Competing Disiplines. How Biological and Social Sciences competed to be the Academic Authority on Human Social Behaviour, ca. 1970-1990

• Applicant: Professorin Dr. Kärin Nickelsen
• Subject Area: History of Science
• Term: from 2016 to 2020
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 316166947

This project explores the emergence of sociobiology and the resulting academic and public debate, which took place in the last thirty years of the 20th century. In doing so, the project aims to contribute to the history of science and, secondarily, to the contemporary history (of the United States). In addition, it seeks to strengthen the Munich site of the research association "Konkurrenzkulturen" (Cultures of Competition). The sociobiology debate is examined as an instructive case study for competition in academic culture. In this debate, different disciplines attempted to position themselves as the academic authority responsible for explaining human social behavior. With the publication of E.O. Wilson's "Sociobiology. A New Synthesis" in 1975, the claim of the traditional social sciences to this particular subject matter was challenged. "Sociobiology" was understood by some to unduly devalue the social sciences and overstate the relevance and scope of evolutionary biology: It asserted that biological causes were the primary causes of human behavior and, therefore, more important than the "social" causes, which sociology, psychology or anthropology investigate. This sparked a fierce debate that transformed into a competition between disciplines for public attention and approval. The objective of the project is to identify which different strategies of academic competitive behavior were employed and to analyze how these strategies changed over time. Dynamics of boundary work will be investigated as well as the complex interactions between science and the public in the late 20th century.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants
• Co-Investigators: Professorin Dr. Margit Szöllösi-Janze; Professor Dr. Tobias Werron