Social sciences, philosophy and theology
Anton van Niekerk
June 4, 2026
The term “social sciences” includes subjects like history, psychology, sociology, anthropology, social work, political science, information science, economics, geography, journalism (or media studies) and philosophy. It normally consists of a large grouping of subjects at the university, and it seems as if they cover such a variety of topics that it isn’t always clear as to why they all form part of the “social sciences”. At some universities social sciences form a separate faculty. Sometimes they form a faculty along with languages and the arts, but usually they are grouped separately. The subject field of economics (the biggest single subject at most universities) is seen as a social science – in fact, one of the most important social sciences – but is usually found in the faculties of commercial sciences or economic and management sciences. Philosophy – the oldest of all the disciplines at university – is often grouped along with the social sciences and sometimes with the arts and/or languages. Philosophy as discipline has a somewhat different focus and approach than the typical sciences at the university, but has a big influence on the other sciences, including theology.
The origin of the “social sciences”
Except for philosophy, the differentiation of the social sciences in their different subject fields is a relatively new phenomenon at most universities. When universities originated in the Middle Ages it was mostly philosophy and theology that were studied (during the Middle Ages these subjects weren’t clearly distinguishable from one another) along with medicine, mathematics, languages and rhetoric (debating). The subjects that today are known as “natural sciences” weren’t really studied separately from philosophy, and although with the start of modern times it claimed more and more separate attention, right up to the eighteenth century, it was still widely known as natural philosophy.
Up to then it was common practice to study science at the university as a so-called unitary science. It wasn’t strange to get an overview of just about everything which up to that time was known and available as “scientific” knowledge – something which we struggle to understand in light of the explosion of knowledge and science in our time. Of course this doesn’t mean that all university students in those years successfully mastered such an overview. It is, however, interesting to note that the best-known figures in the formative years of the modern times in Western intellectual history were geniuses who made important contributions to a variety of areas – areas which were restricted by our current distinction between natural, human or social sciences.
René Descartes, for example, was the founder of the modern philosophy, but also a well-known mathematician and the founder of trigonometry. Blaise Pascal, another important French thinker, was a philosopher as well as theologian and chemist. Immanuel Kant and GW Leibniz, two of the best-known philosophers of the eighteenth century, made important contributions to mathematics and the natural sciences.
The multiplication of a multitude of “sciences” (for example physics, chemistry, sociology, psychology, social work, et cetera) was mainly the result of a knowledge explosion in the nineteenth and twentieth century. For nearly two centuries we find that knowledge became continuously more specialised, and that different questions, which correspond with more and more specific areas of scientific research (and therefore “subjects”) occured and are developed. Biology gets refined into microbiology, zoology, botany, genetics, etc. Each becomes a “science” with its own field of research, sets of problems, methods and approaches. After these developments science is no longer studied as a “unitary science”, but as separate “sciences” delivering knowledge that is more and more specialised. It is actually only since the last part of the twentieth century that due to a variety of developments (for example the discovery of the molecular basis of all living things in the biological sciences) this tendency has been somewhat reversed and that the necessity of multi- and interdisciplinary studies have developed – studies where the potential contributions of a variety of sciences is acknowledged and examined in the solving of problems.
The idea that the reality of human life can also be “scientifically” examined, originated largely in the course of the nineteenth century. Figures like Auguste Comte (the founder of the science of sociology), Karl Marx (who insisted on characterising his socialism as “scientific”), Sigmund Freud (who gave psychology a big push forward with his discovery of man’s subconscious and the importance of our dreams in the understanding of who we are), Max Weber, Émile Durkheim and many others who started examining man as a conscious object of scientific research. We see that the different social or human sciences slowly started distinguishing themselves from one another and became more self-reliant and independent “subject fields”. That which today we distinguish as the sciences of psychology (the study of individual human behaviour), sociology (the study of human behaviour in a social context), social work (the study of ways to improve social welfare) and political science (the scientific study of politics) were once all part of one big field of study.
The relevance of the social sciences today
This does not mean that social sciences are a useless exercise. Today we understand a lot more about human reality, thanks to social sciences. For example, we understand the phenomenon of urbanisation – something that can almost be called a “law” of modernising societies – a lot better than before. This type of knowledge which is acquired on large scale in the social sciences can, if understood and applied correctly, be of huge value in political policy decisions. To give just one example: Many economic historians still allege that it is mainly thanks to the influence of John Maynard Keynes’ ideas on the government of president Franklin D Roosevelt that policies were put into place in the USA in the 1930’s which brought the Great Depression to an end.
A study of the social sciences is therefore quite necessary as well as very relevant in our time and circumstances. It is true that South Africa has an urgent need for natural scientists and engineers. It is however also true that some of the biggest problems in the South African society, in the past as well as the present, are relationship problems – problems which fundamentally have to do with man’s inhumanity towards his fellow people. We will not solve those problems – prejudice, discrimination, distrust, crime, corruption – by only training engineers. We need just as many people who strive to know and understand the social reality as well as possible.
In one of his writings Hennie Rossouw develops a number of important arguments about the way in which natural sciences/technology and social sciences should and are supposed to complement each other.1 The social sciences can play an important role in humanising the technique and the technology, and focusing technique and technology on the improvement of human welfare and quality of life, rather than making them self-supporting values which are only pursued and expanded for their own sake. It is worth taking note of the three points which he uses as motivation.
Firstly, the human or social sciences can counteract the dehistoricising that technology often brings about, by the promotion of an historical awareness (in history and all other disciplines that approach the study of problems historically, for example political science, general linguistics, anthropology, archaeology and sociology). This means that the historical sciences can help us to remember where things and ideas came from, so that we can learn from history and not repeat the mistakes of the past.
Rossouw’s second and third points have to do with the contribution that two other disciplines, namely philosophy and theology, to which I’ll briefly refer, can make. Philosophy is the study of thought categories and/or structures (for example concepts and ideas) that we use to think about,, understand,, interpret and try to improve the world (values). Philosophy is of great value in helping us to understand and criticise the meaning of terms and ideas that play an important role in how people think and what their preferences in life are. Rossouw argues that in our current world we increasingly lose our moral sense or become morally disorientated. We increasingly doubt which values are of importance. We become victims of people who seemingly do not have or acknowledge values (for example criminals and corrupt politicians, officials and businessmen). The human sciences, secondly, can therefore help us to understand why society is facing moral decay and show us how to promote a renewed moral awareness in our society.
Lastly we live in a world that has been profanitised, in other words a world where our sense of the religious dimension of the world becomes blunted and where we increasingly believe and live in the moment and the pleasure that the present brings. Theology as well as religious studies, philosophy of religion, sociology of religion, psychology of religion and subject fields like the study of ancient languages and cultures are all disciplines that enable us to better understand our sense of religion and religious awareness. What we cannot deny is that religion plays a very important role in most human societies – especially in Africa. Think for a moment of the influence and impact of religion on most countries in the Near East, and the effect it currently has on world politics. And then we’re not even talking about the influence of religion on the history of Western Europe and therefore on Africa. Theology and the other disciplines mentioned above not only have a place at universities in order to train clergy. It also has its place because religion is an important part of people’s lives and is therefore an integrating part of the human reality that human and social sciences are trying to understand.
Rossouw, HW. 1993. Universiteit, wetenskap en kultuur. Cape Town: Tafelberg. p. 119-123.↩︎