ABSTRACT
At first blush, the wonder is that Sorel is remembered at all, much less remains a paramount figure in fin the siecle thought. While it is accidental that both the Stanley and Greil volumes on Sorel use the phrase "sociology of virtue" in their titles, it is not accidental that both emphasize the ethical and moral doctrines promulgated by Sorel. Just as an earlier generation of analysts moved from "later" political Marx to an "earlier" moral Marx, so too the same phenomenon seems to have overtaken Sorelian studies. In the current climate of normative theory, with the emphasis on firm moral options to the present relativism and with the desperate search for a socialism in which ethics is an essential ingredient rather than a strategic operation, Sorel has been reconsidered. When the chances for revolutionary success are high, scholars look to past analysts for antecedents to present-day practice.
