EN
This case study in the history of sociology describes three main characters of the 1960s, Ferenc Erdei, Sándor Szalai and András Hegedus, as well as their relationships and conflicts with each other. They accomplished the most in the process of the reorganisation of Hungarian sociology, and in the establishment of its first institutional form, the Research Group of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences. The aim of the present study is to shed light on the role of human qualities, as important factors of sociology and to decode the motivational patterns that influence the choices between alternative actions in a given historical situation.