Hugo Otto Engelmann (September 11, 1917 – February 2, 2002) was an American sociologist, anthropologist and general systems theorist. Throughout his work he emphasized the significance of history.
Biography
Born September 11, 1917, in Vienna, Austria, Engelmann arrived in the United States in 1939, just two weeks before World War II broke out in Europe. Having fled first to Czechoslovakia and later to France as a result of the German annexation of Austria in 1938, he worked as a laborer in the fields of France until he was able to sail to America, as recorded in Journey Into a New Life.
Following graduate school at the University of Wisconsin–Madison he taught at Michigan State University in East Lansing, at the University of Wisconsin–Milwaukee, and at Northern Illinois University, DeKalb. Towards the end of the 1950s he was among the first members of the Society for General Systems Research. He was the first editor of the Wisconsin Sociologist 1960-62, then again in 1965-70. In 1963 Engelmann was president of the Wisconsin Sociological Association. He is named in Austrian Social Scientists in Exile 1933-1945.
In the 1960s Engelmann regularly participated in civil rights marches and was a strong advocate for racial and gender equality at a time when neither could be taken for granted even at universities. In the early 1970s one of his papers - an analysis of bussing and neighborhood schools—was quoted in a successful desegregation suit of Milwaukee Public Schools initiated by Lloyd Barbee.
From 1969 until he retired Professor Emeritus in 1989 he taught, wrote, and traveled throughout the US and Europe. Retirement did not change much. He continued his active correspondence with colleagues and former students for 30 years and more. He remained active in sociology until his death on February 2, 2002, in DeKalb, Illinois.
His wife Ruth is author of Leaf House: Days of Remembering. Their son John is a lawyer and was sometimes a co-author of Engelmann's articles.
Work
For most of his life he was first and foremost a sociologist. Ethnicity and religion were distant runners up. He was a strong supporter of intellectual freedom, equal rights, civil liberties, and workers. That spirit is evident in the first Wisconsin Sociologist journal—today called Sociological Imagination. It insisted it was "a journal of communication, published cooperatively by its contributors, under the auspices of WSA Wisconsin Sociological Association. Communications may cover any subject matter of concern to social scientists in their respective roles as scientific workers, teachers, and professional employees."
About injustice he had this to say, "...when we restrict the behavioral development of others, we are depriving ourselves of interactive opportunities, and limit our own development. Thus, we can say in a very real sense that 'Whatsoever we shall do unto the least of them, we shall have done to ourselves.'"
Population Expansion and the Social System
Through billions of small-scale social interactions society changes in piecemeal ways and often in contradictory directions. Still, the overall thrust of social change can be discerned. In his 1967 paper "Population Expansion and the Social System," Engelmann outlined his basic theory. As the world's population increases people interact with each other more and more frequently due to crowding, migration, and travel. Freedom declines, power exercise at first increases but later abates (see also Engelmann and Cash, 1981),) and violence becomes boundless.
Beyond a certain point totalitarian power structures eclipse authoritarian ones. Sheer amounts of interaction transform vertical power structures into horizontal ones as more and more people exercise power over each other. In "Orwell, Modern Thought, and Totalitarianism" Engelmann drew a stark distinction between authoritarian and totalitarian societies. "Authoritarian police officials aiming at outward compliance suppress activities considered undesirable. Totalitarian leaders look for inner conviction expressed in positive enthusiasm or contrite confession."
Other 1960s papers
In his paper "A Sociohistorical Perspective for East European Developments" he made his point even more forcefully, "While totalitarianism derives from psychological rigidity, authoritarian rule depends on external enforcement of regulations through power exercise."