Surprises

“It is the task of the historian and the social scientist alike to render surprise non-surprising in retrospect. The social scientist can dream of a world in which surprise is eliminated because all is foreseen. But the historian must cherish its role – even when the surprises themselves are appalling and fearsome. Surprise, furthermore, testifies to the pluralist possibilities of the social and political world. It suggests that multiple chains or streams of causal development potentially proceed at the same time, but that not all will be confirmed as existent. Surprise in effect mediates between the counter-factual and the factual.

Surprise thus justifies the historian’s role. It suggests that sequential coherence or narrative remains a fundamental explanatory structure. It compels us to reconstruct an alternative temporal chain of causation, a new history. It means that historical reconstruction is fundamental, not just for aesthetic pleasure, but for explanation of the social world. On the other hand it also suggests that every such reconstruction is provisional and precarious. Still, openness to the instructiveness of surprise refreshes historical understanding and teaches a necessary humility to the social scientist as well. Not all surprises can be welcome, some are atrocious and appalling, but all are instructive.”