Charles Horton Cooley is one of the pioneers of the interactionist approach (George Mead, W.I. Thomas, and R. Park). Indeed he is the first sociological version of pragmatist philosophy (William James, John Dewey and Charles Pierce) and could be considered as one of the leading figures that contribute to the development of an evolutionary and process focus1 and to the sociological and institutional analysis of the economy in the United States. It is of interest to social-economy and to economic sociology to rescue the memory and the opportunities that this school of thought contains, just as Michael Piore reminds us.
Throughout his life Cooley shows an interest in that which he calls the mental character of social life, paying attention to the processes of social change. Mental life makes up the nucleus of Human Nature and the Social Order and is the reason for his interest in introspection and comprehension of the phenomena of empathy in the diverse forms of “communication” that exist in life. Social life is only achievable and expressed through mental contents.
People’s minds are organized and constructed in relation and in reference to the presence of other individuals, groups, social institutions, and public opinion. If the dynamics of social life are understood in experimental terms, this is a reflexive trial in an evolutionary context in which the individuals and groups have to learn to adapt themselves to new and always renewed conditions of existence (Fligstein, 2001).
His ideas about evolution, adaptation, and the market, influenced by Darwin, are interwoven with some of his contributions about the “social subjective processes” that he had developed more precisely in Human Nature and the Social Order. This is the case of his main contribution about “the looking glass self” but also about conformity, learning, routine, ritualism, resistance to change, emulation........
