ABSTRACT
This book consists of two studies, the first of Claude Bernard’s theory of scientific knowledge, and the second of Émile Durkheim’s attempt to provide an epistemological foundation for a scientific sociology in The Rules of Sociological Method. These two studies are complementary, certain of the themes and concepts in the analysis of Bernard illuminate the discussion of Durkheim’s work, and they are linked by a common approach to the reading and analysis of theoretical and philosophical texts-an approach developed in recent years by several French philosophers-the most important of whom is Louis Althusser.
