Introductory Sociology

Instructor
Dr. Akhaya Kumar Nayak
aknayak@iimidr.ac.in

Social Forces
Intellectual Forces

EMERGENCE OF SOCIOLOGY AS A
DISCIPLINE

Social Forces

Nepolion

French Revolution

Political Revolution
Especially French Revolution
Not the positive consequence but the
negative consequence that attracted the
attention
They wanted to restore the order the in
society in two ways
Some wanted to return to the relatively peaceful
period of middle age
Others wanted to establish new orders in society

Spinning Genie
Beginning of Industrial Revolution

Men and machines

The emerging state

Machine and Men

Latter phase of Industrialization

Machines only with few men in background

Complete Industrial stage

Industrial Revolution and Rise of

Capitalism
Change of occupation
New economic bureaucracy
Emerging capitalistic economy
Appropriation of Surplus value by selected few
Three kinds of alienation of Prolatariates
1. From Products
2. From Fellow workers
3. From own Labour
Marx, Weber, Simmel, Duekheim etc extensively
wrote on these themes

Rise of Socialism

Rise of Socialism
Impact of Karl Marx
He directly does not talk about socialism but
indirectly does
Soc developed not in favor of Socialism rather as
reaction to socialism
Weber and Durkheim were opposed to Socialism
and tried to reform the capitalist society
A lot of literature developed in criticism to Marx

Feminism

Rise of Feminism
Power to women and removing the glass ceilings of
gender/race
1780s and 1790s saw some uproars but started in
focused way in 1850s
Harriet Martineau, Jane Addams, Florence Kelley, Anna
Julia Cooper, Marriane Weber etc started to write on
women issues in sociology
But their literature was pushed to periphery for
Durkheim, Weber, Spencer etc were having a
conservative view of Feminist literature
Later when Male feminist started writing on these
issues these literature came to forfront

Village

Village

Village

Urbanization

Slum

Traffic in Mumbai
Urban problem

Urbanization
Rise of Cities and the problems associated
with it
Weber and Simmel
Chicago School
Two kinds of problem
Problems related physical world
Problems related to mental horizon sometimes
stemming from the problems of Physical world

Catholic Church
Authority of Pope

Modern Baptist Church

Change in religious authority

Secularists Dialogue

Religion Change
Growth of Secularism
Sociologists coming from Religious
background tried to establish peace by their
religious ideas
Others opposed it and a large chunk of
literature were produced out of that
Durkheims Elementary forms of Religious Life,
Webers Sociology of Religion and Protestant
Ethics and Spirit of Capitalism, etc.

Helios
The Greek Sun God

Selene
The Greek Moon Goddess

Description of the Sun

Scientific

Description of Sun
Scientific

Structure of Moon
Scientific

The Growth of Science

Mode of Explanation of the world around
changes
The Physical Sciences like Physics, Chemistry,
Biology were revered a lot
Some Sociologist tried to model sociology in
the line of those natural Sciences
Some others opposed it and that debate itself
produced enormous literature on Objectivity,
Value Neutrality etc.

Intellectual Forces

The Enlightenment
It is a period of remarkable intellectual
development and Change in Philosophical
Thought
A lot of long standing ideas and beliefs many of
them concerning social life have been
overthrown and replaced
Montesquieu, Rousseau etc. were prominent in it
Early Sociology emerged as a reaction to
Enlightenment

The Enlightenment
Two Currents of Enlightenment
Seventeenth Century Philosophy and
Descartes, Hobbes, Locke
Emphasis is on grand, general and abstract ideas that made
rational sense
Rationalism (Descartes), Empiricist (Locke), Transcendental
realism (Kant)

Science
Newtonian Science
Combining empirical research with reason
Application of Scientific method to Social Sciences
Controlling the nature by empirical research (both physical and
Social) by finding out the laws behind it
Rejection in belief In traditional authority

The Enlightenment
Overall it is characterized by the belief that people
could comprehend and control the universe by means
of reason and empirical research
Natural world is dominated by natural laws so it is likely
that social world is too
It is up to the philosophers using reason research to
discover these social laws
The aim is to create a better and more rational social
world by understanding these laws
Examples: Comtes theory of three stages, Durkheims
elementary forms of religious life, Spencers theory of
social evolution, etc.

The Conservative reaction to

enlightenment
Sociology at the beginning was a combination of enlightenment and
counter-enlightenment ideas
The famous counter-enlightenment ideas were represented by the
ideas of Louis de Boland and Joseph de Maistre
They reacted against enlightenment and also French revolution and
suggested to return to middle age for restoration of peace.
Why opposition
God is the centre and source of everything in catholic thinking not
reason which was so important to enlightenment philosophers
Because god has created the society man should not tamper with it
Patriarchy, Monogamous family, the monarchy and catholic church are
the pillars of social existence, so should not be undermined

The Conservative reaction to

enlightenment
They recognized the non-rational aspect of the
social life and assigned them positive value
They regarded tradition, imagination,
emotionalism and religion as the useful and
necessary components of social life
They disliked the upheaval and sought to retain
the existing order
Emphasis on social order
Zeitlin outlined ten propositions emerging from
the conservative reaction to enlightenment (Page
12 of Ritzer)

The Development of French Sociology

Claude Saint Simon
He is a conservative (influenced Comte) as well as
Radical (influenced Marx) thinker
Conservative
Wanted to preserve society as it was
A positivist
Comte took it further and systematized it

Radical
Need for socialist reforms
Especially centralized planning of economic system
Marx took it further and tried to have communist revolution

The Development of French Sociology

Auguste Comte
First to use the term Sociology
Has tremendous impact on latter sociologists
Disturbed by anarchy prevailed due to French revolution
and enlightenment
Developed the scientific view positive philosophy to
combat what he considered to be negative and destructive
philosophy of the enlightenment
He is a conservative philosopher but different from rest in
two respect
He did not think it possible to return to middle ages because of
advancement in technology and industry
He developed a much more sophisticated theoretical system than
his predecessors

The Development of French Sociology

Auguste Comte

Developed social physics in 1939 he called it sociology

Subject matter will be social statics and social dynamics
Dynamics are more important than statics
Did not urge revolutionary change
Natural evolution will make society better ordered than
artificial revolution which disrupts the order
Reform is needed to support the process
Three stages of evolution
Theological
Metaphysical
Positive/scientific

The Development of French Sociology

Auguste Comte
Disorder stem from previous idea system and will be
over as soon as positive stage takes full control of
society
Larger entities like family will be the unit of analysis
rather than individual
Social structure and social change to be given equal
importance
Accorded great importance on consensus rather than
conflict
Envisioned Sociology to be dominant scientific force

The Development of French Sociology

Emile Durkheim
Inheritor of conservative tradition of Comte
Developed a strong academic base for sociology and
legitimized sociology in France
Feared and hated social disorder
So most of his work was devoted to study social order
Disorders are not original part of society. It can be
removed by reform. Marx says problems of modern
world are inherent in society and thus revolution is
needed

The Development of French Sociology

Emile Durkheims Central Contributions
Social Facts
Should be treated as things
External to
Coercive of, the individuals
Ex. Shared moral beliefs

Suicide
Norms and Integration

The Rules of Sociological Method

Talks about material and non-material social facts but emphasised on nonmaterial social
facts
Collective consensus

Division of labour in Society

Mechanical and organic solidarity

Elementary forms of religious life

Totemism
Society as God

L annee Sociologique

The Development of German

Sociology
Karl marx
The dialectics
Materialism instead of Hegelian Idealism

Feuerbach
Ideas to be applied to material field

The Development of German

Sociology
Marx
Political Economy

Contradiction in Classes structure

Evils of capitalism
Class struggle or political revolution
Alienation
Utopian Socialist State

The Development of German

Sociology
Weber
Initially Marx kept him away from the sociological tradition but
the major part of early German Sociology developed as a
reaction to Marx
Weberian theories are all debates with Marx. Weber opposed
some of the ideas of Marx and extended some others or tried to
round out his theoretical perspective
Opposition:- Economic determinism- Marx says ideas are simply the
reflections of Material Interest/material interests determine ideology.
Weber says on the other hand Weber believes Ideas are fairly
autonomous forces capable of profoundly affecting the economic
world. Ex. Protestant ethics and Spirit of Capitalism
Extension:- Webers says stratification can not be reduced to
economic factors (class) only, it is multidimensional. Status (Social
Position) and Party (Political Power) are two other major dimension
along with class

Marx was also influenced by Kant and Nietzsche

The Development of German

Sociology
Webers Theories
Social action:
When actors attach subjective meaning to it
Clearly involves intervention of thought process
Four types
Means-end rationality: determined by expectations as to the behaviour of
objects in the environment and of other human beings
Value rationality: determined by a conscious belief in the value for its own
sake of some ethical, aesthetic, religious form of behaviour independently of
its prospects for success
Affectual actions: determined by the emotional state of actor
Traditional actions: determined by the actors habitual and customary ways of
behaving

Structure of Authority
Legal Authority: legitimized on rational grounds rests on a belief in the
legality of enacted rules or issue of commands
Traditional Authority: derived from sanctity of immemorial traditions
Charismatic authority: derived from exceptional sanctity, exemplary
character, heroism or special power

The Development of German

Sociology
Rationality
Action that is in accord with some process of external
systematization
Types of rationality
Practical rationality: everyway of life that views and judges worldly
activity in relation to the individuals purely pragmatic and egoistic
interests
Theoretical rationality: Involves a cognitive effort to master reality
through increasingly abstract concepts rather than action
Substantive rationality: directly orders action in to patterns through
clusters of values. Choice of means and ends within the context of a
systems of values
Formal rationality: involves means ends calculation with reference to
universally applied rules, laws and regulations
His rounded approach is better accepted and has greater impact on
latter sociologists and

The Development of German

Sociology
Simmel
Small scale issues especially individual actions and
interactions
Forms of interaction (for example conflict)
Types of interaction (for example stranger)
He tried to find out sets of forms and types of
interaction found in large number of social
settings
Philosophy of money
Dyad and Triad

The Development of British Sociology

British Sociology
Political economy
Amelioration: desire to solve social problems by
reforming the individuals
Social Evolution
Spencer
Evolutionary theory
from militant to industrial

Development of Italian Sociology

Pareto
Opposition to Marx
Elite Theory