The Positive Background of Hindu Sociology c15.s2.11

c15.s2.11

The formal sociology of the state cannot afford to remain a mere history of the state, as says von Wiese in his *System der Allgemeinen Soziologie*.⁴ Its function consists in "abstracting," scratching out (*herauslösung*) or isolating the "between-men" elements (*Zwischenmenschlichen*) out of the historico-empirical raw material. The items such as happen by accident to be the features of contemporary states, for instance, of the German state cannot according to him constitute its subject matter. In formal sociology are to be discussed the striking repetitions, similarities and rhythms etc. of all statal happenings or historical states. Its object is to analyze the common factors in all these social processes. And this is what has been done, along, of course, with other things, by the authors of the *dharma* and the *artha* or the *nīti śāstras*.