Eric Kaufmann

Challenging Unscientific Orthodoxies

The Centre will publish and disseminate research to challenge unscientific orthodoxies in the social sciences and humanities. For instance, around explanations of race and gender achievement gaps (are these really due to discrimination?), perceptions of history (i.e. ignorance of non-western genocide, slavery, colonialism), causes of social problems (why is culture neglected?) or the lack of attention to left extremism as compared to right extremism. Our unconventional explanations may be wrong, but only the clash of viewpoints and ideas, adhering to scientific norms of measurement and falsifiablity, can help sift strong from weak theories.

Advancing Knowledge

Our work can help to advance and reframe the state of knowledge around questions that many social scientists currently seek to answer, such as what drives inequality and injustice, and how to counter this.

Yet these should not be the only questions that academic research addresses. What about topics that are deemed unfashionable or undesirable for ideological reasons? We believe that the academic enterprise is focusing primarily on issues of inequality of outcome, power differentials, and harms to disadvantaged race, sex and gender groups. These are important questions, but work on them has come at the expense of investigating problems of freedom, social cohesion, beauty, human flourishing, and excellence. A positive social science that seeks to advance human happiness and excellence is required alongside the current focus on ameliorating negative social outcomes.[1]

A further aim is to propound a new sociological-philosophical framework, a kind of ‘Reverse Critical Theory’ that can guide scholarship going forward and counter the normative dominance of Critical Theory and egalitarian philosophies.

Finally, we aim to serve as a hub for a growing international network of like-minded researchers and institutions, a countercultural social science and humanities scholarship. We believe that we can play a vital role in rebalancing the academic enterprise, restoring trust in universities and helping to contribute to a less fractured and more cohesive society dedicated to all aspects of human flourishing.

[1] Thin, N. (2014). “Positive Sociology and Appreciative Empathy: History and Prospects.” Sociological Research Online 19(2): 1-14.