1. Avant-Propos

1. Jacques Proust : Introduction. This special issue of Dix-Huitième siècle on the present-day problems of research is the fruit of a collective reflection. Our research has reached a critical threshold, each one of us knows or feels it. But this crisis is not the outcome of the accumulation of knowledge acquired especially in the last twenty years and which is a matter of merely totalising, nor of improving methodology. It is the consequence of profound changes which have place in the overall pattern of social and intellectual relationships in which research is practised. It is this change and its consequences which must be taken into account to-day at a theoretical level. The preparatory dossier of this number constituted essentially by " propositions " and " counter-propositions " exchanged by members of the group, bears witness both to the difficulty and the necessity of the steps undertaken.Proust Jacques. 1. Avant-Propos. In: Dix-huitième Siècle, n°5, 1973. Problèmes actuels de la recherche, sous la direction de Jacques Proust . pp. 1-15