BOOK R E V I EWS

Living with Mental Illness by Enid Mills, Pp. xii + 184. Institute of
Community Studies/Routledge and Kegan Paul, London, 1962,
28s.
Miss Mills' survey concerns eighty-six patients fixmi a certain 'area in
East London' (which we are asked to leave un-named) who were admitted
to mental hospital in 1956 and 1957. She deals with the events and problems
which led up to their admission to hospital; the actual mechanics <rf admis-
sion; the nature of the community services to whose care many of them
returned; and with their difficulties, and those of their families, after dis-
charge.
The picture is a distressing one. The process of becwning ill enough to
be attonitted to a mental hospital is seen as 'a confused, slow and clumsy
process which may reach a sudden and bewildering climax'. Mental health
workers were overworked, insensitive, and sometimes callous. Only rarely
did patients and their relatives have any clear idea of the nature of the
problem, or of the measures which were being taken to deal with it. A
number of the patients entered the hospital 'voluntarily'—^but investigation
indicated that they had been led to do so by means of 'deception or threats'.
There is, for example, the case of Mr. Atterbury, who 'was led to believe
that he was going into a convalescent home' till 'at the front door, he noticed
the word "Asylum" carved into the stone'.
'At what cost does a family continue to care for a mentally sick relative?'
Now that the emphasis in the Mental Health Services is moving to com-
munity care, this question is a vital one. Miss Mills answers it with a
catalogue of despair—of bewilderment, fear, physical and mental exhaustion
and often social ostracism. She notes that, on the whole, families with a
mentally sick member were worse housed than other families—largely
because complaints of 'fire, flooding and gas, hangings and noise during the
night, and bad language and paranoic accusations during the day* had
caused the Housing Authority to move them to substandard acccMnmoda-
tion.
The social services provided little support. Only four patients out of
eighty-six were in touch with the L.C.C. psychiatric care service. Other
services were under-staffed, fragmentary, and poorly-co-ordinated. The
greatest degree <rf support came not from professional social workers, but
from the people whom Mis& Mills calls 'the Cognoscenti'—the local publican,
the secretary of a darts dub, someone with a little more knowledge and a
little more organising ability than the average. Home helps were commonly
accepted, and provided 'down to eardi common-seme'. By contrast, 'pro-
fessionally trained social workers from a different social class were often
received with hostility'.
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 Reviev>s
Much of what Miss Mills has to say has the stamp o£ authenticity; but
it is unfortimaite that she weakens her case by over-emphasis. It is hard to
believe that there were no sympathetic and sensible social wcwkers in the
area. One would have thought that the presence of the Institute of Community
Studies would have had some effect in raising the standard of provision
by now.
The material is taken very largely from patients and their relatives, and
no attempt at validation appears to have been made. Since some of the
patients were sufferii^ from pananoira, and others from d^ression, it would
have been a basic precaution to chedc the objective value of statements with
the medical records or the responsible psychiatrist.
Miss Mills makes no attempt to study the administrative problems of
mental hospitals or of local authority services. She has a passionate identi-
fication with her eight-six patients, and an apparent lack of sympathy for
doctors and niirses and social workers, whom she tends to see as the agents
of indifferent Authority.
This is essentially a small-scale piece of empirical research, unrelated to
any iwevious work, or to any general concepts in this field. Previous reports
from the Institute of Community Studies have provided a good deal of in-
formation about this 'area in East London', and indicate that it has a distina
sub-culture of its own. It is a pity that more reference could not have been
made to these studies, since the symptomatology, if not the aetiology, of
mental illness is culturally conditioned.
Miss Mills is a sensitive and humane observer; but sensitivity and a
strong social conscience are just not enough to produce a soumi piece of
research. At several points, her conclusions go beyond her evidence—
there is one particularly sweeping statement on the policy of mental hos-
pitals which seems to be based solely on interviews with the twenty patients
who were not discharged by the time the survey took place. A more system-
atic and objective appraisal would have produced less sensational material;
but it would have given a firmer basis for argmnent.
University of Manchester. KATHLEEN JONES.

Ability and Education*^ Opportunity. Edited by A. H. Halsey. Pp.

211. Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development,
Paris, 1961, 15s.
Now that far-reaching develc^wnents are taking place in economic relations
between the states of Western Europe, it is encouraging to learn that they
are paying coll«:tive attention to education, the one resource which, if
wisely fostered, can bring increasing returns to them all. In conjunction with
the Swedish Ministry of Education, the Office for Scientific and Cultural
Personnel <rf O.E.E.C. heW a conference at Kungaiv in Jxme 1961, under
the chairmanship <rf Mr. H. L. Elvin, the proceedings being presented in
the volume under review. The main papers are reproduced in full (in English),
while in place of the usual weariswne precis erf the discussions there is a
masterly aper^u of the whole conference by its ra^wrteur. Dr. A. H. Halsey.
344
 ReiHews
The outCMne is virtually a symposium in c<nnparative educational socio-
l<^y, valuable both because it indicates that empirical studies in this field
are far frcMn being an Anglo-American monopoly and bec^ise it brings out
the dangers of generalising from data about any one country, a point con-
stantly stressed by the particijrants themselves and especially by Mr. Vaizey
in his forceful 'Note on Comparative Statistics'. In spite of their diversity,
however, the extent of common ground among the contributOTs was im-
pressive: they all interpreted the confereiKe theme in sociological terms,
as implying a need to measure and foster reserves of ability in order to
extend individual arui collective well-being in an increasingly scientific
culture. Thus, Dr. Wolfe of the U.SA. outlined this sodal task with
special reference to his own country; M. Ferrez analysed the striking dis-
parities in readiness to profit from opportunities of higher education in
various regions of France (a subject which calls for ctxiiparable studies
elsewhere); and Mrs. Houd sunumrised her principal conclusi<Mis on
sodal-dass factors in educaitional adiievement in a characteristically masterly
way expressii^ with notable clarity and conciseness her views on the cxiltural
differentials which survive when countries, such as some of those in O.E.E.C.,
succeed in eliminating gross material poverty. Professor Husen, quoting a
survey in Stockholm with which he had been associated, gave evklence of
the greater overall intellectual stimulus afforded by comprehensive s<±.ools
in whidi 'differentiation' was deferred, when compared with the previous
bipartite pattern: this research might well be replicated, as far as drcum-
stances permit, in Leicestei^hire. The last principal contributors, Professors
de Wolff of the Netherlands and Harnqvist of Sweden, discussed the relative
merits of some ingenious methods of assessing the potential reserves of ability
in a society.
Dr, Halsey shows that, in the discussions, some valuable additional con-
cepts were introduced, notably that of the relationship between growth of
educational opportunity and reduction of social distance; and there was a
unanimous demand for more and better statistics and a wider dissemination
of sociological knowledge in the educational world, as a necessary basis for
planning. However, too littie attention was paid to the influences of 'the
adolescent sodety' on educational aspiration and, despite disclaimers, the
nature-nurture controversy abmt abilities was too readily overlot^ed. Per-
haps, as Dr. Halsey himself suggests, the assumption was too easily made
that individioal opportunity and the needs of a sdentiflc economy could be
permanently harmonised t h r o u ^ organisational and curricular manipulation.
Instead, and understandably, the partidpants concentrated <HI agreement and
optimism, for nobody doubted that the reserves of ability are a spring to be
tapped rather than a "pool' to be drained, or, as Dr. Halsey put it, that
affluence and cultural advance will move together in 'a virtuous ascending
spiral'. It is to be hoped that this volume vnH stimulate the discussion and
positive action required to prepare its Iaunching-pad.

University of Manchester. W. A. L. BLYTH.

345
 Revievts
The Clerk in Industry by J. R. Dale. Pp. n 8 . Liverpool University
Press, 1962, 25s.
This is a useful descriptive study of a particular cat^ory of clerks about
whidi little has so far been known. It uses a variety <rf sources, but is based
predfflninantly on interviews with 208 male clerks in five companies in
different parts (rf the country. The author covers a number of topics of
interest to the sociologist in general as well as discussing in detail the more
practical problems of education and training. The two chapters dealing with
job experience, social origin and social status have perhaps the widest rele-
vance, containing as they do not only an analysis of the actual job histories
<rf the clerks analysed but an attempt to assess their attitude to clerical work.
There is, for example, material OTI their reasons for becoming a clerk which
reveals how oftra, clerical work, for the male entrant, is only a 'second best'.
Of particular interest is the findings that only 3.2% of the clerks interviewed
would choose clerical work for iheir sons, although 18.8% said that they
would choose a trade. The material on education background is also of
interest, for, although over half went to a grammar school, only 27 %
possessed an adequate general certificate of education.
Sociologists studying clerks have always been interested in white collar
unionism and Air. Dale has included a chapter on attitudes to what he calls
'combination and consultation'. It c(»nes as no surprise, in view of the low
union membership of industrial clerks, to find that 87.5% of those he
interviewed were not, and had never been, members <rf a trade union. Mr.
Dale convincingly suggests, however, that this low level <rf membership is
the result of apathy and lack of interest rather dian any considerable body
of opinicm hostile to white collar unionism in principle.
The chapters on qualifications, training, and education cwnprise a good
deal (rf the book and it is clear that these are matters on which the author
feels strongly. Certainly the general picture is a discouraging one, revealing
as it does considerable waste and frustration. A high proportion of the clerks
interviewed had tried to achieve some sort <rf pr(rfessional qualification for
purposes of pr(Hnotion but this effort had in the majority of cases, beai
frustrated, either because the exMnination was not taken or was failed. It
is true that many of those who did succeed were probably no longer clerks
so that Mr. Dale's universe, containing as it inevitably does, all those still
trying for promotion, and all those who have failed to get it, but not those
who have succeeded, will be rather more depressing than the reality. Never-
theless, the record of failure and frustration is an impressive one. Nor, as the
author shows, is this necessarily due to any fault in the students themselves,
fOT- education for c(Mnmerce is stiU almost entirely in the part-time evening
study stage, with all its hazards for the would-be student. Nor lave the
firms themselves given much thought to the actual training of their derks,
who are still taught 'on the job'.
Although this b(K>k is about the male clerk the author is well aware of the
significance for his status and j<^ oi^Kutunity of mechanisation in <^ces
and the scope this offers for the transfer (rf routine tasks to rdatively un-
called female labour. Nevertheless, he does not anticipate that the male
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 Reviews
clerk will disappear: rather, that with increasing mechanisation, women will
take over even more <rf the routine chores, leaving men to take over the
'many clerical positions which demand long experience and continuity of
service'. The implications of this tendency is that the male clerk will tend
to become mwe, radier than less skilled and will need more, rather than
less qualifications. As the author puts it, 'in the industrial office there is
likely to be no room at all for the male clerk of very limited ability and low
productivity'.
The clerk has for long been a significant figure in sodol<^ical literature
by reason of his marginal position between the middle and the working
classes. Yet, for some reason, there have been few att«npts by sociologists
to make a really determined effort to study this interesting social and oc-
cupational group. It is to be hoped that Mr. Dale's venture will encourage
others to follow.
University of Liverpool. OLIVE BANKS.

Human Befumour and Social Processes: An Interactionist Approach.

Edited by Arnold M. Rose. I ^ . xvi -f 680. Routledge and Kegan
Paul, London, 1962, 56s.
The aim of this volume is to give a comprehensive account of the nature
and applications of 'symbolic interaction theory'. It is unlikely that this
label will convey much to British sociologists: the intellectual strands from
which the theory is woven stem mainly from across the Atlantic. The origins
go back to Cooley, but the single most important figure is George Herbert
Mead. His writings have appealed chiefly to social psychologists in this
country, and the reviewer had been under the impression that Mead's r61e
theory, though in many ways brilliant and penetrating, was largely a dead
end. This is evidently a mistaken view, and Mead's writings have profoundly
influenced numerous American sociologists, who set about to clarify and
systematize his ideas, using them as a framework for research.
In a key introductory chapter Professor Rose sketches an outline of sym-
bolic interaction theory. He does this by presenting a series of assumptions
upon which the theory is based. These are, briefly, that man lives in a
symbolic environment, such symbols being learnt as a result of interaction
and issuing in shared meanii^s and values; learned symbols requiring role-
taking for their communication {Mead's significctnt symbols as opposed to
natural signs) enable us to influence the behaviour of others, at ^ e same
time as we are aware <rf how the recipient of a communication understands
what is communicated; in this manner man can learn vast numbers (rf
meanings and values, and thereby ways <rf acting, from other men; the
symbols typically occur in large and complex clusters; lastly, thinking is
a process o£ covert trial and error for symbolic solutions preparatory to
action. This bald, though it is hoped not entirely misleading summary does
scant justice to liie author's presentation. Nevertheless, one is apt to be
left with a feeling that <Mie has heard most <rf diis before. This does not
apply to the implications that are drawn from the assumptitms: the relations
347
 Reviews
between ejqwrience and behaviour are far nnwe comp'lex than s<»ne other
theories would have us believe; a group of individuals learning by means of
symbols has 'a culture witii a hist<M7', hence the search for a universal
control group in group-dynamics work is bound to be a will-o'-the-wisp;
finally, the theory postulates that a man's conception of his self is the most
important meaning he ever learns; hence it affects his behaviour throughout
life and we must focus on this if we wish to understand his behaviotir.
This introduaory essay is followed by over thirty contributions, and s<Mne
of the most distinguished American sociologists figure among the writers.
The selection of examples which follows is inevitably an arbitrary one.
Ralph H. Turner criticises conventional rok theory for its rigidity and
neglect (rf the subtleties of muttial interactitms. Anselm Strauss traces some
oi the transformations trf self and personal identity in adult life widiin their
social context. Tamotsu Shibutani re-examines the notions of reference
groups and of social control; the latter is vie^red not as direa influence, but
as governed by the fact *that each person generally takes into account the
expectations he imputes to other people'. Herbert Biumer appHes^ Mead's
ideas to society as a ftmctioning whole, maintaining that structural aspects
such as social stratification or social r61es provide the frameworfi; of social
action but cannot be regarded as determinants; people 'construct' action by
an interpretation of the situations with which they are faced.
Subsequent essays deal with more drcumscribed topics. Tlius Eliot Freid-
son explores the subterranean ccanplexities of relationships between doctor
and patient, and Melville Dalton analyses the 'co-operative evasions' often
involved in the interactions between management and the tinions. The
editor himself contributes a s(Kial-psychological ilieory of neurosis, inter-
preted as a failure in role transition. There is only space for brief mention
of some other highlights: Ernest W. Burgess on social process; I>aniel
Glaser and Donald R. Cressey on the differential association theory of crime;
Howard S. Becker on Marihuana and social control; E. Franklin Frazier on
desegration.
This concludes the first part of the reviewer's duty, namely to convey some
idea of content: it should be evident by now that this volume offers a rich
and varied fare. What about the broader perspective? If one takes the
liberty of viewing sociological theories as forming a continuum joining at
one extreme physics or metereology and on the other philosophy or literature,
then symbolic interactionism is located nearer the latter end. Its practitioners
are on the inside of social processes: tiiey are trying to capture die nuances
of human relationships and build up fr<Kn liiere, rather than treat society
like an ant-heap as quasi-outsiders (though there is of course much to be
^ i d in favour (rf such an approach). Consequently the most impressive parts
are either theoretical/analytic ones, or diose based on observation and ex-
perience. One of the outstanding contributions, for instance, is an essay on
*The Treatment of Tuberoilosis as a Bargaining Process', vsritten by a
former patient who supplemented his own a:perience by siystematic olwerva-
tion in T B hospitals. On the other hand, the conventional r^Kxrts of
empirical studies are, with a few conspicuous exceptions, rather weak and
disappointing; the worst case is that of Sbeld<Hi Stryker who feit able to
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contravene the basic assumptions of analysis <rf variance and proceed to
draw conclusions from his computations.
Another characteristic of the book which iMrobably also follows from the
general orientation, is its relative freedom from repulsive jargon. Admittedly,
one author was able to write (in an otherwise valuable discussion of the
American fuiKral director) about 'beliefs which underpin modern deathways';
as against that, the essay on the beat generation might well have merited
a place in a fastidious literary journal; here is a sample of the style: *the
final alternative is to lapse into that dark inertia which is just beneath the
neon surface of American life'.
In conclusion, ±is is a book which may be wholeheartedly recommended
to sociologists. With unusual coherence atid unity it throws much fresh
light on many and varied perennial themes, and few readers will fail to be
stimulated.
University of Glasgow. GuSTAV JAHODA

Backbench Opinion in the House of Commons, 1955-59 by S. E.

Finer, H. B. Berringtoa and D. J. Bartholemew. Pp. ix + 219.
Pergamon IVess, London, 1961, 60s.
Diuring the past dozen years political scientists have produced much new
information about political processes. Most notable have been the studies of
voting behaviour at elections, of the organisation of parties, and oi the part
played by interest group; Professor Finer has himself been pr<miinent in
studies of the last type. Pariamentary procedure, the Cabinet and the civil
service have not been neglected, but there still remain big obstacles to a
really adequate study of Parliament at work. Because of the nature of party
discipline the division lists are not very informative; furthermore Hansard
does not indicate abstentions. Oae cannot well analyse speedies, and the
leaks about the private party committees are s l i ^ t and scrappy.
We know that the two parties which confront one another in the House
of COTnmons are collections of pec^le who almost always vote together,
but we also know that •Kich party includes people of differing opinions,
and that the pany line on any particular matter is not simply dictated by
die leaders from above. In the search for a means of discovering the nature
of the differences of attitude within the parties the authors of this book have
hit upon the very ingenious idea of analysing the signatures to 'early d a /
motions. These imdeniably supply Members vfith an important device for
expressing their views and of trying to enlist support for them. Any
Member may at any time put down a motion expressing srane hope or
opinion, or calling on the Government to take some action, and other
Members may add their signatures if they are sympathetic. Such a motion
may have a chance of being debated on one of the few occasions in the
year when time is given under sessional orders to private members' motions,
or it may conceivably be taken up by one of die parties and debated under
arrangements made through the usual channels Qsy agreement between the
Chief ^SCTiips who form an informal steering committee). But when a Member
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 Reviews
puts down a motion it is usually without much thought that it will be
debated; he just wants to use this device for calling attention to his c^inions,
and to see how many coUeagues will siqiport him.
As these motions are put down spiMitaneouslyj it seemed to the authors
of this book that a close study of the behaviour of Members, in putting
diem down and in signing them, would help them to produce srane facts
about MJ*.s' attitudes and synnpathies. So they classified the motions, and
then went through the names <rf the preqxwers and signatories, lodging for
connexions beween these activities and other definable diaracteristics of the
M.P.S concerned, such as age, length of service in the House, type of seat
represented, education, and, with Labour Members, sponsorship by Trade
Unions. The two main parties are dealt with separately, and there is a very
illuminating series of 'annexes' on particular t<^ics.
This type of approach to political analysis is capable of jwoducing
strongly hostile reactions in some quarters, particularly among some jour-
nalists atid practitioners of politics. In some of the earlier reviews the book
was criticized on various counts, and the main objection seems to be (as
suggested by Mr. Anthony Howard in the New Statesman I2th January),
that the conclusions can be divided into two categories: the inherently
obvious and the absurd. An ancillary objection is that the niethod was ill-
founded. After all, it is perfecUy dear that in any group of people, including
Labour M.P.s and Conservative M.P.s, there will be scMne who are personally
nvore ready to sign things than others, and that personal considerations or
log-rolling tactics, or pure chance, must have a great part to play in leading
a Member to sign, or not to sign, a particular motion. A member who signs
a motion with great hesitation may be poles apart from one who signs with
conviction, but very dose to one who does not sign. For failing to see that
these facts invalidate their methods the authors are accused of extreme
academic naivete.
But this is not fair at all. The authors fully recognize the effect of the
personal considerations and of other chance factors; their point is that as
diey put it, 'it is possible in principle to establish just how jwrobable or im-
probable it is that the support given by any type-class (rf Members to a
certain kind of Motion is due to chance alone'. Surely it is the people who
deny this who can justly be accused of naivet^ and worse; they are cwning
near to the obscurantist position that 'statistics can be made to prove any-
thing, therefore let us not bother with any statistics at all'.
The authors have in fact produced a great number of very interesting
and significant findings. Sonw of these, such as the tenancy of trade union
and working class Labour Members to be relatively forward in supporting
motions concerned with social questions, may be mere confirmations of
what one would have expected, and perhaps asserred with some con-
fidence, even in the absence of the authors' findings; nevertheless new
concrete evidence is very welcome. In many other matters the findings
are mudi less obvious, t h o u ^ they are not necessarily surprising. We can
now have mudi mwe confidence than before in making statements
about the differences between yoimg and old members erf both parties,
particularly Conservatives, on some matters, and the educational diver-
350
 Re^Hervs
gences produce some quite fascinating results. Among these is a v a y
curious and inexplicable one. Conservatives ftom Oxford seem to be
distincdy more leftish in many fields than Cotiservatives frtmi Cambridge.
This is, as it happens, not altogether unexpected, though one cannot very
well go anywhere on the basis of this odd bit of information. On the more
generalised conclusions, it is also not surprising to find that it is much more
difficult to classify Conservative Members in order <rf 'leftishness' dian it
is with the Labour Members, because the attitudes of Conservatives <m
different classes of topics show a much less consistent pattem. This again
is not really surprising, though it is the sort of observation that a reasonably
cautious observer wotild have been reluctant to make in the absence of
evidence going beyond intelligent guesswork.
The study of correlations between Members' attitudes on civil liberties,
penal reform, social and foreign policy questions has turned out to be a
most interesting exercise. With the Labour Members something like a
consistent pattern has been produced, and it has been carried so far that
we are provided with a list of the fifty most left Labour Members. This
was indeed a risky xmdertaking, and it is not surprising that this list has
been the sul^ect of some hostile comment. As Mr. Richard Crossman wrote
in the Guardian, there is something wrong with an X-ray which reveals
Mr. Robert Mellish and Mr. Roy Mason as among the fifty most Left
Members of the Parliamentary Labour Party and excludes Mrs. Barbara
Castle. But it would be very wrong to concentrate one's attention on par-
ticular inclusions in this table or cMnissions from it. The point is that, even
in the restilts obtained from this tabulation of individuals, there is much to
suggest that the methods were based on valid asstimptions.
In any case, the main object of the book was not to find out which in-
dividuals were furthest to the Left, but to produce much more interesting
and significant information about the whole cranplex of attitudes among the
Members of the two main parties. In this main purpose the authors have
succeeded very well. Of course they have not produced a final and definitive
answer to the question of the relations between individual Members and
their parties, but they were not trying to do that. What they have done is
to show that there are generalisations which can be made, on the basis of
reasonably convincing evidence, and these generalisations teach us much
about die nature of political life that we could not know without them.
The Durham Colleges. P. A. BROMHEAD.

Mental Hedth in the Metropolis. The Midtown Manhattan Study.

Vol. I. by Leo Srole and others. Pp. xii -(- 428. McGraw Hill,
London, 1962, 77s.
This is the first instalment of die three-volume series to be known as the
Thomas Rennie Memorial in Social Psychiatry named after the founder
and first director of the Midtown Manhattan Mental Health Study. After
his death in 1956 he was succeeded by Professor A. Leighton. The iwoj«:t
was planned atid executed by a team of sociologists, psydiiatric social
 Revieztys
workers, psychiatrists, clinical psychol<^ists and anthropologists. The popu-
lation chosen for study numbered 175,000 persons settled in a well-defined
residential area near the centre of Manhattan. One of the assumptions
underlying the project was that environmental factors may result in intensi-
fication of predispcBition to, and in predpitati<m of mental illness. In this
volume only demt^aphic factors and their inter-corrdations are analyzed.
The following ten variables were established in a representative sample of
1660 white individuals aged 20-59; age, sex, marital status, parental and own
socio-econcHnic status, gaieration in the U.S., rural-urban background,
religious origin, own religion, ethnic origin. A questiormaire wiiii 200 items
was used. It provided for a treatment census. In ascertaining data concerning
psychiatric morbidity only a broad classification of symptom, formation was
applied. It consisted (rf the six categories: wdl, mild, moderate, marked,
severe symptoms, incapacitated. The last three categories were called the
impaired group. Midtown had a scarcity of children, a large contingent of
unmarried adults and many working wives. While the ctmipoation of its
population did not diflFer materially from that of other big American cities,
it had an excessive concentration of medical specialists, among whom there
were 250 psychiatrists. It was exceptionally well served with psychiatric
treatment facilities. It had the highest Juveiule ddinquents rate cwnpared
with the rest of Manhattan and other boroughs. The number of patients in
psychiatric treatment was four times that found at New Haven. Neverthe-
less, 73.3% of the impaired Midtown group were listed as 'never-patients',
i.e. as imtreated. This finding poses a tremendous problem. The authors
compare the impaired population with an iceberg of which only a small part
is visible.
In a one-day prevalence count it was established that 502 per roo,ooo of
the popidation were in a mental hospital and 788 were imder out-patient
treatment. Of the survey sample, 18.5% were classified as well, 58.1% as
having mild to moderate symptons and 23.4% as impaired. This was a
higher morbidity rate than found in cranparable studies at Baltimore and
Boston, but the differences were mOTe apparent than real. When correlated
with age, the well category was h i ^ e s t in the young adults, the impaired
conditions were most prevalent among the oldest, while mild-moderate
categories were evenly spread among all age groups. The authors attribute
the deterioration with advancing age to social r61e discontinuity rather than
to organic wear and tear. Mental pathology was highest among single men
and the divorced of both sexes. In the Midtown population as a whole the
sex factor was^ imrelated to mental morbidity.
Sis groups of socio-economic status (SES) were distinguished. On the
parental SES range the frequency of impairment varied inversely and die
well-rate varied directly. Up-ward status mobility correlated with low, down-
ward mobility with high psychiatric morbidity. Own SES too, was strongly
related to mentd health. The authors regard these findings as evidence that
the sodal cbass system acts 'as an apparatus that differentially sows, reaps,
sifts atid redistributes the community's crops of mentsj morbidity and' of
sound personalities.' They hypothesize that in the upper ranges sodo-cultural
processes penetrate the family unit with eugenic and prophylactic rffccts for
352
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personality develtqanent, while in the lower range they tend to work with
the opposite effect.
While the 'poor' had many more impaired people, relatively fewer of
them got psychiatric attention than amraig the 'aifluent', and relatively fewer
of the former than of the latter seemed to benefit frcan treatment. This has
been found by other research workers, also, and is capable of various inter-
pretations.
Contrary to previous workers, diis team found that the differences in
mental health between immigrants and American-born persons were in-
significant, if age and SES were taken into account. The mental health of
those who had arrived before the immigration acts of 1921 and 1924, which
excluded persons suffering from mental illness, was inferior to those who
had arrived afterwards, but the two groups differed with regard to origin
and selection also.
Religious origin proved an interesting variable. A far larger proportion
of Jews than oi Catholics and Protestants were under psychiatric out-
patient treatment, while among the in-patients the Catholics were over-
represented. The impairment rates of Jews, Protestants and Catholics were
165, 215 and 263 respectively. The favourable rate among Jews was charac-
teristic especially of the lower SES origin persons. Change in religious
affiliation worsened the mental health picture for those who had drifted into
the 'no religion' streams, while converts did not do badly. Jews were found
to accept psychiatry more readily than Non-Jews.
In a commentary, the significance of the findings is discussed frran the
psychiatric and sociological viewpoints. The survey has thrown l i ^ t on
the problems of untreated psychopathology, the role of sodogenesis in mental
disorders, the disadvantage of low SES status for mental health, the different
attitudes towards psychiatric treatment, the role erf religious origin and of
migration. Contrary to widely held beliefs, more than one third of the test
populations was found to live under conditions a£ poverty. The authors
are confident that American society generates its own correctives against
the psychol<^cal consequences of poverty.
This is a most impressive piece of team work which challenges some
old-established assumptions and should be productive of many new hypo-
theses. A similar survey carried out in this country would probably yield
similar results exc^t where the structure of the medical services is involved.
While the proportion of psychiatrically impaired persons trKited by psychia-
trists is probably smaller in this rountry than in Midtown, the proportion of
untreated persons is much smaller in Britain where the general practitioner
is the main therapeutic agent. He is not specially referred to in this airvey
and appears to be fading out of the picttire in the United States, at least
in the big cities.
This book has all the qualities that make a classic. The authors have
indeed gone to town with their project. They have set an example by their
restraint in the design (rf the investigation and by their caution in die inter-
pretation of the results.
University of Sheffield. E. STENGEL.

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Married Women Working by Pearl Jephcott, with Nancy Seear and
John H. Smith. Pp. 208. Allen and Unwin, London, 1962, 35s.
In Britain today just over half of all female employees are married, ann-
pared with about a fifth at the turn of the century. Economic expansion and
full employment have increased the demand for female labour at a time
when the numbers of single women available continue to decline. In face
of this increase in the employment of married wranenj it is astonishing how
conroversial an issue it still remains as to whether married wcanen—and
particularly those with dependant children—should wantj be allowed, be
encouraged (the words should fit the prejudice) to leave home.
One of the purposes of the research of Miss Jephcott and her colleagues
was to find out the consequences for family life where the mother goes out
to work. The area selected for stiuly was Bermondseyj a solidly working-
class dockland borough on the south side of the Thames. It is a borough
which has been noted for many years not only for its poverty and the
troubled employment history associated with any area where casual labour
is common, but also for its respectability and strong local pride. Studied
by Charles Booth in the nineteenth century, and later adopted by a series
of social workers and reformers, its social history is well-documented. The
authors have drawn on this store of knowledge from the past and it is this,
plus their intimate knowledge of the present Bermondsey—^Miss Jephcott
herself has lived in the borough for some years—which adds colour and
substance to this report.
Although the employment of married women has so dramatically increased
in the country as a whole, it is by no means a recent phencanenon in
Bermondsey. Because <rf its closeness to the centre of I^ndon, because of
the long history of uncertain employment amongst their menfolk, it has
been both possible and necessary for many years for married women to
work outside the home. What is interesting therefore in this particular
district is not the effect of a sudden social change (a mass exodus from
home to factory); it is rather the adaptation of an established tradition in a
changing social situation—improved housing, smaller families, higher stan-
dards of childcare, and full employment. On the whole the findings of the
research are very reassuring. So much so, indeed, that the writers seem
at one or two points to strain to find a darker side. For example, they go
to some trouble to seek out a correlation between mothers at work and
children in court but, as they themselves point out, the evidence is. far
from conclusive. It also, in fact, somewhat conflicts with an earlier impression
in the botA that the mothers who work were amongst the more energetic
and cOTni)etent.
The authors suggest that the stability of the area, the tradition oi mothers
working, the availability of part-time work close by, and so on, tnay all
have helped to minimise the risks and strains so often associated with the
mother's absence from home. Other research on the subjea in very different
areas has, however, similarly found no evidence oi harmful consequences.
Of course there may be adverse effects as yet undiscovered—one can only
say at present that there is no indication that families stjffer in serious
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ways when wives work—and one would like to see more research, perhaps
in a new town, along similar lines to explore this further. One wonders,
for example, what the lor^-tcrm effects on w<Mnen's health might be, for
in Bermondsey, at any rate, there is little doubt that tiie dual rSle demands
a good deal of physical and mental effort. But even here there would be
great difficulties in disentangling and measuring results, as might be illustrated
by the quotation from an essay by a 14 year old Bermondsey girl: 'My own
mother recently took up a part-time job and I find that although she often
feels tired and needs more help, she is much happier and has more interesting
things to say'.
Other aspects one would like to see explored more thoroughly in future
enquiries are the differing effects on women's family lives of their doing
part-time work as against full-time, and more detailed study amongst that
minority of women who start work when their children are below school
age.
As well as its comprehensive and intensive research into family life in
Bermondsey today, the study also covers—and with similar thoroughness—
the employers' problems in using married women. Peek Frean's, the firm
on which this aspect of the enquiry is based, has, so the authors write 'the
reputation of being progressive, and . . . certainly tended to be experimental
in both its technical and its personnel policy'. The speed with which it has
radically departed from traditional employment policy towards the married
woman worker suggests as much. In pre-war days no married women at all
were employed by the firm; by the middle fifties 82 per cent of women
employees were married. What is more, nearly half of all operatives were
engaged on a part-time basis, and numerous adjustments (in terms of hours)
and concessions (in terms of permitted absence) had been made as part of
the firm's attempt to meet the domestic needs of its married women em-
ployees. Of course, none of these changes have come about without difficulties
for management; but by and large they seem to have been worthwhile.
These are only one or two of the main strands in the fabric of this closely
woven and richly rewarding book. It is a pity that the swnewhat confusing
tables do not contribute as much as they could to an otherwise excellent
research report.
Institute of Community Studies. PHYLLIS WILLMOTT

Social Theory and Social Practice by Hans L. Zetterberg. Pp. 190.

The Bedtninster Press, New York, 1962, $6.50.
The title <rf this boc^ is attractive; it suggests that here, at long last,
attention is being paid to the ways in which social theory and fact interact,
at least in those situations in which sodal theories are made use of to
understand specific problems. One of the chapters in the boc^ is, indeed,
entitled T h e Practical Use of Social Theory'. But a distinction is made in
the Introduaion between 'applied social sdence' (or the pt^tilarization of
the content of the sodal sciences on the one hand, and applied research on
the other), and 'applied social theory'. It is the latter that is the basis of
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the boc^. This, it appears, is an activity in which a 'client's problems' are
looked at in the light of theoretical sodology, as a result erf whidi 'theoretical
solutions' are arrived at and reported to the client.
So one is led bad; once more al<Mig a path that is so familiar in the
sociological thinking of today, to a state of affairs in which abstract theory
is paramoimt; there is little interaction that is reported on between theory
and fact, except (as is stated at the end of the book) in so far as 'practical
application of social theory forces theorists to be at least reasonably
precise . . . and to have more than a technical vocabulary to offer when
talking about social events'. A clear conflict has thus arisen in the aurfior's
mind between 'applied social theory', of which he is an exponent, and 'basic
theory', though hiis argument assumes that the former is given meaning,
if not purpose, by the latter. But he appears to be unaware that this is
so.
One cannot be surprised, therefore, when one looks at the book as a
whole, to find that about half of it is devoted to an examination of the
'knowledge' possessed by 'sodal practitioners' and 'sodal theorists', for it
is assumed that in 'social practice' pre-existing theory is applied to a problem
under investigation. As might be expected, this kind of theory turns out
to be highly abstract, and to be derived from speculation rather than
empirically. For instance, it is said that 'among associates, the positions of
those performing different actions (or very dissimilar distributions of the
same actions) are likely to become differentiated'; or, again, 'growth oS
an institutional value is channelled frcwn its receivers to its creators'. If
we complain that we find these aphorisms of small value, then we are told
to be of good cheer, for though the 'tMminological excuses that plague
sociology are not to be excused, they are, 'at least in part . . . inherent in
the discipline'. So that is that.
The book ends with a case study of an attempt by the director <rf a
muiseum to get help frwn an applied sociologist, to find out how he could
attract more people to visit his building. After a number of glimpses of the
obvious have been given us, we are told in die end that die museum is
part of the status-system of the town. Only those inhabitants who were
'upwardly mobile' concerned themselves with museum affairs; it was a
necessity for the museum staff to 'co-operate with the very rich', because
it appeared to be only 'the man who achieves prosperity and power, or
academic honor, (who) begins to want beauty as well'. So nothing much
could be done to help the Director, and the final conclusion, a depressing
one, was that 'the plain circumstance is that nothing in theoretical sodology
could be relevantly related to these issues'.
My own conclusion would be, so much the worse for 'theoretical sodology',
and I would decide to back down out of the blind alley in which I had
found myself. The author, indeed, seems to maintain throughout the book
the doubts he expresses at the beginning, namely, that the 'notion that
science can be put to work to provide solutions to sodal problems' is
'a frustrating dream'. If that is so, it is hard to understand why he wrote
it; a straightforward attack on the whole idea of a sodal sdence would have
been much more rewarding.
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For myself, I certainly cannot agree that there is no more to sociological
work of this kind than to make available such supposedly relevant dieory as
there may be, to 'clients'. This, I feel, could only lead to the creatiwi <rf
a new classicism, expoimded by schoolmen who wouldj in effect, continue a
tradition derived from the Middle Ages, rather than that of the science of
the Renaissance. My vote would go to any modern Gallileo, if I could find
one.
University of Liverpool. T. S. SiMEY.

The Myth af Mental Illness, A Critical Assessment of the Freudian

Approach by Thomas S. Szasz. Pp. xii + 337. Seeker & Warburg,
London, 1962, 35s.
In a recent debate in the House of Lords Lady Wootton judiciously
remarked that she did not wish to go as far as the psychoanalyst. Dr. S2as2j
in discounting the notion of mental illness entirely. So, at last, we have
come to the spectacle of Lady Wootton defending the concept of mental
illness and Dr. Szasz, the training analyst from the Chicago Institute of
Psychoanalysis disposing of it altt^ether! Szasz advocates a measure of
scepticism which, if followed up logically, would lead to his own un«nploy-
ment as a counsellor-healer and as a trainer of counsellor-healers. He believes
that 'mental illness' is a conceptual construct which relates to nothing very
distinctive in this world: conditions which have been called by this name
are either adequately described in neurological terms or they ate simply
moral aberrations. Szasz takes hysteria as a prototype erf mental illness and
blames psydiiatrists frtrai Charcot to Freud for attaching to this form of
malingering behavior the respectability of a clinical-sounding name and for
making it out to be a 'genuine' illness. Szasz brilliantly argues to show the
responsibility of the psychoanalyst for making the help-seeker think that
he is a patient and that he is ill, and also for creating a cultural-moral
climate in which hysterical behaviotir is encouraged by making this appear
a legitimate illness. Mudi of what he says on the suggestive, directive, and
exhortational influence of psychiatry is most timely and sotind. There is,
however, somediing seriously lacking in his proposals. It may be as he says
that psychoanalysts have objectified the unconscious whilst it is, in fact,
no more than a hypothetical construct; yet, even so, are we not to make
any moral distinctions between acts carried out, say, under posthypnotic
suggestion and acts consciously and freely embarked on? Is the person acting
under posthypnotic suggestion a disembler, a malingerer, and a fake? It seems
to me that the conventiraial moralist's attitude to mental illness can't be rehab-
ilitated, for with our new tindersanding we have powerfully grown in cran-
passion and tolerance and have also grown suspicious of all kinds of moralising.
At any rate the argument Szasz oSeis us has certain other obvious weaknesses.
Are we to regard hysteria as a prototype of mental illness? Is, for example,
a ruminative obsessional a maliriga*er in the sense that a sufferer fran a
hysterical conversion symptom couW be so described, but with swne obvious
lack of pity? And in any case, if hysteria is not an illness does Szasz proprae
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 Reviezvs
that we henceforth stop 'treating' or 'healing' conditions such as this, for
if there is no illness, there is surely no point in talking about cure?
Szasz developes the thesis that mental illness is a gesture of cwmnunica-
tion, indeed that hysterical symptoms, for example, are constituents of a
language, body language. From this he advances triumphantly to the
remai^ble conclusion that if hysteria is a linguistic statement, a kind of
language, it would be senseless to speak of the etiolt^y of a hysteria for
a language has no etiology. The obvious difficulty is this: all language has
referents and if the hysterical syndrome is a linguistic statement it has as
its referent the condition which the syndrome cwnmunicates to others. The
concept of communication is not separable frwn the concept of 'message
with a content and meaning' and Szasz has not told us what the fate of
this content or meaning is in his theory. There are other liberties taken
with the concept of commimication, especially when Szasz speaks of the
'sufferer' {sic) who 'commimicates with internal objects'. (It is interesting
to see diat the 'mentally ill' are henceforth not to be regarded as 'mentally
ill' yet they are still to be thought of as 'sufferers'). Yet Szasz does a good
service for us by bluntly proclaiming that psychiatric and psychoanalytical
language is morally judgmental and socially manipulative. The more the
directiveness is disclaimed and the more the psychotherapists back up their
intervention by striking the pose of 'applied scientists' the more insidious
this directiveness.
The philosophical assumptions at the basis of this work are somewhat
eclectic: G. H. Mead and Richard Peters are often quoted to support a thesis
which Szasz would have been very well equipped to develc^ unaided. Some
readers are bound to feel that the game-play conception of human behaviour
and of Ulness has hardly more than a metaphorical value and one cannot
help wondering whether an extension of this conception to the activities
of book-writing, book-reviewing, and indeed, of making up a game-theory
of behaviour would not somewhat lessen our exdtement about the value of
this metaphor. Then there is Richard Peters and his stress on man being
a Vule following' creature. We are invited by Szasz to bear in mind that
the socio-historical contexts are mainly responsible for the forms mental
illness takes: we should, for example, look at the virtual disappearance of
certain forms of hysteria which were well known in the nineteenth century.
Man only follows the cultural rules laid down for behaviour and we are
wrong in calling his compliance with expectations an illness. No doubt there
is a significance in the difference between causal and conventional behaviour
but this significance is not psychological: if eating the wrong food results
in food poisoning and we call the result an illness I see no reason why the
outcOTne of following the wrong kind oi rules should not be regarded as
an illness. And espedally neither Peters nor Szasz would convince us that
breakdowns following bad meals substantially differ from breakdowns
following bad deals. Nor is it entirely certain that any particular culture
can alter mans destiny of dependency and that the psychotherapeutic culture
following the Christian culture of humility and dependency misdiagnoses
the human ccmdition and encourages les rrudades imagirudres. Reading Szasz,
the psychoanalyst, one feels that one is back in the pages of Lapiere's
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Freudian Ethic with all its bitter charges of subversion of western morals
and of causing the enfeeblement of the western moral stamina.
At the same time Szasz is rightly critical of psychoanalytical complacencies
and especially erf the therapeutic optimism which somehow never gets sub-
stantiated. Of course, if the concept <rf mental illness is a logical and a moral
error we need not concern ourselves with doubts about the strength and
personal effectualness of the psychotherapeutic professions—all that is wanted
is a return to a culture of personal responsibility. Szasz firmly and, I think,
decisively challenges the psychotherapeutic professions for their pretensions
both as appliers of science and as manipulators trf human material. He is
willing to give them credit for their work as theoretical scientists who have
deepened our understanding of man. Indeed the quest for a knowledge of
man has good moral credentials but it is not even probable that psychiatrists
will be able to continue enjoying their present status and privileges if they
abdicate their function of counsellors and retire to cultivate theoretical
knowledge for its own sake.
University of Keele. PAUL HALMOS.

Sentiments and Activities by George Caspar Homans. Pp. 326. The

Free Press of Glencoe, 1962, $6.50.
George Homam is one of the most attractive figures in American
sociology today, and this book explains why. It contains a selection of his
articles which is fully representative of his wide range of interests, covering
economic history, anthropology and the sociology of small groups. But the
most fascinating part of the bocrfc is the fifty page autobiography with which
it opens. This reveals how his intellectual curiosity led him along these
diverse paths, and also how all that he did has been influenced by his
personal origin and background. One never forgets that he is the product
of a well-to-do, aristocratic-bourgeois, Puritan family of English origin. He
tells us himself that he foimd in Pareto an answer to the gnawing fear that,
as Marx maintained, his intellectual processes might be conditioned by his
class position, and he pursued his study of English land tenure across the
sea to its possible origins in Friesland because 'in going back I have been
looking for myself: I was amcmg the Frisians who crossed the North Sea
at the news from Britain that the emperor had withdrawn his legions'. One
even learns why it is that he often reminds us of a ^a-captain: he was
one, dtiring the war. This is all done with so much frankness and diarm
that he has us walking beside him frmn the very start.
Homans graduated in English literature and then came under the influence
of L. J. Henderson, Harvard Professor of Biolc^ical Chemistry, who invited
him to join his seminar on Pareto. Among the members were Crane Brinton
and Schumpeter. This experience introduced him to ideas about scientific
method which remained with him throughout. 'I took to Pareto', he writes,
'because he made clear to me what I was already prepared to believe'. He
became a junior Fellow in the Sodety of Fellows among whose senior mem-
bers were Lowell and Whitehead, and he met and worked with Elton Mayo.
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 Remezos
It was his sociological questions about social structures and human behaviour
that drove him into history, and he did the job thoroughly under the dis-
tinguished guidance of Mcllwain. And, on the advice of Henderson, he
learned German, studied mathematics and read a lot about the histcary and
methods of the natural sciences. It was a wonderful training, and it was
in line with his Puritanical inclination to do things the hard way, A propos
of his historical apprenticeship he says, 'some sociologists are still fond of
implying that, with their training and theories, they could do a better job
of writing history than the historians can. All I can say is: let them do it;
let them put up or shut up.' It is a highly characteristic remark.
He tells us that he has prc^essed mainly by reaction against the views
of others rather than by original and creative thought of his own. It is
doubtful whether this is truer of him than of most, but, be that as it may, his
reaction was not total rejection or blind opp<Kition, but involved himi in
an attempt to reshape what was good in the views he rejected, while com-
bining them with other elements, into something new and acceptable. It is
typical that his article on the theories of Alalinowski and Radcliffe-Brown
about magic and ritual should be devoted to showing that they were both
right, up to a point. His chief reactions were against Marxism, functional-
ism, pans of Durkheim (that society is. an object sui generis and not derivable
fr<Hn psychology), and later against the so-called theoretical school of
Talcott Parsons. In order to avoid going into detail, it will be best to
summarise the result.
The aim of sociol<^y, he says, is 'a system of equations which defines the
relations between variables, time being one, and by means of which it is
possible to predict the changing behaviour of single human groups and
account for the differences between groups'. In this Pareto remained his
master. He rejected functional explanation which took the form of asserting
that particular institutions or modes of behaviour contributed functionally
to the maintenance of the total social system, and existed for this reason,
because it was vague and incapable of demonstration. He also rejected as
meless for his purpose concepts which were either merely taxonomic (like
class) or cranposite (like status) and sought for concepts that were truly
analytical. And this led him to the belief that the tiltimate explanatory
principle for sociology is psycholt^cal, namely the behavioiir of men as men.
'I finally came to the conclusion that the erapiricai findings of small-group
research, social anthropology, and history could best be explained by the
propositions of behavioural psychology'. He quarrels witb the theoretical
school of Parsons on the grounds that they have no theory. They deal in
concepts, not in propositions, and one can dediKe nothing from concepts.
Theory is built by deriving lower-order contingent propositions from higher-
order ones; ot rather in practice by conceiving the highcr-wder propositions
from which the lower-order ones could be derived. It is with this problem
that Homans has occupied himself. The chapter in this boc^ which, apart
ftoim the autobiography, is most illuminating about his aims and methods,
is that on 'The Strategy <rf Industrial Sodol<^y'.
One final point must be made, if the impression of Hwnans is to be a
faithful one. He rejects v/ba.t he believes to be basically wrong. But he is
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tolerant of those who pursue lines of research quite different from his own,
which may yield results with which his own may ultimately be combined.
In the course of comparing the work of social psychologists, \rfio use statis-
tical methods to seek correlations for selected variables over as wide a social
field as possible, with that of the industrial sociologist, who studies in great
detail the whole life of one small group and draws tentative craiclusions
which are not statistically controlled, he makes a remark which should be
taken to heart by all sociologists: 'the idea that there is only one way of
going to work will be the ruin of our science'.

Cambridge. T. H. MARSHALL,

Social Life and Cultural Change by Don Maitindale, Pp, xii -|- 528.
Van Nostrandj 1962, 70s,
The interpretation of sodal and cultural diange is a field in which socio-
logists, historians, and critics are necessarily concerned. The problems are
so difikult that we ought to keep an open mind about the value of disciplines
not our own, which t^er to work here. It has been very interesting for me
to read and think about Professor Martindale's study. He <^ers to rescue
the theory of social and cultural change from the comparative disrepute
into which it appears to have fallen in the social sciences. He advances a
number of theoretical propositions, and tests them with case studies. Enough
of my own work has been in a comparable field, t h o u ^ following different
disciplines, to make the book alive for me, but of course I cannot claim to
review it from any but my own points of view.
Martindale begins by analysing the professional suspicions of any compara-
tive study of society and civilisation. He argues that the collapse of early
f^ms oi prc^ess theory, and in particular of unlinear evolutionism, left com-
parative studies (rf social and cultural change in a disreputable mess, since
the ordinary purpose of these studies had been to prove one or other of
these schemes. The same point is true, he argues, of the many popular
cyclical theories, and the studies supporting them. A more self-conscious
and scientific sociology, on the other hand, has producd only three major
approaches lo the matta-, none of them satisfactory. These are the culture-
lag theory, which he sees as breaking down, in any wide field, because of
its distinction between material and non-material culture; the o r ^ n i c cyclical
theory, which he sees as determined and distorted by moral and ethical pro-
grammes, allowing bias in the selection of evidence; and the intrusive dis^
turbance theory of the functionalists, which has proved very limited in its
description of actual change.
Martindale then outlines a social behaviouristic theory of change. Three
areas are defined: the establishment of groups and institutions; the formation
of cranmunities; and the synthesis of civilizations His book is mainly ain-
cemed witb the formation of commimities, since this process requires the
reconstruction of first-ord«r groiq>s and instituti<ms, and its crystallisation is
normally the essential agent of the synthesis of a civilisation. The intellectuals,
as a group, are given special attention because they occupy a strategic rdle
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in the integration of conmiunities, though they are not the sole creators, and
because they are again prominent in the subsequent syn'diesis oi a civilisation.
Four hypotheses are then offered:
(i) that the periods of formation of new cwnmunities are man's creative
epochs;
(ii) that the quality and quantity of creativity are related to Ihe type of
coimnunity in each case, and in general have been highest in the
creation of the more complex axnmimities;
(iii) that in the maturity <rf a community free creativity declines, and in-
tellectual forms becmne restricted;
(iv) that in creative periods truth is tested by standards arising from the
creative process itself, while in conformist periods it is tested by its
degree of acceptability to established institutions.
I have no doubt that these theoretical propositions are useful, though I
find them unsurprising The major problems seem to me still concealed
within the forms of the hypotheses. What criteria, for example, do we use
to distinguish a period of ccMnmunity formatitm from a period of maturity,
unless we use the evidence of the rise or fall of creativity whidi in fact
we are trying to eiqjlain? As Martindale turned to bis test cases, I watched
with considerable interest.
His first four cases are of andent sodeties: in China, India, Palestine
and Greece, Martindale fulfils his hypotheses, but I can say no more than
that, I have seen (as Martindale has seen elsewhere) bow easy it is to make
a sdxeme fr«n facts imperfecdy known, I mean no disrespect to Martin-
dale when I find my critical training reminding me that studies of this
kind must be to a considerable extent external. I don't mean that they
shouldn't be tried, but when I think oi what is involved I hesitate to
imderwrite them. In the only case of which I have some limited knowledge,
that of the Greek dramatists, I can say that I found. Martindale's
brief account depressingly reminiscent of the worst kind oi external
literary history. To explain change at that level of generalisation has
never been difficult 'Sophistication—Eurijades' has been a tag for
generatiwis, but I find as I read the plays that it leaves the major questions
unanswered. A sophistication from what? From *a ratiwialization of the
old semi-religious conceptualisations , . . (Aeschylus and Sophodes)'. but
then to bracket Aeschylus and Sophodes seems to me to an odd ear for
change. And 'semi-religious conceptualisations'? The Oresteja} I suspect
that if I knew much of China, Palestine and India I should be arguing like
this all the way. It isn't that Martindale's hypotheses seem wrong; it's that
they don't, for me, engage anything like dosely enough.
TTie problem about community formation and maturity came up with
particular difficulty in Martindale's last case: Humanists and Sdentists in
the Western World. I can speak tmly of E n g i i ^ culture, but I can see that
two <rf our most brilliant literary periods (Elizabethan and Romantic) could
be interpreted as periods of c«nmunity formation, and I am interested in
the possibility that periods <rf literary and sdendfic creativity may actually
have alternated. But in this way I am away from Martindale, I do not indeed
understand whether he w i ^ e s us to take modem Western society (since
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the Renaissance) as one period or several of (XKnmxmity fonnati<Mi. It seems,
on the w*ole, one period, as he describes it, but by the time that has been
said I find all the questions of social and cultural change that I know any-
thing about swallowed up in a single movement. I was thinking about
1750-1780 as a period of maturity and rigidity, or as at least a period <rf
quiet. I was thinking about 1880-1930 as a period trf creativity, but what
community was then being formed? I confess I find my own jargon
of new problems and consequent tensions more immediately useful^ but
I would like to see it set down, point by point, with Martindale's hypotheses,
to find out if it is only the scale and generality <rf his accoimt which is a
diifercnce between us. If he would accept the history of England since
the Industrial Revolution as in his sense a period of community formation
(it seems to me to answCT his criteria) a genuine confluence might be possible.
Yet I suspect we would diifer, even then, about the point of maturity now
reached, since the Industrial Revolution or even since the Renaissance. He
shows a fine professional contempt for any valuing history, and this I don't
mind: there must be both kinds about. But on his own ground I don't
think he has supplied any objective tests of formation and maturity by which
we might decide where we now are. His remarks on the present are lame
and sketchy, taking evidence from the anti-utopias and s(Hne problems of
American civilisation (die academic problem takes on a sudden panicularity,
and engagement of emotion, that is interesting by comparison with the rest
of the book). There is perhaps even a hint of unconscious cyclical theory.
The 'instrumentalism' of science and the 'growth of mass institutions', which
I suppose were agents of our kind of community formation, are seen as
threatening the humanism which has sought to integrate the civilisation. I
don't know about valuing histories, but I am impressed by the regularity
with which that valuing pattern recurs, in men claiming objectivity. I
wonder even whether the formulations of 'ccmimunity formation-creativity'
and 'maturity-rigidity' are themselves rationalisations of a present and im-
explored tension.
But then in these matters I am a critic and not a sociologist. My imper-
tinences can be assigned to the inter-disciplinary war. Except that I don't
think there is really any need for war. If sociologists, historians and critics
can accept diat they will often be working on the same material, and that
different approaches may be necessary to illuminate its genuine cmnplexity,
then we can go profitably on heaping up our mistakes and letting others
expose them, with an essential charity. I am grateful to Professor Martin-
dale for this (^portunity of a peaceful collision with a non-valuing sociol-
logist. There will no doubt be many more opportunities.
Jesus College, Cambridge. RAYMOND WILLIAMS

An Introduction to the Sociology of Education by Karl Mannheim

and W. A. C. Stewart. Pp. xvii + 187. Routledge and Kegan Paul,
London, 1962, 21s.
Although Mannheim's nidie in the sociological hall <rf fame was won
by his profoimd theoretical contributions, he always viewed his work as a
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step toward increasing man's mastery over the social environment. Hence
it was not out of character that his later energies should have been directed
toward applying sociological analysis to educational ptt^lems, nor that his
thinking should have been frankly loaded with value jxidgments regarding
how education could best be conducted. Mannheim held the chair in edu-
cational sociol<^y at the London Institute of Education for only a year
before his death, and it was during this time that he wrote most of the
essays which appear in this book. Because the materials were merely notes
and preliminary drafts, the task of fitiishing and integrating the writing into
an orderly volume was prodigious. This t a ^ Professor Cam,pbell has per-
formed well, as reflected in the admirably simple and orderly exposition
and logical development of the book. Indeed the transparent clarity and
gentie style come as a shock to those of us who know Mannheim through the
often obscure and cumbersome translations from fais native German.
The authors begin by showing that the distinctive contribution of sociology
to the understanding of educational process lies in the fact that ediication
must both prepare members of society to conform and provide the oppor-
tunity and scope for individuality, and that institutions have latent effects
which must be xmderstood if educational policy is to be soimdly based.
Education is contrasted with three narrower concepts, 'training', 'instruction',
and 'teaching'. Bnergence of the broad conception of education in a demo-
cratic society has created the contemporary problems of redesigning a scheme
of education intended for an elite to suit the purposes of the masses, and of
devising methods whereby the mobilisation of student interest will take
the place erf external rewards or punishments. The problem in devising
educational aims in a changing society is that a knowledge of the past must
be used to 'prospect in ideas' for the future, without destroying faith in the
heritage from the past.
Part two contains a review of some of the psychological theory of learning.
While attempting to steer dear of factional commitment, the authors acknow-
ledge that a psychoanalysis with adequate attendon to social context affords
the most fruitful approach to educational psychology. P&rt Three introduces
the reader to some elementary ideas regarding the social and cultural
development of personality, including the ideas of G. H. Mead, Piaget,
Kardiner, and others.
Part four is the all-too-brief (39 pages) section in which the main concern
of the bo<^—'sociological factors'—is reached. The distinctive character of
the primary group is explored, and the importance of recognizing the inter-
dependence of h«ne and school in the educative process is stressed. The
classroom is considered briefly but insightfully as a sjrstan of social oi^aniza-
tion whose latent effects are exposed through sociological investigation. The
section is concluded by consideration of the school's relationship to the
larger order. In a concluding chapter the authors cwne bad^ again to the
fundamental challenge <rf devising educational procedure to suit a democratic
society.
The first reaction of a reader familiar with Mannheim's great works can
be no other than disfii^)ointmeiit. From a seminal mind one is disappointed
to encounter only thoughts which have already been reoMxlwi in adundance
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in the massive educational literature in^ired by John Dewey and his asso-
ciates. Frffln a writer capable of sharp definition of issues one is disappointed
to encounter a style in which the sweet persuasiveness of the presumedly
non-controversial prevails. Only in endorsing Waller's observations regarding
the inevitability <rf an authoritarian relationship between teacher and student
do the authors step boldly into controversy, and even h ^ e no hint of the
intellectual weight erf this decision is tiered. The authors write as if they
vrere unaware that there is controversy in their advocacy of fuU utilization
of the primary group as an educative medium, though the classic essay in
which W. I. Thomas laid many of our social ills to the persistence of primary
group values in modern secular society is cited as a reference to a different
chapter.
The authors nowhere come to grips with the manner in which educational
objectives can be derived in the context of sociological study. They seem to
be content to by-pass the issue by gearing their program to democratic
values because the sodety in which we live is democratic. Pious talk about
a balance between individuality and conformity is a poor substitute for the
courageous radicalism of a generation of educationists who were prepared
to train children to be maladjusted in what they regard as a bad society
so that when they became adults they would be driven to change it. It is
a small step from accepting conformity to our society without specifying
the conditions warranting conformity, to accepting conformity to any kind
of society. In Mannheim's greatest work the rigidifying effect of ideology—
a pervasive labyrinth of ideas in which every pathway leads eventuaUy to
justification of the status quo—is magnificently described, and the dialectic
set in motion by the disruptive Hitopia' is identified as man's princ^ial hope
of seeing his situation objectively. The daring and the magnificent sweep
of Ideology and Utopia are missing here. Indeed, one might even conclude
that in the present wwrk the authors have contributed more to the ideology
than to the Utopia of our day.
But the bocrfc must be read with different expectations. We must suppose
that Mannheim wrote at a time when he was just ccmipletlng his broad
familiarization with writings in the field of education and was beginning
to try out some of the sociolc^st's stock in trade to see how it fit in this
context. The book is truly a preface, such as might fruitfully be asMgned
during the first week or two of a (x>urse in educational sociology, to SCTve
as a point of departure for serious study of the field. From this point of
view the book is perhaps most valuable in showing what Mannheim selected
as the main points at which sociolt^ical analysis m i ^ t advance educational
policy.
University of California, Los Angeles. RALPH H . TURNER.

Ou Va Uartisanat Francois} by Simone Frances. Pp. 131. Centre

National d e la Recherche Sdentifique, Paris, N F 16.
"Where are French craftsmen going? An enquiry into the manner of
life and ideol(^y of the craftsmen cabinet makers <rf the Seine Department',
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 Reviews
so runs the title of Simone Frances's bodk, a well produced and annotated
volume (rf 135 pages, with bibliography, diagrams, sketch map and photo-
graphs.
This enquiry into Frendi craftsmen's views was carried out dxiring the
period from Octobetj 1956 to September, 1958, i.e. before General de Gaulle
became President. In the introduction the author speaks of the need for an
investigation into the 'artisanat' (handicraftsmen as a social group) because
of the numerous contacts which the French man in the street has with
craftsmen—^with his hairdresser, his watch repairer and his motor mechanic.
Other reasons for the enquiry were to discover the causes of craftsmen's
political dissatisfaction as shown at that time by their support for the
Poujade movement: also to find out their attitude to big business, and to
foreigners and Jews considered as possible economic cwnpetitors. Cabinet
makers were chosen for this investigation because it was wnsidered that
their trade was neither in a period of crisis nor of boom.
It would be interesting to know how far the views of these Parisian
furniture makers can be taken as typical of the general opinions of French
craftsmen. There as still about 900,000 craftsmen's businesses in the coimtry,
according to a recent report, and their economic importance is recognised
by the Government by the existence of a special I^partment for the artisanat
in the Ministry of Industry and Commerce. These 'entreprises artisanales'
are all small concerns, for the French define 'artisans' as 'independent
workers, whose names are entered in the trades' register, carrying on a
manual trade recognised as a craft, and not employing more than five
assistants'. (P. Demoi«5ion: L'artisanat dans i'^tat moderne, Paris, 194I3 p-
324)-
For the present enquiry, the names of 280 cabinet m ^ e r s were drawn
at random from the 3,500 listed in the trades' register of Paris and the
Seine Department, and 206 agreed to be interviewed. A questionnaire with
77 questions was put to each of them. Subsequently there was a free dis-
cussion with each craftsman on the subjects which most interested him;
this talk also gave an oppM'tunity to locA at his equipment and examples
of his work.
Some of the questions used in the survey were factual—about age, income,
employees, equipment, etc. Three questions were aimed at finding out the
craftsman's standard of living, and twelve at testing his general knowledge.
A considerable number dealt with his views on the present and future state
of cabinet making and oUier craft trades, and there were particular questions
to find out his opinions about officials, foreigners, Jews and big business.
Aided by photographs of the workshops visited and by a careful analysis
of the replies to the questionnaire, the hock produces a vivid picture of the
average Paris cabinet maker. He appears as a middle-aged or rather elderly
craftsman, working on his own or with one or two assistants His workshop
is not very spacious, though quite well equipped. He makes^ repairs or
restores fiimiture, or makes other articles in wood, such as cupboards, radio
cabinets, boxes, cases, etc. His standard of living is not high and his work
is hard and tiring. He is worried by the tax laws, and is uncertain about
the position of his social group in an industrial society. However, he gets
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on well with his employees and with his customers, and he has a very deep
love for his craft and for the tnaterial in whidi he works. He also values
highly the faa that he is responsible for running his own business. Two
quotations highlight his views: 'I adore woddng in wood. I liked it as a
child. Sranetimes I even think I love my craft better than by wife', and
'Why did I choose this trade? Because I wanted to be independent. Liberty
is wcKiderful. I could never work for anyone else'.
This love of the job is the predcHninant impression which one takes from
this book. 92.5% of those who answered the question 'Do you like your
work?' said 'Yes'.
The cabinet makers' replies about their trade in 1956/58 show clear
though not tmanimous tendencies. They had few apprentices (90% of those
who answered this question had none), and over 50% worked on their own.
Their work was largely for the upper and middle classes and for dealers,
they did not export mudi, and many of them (89%) undertodc no publicity.
Over 80% were critical of the tax arrangements. Many considered that co-
operatives would be useful, but few had belonged to them or even knew
of their existence. Only a minority were members of trade unions or
associations (syndicats), but many voted in the elections for the state
sponsored Crafts Chamber (Chambre des Metiers) and read its bulletin.
As is to be expected, the section on craftsmen's social and political views
is less conclusive than the earlier parts of the book. A nmnber of those inter-
viewed were not well disposed to officials (41% tiiought there were too
many). 28% c<Misidered that foreigners should not be allowed to enter
certain professions, while 39% thought there were too many Jews in
business; however, the better the craftsman's general education, the less he
was likely to have an anti-Semitic view. Craftsmen's opinions on big
business varied, though there was a relation between hostility to capitalism
and a feeling that the craftsman's own business was declining.
In the view of this reader, this last section of the book is of less direct
interest in this country than earlier sections about training and aM>rentice-
ship, marketing and co-operatives. Competition from big business and mass
production is indeed a problem for the British independent craftsman, but
it is a problem he can deal with better if he knows where he stands in
basic matters such as the training of workers, business management and
marketing, and co-operation with other producers in the same field. These
are the areas where he needs assistance and encouragement.
Rural Industris Bureau. C. W. OLPHERTS.

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