Test Blog: Sociology

Max Weber and Sociology

Max Weber

•1864-1920

•German

•Protestant

•Mother was a

strong Calvinist

•Father was a

German bourgeoisie

politician

Later Life

•1893-Married Marianne Schnitger, who later became an author and published Weber’s works after his death

•1894-Moved to the University of Freiburg, appointed professor of Economics

•1896-Moved to the University of Heidelburg

•1898- Quarreled with his father,

who died two months later, which left Weber more prone to nervousness

and insomnia.

•Reduced his teaching load and spent months in a sanitarium

•1900-Moved to Italy for two years

Weber’s Ideal Type

•The characteristics of ideal types to work

–Division of labor

–Rules and representation

–Hierarchy of authority (Military)

–Technical qualifications (merit-base)

–Impersonality (not favoritism and conflict of interest)

Weber’s Types of Authority

There are three types of authority

1. Traditional

2. Charismatic

3. Rational-legal authority

A. Traditional: patriarchy, rule over others without questioned, handed down from the past, given legitimacy by custom, we’ve have always come this way

B. Charismatic authority: worship, good and bad charisma, given legitimacy by leader’s magical power-revelation, do it because you want appease me.

C. Rational-legal authority: elected leaders, status allows them to rule, electing anchor legitimacy, central to rational society, I do it because you accepted me as your leader.

Weber’s on Bureaucracy

•Bureaucracy is a rational-legal authority.

•Rule of law: a system of authority/law and elected.

•Bureaucracy depends on: division of powers, representation, and collegiality.

•How law and norm can be established and who obey it?

•Law can be established by acceptance from all sides with shared values, intentionally and consistency.

•Who obey? person in authority, subject to impersonal order, obey only the law but not person.

•Nature of rational-legal authority: rule bound and changed slowly, sphere of competency, otherwise can’t exercise the law, hierarchy, specialized training in the right responsibility, separation of responsibility, impersonal but bound (attached) to rule.

•Types of bureaucracy: administrative staff, personally free, organized in hierarchy of office, qualifications-contract, meritocracy, salary based on qualification, contribute to career, avoid multiple jobs and conflict of interest.

•Efficiency of bureaucracy: performance of capacity and credibility with predictability.

•Bureaucracy and Capitalism: lies on technical knowledge, domination to knowledge and competence, formal bureaucratic rule, competency and merit-based recruitment, technical capacity building, impersonal.

•Collegiality: stick to profession, consultation, listening to advices, aided by technical experts, mutual respect, free to express, clear separation of power but rule base, representation to mandate—mostly by the chief.

Max Weber’s Theory of Class

a. Very influential from Karl Marx

b. Marx’s theory of Class is the property relationshipbased on boss and slave (bourgeois/small & proletariat/big)

c. Class is weak in the beginning and getting intensified over time.

d. Weber: defined class as market situation between employer and employee in the modern market economy, not with status.

e. Weber: class is intensified in the beginning but eased up overtime, especially in capitalism.

f. Class is defined into three characteristics

–Status/prestige/stratification

–Class/income/wealth

–Power

G. In capitalism you don’t need to get approval from president, but to invest if you want to be rich.

H. Class is under the market chances in investment, education—getting more incomes.

I. Class interest & class action: depends on economic interest. You belong to a class because labor situation and your rational action to the market.

J. Status group: is a special social esteem, honor, a nobleman’s status depends on education, doctor, lawyer...

K. Status as honor: life style of individual, way of dress and behave, level of education, social discourse.

L. Status as privileges: material goods, special employment

M. Economic conditions of status: success in market,

Social Movement

Prominent features of social movements:

1. Acceptance of change

2. Resistance to change

Social Movement Defined:

Collective efforts of individual or groups are organized into social movements to project social change.

Social movements refer to any persistent, organized, collective efforts to resist existing structures.

“social movements is defined as “collective enterprises to establish a new order of life”.

Types of Social Movement

1. Redemptive Movements

Redemptive movements are usually religious in nature which do not attempt to change society but specifically, target change in people.

It is a lifestyle intended to bring about a complete transformation of an individual through radical change. Redemptive social movements are often based on religion.

2. Alternative Movements

Alternative movements seeks total change among individuals. Examples are students, organizations, civic societies, non government organizations or government organizations campaigning to people, especially the young one’s, to steer clear of prohibited drugs.

3. Reformative Movements

Reformative movements aim to change not only one’s behavior, but also the behavior of the whole society. These are nationally organized efforts to change the norms of society.

4. Transformative Movements

Transformative movements work for total change the society.

5. Regressive or Reactionary Movements

Regressive or reactionary movements have their aim of ‘setting back the clock’. Members view certain social changes with suspicion and distaste and try to reverse current trends in the society.

6. Reform or Revisionary Movements

believe that certain changes in specific areas of society are necessary but are still satisfied with the existing order.

l7. Revolutionary Movements

Revolutionary movements are deeply dissatisfied with the existing social order and work for radical change that is tailored to their ideological beliefs.

8. Utopian Movements

refer to the member’s vision of radical change and blissful life, either on a large scale sometimes in the future or on a small scale at present. Several contemporary religious cults are examples of Utopian movements.

l9. Escapist or Retreatist Movement

this movement do not seek to change society, but to withdraw from it and not to experience its corruption. Certain religious sects are examples of this type of movement where the group of members isolate themselves from contact with outsiders.

10. Expressive Social movements

This aim to change the psychological and emotional social movements of their individual members. The basic forms of expressive movements are religious movements and fashion movements which do not aim to change the world, but give the members opportunities for engaging in ceremonial and related behavior so that inner feelings can be satisfactorily expressed.

Other Important Social Movement

1. GLOBALIZATION- breaking down of the national barriers so that nations can interact freely with each other.

2.WOMEN’S MOVEMENTS-women claim the rights as men.

3. INDUSTRIALIZATION-introduction of power machines and the factory in the manufacture goods.

Emile Durkhiem (1858-1917) and Sociology

Emile Durkhiem (1858-1917)

Durkhiem is the co founder of Sociology and he had two ideas

First Idea

1. Pre-modern society

In pre-modern society social relations are regulated by the shared system of beliefs, sentiments and Emilie Durkhiem called it common conscience.

Pre-modern societies are economically based in the extraction of natural resources: agriculture, mining, forestry, fishing, ranching and related activities. The pre-modern society is also typically dependent on strong and enduring extended family systems.

2. Modern Society

When society is industrialized it is considered to be modern society or it can be defined as people living together in current time.

It is based on expansion of education, technology, industry and urban life. It has a complex culture changing with the time. Its base is materializing.

Due to diverse social conditions heterogeneous life is found. Social problems of various nature develop among various groups.

Modern society is often called materialistic. Where people no longer produce product for living. Instead they produce goods to sell in the market. People don’t rely their own. For example they go to market for groceries instead of owning gardens and animals. These societies stress on quality of education for all.

Second Idea

1. Collectivism

Pre-Modern societies are collectivism and collectivism goes for traditional societies or pre modern society.

2. Individualism

Modern societies are individualism and individualism goes for modern societies and it is not ego vism.

- Modern Societies are based on reason, facts and it's not based on belief, Physic and maths.

- Organic solidarity: is the way people comes together to help each other for necessity.

And it comes in individualistic society.

- Sociologists are the doctor of society.

- Semi modern societies are half modern and half pre modern.

The first case that Emile Durkhiem studied was Suicide.

Before Durkhiem when someone commit to suicide others were said he/she is crazy.

After Durkhiem research and collect data he came to know that cause of suicide maybe: job, religion, family, work history, income wealth and gender…

Two major function of society

1. Integration is the degree to which collective sentiments (knowledge, beliefs, values) are shared by members is society. (to be more attached to the society)

2. Regulation is the degree of external constraint on people, i.e. the common norms people live under. (more free society, have less regulation).

Four types of suicide according to Durkhiem

1. Altruistic suicide (too much integration, to be too much attached to traditional culture)

2. Egoistic suicide (less integration, to be not much linked in a group)

3. Anomic suicide (too much regulation, disconnection from other members of society)

4. Fatalistic suicide (less regulation)

What is Sociology ?

Sociology is the study of human social relationships and institutions. Sociology’s subject matter is diverse, ranging from crime to religion, from the family to the state, from the divisions of race and social class to the shared beliefs of a common culture, and from social stability to radical change in whole societies. Unifying the study of these diverse subjects of study is sociology’s purpose of understanding how human action and consciousness both shape and are shaped by surrounding cultural and social structures.

Or Sociology is studying of society.

Stratification of Sociology:

1. Class: is the economic, social, political power of someone in society. and we have 3 class’s one is upper class (this class makes up around 1 up to 10% of a society and they are Wealthy people or belongs to a recognized family, second is middle class (the middle class includes about 60 to 90 percent of the population and the members of the middle class earn their money by working professional jobs, and they also have college educations and these peoples are managers, doctors, lawyers professors, and teachers, and the third one is lower class ( the lower class make more than 50% population of our country and they may go to college but most of them are workers, drivers, factory worker, carpenter, electrician and police officers.

2. Race: (is not ethic) the term race refers to groups of people who have differences and similarities in biological traits deemed by society to be socially significant, meaning that people treat other people differently because of them and it’s not because of similarities and differences in eye color it’s because of differences and similarities in skin color like black and white race in USA.

3. Gender: (Is related to male and female) the unequal distribution of wealth, power, and privilege between men and women

4. Power: (Power is the social power) Power refers to someone’s ability to get others to do his/her will, regardless of whether or not they want to. Legitimate power, power given to individuals willingly by others, is called authority. Illegitimate power, power taken by force or the threat of force, is called coercion.

5. Prestige: (is not belongs too many but belongs to personality) Prestige refers to the reputation or esteem associated with one’s position in society. Prestige used to be associated with one's family name, but for most people in developed countries, prestige is now generally tied to one's occupation. Occupations like physicians or lawyers tend to have more prestige associated with them than occupations like bartender or janitor. An individual’s prestige is closely tied to their social class – the higher the prestige of an individual (through their occupation or maybe family name), the higher the social class. These three indicators tend to go hand-in-hand or lead to each other, such as a Supreme Court justice who is usually wealthy, enjoys a great deal of prestige, and exercises significant power. In some cases, however, a person ranks differently on these indicators, such as funeral directors. Their prestige is fairly low, but most have higher incomes than college professors, who are among the most educated people in America and have high prestige.

Key Terms:

1. Prejudice has to do with the inflexible and irrational attitudes and opinions held by members of one group about another, while discrimination refers to behaviors directed against another group. Being prejudiced usually means having preconceived beliefs about groups of people or cultural practices. Prejudices can either be positive or negative—both forms are usually preconceived and difficult to alter. The negative form of prejudice can lead to discrimination, although it is possible to be prejudiced and not act upon the attitudes. Those who practice discrimination do so to protect opportunities for themselves by denying access to those whom they believe do not deserve the same treatment as everyone else.

2. Racism:(Sociology) abusive or aggressive behavior towards members of another race on the basis of such a belief.

Social definition of race: Sociologists define race as a concept that is used to signify different types of human bodies. While there is no biological basis for racial classification, sociologists recognize a long history of attempts to organize groups of people based on similar skin color and physical appearance.

3. Institutional Racism: Institutional racism is a pattern of social institutions — such as governmental organizations, schools, banks, and courts of law — giving negative treatment to a group of people based on their race. Institutional racism leads to inequality; sociologists use the concept to explain why some people face unequal treatment or occupy unequal statuses. One historic example of institutional racism is the barring of African-American students from attending certain public schools, which limited the students' educational opportunities and helped prevent them from achieving a status equal to that of others. Institutional racism need not involve intentional racial discrimination. For example, individual judges might intend to impose similar sentences for similar crimes; yet if Caucasian people tend to receive lighter punishments, plausibly institutional racism occurs.

4. Minority Status: in society sometimes minority are excluded and sometimes minority exclude majority.

Social institutions

1. Family: is the first cycle of society and family is small group of society and every human being belongs to family because from birth to dead they are belong to one family.

2. Religion:Religion is a big part of society.

3. Economics and politics.

4. Education

How Sociology did begins:

Sociology is emerged in the middle of 19 century in Europe by August Comte (1798-1858) and he is the father of sociology.

Three factors led to the development of sociology.

1. Industrial Revolution (Europe was changing from agriculture to productions and peoples moving from villages to the cities).

2. Travel (people of Europe start traveling around the world and they discovered new nations and cultures.)

3. Modern Sciences (is a modern of exactitude, is universal, is based on observation, belief is not science, science is logic).

Positivism: is based on scientific methods (which is based on facts and experience).

The law of human progress according to August Comte:

1. Theological (is the study of religion,

2. Metaphysical (imaginary) is the science of abstract (abstract is something which is not exist in reality but it's an Idea)

3. Scientific (is the modern time which is positivism)

Social Statics:

Is the pre social condition of social order and it is based on three factors,

1. Language

2. Religion

3. Division of Labor (giving the right task to the right person according to his/her skills, Specialization: is Bureaucracy: is the classification of the tasks).

Or we can say Social Statics is the unity of Language, Religion and Division of Labor.

Social Dynamic:

Social Dynamic is the study of human progress and evolution, (if we have the social statics then we can move to Social dynamic and there is not social dynamic without having social statics).

We have learned three points from August Comte:

1. Modern science

2. Three stages of history

3. Two concepts of social statics and social dynamic

DOWNLOAD PDF LINK 1
DOWNLOAD PDF LINK 2