What do Social Sciences Study: Institutes or Institutions?
Authors: Kotygorenko Viktor 
Published: September 2024

This article deals with the concept of social studies, which are subject to ongoing debate. In the tradition of Western scholars, this scientific concept is referred to as „institutions”. In the post-Soviet space, in particular, in Ukraine, there are two terms: „institutes” and „institutions”.
In the first case, the polemic focuses on what aspects of institutions and their functioning should be studied to acquire essential knowledge for developing and adopting effective management decisions that contribute to improving the situation in all spheres of social relations and social behaviour. After all, institutions are decisive structural components and regulators of society’s functioning as a system.
In the second case, the debate also focuses on how to adapt the term „institutes” to the conceptual framework of institutional economic, political and other social studies. The origins of this debate trace back to the Soviet Union era. Then, as we know, the vectors of scientific research were determined from Moscow. Russian translations of the research results from Western scholars were carried out there and distributed from there. Sometimes there were situations of incorrect translations and inadequate interpretations. This is how the term-concept „institutions” was split into two: „institutions” and „institutes”, and in favour of the latter. This happened contrary to the terminological tradition of institutional studies initiated in the West in the last quarter of the 1800s. Since the early 1990s, updated paradigms of institutionalism have become one of the main instruments of social cognition for many scholars worldwide, including Ukrainian ones.
In order to effectively apply this instrument to study, forecasting and modelling probable and desirable social changes in one's own and other countries, it is necessary to align the terms and concepts of the national scientific discourse with the relevant thesaurus of institutional studies in the countries where these studies began and continue to be leading. In this case, it will be necessary to acknowledge the fact that the object and subject of the latter are phenomena known as „institutions” rather than „institutes”.
Of course, there is a connection between these two terms and concepts. However, it is neither object-subject nor conceptual; it is infrastructural. Institutes are organizations where scholars investigate theoretical and applied aspects of the formation and functioning of social institutions. And those who study at institutes study the results of institutional research and have the opportunity to participate in such research. In short: institutions are studied in institutes.
The first part of the article discusses the genesis of the terms and concepts of „institutions” and „institutes” in the scientific discourse in Ukraine. The second part is about the interpretation of these terms and concepts in the West. Comparing the two discourses and their histories has provided arguments for the conclusion about the necessity of harmonising the former with the second. Perhaps this proposal will require a targeted discussion.