Review: A Social History of Analytic Philosophy by Christoph Schuringa

A Social History of Analytic Philosophy traces the evolution of Analytic Philosophy from its early 20th century roots in Cambridge, Oxford, and the Vienna Circle, through its rise to hegemony in anglosphere academia in the second half of the 20th century, to its absorption of feminist and decolonial schools of thought in the 21st century. Schuringa challenges Analytic Philosophy’s self-mythologizing: the origin story that Analytic Philosophy sprung from Gottlob Frege’s natural language approach to logic was constructed by Michael Drummett in the 1970s. Schuringa also criticizes Analytic Philosophy for viewing itself to be largely synonymous with western philosophy, despite its disregard for Western philosophical developments after Kant. 

Schuringa attributes Analytic Philosophy’s present hegemony to its alignment with liberalism. Unlike Marxism and other critical theories, Analytic Philosophy largely escaped McCarthyism. Its Humean conception of the world as an unchanging collection of facts to be interpreted by the mind leads it to regard the world as unchangeable beyond the (liberal) status quo, even as it takes on questions of gender and race. Schuringa argues that this liberalism shapes not only analytic philosophy's content and conclusions but also its mode of philosophical inquiry:

The ideology of analytic philosophy is that of liberalism. Accordingly, participants in its discussions are conceived of as entering a liberal marketplace of ideas. Circulation on the market is the mechanism by which the best ideas win out. It is presupposed that each participant may enter the market as they see fit, and take full part in the process of exchange. Entry conditions are not considered – it is taken for granted that all are free, sovereign individuals. The maintenance of the fiction of equal entry, of course, just as in the case of the commercial marketplace, serves the interests of those who in fact exercise power.

The author identifies three tendencies in Analytic Philosophy which results in its stodgy resistance to change and its liquidation of other forms of philosophy:

1. Deference to science: analytic philosophers either attempted to turn philosophy into a science (empiricism, Bertrand Russell) or serve as science’s handmaiden (Vienna Circle), thereby limiting the scope of philosophy to only what science could not answer.
2. Retreat to common sense: taking on a “noble savage” view of the common man and never questioning how culture, religion and other such factors shape our expectations, philosophy became a series of thought experiments and appeals to intuition (“intuition pumping”).
3. Impulse to therapy: the skepticism arising from empiricism turned philosophy into an ailment that must be cured; what is needed is not a constructive philosophy but a critique of philosophy.

These intellectual developments are presented through the book's social history of the discipline. But the “society” of this social history is narrowly scoped: beyond university administration and academic publishing, there is relatively little discussion of Analytic Philosophy’s interaction with the general public. Other than Analytic Philosophy's relatively friendly encounters with McCarthyism, Schuringa discusses only effective altruism as a significant point of contact between Analytic Philosophy and the broader public. Proponents of this utilitarian strain of analytic ethics seek to maximize their own wealth so that they can devote it to charities that maximize quality-adjusted life years. I ran into many “effective altruists” during my time in the Bay Area, and concur with the author’s assessment of its philosophical poverty, although it seems fairly largely confined to elite tech circles. But several generations of students have now taken philosophy courses at universities dominated by Analytic Philosophy. What broader impacts has it had on society? Schuringa stops short of answering this question.

I found this book valuable for its coherent overview of the major figures and overall trajectory of Analytic Philosophy — things I had put together piecemeal while reading about other 20th century philosophical movements. However, I also recommend it with reservations: the author sees little of value in Analytic Philosophy, thus reassuring me of my own pre-conceived notions. Schuringa writes polemically; I agree with the author that western philosophy’s preoccupation with Analytic Philosophy has not met the needs of our times. Schuringa also writes dismissively; he credits a handful of thinkers for their rigor and originality (Wittgenstein in particular), but dismisses most for narrow-mindedness, sloppiness, and oblivious recourse to metaphysics. Why did so many thinkers pursue this dead-end approach to philosophy? Schuringa's answers of McCarthyism, tacit support of liberalism, and journal monopolies don't satisfy me as a full answer for its appeal. Rather than feeling challenged to integrate new material into my philosophical views, I found myself suspiciously wondering what was left out, or painted with too snide a brush.