The Sociological Imagination

Mills first addresses the fact that many misunderstand sociology as an “objective” study of human society. For Mills, whether social scientists acknowledge it or not, they remain bound by, and implicated within, their social, historical, political, and economic context. The key implication being that the work sociologists produce can and may be used for nefarious political purposes. As Mills puts it:

The social scientist who spends his intellectual force on the details of small-scale milieux is not putting his work outside the political conflicts and forces of his time. He is, at least indirectly and in effect, “accepting” the framework of his society. But no one who accepts the full intellectual tasks of social science can merely assume that structure. In fact, it is his job to make that structure explicit and to study it as a whole. To take on this job is his major judgment (78-79).

Thus, social scientists are obliged to be vigilant in their undertakings. Their contribution to society is never free from the power relations and struggles that shape and define the conditions under which they conduct research. It is these blind spots within sociologists’ work that Mills terms “liberal practicality.