By Franz Brotzen
30 Years of
Social Sciences at Rice It’s hard to believe that 30 years ago the school that now graduates the largest group of Rice students each spring didn’t exist.
In 1979, President Norman Hackerman announced the separation of the social and behavioral sciences from the humanities, creating Rice’s School of Social Sciences. “The new school represents an attempt to provide a smaller administrative unit with more shared interests than was possible in the former Division of Humanities and Social Sciences,” Hackerman said at the time. The new school began with 38 full-time faculty who taught anthropology, behavioral science, economics, political science, psychology and sociology. “The separation was not a revolt,” explained Lyn Ragsdale, the Radoslav A. Tsanoff Chair of Political Affairs, professor of political science and dean of the School of Social Sciences since 2006, “but instead a historic recognition that the study of human behavior had come of age at Rice.” Joseph Cooper, the first dean of social sciences and currently a professor of political science at Johns Hopkins University, praised Hackerman’s backing of the new school. “The social sciences, though quite new to Rice in the 1960s, were an important part of any university, and they needed to flourish and gain in reputation and accomplishment if Rice was to realize its high ambitions,” he said. “President Hackerman offered Rice social scientists the opportunity to make their own way, the freedom to flexibly administer their resources, and perhaps most important of all, warm and strong encouragement and support.” That had not always been the case for the nascent social sciences during Rice’s early years. Although the first economics major graduated in 1931, the department did not award a Ph.D. until 1963 — the same year the psychology department was founded. Anthropology graduated its first majors in 1964. Political science, which began as part of the history department, became a department in its own right in 1967, and sociology formally separated from anthropology in 1971. John Ambler, professor emeritus of political science, who was “present at the creation,” emphasized President Kenneth Pitzer’s role
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in expanding and strengthening the social sciences during his tenure from 1961 to 1968. “Pitzer pressed for the development of Rice into a genuinely national university,” Ambler wrote. “He noted that while Rice had a number of strong departments in science and engineering, as well as a few in the humanities, the social sciences were poorly developed.” Pitzer recruited several faculty members who made a lasting imprint on the social sciences at Rice and helped lay the groundwork for an independent school of social sciences, including Gilbert Cuthbertson, professor of political science; Ambler; Chandler Davidson, research professor and the Radoslav A. Tsanoff Professor Emeritus of Public Affairs and Sociology; and William Martin, professor emeritus of sociology and of religion and public policy and the Harry and Hazel Chavanne Senior Fellow in Religion and Public Policy at the James A. Baker III Institute for Public Policy. William Howell, who was lured to Rice by Pitzer and served as chairman of the psychology department for 17 years, said that, at the time, the unprecedented flow of federal and foundation money into the expansion of university programs, facilities and faculties contributed to the rise of the social sciences at Rice. Howell, now an adjunct professor of psychology, cited large development grants from the Ford Foundation and the National Science Foundation in building the university’s social and behavioral science programs. The School of Social Sciences has experienced dramatic growth in the 30 years since its creation. In addition to the five departments that currently fall under its jurisdiction — anthropology, economics, political science, psychology and sociology — there are three interdisciplinary programs. Students in cognitive sciences are engaged in the multidisciplinary study of the mind. Managerial studies provides an understanding of the environment in which business and other organizations exist and of the tools used by managers. Policy studies students learn to analyze and evaluate public policy and gain an understanding of the policymaking process. When Davidson arrived at Rice in 1966, most of the departments that later formed the School of Social Sciences were quite small. Together, they offered an interdisciplinary doctoral program that was modeled on Harvard’s Department of Social Relations. “Any of the social scientists at Rice could oversee a doctoral dissertation in our department,” Davidson said, “and the rest of the dissertation committee typically consisted of people both from that department and other areas of the social sciences.” Eventually, most of the departments were given enough
Lyn Ragsdale rice.edu/ricemagazine