Citation

Befani B. Int. Rev. Sociol. (London) 2005; 15(1): 51-75.

Copyright

(Copyright © 2005, Informa - Taylor and Francis Group)

DOI

10.1080/03906700500038504

PMID

unavailable

Abstract

This article pursues two aims, a major and a minor one. The major one is to read some important results in the sociological literature on suicide, namely those obtained by Durkheim in 1897, Giddens in 1966 and Pope and Danigelis in 1981, as Context-Mechanism-Outcome configurations. The realist interpretation of the theories of suicide is deemed to be fundamental for the explanation of this social phenomenon, if one wishes not to be misled by the (false) laws which have repeatedly been designated to govern it, e.g., the married are more immune than the unmarried, and, above all - being clamorously labelled 'Sociology's One Law' - the one declaring 'Protestants kill themselves more often than Catholics'. The minor aim is to show that the synthesis of Boolean data, as can be performed for example by QCA (qualitative comparative analysis), is perfectly compatible with the realist synthesis; when not quite constituting its rigorous formalization. © 2005 University of Rome 'La Sapienza'.

Language: en