Introduction
The postwar campaign for scientific legitimacy
Quantitative methods and the institutionalization of exclusivity
Social theory and the romance of American alienation
Theories of mass society and the advent of a new elitism
Fads, foibles, and autopsies: unwelcome publicity for diffident sociologists
Pseudoscience and social engineering: American sociology's public image in the fifties
The perils of popularity: public sociology and its antagonists
Conclusion: the legacy of the scientific identity.