Epistemic Thought and Social Knowledge: Emergencies and Potentialities in Social Research

The article presents an exercise of epistemic thought and critical methodology for the development of social research. After diagnosing the current situation of the social sciences (introduction), the first part of the text proposes an epistemic-methodological strategy to be followed. The second part carries out a dialogue between the Potential of the Present theory of Hugo Zemelman and the tenets of the Sociology of Absences and Emergencies of Boaventura de Sousa Santos. The third part then proposes a critical research approach to social reality and collective subjects. The text closes with an evaluation of the exercise proposed and a reflection on the possibility of empirical application of the proposal.