Chapter 4

Society

I. Society.

Society refers to people who interact in a defined territory. This chapter

explores four important theoretical views explaining the nature of human societies, focusing on

the work of Gerhard Lenski, Karl Marx, Max Weber, and Emile Durkheim.

II. Gerhard Lenski: Society and Technology.

Technological Determinism: the idea that technological change (independent variable) drives social and cultural change (dependent variable).

Gerhard Lenski focuses on sociocultural evolution, the changes that occur as a society

acquires new technology. According to Lenski, the more technological information a society has, the faster it changes. New technology sends ripples of change through a society’s entire way of life. Lenski’s work identifies five types of societies based on their level of technology.

A. Hunting and gathering societies use simple tools to hunt animals and gather vegetation. From about 3 million years ago until about twelve thousand years ago, all humans were hunter-gatherers. At this level of sociocultural evolution, food production is relatively inefficient; groups are small, scattered, and usually nomadic. These societies are quite egalitarian and rarely wage war.

1) Still a few left, like Bushmen and !Kung in S. Africa.

2) Spend time hunting, gathering, socializing.

3) Family all important. Society is built on kinship, and specialization is minimal, centered chiefly around age and gender (though sexes are roughly equal). Basic division of labor even at this point is along gender lines.

4) Usually have a shaman, commune with spirits and animals.

B. Horticultural and pastoral societies employ a technology based on using hand tools to raise crops. In very fertile and also in arid regions, pastoralism, technology that supports the domestication of animals, develops instead of horticulture. In either case, these strategies encourage much larger societies to emerge.

1) Material surpluses develop, allowing some people to become full-time specialists in crafts, trade, or religion.

2) Expanding productive technology creates social inequality.

3) Emergence of government and military

4) Move from many spirits to monotheism. (“The Lord is my Shepard.”)

C. Agrarian societies are based on systematic agriculture, the technology of large-scale cultivation using plows harnessed to animals or more powerful sources of energy.

1) These societies initiated civilization as they invented irrigation, the wheel, writing, numbers, and metallurgy.

2) Agrarian societies can build up enormous food surpluses and grow to an unprecedented size. Occupational specialization increases, money emerges, and social life becomes more individualistic and impersonal.

3) Inequality becomes much more extreme. Slaves or peasants, kings and pharaohs. Rise of high culture. Patriarchy arises as men control food production.

4) Religion underlies the expanding power of the state. Pyramids are possible.

D. Industrial societies are based on industrialism, the production of goods using advanced sources of energy to drive large machinery.

1) At this stage, societies begin to change quickly.

2) The growth of factories

3) Occupational specialization and cultural diversity increase.

4) The family loses much of its importance and appears in many different forms. Leads to erosion of many traditional values, beliefs, and customs.

5) In the early stages of industrialization, social inequality increases. Later on, while poverty continues to be a serious problem, most people’s standard of living rises. Rise of the middle class.

6) Mass education. Demands for political participation also escalate.

E. Postindustrial societies are based on technology that supports an information-based economy. In this phase, industrial production declines while occupations that process information using computers expand. The emergence of postindustrialism dramatically changes a society’s occupational structure.

1) Connected to globalization

III. Karl Marx: Society and Conflict.

Karl Marx’s analysis stresses social conflict, the struggle between segments of society over

valued resources. Grounded in his vision of mid-19^th Century England: why was there so much poverty amid such productivity?

A. Society and production.

1. Marx divided society into profit-oriented capitalists, people who own factories and other productive enterprises, and the proletarians, people who provide labor necessary to operate factories and other productive enterprises. Marx believed that conflict between these two classes was inevitable in a system of capitalist production. This conflict could end only when people changed capitalism itself.

a) Workers were both oppressed, but also exploited.

2. All societies are composed of social institutions, defined as the major spheres of social life, or societal subsystems, organized to meet human needs.

3. He considered the forces of production (economy) the base (infrastructure) on which all other social institutions, i.e., the superstructure, were based. The institutions of modern societies, he argued, tend to reinforce capitalist domination.

a. Marx’s approach is based on materialism, which asserts that the production of material goods shapes all aspects of society. Called his system historical materialism.

5. According to Marx, most people in modern societies do not pay much attention to social conflict, because they are trapped in false consciousness, explanations of social problems that blame the shortcomings of individuals rather than the flaws of society.

a) Example: notion of property “rights” as universal and legitimate. Any concentration of wealth the result of hard work and merit.

B. Conflict and history. Marx argued that early hunting and gathering societies were based on highly egalitarian primitive communism, and that society became less equal as it moved toward modern industrial capitalism dominated by the bourgeoisie class (capitalists).

1. Society moves through stages as forces of production become more productive:

Ancient

Feudal: Struggle between feudal lords and bourgeoisie. Capitalists initially play a progressive role. Their victory (in French Revolution, Civil War) leads to:

2. Capitalism – As capitalism becomes more productive, contradictions become more obvious and more extreme. Proletariat makes everything, controls nothing. Possibility of new, post-scarcity society, becomes more obvious.

2a. Capitalism destroys old feudal ties, strips exploitative nature of society naked. Destroys all old bonds: family, religion, national identity.

3. Proletariat is uniquely situated to overthrow capitalism. Capitalism “creates its own gravediggers” who “have nothing to lose but their chains.” Marx viewed class conflict, antagonism between entire classes over the distribution of wealth and power in society, as inevitable.

1. In order for conflict to occur, the proletariat must achieve class consciousness, workers’ recognition of their unity as a class in opposition to capitalists and, ultimately, to capitalism itself. Then workers must organize themselves and rise in revolution. Internally divided by their competitive search for profits, the capitalists would be unable to unify to effectively resist their revolution.

2. Begins with trade unions, escalates to political struggle.

3. In 20^th Century, notion of proletarian nations.

D. Capitalism and alienation. Marx also condemned capitalism for promoting alienation, the experience of isolation resulting from powerlessness.

1. Marx argued that industrial capitalism alienated workers in four ways:

a. Alienation from the act of working.

b. Alienation from the products of work.

c. Alienation from other workers.

d. Alienation from human potential.

E. Revolution. Marx was certain that eventually a socialist revolution would overthrow the capitalist system.

F. Weaknesses:

1. Capitalists read Marx, begin reforms

2. Nationalism, family, religion remain strong

3. Continued capitalist domination of culture makes resistance hard to conceive.

IV. Max Weber: The Rationalization of Society.

Weber emphasized role of culture, consciousness, in contrast with Marx’s materialism.

A. Two world views: Tradition and Rationality. Weber wrote that members of preindustrial societies embrace tradition, sentiments and beliefs passed from generation to generation, while industrial societies are characterized by rationalism “rationality,” deliberate, matter-of-fact calculation of the most efficient means to accomplish a particular task. Calculability, predictability, uniformity, transparency, universality.

1. The Industrial Revolution and the rise of capitalism both reflect the rationalization of society, the historical change from tradition to rationalism as the dominant mode of human thought.

B. Is capitalism rational? Weber considered industrial capitalism the essence of rationalization, where rational processes predominated. Didn’t necessarily disagree with Marx that system as a whole was fundamentally irrational. Famous quote: “In the modern world, rationalization drives out rationality.”

C. Weber’s great thesis: “The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism.” Weber traced the roots of modern rationality to Calvinist Protestantism, which preached predestination and the notion that success in one’s calling testified to one’s place among the saved. Weber’s analysis demonstrates the ability of ideas to shape society.

D. Rational social organization. Weber identified seven characteristics of rational social organizations:

1. Distinctive social institutions.

2. Large-scale organizations.

3. Specialized tasks.

4. Personal discipline.

5. * Awareness of time.

6. Technical competence.

7. Impersonality.

E. The growth of rational bureaucracy was a key element in the origin of modern society.

F. Weber feared that the rationalization of society carried with it a tendency toward dehumanization or alienation. He was pessimistic about society’s ability to escape this trend. Modernity led to us living in a disenchanted world.

a. Modern humans were trapped in the “iron cage” of rationalization.

G. Ultimately, Marx was an optimist, Weber a pessimist.

V. Emile Durkheim: Society and Function.

For Emile Durkheim, a social fact is a pattern that is rooted in society rather than in the experience of individuals. Society is an elaborate, collective organism, far more than the sum of its parts. It shapes individuals’ behavior, thought, and feeling.

A1.

A. The function of a social fact extends beyond its effect on individuals and helps society itself to function as a complex system.

B. People build personalities by internalizing social facts. Durkheim’s notion of collective consciousness/conscience. “Society is not merely beyond ourselves, but within ourselves.”

C. Durkheim warned of anomie, a societal condition in which individuals receive little moral guidance.

D. The division of labor, or specialized economic activity, has increased throughout human history.

1. Traditional societies are characterized by a strong collective conscience or mechanical solidarity, social bonds, based on shared moral sentiments, that unite members of preindustrial societies.

2. In modern societies, mechanical solidarity declines and is partially replaced by organic solidarity, social bonds, based on specialization, that unite members of industrial societies. This shift is accompanied by a decline in the level of trust between members of the society.

VI. Critical Review: Four Visions of Society.

A. What holds societies together?

B. How have societies changed?

C. Why do societies change?