Gabriel Tarde



Gabriel Tarde (March 12, 1843 in Dordogne, France – May 13, 1904 in Paris) French sociologist and social psychologist who conceived sociology as based on small psychological interactions among individuals (much as if it were chemistry), the fundamental forces being imitation and innovation.

Among the concepts that Tarde initiated were the "group mind" (taken up and developed by Gustave Le Bon, and sometimes advanced to explain so-called herd behaviour or crowd psychology), and economic psychology, where he anticipated a number of modern developments. However, Emile Durkheim's sociology overcame Tarde's insights, and it wasn't until US scholars took up his theories, such as the Chicago school, that they became famous.

Everett Rogers furthered Tarde's "laws of imitation" in the 1962 book Diffusion of innovations.

Works

 * La criminalité comparée (1890)
 * La philosophie pénale (1890)
 * Les lois de l'imitation (1890)
 * Les transformations du droit. Étude sociologique (1891)
 * Monadologie et sociologie (1893)
 * La logique sociale (1895)
 * Fragment d'histoire future (1896)
 * L’opposition universelle. Essai d’une théorie des contraires. (1897)
 * Écrits de psychologie sociale (1898)
 * Les lois sociales. Esquisse d’une sociologie (1898)
 * L'opinion et la foule (1901)
 * La psychologie économique (1902-3)