International co-operation in sociology began in 1893, when Rene Worms founded the Institut International de Sociologie, an institution later eclipsed by the much larger International Sociological Association (ISA), founded in 1949.Positivism and Anti-positivismPositivismThe overarching methodological principle of positivism is to conduct sociology in broadly the same manner as natural science.. 
The term first came into widespread use in the 1920s, when a number of German-speaking therissats, most rẹwàbly Max scheler, and Karl Mannheim, wrote extensively on it.. 