Geschichte als Wissenschaft?

Abstract

The essay presents some preliminary ideas on the possibility of history as a science sensu stricto, i.e. as an explanatory enterprise. Historical explanations ought to be based on laws (in the ideal case) or at least on ‘regularities’ (in the normal case). There is no principal problem in transferring the Hempel-Oppenheim concept of scientific explanation to the realm of history. Beyond single explanations, historians ought to construct more general explanatory theories with a broad ‘range of action’. The concept of individuality (i.e. of persons or events) and the concept of contingency can be integrated into such a theoretical framework without difficulties. The ‘scientific approach’ implies that the historian’s business should not be limited to producing micro-descriptions of a multi-faceted past (which is allegedly not accessible to generalization). But this should not be misunderstood as a verdict against microhistory: Micro-approaches may be theory-based in the same way as macro-approaches.