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Krzywicki was the Nestor of Polish sociology, but its founder as an academic discipline and its undisputed chief exponent was Florian Znaniecki (1882–1958). Znaniecki's school as much dominated the sociological thinking in Poland in the inter-war period as the Warsaw School did in philosophy. Before Znaniecki began to teach, some studies in social philosophy and much sociological journalism were published in Poland but sociology as such did not really exist¹⁵⁰. Znaniecki provided a definition of the subject matter of sociology, gave it its method and research techniques, organised its teaching, set up the Polish Sociological Institute (1927) and the first Polish sociological periodical Przegląd Socjologiczny (1930). The inter-war period witnessed a lightning growth of the interest in sociology, a considerable expansion of sociological studies and research activities (in particular in the ecology of towns, in rural sociology, in social stratification and mobility), an increasing output of sociological publications, a steady rise in the status of sociology as an academic discipline. Before the war Poland enjoyed the reputation of being one of the most highly organised and productive centres of sociology in Europe ¹⁵¹.

DOI: 10.1007/978-94-010-3636-8_6

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