當社會科學家要回答他們的學科內的問題時，他們就必須做抉擇；抉擇就會產生力量，使他們從哲學的觀點，尋求解決之道。社會科學哲學對思考認識論或形而上學的哲學問題，以及對有關知識和人類行動的基本問題同樣都是重要的。 社會科學哲學的目的在於詮釋哲學和經濟學、社會學、政治科學、部分心理學、歷史，以及這些學科交叉重覆的學科之間的聯結；探究哲學與人類科學的相關；然後再研討不同的詮釋策略對人類科學所提出的問題。

The philosophy of social science is equally necessary for philosophers who think their interests are wholly limited to epistemology or metaphysics, for the social sciences raise fundamental questions about knowledge and human action. The philosophy of social science aims to explain the connections between philosophy and economics, sociology, political science, parts of psychology, history, and the disciplines at the intersections of these subjects. This article begins with an explanation of why philosophy is relevant to the human sciences, and explores the problems raised by alternative explanatory strategies of the human sciences. Finally, this article provides five problems that social scientists and philosophers have challenged every step in the chain of reasoning: the claim that the natural sciences show progress and the social sciences do not; the assumptions about what progress in the growth of knowledge consists of; the role of laws in providing knowledge; the purported explanations of why the social sciences have not yet uncovered any laws; and the prescriptions about how they should proced if they hope to uncover laws.