Social Anthropology Notes

ASC 100: INTRODUCTION TO
SOCIOLOGY
OTIATO WAFULA, CPS (K) PhD

0720271711
SAMUEL MBURU KAIRU THE INCOMING DELEGATE SLASS -0794110307

• Writing Assignment
Human beings are socialized. Can you explain this process? Give specific examples in
how you were/are socialized.

What is sociology?
• Sociology is the scientific study of the human interaction.
• It is the systematic study of social behavior and human groups. It focuses primarily on the
influence of social relationships on people's attitudes and behavior and on how societies are
established and change. [e.g., Tattoo, piercing]
The focus is on the GROUP over the individual
• Sociologists attempt to understand and explain human social behavior by studying the groups
they belong to.
Why study sociology?
• There is more pressing need for sociological insight today than at any previous time in history
• It is no secret that this generation of humans faces several unprecedented dangers;
Nuclear winter‐in a matter of seconds can seal the doom of human race
If we escape nuclear extinction we might survive the vagaries of overpopulation
Starvation
Terrorism,
Add these to crime,inflation,unemployment,prejudice,national debt etc
• But the picture is not completely gloomy either
• These are also times of great achievements in;
Space, humans landing on the moon
Drones
Globalization
Science has eradicated smallpox, syphilis.
• This list indicate that humans today are facing both trying challenges and promising
opportunities!
• Assuming that these class favours peace over war, prosperity over hunger and deprivation etc;
the question you should be asking yourself is what determines how this turns‐out?
We would like an answer to this question. But I suggest there is a preliminary question to the above .

• That is where should we look for the answer to how peace will prevail over war?
i.e
Before asking what the answer is, we need to ask where the answer is likely to come from.
• Hitherto, humanity have for example tended to look for answers to how peace can prevail over
war and suffering within the domain of military technology i.e
creating weapons that would preserve peace
• When Hiram Maxim invented the first fully automated machine gun in 1884, he believed that
actually he had brought an end to war.
• On the contrary machine gun only made killing more efficient!
• Some felt the invention of aeroplane would mark the end of war. No less an authority than
Orville Wright said;
when my brother and I build and flew the first man‐carrying flying machine, we thought we were
introducing into the world an invention that would make further wars practically impossible
• Again as the residents of resden,london,Pearl Harbour, Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Bagdad, Tripoli
etc were to learn, the airplane only made war more deadly
• The point of this discussion on war and peace is to suggest that what we need to know to
establish peace around the world is not likely to come from military technology!
• If such an answer is to be found at all, we must look elsewhere:
In the study of why people relate to each other as they do, sometimes peacefully, sometimes hostilely
HUMAN INTERACTION: THIS IS THE DOMAIN OF SOCIOLOGY
i.e the study of interactions and relations among human beings.
• Whereas psychology
is the study of what goes on inside individuals, sociology addresses what goes on between them
• Sociology addresses simple face‐to‐ face interactions such as conversations, dating behaviour
and student asking the professor to delay the term paper deadline.
• Equally sociology is the study of formal organisations, the functioning of whole societies, and
even relations among them:cooperation,conflict,competition etc
That is sociology can be viewed as the study of our rules for living together.

• Our needs or wants:
Food
Shelter
Security
Companionship
Satisfaction etc
Are always scarce and create endless possibilities for conflict and struggle
• We know that human beings are not constructed like ants or bees in such a way as to ensure
cooperation
• As a rule human beings develop rules to establish order in the face of chaos
• Many times humanity agree on these rules voluntarily‐sociology is the study of how these rules
emerge
EXAMPLES:
You can not marry your brother,sister, mother
You can not drive on the right side of the road
You must pay taxes
You must shake hands when you meet
etc
• Most of these rules were here before you and I showed up and there will be here long after our
exit.
• I do not remember you or me taking part in the enactment of these rules but we voted for them
by obeying them.
HOW DOES THIS COME ABOUT?
• The persistence of our rules is largely a function of one generation teaching them to the next
generation‐ socialisation
• Socialisation is the process of learning the rules through the use of positive and negative
sanctions(rewards and Punishments)

• Fundamentally all the rules we are talking about are arbitrary‐
different rules would work just elsewhere as well e.g. driving on the right work well in the USA
It is not eternal and universal truth
But we tend to reify our acts‐
• Pretending that they are real and natural….it is in the same realm that we reify our rules of
interaction
• Reification is a product of internalisation.
• For example, one driving past traffic lights at 3am in the morning
• All these notwithstanding,
sociology is also the study of how we break the rules
• The study of rules are broken is closely related to the study of how rules change over time
• Therefore in summary sociology is the examination of the rules that govern our living together:
what they are
How they arise
How they change
• Sociology Focuses on:
– How social relationships influence people’s attitudes and behavior
– How major social institutions affect us
– How we affect other individuals, groups, and organizations

The Sociological Perspective
• The sociological perspective helps us to see general social patterns in the behavior of particular
individuals.
• It allows or forces us to look beyond the outer appearances of our social world and discover
new levels of reality
• It also encourages us to realize that society guides our thoughts and deeds — to see the strange
in the familiar
• Sociology also encourages us to see individuality in social context.
• DURKHEIM’S STUDY OF SUICIDE
– MORE LIKELY TO COMMIT
MALE PROTESTANTS WHO WERE WEALTHY AND UNMARRIED HAD HIGHER

SUICIDE RATES
– PROTESTANTISM AND INDIVDUALISM
– LESS LIKELY TO COMMIT
MALE JEWS AND CATHOLICS WHO WERE POOR AND MARRIED
– BEING CATHOLIC AND GROUP‐ORIENTATION
• ONE OF THE BASIC FINDINGS: WHY?
– THE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN THESE GROUPS HAD TO DO WITH “SOCIAL INTEGRATION”
THOSE WITH STRONG SOCIAL TIES HAD LESS OF A CHANCE OF COMMITING

SUICIDE
• By taking a scientific look into human group behavior, one can gain a view of oneself in relation
to the rest of society
– Middle vs. Lower Class
– How do expectations of society affect individual behavior?
– Help to find a balance between personal desires and demands of environment
– How does environment shape individual beliefs?

• The Sociological Imagination
• The sociological imagination provides the ability to see our private experiences and personal
difficulties as entwined with the structural arrangements of our society and the times in which
we live.
• Understand social marginality, the state of being excluded from social activity as an “outsider.”
People at the margins of social life are aware of social patterns that others rarely think about
• C. Wright Mills described sociological imagination as “An awareness of the relationship between
an individual and the wider society, and …the ability to view our society as an outsider might,
rather than relying only on our individual perspective, which is shaped by our cultural biases”
C. WRIGHT MILLS’ SOCIOLOGICAL IMAGINATION
– SOCIETY IS OFTEN RESPONSIBLE FOR MANY OF OUR PROBLEMS
– WE NEED TO LEARN TO SEPARATE THINGS THAT HAVE TO DO WITH
PERSONAL TROUBLES, OR BIOGRAPHY
SOCIAL ISSUES, OR HISTORY
• EXAMPLES:
– WOMEN’S OPPORTUNITIES AT THE TURN OF THE CENTURY AND THESE DAYS
– LIFESTYLES OF THOSE WE LABEL DISABLED IN THE 1950’S AND NOW
• List five ways that the current political/social unrest in the Middle East affects you
Seeing individuality in social context
– (social forces are at work in society to influence our most personal actions)
Emile Durkheim.
• Benefits of the sociological perspective
• The sociological perspective helps us assess the truth of “common sense.” The sociological
perspective helps us assess both opportunities and constraints in our lives.
• The sociological perspective empowers us to be active participants in our society.
• The sociological perspective helps us to live in a diverse world. It also encourages us to realize
that society guides our thoughts and deeds — to see the strange in the familiar

• Benefits of the sociological perspective
• "The excitement of sociology lies in the fact that its perspective makes us see in a new light
the very world in which we have lived all our lives."
(Peter L. Berger)

Sociology and Common Sense
• Common sense assumptions are usually based on very limited observation.
• Moreover, the premises on which common sense assumptions are seldom examined.
• Sociology seeks to:
• use a broad range of carefully selected observations; and
• theoretically understand and explain those observations.
• While sociological research might confirm common sense observation, its broader base and
theoretical rational provide a stronger basis for conclusions.
IS COMMON SENSE ENOUGH?
• COMMON SENSE SAYS:
• You can tell a criminal by his/ her facial features
• People go to war or remain at peace because of some instinctive drive.
• SOCIOLOGICAL INQUIRY FINDS:
• There is no relation between behavior and any type of physical feature
• Humans live in social arrangements determined by the interaction of social influences
Scope of Sociology
• The scope of sociology: studying all human relationships, groups, institutions, and societies.
• E.g., romantic love & marriage, gay family & marriage, Health & illness, racial & ethnic conflicts,
poverty, education, immigration, sexuality, gender, class, and crime & punishment, environment
& economic development all come under the scope of sociology.

Pre‐Sociological Influences
The fundamental foundations of sociology have been gleaned (as all things seem to be) from the
ancient Greeks.
Even though Plato is not considered the “father” of sociology‐‐he is probably the first person to
systematically study society in a “sociological” way. In other words, he thought like a sociologist.
The basic notion of natural law is found in Plato’s Republic. There is an order to society‐‐a universalism,
urged the Greek philosopher. The essence of this universal, unfortunately, was not totally clear. On the
one hand, society was characterized as an organism, an enclosed, total, holistic unit. This was the
Platonic “is” of society.
The entire state of nature, however, was not yet known. Consequently, man was in a position to use
logic‐‐”the act and method of correct thinking”‐‐to posit an “ought” of what society could be. This
inherent contradiction between the Platonic “is” and the “ought” is fundamental to the processes of
random fact gathering in Western thought.
Plato’s Six Basic Assumptions of Society
Man is an organism.
Organisms tend toward survival.
Man survives in groups.
Man is a social animal.
Man lives in an ordered society.
The order of society is knowable.

The Origins of Sociology
Three major social changes during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries are important to the
development of sociology.
• Scientific Revolution (circa 1550): Encouraged evidence‐based conclusions about society
• Democratic Revolution (circa 1750): Suggested people were responsible for creating society;
thus, human intervention capable of solving social problems
• Industrial Revolution (circa 1780): Created host of social problems; attracted attention of social
thinkers*
• The Origins of Sociology
The rise of a factory‐based industrial economy(industrial revolution).
The emergence of great cities in Europe. Social Problems developed:
• 1. Work
• 2. Housing
• 3. Crime
• 4. Pollution
Political Problems of late 1700 early 1800’s
• American and French Revolutions including a rising concern with individual

liberty and rights.
The French Revolution symbolized this dramatic break with political and social tradition(theocratic
feudalism).

Founding fathers
• Henry de Saint‐Simon(1760‐1821)
– He was the first scholar to treat society as a distinct and separate unit of analysis. He
also was one of first to stress the idea that the social sciences might use the new
methods of the natural sciences. But like most of the early social thinkers who followed
the Industrial Revolution, Saint‐Simon was interested in the analysis of society only as it
related to his desire for social reform.
• Émile Durkheim’s Study of Suicide:
• Émile Durkheim (1858–1917) developed a highly original theory about the relationship between
suicide and social factors. Durkheim was primarily concerned not with the personalities of
individual suicide victims, but rather with suicide rates and how they varied from country to
country. In his landmark work, Suicide, published in 1897, Durkheim concluded that the suicide
rates of a society reflected the extent to which people were or were not integrated into the
group life of the society.
• August Comte(1798‐1857)
• He was considered the founder of sociology. He had once been personal secretary to Saint‐
Simon. Comte coined the term sociology. Previously, he had called the discipline “positive
philosophy”( social physics ), both to stress its scientific nature and to distinguish it from
traditional philosophy. The aim of sociology, as he saw it, was to find the “invariable laws” of
sociology upon which a new order could be based.
• Positivism . . . seeks to describe only what “obviously” is, what one can really be positive about,
that is, sense data. A strict positivist, seeing a black sheep on a meadow could not say, “There is
a black sheep.” He could only say, “I see a sheep, one side of which is black.”
• In other words, Comte saw a need for a scientific approach toward studying structures of and
interactions within society. While many aspects of society are “obvious” to us in a vague
manner, the scientific method uncovers sociological phenomena that are not always so obvious.
One primary purpose of ASC 100 Introduction to Sociology is to learn about these sociological
phenomena.
LAW OF THREE STAGES (human progress)
This law is based mainly on the development of human intelligence and the progress of ideas.
According to this law, human knowledge evolves through three different stages –

The Theological or fictitious;
the Metaphysical or abstract, and the Scientific or positive.
THE “TWIN PILLARS”
Social statics‐forces which produce order and stability
Social dynamics‐forces which contribute to social change
Herbert Spencer
• Spencer (1820‐1903) put the idea that society is like an organism—a self‐regulating system.
Drawing an analogy to Charles Darwin’s theory of biological evolution, Spencer suggested that
societies, like animal species, evolved from simple to more complex forms. Spencer was an early
advocate of what later came to be called Social Darwinism—the view that the principle of
survival of the fittest applies to societies and within societies.
• Earthworm‐‐‐‐‐‐‐>dog
– SOCIAL DARWINISM
evolutionary view of the "survival of the fittest" by arguing that it is "natural" that people who could
not compete were poorly adapted to the environment and inferior.
• Karl Marx(1818‐1883)
• In contrast to Spencer’s view that societies are subjected to “natural” laws, Marx believed that
societies follow historical laws determined by economic forces. He saw human history as a
series of inevitable conflicts between economic classes.
• Marx’s view on class conflict are reflected in the conflict school of modern sociology
Primitive society Æslavery Æ feudalismÆ capitalism Æ communism
Productivity
Economic base and superstructure
• Marx Weber(1864‐1920)
• Weber was perhaps the greatest single influence on modern sociology. He was particularly
interested in the larger dimensions of society—its organizations and institutions—which he
studied on a vast historical and worldwide scale. He is perhaps best known for his bureaucracy
and capitalism. Much of Weber’s thought contrasts strongly with that of Marx. Weber argued
that sociology should include the study of “social action”.

• George Simmel(1858‐1918)
• Unlike the other theorists we have discussed, who were interested in studying the larger
structures of society, Gorege Simmel focused on smaller social units. He put forth the idea that
society is best seen as a web of patterned interactions among people. He also believed the main
purpose of sociology should be to examine the basic forms that that these interactions take.
Some examples of the basic forms of interaction that Simmel analyzed are cooperation and
conflict, leaders and followers, and the process of communication.
• Development of American Sociology
• Chicago School
– Sociology first became an established discipline in the Midwest. The sociologists at the
University of Chicago during this period came to be known collectively as the “Chicago
School”. They were interested in such typical American social problems as ghettos,
immigration, race relations, and urbanization. They assembled a vast amount of useful
statistical data and developed many important concepts that are still in use.
• Robert Park
• The leading figure at the University of Chicago was Robert Park (1864‐1944), who began
teaching there in 1914. Park was a unique combination of news reporter, social activist,
researcher, and pure theorist. He combined the perspectives of biology, conflict theory, and the
sociology of Gorge Simmel into the first major introductory textbook in sociology. Many of his
students later became influential sociologists at other American universities.
• Gorge Herbert Mead
• Gorge Herbert Mead (1863‐1931) was the major theorist of the symbolic interactionist branch
of sociology that was born at the University of Chicago. Mead stressed that humans respond to
abstract meanings as well as to concrete experience. Unlike most theorists of the time, Mead
claimed that the human mind and self‐consciousness are largely social creations. Thus he helped
to define that aspect of sociology that sees individual behavior as the product of society.
• Charles Horton Cooley:
• Charles Horton Cooley (1864–1929) preferred to use the sociological perspective to look first at
smaller units—intimate, face‐to‐face groups such as families, gangs, and friendship networks. He
saw these groups as the seedbeds of society in the sense that they shape people's ideals, beliefs,
values, and social nature. Cooley's work increased our understanding of groups of relatively
small size.

HARRIET MARTINEAU (1802‐1876)
– TRANSLATED THE WORKS OF AUGUSTE COMTE
– FOCUSED ON ISSUES SURROUNDING
à WOMEN’S RIGHTS
à SLAVERY
à THE WORKPLACE AND FACTORY LAWS
• JANE ADDAMS (1860‐1933)
– SOCIAL WORKER
– DEVELOPED PLAN TO HELP IMMIGRANTS NEW TO CITY LIFE IN AMERICA
à HULL HOUSE IN CHICAGO
à NOBEL PEACE PRIZE WINNER, 1931

SOCIAL SCIENCE
` Many scientists claim there is a clear distinction between science and the supernatural. A good
recent example is Richard Dawkins who in ‘The God Delusion’ 2006 makes the following
observations about science and religion;
` ‘Fundamentalists know they are right because they have read the truth in a Holy Book.... the
truth of the Holy Book is an axiom, not the end product of a process of reasoning. The book is
true and if the evidence seems to contradict it, it is the evidence which must be thrown out, not
the book. By contrast, what I as a scientist believe, I believe not because of reading a Holy Book
but because I have studied the evidence..... When a science book is wrong somebody eventually
discovers the mistake and it is corrected in subsequent books. That conspicuously does not
happen with Holy books’
• According to Dawkins then science is characterised by;
1. Objectivity – the scientist is neutral
2. Scientific enquiry is evidence based – conclusions are based on evidence not preconceived ideas
3. Scientific enquiry is ‘open’ – ideas which are tested and ‘falsified’ are rejected and more accurate
ones replace them.
• Sociology is not social philosophy, it is not a point of view about how things ought to be.
• Rather Sociology deals with the way things are.
• But sociology is more than an opinion about how things are, it is a science of social life
Like other sciences, sociology has a logical/empirical basis.
A SCIENCE OF SOCIETY
• This means that for sociology to be accepted as a science, the assertions must:
i. Make sense and
ii. Correspond to the facts
i.e CRITICAL THINKING

A SCIENCE OF SOCIETY
• Reality has it that most us most of the time we are uncritical in our thinking; we just believe
what we hear or read.
• And most of the time, when we disagree, we do so on the basis of ideological grounds and
prejudices that are not well thought out.
• Suppose you are talking with your friend about the value of education. Your friend disagrees:
“College is a waste of time…we tafuta kazi, todays’ millionaires never went to college. And there
plenty of graduates shouting as makangas or out of work altogether”.
• This is normal talk on the streets of Nairobi but does it stand up to logical and empirical testing?
• Logically it doesn’t seem to make sense, since college education would seem to give a person
access to high paying occupations not open to less educated duds
• How does that assertion stand up empirically
• Median income by level of education
THIS IS CRITICAL THINKING
It is a sociological tool
Protect yourself from misinformation
SCIENCE AND THEORY

Twin foundations of critical thinking:
1. Research‐determination of facts
2. Theory‐ matter of reasoning
3. Research‐determination of facts
• President Ronald Reagan at his August 5th 1985 news conference noted that the 40th
anniversary of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombing in the context of unabated nuclear arms
race and increasing popular call for a freeze on the manufacture of the same.
• In defense of his administration's military policies, the president suggested that the US store of
nuclear weapons coupled with
Research‐determination of facts
• The horrible example of Hiroshima is a deterrent that kept at peace for the longest time ‐40 yrs.

• Regardless of how you feel about the arms race, Reagan's argument is a compelling one.
• At the moment, no one questioned the accuracy of the assertion
• Research‐determination of facts
• A simple historical review of the period between 1945‐1985 turned up:
• Korean war 1950‐53
• Vietnam war 1959‐73
The Vietnam war only claimed 47,318 American lives –this must be the bloodiest 40 yrs!
Much of what we hear or read does not correspond to empirical facts, but the inaccuracies get
overlooked in the heat of rhetoric
• US TODAY a US daily one time focussed on the US deficit, they interviewed seven men and
women on the street to get their opinion
• One of the respondents asserted that: “One way of reducing the deficit was to reduce the
amount of aid the US provides to other country’s”.
• It is possible to determine whether reducing foreign aid will lower the federal deficit .
• In 1983 the US gave a total of US$ 8.6 billion aid to other countries.
• The US deficit that year was US$ 195.4 billion
• Therefore cancelling the US forein aid will reduce the deficit by 4%
• If you express the reduction in per capita terms, its more dramatic
• This would amount to reducing the deficit from US $ 836.81 to 799.98‐not much of a reduction
• The benefit of this ongoing critical analysis is the ability to balance what you read or year in your
day to day life against empirical evidence!
• This is one of the KEY cornerstones of Sociology
Sociology as a Science
• The term science refers to the body of knowledge obtained by methods based upon systematic
observation. Just like other scientific disciplines, sociology engages in organized, systematic
study of phenomena (e.g., human behavior) in order to enhance understanding. In contrast to
other social sciences, sociology emphasizes the influence that society has on people's attitudes
and behavior and examines the ways in which people shape society. [e.g., Gun use]

THE ROLE OF REASON: THEORY
• President Reagan appointed a thirteen man commission on Food Assistance to determine the
nature and extent of the problem of hunger in the US and recommend government action.
• Dr. George Graham attracted considerable attention by indicating his belief that the problem of
malnutrition among children had been exaggerated‐especially in regard to black children
• He was quoted saying:
“National data show that black children are now taller than white children‐obviously they must be
getting more to eat…..if you think that black as a group are more undernourished, look around at the
black athletes on television‐they are a pretty hefty bunch”
Dr Graham quotes two pieces of evidence:
One statistical and one impressionistic to support his thesis that black Americans are no more
likely to suffer from malnutrition than other American children.
But take a minute to consider this assertions logically
First, Graham says that black children are taller on average than white children.
But even if this is true does it necessarily mean black children must be getting more to eat?
What other factors might affect height?: Genetics!
Consider the Tutsi”s, the Nuer’s etc
These two groups of Africans are usually taller
It will be absurd to conclude that they must eat more than Americans just because they are tall
• Second, what about the atheletes on television; does their heftiness mean that all black
Americans as a whole must be getting more to eat?
• Another question, does these athletes' on TV typical of all black Americans
• Otherwise we would need to look at Japanese Sumo wrestles and conclude that the
• Japanese people in general are bigger and must be well fed than Americans.
• In short Graham’s assertions does not hold up under logical scrutiny.
• Logical reasoning, then, is another component in critical thinking.
• As a science, sociology is consciously committed to logical reasoning.
• In part this commitment involves the development of theories.

• To understand the function of theory; we need to consider a few of its elements:
Concepts
Attribute
Variable
Ultimately sociologists Endeavour to develop a more or less comprehensive picture of the

inter‐relationships among many variables‐ideally to understand the functioning of social life!
• That is the SOCIOLOGICAL THEORY
• As a basis of understanding, sociologists begin with overarching models or paradigms of social

life. There are three paradigms commonly used in sociology.
• Sociological Theory?
• Within sociology, a theory is a set of statements that seeks to explain problems, actions, or
behavior. An effective theory may have both explanatory and predictive power. That is, it can
help us develop a broad and integrated view of the relationship between seemingly isolated
phenomena as well as understand how one type of change in an environment leads to others.
An essential task in building a sociological theory is to examine the relationship between bits of
data, gathered through research, that may seem completely unrelated. [e.g., crying children]
• Theories are never a final statement about human behavior
• Paradigm:
• Model or pattern of thinking:
A SET OF FUNDAMENTAL ASSUMPTIONS THAT GUIDES THINKING
i.e
Taken‐for‐granted ideas and assumptions not debated by members of a scientific discipline
•
The Paradigms, Perspectives, and Theories of Sociology
Sociology , as a science, has not developed a singular dominant paradigm. It currently accepts three
major paradigms. At this time a fourth one is being considered. We will not study the fourth paradigm
in this course.
Some sociological textbooks use the term theoretical perspectives in place of paradigms. In
sociological theory, perspectives are a sub‐category of paradigms. For general discussion in this
course, the two terms will be used interchangeably.
• The Table lists three Paradigms

– Order
– Pluralist
– Conflict
• One Perspective is listed under each Paradigm
– Structural‐Functionalism
• Listed under the Order Paradigm
– Symbolic‐Interaction
• Listed under the Pluralist Paradigm
– Conflict
• Listed under the Conflict Paradigm
• Structural‐Functionalism
– Primary theorist for this paradigm/perspective
• Emile Durkheim
– 1858‐1917
•
The Paradigms, Perspectives, and Theories of Sociology
• Symbolic‐Interaction
• SYMBOLIC INTERACTION IS A MICRO‐ORIENTED PARADIGM,WHICH MEANS IT IS EFFECTIVELY

USED WHEN ATTEMPTING TO UNDERSTAND SMALLER‐SCALE SOCIAL PHENOMENA
– Primary theorists for this paradigm/perspective
• Herbert Mead
• Erving Goffman
• Max Weber
– 1864‐1920
– His last name is pronounced as “vey‐bear”

• Charles Horton Cooley
– 1964‐1929
Conflict
– Primary theorist for this paradigm/perspective
• Karl Marx
– 1818‐1883
To understand the “view” or “philosophy” of each paradigm/perspective, carefully read, study, and
reflect on the comparison portion of the Table.
As an example, let us review how each paradigm/perspective views “Society” and the “Individual.”
The Paradigms, Perspectives, and Theories of Sociology IMPORTANT CONCEPTS
Order/Structural‐Functionalism
Society is a set of interrelated parts; cultural consensus exists and leads to social order; natural state of
society‐‐balance and harmony (Mooney, Knox, & Schacht, 1997, p. 18).
Views society as a vast organism whose parts are interrelated; social problems are disruptions of this
system. Also holds that problems of social institutions produce patterns of deviance or that institutions
must address such patterns through strategic social change (Kornblum, Julian, & Smith, 1998, p. 8).
Individuals are socialized by society's institutions; socialization is the process by which social control is
exerted; people need society and its institutions (Mooney, Knox, & Schacht, 1997, p. 18).
Pluralist/Symbolic‐Interaction
Society is a network of interlocking roles; social order is constructed through interaction as individuals,
through shared meaning, make sense out of their social world (Mooney, Knox, & Schacht, 1997, p. 18).
Holds that definitions of deviance or social problems are subjective; separates deviant and nondeviant
people not by what they do but by how society reacts to what they do (Kornblum, Julian, & Smith, 1998,
p. 8).
Humans are interpretative and interactive; they are constantly changing as their “social beings” emerge
and are molded by changing circumstances (Mooney, Knox, & Schacht, 1997, p. 18).

•
Conflict/Conflict
Society is marked by power struggles over scarce resources; inequities result in conflict; social change is
inevitable; natural state of society—imbalance (Mooney, Knox, & Schacht, 1997, p. 18).
Views society as marked by conflicts due to inequalities of class, race, ethnicity, gender, age, and other
divisions that produce conflicting values. Defines social problems as conditions that do not conform to
society's values (Kornblum, Julian, & Smith, 1998, p. 8).
People are inherently good but are corrupted by society and its economic structure; institutions are
controlled by groups with power; “order” is part of the illusion (Mooney, Knox, & Schacht, 1997, p. 18).
• Other Social Sciences that Study Human Behavior
• 1. Anthropology
• Closest to Sociology
– Study Past Cultures
– Study Present Less “Complicated” Societies
– * Sociology studies more “Complex” (Urban) Societies
• Psychology
• Focus on “Individual” behavior
– Exception: Social Psychology: How does environment affect personality?
– * Sociology focuses on “group” behavior
• Economics:
• Study how people satisfy wants and needs
• * Sociologists study distribution of economic resources and the impact of this “unequal
distribution” on various social groups
• Political Science:
• Organization and operations of Government
• Sociologists study the distribution of political power and the formation of “politically” based
groups
• History

– Study of the past
• HOW DOES THE PAST INFLUENCE THE PRESENT
– Social Structure?…etc
– *Sociologists borrow freely from ALL other social sciences
CULTURE
• Culture is developed in interaction over time; it determines much of what the individual does;
and it allows for continuity, stability, and predictability among people
The Sum of socially transmitted practices, languages, symbols, beliefs, values, ideologies and
material objects that people create to deal with real‐life problems
Enables people to adapt to, and thrive in, their environments
ORIGINS OF CULTURE
• Three tools in human cultural survival kit:
1. Abstraction: Capacity to create ideas or ways of thinking that allow us to classify experience and
generalize from it
¾ Ideas or ways of thinking find expression in symbols: Anything that carries a particular meaning,
including the components of language, mathematical notions, and signs…*
2. Co‐operation: Human capacity to create complex social life by establishing norms, which are
standards of behaviour or generally accepted ways of doing things
3. Production: Human capacity to make and use tools, and thereby improve our ability to take
what we want from nature

¾ Tools and techniques known as material culture*
THE BUILDING BLOCKS

OF CULTURE
• Material Culture
– The physical or tangible (see, touch) that members of a society make, use, and share
• Raw Materials → Technology → Stuﬀ
• Non‐Material Culture
– The abstract or intangible human creations of society that influences people’s behavior
• Language, beliefs, values, rules of behavior, family patterns, political systems
• Cultural Universals
• Customs and practices that occur across all societies
• Culture Is a Shared Perspective on the World
• From a sociological viewpoint, culture does not mean violins, poetry, or art.
• The sociological definition of culture is:
– A perspective on the world that people come to share as they interact.
– It is what people come to agree on, their consensus, their shared reality, their common
ideas.
– In Kenya, each community, each formal organization, each group and dyad has its own
culture (or what some social scientists call a subculture because it is a culture within
another culture).
– Whereas structure emphasizes differences (people relate to each other in terms of their
different positions), culture emphasizes similarities (how they agree). IMPORTANT
CONCEPT
– Culture is made up of what people come to share in their heads—their ideas about
what is true, right, and important. Such ideas are guides to what we do, they determine
many of our choices, they have far more consequences than simply being carried
around in our heads. We should think of our culture as shared in interaction,

constituting our agreed‐on perspective of the world, and directing our acts in the
world.
• Culture Is Learned
– To argue that culture is important is to believe that learning about the world and how to
act in it is a result of socialization in contrast to biology. IMPORTANT CONCEPT
– It is also to believe that humans do not simply imitate, but they learn about the world
from other people who teach them through language. Culture is that which we learn
and come to believe.
• Culture Is a Social Inheritance
– Many social organizations we enter have existed for a long time; people who have
power within them teach us their long‐established “truths” so that we may become
good members and the social organization will continue.
– Culture is a social inheritance; it consists of ideas that may have developed long before
we were born.
– Our society, for example, has a history reaching beyond any individual’s life, the ideas
developed over time are taught to each generation and “truth” is anchored in
interaction by people long dead.
• Do you find this fascinating? People in their “graves” are influencing our
thoughts and guiding our social actions.
– Here are some examples from the middle class:
• Successful people must get a college diploma
• Women should marry and have children
• Romantic love should be the basis for marriage
• Making money is the best way to encourage people to work
– Each child is taught this culture by the family, school, and church—those social
organizations that are its carriers.
– We are socialized to accept the ideas of those in the positions of “knowing better,”
those who have many years of history on their side, a long tradition, rightness or God or
science or whatever.
• A culture, then is a shared perspective, a set of ideas that people develop and learn in social
interaction. Ideas can be subdivided into three categories.

– What is true (our truths)
– What is worthwhile (our values and goals)
– What is the correct way of acting (our rules)
• Culture Is a Body of “Truth”
• A culture is, first of all, a set of ideas concerning what is true or real.
• Almost all of us like to think that our ideas about the world are true. Some of them are, but
most of them we have come to accept not because of careful evidence, but because of our
interaction.
• Components of Culture
1. Values
2. Goals
3. Norms
4. Physical Objects
5. Symbols
6. Language
• Culture Is a Set of Values and Goals
• Culture is also made up of ideas about what is worth working for (ends). These ends are of two
kinds: values and goals. Sometimes, the distinction between values and goals is difficult to make
because both consist of ideas about what we should pursue, what purpose our action should
have.
• Culture Is a Set of Values and Goals
• Values
Societies’ shared beliefs about what is good and bad. (Right and Wrong)*Differ from culture to culture
• Goals
– A goal is a short‐range objective in a specific situation by an individual or social

organization.
Culture Is a Set of Norms

• Norms are the expectations we have for each other—how we are supposed to act—the rules,
the laws, the right way (Shared rules of conduct )
• Norms are associated with one’s position and are thus part of structure (remember, they make
up a role), but they are also associated with membership in the group, irrespective of position
(they make up the culture).
• Norms: Folkways and Mores
• Folkways: Norms
• that have no great moral significance
• Usually not enforced by rules
• Ex. Eating salad with a spoon “Abnormal; not illegal”
• *Break a Folkway exercise
• Mores:
• Norms with GREAT “MORAL” Significance
• Has the potential to become a Dysfunction of society
• Are usually enforced by Laws: Written rule of conduct enacted and enforced for good of
society
Language
is a system of symbols that allows people to communicate with one another. It can be either written or
spoken or both
Language is the key to cultural transmission, the process by which one generation passes culture to the
next.
Through most of human history, cultural transmission has been accomplished through oral tradition
Don’t ignore the non‐verbal aspects Organization of written or spoken symbols
• Language and Culture
• Benjamin Whorf: Linguistic‐Relativity Hypothesis
• Two Principles:
• 1. Language shapes the way that people think
• 2. People who speak different languages perceive the world in different ways

• Ex. Since the Inuit (Eskimos) of N. America live in landscape dominated by snow, their
language features many different words that describe that many potential states of snow
(Drifting, Falling…etc)
• For this reason, Whorf concludes that the Inuit have a better understanding of snow than
most other cultures
Functions of culture
Culture shapes behaviour
Culture provides a standard by which we evaluate others’ behaviour
Culture gives meaning to acts or events
Culture allows for communication of events or acts
Culture provides boundary maintanance
Culture unites
• Characteristics of Culture
• Culture is shared
• Culture is learned
• Culture is dynamic
• Culture is integrated
• Culture is based on symbols
• Examining Culture
• Culture is dynamic: It changes continuously
• Ex. Pop Culture: What was cool in 1985 is NOT cool today (Depending on who you are)
• Three Levels of Culture
• Culture Trait: Individual tool, act, or belief that is related to a certain situation (Spoon,
Baseball..etc)
• Culture Complex: Cluster of interrelated traits (Silverware, Baseball Equipment…etc)
• Culture Pattern: Combination of culture complexes (Sports…not just baseball…etc)
• *See Diagram on page 27

• Cultural Variations
• Cultural Universals: Traits common to ALL/MOST cultures
– Ex:
– 1. Cooking
– 2. Feasting
– 3. Myths {Urban Legend} (Hull House; Reder Road)
– 4. Folklore
– 5. Religion
• Cultural Variability
• Subculture: Do not share ALL of the culture traits of the dominant society
• Ex. Little Italy in Chicago
• Ex. Little Havana in Miami
• Consider selves as PART of the main culture, but still retain SOME of their original culture
traits
• Counter Culture: REJECT ALL aspects of the dominant society
• Ex. Anarchists
• Ex. Hermit
• Cultural Relativism and Ethnocentrism
• Cultures should be judged by their OWN standards; not ours (Verstehen)
• Marvin Harris: Cannibals and Kings
• Harris explored the Indian prohibition against killing cows in spite of food shortages
• Harris concluded that Indians did not kill cows because they were needed for plowing fields
and providing milk; both of which are essential to the Indian culture
• Cultural Relativism and Ethnocentrism
• Ethnocentrism:
• Caused by cultural diversity

• Who is right?
• “Tendency to view ones own culture as superior to others.”
• We often mock the beliefs and actions of other cultures with the assumption that what we are
doing is right
• Determinants of Culture
CULTURE AND
SOCIAL CONTROL
• To ensure conformity to cultural guidelines, society develops sanctions
• Are two types of sanctions:
¾ Positive sanctions: Rewards for following cultural guidelines (e.g., praise, money)
¾ Negative sanctions: Punishments for violating cultural guidelines (e.g., avoidance, arrest)*
• TWO FACES OF CULTURE
• Are two faces of culture:
1. Culture as freedom
2. Culture as constraining and/or endangering…*
• CULTURE AS FREEDOM
• Culture as freedom implicated in the following:
i. Cultural diversification and globalization
ii. Postmodernism…
i. Cultural diversification and globalization:
• As societies become more complex, cultures become more heterogeneous (e.g., through
immigration)
• Is characterized by increase in freedom to choose elements of cultural consumption and

identification*
• The Rights Revolution:

¾ Process by which socially excluded groups (e.g., women, aboriginal peoples, homosexuals) have
struggled to win equal rights in law and practice
• Issues raised by the rights revolution:
¾ Obligation to compensate for past injustices
¾ How to maintain acceptable balance between right to be equal and right to be different*
• Globalization: Characterized by Ö
¾ Expansion of international trade and investment
¾ International travel and communication
¾ Prevalence of mass media
¾ Routine contact between people of diverse cultures
¾ Migration by members of different racial and ethnic groups*
• GLOBALIZATION: EFFECTS
• Contributes to cultural fragmentation
• Destroys political, economic and cultural isolation; i.e., McLuhan’s notion of “global village”
• Individuals less obliged to accept native culture and freer to combine elements from wide
variety of historical periods and geographical settings*
ii. Postmodernism: Three main features Ö
a. Eclectic mixing of elements from different times and places
b. Erosion of authority
c. Decline of consensus around core values
¾ Reflected in fate of “Big Historical Projects”: For past 200 years, was global consensus about
inevitability of progress arising from human ingenuity, but negative side of progress recognized
in postmodern era*
• CULTURE AS CONSTRAINT
• Are two constraining aspects of culture:

i. Rationalization:
ii. Consumerism…*
i. Rationalization:
¾ Weber’s term for systematic application of standardized means to predetermined ends
Ö Has given rise to widespread acceptance of regimentation associated with the Werkglocken
(work clock)
¾ Has also led to “McDonaldization” of the world:
Ö Organizational principles of fast‐food restaurant have come to dominate life and have resulted
in Weber’s concept of the “iron cage”*
SOCIALIZATION
• In comparison with other species, we enter the world as amazingly “unfinished” beings. We are
not born human, but become human only in the course of interaction with other people. Our
humanness is a social product that arises in the course of socialization—a process of social
interaction by which people acquire the knowledge, attitudes, values, and behaviors essential
for effective participation in society. By virtue of socialization, a mere biological organism
becomes transformed into a person—a genuine social being.
• Socialization
What happens in socialization is that the social world is internalized within the child. The same
process, though perhaps weaker in quality, occurs every time the adult is initiated into a new social
context or a new social group. Society, then, is not only something “out there,” in the Durkheimian sense,
but it is also “in here,” part of our innermost being.
SOCIALIZATION: TWO TYPES
1. Primary socialization:
• Occurs in childhood

• Lays foundation that influences self‐concept and involvement in social life
2. Secondary socialization:
• Learning that occurs after people have undergone primary socialization
• Continues throughout life*
– The Case of Isabelle
[first six years, total seclusion in a darkened room, no contact with other people but her mother…]
– Primate Studies
[monkeys been raised away from their mothers and contact with other monkeys…results: easily
frightened; isolation had damaging effects on them]
[use ‘artificial mothers’ on monkeys…results: infant monkeys developed greater social attachments
from their need for warmth, comfort, and intimacy than from their need for milk]
• The Influence of Heredity
• Identical twins who separated soon after their birth and raised on different continents in very
different cultural settings.
– Certain characteristics, such as twins’ temperaments, voice patterns, and nervous

habits, appear to be strikingly similar; these qualities may be linked to hereditary
causes.
– Twins reared apart differ far more in their attitudes, values, types of mates chosen, and
even drinking habits; these qualities are influenced by environmental patterns.
Agencies of Socialization
• The last theme in life course sociology is agency, our ability to make decisions and control our
destinies
• This concept is important to life‐course sociology because individuals are able to act within the
constraints imposed by social and historical conditions, leading to myriad possible outcomes
• Our life course is not “set in stone” by social conditions
• Sociologists generally view agents of socialization as mediators of the larger society
• Families may affect child development directly through their parenting techniques, for instance,
but those techniques often reflect larger cultural patterns

• Family: The family is the most important agent of socialization in the United States. Obviously,
one of its primary functions is the care and rearing of children. The lifelong process of
socialization begins shortly after birth. An infant enters an organized society, becomes part of a
generation, and typically enters into a family. As the primary agents of socialization, parents play
a critical role in guiding children into those gender roles deemed appropriate in a society.
• School: Like the family, schools have an explicit mandate to socialize people in the United
States—especially children—into the norms and values of our culture. Functionalists point out
that, as agents of socialization, schools fulfill the function of teaching recruits the values and
customs of the larger society. Conflict theorists agree but add that schools can reinforce the
divisive aspects of society, especially those of social class.
• Peer Group: as a child grows older, the family becomes somewhat less important in
social development. Instead, peer groups increasingly assume the role of Mead’s
significant others. Within the peer group, young people associate with others who are
approximately their own age and who often enjoy a similar social status. Peer groups
may encourage a young person to follow pursuits that society considers admirable, as in
a school club engaged in volunteer work in hospitals and nursing homes. On the other
hands, the group may encourage someone to violate the culture’s norms and values by
driving recklessly, shoplifting, engaging in acts of vandalism, and the like.
• Mass Media and Technology: Television is a critical force in the socialization of children.
Television has certain characteristics that distinguish it from the other agents of
socialization. It permits imitation and role playing but does not encourage more
complex forms of learning. Issues have been raised regarding the content of television,
popular music, music videos, motion pictures, and Internet Web sites. These forms of
entertainment serve as powerful agents of socialization for many young people around
the world.
• CONTENT OF SOCIALIZATION
Role related information
Information about societies culture
• Functions of socialization
– An example of a person who was not raised in society was the boy of Aveyron (France
1797).
• He did not have the ability to speak—only in cries and inarticulate sounds
• Rejected all clothing
• Could not distinguish real objects from pictures and mirrored objects

• Did not weep
• RESOCIALIZATION
• Resocialization: Deliberate attempt to correct or instill particular values and behaviours in

individual or group
• Occurs in total institutions:
¾ Settings in which people are isolated from rest of society for set period
¾ Where all aspects of person’s life are regulated under one authority
Ö Examples: The military, convents, prisons, boarding schools, psychiatric hospitals*
• GOFFMAN: RESOCIALIZATION
• Total institution resocializes inmate into new identity by:
¾ Completely controlling and manipulating environment
¾ Stripping away established identity
¾ Subjecting inmate to mortification rituals (e.g., humiliations, degradations, physical

pain)
¾ Reconstituting inmate’s sense of self by imposing new identity and new way of life
• Process likened to symbolic ritual death and rebirth**
• Symbols, Self, and Mind: Our Active Nature
Determinism
• Sociologists tend to be what is sometimes called “deterministic.”
• If a perspective is deterministic, this means that the cause of human behavior is thought to be
outside free choice.
• Determinism is definitely part of what much of sociology is. It just seems to “come with the
territory” because the real purpose of sociology (as well as all other sciences) is to understand
what causes something—what causes human action. The question does not lend itself to an
investigation of freedom and individuality.
• Yet sociologists will almost always become defensive when people charge that their perspective
does not account for at least some freedom.

• The work of George Herbert Mead wrote about the links between the individual and society,
and always emphasized the interdependence of the two. Society makes the human being, yet
the human being, in turn, makes society. We are social beings, Mead argued, but our most
important individual qualities (all of which arise from society)—symbols, self, and mind—also
allow us to exercise some control over our lives.
Individuality and Freedom
• Perhaps the most important questions thinking people ask concern the relationship between
the individual and society.
– Are we simply the product of our social life?
– Do we make free choices?
– Do we have any impact on the direction of society?
– Is there any real individuality?
• A philosophy of freedom is central to our political ideas.
• Individualism is also central to the liberal culture.
• Not all societies value freedom and individualism. In some, commitment to kin is far more
important. In some, commitment to tradition, God, or society itself overshadows freedom or
individuality.
• It is important to separate freedom from individuality.
• Freedom means that the actor actively makes choices and directs himself or herself in
situations. The actor is in control of his or her own life. This may mean the actor is an individual;
it may also mean the actor is like other individuals.
• Individuality means that the actor is unique. The actor is different from others around him or
her. This may arise from freedom: The actor may actively refuse to think or act in a certain way
simply because others do so.
– I may be an individual who flies off the handle all the time, making me different from
others around me, but that does not mean I am free.

• Freedom has to do with cause.
– If freedom does exist, it exists when the individual is somehow his or her own cause,
exercising control over self and situation.
• Individuality has to do with differences.
– When a person stands out, he or she is said to be very different from others, and we
usually call that person an individual.
• Individuality is like all other human qualities: It arises in interaction with others. We are all
different—and some of us are very different—partly because we each have a unique set of
interactions, positions, cultures, and socialization experiences. We are all subject to a different
set of social controls. Each actor faces a different set of influences; each is the convergence of a
different set of social forces.
SOCIAL INTERACTION
Where do social patterns come from? How do they arise in the first place? How are they
reaffirmed? Altered? Done away with? The simplest answer is social interaction. As people
interact, they develop social patterns—organization. Where interaction stops, social patterns
die out. Where interaction is segregated, more than one set of patterns develop separate social
organizations. Where interaction is interrupted, where many new actors enter in, where new
problems arise for those in interaction, the social patterns are altered.
Social interaction is the key to understanding social patterns and social organization. The key to
understanding social interaction is social action.
Social action, according to Weber, takes place when the actor “orients his acts” to others and is
thus influenced by these others. The actor takes account of others, or acts for others. The actor
forms his or her acts in order to influence others, or to communicate to them, or to compliment
or criticize them, or to fool them, or to make them laugh or cry, or to do all the various things
people do in relation to others. Wherever others make any difference to what we do, wherever
we think of others as we act, there is an example of social action!
The key to social action is acting with others in mind.
• Social action is intentional action. I think of others as I act.
• Not all acts are social acts. If I open an umbrella because it is raining—that is not
a social act. However, if I open an umbrella because I do not want others to

think I am a fool for walking exposed to the rain in my good clothes—then it
becomes a social act.
Mutual Social Action Is Social Interaction
Much of what humans do results from their interaction. Sometimes I take you into account
when I act; likewise, you take me into account when you act. The presence of each makes a
difference for the other’s acts. This is mutual social action or simply social action. Each person
is both subject and object; that is, each person acts toward the others and is in turn considered
an object by the others. The presence of each and the actions of each make a difference to the
others’ actions.
Interaction is also very important because it is the source of our socialization. To some extent,
every time we interact, we are being socialized.
• Contexts of Social Interaction
• The context in which a social interaction takes place determines its meaning
• Three elements comprise the context:
• The physical setting
• The social environment
• Activities surrounding the interaction
• Studying Social Interaction: Ethnomethodology and Dramaturgy
• Ethnomethodology is the study of the norms governing social interaction
• This approach normally involves purposely violating commonly understood rules as a

means to gauge the nature of people’s response
• Dramaturgy understands social interaction in terms of the theater
• Interacting parties are actors involved in a performance known as impression

management
• Types of Social Interaction
• Nonverbal Behavior
• Involves forms of communication that involved body movements, or kinesics
• Researchers focus on things such as posture, yawns, and eye contact

• Exchange—interacting in an effort to receive a reward or a return for one’s actions
• Competition—two or more people or groups are in opposition to achieve a goal that only one
can attain
• Conflict—deliberate attempt to control a person by force, to oppose someone, or to harm

another person
• Cooperation—two or more people or groups working together to achieve a goal that will benefit
more than one of them
• Accommodation—a state of balance between cooperation and conflict
• Coercion
• Elements of Social Interaction: Statuses
• A status is any socially defined position that people occupy
• Some statuses are more influential than others in shaping our identity and the interactions of
others around us. These are called master statuses
• Statuses can be either conferred upon us, or can be voluntarily attained
• Ascribed statuses are conferred upon us, usually at birth. Include our race, sex, etc.
• Achieved statuses are voluntarily attained and include our occupation, student status,
etc.
• Elements of Social Interaction: Roles
• Roles are the “...culturally defined rules for proper behavior that are associated with every
status.”
• All of the roles attached to a particular status are called, collectively, role sets
• Because we cannot possibly fulfill all of the roles attached to a particular status at any given
time, we typically identify a role set as those rules that apply to our interaction with other
individuals in particular statuses
• Understanding Role Sets
• Understanding Role Sets
• Role Strain and Role Conflict

• Because we occupy several statuses, and numerous roles are attached to each status, there is
great potential for conflict between roles
• Role Strain occurs when there is conflict between roles attached to the same status
• Role Conflict occurs when conflict is encountered between roles that are attached to
two or more statuses
• Role Strain and Role Conflict
Social interaction is important because it leads to social patterns.
It is the very basis for all social organization. Imagine what happens in interaction over
time. We develop relationships. We know more about what to expect from each other;
we come to understand more clearly each other’s meanings and intentions; we can
agree on a number of matters; we develop routines of action; and we are less and less
surprised by others’ actions. We have developed social patterns, and these create a
social organization of which we become a part.
Patterned social interaction is what sociologists call interaction where action becomes more
organized, less spontaneous, less accidental or different, and we come to know what others will
do and what we are supposed to do in relation to them. We do not have to start over; we do not
have to explore how to act with each other whenever we come together.
Patterns are more than the individuals who comprise them; they are like new, additional forces
that have arisen among people and now exert influence on each individual. They are not
explainable just by adding up the individuals involved; they are social facts above and beyond
the individuals themselves.
Thus, when people interact over time, they are influenced not only by each other’s
specific acts, but also by the patterns that have developed among them.
The Forms of Social Organization

Social organization takes five forms.
Dyads
Groups
Formal Organizations
Communities
Societies

• ORGANIZATION
• Organizations are groups that associate for the purpose of achieving some goal or action.
• Organizations have identifiable membership.
• The study of organizations is a core topic in sociology, as they are one of the dominant forms of
social relations.
• Social Organization
• Social organization refers to the “...relatively stable pattern of social relationships among
individuals and groups in society”
• The organization of society consists of statuses, roles, groups and institutions, ordered
according to social norms that provide regularity and predictability in social interaction
•
Social Organization
Organization is made possible because individuals accept the patterns as guides to their thinking
and acting. Such acceptance facilitates social control over the individual actor and cooperation
among the actors in the social organization.
•
Social Organization
When we identify any social organization, two qualities must be in evidence.
Ongoing Social Interaction
à Actors regularly interact with one another
Social Patterns
à A set of rules and perspectives are to some extent characteristic of that

particular organization. Actors in the organization are influenced by these
patterns.
• Statuses and roles are building blocks for more comprehensive social structures, including
groups. Sociologists view a group as two or more people who share a feeling of unity and who
are bound together in relatively stable patterns of social interaction
• Nature of social groups
People are bound by within two types of bonds:

Expressive ties are social links formed when we emotionally
invest ourselves to other people. Through association with people who
are meaningful to us, we achieve a sense of security, love, acceptance,
companionship, and personal worth.
Instrumental ties are social links formed when we cooperate with

other people to achieve some goal.
Dyads
Dyads are formed when there is patterned interaction between two people
à Friends
à Lovers
à Doctor‐patient
à Mother‐son
à Husband‐wife
Groups
A group, like a dyad, is made up of people who interact and form patterns, but a group
is made up of three or more individuals who have a common sense of identity, shared
norms and common goals.
à Family (beyond dyadic relationships such as husband‐wife)
à Company softball team
à Sunday School class or Bible study group
At first glance, there may not appear to be much of a difference between a dyad and a
group, but size does indeed affect the nature of the patterns. IMPORTANT CONCEPT
Here is Simmel’s analysis of comparing dyads to groups
• In a dyad, there is instability and insecurity not characteristic of the group

because the dyad is faced with dissolution if one person leaves. A group is
capable of survival if a member leaves or is replaced because the group has a
“collective identity” that does not depend on any one individual.
• In a dyad, an individual can veto collective action. In a group, the individual, if

he or she wants to remain in the group, may have to do things contrary to
desire because the possibility exists that he or she will be outvoted. No longer
does the individual have the power to veto action.

A dyad cannot have a coalition (an alliance), but in groups, coalitions will inevitably
occur, and this makes the group qualitatively different from the dyad. Such coalitions
can be predicted beforehand. According to the work of Theodore Caplow, for example,
in the triad (three‐member group), the two weaker members will usually try to balance
the power of the strongest.
Dyads are usually more intense, exhibit more emotional involvement, and are less
impersonal than groups.
•
Social groups are distinct from other types of collectivities:
Social Aggregates—people who happen to be in close physical proximity, but share

little else
Social Categories—people who share one or more characteristics in common, but do

not interact (students, women, and teenagers).
• What is a group?
• 1. Consists of two or more people
• 2. Interaction among members
• 3. Members must share expectations
• 4. Members must possess some common identity
• Group Sizes
• Dyad: Smallest group possible (Two People)
• Triad: Three person group
• Small Group: One in which all members can interact on a “face to face” basis
• ORGANIZATION:
• Formal Group: Structure, goals, and activities are clearly defined
• Informal group: No official structure or rules of conduct
• Types of Groups
• Primary Groups: small group of people who interact over over a relatively long period of time
(family)

• Secondary Group: a group in which interaction is temporary and impersonal in nature
(Teacher/Student)
• Reference Group: Any group whose attitudes and values an individual adopts. (friends, clubs,
and even gangs)
• In Groups: The group that a person belongs to and identifies with
• Out Group: A group that a person does NOT belong
• Types of Groups
• E‐Communities: Brought about by emergence of Internet (Argue, discuss, and interact over the
web in a variety of different ways)
• Social Networks: Include both direct and indirect relationships… do not have clear boundaries
(“a friend of a friend”)
• Can be important: (Job hunting)
•
Humans Are Embedded in Social Organization
Two major classifications of groups
• Primary groups
These are small, relatively permanent, intimate, and unspecialized.

Individuals feel a close attachment to such groups, and they fulfill a
wide range of personal needs.
Charles Horton Cooley called these groups primary because they are
important to both the individual and society.
These are the groups from which individuals receive their early
socialization; thus they are the groups that are most responsible
for imparting those qualities that make us human: language,
self, mind, conscience.
Such groups also are important for society because they

influence individuals to see the world as those in society do and
to control themselves as those in society wish.
• Secondary groups
These groups tend to be larger, more temporary, more impersonal, and

more specialized than primary groups.

• COMPARISON
• Primary Groups
• The most intimate type
• Fundamental in forming the social nature and ideals of the individual
• Small group that interacts over a long period of time on a personal basis
• Involves entire self of a member
• Secondary Groups
• Interaction is impersonal and temporary
• Involve only part of a member’s self
• Casual and limited
• Importance of person linked to his or her function
• Members can be replaced
• Group Functions
• Define boundaries
– Use of uniforms, gestures, handshakes, or language
• Select leaders
– Leaders influence the attitudes and opinions of others
– Instrumental leaders help find specific means that will help the group reach its goals
– Expressive leaders find ways to keep the group together and to maintain morale
• Define purpose
– Set goals
– Assign tasks
– Make decisions
• Control members’ behavior
Formal Organization

Often, secondary groups become so large and complex that their social patterns must
be made very explicit, often in written form. Such groups are a third form of social
organization, the formal organization.
à When a group makes patterns explicit through written rules, it becomes a

formal organization.
• Weber’s Model of Bureaucracies
Characteristics: “IDEAL TYPE”
1. Division of Labor: Work divided among specialists
2. Ranking of authority: Cleat cut lines of responsibility
3. Employment based on qualifications: Qualifications required for specific jobs
4. Rules and regulations: Objective rules and procedures of what needs to happen
5. Specific lines of promotion and advance: Rewards for following proper procedures
Community
Sometimes the group or formal organization becomes relatively self‐sufficient or

independent of other social organizations. It takes care of all the basic needs of its
members—economic, social, cultural, educational, political. People are able to live their
whole lives within this social organization, carry out most of their activities within it, and
only occasionally leave it. This is called a community, and it is the fourth form of social
organization.
à Whether or not a given group is a community is often debatable, but to the

extent that we can establish it as a self‐sufficient social organization, we can so
designate it.
This is a very brief overview of community—it is a major subset of the discipline of sociology.
• Humans Are Embedded in Social Organization
• Society
– We can define society simply as the largest social organization whose patterns make a
significant difference to the individual’s actions. It is the social organization within which
all other social organizations exist.
– Within society we will find a host of dyads, groups, formal organizations, and
communities, each affected in part by its location in society.

– Society is a social organization with a long history, longer than any of its actors, and
usually longer than other social organizations. It is embedded in its past; it is enduring.
– Society
– A group of people who live within the same territory and share a common culture. By
virtue of this common culture, the members of a society typically possess similar values
and norms and a common language. Its members perpetuate themselves primarily
though reproduction and comprise a more or less self‐sufficient social unit. A society can
be as small as a tribal community of several dozen people and as large as modern
nations with millions of people.
• Society
• Sociologists classify societies according to subsistence strategies, or the ways societies use
technology to meet the needs of their members.
• Sociologists recognize three broad categories of society—preindustrial, industrial, and

postindustrial.
•
Preindustrial Societies
The largest groups studied by sociologists are entire societies. Sociologists categorize societies
according to subsistence strategies. In a preindustrial society food production is the main
economic activity.
• Social Institutions
• Sociologists view institutions as the principal instruments whereby the essential tasks of living
are organized, directed, and executed. Each institution is built about a standardized solution to a
set of problems.
• A social institution is a group of statuses and roles that are organized to satisfy one or more of
the basic needs of society.
• Sociologists have identified government, religion, education , economy and family as the five
basic social institutions that are necessary for a society to survive
• An easy way to remember the social institutions is by using the initials GREEF
• G is for Government
• Government is the political institution.The political institution is the system of norms

that governs the exercise and distribution of power in society.
• The purpose of government is to keep order and make group decisions

• In Kenya,the government keeps order by providing law enforcement at various levels; it
defends us from enemies through the armed services; it provides social services like Social
Security and Medicare; it protects the rights of the population.
• R is for Religion
• Religion represents the moral belief system of a society; it can include ideas about magic,
superstition and an explanation about how the universe came about
• Religion is necessary to determine group values; to have a common belief system
• Although the Kenya society has many religions sects, they serve similar functions. Religion
teaches a moral code that is generally reflective of the society;
• Religion as an institution
• Meet Basic needs not met by Other Social
• Meet ultimate concerns with life and death
• Explain the meaning of existence
• Provide social stability…provide individuals with A moral & ethical code of behavior.
• enhancement of social solidarity and consensus
• E is for Economy
• The economy of a culture represents the way that resources are used to meet human needs
and wants
• An economy is necessary because it allows people to make a living and determines how to
acquire and distribute goods and services
• The kenya economy provides a great number of goods and services demanded by society. It
produces and distributes food supplies; it manufactures and sells industrial and consumer
goods; it conducts trade with industries around the globe.
• E is for Education
• Education is the institution that passes on essential cultural knowledge to members of a society
• Education ensures the transmission of values, patterns of behavior, and certain skills and
knowledge from one generation to the next
• kenya education instills knowledge about the world; it provides skills to become competent in
the adult world of work; it teaches the values of the American way of life; it offers
opportunities for intellectual, social and emotional growth.

• F is for Family
• Family is the first and most basic social unit of society
– The family, the most universal social institution, takes responsibility for raising the
young and teaching them accepted norms and values.
– .
• The kenya family is the basic unit of society. As such, it cares for the young physically,
emotionally, socially and intellectually. It provides the basic living arrangements; it structures
the kinship system; it furnishes companionship and emotional and social support for its
members.
• Social Structure
– How do status positions form our identities? How is this connected to social structure?
• Social structure is the relatively stable network of interrelated statuses and roles that guides
human interaction.
i.e.
the way in which a society is organized into predictable relationships
i. Microstructures: Overarching patterns of intimate social relations formed during face‐to‐face

interaction (e.g., families, friendships, work associations)
ii. Macrostructures: Overarching patterns of social relations outside one’s circle of intimates and
acquaintances (e.g., class relations, bureaucratic organizations, power systems)
iii. Global structures: Patterns of social relations outside and above national level (e.g., United
Nations, AU, COMESA region)*
We All Fill Positions in Social Structure
• One of the patterns in social organization is called social structure. Social structure refers to the
fact that individuals act toward one another according to their position in the interaction. Over
time, actors are located in relation to one another in the interaction—they have a “place”—and
others act toward them according to their place, and they act toward others according to their
place. These positions or places create a network or what we might describe as a social map;
this network or map is called the social structure.

• A social structure consists of a interrelated set of positions within the social organization.
Positions form a network—they all are places in relation to all other positions—and they cannot
be described as isolated entities. Thus, a teacher is someone who exists in relation to students, a
husband in relation to wife, a boss in relation to employees, etc.
• A position is like a slot. This is an impersonal word, perhaps an exaggeration, but it still
emphasizes the fact that people are placed in positions whenever they interact with others, and
certainly whenever they join an established organization.
• As we interact with others, we focus our perceptions and actions and expectations on where
others are in relation to us. The more technical name for position is status position. Some
sociologists prefer the term “status,” but position or status position is more descriptive.
• Statuses
• A status is a socially defined position in a group or society. Being female, black, a lawyer,
or a rather is a status. There are two types of statuses. A status can be gained by a
person’s direct effort, usually through competition, is called an achieved status. Most
occupational positions in modern societies are achieved statuses. A social position to
which a person is assigned according to standards that are beyond his or her control—
usually parentage, age, and sex—is called ascribed status.
Roles Are Attached to Positions
• Over time people within the interaction come to focus on positions. Expectations are also called
norms.
– Norms can be informal and simply agreed upon in the interaction, or they can be formal,
written down, even becoming a body of rules, a constitution, charter, or contract.
– Norms can be stated, or they can be picked up from other people’s actions.
– Norms can be violated and met with only mild disapproval (you are foolish; I am going
to pretend I didn’t see that; stop it!), or its violation can be met with fines,
imprisonment, or even death.
• The norms focusing on a position together are called a role. A role should be thought of as a set
of expectations, a script to be followed, a set of behaviors and thoughts a person is expected to
follow in a position.

• Most of the time, we are barely aware of the script attached to our position. The norms are
accepted without consciously thinking about it. We are expected to wear clothes in public, to be
polite to people we meet, not to embarrass people we do not know, to drive on the correct side
of the street, to use utensils when we eat. In a given day we will enter many roles and act
appropriately without thinking twice.
• Some roles on the other hand are made very explicit and are very much part of our conscious
life. A marriage ceremony and certificate spells out what is expected in the positions. A catcher
on a baseball team, a police officer on the street, the driver in a getaway car, and a private in
the army tend to be clearly defined and understood roles.
• If you wonder if roles are really all that important, effective, or impacting…consider an
experiment conducted by Philip Zimbardo at Stanford University.
• He tested the effects of isolating normal, middle‐class students from the outside world for a
couple of weeks, putting them in a “prison situation” in which some them were in the position
of guard and some were in the position of prisoner.
• Within a few days, these people became their roles—that is, the guards actually came to act
brutally, the prisoners really “wanted out.” Something happened to everyone involved: A
structure evolved, the situation demanded new behaviors from everyone, and the new roles
took over.
• The situation became so nightmarish that the study had to be ended much earlier than planned.
• Role Exit
Describe the process of disengagement from a role that is central to one’s self‐identity and
reestablishment of an identity in a new role.
• Four stage model of role exit:
– Doubt
– Search for alternatives
– Action stage or departure
– Creation of a new identity
Status Positions Form Our Identities

• Much of our socialization involves learning about the many status positions and roles in the
world. The child learns how firefighters and dentists work, what grocery clerks and teachers do.
The child learns what Mom and Dad do, what bad guys do, and what good students do. The
child plays at these roles, and in playing them displays a recognition that he or she knows the
expectations attached to each.
• An identity is who we see ourselves as. It is the name we call ourselves and the name we
usually announce to others in our actions. For most of us, gender is our most important
identity, but class position and occupation are also very important.
• To discover our identities all we really have to do is list our positions in social structure and to
determine which positions are most important
• The identity I have situates me in relation to others. I see who I am in relation to them. Their
acts remind me of who I am; my acts toward them continue to tell them who I am. Identity, like
role, is attached to my status position; it is my “social address” in social structure.
IMPORTANT CONCEPT
• Peter Berger describes the experience of a newly commissioned office in the army—taking on
the role and identity of being an officer.
– At first the new officer is slightly embarrassed having enlisted personnel salute her/him.
– With every salute given and accepted, the newly commissioned officer begins to change
her/his attitude from one of slight embarrassment to one of expectation of respect from
enlisted personnel.
– In a short period of time, the newly commissioned officer becomes the role.
Positions Are Unequal
• Status positions are not usually equal. Inequality seems to be inherent in almost all social
structures.
• Unequal Power
– Social power refers to the ability one actor has for achieving his or her will in relation to
others in the social organization.

– A position that one occupies within an organization determines the amount of power
that person had to accomplish her/his will over others.
• One primary motivation for seeking promotions is to have more power to

accomplish one’s will.
– It is critical to recognize that class, gender, and race are structures with positions, and
these positions also have power attached to them. In general, although it is not
necessarily right, the wealthy have greater power in society than the poor, men have
more power than women, whites have more power than nonwhites.
• This is not a “law” of social nature—but rather a picture of the current situation
within the United States. As society evolves—these power positions can change.
• Unequal Prestige
– Prestige refers to the honor that people in social structure accord the position.
– Many of us seek positions that give us honor by others. Self‐respect may be personal to
some extent: I am good, intelligent, honest, capable. However, self‐respect also comes
from “who we are” in relation to others. It is associated with the position we fill in social
structure.
• Unequal Privileges
– Positions also bring with them privileges, the good things so to speak, the benefits, the
opportunities that come to those filling the position. These privileges may be high
income and other material benefits, opportunity to choose one’s own office furniture,
choice of home, long vacations, a secretary, quality schooling, an expensive car.
• In addition to role and an identity, then, each status position also has a certain amount of
power, a certain degree of prestige, and privileges attached—or denied.
• Different amounts of power, prestige, and privilege create the inequality within the social
structure.
A note before showing the next slide…
If you can understand this next section, you are on your way to thinking like a sociologist!
Our Positions Give Us Our Perspectives
IMPORTANT CONCEPT

• Social positions give us the eyeglasses through which we look at the world. People define the
world according to where they are located (socially).
– Boss versus employee
– Wealthy versus poor
– Upper middle class versus the working class (blue collar)
• Our status position may also influence how we look at the world in general. Not only does a
corporate executive see the corporation differently from the man or woman who works on the
assembly line, but the executive probably has a different view of government, capitalism,
foreign policy, American education, and perhaps even religion.
– What we think is true, what we value, what we believe is wrong or right in the world
arises from our position.
• First, we are socialized into our positions: not only in how to act and who we are but also in how
to think, how to approach understanding reality.
• Second, each position is in fact a location in organization, a point within it, and thus an angle of
perception used to understand what is taking place in and outside the organization. Each
position is a place from which we look, causing us to see reality at that particular angle.
• The third reason we are influenced to see the world through our position has to do with our
desire to successfully enact the position. Success in position means that we have to understand
how people in that position think. We have to understand how others who are somehow linked
to that position expect us to think in that position.
This is a complex process.
• Stratification
• Social Stratification: ranking of individuals or categories of people on the basis of unequal access
to scarce resources and social rewards
• Social Inequality: The unequal sharing of scarce resources and social rewards
• Types…
• 1. Caste System
• 2. Class System
• Caste System
• ‐Usually occurs in an area where resources are scarce for a variety of reasons

• ‐Ascribed Status: Status that is assigned based on factors that one can not control
• ‐One can not marry outside of one’s own Caste
• ‐Endogamy: Marriage w/in one’s own social group
• ‐Exogamy: Marriage outside of one’s own group
• ‐Think about it… If your arm was in a “CASTE” you would not be able to “MOVE” it
• *It is impossible to move between Castes
• The Class System
• Achieved Status: Variable; can change
• ‐People judged by accomplishments
• ‐Based on who owns the Means of Production: Tools, Buildings, Materials needed to produce
goods
• Bourgeoisie: Own the means of production
• Proletariat: Workers who sell labor
• Social Class: Grouping of people with similar levels of wealth, power, and prestige
• Socioeconomic Status
• Socioeconomic Status: Rating of individuals based on
• 1. Educational Level
• 2. Occupational Prestige
• 3. Income
• 4. Place of Residence
Structural Change
• Nothing stays the same. Over time, structures change. As they do, opportunities open up for
people long deprived, and those who have always had privileges are forced to surrender some.
For example, since World War II, there has been a steady change in the relationship between
men and women. As women have entered the paid labor force, expectations have changed
about what women’s roles are, and their power, privileges, and prestige have all become more
equal to those of men. Widespread use of birth control, the women’s movement, longer
lifespans, and the increasing independence of children have all contributed to this changing
gender structure.

• Inequality in Society
Marx’s View of Social Stratification
• Marx believed that economic class was central to society because all other systems of inequality
were dependent on it.
• Marx also argued that the powerful determine the ideas that prevailed in the society. They were
in the best position to each what they considered the truth, and the ideas they taught would be
in their own interests—for example, competition is a law of nature, poverty is inevitable,
protection of private property is more important than protection of workers’ rights or people’s
lives.
• Marx saw that those who have the power also have the privileges in the society. They have
longer lives, better health care; higher educational opportunities, more leisure time, comfort,
and security.
• Race
• Race: Grouping of Human Beings by
• 1. Skin Color
• 2. Hair Texture
• 3. Body Structure
• Three basic racial groups
• 1. Caucasoid: White; Fair Skin; Straight/Wavy Hair
• 2. Mongoloid: Oriental; Yellowish/Brownish Skin; Distinct Folds on the Eyelids
• 3. Negroids: Dark Skin; Tightly Curled Hair
• Characteristic Problems
• Social Order, Social Control, and Social Deviance
• Now we will consider the “problem” of social order. How is it that a number of individuals are
able to come together into an organization, sacrifice to some extent their individual wants and
needs to that organization, and agree to temporarily control themselves so that the organization
is able to continue? Without control, social order is impossible; without social order, we would
not be socialized nor could we act together in some cooperative endeavor. In fact, even
freedom—whatever there is—can exist only within some underlying order within which it is
encouraged to exist.

• Social order—a concept used but rarely defined—is a quality of all working organizations. The
opposite of social order is easy to grasp: disorder, chaos, the absence of rules, disorganization. If
there is no order, actors will act without taking one another into account or they will act without
any concern for the cooperative effort. Action will be impulsive—uncontrolled—or it will be self‐
controlled without regard for the organization. Cooperation is made impossible.
• Social order is made possible by “social control”
The term social control refers to the techniques and strategies for preventing deviant human behaviour
in any society. Social control occurs on all levels of society (e.g. family, colleges, government,
etc.).
Social control and social order are necessary for the continuation of social organization. They are often
good things, but we should not simply assume that they are always good. A society that oppresses
people should not be supported simply because control and order are necessary.
• Conformity and Obedience
• Conformity as going along with peers– individuals of our own status, who have no special right
to direct our behaviour.
• Obedience is defined as compliance with higher authorities in a hierarchical structure.
(e.g., military recruits; college students)
• The central question for every organization is how much control and order? Too little can lead to
chaos and a war of all against all. Too much means that little individuality and freedom will be
tolerated, and peaceful change will be unlikely.
IMPORTANT CONCEPT
Social Order is Established Through Structure and Culture
• For most animals, order is established through instinct and through instinctive‐battles between
individuals for control.
• What makes order possible for humans?
– The answer, of course, is the social patterns that arise in social interaction. Social
patterns guide the actor; the actor acts in predictable and expected ways. Social
patterns bring people together, make them interdependent, cause them to understand
one another, and even make them feel as one. Almost all sociologists have described

the role of social patterns as the foundation for social order in one way or another—
although they do not always call them social patterns.
• Emile Durkheim shows us how both culture and structure bind people. Culture is especially
important in simpler societies. Here, a common moral and value system is what binds people
together. Durkheim called this “mechanical solidarity.” People tend to be the same in such
societies. Common beliefs, values, and norms are the glue. Crimes in such societies are
regarded not as transgressions against other individuals so much as crimes against the whole
of society and its common culture. IMPORTANT CONCEPT
• Punishment and public executions serve to reaffirm this culture and give people the assurance
that its truths, values, and morals are right. The worship of a common god and other sacred
objects (objects that are symbolic of society) is also important because, according to Durkheim,
this too serves to bind people together and assures them that their culture is valid. Durkheim
called society’s culture its “collective conscience” or “collective consciousness.” The conscience
(morality) and consciousness (awareness, understanding) of each individual are produced by the
collective.
• Mechanical solidarity is based on a common culture.
• All societies have a common culture, and this pattern always holds societies together.
Developed societies—particularly modern industrial societies—create complex social structures
where people occupy different positions in society. Such differences between people replace
the sameness that characterizes simpler societies. Industrial societies develop a complex
“division of labor,” where occupations are increasingly different from one another. We work at
various jobs. We specialize. Some of us become corporate executives, and some teach the
families of corporate executives; some grow food, some transport it, and some prepare it for
others.
• Such a society needs a common culture to some extent—after all, even if we are all different,
we must agree on some things or we would not be able to trust one another. However, it is a
solidarity based on social structure that becomes increasingly important. Durkheim calls this
“organic solidarity” because society increasingly takes the form of an organism with many
different parts, each part making a contribution to the whole.
• Structure unites society by making us all interdependent, where human differences ultimately
contribute to the welfare of everyone. When a common culture becomes less and less central to
social solidarity, and when people become increasingly different from one another, there
develops more tolerance of individuality and less severe punishment for those who are defined
outside the law. Modernization, in this sense, brings with it a more humane approach to
establishing and maintaining social order.

• By contrasting mechanical solidarity with organic solidarity, Durkheim shows us how both
culture and structure are important ingredients for holding society together, thus creating a
sound basis for social order.
• Marx also shows us the role of both structure and culture. He uses the concept of social control
rather than social order. To Marx, social control refers to the various ways the powerful in
society attempt to repress the individual, to control and manipulate the individual for the good
of the few. To Marx, society is a system of class inequality, allowing the few who own the
means of production to coerce and manipulate the many to accept society as it is. Power in the
social structure brings control over jobs, government, army, police, courts, and the media, and
this, in turn, brings control over the individual. Therefore, Marx begins with social structure in
his understanding of order. Order is produced through the power of a few people high in the
social structure. They establish order through force, control of jobs, and manipulation.
• Marx also deals with culture in his analysis of order. The dominant ideas, values, and morals in
society are produced by the powerful. They are meant to control the individual to help ensure
“willing” conformity. Culture helps justify and protect the inequality in society, and it serves the
powerful who produce it.
• Thus, to Marx, social order is created from above. Position brings power; power brings the
instruments used to create order so that privilege continues. Power also brings control over
culture, including a people’s ideas, values, and rules.
Social Order Depends on Socialization
• Socialization refers to the process by which the individual is taught to know the society, and to
learn its culture, structure, and institutions, as well as his or her place there. Through
socialization, we learn to accept social organization because we are taught that it benefits us, or
it is us, or we must accept it to survive. To become socialized is to “become” society, to make it
part of us, to internalize it. Each social organization we enter and each we form sets up
procedures to make new members learn the patterns and ensure that things work smoothly.
– Willingness arises from socialization.
The Five Foundations of Social Order
• Social structure places us, makes us interdependent, and encourages control of the many by the
few.
• Culture makes people similar to one another in the truths, values, goals, and rules they follow.
• Social institutions deal with the ongoing problems of society.

• Institutions socialize us so that society gets inside us and we become “willing” partners in
society.
• Institutions encourage us to feel part of organization. Loyalty is encouraged by developing a

sense of “we”, by convincing members that the organization is beneficial, and by establishing
boundaries between those within and those outside the organization.
IMPORTANT CONCEPTS
Social Control Contributes to Social Order
• Socialization is never perfect. For many, loyalty is never felt; for some, the patterns are not
willingly followed. This is true in every organization: in society, in the university, in families, and
in businesses, to name a few. If socialization worked perfectly, there would be little individuality,
no criminals, no revolutionaries, no dissatisfied member, no one unhappy with the social
structure. Thankfully, humans are not only conforming members of organization. They are also
rebels, questioners, suspicious, creative, and individualistic.
• Informal and formal social control
• The sanctions used to encourage conformity and obedience– and to discourage violation of
social norms– are carried out through informal and formal social control.
(e.g., informal social control: smiles, laughter, raising an eyebrow, and ridicule…)
• Informal and formal social control
• Formal social control is carried out by authorized agents, such as police officers, physicians,
social administrators, employers, military officers, and managers of movie theatres. It can serve
as a last resort when socialisation and informal sanctions do not bring about desired behaviour.
Social Deviance
• It is impossible to ensure total conformity to organization, nor is that ever desirable. Society
needs thinkers, not robots; problem solvers, not sleepwalkers; creative, self‐directing persons,
not simple conformists. Everyone breaks the established rules occasionally, and some break the
rules much of the time. As children, we learn to test adults: We bend the rules of authorities,
they act back, we test again. In real life, everything is dynamic and involves conflict.
• Deviance – Behavior that violates social norms
• Crime – Deviant behavior that breaks a law
• Deviance is decided by two things:

1. Extent of disapproval
2. Degree of Societal Outrage
• The problem is always “How much individuality is acceptable?”
• How much bending of the rules can be tolerated?
• Americans value individuality; yet we all have our limits, and certainly authorities do. Every
social organization draws lines and brings negative social controls to bear on those outside
those lines.
• High‐schoolers recognize well that there are certain acceptable ways to dress and act around
peers; outsiders are nerds, uncool, weird. Certain people are declare to be mentally ill; others
we punish as criminals. Wherever there are social patterns, there are those who are
unacceptable, who are condemned as “immoral,” “sick,” “unnatural,” or “antisocial.”
Deviance is the term used by sociologists to refer to that action defined by society and its defenders to
be outside the range of the acceptable. (e.g., in the US, alcoholics, compulsive gamblers,and the
mentally ill would all be classified as deviants)
What is deviant in our culture may be celebrated in another. (being fat in our society vs. Nigeria)
• Social Power
The Meaning of Social Power
• Social power, like social order, is one of those terms we all use but rarely define. In fact, the
more we try to define it, the more the concept seems to elude us. Weber wrote, that power has
something to do with “achieving one’s will.” and that is a good place to begin.
• People who have power achieve their will in relation to others. When they want something,
they get it; they win in the relationship. Weber believed that social power accompanies social
action—so, therefore, power is an element of a willful act; it accompanies an intentional
attempt to achieve one’s will or to get one’s way.
Social Power
Authority
• Amos Hawley wrote: “Every social act is an exercise of power, every social relationship is a
power equation, and every social group or system is an organization of power.”
– Although for many of us, power is something that sounds bad, it is an inherent part of
all social life.

• Social Power
• Max Weber’s insights on authority are very important. Weber pointed out that power can arise
from many different bases, or resources. Our power may be based on fear, money, or promises,
for example. Nothing is as permanent and stable, however, as authority: position in
organization regarded by others as legitimate.
• When rulers overthrow others, what do they immediately seek? Legitimacy.
• Legitimacy means that someone (because of position in organization) has the right to command
others, and others have an obligation to obey.
– Authority is power based on the resource we might call legitimate position.
• Social Power
• Those in high position in traditional organization have three important resources:
– Legitimacy
– Tradition
– The organization
• To disobey authority is to disobey position, tradition, and to be disloyal to organization.
• Social Power
• Weber presents three types of authority:
– Traditional
• Based on the belief in the sanctity of tradition, of “the eternal yesterday.” It is

not codified in impersonal rules, but inheres in particular persons who may
either inherit it or be invested with it by a higher authority
• Social Power
– Legal‐rational
• Authority may be based on rational grounds and anchored in impersonal rules

that have been legally enacted or contractually established.
– Charismatic
• Rests on the appeal of leaders who claim allegiance because of their

extraordinary virtuosity, whether ethical, heroic, or religious.

• This typology of various forms of authority relations is important on several counts. Its
sociological contribution rests more especially on the fact that Weber, in contrast to many
political theorists, conceives of authority in all its manifestations as characteristic of the relation
between leaders and followers, rather than as an attribute of the leader alone.
• Weber’s analysis is very insightful. It reminds us how important position in organization is as a

power resource. We can apply his points to virtually every social relationship. We eventually
develop a structure that we come to accept. Acceptance of the structure is the acceptance of its
INEQUALITY of positions; it is over time, the acceptance of authority or power arising from
positions regarded as legitimate.
The Inevitability of Inequality in Organization
• Most of use say we believe in democracy. We say that we believe that the people should
somehow rule themselves. However, the concepts of “social structure” and “authority” seem to
contradict the possibility of democracy, to some extent, because both concepts emphasize
• No one makes this point better than Robert Michels (1876‐1936), who developed an important
sociological theory that has come to be called the iron law of oligarchy. Oligarchy means the
“rule of a few,” and Michels’s law translates into the idea that wherever organization exists,
there will be a few people who dominate. This is not because we are evil or weak or stupid; it is,
instead, Michels argues, because organization itself releases strong tendencies for this to occur.
– The very act of choosing leaders to coordinate the activities of the organization
automatically leads toward inequality.
• Both Michels and Weber underline the importance of positions as resources, as the basis for
bringing power to certain actors in social organizations. Weber focuses on the strength of
legitimacy; Michels focuses on the strength of the leadership position itself. Both emphasize the
tendency for subordinates to find themselves in positions that require obedience.
Class Position and Power
• Karl Marx believed that real power came from ownership: ownership of the means of
production in society. If one owned the means of production (factories, large businesses, large
farms, banks), then one possessed a great resource. One had great power in relation to others.
He called such people “the ruling class.”
– This was referred to as economic position.
• The ruling class in society, because of the great importance of economic power, is also able to
control government, the law and courts, education, the military, and all other important aspects
of society.

• Poverty is at the other end of the spectrum. Marx described the worker in a very dependent
position. Nothing is more important than economic survival. If one is dependent on someone
else for this, then the other has control over his or her life.
• This is the heart of a class society. The wealthy control the lives of the many.
• To a great extent, then, it makes good sense to think of class as power. Class position brings
people resources or lack of them. As long as society is a class society, there will be an inequality
of power. Describing society simply as a democracy is to overlook this important fact.
Three Theories of Power
• Social power arises from various sources, not just one.
– Power arises from authority.
– Power arises from positions of leadership in organization.
– Power arises from wealth (class/economic position).
– Power arises from organization itself.

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ASC 100: INTRODUCTION TO

OTIATO WAFULA, CPS (K) PhD

SAMUEL MBURU KAIRU THE INCOMING DELEGATE SLASS -0794110307

SAMUEL MBURU KAIRU THE INCOMING DELEGATE SLASS -0794110307

The focus is on the GROUP over the individual

Why study sociology?

• It is no secret that this generation of humans faces several unprecedented dangers;

 If we escape nuclear extinction we might survive the vagaries of overpopulation

 Add these to crime,inflation,unemployment,prejudice,national debt etc

• But the picture is not completely gloomy either

• These are also times of great achievements in;

 Space, humans landing on the moon

 Science has eradicated smallpox, syphilis.

SAMUEL MBURU KAIRU THE INCOMING DELEGATE SLASS -0794110307

creating weapons that would preserve peace

• On the contrary machine gun only made killing more efficient!

• If such an answer is to be found at all, we must look elsewhere:

HUMAN INTERACTION: THIS IS THE DOMAIN OF SOCIOLOGY

i.e the study of interactions and relations among human beings.

SAMUEL MBURU KAIRU THE INCOMING DELEGATE SLASS -0794110307

 You can not marry your brother,sister, mother

 You can not drive on the right side of the road

 You must pay taxes

 You must shake hands when you meet

HOW DOES THIS COME ABOUT?

SAMUEL MBURU KAIRU THE INCOMING DELEGATE SLASS -0794110307

It is not eternal and universal truth

But we tend to reify our acts‐

• Reification is a product of internalisation.

• All these notwithstanding,

sociology is also the study of how we break the rules

 what they are

 How they arise

 How they change

• Sociology Focuses on:

– How social relationships influence people’s attitudes and behavior

– How major social institutions affect us

– How we affect other individuals, groups, and organizations

SAMUEL MBURU KAIRU THE INCOMING DELEGATE SLASS -0794110307

• Sociology also encourages us to see individuality in social context.

• DURKHEIM’S STUDY OF SUICIDE

– MORE LIKELY TO COMMIT

 MALE PROTESTANTS WHO WERE WEALTHY AND UNMARRIED HAD HIGHER

– PROTESTANTISM AND INDIVDUALISM

– LESS LIKELY TO COMMIT

 MALE JEWS AND CATHOLICS WHO WERE POOR AND MARRIED

– BEING CATHOLIC AND GROUP‐ORIENTATION

• ONE OF THE BASIC FINDINGS: WHY?

– THE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN THESE GROUPS HAD TO DO WITH “SOCIAL INTEGRATION”

 THOSE WITH STRONG SOCIAL TIES HAD LESS OF A CHANCE OF COMMITING

– Middle vs. Lower Class

– How do expectations of society affect individual behavior?

– Help to find a balance between personal desires and demands of environment

– How does environment shape individual beliefs?

SAMUEL MBURU KAIRU THE INCOMING DELEGATE SLASS -0794110307

C. WRIGHT MILLS’ SOCIOLOGICAL IMAGINATION

– SOCIETY IS OFTEN RESPONSIBLE FOR MANY OF OUR PROBLEMS

– WE NEED TO LEARN TO SEPARATE THINGS THAT HAVE TO DO WITH

 PERSONAL TROUBLES, OR BIOGRAPHY

If we escape nuclear extinction we might survive the vagaries of overpopulation

Add these to crime,inflation,unemployment,prejudice,national debt etc

Space, humans landing on the moon

Science has eradicated smallpox, syphilis.

You can not marry your brother,sister, mother

You can not drive on the right side of the road

You must pay taxes

You must shake hands when you meet

what they are

How they arise

How they change

MALE PROTESTANTS WHO WERE WEALTHY AND UNMARRIED HAD HIGHER

MALE JEWS AND CATHOLICS WHO WERE POOR AND MARRIED

THOSE WITH STRONG SOCIAL TIES HAD LESS OF A CHANCE OF COMMITING

PERSONAL TROUBLES, OR BIOGRAPHY

SOCIAL ISSUES, OR HISTORY

Organisms tend toward survival.

Man survives in groups.

Man is a social animal.

Man lives in an ordered society.

The order of society is knowable.

The rise of a factory‐based industrial economy(industrial revolution).

The emergence of great cities in Europe. Social Problems developed:

Political Problems of late 1700 early 1800’s

Social statics‐forces which produce order and stability

Social dynamics‐forces which contribute to social change

Protect yourself from misinformation