ABSTRACT
This chapter reappraises two of Maurice Mandelbaum’s articles that played a central role during the 1950s in the debate over methodological individualism and sociological holism. The twin pieces are “Societal Facts” and “Societal Laws.”1 Ian Verstegen asked me to write on this topic because of my own role decades later in the same debate. I was originally reluctant to participate. My writing agenda was already full, and, I thought, I had already made my peace with the issues Mandelbaum had raised so long ago. I would find nothing there to challenge me to say anything new.
