Congeniality and P. A. Sorokin’s great dream of eternal peace

Abstract

P. A. Sorokin’s concept of congeniality is presented in the article. This outstanding sociologist believed that after the end of World War II Kant’s idea of eternal peace was no longer utopian. It seemed possible to Sorokin to bring this dream to life. Sorokin saw congeniality as a crucial social factor of a lasting peace and friendship between peoples and countries. He carried out a large-scale comparative study of the USA and Russia and came to the conclusion that these countries are very much alike (they are congenial), thus they would play a leading role in establishing and ensuring peace worldwide. Is it really possible to consider congeniality to be the basis of peace and friendship between peoples and countries? The aim of this article is to present a sociological and theoretical study of this problem. First, Sorokin’s methodology and key congenial characteristics of these two countries are provided in the article. Then, analytical and sociological study of these characteristics is carried out. It is shown that critical approach to Sorokin’s idea of congeniality of societies brings forward the discussion about societies and their interactions in present-day sociology and other social sciences. General scientific methods of deduction and induction as well as analysis and synthesis, document analysis method, system analysis and comparative historical method were used to study the problem presented in the article.