Question

Identify some of the social conditions or events around the time of sociology’s emergence as a discipline. Why did society at the time need a ‘science of society’?

Answer 1

Sociology

Introduction

Sociology is one of the newer of the academic disciplines, tracing its origins no further back than the middle of the nineteenth century. It has a short history. Sociology, the science of society, is the youngest and it came to be established only in the nineteenth century. The French philosopher, August Comte gave sociology and a programme for its development. For thousands of years, society has been a subject for speculation and enquiry. Yet sociology is a modern science which originated only within last hundred fifty years or so.

The study of society, however, can be traced to the Greek philosophers, Plato and Aristotle. The philosophical basis of Plat o and Aristotle characterised the observations of man for a very long period of time. The literature concerning society and its problems found place in the Republic of Plato (427-347 B.C.) and in the Politic and Ethics of Aristotle (388-327 B.C.).

Plato was the first Western philosopher who attempted a systematic study of society. In the Ethics and Politics of Aristotle we find the first major attempts of systematic dealing of law, the society and State. In his book Cicero, the Roman thinker, brought the great Greek ideas in philosophy, politics and law in the West.

In the sixteenth century, a precise distinction was made between State and society. Thomas Hobbes and Machiavelli were the outstanding contributors of the realistic approach to social problems. Hobbes in his Levithan and Machiavelli in his Prince analyses the system of statecraft and also put forward conditions for success of State.

Notable among those who made contribution towards the specific investigation of social phenomena are the Italian writer Vico and French writer Baron de Montesquieu. Montesquieu explained in his The Spirit of Laws that many external factors, particularly climate, play significant role in the life of society.

The eighteenth-century Europe witnessed the publication of a number of great works of observation, for example, Rousseau’s social contract and Montesquieu’s De l’espirit des louis. These writings were still in the philosophical tradition, but they contained sufficient analysis to lay foundation for a separate social science.

Various social sciences gradually evolved in response to the varied needs of human living. The writings in philosophical tradition laid foundation for development of social sciences. With the passage of time various social sciences developed one after another and began to pursue separate and independent path of their own. Political philosophers inquired into the evolution of State, the growth and nature of State authority and various other problems of political nature.

Similarly, economics as separate and independent science inquired into the problems concerning production and distribution of commodities as well as the larger question of economic growth. Thus, study carried on by man about different aspects of society gave rise to different social sciences like History, Political Science, Economics, Anthropology and Psychology etc. August Comte created the new science of society and coined the name sociology in 1839.

Emergency of Sociology:

Sociology has a long past, but only a short history. The study of human society in scientific way is said to have begun with August Comte. The emergence of sociology as a discipline of academic interest is of recent origin. Its emergence as a discipline can be attributed to the vast changes that took place in the nineteenth century.

Various strains and tendencies, some intellectual and some social, combined to-form the science of sociology. To quote Bottom ore, “The conditions which gave rise to sociology were both intellectual and social”.

The chief intellectual antecedents of sociology are summed up by Ginsberg in the following words: Broadly it may be said that sociology has had a fourfold origin in political philosophy, the philosophy of history, biological theories of evolution and the movements for social and political reform which found it necessary to undertake survey of social conditions.

Over the time, there had grown the intellectual tradition described as the historical tradition or the philosophy of history, which believed the general idea of progress. To combat the influence of theology on history, the thinkers of the Enlightenments introduced the idea of causality into history of philosophy, elaborated the theory of progress. But philosophy of history as a distinct branch of speculation is a creation eighteenth century.

The philosophical historians introduced the new conception of society as something more than the political society’ or the State. They were concerned with the whole range of social institution and made a distinction between the State and what they called ‘civil society’.

Development of Sociology:

Sociology as a science of society originated with August Comte in the nineteenth century. He worked out a general approach to the study of society. He called sociology the “queen of all sciences” and recommended that as the highest of all sciences, it would use the ‘positivist’ method of observation, experimentation and comparison to understand order and promote progress. Sociology as a separate discipline originated with Comte in the middle of nineteenth century. Since then a galaxy of thinkers and scholars have contributed for the development of sociology.

There are four men, however, whom everyone in sociology regardless of his special emphasis, bias, or bent will probably accept as the central figures in the development of modern sociology. They are: August Comte, Herbert Spencer, Emile Durkheim and Max Weber.

Together, they span the whole of the nineteenth and early twentieth century, during which modern sociology was formed. They represent the main national centres France, England and Germany in which sociology first flourished and in which the modern tradition began. Each exerted a profound personal influence on the conception of sociology as an intellectual discipline.

The theory of scientific evolution was brought into sociology by Herbert Spencer (1820- 1903) in his book Principles of Sociology (1876). Spencer observed that the study of sociology was, the study of evolution in its most complex form”.

The nineteenth century sociology was evolutionary because it attempted to identify and account for the principal stages in the social evolution. At the same time that evolutionism blossomed, a new analytical approach to sociology emerged.

In the last quarter of the nineteenth century, four men made outstanding contributions to this trend. The three pioneers of analytical sociology were Ferdinand Tonnies, George Simmel, and Gabriel Trade. Durkheim was one among them. Each of them has contributed significantly to modern sociological theory. Tonnies inaugurated the study of basic types of social groups and suggested a system for their classification. Simmel initiated the study of types of social processes.

Trade was the first to provide what, according to many thinkers, is a sound basis for a theory of social and cultural change. Efforts of these pioneers prepared the way for systematic sociological theory based on empirical investigation.

The writings of Herbert Spencer had a remarkable impact on the psychologists who had displaced his biological interpretation of social phenomenon to psychological interpretation. The notable among them were Graham Wallace and Mc Dougol (England); Wars, Codings, Mead and Deway (America)

In the early twentieth century, Durkheim made valuable contributions to sociological theory and method. His theory was fairly systematic and has been highly suggestive for his successor in France and elsewhere. Durkheim was aware that most of the earlier social theorists had neglected the problems of the appropriate method to be used in analysing social phenomena.

The Rules of Sociological Method, one of the Durkheim’s principal work is specifically concerned with methodological problems.

Further, sociology was enriched by the contribution of Max Weber. The development of sociological theory was advanced by Weber’s use of the comparative method, for he contributed more to comparative sociology than almost any other scholar. Weber gave a new start with his work on important subjects such as bureaucracy, sociology of law and religion.

It is a fact that the European classical scientists, particularly Marx, Max Weber and Durkheim sought to establish the scope and methods of sociology to show its value by investigation and explanation of major social phenomena.

Karl Marx sought to discover the objective laws of history and society and attempted to show that the development of society is natural historical process in which various social systems succeed each other.

But Marx introduced an entirely new attitude and orientation in the study of society. It is this attitude and orientation that has made significant contribution to the development of sociology, for it has compelled thinkers to give their attention on social (including economic) relationships than the social thought.

In the early twentieth century, important contributions have been made by the giants-Cooley, Thomas and Pareto. Many of their formulations guide sociological work today.

In the mid of the twentieth century, sociological theories were developed by the representatives of systematic sociology. Most important among them are Sorokin, Parsons, Florian Znaniecki, Maclver, Gerge C. Homans, Charles P. Loomis and others. All the major representatives of present-day systematic sociology are concerned, though in varying degrees, with both social structure and function.

All the proponents of systematic sociology agree that abstract theory must be tested by empirical research. In contrast to Spencer who accepted the significance of individuals and Durkheim who stressed emphasis on the significance on the group, the systematic sociologists seem to be in fundamental agreement about the relationship of society and individual.

It is noteworthy that systematic sociologists including Maclver were in basic agreement about the interdependence of individual and society. The systematic sociologists mainly developed elaborate conceptual schemes.

Sociological studies acquired a system at the hands of Talcott Parsons. He laid emphasis on conceptional schemes such as social system, cultural system, personality and such other in sociological theory and for their relevance to modern life.

On the other side there developed modern empirical sociology based on the social survey tradition. Sociological research developed rapidly after World War-I and even more so during and after World War-II, especially in USA.

Theoretically, sociology emerged historically as a kind of speculation about general laws, as illustrated in the broad theoretical schemes of August Comte, Herbert Spencer and other pioneers. In the twentieth century, most sociologists shifted their attention to much less ambitious problems and particularly to the gathering of empirical data about social life.

In recent years, however, the sociological quest once more has become focused upon broader generalisations and theoretical systems. Since the 1960’s an unmistakable sign of a renaissance of the classical tradition in sociology, as it was fashioned by Max Weber and Durkheim, is discernible not only in advanced industrial societies but also in developing countries of Third World .

On the one side the growing interest in social change in the industrially advanced societies is encouraging the wider acceptance of Weber’s method in the formation of problems, in the ideal-type of definition of concepts .On the other side, there has been a resurgence of Marxism as a general theory of society.

Initially concerned primarily with the problem of industrial society, sociology continued to expand its scope, making its concern comprehensive enough to include not only the sociology of politics, but also those of many other branches such as law, education, religion, family, art, science, medicine, leisure and knowledge, says R.K. Merton.

The recent changes in world situation have altered the attitude to the study of society. There is a change-over from the encyclopedic conception of society to a segmental interest of societies. Instead of studying the entire social structure, sociological knowledge is directed to a specific approach of the types of society of microscopic and macroscopic phenomena.