Creative Marginality

Preface -- Introduction -- Scientific Innovation and Obsolescence -- Defining Innovation in the Social Sciences -- Patrimonies: Incremental Advance and the Distorting Effects of the “Star System” -- The Paradox of Density -- Does Citation Measure Innovation? -- Cemeteries for Books -- From Specialization and Fragmentation to Hybridization -- Specialization in the Social Sciences -- Hybridization: The Recombination of Fragments of the Social Sciences -- Fragmentation by Geographical Area versus Analytical Fragmentation -- The Crumbling Walls of the Formal Disciplines -- The Fate of the Formal Disciplines: From Coherence to Dispersion -- Why Interdisciplinarity is a False Notion -- The Interpenetration of Disciplines: The Processes of Hybridization -- The Diffusion of Concepts Across Disciplines -- Borrowing Methods -- The Impact of Technology -- The Cross-Disciplinary Repercussions of Findings -- The Influence of Theories -- Perspectives, Paradigms, and Praxis -- Hybridization of Academic Journals -- The Balance of Trade between Disciplines -- Gallery of Hybrids: Creative Marginals -- Three Ideal Types of Social Scientists -- Intellectual Migration Across Disciplines -- Crossroads: Four Illustrations -- Historical Sociology and Sociological History -- Junctions between the Social Sciences and Life Sciences -- International Political Economy: A Fusion of Several Subfields -- The Hesitant Exchange between Economics and Psychology -- Final Remarks: The New Kaleidoscope of Social Sciences