Is it Common Sense or Science? Critically Appreciating the Epistemological Position of Social Network Analysis

• In Event: 4349 - Issues in Social Network Data, Analysis and Epistemology

Abstract

In this article, I aim to introduce the question of epistemology to the debate among meta-theorists of social network analysis. My main point is that while the two main schools of social network analysis – formalism and relationalism – claim to be different because of their respective comprehensions of the ontology of social networks, they both rely on a commonsensical comprehension of social ties for studying relational structure. Following insights from the philosophy and history of science, as well as debates among the founding figures of sociology over the role of common sense in doing science, I argue that social network analysts must break from their commonsensical comprehension of social ties in order to illustrate the objective principles of social networks. I suggest that one such strategy is to treat the social world as a historical product of social agents’ political labor for the purpose of molding the world from their particular point of view.

Author

• Sourabh Singh, Florida State University