Husserl established the standard phenomenological approach to the social sciences with his claim that transcendental phenomenology determines the universal a priori and fundamental grounds for all objective descriptions and claims. Such a position, however, appears to leave phenomenology open to the charge that it presupposes some kind of disinterested observer, who offers non-contextual, value-free descriptions of our cognitive structure, motives, values, social practices. It could be objected that this, in turn, prevents Husserlian phenomenology from properly taking account of the socio-historical conditions under which human action occurs and of the explanation of such actions offered by the social sciences.