What's in a Research Project: Some Thoughts on the Intersection of History, Social Structure, and Biography

ABSTRACT

Social influences on the formation of research agendas comprise one of the central problems of control and power in contemporary societies. The contemporary world is one in which the exercise of control is provided not by brute force but by the defining patterns of communication by which a society gives direction and organization to its social affairs. The production of knowledge has implications for how we conceive, organize, and challenge our ongoing social relations.

This article focuses upon the social formation of research by considering autobiography, biography, and institutions. Our research programs are not conceived solely as those of individual imagination, but involve a complex relation among community, institutions, social structure, and individuals. The discussion focuses upon the relation of U.S. corporate liberalism, Protestant theology, and Jewish identity, and the role of the university as a dynamic in the administration of the State. The story is not one of causation. Yet, it is also not one of individual autonomy and freedom, as the paths chosen always exist within a horizon provided by the structures of our institutions.