GABRIEL TARDE AND THE FRENCH SOCIAL SCIENCES: ELECTIVE AFFINITIES

This article investigates the factors that contributed to the intellectual ascension of Tarde during the 1890's. Taking into account the fact that the author lacked the necessary academic credentials for a university career, I seek to show that Tarde obtained prestige among circles of intellectual and political power that were contrary to the growing autonomy of the university and the social sciences. Groups affiliated to the pedagogic pole and the technical-professional pole were still hegemonic in the 1890's, but they began to contend with Durkheim for the legitimate definition of the new disciplines. As part of a strategy of maintaining hierarchy, these groups elected the social psychology of Tarde as an instrument for combat. The author lived up to expectations and accumulated social capital in diverse intellectual and political fields, being thereby amply rewarded.