Robert Owen in the History of the Social Sciences: Three Presentist Views.

This paper argues that the present-day disagreements over the right course for sociology and its public role are reflected and paralleled in contemporary historiography of Robert Owen, British social reformer and a self-described social scientist. Historical accounts, written from the perspectives of public sociology, 'pure science' sociology, and anti-Marxism, interpret Owen's historical role in mutually antithetical and self-serving ways. Contrasting the three presentist accounts, I engage in an analysis of 'techniques of presentism'-history-structuring concepts, such as 'disciplinary founder' and 'disciplinary prehistory,' that allow presentist authors to get their effects. Along the way, I elaborate Peter Baehr's classification of sociology's founders. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]