Ronald Fletcher (1921–1992)

The obituary below was published in New Humanist, June 1992

Ronald Fletcher, the well-known sociologist, has died at the age of 70. He was an Honorary Associate of the Rationalist Press Association, contributor to the New Humanist, and author of two pamphlets published by the NSS and RPA (Ten Non-Commandments, 1966, A Definition of Humanism, 1968).

In his distinguished career as a sociologist, he was Professor of Sociology at York, Essex and Reading Universities. Students speak highly of his teaching; he was highly individual and stuck to his mast, even if it led to unpopularity. He had little time for the fashions of sociology, thinking the subject should be seen as a whole and from a historical perspective. His best-known work of sociology was The Family and Marriage in Britain (1962); he thought that those who predicted the end of family life were wrong and could only come to such conclusions by ignorance of the history of the family in the nineteenth century.

He was very critical of the Catholic teaching on sex which he described as: “a tissue of illogicality, an overstrained and unconvincing attempt to make medieval mumbo jumbo fit the knowledge and problems of the modern world… an infallible guide to muddle and misery…”

His major academic work was the first two volumes of The Making of Sociology (1971) (the third volume remains unpublished). He examined the central concerns of sociology as it stemmed from thinkers such as Comte, Weber and Durkheim. In recent years he published a book in defence of the psychologist Cyril Burt, arguing that the vilification of Burt — a defender of selective education and hereditary intelligence — was based on misinterpretation of the facts. The Telegraph obituary of Fletcher stated: “Much of his work, over four decades, was at the interface of sociology and other ’special’ sciences, which he approached as a liberal humanist and a rationalist.”

Fletcher was a champion of student rebels in the ’sixties. In the face of a call for stern measures, he proclaimed: “The only discipline that is worth anything in human character is self-discipline, and this cannot be forced from outside.” He was impatient of university administration, believing that “At heart education is Socrates questioning on the street comer. But the machine has no time for that.”

Fletcher had time to explore many avenues and byways — as is seen in his series in the New Humanist on essayists. His belief in the Socratic method and determination to pursue his own path put him firmly in the humanist tradition.

_{Main image: Ronald Fletcher at a joint conference of the Ethical Union and Rationalist Press Association in Nottingham, 1962. He is seated next to H. J. Blackham.}