Society

1
Society

• Gerhard Lenski Society and Technology
• Karl Marx Society and Conflict
• Max Weber The rationalization of Society
• Emil Durkheim Society and Function
• Critical Evaluation

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Gerhard Lenski Society and Technology

• What are some of the differences between
  societies? How do societies change?, and What
  forces divide a society or hold it together.
• Sociolcultural evolution- refers to the changes
  that occur as a society acquires new technology.

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Hunting and Gathering Societies

• From the emergence of our species 3 million years
  ago until just 12,000 years ago, all humans were
  hunters and gatherers.
• Hunting and Gathering- the use of simple tools to
  hunt animals and gather vegetation.

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Horticulture and Pastoral Societies

• 1200 years ago people discovered horticulture.
• Horticultural- the use of hand tools to raise
  crops. People used a hoe to work the soil and a
  digging stick to punch holes in the ground to
  plant seeds. This was a huge break through, it
  allowed people to grow their own food instead of
  hunting and gathering it.

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• Humans first planted gardens in the Middle East
  and then in Latin America and Asia. Within 5000
  years horticulture spread throughout most of the
  world.

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• Pastorialism- refers to the domestication of
  animals.
• Tribes who became pastoral remained nomadic
  compared to horticulture communities who were
  more likely to remain in one place for a while.

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Agarian Societies

• About 5000 years ago agriculture was discovered
  by the Middle East and then spread to most of the
  world.
• Agriculture- large scale cultivation using plows
  harnessed to animals or more powerful energy
  source.
• Plowing allowed people to cultivate large amounts
  of land and aerating the soil increased fertility.

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• Among hunting and gathering and also horticulture
  societies women were the primary role of
  providers of food. Agriculture however propels
  men into a social dominant role.
• Agrarian societies have the greatest
  specialization and the most social inequality.
  This technology gives people a greater range of
  life choices, which is why agrarian societies
  differ more from one another than horticulture
  and pastoral societies.

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Industrial Societies

• Industrialism- is the production of goods using
  advanced sources of energy to drive large
  machinery.
• People went to the cities to work, leaving behind
  close kinship ties. Rapid change and movement
  from place to place generated anonymity, cultural
  diversity, and numerous subcultures and
  countercultures.

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Postindustrial Societies

• Postindustrialism- refers to technology that
  supports an information-based economy.
• The Limits of Technology
• Technology remedies many human problems, it
  raises production, reduces infectious diseases.
  It however does not eliminate hunger and is not a
  quick fix for social problems.

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Karl Marx Society and Conflict
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• Marx struggled with the basic contradiction of so
  many people being so rich and so many people
  being so poor.
• Social Conflict- struggle between segments of
  society over valued resources.

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Society and Production

• Marx observed the early stage of industrial
  capitalism in Europe.
• Capitalists- people who own and operate factories
  and other businesses in pursuit of profit.
• Proletarians- people who sell their productivity
  labor for wages.
• Conflict between capitalists and workers is
  inevitable in a system of capitalist production.

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• Social Institutions- the major sphere of social
  life, or societal subsystems, organized to meet
  human needs.

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• Marxs argued that one institution- the
  economy-dominates all the others and defines the
  character of a society.
• False Consciousness- explanations of social
  problems as the shortcomings of individuals
  rather than the flaws of society.
• Capitalism and Class Conflict- Marx wrote the
  Manifesto of the Communist Party, where he
  described the two major social classes of
  Industrial Capitalism the ruling class and the
  oppressed class.

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• Class Conflict- conflict between entire classes
  over the distribution of a societys wealth and
  power.
• Class Consciousness- workers recognition of
  themselves as a class unified in opposition to
  capitalist and, ultimately, to capitalism itself.

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Capitalism and AlienationMarx

• Alienation- the experience of isolation and
  misery resulting from powerlessness.
• 1. Alienation from the act of working.
• 2. Alienation from the products of work.
• 3. Alienation from other workers.
• 4. Alienation from human potential.

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Revolution

• The only way out of the trap of capitalism,
  argued Marx, is to remake society.

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Max Weber The Rationalization of Society
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• Tradition- sediments and beliefs passed from
  generation to generation.
• Rationality- deliberate, matter-of-fact
  calculation of the most efficient means to
  accomplish a particular task.

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Is Capitalism Rational?

• Weber and Marx are on opposite side of the
  argument.
• Weber considered industrial capitalism the
  essence of rationality because capitalists pursue
  profit in whatever ways they can.
• Marx believed capitalism was irrational because
  it failed to meet the basic needs of most people
  on earth.

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Webers Great Thesis Protestantism and
Capitalism Calvinism

• Rational Social Organization

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• 1. Distinctive social institutions.
• 2. Large-scale organizations.
• 3. Specialized tasks.
• 4. Personal discipline.
• 5. Awareness of time.
• 6. Technical competence.
• 7. Impersonality.

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Rationality and Beaucreacy-

• The Medieval church grew large, but it remained
  basically traditional and resisted change,
  according to Weber.

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Rationality and Alienation

• Max Weber like Karl Marx recognized the
  efficiency of capitalism. Weber also agreed that
  modern society generates widespread alienation.

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Emile Durkheim Society and Function
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Structure Society Beyond Ourselves

• Durkheim recognized that society exists beyond
  ourselves. Society is more than the individuals
  who compose it society has a life of its own
  that stretches beyond our personal experiences.

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Social facts-

• Patterns of behaviorcultural norms, values and
  beliefsexist as established structures and are
  social facts that have an objective reality
  beyond the lives of individuals.

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Function Society as System-

• The significance of any social fact, he
  explained, is more than what individuals see in
  our immediate lives social facts help society as
  a whole to operate.

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Personality Society in Ourselves

• Society is beyond ourselves and also in
  ourselves. Each of us builds a personality by
  internalizing social facts. How we act, think,
  and feelour essential humanityis drawn from the
  society that nurtures us.

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Modernity and Anomie

• Anomie- a condition in which society provides
  little moral guidance to individuals.

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• Mechanical Solidarity- social bonds based on
  common sentiments and shared moral value that are
  strong among members of preindustrial societies.
• With industrialization Durkheim believed that
  mechanical solidarity becomes weaker, and people
  cease to be bound by tradition.

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• Organic Solidarity- social bonds based on
  specialized and interdependence that are strong
  among members of industrial societies.
  Solidarity is based on differences among people.
• Division of Labor- a specialization of economic
  activity.

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Durkheims Delimma

• The technological power and greater personal
  freedom of modern society come at the cost of
  declining morality and the rising risk of anomie.

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Critical Evaluation

• What holds Societies together?
• How have Societies changed?
• Why do Societies change?