In this paper the centrality of concepts for intellectual history is stressed. Naturally, this focus on concepts requires an account of what concepts are. More contentiously, an account of how concepts are best approached by intellectual historians also requires taking a stand vis-à-vis some prevailing notions of concepts. In particular, I will direct attention to the weaknesses of the historicist theory of concepts derived from the later Wittgenstein. By contrast, I will put forward an account of conceptual innovation and change in intellectual history based on a notion of concept loosely inspired by Frege. The first three parts of the paper lay out a framework for what I call “analytic contextualism,” which is then briefly illustrated with an example from the history of political thought in the fourth part. I argue that this framework should be attractive to intellectual historians for two reasons: First, Fregean concepts, due to their relative independence from context, explain long-term conceptual stability and change better than competing notions of concepts. Second, a Fregean notion of concept is better suited than its competitors to explain how concepts and conceptual innovation sometimes manage to have causal effect on institutions and social reality. To demonstrate the latter point, it will be shown that my account of concepts is consistent with, and well placed to exploit, recent philosophical advances in social ontology.

在本文中，强调了思想史概念的中心性。自然地，对概念的关注需要说明什么是概念。更具争议性的是，要了解知识史学家如何最好地处理概念，还需要对一些流行的概念持立场。特别是，我将直接关注从后来的维特根斯坦（Wittgenstein）派生出来的历史主义概念理论的弱点。相比之下，我将根据弗雷格（Frege）松散启发的概念概念，对概念创新和知识史的变化进行阐述。本文的前三部分为我所谓的“分析情境主义”奠定了框架，然后在第四部分以政治思想史为例对此进行了简要说明。我认为，该框架应该对思想史学家具有吸引力，其原因有两个：首先，弗雷格安概念由于其相对于上下文的相对独立性，可以解释长期的概念稳定性，并且其变化要比竞争性概念更好。其次，弗雷格安的概念概念比竞争对手更适合于解释概念和概念创新有时如何对制度和社会现实产生因果关系。为了说明后一点，将表明我对概念的论述与社会本体论的最新哲学进展是一致的，并且可以很好地加以利用。其次，弗雷格安的概念概念比竞争对手更适合于解释概念和概念创新有时如何对制度和社会现实产生因果关系。为了说明后一点，将表明我对概念的论述与社会本体论的最新哲学进展是一致的，并且可以很好地加以利用。其次，弗雷格安的概念概念比竞争对手更适合于解释概念和概念创新有时如何对制度和社会现实产生因果关系。为了说明后一点，将表明我对概念的论述与社会本体论的最新哲学进展是一致的，并且很容易被利用。