional states to function. Searle (1995,
132) relates his own concept to Wittgensteins later work, though without
defining this any further, and to Pierre Bourdieus work on the habitus,
one of Searles few references to a sociologist. Among others, Bourdieu is
inspired by Durkheim and Marcel Mauss, in his use of the concept of habitus. For Bourdieu, habitus denotes the perfectly Durkheimian idea that mental and bodily pre-conditions for developing thoughts, perceptions, and
actions derive from the culture of a given society. In contrast, Searle, conflating the one world argument with an idea of one-reality, is forced to perceive
Background as something individual, a manifestation of the brain. This manifestation may be affected by evolutionary and social factors, but it is not
constituted by them; therefore, Searles concept of Background differs profoundly from Bourdieus habitus, a fact that Searle overlooks.
Searle accounts for his notion of Background by referring to seven ways
in which it manifests itself. It is thus Background that enables perceptual
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interpretation to take place, structures consciousness, and dispose[s] me to

certain sorts of behavior, just to mention three. Reading the examples given
by Searle (1995, 136)such as that it is the biologically primitive Background
that disposes one to laugh at certain kinds of jokes and not othersmakes
it quite obvious why the cultural socialization arguments of Durkheim,
Mauss, and Bourdieu are much more convincing than Searles assumption of
internal causes. According to Searle (1995, 129), it is important to see that
when we are talking about the Background, we are talking about a certain
category of neurophysiological causationwhile adding, we do not know
how these structures function at a neurophysiological level.
Left with this explanatory vacuum, Searles claim that Background is a
case of neurophysiological causation lies on a weaker foundationboth logically and empiricallythan the claim of the sociological tradition. The disposition to laugh at certain jokes is derived through socialization. The key to
understanding why this is the case lies with the notion of social fact.
4. Ways to Misunderstand the Concept of Social

Facts (Claims 3-7 and 9)
The fact that Durkheim, in The Rules of Sociological Method, views social
facts as external, constraining, and coercive provoked strong reactions after
its publication in 1895. And since Searles critique repeats central elements of
the initial critique, Durkheims response in the second edition of Rules, published in 1901, remains relevant even today.
As Searle explains himself, while working on The Construction, he read
Durkheims chapter Social Facts as well as some other sections of his
book. However, Searle argues, it was immediately obvious to me that
Durkheim had an inadequate conception of social facts.
[Durkheim] fails to distinguish social facts in general from the special subclass
of institutional facts, he thinks that social facts are essentially coercive, and he
thinks that they exist outside of individual minds. He says that the essence of
social facts is that they are external to the individual and endowed with a
power of coercion, by reason of which they control him . . . This is exactly the
opposite of my view. (Searle 2006, 57; emphasis added)
In responding to the initial critique, Durkheim draws attention to what he

calls the habit of applying to sociological matters the forms of philosophical
thought, which turns methodological rules of observing social phenomena
into a priori reasoning (Durkheim [1901] 1982, 43). Durkheim attempts to
argue against this habit because he views it as based on intuition and
66
introspection rather than empirical observation. Durkheims argument that

the social scientist should treat the same phenomenaideas, morality, and
rationalitythat philosophers study as social facts is not an ontological but a
methodological statement. Durkheim argues that the social scientist should
look for outward signs to ensure that his claims are rooted in observations
rather than in the pre-notions of his own thinking. Thus, to study solidarity,
the social scientist should observe empirical indicators that are fixed outside
the individual mind, such as different types of laws, to ensure that it is an
empirical reality rather than the subjective experience of solidarity, which
becomes the ground on which the scientific debates unfold.
With the statement that social facts are things, as Durkheim explains in
the 1901 preface, we do not say that social facts are material things, but that
they are things just as are material things, although in a different way
(Durkheim [1901] 1982, 35). Thereby, Durkheim aims at making a methodological statement. To treat facts of a certain order as things, Durkheim
explains, is therefore not to place them in this or that category of reality; it
is to observe towards them a certain attitude of mind (Durkheim [1901]
1982, 36; emphasis added).
This explanation of the social fact is completely overlooked by Searle
(2006, 63), who states that Durkheim contrasts things with ideas,7 and
states in his fourth claim that Durkheim does not distinguish between brute
facts and institutional facts. Durkheim, Searle (2006, 63) argues, thinks all
social facts are brute facts because Durkheim thinks that social facts are
things (emphasis added).
While it might be possible to argue that Durkheims methodology implies
an ontology, it is a misrepresentation to treat his methodological statement
that we should regard social facts as things solely as an ontological statement.
Arguing that Durkheim does not distinguish brute facts from institutional
facts makes no sense. Durkheim ([1895] 1982, 49) made a special effort to
distinguish social facts from all other factsand as a consequence, he defined
institutions as the beliefs and modes of behavior instituted by the collectivity. Based on this definition, it should be quite easy to distinguish institutional facts from brute facts.8 Adding to this, the fact that most contemporary
critiques of Durkheim attack him for taking precisely the opposite position,
7Lukes
(2007, 194) has already demonstrated how Searle misunderstands Durkheims

methodological distinction between preconceived ideas and things as an ontological
claim contrasting things and ideas.
8And given the fact that the category of social facts is broader than institutional facts,
it may be argued that Durkheim even sets out institutional facts as a subclass of social
facts (Lukes 2007, 194).
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that is, for being too radical in making the distinction between social/institutional facts and natural facts,9 Searles interpretation becomes even more
inexplicable.
A balanced reading recognizes that Durkheim methodologically distinguishes social factssuch as institutionsfrom natural facts, without making
an absolute ontological distinction between the two domains. Durkheim thus
argues for a continuum of social facts, and he recognizes the existence of what
he calls social facts that are of an anatomical or morphological nature.
However, because the morphological social facts do not at first sight seem
relatable to ways of acting, feeling or thinking, Durkheim ([1895] 1982, 57)
tentatively attributed the study of these morphological social facts less urgency
than the more clear-cut cases of social facts.10 This point is absolutely crucial
in considering the above-debated issue concerning Searles argument against
Durkheims dualism. As we have already seen, what Durkheim is suggesting
is not that we live in more than one world but that different orders of reality
exist and that these orders of reality follow different laws.
4.1. Debating Searles Four Types of Social Motivation

Besides the fourth claim, Searles misunderstanding of Durkheims notion of
social fact has implications for his claims 3, 6, 7, and 9, that is, those claims
dealing with the distinction between observer-relative and observer-independent phenomena, regulative rules and constitutive rules, the notion of coercion and desire-independent reasons for action.
In his seventh claim, Searle reproaches Durkheim for lacking the conceptual resources even to state the distinction between four different types of
social motivation, four different kinds of coercion. This is because
Durkheim sees all these as social facts: they all involve coercions that are
external to the individual (Searle 2006, 65). Steven Lukes later argued that
Searle here effectively shows that Durkheim runs together four different
9Thus,
as Leda Cosmides and John Tooby (1992, 24-25) coined the term the Standard
Social Science Model, it was as an attempt at correcting the extreme sociology of
the Durkheimian tradition. Bruno Latour has attacked Durkheim as an exponent of
the sociologists of the social (Latour 2005), responsible for postulating the modern
distinction between nature and society (Latour 1993).
10As argued by Gesa Lindemann (2011), Durkheim distinguished between social facts
that are moral things, such as law or normative institutions, and social facts that
are materially constructed things, which function as an external constraint for the
actions of human individuals. As noted by Lindemann (2011, 100), only the first
meaning of social facts has become widely recognized in sociological theory.
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senses of coercion, while adding (in a footnote) that he (Lukes) himself

had already made this point in 1973 (Lukes 2006, 9-10n).
Searle describes four types of social motivation using the following
examples:
(1) I buy a certain type of shirt because that type is currently fashionable. (2) I
pay back the money you loaned me because I promised I would. (3) I am swept
along in an emotional crowd. (4) I surrender my wallet to an armed gang.
(Searle 2006, 65)
In the following, it will be demonstrated how Durkheims sociology

not only provides a framework for making the distinctions but also does
so in a more convincing way than Searle himself. This is due to the fact
that Durkheim argues both historically and logically, rather than only
logically.
4.2. Again: What Indeed Is a Social Fact?

According to Searles interpretation, Durkheim would classify all the four
above-mentioned actions as social facts; however, as we shall see, this is
not the case. Durkheim himself lamented that the term social fact was
used without much precision; while insisting that not all the phenomena
that occur within society are social facts, only acts, which are rooted in
collective sentiments or conscience (Durkheim [1895] 1982, 50; [1903]
1982, 191). Thus, ways of thinking and acting, which are defined by the
prescriptions of religious doctrines, laws, and moral codes, are social facts
since they are rooted in the historical reality of collective sentiments and
conscience. That Searle misunderstands Durkheims definition of social
fact is obvious in Searles first and fourth example. In the first example, it
is the pressure created by fashion, which is a social fact, not the act of buying the shirt itself. The fourth examplethe surrendering of ones wallet to
an armed gangis, obviously, a social act, insofar as it is an action between
humans, but it is not a social fact. It is not a social fact because it is not
rooted in either collective sentiments or conscience; it is simply a phenomenon that may occur in society. It is the judgment of certain actions such as
these being deemed illegal that we must do something about crime,
which is the social fact.
In the following, Searles second and third examplesthe obligation to
repay a loan and being swept up in an emotional crowdwill be taken up in
a separate section, since they are related to Searles argument, that Durkheim
has no notion of deontic power.
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4.3. Deontic Powers and Collective Effervescence

The claim that Durkheim gives no account of deontic power can be easily
refuted, since if deontic power denotes phenomena such as rights, responsibilities, obligations, and duties (Searle 1995, 100), then most of Durkheims
work is, in fact, an analysis of the origin and development of the deontic
powers as found in religion (Durkheim [1912] 1995), morality (Durkheim
1961), education (Durkheim [1938] 1977), the state and the labor market
(Durkheim [1950] 1957). And the very first example of a social fact in
Durkheims The Rules of Sociological Method is obligation: When I fulfill
my obligations as brother, husband, or citizen, when I execute my contracts,
I perform duties which are defined, externally to myself and my acts, in law
and in custom (Durkheim [1895]1982, 50).
Consequently, Searle errs when he insists that Durkheim is unable to distinguish between deontic powers and other social facts. Durkheim treats the feeling of duty as a social fact, which is different from all other social facts because
it is a moral feeling. What distinguishes moral duty from all other human
affairs is the incommensurate value granted to them in comparison to other
things which men desire (Durkheim 1912; quoted in Lussier 2002, 39).
The difference between Searle and Durkheim on deontic power cannot be
summed up in the claim that Durkheim (unlike Searle) fails to acknowledge
the power of obligations as a distinctive type of social fact, or a discussion of
whether Durkheim is able to make this or that distinction. Rather, the difference is that Durkheim views deontic powers as historical, whereas Searle
treats them as logical objects. This difference becomes obvious when we turn
to Searles third examplethe emotional crowdwhich may be taken as an
implicit reference to one of Durkheims central empirical phenomenon, collective effervescence (Shilling and Mellor 1998).
Based on Durkheims empirical analysis of collective effervescence, one should
be careful not to make an excessively clean-cut distinction between the obligation
to pay back a loan and the obligation to conform within an emotional crowd.
Contrary to other theoreticians of crowds, such as Gustav Le Bon, who
saw crowds as an essentially destructive type of power, Durkheim argued that
crowds may also be formed as gatherings around social ideals. Moments may
occur where life is lived with such intensity and exclusiveness that it monopolizes all minds to the more or less complete exclusion of egoism ([1911]
1953, 92). This type of emotional crowd behavior is, therefore, related to the
historical development of morality and solidarity. The real question to be
answered is whether Durkheims account of collective effervescence may be
viewed as a theory of deontic powers in the making, as well as an account of
what Searle terms desire-independent reasons for action.
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4.4. The Desire for Desire-Independent Reasons for Action

In terms of both ritual and moral action, we are dealing with Durkheimian cases
of acts where the individual follows something else than his own desires (as he
does when he shops), acts that Searle terms desire-independent. As we have
seen, Durkheim is perfectly well aware of the importance of distinguishing
mental states where individual desire is excluded, therefore Searles ninth critical claimthat Durkheim is unable to account for desire-independent reasons
for actionis false. However, Durkheim has an even more complex understanding of these issues than Searle. As Durkheim analyzes this type of action,
he discovers that even if moral action forces the individual to act against its
own desires, they must still appear in some way, desirable ([1906] 1953, 36;
emphasis in original). Following this, it may be argued that Searles logical
distinction between acting out of desire versus acting out of obligation fails to
acknowledge the fact that the existence of desire-independent action in society
produces a new type of desire. As the desire-independent action of the firefighter who enters a burning building to save lives becomes monitored in the
community, and he achieves the status of hero, it creates the desire of others to
conduct this type of action. Therefore, while desire-independent reasons for
action imply the imperative to govern ones actions in a way, which is independent of immediate inclination, the fact that this type of action becomes the
mode by which individuals acquire status creates a new type of desire, which is
at once a desire for status, and a mode of acting out of pure duty.
4.5. The False Assumption of an Opposition between Coercion

and Rationality
At the bottom of Searles misunderstanding of Durkheim are the logically
sound but empirically false opposition between coercion/constraint and freedom/rationality. Mentioning Durkheim, Searle thus argues that some social
theorists have seen institutional facts as essentially constraining. That is a
very big mistake (Searle 2010, 105).11 According to Searle, since institutions increase our power, they cannot be cohesive and constraining.
11It
adds to the confusion that Searle contradicts his own statement in the very next
line: There is indeed an element of constraint in social institutions (Searle 2010,
106). People have to be part of the institutional game where they rely on social facts:
In ordinary English, I do not have the power to not pay the money I owe (Searle
2010, 106). The fact that Searle changes his mind does not lead him to also change his
claim; the reader is left to cope with the inconsistency.
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However, any empirical observation of institutional reality will demonstrate that it is by submitting oneself to the constraints of a given institutional
reality that one gains power. Entering a profession, a moral community, and
even society in general, one has to constrain ones actions, if one wants to
increase ones powers. Jrgen Habermas theory of the coercive power of the
better argument may be used as an exemplary case of this: submitting oneself
to the coercive power of the better argument is the mode by which one
acquires the enabling structures of rational thinking: the coercive power (of
the better argument) and rationality are thus mutually constitutive elements in
communicative action.
Besides the fact that coercion and freedom should not be opposed,
Durkheim in The Division of Labor in Society does, in fact, distinguish
between traditional constraint based consensus and the spontaneous consensus of parts that characterizes modern constitutive practices (Rawls 2011,
414, n13). Discussing the latter, Rawls cites Durkheim:
The rules which constitute [modern constitutive practices] do not have a
constraining force which snuffs out free thought; but because they are rather
made for us and, in a certain sense, by us, we are free. We wish to understand
them; we do not fear to change them. (Durkheim [1893/1902] 1933, 408; cited
by Rawls 2012, 285)
Thus, Searles sixth claim, that Durkheim does not make a distinction
between regulative rules and constitutive rules, must be disputed. As demonstrated by Rawls, Durkheims analysis of the relationship between constraint
and freedom may be interpreted as a case of constitutive order: Durkheim
grounded his argument for the organic coherence of modern societies on an
idea of constitutive rules (Rawls 2011, 396). And not only does Durkheim
make the distinction, according to Rawls, Durkheims accomplishment in
relation to these matters is in same league as Winch and Garfinkel; and even
among these great scientists, she argues, Durkheim is the social theorist who
took most seriously the relationship between categories of meaning and
social interaction and located constitutive practices at the center of that process (Rawls 2011, 401; emphasis added).
4.6. The Concept of Status Function

Searle distinguishes status function from function by associating the former with constitutive rules and deontic status: functions that can be performed only by virtue of a deontic status, which is collectively recognized,
are status functions. Examples are pretty much everywhere, Searle argues.
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Presidents or professors could not do without the collective recognition of

their status (2010, p. 7).
Reading Durkheims On the Division of Labor in Society will not only
prove that Searles claimthat Durkheim does not have an adequate conception of the assignment of functionsis wrong but also demonstrate the power
of Durkheims account in relation to Searles; since, where Searle analyzes
only random examples and sentences, Durkheim elaborates an empirical
analysis of the historical and social pre-conditions for what Searle calls the
assignment of status function in modern society.
In his description of organic solidarity, Durkheim acknowledges a type
of solidarity by mutual recognition of the function of the other individual.
This is related to the need to find a place for what is different. [I]n order
for a feeling of solidarity or attachment to be effective within a modern,
differentiated society, Durkheim ([1893/1902] 1933, 361) argues that it
would be necessary for it also to be continuous, and it can be that only if it
is linked to the very practice of each special function (cited by Rawls
2012, 493).
Thus, Durkheim goes further than Searle. He argues that it is the recognition
of the function of ones fellow men that produces solidarity in modern society.
4.7. Observer-Relative and Observer-Independent Phenomena

I take Searles third claim that Durkheim did not grasp the distinction between
observer-relative and observer-independent phenomena, and the distinction
between the ontological sense of the objective/subjective distinction and the
epistemic sense, as being a combination of overlapping claims, which
although conceptually advanced, adds very little to what is already implied
by Durkheims notion of social facts.
Observer-relative phenomena such as money, marriage, and governments
(the object of the social sciences) are social facts; and it is implied in the
concept that the phenomena only exists, when they are generally recognized
by observers, contrary to natural phenomenasuch as force, chemical structures, mass, and gravitationwhich are not dependent on an observer. This
distinction goes back to Durkheims argument for distinguishing between
social and natural realities, already debated in relation to Searles one world
claim. And somewhat overlapping, the same may be argued in relation to
Searles distinction between the objective mode of existence of a mountain
and a particlewhich exist independent of individual mental statesand the
subjective mode of existence of conscious experience itself.
Searle (2010, 18) uses these distinctions to distinguish between an ontological sense of the objective/subjective distinction and the epistemic sense,
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thus enabling him to pose the question of how to develop an epistemic objective science of a reality, which is ontologically subjective.
After having presented what Durkheim meant by his statement that social
facts should be studied as things, we now see how Searles central question is
nothing more than a new conceptualization of Durkheims initial intention.
According to Durkheim, social facts are ontologically subjective in the sense
that they are constituted by shared opinions and values that have an ontological existence only insofar as they are mentally constructed by the individual
mind. Social facts should be studied as things to achieve an epistemic objective account of them. It is because values are observer-relative that the scientific observer should treat them as things: sociology, as a science of
observer-relative phenomena (values), should attempt to be observer-independent by treating values as factsto paraphrase the parallel argument
made by Weber.12
4.8. Durkheim versus Searle and the Space of Reason

Before summing up the basic assumptions that separate Durkheim and Searle,
let us conclude this demonstration with the crucial point in Searles ninth
claim, concerning the scope of the social sciences. The social sciences, Searle
argues, are about . . . human action within the space of reason. Durkheim,
says Searle (2006, 65), fails to acknowledge this point.
First of all, what is meant by the imprecise notion of a space of reason?
Hardly, that such a space exists in society, and that action conducted outside
of the space of reasonsuch as actions conducted during ritual processes,
suicide attempts, or in panicshould fall outside the scope of the social sciences. Rather, what he must mean is that the social sciences are about actions,
which philosophers are able to describe by the use of reason. This interpretation would make sense in relation to Searles consequent argument that there
exists a necessary overlap between sociology and philosophy because society has a logical structure. This, Searle (2006, 69) goes on, is the central
claim of The Construction of Social Reality, and, by the way, I find nothing
remotely like this in Durkheim (emphasis added).
Again the problem lies with Searles reading, rather than Durkheims writings. If we consult The Elementary Forms of Religious Life, Durkheim
12According
to Weber, even if only a thin line separates facts from values, and
values intrude even into our modes of observation [ . . . ] the social scientist must
make a concerted effort to distinguish empirically based arguments and conclusions
from normativeor value-basedpositions. The latter should be eliminated as much
as possible (Kalberg 2002, 13).
74
([1912] 1995, 437-40) sums up his argument by stating that we can now
begin to see societys share in the origin of logical thought . . . logic evolves
as societies themselves evolve. This insight has also been discussed by Anne
Rawls, in her chapter on Logic, Language and Science. According to
Rawls, Durkheim is demonstrating that logical thought is historically derived
from religion, as an unintended consequence of its social dynamics. In short,
Durkheims argument is that logical thought is essential to society, and as
soon as society develops, logic develops (Rawls 2004, 289). It is inexplicable, how Searle can state so bluntly, that he finds nothing remotely like this in
Durkheim when the idea that society has a logical structure is so central to
Durkheimian thought.13
4.9. Who Believes in the Waves of Thought?

The very title of Searles (2006) article Searle versus Durkheim and the
Waves of Thought is based on a flawed reading. Searle begins his article
with a general evaluation of Durkheim, arguing that the situation with
Durkheim is much worse than I had originally thought. To document this
claim, Searle provides what he sees as a typical statement of Durkheims,
taken from the essay on Individual and Collective Representations:
How many well-established cases suggest that thought can travel over a
distance? The difficulty which we may have in conceiving so disconcerting an
idea is not sufficient reason for us to deny its reality, and we shall in all
probability have to admit the existence of waves of thought. (Durkheim 1953,
19; cited by Searle 2006, 58)
No comments needed. Searle lets the quote speak for itself. However,
Searles example of a typical Durkheimian statement derives from an incorrect translation of the French text:
Que des faits bien tablis viennent dmontrer que la pense peut se transfrer
distance, la difficult que nous pouvons avoir nous reprsenter un phnomne
aussi dconcertant ne sera pas une raison suffisante pour quon en puisse
contester la ralit, et il nous faudra bien admettre des ondes de pense dont la
notion dpasse ou mme contredit toutes nos connaissances actuelles.
(Durkheim 1924, 26-27; emphasis added)
13In
his introduction to the sociological traditions, Randall Collins (1994, 193) credits
Durkheim as the sociologist who provided the classical breakthrough insights of
sociology, the great Aha! experience: of realization that social order and rational
thought itself rest on a nonrational foundation.
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In his translation, D. F. Pocock translates Que des faits bien tablis viennent dmontrer que la pense peut se transfrer distance into How many
well-established cases suggest that thought can travel over a distance? This
leads Searle to assume that Durkheim is arguing that we have to accept the
existence of waves of thought.
According to the French text, Durkheim is giving a hypothetical example,
clearly marked by his use of the subjunctive mode Que . . . viennent and used all
along. Durkheim writes that if science were to prove the existence of a fact that
opposes our perception of things, our conceptual framework would have to
change. Durkheim is writing this in 1898, a few years after Roentgens discovery
of X-rays in 1895. In this historical context, Durkheims example, therefore,
makes perfect sense: if science were to discover a phenomenon that would disturb
prevailing assumptions [un phnomne aussi dconcertant]such as the phenomenon of waves of thought wouldthen the assumptions should be changed.
5. Confronting the Premises Underlying Searles

Theoretical Project
Through the debate about Searles reading of Durkheim, we have revealed
several problems concerning the premises of Searles attempt to create a
foundation for the social sciences.
First of all, the very premise for approaching social reality through language philosophythat language is constitutive for social realityhas
proven to be misleading, at least in Searles version.
Second, Searles metaphysical assumptions concerning intentionality,
Background, and the one world have also been shown to be inconsistent,
since Searle conflates world and reality, operates with de facto conceptual
dualisms, and postulates the innate status of mental states such as intentionality without contesting the notion of sharing intentionality and the role of
socialization and acculturation.
Third, the premise that social reality can be studied by an a-temporal,
a-historical approach has also proven to be problematic. Deriving its conclusion from the structure of the conceptual logic rather than the object of analysis, we risk becoming victims of philosophical pre-notions rather than being
informed about reality. Since Searles conceptual repertoire derives from the
analysis of the conceptual logic by which he thinks, it becomes quite difficult
to distinguish between how Searle thinks human civilization is founded and
human civilization itself. And as Searle simply endorses direct realism, the
necessary debate on the justification of the correspondence between Searles
conceptual map and the landscape he aims to conceptualize is bypassed.
Fourth, the fact that Searle refuses to confront the historical character of
76
institutions, even if it is theoretically possible, is ontologically paradoxical

and methodologically inconsistent: if so much social reality is constituted by
ideas, representations, and institutionswhich have emerged through historical processesthen it must be viewed as ontologically paradoxical to
approach this reality through an a-temporal conceptual analysis of language.
Present day reality, as Durkheim ([1938] 1977, 15) puts it, is by itself nothing but only an extrapolation of the past. Hence, taking ones own presentday language as a point of departure for an a-temporal theory of civilization,
while certainly important, remains incomplete as an explanation of social
reality. Posing Durkheim's rethorical question ([1922] 1953, p. 66) to Searle,
it may be asked: how can the individual pretend to reconstruct, through his
own private reflection, what is not a work of individual thought?"
6. Steps toward a Sociology of Emergence

Debating Searles interpretation of Durkheim has also contributed to the
clarification of Durkheims assumptions concerning social reality. Durkheim
sought to move beyond the limitations of thinking in the dichotomy of ontological individualism and collectivism. Thus, the aim of creating a sociology
founded on methodological collectivism was not to defend a position of
ontological collectivism in the philosophical sense of the term, nor was
Durkheim the victim of a simple contradiction, as Searle assumes.14 The fact
that Durkheim argues that social things are only realized by men: they are
the product of human activity (Durkheim [1895] 1982, 62), while arguing
that society is an order sui generis (Durkheim [1895] 1982, 134), is not a
case of contradiction. It is, rather, as Sawyer (2002) has argued, an attempt
to develop a theory of emergence avant la lettre. Social reality, according to
Durkheim, is experienced as exterior and superior to us, in the sense that we
live our life within an already existing, dynamically retained, social reality.
However, as we mentally and emotionally construct internal models of this
complexity, social reality becomes realized within us, and in a sense, it is
us (Durkheim [1906] 1953, 57; emphasis in original). Durkheim thus
attempts to go beyond the idea that social reality has to be either in the head
or exist as a reality separate from the individual. Consequently, Durkheim
saw social reality as a structure that emerges as individuals tune mentally
and emotionally into one another and to the mode of interacting, accepted as
normal within the group. Like Searle, therefore, Durkheim refused to view
14Durkheim,
Searle argues, on the one hand says repeatedly that collective representations are not in individual minds, and on the other hand that they are realized in
individual minds (Searle 2006, 61).
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social and mental realities as two distinct ontological domains. However,

unlike Searle, who argues that the only sound alternative to this type of dualism is to view higher level phenomena of mind and society as dependent
on lower level phenomena of physics and biology (Searle 2010, 25),
Durkheim takes several steps toward a sociology of emergence and a theory
of constitutive orders. Durkheim connects his views of social reality as an
emergent reality, with the observation that this reality, while emergent, may
be retained as normative and cognitive expectations. When these expectations are given status in society, they begin to exert downward causational
power over the mind of individuals, and to influence the future processes of
emergence. This creates a situation where social reality incorporates the
retaining of past emergent realities, within its present modes of emergence,
and leaves each individual with the task of constructing their own incomplete version of the system of collective representations and normative
expectations, which structures the social environment. The individual intellect isas Durkheim ([1912] 1995, 437) puts it metaphoricallyin the
same situation as the of Plato before the world of Ideas. He strives to
assimilate them, for he needs them in order to deal with his fellow men, but
this assimilation is always incomplete. As such, we may view social reality
as an emergent property, without having to accept the idea of upward causation, which Searle, along with other leading figures within the philosophy of
mind, takes for granted. Durkheim ([1912] 1995) sought to demonstrate
([1898] 1953) that mind and social reality can be accounted for as emergent
properties of neuronal interaction, within a downward causational model of
explanation; due to the fact that emergent properties are shared, they acquire
an autonomous status and create a new type of cause that exerts a downward
causation on the mind. Thus, without contradicting the findings of evolutionary psychology (Cosmides and Tooby 1992; Schmaus 2003), Durkheim
may perfectly well argue that the adapted mind becomes placed in a qualitatively different situation, as it is forced to adapt to an increasingly complex
social reality, where the importance of understanding the moral forces of the
social environment for survival gradually exceeds the importance of understanding the natural forces of the environment.15 Adapting to the densely
15Due
to the rise of fields such as cognitive psychology, the philosophy of mind, and
later neuroscience, the role of sociology in relation to the task of explaining mental
phenomena is today often considered less obvious than it was at the beginning of the
twentieth century. However, new fields such as cognitive sociology (Cerulo 2002;
Zerubavel 1997) are now returning sociology to one of its main justifications as a science: the fact that understanding how the mind works demands sociology, since the
structure of the mind co-evolved with the structure of social reality.
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populated environment of rules, collective representations, and normative

facts is a qualitatively different mode of adaptation than adapting to the
natural environment. Understanding this process, according to Durkheim, is
what defines sociology as a science of human behavior. Like the physicist
observes inanimate matter and the biologist, living bodies, as Durkheim
writes ([1922] 1953, 66), the sociologist observes and analyses social realities. And, as argued by Rawls (2011), observing social realities means
observing the process as it unfolds in its witnessable empirical details
(403), rather than relying on the static notion of social institutions, words,
Speech Acts, or other units of meaning, which is like trying to understand
the game of football by reading the rulebook, or examining a football, and
never playing the game or even looking at the play (402). Social realities
are games that individuals must play to be individuals at all; and while these
games are constantly reconstituted, as they are played, the individual cannot
create, or destroy, or transform them at will. The individual can act on
these realities only to the extent that he [and she] has learned to understand
them, to know their nature and the conditions on which they depend
(Durkheim [1922] 1953, 66).
7. Conclusion
Even if Searles effort to contribute to the social sciences is remarkable, the
outcome of his work is not easily integrated into either the theory or method
of the social sciences. To use Searles (2010, 201) conceptual framework, one
is forced to accept the idea that a logical analysis of the fundamental ontology of the entities studied by the social sciences is possible. Comparing his
own contribution in relation to the social sciences with the contribution of the
nuclear physicist to the science of geology, Searle believes that just like the
nuclear physicist studies the same reality as the geologist, only at a deeper
level, Searle himself studies the same reality as the social scientist, only at a
deeper level. However, whereas we know that geological matter is constituted by atoms, the premises of Searles fundamental ontology are questionable, and the assumption that Searles philosophy is somehow deeper than
the sociology of Durkheim or other social scientists is unfounded. Searle, as
we have seen, produces a model that competes with Durkheims model at the
same level. And given the misunderstandings and inconsistencies in Searle, it
is the Durkheimian model that provides the best means of approaching society. Durkheims attempt to found his theories on empirical work, and the
steps he takes toward a sociology of emergence in accounting for mind, social
reality and downward causation, provides the better foundation for the social
sciences. Despite all the advances in neuroscience and philosophy of
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language, Durkheims theory of social reality demonstrates why sociology

holds an important key to the contemporary debates on mind and cognition.
Acknowledgments
I would like to thank the anonymous reviewers, Alexandra Maryanski, Thomas
Schwarz Wentzer, Brian Kjr Andreasen, Antje Gimmler, and Patrick Lemonnier for
their responses on earlier drafts.
Declaration of Conflicting Interests

The author(s) declared no potential conflicts of interest with respect to the research,
authorship, and/or publication of this article.
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
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Author Biography
Jrn Bjerre has a background in teacher education. He specializes in classical sociological theory, and has mainly written on Durkheim, as well as on the application of
sociological theory to pedagogical issues and case studies.

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POSXXX10.1177/0048393114525860Philosophy of the Social SciencesBjerre

A New Foundation for

Philosophy of the Social Sciences

University, Aarhus, Denmark

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Philosophy of the Social Sciences 45(1)

1. Why Searle Finds Nothing Like That in

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4. Durkheim implicitly denies the distinction between brute facts and

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Philosophy of the Social Sciences 45(1)

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Durkheims argument against this method is relevant in relation to Searle:

2. Language and the Social Construction of Social

of the role of language in the construction of social reality already existed

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Philosophy of the Social Sciences 45(1)

2.1. Confusing Dependency with Identity

This argument confuses dependency with identity. The implied logic is as

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claim that language is constitutive of human institutions regresses into the

2.2. Questioning Searles Identification of Language with

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Philosophy of the Social Sciences 45(1)

Durkheimian argument aligns with the theories of leading archaeologists and

3. Debating Searles Metaphysical Claims (1, 2, and 10)

argues that it is within religionin ritual actionsthat the origin of the

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physical forcesand therefore renders both sociology and psychology

Here, Searle is arguing for a version of upward causation from subatomic

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Philosophy of the Social Sciences 45(1)

3.1. Searles De Facto Dualisms

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concept was already used by contemporaries of Durkheim, such as Franz

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Philosophy of the Social Sciences 45(1)

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interpretation to take place, structures consciousness, and dispose[s] me to

4. Ways to Misunderstand the Concept of Social

In responding to the initial critique, Durkheim draws attention to what he

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Philosophy of the Social Sciences 45(1)

introspection rather than empirical observation. Durkheims argument that

(2007, 194) has already demonstrated how Searle misunderstands Durkheims

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4.1. Debating Searles Four Types of Social Motivation

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Philosophy of the Social Sciences 45(1)

senses of coercion, while adding (in a footnote) that he (Lukes) himself

In the following, it will be demonstrated how Durkheims sociology

4.2. Again: What Indeed Is a Social Fact?

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4.3. Deontic Powers and Collective Effervescence

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Philosophy of the Social Sciences 45(1)

4.4. The Desire for Desire-Independent Reasons for Action

4.5. The False Assumption of an Opposition between Coercion

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4.6. The Concept of Status Function

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Philosophy of the Social Sciences 45(1)