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The ideal of objectivity, not allowing personal feelings or opinions to influence observation, is an essential part of the study of humanity and the universe. Researching fact, free from personal influence or emotion, separates empiricism from faith, knowledge from conjecture, doctorate from dogma. Without objectivity, all the gathered knowledge of humanity is reduced to personal belief. History, both an art and a science, asks for more than cold hard fact and the possibility of fact in history is defended by some, rejected by others; objectivity’s place in modern history is fiercely debated.
The emergence of objectivity in history, the influence of the enlightenment and the writings of Leopold von Ranke allow us to glimpse the minds behind the notion of applying objectivity to history. The use of objectivity in history by a champion of the observed and experienced, empiricist G.R Elton, the necessity for context and personal views in the subjectivity of E.H Carr and the rejection of objectivity by those who distrust it, Michael Foucault and postmodernists such as Keith Jenkins, reveal that entirely excluding objectivity from history is impossible. Analysing the methods used by these historians should steer us to the conclusion that although the theories within history are subjective, they should rest on objective historical facts.
The concept of objectivity in research originated within the natural philosophy of the 16th and 17th centuries. Born of the writings of Francis Bacon, the empirical ideal was applied to the study of humanity by thinkers such as David Hume and Immanuel Kant during the enlightenment. At the dawn of the modern era, the importance of objectivity in the discipline of history was developed in Germany by a number of scholars. Amongst these were Freidrich Meincke, Johann Gottfried Herder, and most importantly, Leopold Von Ranke.
Leopold Von Ranke, in his 1830’s manuscript “On the character of Historical Science”, called for historical events to be investigated without imagination “pre-empting this condition” in “a documentary, penetrating, profound study” devoted only to primary sources of the “phenomenon itself”. Ranke placed objectivity at the heart of historical research. To Ranke, history needed no imagination, speculation or subjectivity. Nor did it need, despite his apparent faith in God’s plan, “the claims of a certain narrow theology”, but a profound, through and objective investigation. Ranke’s empirical and objective approach remains popular and has been embraced by many respected historians.
Sir Geoffrey Elton believed that an event known to have taken place in history is an objective historical fact, impossible to “make or unmake”. In ‘An Early Tudor Poor Law’ written in 1953, Elton demonstrated this view of history. The work investigated a long forgotten draft, found in the British Museums Royal Manuscripts, created in the autumn of 1535. The draft has a close relationship with the pauper act of 1536 but went beyond it in its scope. It is not Elton’s research into the content of the draft itself which is of interest, but his investigation into its origins. Elton seeks the author of the early draft, suggesting that the writer would be “a pamphleteer with an interest in social reform”, a humanist, a religious reformer, be known to government, probably belonging to a circle who “grew up around Thomas Cromwell in the 1530’s”. Elton provides evidence for each of these statements in the text and the footnotes and then concludes that he has found such a man, William Marshall.
William Marshall, an ardent religious reformer and pamphleteer, who was occasionally commissioned by Cromwell, seems a likely author. Marshall, also mentioned by one of Cromwell’s correspondents, was “the only Englishman interested in continental poor relief” according to Elton. Elton has him translating the poor relief ordinances of the town of Ypres, dedicating the work to Queen Anne Boleyn and publishing them “in order to draw the attention of the king and council to the problem” in the same year the draft was produced. In all respects, William Marshall fits the bill; another historian might find this evidence sufficient. The always objective Elton, however, qualifies his position by stating that “These are conjectures, though of a kind that ought to carry some weight”. He speaks of the difficulties and unreliability of the evidence on this point and concludes “we cannot, then, be certain of the author of this remarkable document”.
The objectivity shown by Elton here is admirable. His warnings against taking his assumption as fact despite his strong personal conviction not only warn off those future historians who wish to quote his conclusions, but also instils confidence in the accuracy of Elton’s research. Where Elton has evidence to back his assertions up, he states so boldly, where he has only circumstantial evidence, he warns the reader; this gives Elton a degree of academic integrity. Elton, a member of the political right and uncomfortable with change strongly endorsed the then already over a century old style of objective, empirical history suggested by von Ranke. But what use is history for history’s sake?
According to E.H Carr, pure objectivism is impossible because all historians are influenced by their own values in their choice and interpretation of sources. He claimed that history “cannot accommodate [itself] to a theory of knowledge which puts subject and object asunder, enforces a rigid separation between the observer and the thing observed.” Historians must, according to Carr, subjectively choose which facts to interpret. Some historical studies need a certain amount of subjectivity. Edward W. Said, for example, could not have researched ‘Orientalism’, investigating the relationship between ‘the orient’, or “the other”, and “the west”, nor challenged “the worldwide hegemony of orientalism” without subjectively choosing only the sources which informed his chosen study. Studying women’s, black, gay and other specialist histories would also difficult without subjectivity. The historian is, in Carr’s words, “balanced between fact and interpretation, between fact and value. He cannot separate them”. Carr’s own values and interpretation of fact, however, have been called into question.
Carr’s subjectivity was tainted by the search for a larger, progressive history “flowing”, as Richard Evans put it, “from past through present to future”. Some historians, such as Hugh Trevor-Roper, accused Carr of being a Marxist, a Stalinist and a Leninist; ignoring sources which did not accord with his own ideas. Others said Carr was highly critical of Marxism and that to say he was a Marxist is debatable. His comment that “Caesar’s crossing of...the Rubicon is a fact of history, whereas the crossing of the Rubicon by millions of other people before or since interests nobody” refutes that idea that his chosen historical approach was Marxist, otherwise the lives of the “millions” would be paramount to him. But political Marxist or not, Carr spoke openly about history as a progression towards a desired future, perhaps not, as Evens suggested, a “Soviet-style planned economy”, but certainly a progression.
In Carr’s paper, ‘Some Notes on Soviet Bashkiria’, we see evidence of this progressive colouring of sources. Words crop up like “economic and cultural development...substantially higher than their own” and “backwards regions”. He describes the Islamic and nomadic Bashkir’s as “primitive peoples” and insists that a positive turning point came for the Bashkir’s “with the development of industry”; no dissenting voices are heard from. The work is filled with facts and figures, such as population levels, but his use of relative statements like “but something had to be done, and the obvious alternative...”, typify Carr’s use of personal opinion; he presents no objective evidence that the action mentioned was necessary, or that the alternative was, indeed, “obvious”.
This pursuit of purpose in history was regarded as “trying to fill the vacuum created when God was removed from history” by Elton, who also saw Carr’s additional assertion that a historical fact only becomes so if it is chosen by historians as arrogant. Carr’s progressive subjectivity could lead to distortions and omissions from history, potentially creating a form of progressive pseudo-history, devoid of anything but that which enriched the historian’s own relative view of progress. Without some degree of subjectivity, however, histories focusing on specific fields could be overlooked.
Michel Foucault took Carr’s subjectivity further. To Foucault, history could not be objective. He stated that “historians take unusual pains to erase the elements in their work which reveal...their preferences in a controversy”, suggesting an approach in which “perception is slanted.” Not only is objectivity impossible, according to Foucault, but it should be rejected. “An event”, he claims, “is not a decision, a treaty, a reign or a battle, but the reversal of a relationship of forces”. In 1977 he stated of his own “Effective History” that “I have never written anything but fictions. I do not mean to say...that truth is absent...One fictions history on the basis of a political reality that makes it true.” His truth was a personal, philosophical, aesthetic perception of history, rather than an objective historical reality.
The idea that ‘absolute truth’ is impossible in history does have merit, but do any historians look for absolute truth? Foucault and postmodern historians such as Keith Jenkins are right to point out that a historical source does not provide any certainties. Mathematics has absolute and falsifiable notions such as ‘‘every circle has a centre”, and it can be argued that history does not; history, however, records some dates with almost as much certainty. Jenkins maintains that “history is intersubjective and ideologically positioned; that objectivity and being unbiased are chimeras; that empathy is flawed; that ‘originals’ do not entail anything genuine”. This is the “intellectual equivalent of crack” according to Elton; postmodernism attacked the core of his empiricist sensibilities, but Elton’s dream that “pristine pieces of evidence...organise themselves into...explanations”, is, as Jenkins suggests, farfetched. It is right to be skeptical about historical sources, but extreme postmodernism leads to what Elton referred to as acts of “frivolous nihilism”, such as denying the Nazi holocaust. This, as stated by Deborah Lipstadt, is a threat to all who value history as part of our cultural and social foundation.
Is a history without any objectivity even possible? Foucault did not seem able to avoid objectivity entirely in his historical works. In “Madness and Civilisation”, although his derivations are subjective, Foucault bases much of this subjectivity on objective, primary sources, such as Johann Weyer’s ‘De Praestigiis Daemonum’. Keith Jenkins and other ‘endism’ historians rarely contribute to the field of history, believing the study of history to be impossible. This begs the question: to what extent can they be regarded as historians rather than philosophers? It also casts serious doubt on the practicality of postmodern methods in the real world of historical research.
Conclusion
Ranke had a good point when he suggested that history should be “in pure cognition, undulled by preconceived notions”. The spectre of a world filled with Carr’s politically progressive views of history, or Foucault’s self-confessed historical fiction, or no history at all as suggested by postmodernism, is threatening. Objective facts are the bedrock on which we build historical theories and without their support, the towers of historical knowledge will crumble and fall.
Total objectivity is also problematic. As Thomas Haskell states, objectivity alone gives “a two dimensional representation of a path that is at least three dimensional”. In Elton, events were reconstructed objectively from their sources without questioning, unless the questions came from the sources themselves. As Quentin Skinner observes, if faced with a house which has nothing interesting to say, what should a historian do? Furthermore, if the house is huge and objectively reconstructing all of its facts would take a life time, is it not wiser to use assumption where it is reasonable to do so? The postmodern view that objectivity and absolute truths in history are impossible does have merit. However, as John Tosh explains, this betrays “an ignorance of how historians actually work”. The dismissal of objectivity through an inability to find absolute historical truth is as foolish as dismissing the validity of physics due to Heisenberg’s Uncertainty Principle. Most historians are well versed in the art of critical analysis. They, as Richard Evans put it, “engage in dialogue with it [the evidence], actively interrogating it and [bring it] to bare on theories and ideas formulated in the present.” By ignoring the dialogue between historian and evidence, we are left with the threat of prejudice slipping into our evaluations of the sources unnoticed. Additionally, specialist areas of history, such as black history and women’s history, are difficult to investigate without subjectively selecting relevant sources; Ranke and Elton’s wish for total objectivity could leave these important subjects forgotten.
So what is the best way to find balance on the tightrope between cold objectivity and subjective anarchy? Karl Popper has long since resolved the dichotomy of objectivity versus subjectivity in science, stating that “judges are not omniscient, and may make mistakes...in truth absolute justice is never realised...but the belief in the rule of law can hardly survive...an epistemology which teaches there are no objective facts”. Popper endorsed the concept of building falsifiable theories; based upon subjective hypothesises which have been tested by objective observations. This concept has been readily accepted by science which subjects its theorists to stringent peer review, attacking the validity and accuracy of both observation and theory. Science, for the most part, is comfortable balancing objectivity with uncertainty. Why isn’t history?
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