This paper will review the relationship of Durkheim and his closest collaborators with the young men who came to the Durkheimian enterprise from the Revue de métaphysique et de morale: Célestin Bouglé, Paul Lapie and Dominique Parodi. I will review epistemological points of dissention inside the group that founded the Année as an independent journal, particularly around the definition of sociology, its scientific status, and the relationship between science and ethics. I will explore the epistemological constraints sociology was under, i.e., what kinds of arguments, methods and objects were considered appropriate to the formation of the science of sociology at this time.

I will argue that the figure of Célestin Bouglé in particular deserves further consideration given his close relationship to Elie Halévy, his central place in the Durkheimian group and his role in post-WWI sociology, when he would hold Durkheim's former chair at the Sorbonne and become director of the ENS. He was both a link between the two journals and a critical presence inside the newly forming discipline of sociology.