The Localization of Sociology in Germany: The “Role-Debate” and Its Effect on De-Americanization

No long after the embryonic stage during the Weimar Republic, the German sociology is at a standstill due to the rise to power of the Nazi regime and then falls into the crisis of Americanization because of the control by the USA after the World War II. In this time of crisis, Ralf Dahrendorf’s work Homo Sociologicus unexpectedly triggers a wide-ranging debate, which is known as “role-debate” of the German sociology in the 1960s. By means of the role-debate, the German sociology develops two strategies, namely “de-Americanization through transcending America” and “counteracting Americanization through internationalization”, which contributed the German sociology to recover disciplinary subjectivity and to gain the international academic discourse power. These two strategies are also the references for establishing the sociological discourse system with Chinese characteristics.