Although historians of all sorts and persuasions practised comparative history during the twentieth century, by the end of this epoch comparative history as a genre still seemed in need of theoretical legitimation and explication. So much can be inferred from the fact that, even in the 1990s, several books and articles were devoted to the subject by practising historians, Kaelble's Der historische Vergleich, under review here, being one of them. This observation suggests that comparison as a research ®eld is still embattled territory for historians, notwithstanding counterclaims that `̀ all history is comparative history'' ± and the implication that comparative history as such is not worthy of special discussion. Several explanations for this remarkable state of affairs can be presented (most of them with a long pedigree in historiography), but the most notable is that related to the disciplinary differentiation between history and the social sciences. Since the method of history was de®ned in the course of the nineteenth century as somehow ®xated on the `̀ particularity'', or even `̀ uniqueness'' of its object, comparative strategies have been regarded by most mainstream historians as lying outside history proper and at best have been relegated to the fringes of the discipline (such as theoretical or speculative history). This tendency was immensely strengthened by the fact that many of the social sciences, especially sociology and political science, claimed comparison as their own disciplinary speciality. Therefore, it is by no means accidental that many of the historians who have practised and propagated comparative history have at the same time propagated a rapprochement between history and the social sciences. Hartmut Kaelble, Professor of Early Modern and Modern History at the Humboldt University in Berlin, ®ts perfectly into this picture. As a former leader of the Arbeitsstelle fuÈ r Vergleichende Gesellschaftsgeschichte in Berlin, and one of the present leaders of the Zentrum fuÈ r Vergleichende Geschichte Europas, interdisciplinary and comparative history have been his daily bread and butter for a long time now. He is therefore well equipped to give a sound overview of this ®eld and to act as a guide for beginners. And that is what this short book essentially amounts to; no more, no less. Being a German professor, Kaelble deals mostly with German and West European history. This German focus might also re ̄ect the fact that for the last two decades or so comparative history in Germany has been closely related to the debates on the alleged German Sonderweg. Being linked to the Sonderweg debate, most of the comparative history dealt with is related to the national framework and to the usual candidates for comparison with Germany, i.e. France, England, and ± to a lesser degree ± the US. This ®xation on the national framework was also to be expected since the primary unit of analysis of the Gesellschaftsgeschichte ± i.e. the Gesellschaft ± was none other than the national state, as was recently observed by both Lutz Raphael and Paul Nolte. However, the `̀ national characteristics'' of this book only testify to its concrete, practical character and do not weaken its theoretical argument, for there is no intrinsic relationship between the nation-state as an analytical unit of comparison and comparative history; subnational and supranational units are just as International Review of Social History 46 (2001), pp. 257±284 # 2001 International Instituut voor Sociale Geschiedenis

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书评

尽管各种历史和说服力的历史学家在20世纪都实践过比较历史，但到本世纪末，比较历史作为一种体裁似乎仍需要理论上的合法性和解释性。从这样一个事实可以推断出如此多的事实：即使在1990年代，实践历史学家也撰写了数本针对该主题的书籍和文章，在此接受审查的Kaelble的Der historische Vergleich是其中之一。这一观察结果表明，尽管作为研究领域的比较仍然是史学家的四面楚歌，尽管有人反驳说“所有历史都是比较历史”，也暗示着比较历史本身不值得特别讨论。可以针对这种非凡的状况提供几种解释（大多数在历史学上具有悠久的血统），但是最值得注意的是与历史学与社会科学之间的学科区分有关的解释。由于历史方法是在19世纪过程中以某种方式基于其对象的“特殊性”或什至“独特性”来定义的，因此大多数主流历史学家都认为比较策略是说谎的。适当的外部历史充其量只能归结为该学科的边缘（例如理论或推测性历史）。许多社会科学，特别是社会学和政治学，都声称比较是他们自己的学科专长，这一趋势得到了极大的增强。因此，绝非偶然的是，许多实践和传播比较历史的历史学家同时传播了历史与社会科学之间的和解。柏林洪堡大学早期近代史和近代史教授Hartmut Kaelble完美地描绘了这张照片。作为柏林柏林历史博物馆的前领导人，以及欧罗巴Zentrum历史博物馆的现任领导人之一，跨学科和比较历史已成为他的日常食品。因此，他有足够的能力对这一领域进行全面概述，并为初学者提供指导。这就是这本短书的本质。不多不少 作为德国教授，Kaelble主要处理德国和西欧的历史。德国人的这种关注也可能反映出这样一个事实，即在过去的二十年左右的时间里，德国的比较历史与关于所谓的德国桑德韦格的辩论密切相关。与Sonderweg辩论有关，涉及的大多数比较历史都与国家框架和与德国进行比较的通常候选人有关，例如法国，英国和（程度较小的）美国。正如Lutz Raphael和Paul Nolte近期所观察到的那样，由于对Gesellschaftsgeschichte（即Gesellschaft）的主要分析单位不是国家，这也是对国家框架的期待。但是，本书的“ ̀民族特色”仅证明了其具体含义，实用性，不削弱其理论论据，因为作为比较分析单位的民族国家与比较历史之间没有内在联系；地方和超国家单位就像《国际社会史评论》 46（2001），pp。257±284＃2001 International Georg Instituut voor Sociale Geschiedenis