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SOCI 1510 Introduction to Sociology SOCI 1510-003 TuTh 9:30AM - 10:50AM Phys 112 SOCI 1510-003 TuTh 12:30PM - 1:50PM Wh 322 Aug 29, 2016- Dec 16, 2016 Office Hours: TuTh 2-3PM Associate Professor Gabe Ignatow
[email protected] Chilton 390E 940 565 3616 Assigned book Introduction to Sociology (Seagull Ninth Edition) Paperback – 2013 by Anthony Giddens, Mitchell Duneier, Richard P. Appelbaum, and Deborah Carr ISBN-13: 978-0393922233 ISBN-10: 0393922235 Assignments Assignments are based on both the assigned readings from the textbook and the lectures, which only partially track the textbook. 4 pop quizzes administered in class, 5% each 3 exams: 25%, 30%, 25% Syllabus 1. Introduction
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Read Chapter 1: What is Sociology? (week 1 8/30) 2. What Is Sociological Research? Read Chapter 2 Asking and Answering Sociological Questions (week 2 9/6) 3. Culture and Society
Read Chapter 3: Culture and Society (week 3 9/13) 4. Groups, Networks, and Organizations
Read Chapter 6: Groups, Networks and Organizations (week 4 9/20) exam 1 (9/27 in class) 5. Social Inequality
TracDat Inequality Assignment handed out 9/29 Read Chapter 8: Stratification, Class and Inequality (week 6 10/4) Read Chapter 9: Global Inequality (week 7 10/11) TracDat Inequality Assignment due 10/13
Read Chapter 10: Gender Inequality (week 8 10/18) Read Chapter 11: Ethnicity and Race (week 9 10/25) exam 2 (11/3 in class) 6. Work and Economic Life Read Chapter 14. Work and Economic Life (week 10 11/8) 7. Sociology of Education Read Chapter 16: Education (week 11 11/15)
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quiz 4 8. Sociology of Religion Read Chapter 17: Religion (week 12 11/22) 9. Sociology of Globalization Read Chapter 20: Globalization and a Changing World (week 13 11/29) Week 14 flex week and final exam review final exam (not cumulative)
Lecture Notes 1. Introduction Read Chapter 1: What is Sociology?
What Is Sociology? Socio-logos, Latin-Greek hybrid word, means knowledge of society sociology psychology biology chemistry physics Influence also by the humanities: mainly history and philosophy But where philosophy (and also t heology) are like sociology concerned with social theory, sociology is different from philosophy and theology because in sociology, theories are about people and societies and culture and history, not truth, time, reality, god, the devil, etc. Sociological theories are about real things that we all experience in our lives, and that we tend to think are important. Why study sociology? humanistic: become a better person by learning how the world works, how to think about society in sophisticated ways
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practical: foundation for careers in marketing, government, education and counseling; good as part of a double major, or with a more focused minor Sociology seems to appeal to two types of students: bookish students who have experienced downward or upward social mobility (e.g. the French concept of t ransfuge), or who have experience in different cultures; or students who sort of fall into it because it appeals to both right-brain and left-brain types.
European Sociology Movement started in the mid-1800s Motivated by concern with social conflict, inequality, alienation, societal m orale, colonialism, disease, racism, child abuse, crime Basically the modern world, the world formed by u rbanization, capitalism, and s cience and technology The founding fathers were all basically European men: August Comte Karl Marx Emile Durkheim Max Weber George Simmel As we will see their approaches to sociology differed, but they were all basically concerned with the same social phenomena.
American Sociology In America sociology originates during R econstruction, following the C ivil War. As in Europe, the mid- to late-19th century was a period of intense u rbanization, but in the American case, also of immigration, mostly from Europe. Very rapid flow of ideas from Europe (although translations from German and French were not always available or accurate) Americans were trained in European universities Early American sociologists were n ot nostalgic. And to this day sociologists rarely are nostalgists. They were political liberals, generally unfamiliar with Marx’s writing They were social progressives; they believed in progress, w/or w/out government action
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There was a strong influence of Protestantism: desire to save the world, in this case using science rather than scripture: to “solve social problems” without radically changing society Applied Sociology / Social Problems-type sociology Compared with Europe, sociology was easily established in American universities, which were newer and rapidly expanding American sociology was mostly positivist, “scientistic” and pragmatic Turned away from Weberian interpretive historical approaches, Verstehen Less theoretical interpretation of long-term changes More quantitative analysis of short-term changes In the 1960s there was a turn back to theory in sociology as well as the “qualitative revolution”
2. What Is Sociological Research? Read Chapter 2 Asking and Answering Sociological Questions A. Sociology as a Science Sociology is a special kind of science. Not pseudoscience, although fraudulent sociology or sociology that makes exaggerated claims can be pseudoscience. Not quite like the physical sciences, like chemistry and physics, where natural phenomena behave in law-like ways. Natural phenomena can be fully accounted for, more or less, in terms of laws of cause and effect and complex mechanisms. For the sociologist Emile Durkheim, sociology more closely resembles meteorology than physics or chemistry. Geology is another good analogy. These sciences do not develop universal laws. Instead they try to explain complex higher-order systems in terms of many different types of lower-level mechanisms and cause-effect relationships. Meteorology is to physics and chemistry as
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Sociology is to psychology and biology But unlike meteorology and geology (to a point), there is a s ubjective element in sociology and also in psychology and other social sciences. Sociologists study phenomena in which they themselves may have a strong ethical or even financial commitment. For example sociologists with strong religious commitments, or anti-religious commitments, studying religion. This is somewhat different from the natural and physical sciences, although it is not entirely different.
B. Basic Concepts Solving Problems, and Solving Puzzles 1. Sociological research starts with a Research Question For example: Why are some regions of the world poorer than others? Why are some regions of the world more politically unstable than others? What are the causes of racial inequality? Racism? Gender inequality? Sexism? What determines voting behavior? or more fundamental social phenomena like: friendship, violence, political violence, crime, corruption, organizational performance, school performance, life satisfaction, happiness, stress 2. Literature Review Scholar.google.com, library.unt.edu, jstor.com, web of science 3. Formulate a Hypothesis or Hypotheses Educated guesses about what is going on 4. Research Design Choosing a method that can test the hypotheses and potentially answer the research question A range of designs and methods are available to researchers Survey Social surveys, or questionnaires Online or paper-pencil Pilot studies Standardized or open-ended Surveys of a population require sampling to generalize from the sample to the population
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Advantages: compatibility with the scientific method; generalizability Disadvantages: shallow analysis, respondent biases, often ahistorical Experiment Random assignment of subjects into two groups Advantages: compatibility with the scientific method; cause-and-effect Disadvantages: artificiality, shallow analysis, respondent biases, generalizability, ahistorical Ethnography-firsthand studies of people using participant observation Sometimes autoethnography which includes self-reflection Advantages: insights unavailable from arms-length research methods Disadvantages: generalization, scientific method: hypothesis-testing, theory-testing, ahistorical; cause-and-effect Comparative Historical Research Archival methods Reading-intensive Involves comparing societies, communities, or organizations Advantages: depth, historicity 5. Performing the Research May take weeks or years 6. Interpretation of Results A critical step that depends on the research design 7. Reporting Findings Writing up your study for an academic journal article, book, or report for a company, nonprofit organization, or government agency
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3. Culture and Society Read Chapter 3: Culture and Society quiz 2
Maybe not everyone wants money and power. Aren’t people also motivated by their values? Their beliefs? Don’t ideas matter in society? Haven’t some ideas changed the world? The next classical theoretical perspective is cultural theory, although you should note that the way I’m presenting this is a bit different from what’s in the book. This is the newest of the classical theoretical perspectives, although in sociology it’s at least a hundred years old. In this perspective, societies are guided not, or not only, by functions or conflict, But also by shared values, symbols, ideals, ideas, beliefs, religions, and rituals Cultural theory is associated with M ax Weber and Emile Durkheim, and also with a nthropology In cultural theory, scholars pay a lot of attention to language, symbols like flags and statues and national anthems, rituals like n ational holidays and religious rituals, and lots of other kinds of symbolic and ritualistic behavior. They also pay a lot of attention to cultural difference between and within societies. This perspective is very international—probably more international than the functionalist or conflict perspectives. So if we ask our usual question of why we have universities, cultural theory provides different types of answers. For cultural theory, education is like a religion, and we build universities because we believe in education. Secular education is part of our value system. Also, we build universities so that we can socialize children to have the right kinds of beliefs and attitudes. It’s important for universities to have rituals like graduation ceremonies and symbols like diplomas, in order to make the experience of graduating meaningful to the students and parents. We have mentioned culture a few times already. Along with functionalist theory and conflict theory, cultural theory is one of the big theoretical perspectives in sociology. Also, the textbook’s definition of society itself includes the concept of culture.
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And in his book The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, Max Weber argued that Calvinists’ culture, and not only technology, economics, or power, contributed to the success of capitalism. When we talked about differences between different countries, students said that different countries have different cultures. But What is Culture? What does the word Culture mean? One definition is that it is different from economic and political processes. This might help, but it’s not a very good definition. Most discussions of Culture start with the idea that people are different from animals because people have culture. Some animals use tools and some teach each other how to do things. But overall, non-human animals operate by instinct. What are animals’ instincts? What are human instincts? Food, water, sex, friendship, play, take care of young, aggression Unlike most animals, humans are born incomplete; we need other people to teach us how to live. Our instincts are not enough. “Human nature” is not enough.
e.g.
Blinking vs. Winking instinct vs. culture
For example, in the 19th century scientists found feral children—wild children who grew up by themselves in the forest. They could not speak, and did not know how to live or how to interact with other people. No one taught them how to be social, how to eat, how to speak, how to read or write, etcetera. These were some of the only people ever found who had no culture.
Second definition: Culture is something we have to learn from people in our society (family, community, nation).
Social scientists talk about two kinds of culture: 1. material culture tangible things people make in a society cell phones, worry beads, houses, cars, clothing, food
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2. non-material culture ideas, meanings, beliefs, values, utopias, moral judgments
Components of culture, or What counts as culture and what doesn’t? Blinking is not culture, winking is Roughly five things are thought to count as culture
1. Symbols (or signs) (the difference is not important) Anything that carries meaning for people who share culture e.g. The Turkish flag is a symbol; it is meaningful, but it means different things to different people e.g. a blink is not really a sign; a wink is a sign Symbols and signs have two parts: A. The signifier (e.g. the winking eye) B. The signified (e.g. flirting) 2. Language Languages are systems of symbols Without language, there would be no culture, because we could not pass on our culture to our children and to other people 3. Values and Beliefs Beliefs are specific statements that people think are true e.g.
God created the universe Humans evolved from Apes
Values are standards about what is right and wrong e.g. individualism versus collectivism family values tolerance
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freedom 4. Norms Rules about appropriate behavior e.g. How do you treat guests? If you are a guest in someone’s home, how are you supposed to act? 5. Material Culture Physical differences between cultures, e.g. in clothing, architecture, how people eat
THINKING ABOUT CULTURE High versus Low high culture (elite culture) popular culture (mass culture) cultural capital (culture used for social climbing; Pierre Bourdieu) Subcultures and Countercultures alternative cultures within a nation; small cultures; cultures that rejection the mass culture e.g. youth cultures; professions; street culture; ethnic groups
Ethnocentrism The idea that your culture is the main, central, or best culture Seeing reality only through your own culture Judging other cultures based on your own culture’s standards e.g. Indian Suttee; homosexual rituals in New Guinea; eating dogs in China Hard to avoid Relativism Trying to understand other cultures o n their own terms The belief that different cultures have different truths and different ways of being moral, and that no one culture is better than others
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Cultural Lag The idea that material changes in society occur quickly, while culture (ideas, values, customs, habits, norms) change more slowly. Sociologist William Ogborn, 1920s and 1930s Example of deforestation, slow shift to conservation methods e.g. high price of gas, gradual shift in preferences toward small cars 2 THEORIES OF CULTURE Functionalism (again!) combines functionalism that we saw before (structural-functionalism) with idealism (cultural functionalism) different societies have different basic values societies and cultures work hard to preserve these basic values. pieces of culture (symbols, norms, language, material culture, etc.) function to preserve these values e.g. Why do the Amish refuse to use high technology? Are they dumb? Why do some Indian communities practice Suttee? Because cultural practices reflect basic values. e.g. individual freedom, hard work, community, family, tradition Like Weber (at times), cultural anthropologist view culture as a system. Their analyze “cultures” in s ynchronic, not diachronic, terms. This is part of what makes cultural anthropology unique. Their approach and methods are interpretive; they see cultures as texts that are open to interpretation, and contain recurring themes and symbolism Cultural anthropology can tend to be f unctionalist in its thinking. Everything in a culture serves a function
Everything in a culture is part of an integrated whole Society is a system of mutual interdependence that must be kept in equilibrium
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Cultures are necessary for human life, serve concrete needs: For rearing and socializing children For creating social solidarity and harmony An implication of these functionalist views is that indigenous cultures should be protected or preserved i.e. if Westerners tamper with one part of an indigenous culture, they may destroy the whole thing This view was crucial for anthropology during its early years in the 20th century, when Western powers still operated systems of colonial control in “3rd world” countries. Conflict (again!) Marx: culture is determined by whomever has control over the means of production Critical theory (The Frankfurt School): Mass culture (pop music, films, tv) is created by the culture industry, and is like an opiate. It keeps people from thinking too much.
The Frankfurt School a group of intellectuals who were associated with a research institute in Frankfurt in the 1920s, but were dispersed with the rise of Nazi Germany
I will focus on Max Horkheimer and Theodor Adorno
They were members of the German cultural elite, and Adorno moved to Los Angeles in the 1940s saw Nazi populist propaganda, then in America television commercials, popular newspapers and films
A and H, in The Dialectic of Enlightenment, argued that the project of the European Enlightenment had reached an end, and had led to a world of n arrow pragmatic rationality and a mass society of passive, uniform consumers Popular media produced by the culture industry appeals to the l owest common denominator, simple likes and dislikes, in the interest of maximum profits “No independent thinking must be expected from the audience” Audiences are zombie-like and amused, but unthinking and gullible
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Classical and avante-garde art, however, is much better
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4. Groups, Networks, and Organizations Read Chapter 6: Groups, Networks and Organizations exam 1
Ferdinand Toennies: Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft social relations (1887) President of the German Society for Sociology until he was ousted by the Nazis in 1933
Gemeinschaft – tight-knit communities, intimate relations of kinship, friendship, trust, reputation Often translated as “community” e.g. rural villages, farming communities Tonnies argued that Gemeinschaft relations were organic, natural, healthful Gesellschaft modern urban relations – impersonal, based on money and prestige, and on rationality, efficiency, and instrumental value Often translated as “”society”
Emile Durkheim The Division of Labor in Society
(1893, from his doctoral dissertation) Durkheim was especially interested in morality as a social phenomenon He wanted to understand how people could remain socially integrated in a modern, capitalistic society He was not romantic, as were Marx and Toennies
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He was not interested in developing a critique of modern society. Rather, France had been humiliated by Germany in the Franco-Prussian war in 1871, and Durkheim and many of his peers wanted to support France and to modernize it.
Mechanical Solidarity, in which everyone knows everyone, and people are tied together through similarity People work together (e.g. in the fields), and they share culture and “collective consciousness”
Organic Solidarity, here Durkheim reverses Toennies’ use of the term organic. For Durkheim, organic solidarity is like the solidarity of the heart and the liver. They are highly specialized, and work together. People operate in complex webs of interdependent relations. People cultivate individual differences for the good of the whole. People do not necessarily share culture or a “collective conscience” as in mechanical solidarity. OS arises from the natural development of the division of labor, although this can lead to anomie and over-individualization. Now we move on to our third major explanation of the shift to modern industrial societies. This comes from Emile Durkheim, who wrote Suicide, among many other important books. Like Weber, Durkheim comes along after Marx. And like Weber, he is in part reacting to Marx. From our discussion of Suicide, we know that Durkheim argued that society has extraordinary power over individuals. Like Weber, and unlike Marx, he though that religion was very powerful social force that shaped individuals’ lives and decisions. So society generally, and religion in particular, have power over the individual. But how does Durkheim explain the shift away from traditional religion to capitalism, industrialization, and so on. Unlike Weber, he argues that modern societies have less control over individuals t han do pre-modern societies. They do not give individuals the m oral guidance they get from traditional religion. This leads to anomie, meaninglessness. Anomie is a result of a shift in the basic economic and functional structure of society. The shift is from mechanical solidarity to organic solidarity Mechanical solidarity is defined as s ocial bonds, based on shared morality, that unite members of pre-industrial societies
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In pre-modern societies people almost automatically feel strong bonds toward each other. This is because they know each other, each person knows what everyone else is doing. And everyone is very similar, e.g. in religion, beliefs, race and ethnicity. Organic solidarity is defined as social bonds, based on s pecialization, that unite members of industrial societies. In industrial societies, there is a high level of d ivision of labor. There are 1000s of different types of jobs, so not everyone knows what everyone else is doing. And not everyone shares beliefs, values, religion, or race or ethnicity. So people do not necessarily share the same morality. But they are functionally interdependent. They need each other for society to work properly. Tradition does not guide us. Functional interdependence does.
Durkheim was more optimistic than Marx or Weber. Marx predicted a violent socialist revolution. Weber predicted that life would become boring and routine. Durkheim thought that societies were experiencing a major shift, from mechanical solidarity to organic solidarity, but that our morality would catch up with this shift. It is useless to look to the past for guidance; instead, people would develop a new kind of morality that fits the modern world better.
Georg Simmel
Brilliant itinerant German social theorist who wrote on an extraordinary number of topics. Like Toennies and Durkheim, he argued that there was something fundamental about the transformation from rural life to modern urban life. He argued that society is an event, it is interaction of individuals in groups He developed a geometry of social life, an analysis of the “web of associations” that, for Simmel, make up society. Simmel’s ideas have reemerged almost 100 years later in the form of network analysis. In modern societies, people have larger social, occupational, and associational networks. This leads to individualization, as people are more likely to develop social networks that are unique. Simmel wrote about many topics: money, fashion, commodity fetishism, alienation—but his writings on the city are among his most influential. The blasé attitude: due to sensory overload, overstimulation in urban areas (people fear the Internet is doing the same thing)
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Max Weber on Organizations Founder of organizational sociology The rationalization of society What does rationalization mean? Life becomes more rational, subject to m eans-ends reasoning. Weber lived in the 19th and early 20th century, mostly in Germany, but he took a long trip to America too. He knew almost everything you could know about history, but in both countries, he felt strongly that a great shift was taking place in society. This was not just a change in technology, not only industrialization. The shift was from tradition to rationality. What does this mean? Are people who follow traditional ways of life irrational? Tradition: sentiments and beliefs passed from generation to generation Rationality: Disciplined calculation of the best means to accomplish specific ends So these are different ways of thinking and living. The rationalization of society affects more than just technology or industry. It changes the whole way people think, what they believe, and the ways they live their lives. Rationalization does not happen to individuals one at a time, so much as it happens to w hole societies, or whole segments of societies, at a time. It happens in Northern and Western Europe and North America first. e.g. England, Holland, Germany, America But Weber is similar to Marx, because Weber is also concerned with the social and psychological alienation that is associated with capitalism and industry. In a famous line, Weber likens modern organizations to an “iron cage” tightening around individuals. People are left with little freedom to be creative or unique or to enjoy life or be social. What is an organization? social group specific goals division of labor formalization
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Modern organizations, from the government to Microsoft or MacDonalds or IBM, are supposed to be the ultimate examples of rationalization, of means-ends reasoning. So many people think these organizations are good and r ational. They make people work hard. Even Marx thought that capitalist organizations uproot people from the “idiocy of village life” For Weber, capitalist organizations have “purely technical superiority” over all other organizations because of their “precision, speed, unambiguity, continuity, discretion, unity, reduction of costs…” Max Weber on Modern Organizations
Weber was concerned that Germany was lagging behind Britain—a question of comparative development—and wanted to understand why, and then to improve Germany’s position 3 Types of Legitimate Authority (these are “ideal types”) (and these are true for all time) (authority is the ability to make people do things despite resistance) 1. Charismatic Authority authority from personality, charisma: e.g. religious leaders, popular politicians, kings any problems with this kind of authority? succession, irrationality, incompetence 2. Traditional authority authority from sacred traditions and leaders e.g. a man is elected president because his father was president e.g. a man is anointed king because his father was king any problems with this? lack of charisma, irrationality, incompetence 3. Rational-Legal authority Authority based on specialized learning rule by experts technical ability exams career ladders meritocracy any problems with this? lack of charisma, rigid hierarchy and inequality
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For Weber, modern organizations, and especially capitalist organizations (corporations), must move from charismatic and traditional forms of authority to rational-legal authority. Rational-legal authority is more efficient, faster, better; and in capitalism, the older forms cannot compete.
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5. Social Inequality The next perspective, the conflict perspective totally rejects functionalism. In the conflict perspective, societies aren’t like biological organisms at all. Instead, societies are arenas of inequality that generate conflict and change Forms of inequality include: Class Race Ethnicity Gender Money Power Prestige The focus here is on social divisions Privileged groups try to keep their privileges, and pass them on to their children Non-privileged groups sometimes resist, sometimes do not resist This perspective is, again, radically different from functionalism
Question: What would each say about university education?
The conflict perspective is associated with two famous G erman thinkers: Karl Marx and Max Weber Conflict Theories Karl Marx this is the Marx lecture, so if you don’t know much about Karl Marx, here’s your chance his most famous books were The Communist Manifesto and Capital 1) theorist of the relationship between capitalism and class conflict; this was his first major concern
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2) the second major concern was alienation lived 1818-1883 Ph.D. in philosophy in Germany became a newspaper editor and writer unlike most philosophers at the time, he thought you needed to understand society to understand ideas unlike most academicians, he wanted to change society, not only to understand it better 1) capitalism and class conflict Marx wrote his articles and books during a time when the B ritish Empire was at its strongest, when the Industrial Revolution had made Britain, a medium-sized island nation, the wealthiest and most powerful nation in the world. At the same time, most British citizens were part of the proletariat, the factory workers, who were terribly poor, worked in polluted factories all day (remember there were no weekends), had no homes or lived in slums, and rarely lived past 30. At the same time, aristocrats, industrialists, and capitalists, who owned the factories, were unimaginably rich. They lived lives of luxury in mansions with hundreds of servants. Marx saw society, not only British society but all societies, as based on conflict between social classes. He saw societies as made up of a base and a superstructure. The base is economic; it is the mode of production of goods and services. The superstructure is nearly everything else: the g overnment, religion, culture, the family, and ideas Social change occurs from the base, from the mode of production of goods and services. Whoever controls the mode of production controls the society, including the government, religion, culture, the family, etc. So for example, British capitalists were able to control virtually all of British society because they were able to control Britain’s economic base. If they did not like a person or an idea, they could buy that person, or have that person put in jail or eliminated, because they were in control of the
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government. They could buy politicians…They could pretty much buy or control whatever they wanted. Marx thought that this was true of horticultural and pastoral societies, agricultural societies (e.g. slavery in ancient Egypt; the European feudal system), and now of industrial societies. He thought this was true of every form of society that came after hunter and gatherer societies. Hunter and gatherer societies were communist because they shared their wealth and did not have social classes or class conflict.
So economic classes struggle over control of the means of production. But in industrial societies, the proletariat is much, much larger than the capitalist class. And they are terribly poor, and they generally know that the capitalists are amazingly rich. If the workers got together and attacked the capitalists and took control over their factories, they could gain control over society. So why don’t they revolt? Marx had trouble with this question, and his answer was what he called f alse consciousness. False consciousness is a kind of confusion about how society works. For example, poor workers blamed themselves for their poverty, when they should blame the rich capitalists. Because there’s really very little they can do to improve their lives. Capitalists create false consciousness in the proletariat because they control the schools, the church, the press, and the whole “superstructure” of society. They control these things because they control the means of production. They control pretty much everything. For the proletariat to revolt, false consciousness would have to be transformed into c lass consciousness. Workers would become aware that they were in the same economic class, and would organize themselves to challenge the capitalists. How would the proletariat switch over from false consciousness to class consciousness? A revolutionary elite group of intellectuals would help them. Also, capitalism would collapse due to its i nternal contradictions. Capitalists do e verything possible (like what??) to increase profits, and would be driven to reduce wages so much, to pay workers so little, that the workers would be forced to start a revolution.
Revolution The only way for workers to escape from alienation is to revolt, to start a revolution against capitalism.
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Workers would take over the factories from the capitalists, and would replace capitalism with socialism Socialism would be a humane, equal economic system that p reserves social ties. Workers would take care of each other, and everyone would work for the good of the society.
Marx’s Predictions Marx thought this revolution would occur in England first, because England was the most advanced industrial country. Eventually it would happen everywhere else. For Marx, it was inevitable. Was he right? Did socialist revolutions occur? Where? What happened in England? Max Weber Much influenced by Wilhelm Dilthey—argued (against Marx and others) that human history is fundamentally different from the material world—the subject of the natural sciences Human history is shaped by contingency, spirit, consciousness, culture Sociologists should try to interpret history to capture the way it is experienced subjectively by other people in other times and societies Strict causal arguments are not appropriate for the study of human history, culture, society
What Weber thought about Marx: capitalists versus proletariat idea was too simple really Three dimensions of inequality Class -- $ Status – social prestige, social honor expressed through “styles of life” (stande) Power – ability to make people do things despite resistance
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Davis and Moore, The Functional Theory of Stratification
Eric Olin Wright, Contradictory Class Locations Contemporary Marxist Wright characterizes white-collar and professional workers’ class position as contradictory. They can influence some aspects of production but have no control over others. They have privileged relationships to authority and s kills and expertise but are ultimately do not have control of the means of production.
Annette Lareau, Unequal Childhoods Concerted Cultivation versus Natural Growth
Other Concepts Social mobility Intergenerational mobility Intragenerational mobility Exchange mobility Structural mobility
Poverty Poverty Line Calculated by the US government as income equal to three times the cost of a nutritionally adequate diet. In 2016, a cash income of approximately $24,000/year for a family of four. Working Poor Approximately 7% of the labor force is below the poverty line (working poor). Approximately 11 million Americans. Culture of Poverty Poverty is a product of the cultural environments into which generations of children are socialized. It includes the values, beliefs, lifestyles, habits and traditions of people living under conditions of material deprivation. Dependency Culture Idea from Charles Murray that refers to a specific culture of poverty characteristic of people who depend on state welfare payments rather than entering the labor market. An outcome of a
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“paternalistic” welfare state that undermines individual ambition and people’s capacity for self-help.
Read Chapter 8: Stratification, Class and Inequality C. Wright Mills – Radical Sociology in America Born in Waco, TX in 1916, conventional middle-class background PhD at the University of Wisconsin, spends most of his career at Columbia University Dies of his fourth heart attack at age 45, 3 marriages with one child from each, many affairs Outsider in many ways, had trouble with his professional relationships as well He was at odds with American society Challenged Talcott Parsons (Structural Functionalist), but also Paul Lazarsfeld (rememberd for his contributions to sociological methodology)
Ideas Marx was either reviled or ignored in American sociology, although there were exceptions, and C. Wright Mills was one of the most notable Not a sophisticated Marxist, not very familiar with Marx’s ideas He was a rare American “radical sociologist” though, meaning he was a Class theorist, a power theorist
“White Collar” – analyzed the new occupational category of white-collar workers
“The Power Elite” – showed how America was dominated by a small group of white male businessmen, politicians, and military leaders—in spite of American conceits of p luralism and democracy, of a balance of competing interests This is a “political economy” that Mills refers to as the “triangle of power”
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Power in the United States had once been decentralized, spread among the states with a weak federal center Since WWII, business and government have become increasingly unified—think of Eisenhower’s warning about the “military-industrial complex” The men of the power elite come from similar social and educational backgrounds, similar careers and styles of life These men move easily between the three points of the t riangle Mills argued that competing interests and competition only occurred among members of the middle class, and middle-sized enterprises (e.g. labor unions and political parties—these change, but the structure of power and privilege does not). At the “commanding heights” of the economy, military, and government, there is unity and class self-interest. Social revolts against this system—the agrarian revolt of the 1890s, the small-business revolt since the 1880s, the labor revolt of the 1930s—have all failed to change anything (also the Reagan revolution in the 1980s, the Republican Revolution in the 1990s, Clinton’s “reinventing government” in the 1990s)
Mills argues that intellectuals need to openly discuss and debate the structures of power in American society. Separation of the civil service from corporate interests. Free associations of communities, families, smaller groups should be able to influence the national political economy.
“The Sociological Imagination” (1959) (damning critique of Parsons)
Read Chapter 9: Global Inequality Basic concepts: Globalization--increasing economic, social, and cultural interactions and integration across national borders Global inequality--inequality within nations; inequality between nations
The era of globalization is generally understood to have begun in the 1970s
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Accelerated with the end of communism
Inequality within nations is understood to have increased in the globalization era. Does globalization cause inequality? If there were less globalization (more walls), would there be greater equality?
Major theories: 1. Modernization theories a. Popular after World War II b. Alternative to Marxist theories c. Evolutionist d. Every society evolves through linear stages e. Some societies have advanced further than others i. Traditional Stage 1. Tribal, unfamiliar with capitalism, fatalistic ii. Takeoff to economic growth 1. Societies abandon some traditional beliefs, begin to save for the future, invest for the future iii. Drive to technological maturity 1. Investments are made in technology iv. High mass consumption 1. Final stage, an advance capitalistic consumer-oriented economy
2. Dependency theory a. World System Theory i. IMMANUEL WALLERSTEIN, “THE CAPITALIST WORLD SYSTEM” ii.
Like Huntington, IW is responding to liberal Western modernizers
iii.
Unlike SH, IW’s focus is economic, not at all cultural
iv.
For IW, the world is now, and has been for 500 years, an economically interdependent system
v.
Historically, the world has been run by w orld economies and world empires
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vi.
World Economies: Napoleonic France, the British Empire
vii.
World Empires: China, Egypt, Rome
viii.
Today we have the “modern world economy” which emerged in 16th-century Europe. This is capitalism, and it does not evolve into a world empire, though it is sometimes described as an American empire
ix.
Northwest Europe became the center or “core” of the modern world economy because it was able to diversify its agricultural production through technological innovations, and to develop cities and eventually strong states that allowed for stable economic transactions.
x.
Mediterranean and Eastern Europe were in the “semi-periphery”. The colonies and the rest of the world were in the “periphery”, exporting cheap raw materials and importing expensive goods and services.
xi.
These inequalities are reinforced and perpetuated by “unequal exchange” between core and periphery. The core almost always wins.
xii.
Both poor and rich nations are almost locked into their positions in the world economy. The basic structure of the world economic system is stable and static.
xiii.
Criticisms of IW? IW pays almost no attention to culture – values, beliefs, religion, traditions.
xiv.
Is his view of the world too static? What about countries like South Korea that have changed their positions?
3. Market-based theories a. Basically ideas from mainstream economics applied to globalization b. Compatible with modernization theory, for the most part 1. “Economic Liberalism” This is not an economics course, but we can discuss the basic principles of what is sometimes known as “Anglo-Saxon” or “ Anglo-American” or “ laissez-faire” capitalism, and its transformation. Adam Smith: the “invisible hand” of the market provides goods and services for all of us. Free trade is good because, since individuals are r ational and self-interested, and tend to negotiate and trade and bargain, and because whenever people trade or buy goods or services both parties must gain (most of the time), governments should allow free trade. Governments should not interfere in the market.
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Economic liberalism thus gave priority to economic freedom over economic equality Liberal capitalism was the official economic system, and the economic backbone, of the British Empire, and it was the dominant global system until the early 20th century and the rise of communism and socialism, and crises of capitalism including the 1929 stock market crash. The result of these crises and threats, in advanced capitalist democracies, was that the state sought to smooth out the volatility of markets, and sought to make capitalism serve social purposes – equality and welfare. The result was not communism, but rather the “welfare state” in which states taxed citizens, and taxed the wealthiest citizens more than others, in order to provide health insurance, unemployment insurance, retirement benefits, and other benefits to vulnerable citizens. The welfare state was the dominant economic-social model in the world from about 1945-1975(ish). This period also saw the growth of labor unions, which were generally not communist/socialist, but that demanded guarantees of social security and benefits from states.
In the 1970s the welfare state and unions faced their own crises and also sustained intellectual/ideological criticism from “neo-liberal” economists and other writers. The welfare state was, and is, threatened by global economic competitition, by economic globalization and the incorporation of countries like China into the global economy. States that tax businesses and citizens for social reasons lose because businesses and citizens can more easily move. E.g. Germany and France today. Thus economic globalization / neo-liberalism directly threatens the welfare state, and in so doing it threatens the welfare of millions of people in advanced democracies. For these and other reasons, we should not be surprised to find anti-globalization social movements, and anti-globalization and anti-immigration sentiments among voters in advanced democracies. And yet economic globalization / neoliberalism continues to advance, and welfare states continue to shrink. Why? Peter Martin and Martin Wolf argue that there is a strong moral case for economic globalization. Their arguments are classical arguments of free-traders and economic globalizers, and most business executives would strongly agree with them. Their arguments are rooted in neoclassical economics and in observations of the world, particularly since the 1990s.
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economic globalization is morally good. In fact it is great, because it has integrated previously marginalized, poor people into the world economy and provided them with higher standards of living.
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Economic globalization is better and more powerful than bureaucratic elites. Economic globalization is real, powerful, and beneficial because it will transfer power from developed countries to developing ones.
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Leftist critics of globalization (the anti-globalization movement) are in fact conservative, they want to retain the status quo.
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Economic globalization refers to the lowering of trade barriers and the liberalization of economic policies and labor laws.
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Economic globalization creates losers, but it creates more winners than losers.
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Economic globalization creates jobs. Millions of jobs. Maybe not great jobs, but a job in a factory is better than no job at all.
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Globalization can be stopped, but this requires a more powerful state that can repress individual rights and freedoms. This is undemocratic.
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Economic globalization / liberalization is associated with democracy. Where we have free trade, we will generally have democracy and more freedoms.
This is a “mainstream” view of globalization. For evidence it relies on the economic development of southeast Asia – Taiwan, Thailand, South Korea, Vietnam Technology has made the lives of millions of people much better. It is easier to travel, to communicate. Governments are forced to open their economies to the world economy, although this leads to a loss of power and control. Why do they do this? Because choosing economic isolation leads to disasters, e.g. East Germany, North Korea, and Maoist China (poor, isolated, militaristic) versus West Germany, South Korea, and Taiwan (rich, successful, not militaristic). Still, some people resist economic globalization. Why? Hatred of markets Fear of foreigners Concern about wages and jobs These fears are unfounded, “mythical” What is not mythical is the economic prosperity of east Asia and other regions that are integrating into global capitalism.
Read Chapter 10: Gender Inequality Basic concepts:
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Sex--refers to physical differences between males and females Gender--concerns psychological, social, and cultural differences between males and females Gender role socialization--process of learning about male- and female-typed roles and practices through social factors such as schooling, the media, and family Social construction of gender--process of learning about male- and female-typed roles and practices through social interaction Gender typing--process by which occupations come to be associated with one gender or another. Once an occupation becomes gender typed, inertia sets in.
Gender Inequality In the 19th century, women were legally analogous to children Today, worldwide, women are ½ the population but own a small fraction of the world’s land and property, make a fraction of the income of men, they are limited in terms of their educational and career opportunities, denied legal rights (such as voting rights), and suffer from spouse abuse and other forms of abuse Women and Sociological Theory As sociology developed, women naturally became interested in trying to explain gender inequality (just as Marx wanted to explain class inequality, and DuBois the “color line”) Women, however, were generally denied opportunities for higher education, and certainly for careers in academia Functionalism In 1949 the anthropologist George Murdock concluded that all societies have a sexual division of labor Sociologist Talcott Parsons: In a sexual division of labor women hold expressive roles involving nurturing and men perform i nstrumental roles such as family breadwinner. However, cross-cultural studies have shown that cultures differ in the degree to which men are seen as “naturally dominant” over women. Gender inequalities do not seem to be fixed or static.
Charlotte Perkins Gilman (1860-1935) From a prominent New England family, difficult childhood—father left, moved around
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Deeply depressed after her marriage and the birth of her daughter. Divorced husband, gave her blessing to his remarry her close friend and raise her daughter. Gilman’s depression lifted when she was able to work, unencumbered by family responsibilities. Gave lectures around the U.S.
Argued that the nuclear family was dysfunctional for women. It was more natural for “women’s work” (cooking, cleaning, childrearing) to be done communally, as was the case in most human societies, rather than alone and isolated in the home. The traditional family structure is inherently exploitative—women work, but are not paid. Gender inequality is a product of socialization in the family, not inherent biological differences. Girls and boys learn their gender (not sex) by dressing differently, being praised and scolded for different things. And yet, she thought that men and women were innately different. Because of e volution, women are antiselfish, they want to love, to nurture. Men are competitive, want to fight, take control. Secured her reputation in feminist circles when she published Women and Economics (1898) Advocated women’s economic independence from men Public day care Cooperative kitchens Wanted peaceful socialism
There were racist sections of her writings, and she seemed to be speaking mainly for white women. She was against slavery and the oppression of African-Americans, and genocide and oppression of Native Americans, though.
D. Contemporary Feminist Theory Gilman’s feminist theory is almost common sense to many sociologists today, aside from the racist parts.
Feminist theory today has taken a “postmodern” turn: Feminism against sociology: some feminist theorists are highly critical of sociology because of its male-centeredness, blindness to women Feminism against science: view of science as a masculine, dominating enterprise
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Feminism against globalization and neo-liberalism (more expressly political): the structure of the world economic system is inherently exploitative of women: e.g. sex slaves, wage inequality, poor health care and day care for immigrant working women
Read Chapter 11: Ethnicity and Race Main concepts Ethnicity--refers to cultural practices and outlooks of a community that emerged historically Race--a classification system that assigns individuals and groups to categories that are ranked or hierarchical Racialization--historical process of assigning groups of people to races as distinct biological groups E.g. Irish and Italian-Americans -> white people Colonialism in Rwand: Hutus, Tutsis Racism--a system of domination operating operating in social processes and social institutions; also at the level of individual consciousness Institutional racism--Racism embedded within institutional structures such as formal organizations and social relations Prejudice--attitudes or beliefs held by members of one group toward another Discrimination--refers to actual behavior toward another group
W.E.B. DuBois Taught sociology at Atlanta University, although is remembered more as a public intellectual than as an influential theorist Like Bourdieu and others, DuBois d id not distinguish theory from practice Not a professional academic theorist; someone who wanted to explain and improve the situation of African-Americans (not long after abolition, 50 years before the Civil Rights movement, affirmative action) DuBois’s mother was a maid, father a barber, preacher, drifter—left the family.
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His mother died while he was a boy. By age 16 he was self-conscious of his race, the “color line,” and class Four white men paid for his education at Fisk University, in Nashville, Tenn.—an all-black university Thought that African-Americans should organize together, a ccept the color line—they should not organize and strive in terms of values of individualism, egalitarianism, or economic participation (e.g. Booker T. Washington and the Tuskegee Institute, a technical institute in Atlanta) DuBois teaches poor black children in the east Tennessee countryside, goes on to Harvard University. 7th ever African-American student at Harvard; first to complete a PhD there While studying at Harvard, DuBois traveled to Germany. Was astounded to find himself studying among non-racist whites—including M ax Weber, who likes DuBois’s work. DuBois returns to the U.S., is politically active: —against racism, colonialism, imperialism —for communism, socialism
Books: Writes The Philadelphia Negro (1899), which was commissioned by the University of Pennsylvania as a study of the problems of Philadelphia’s black community. DuBois is ambivalent about this kind of study. It is insulting, patronizing, and probably won’t lead to any real change—on the other hand, he does it, and it makes known the social situation of African-Americans, which would otherwise be hidden. The Souls of Black Folk (1903) was his major book on race and class. He was the first to write about these issues sociologically and systematically Major ideas the “race idea”—which he took seriously, accepted without much questioning the “color line”—relation of the “darker” and “lighter races” across the w orld (the American Civil War is just one example, not unique) “double-consciousness” or “two-ness”—the experience of being of African origin and American—a divided identity (prefigures identity politics, sociological interest in identity construction)
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“the veil”—metaphor, in which African-Americans and their problems are hidden from white America, and African-Americans have a unique perspective on “White America” “colortocracy” of light-skinned blacks in the African-American community—excessive pride in their noses, skin color, hair
The “talented tenth” of African-Americans would lead their communities
Political career Disagreements with Booker T. Washington Debates with Jamaican Marcus Garvey, who wanted to bring African-Americans back to Africa. Loses all popularity Seen as snobbish (which he was), elitist Proponent of socialism, communism—neither are popular in America Regains popularity since the 1970s-ish Post-colonial studies, studies of globalization Ethnic and racial studies, departments, multiculturalism e.g. at UNT we have Women’s Studies and Jewish Studies departments, an African-American Studies institute, Mexican-American Studies, and the Study of Sexualities Establishment of departments of African-American studies, e.g. Harvard has the W.E.B. Dubois Institute for African and African American Research—a famous institute, often in the news, a site of major academic controversies Henry Louis Gates Jr., Cornel West (left for Princeton)—academic, philosopher, and rapper, he appeared in The Matrix and The Matrix Reloaded
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6. Work and Economic Life Read Chapter 14. Work and Economic Life Work and economics have both been central to sociology since its start in the 1800s. The Industrial Revolution and urbanization brought with them sweeping changes in working conditions in industrializing societies. Early sociologists sought to understand these changes in order to ameliorate them. We have already covered Emile Durkheim’s ideas about different fundamental forms of social solidarity and the different work conditions associated with each. Mechanical versus Organic solidarity The second major figure in the sociology of work and economic life is Karl Marx: Karl Marx on alienation and the labor theory of value This is an important idea for Marx. It comes from some of his earliest writings, which were much more psychological than his later writings. He was concerned, as many people were, with the change from farming and craftwork to factory work artisanal work → industrial work, factory work Also known as Fordism and Taylorism (Frederick Winslow Taylor) De-skilled assembly line work Taylor invented t ime-motion studies Consequences of factory work de-skilling of work routinization boredom workers see themselves as a commodity, as something capitalists can buy and sell workers see themselves as machines, not as full human beings Alienation (separation, or distancing) from the products of work
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factory workers do not see the products of their work. they get no satisfaction from their efforts Alienation from their friends and families workers are not allowed to socialize with friends they work so long that they have little time left for their families Workers cannot grow or evolve as human beings. Work should allow people to evolve and improve themselves. Instead, workers can only learn and grow as human beings during their leisure time. This can only get worse, as capitalists try to make bigger profits.
Labor Theory of Value Value is based on the input of labor to a product, rather than on supply and demand. Capitalists make profits from surplus value, which is the difference between the labor and materials put into a product and its sales price. Marx claimed with some justification that in order to succeed, capitalists had to reduce the cost of labor to its absolute minimum while increasing labor productivity to its absolute maximum.
Types of Capitalism To understand the changing nature of work it is necessary to understand changes in the basic functioning of what we know as capitalism. We’ll try not to overlap with economics too much here. Capitalism is an economic system that features p rivate property that can be invested an reinvested in order to produce p rofit. Family Capitalism Late 1800s-early 1900s Large firms run by individual entrepreneurs or by members of the same family Rockefellers, Fords, Carnegies managed economic empires Managerial Capitalism Corporate managers in the middle of organizational hierarchies gained power Chief executives could be replaced quickly, unlike in family capitalism Dilbert capitalism Welfare Capitalism Started at end of 1800s
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Large firms provided for many of their workers’ needs Paternalistic For example company towns Paid leave Health care benefits Recreational facilities Paid vacations Group life and unemployment insurance Done to avoid unionization Ended in the Great Depression Institutional Capitalism Corporations are interdependent and interlinked through interlocking boards of directors and corporations holding shares in each other Reversal of managerial capitalism Partly caused by large investors investing in funds rather than in individual corporations
Fordism and Scientific Management Frederick Winslow Taylor was an American management consultant who invented what became known as “scientific management” or “Taylorism.” This involved detailed time-and-motion studies of workers’ tasks. Managers took control of production away from workers. Work was “de-skilled” and more predictable if perhaps less humane. Henry Ford did not invent the automobile, but he revolutionized its production with the use of the assembly line. This used the principle of division of labor to make workers far more efficient and productive than they had been prior. “Fordism” also involved giving workers relatively high wages ($5 for an eight-hour day) so that they could buy the cars they were producing. Fordism also refers to the whole integrated system of industrial production and consumption that lasted from World War II through the 1970s. It featured high levels of job security. It was a low-trust system where managers controlled work. This is in contrast with high-trust systems such as at higher levels of industry and in craft manufacturing.
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Post-Fordism Fordism broke down in the 1970s because of foreign competition. Post-Fordism refers to the more flexible production system that replaced it. Post-Fordism features more job mobility and insecurity, and more flexible production systems. Outsourcing of production “The Knowledge Economy,” “New Economy” or “Informational Capitalism” Portfolio Workers These theorists have developed several overlapping and interrelated concepts: information capitalism information society network society postindustrial society knowledge society knowledge economy Fritz Machlup, 1962 American economist “knowledge industry” as early as the 1950s a large proportion of the Gross National Product of the United States was based in knowledge-intensive sectors such as education, research and development, mass media, information technologies, and information services. Peter Drucker, author and management consultant, 1969 modern societies were transitioning from economies based mainly on material goods to ones based mostly on knowledge
Daniel Bell, sociologist, 1973, The Coming of Post-industrial Society In the 1970s computers were beginning to enter offices
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This led to a “new class” of symbolic analysts--working in education, journalism, capitalist firms, and government The service sector was growing and the industrial sector was shrinking Agriculture, Manufacturing→ trade, finance, transport, health, recreation, research, education, and government
1990s: information technology expands into all sectors of the economy and society This resulted in a network society in which individuals’ and organizations’ positions within flows of information are more critical than their positions within traditional hierarchies. Manuell Castells is the preeminent theorist of the network society. He is a bit of a futurist, and celebrates “informationalism” and the advance of genetic engineering Like other network theorists, he argues that flows of information across social and professional networks have become, in a sense, more important than organizational size or power. The state, political parties, churches, and unions become less important. Each individual’s position with respect to global flows of information is what largely determines their life outcomes. Thus Castells has written about the f ourth World: a series of “black holes of informational capitalism,” areas that have been cut off from the flow of wealth and information in the global economy Also known as the digital divide, although Castells’ conceptualization is more complex Consequences of the information society 1. Economic growth a. price declines of IT b. IT→ massive productivity gains c. more efficient and faster flows of money and ideas globally, for example in electronic financial markets 2. Social inequality a. The IT revolution is skill-biased, rewarding individuals and organizations with cognitive abilities, education and technical skills. b. Sharp decreases in demand for workers with less skill and less specialized education c. weakened unions and collective bargaining d. rising income inequality in industrialized nations e. hollowing out of the middle classes in industrialized nations and developing nations (income polarization)
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f.
winner-take-all competition in which companies whose products have high up-front production costs succeed (e.g. Pixar, Apple, Google, pharmaceutical companies that do R&D) g. developing countries have no chance to compete with these types of firms 3. Migration and cities a. brain drain i. within countries ii. between countries b. global cities c. urban geographies of centrality and marginalization (gentrification of urban cores) 4. Politics a. global financial flows overwhelm national governments’ ability to control their economies b. decline of party politics c. the “outrage industry” i. hyper-partisanship
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7. Sociology of Education Read Chapter 16: Education We spend most of our youth and much of our adult lives in educational settings. Educational systems are very complex, and education is directly involved in people’s life outcomes and as a consequence in social inequality.
Sociological Theories of Education: A. Assimilation Theories a. Education systems create affinity if not consensus among citizens b. Education systems contribute to nationalism c. For example, teaching immigrants about American: i. Holidays ii. Pledge of Allegiance iii. Legends and heroes iv. Foods v. Sports d official perspectives on American history Positive perspectives on national history
B. Credentialism a. The diploma matters more than technical learning b. Education systems expand due to e ducational inflation c. Credentialism reinforces the national class structure C. The “Hidden Curriculum” a. In school systems there is both an official curriculum and a hidden one b. Children learn to get along with others c. Children learn to value achievement, hard work d. The HC differs in different school systems e. Students from different class backgrounds are provided different educations f. The HC in working-class schools is centered on respect for authority i. Reward and punishment ii. Strict regimentation 1. E.g. bell system D. Pierre Bourdieu and Cultural Capital a. Major French sociologist b. Three types of capital: economic, social, cultural i. Their transformations ii. Reproduction via capital (cultural reproduction) iii. Schools as sites that generate social and cultural capital
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1. Credentials, etiquette, demeanor, comportment, accent, vocabulary a. E.g. how, what to eat, drink, how to walk, talk E. Coleman’s Study of Between-School Effects a. Famous 1960s study by the sociologist James Coleman b. Essentially found no between-school effects c. Concluded that the material conditions in schools made little difference in performance d. What mattered was parents’ educational and economic backgrounds i. Parents, neighborhoods, social networks
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8. Sociology of Religion Read Chapter 17: Religion Emile Durkheim’s Sociology of Religion The Sacred and the Profane Emile Durkheim, the father of French sociology, explained religion sociologically. All societies and all religions, he thought, divided the world between the sacred and the profane The Sacred Pure Magical, have special powers Holy Clean Set apart Contagious—makes you sacred Inspires awe, fear, reverence
The Profane (in Latin, profane means “outside the temple”) Things that are normal Everyday things Nothing special Can be dirty; doesn’t matter Contagious—makes you unholy if you tough it Boring or disgusting
e.g. in Hinduism, cows are sacred; Brahmins are more sacred than untouchables, who are profane and dirty in Judaism and Islam, pigs are profane The Koran and the Torah are sacred Mosques and Synagogues are sacred
Communities, not individuals, draw lines between what’s sacred and what’s profane These lines are social and cultural Different communities draw different lines Communities do rituals so that they can show themselves what is sacred and what is profane e.g. Baptists, who are a Christian sect in America, dunk people under water to cleanse them of sin Hindus bathe in the Ganges River every 12 years Muslims go to Mecca
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Christians drink the wine and eat the wafer, which symbolize the body and blood of Christ
Durkheim’s functionalism Durkheim defined totems as objects a community defines as sacred They can be anything: a piece of wood, a book, a place, a mountain, a building, an animal, a word, even a person Religions are based on totems, rituals, and on the distinction between t he sacred and the profane Together, these things create a religion, and religions have several functions for society. Religion turns individuals into a community. 1. Social cohesion religion unites people defines what is ethical, defines the rules of the game of life religion channels our emotions (love, hatred) 2. Social control Elites can control people through religion Religion encourages conformity Religion makes the political system seem l egitimate 3. Meaning and purpose For individuals, religion makes life meaningful We are all going to die, and we are all going to suffer many times in our live, even the lucky ones like us; religion makes death and suffering meaningful and thus less painful For Durkheim, “God” is another word for “society”
Weber’s sociology of religion Religious cultures provide comprehensible ideas of theodicy and salvation for laypeople Why did these societies become more rationalized than others? Why did they develop industry, capitalism, democratic governments, corporations, factories, and high technology earlier than the rest of the world? Why not the Ottoman Empire? Why not Catholic Europe? Or China or Japan? These were all massive, powerful empires. Before the early 19th century, these areas were much more powerful than Northern Europe.
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Marx does not have a strong answer to this question, but Weber does. Weber argues that rationalization is associated with c apitalism. It is important to keep in mind that capitalism is different from buying and selling things to make a profit. How is it different? It is different because in capitalism, the money you make is saved up and then invested in new business ventures. This money that is saved and invested is called capital. Since money was invented in Mesopotamia and Egypt, individuals who made money would spend it on themselves and their family, or they would give it to the church. Weber’s answer lies in Protestant Christianity, specifically C alvinism, a sect of Protestantism. Weber’s mother was a devout Calvinist, so naturally he knew a lot about this religion. Most religions in the world at this time were other-worldly Good moral behavior in this world is rewarded by going to heaven when you die. For example, in Catholicism, if you paid enough money to the Church, you would be allowed to go to heaven. Or if you gave money to poor people, you would make God happy. Or in Hinduism, by having a good reincarnation. Calvinism was founded by the 16th-century writer and preacher John Calvin. It is different from most religions because in Calvinism, God is a ll-powerful. Humans cannot change their fate by changing their behavior or paying money to the Church. God decides what will happen to you. You cannot change your fate. This idea is called predestination. Your destiny is preordained. This is a bit tough on people, because they have no way of knowing whether they will go to heaven or hell. And even if they knew, there would be nothing they could do about it. So people wanted to know whether they would go to heaven or hell. And they came to believe that an individual’s material success in this world was a sign from God. God must have made some people rich because those people were chosen to go to heaven. So m aking money became a sign of being chosen by God. What about poor people? They are poor because God has not chosen them. So rich Calvinists did not give their money to the poor. It’s not because they were mean or greedy. They thought God would not want them to give money to people he had chosen to go to hell. It would be a sin to give money to the poor. It would also be a sin to be self-indulgent, to live a life of l uxury. One’s life should be devoted to God, not to oneself. 1) So early Calvinists became very good at making money, because they saw it as a sign of being chosen by God.
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2) They did not share their money with the church or with poor people. 3) They did not spend their money on luxuries. 4) They accumulated money and reinvested it in their businesses. And they kept careful accounts of their money, because they believed that making money was a holy endeavour. They made money the way an Imam reads the Koran or a Jewish Rabbi reads the Torah. With total religious intensity. 5) Later generations of Calvinists lost the old religion as they encountered science and modern thought (Newton, Darwin, Einstein, Freud, sociology, psychology, etc.) and as they became wealthy and urbanized and cosmopolitan. They lost their Protestant Ethic, but kept a strong work ethic.
Religious Economy Theory Finke and Starke American sociologists Religions compete in a religious marketplace This is a good thing, as they see it Religions must be well-organized to be competitive Corporate-like organizational structures “Sales representatives” People are somewhat rational in choosing a religion and church Their decision-making is constrained by tradition
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9. Sociology of Globalization Read Chapter 20: Globalization and a Changing World What is globalization? Here is a preliminary list: 1. increasing volume and speed of global trade and financial interactions (“financial f lows”) 2. increasing global interconnectedness of personal communications – long-distance phone calls and email 3. media globalization – satellite television and the internet 4. increasing migration and changes to citizenship e.g. Mexican laborers in the U.S., Turkish “guest workers” in the EU dual citizenship 5. easier international travel, cheaper flights, more people with passports 6. weakening of states, decline of state sovereignty, privatization of state functions 7. strengthening of transnational corporations 8. evolution of global networks of non-governmental organizations
3 main theoretical positions in the study of globalization 1) globalists: globalization is weakening states positive and negative versions 2) traditionalists: globalization is nothing new 3) transformationalists: no simple unidirectional change, but globalization is transforming societies, cultures, and the nation-state system
Economic Globalization This is not an economics course, but we can discuss the basic principles of what is sometimes known as “Anglo-Saxon” or “Anglo-American” or “ laissez-faire” capitalism, and its transformation.
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Adam Smith: the “invisible hand” of the market provides goods and services for all of us. Free trade is good because, since individuals are r ational and self-interested, and tend to negotiate and trade and bargain, and because whenever people trade or buy goods or services both parties must gain (most of the time), governments should allow free trade. Governments should not interfere in the market. Economic liberalism thus gave priority to economic freedom over economic equality Liberal capitalism was the official economic system, and the economic backbone, of the British Empire, and it was the dominant global system until the early 20th century and the rise of communism and socialism, and crises of capitalism including the 1929 stock market crash. The result of these crises and threats, in advanced capitalist democracies, was that the state sought to smooth out the volatility of markets, and sought to make capitalism serve social purposes – equality and welfare. The result was not communism, but rather the “welfare state” in which states taxed citizens, and taxed the wealthiest citizens more than others, in order to provide health insurance, unemployment insurance, retirement benefits, and other benefits to vulnerable citizens. The welfare state was the dominant economic-social model in the world from about 1945-1975(ish). This period also saw the growth of labor unions, which were generally not communist/socialist, but that demanded guarantees of social security and benefits from states.
In the 1970s the welfare state and unions faced their own crises and also sustained intellectual/ideological criticism from “neo-liberal” economists and other writers. The welfare state was, and is, threatened by global economic competitition, by economic globalization and the incorporation of countries like China into the global economy. States that tax businesses and citizens for social reasons lose because businesses and citizens can more easily move. E.g. Germany and France today. Thus economic globalization / neo-liberalism directly threatens the welfare state, and in so doing it threatens the welfare of millions of people in advanced democracies. For these and other reasons, we should not be surprised to find anti-globalization social movements, and anti-globalization and anti-immigration sentiments among voters in advanced democracies. And yet economic globalization / neoliberalism continues to advance, and welfare states continue to shrink. Why? Peter Martin and Martin Wolf argue that there is a strong moral case for economic globalization. Their arguments are classical arguments of free-traders and economic globalizers, and most business executives would strongly agree with them. Their arguments are rooted in neoclassical economics and in observations of the world, particularly since the 1990s.
final exam (not cumulative)
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