Transcript The Politics of Social Reform

Foundations of Modern Social
and Political Thought
Lecture 6:
Society and the State:
Emile Durkheim and the Politics of
the Social
Society and the State
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The Idealist Turn: Individuality and
Sociability
Understanding the Social
Representing the Social: Society and the
State
The Connection Between the Social and
the Political
The Age of Sociology
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Marx, Base and Superstructure: Politics as
the Playground of the Socio-Economic
Weber and the House of Power:
Responding to Marx, Rejecting the Priority
of the Economic
Durkehim, Comte, and the Politics of the
Social
Social Realism: the Existence of
the Social
‘ … in coming together under a defined
framework and with durable links men form a
new being which has its own nature and laws.
This is the social being. The phenomena which
occur here certainly have their ultimate roots in
the mind of the individual. Nonetheless,
collective life is not simply an enlarged image of
individual life. It presents sui generis features
which the inductions of psychology alone would
not enable one to predict.’
‘Cours de Science Sociale’, 25.
Studying Social Facts
‘Doubtless the idea that we form of collective practices, of
what they are, or what they should be, is a factor in their
development. But this idea itself is a fact which, in order to
be properly established, needs to be studied from the
outside. For it is important to know not the way in which a
particular thinker individually represents a particular
institution, but the conception that the group has of it … But
it cannot be known through mere inner observation, since it
is not wholly and entirely within any one of us; one must
therefore find some external signs which make it apparent.
Furthermore, it did not arise from nothing: it is itself the
result of external causes which must be known.’
Rules of Sociological Method, 38.
Suicide: The Ultimate Case Study
‘… each people is seen to have its own suicide
rate, more constant than that of general
mortality, that its growth is in accordance with a
coefficient of acceleration characteristic of each
society; when it appears that the variations
through which it passes at different times of the
day, month, year, merely reflect the rhythm of
social life; and that marriage, divorce, the family,
the religious society, the army, etc., affect it in
accordance with definite laws.’
Suicide, 38-9.
Explaining Suicide: Egoism
‘ … the bond attaching man to life slackens
because the bond which attaches him to
society is itself slack … the individual is
isolated because the bonds uniting him to
other beings are slackened or broken,
because society itself is not sufficiently
integrated at the point at which he has
contact with it.’
Suicide, 230 and 317.
Explaining Suicide: Altruism
the individual ‘is too strongly integrated …
the self is not autonomous, where it is
fused into something other than itself,
where the goal of its behaviour is situated
outside it, that is in one of the groups of
which it forms part.’
Suicide, 238.
Explaining Suicide: Anomie
‘Egoistic suicide occurs because men no
longer see any justification for life;
altruistic suicide because that justification
seems to them beyond life itself; [anomic]
suicide … because their activity lacks
regulation and they therefore suffer.’
Suicide, 288.
Anomie and the Industrial World
‘From top to bottom of the scale, greed is aroused
unable to find ultimate foothold. Nothing could
calm it, since its goal is infinitely beyond all it
can attain … Men thirst for novelties, unknown
pleasures, nameless sensations, which lose all
savour once experienced. Hence, men have no
strength to withstand the last reverse.’
Suicide, 284.
The Sources of Solidarity
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Mechanical Solidarity: Connection in the
Pre-Modern World
The Threat to Solidarity: the Division of
Labour
Organic Solidarity: Connection in the
Modern World
Organic Solidarity and the
Possibilities of Individualism
‘ ... On the one hand, each depends more intimately on
society as labour is more divided, while, on the other
hand, the activity of each is more personal as it becomes
more specialized. Of course, however limited it may be,
it is never entirely original; even in our occupational
activity we conform to practices and ways of acting that
we share with our whole corporation. But even here, the
yoke we submit to is infinitely less heavy than when the
entire society weighs on us, and it leaves much more
room for the free play of our initiative.’
Division of Labour in Society, 101.
The Politics of Society
‘ There is no longer need to pursue desperately an end which
recedes as we move forward; we need only to work steadily
and persistently to maintain the normal state, to re-establish it
if it is disturbed, and to rediscover the conditions of normality
if they happen to change. The duty of the statesman is no
longer to propel societies violently towards an ideal which
appears attractive to him. His role is rather that of the doctor:
he forestalls the outbreak of sickness by maintaining good
hygiene, or when it does break out, seeks to cure it.’
Rules of Sociological Method, 104.
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The Politics of Society:
Suggestions
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Social Patriotism and the Rejection of
Revolt
Industrial Organization and Occupational
Groupings
The Politics of Equality: Righting the
Misallocation of Labour
The Politics of Equality: Reciprocal
Reward
From Sociology to Politics
‘We would not judge our researches to be worth
an hour’s trouble if they were bound to have no
more than a speculative interest. If we take care
to separate the theoretical from practical
problems, this is not in order to neglect the
latter; it is, on the contrary, to enable us the
better to resolve them.’
The Division of Labour in Society, 33.