In this, a unique history of the America's postwar intellectual, David Paul Haney outlines the developoment of sociology as a discipline and why, given its focus of study, it failed to develop into a force in the intellectual currents of the United States.

Arguing that sociologists attempted to develop both a science and an instrument for the spread of humanistic concern about socity, Haney shows how both attempts failed to connect sociology with larger questions of policy and social progress.