The eugenics movement in the United States between 1905 and 1940 provides a useful case study of the role of “experts” in a scientific controversy with obvious social implications. I have chosen to focus my attention on this topic because it falls most closely within my own area of research interests and is also the one in which my familiarity with the primary source material is the greatest. Throughout this chapter, I will make explicit references to various other case studies that were examined in the course of the Closure Project, thereby hopefully providing a basis for some generalizations about the role that experts play in scientific controversies. By employing a specific historical methodology (Marxism) for the analysis of a detailed case history (eugenics) with respect to a single question (the role of experts), I hope to suggest some ways in which future research on topics such as closure might be carried out.

Let me say at the outset that to me the function of this or any of the other case examples discussed in the Closure Project is to help us arrive at valid sociohistorical explanations for the generation and closure of controversy. My view is that we should seek to understand general causes in history. I appreciate the value of descriptive, “tell-it-like-it-is” narratives, but I think the most important function of the historian is to seek more wide-ranging explanations where possible. At certain points in the investigation of any subject the descriptive material must come first, and I therefore emphasize the value of preparing detailed case histories.