Sociology: Key Concepts, Theories, and Social Structures

Posted on Dec 26, 2024 in Social sciences

Core Sociological Concepts

Social Construction: An idea or practice that a group of people agree exists. It is maintained over time by people taking its existence for granted.

Social Order: The relative durability and persistence of social structures across time and space. These norms, roles, and values get “inside” people through socialization…Unavoidable, and most intense during childhood.

Agency and Structure: One extreme: Radical free will. Other extreme: Radical determinism. Incoherent: radical free will can’t account for how society will “push back” against choices.

Micro and Macro: The study of human behavior in contexts of face-to-face interaction. The study of large-scale groups, organizations, or social systems.

Social Change: The rise of (now post) industrial capitalism (private ownership of wealth). The rationalization of science, business, and government (precise calculation, involving abstract rules and procedures…dominate the social world).

Foundational Sociologists

August Comte (1798-1875)

Coined the term Sociology. Wanted a secular social physics of the world.

Émile Durkheim (1858-1917)

Influenced by Comte but thought he wasn’t scientific enough. Developed key concepts like:

• Social facts: aspects of social life that shape our actions as individuals.
• Social Constraint: conditioning influence on our behavior of the groups and societies of which we are members.
• Anomie: situation in which social norms lose their hold over individual behavior.
• The division of labor, Organic solidarity: social cohesion that results from the various parts of a society functioning as an integrated whole.

Karl Marx (1818-1883)

Known today for the Communist Manifesto. Historically and politically important. Substantively important for his materialist conception of history. Group behavior and outlook shaped by relationship to means of production. Saw rising inequality under capitalism.

Max Weber (1864-1920)

Modernity meant the spread of bureaucracy and rationalization. Marked by a clear hierarchy of authority and written rules and procedures, and staffed by full-time employees. Looks for the religious origins of both.

Lost Founders

Harriet Martineau

Focused on key neglected social institutions like marriage, children, home life, and race relations.

W.E.B. DuBois

Traced racial inequality in the US back to its institutional underpinnings. Historical analysis of the aftermath of the US Civil War and subsequent social and economic policies.

Sociological Theories

Symbolic Interactionism: The role of symbols and language as core elements of all human interaction.

Functionalism: Can be manifest (group) or latent (unintended functions).

Marxism and Class Conflict: Key agonistic theory (SI and Functionalism are consensual) focusing on power and ideology.

Feminism and Feminist Theory: Example: among college-educated people, married men earn 44% more and married women earn 10% less than their unmarried colleagues.

Rational Choice Theory: Individual behavior is purposive (oriented to achieve a known goal). Narrow appropriation of Weber’s theory of action.

Postmodern Theory: Belief that society is no longer governed by history or process. Postmodern society is highly pluralistic and diverse, with no grand narrative guiding its developments.

Research Methods

Scientific Polyglot: The object of sociological analysis (society) is big and complex, so we need many different tools (methods) to study it.

Ethnography: Firsthand study of people as they go about their lives, often using participant observation or interviewing methods. Pro: window into people’s self-understanding of their social location. Con: difficult to generalize, ethical concerns.

Key Statistical Terms: Correlation coefficients, can infer, first whether your sample is likely to be representative of your population, second whether there is (potentially) a causal relationship between two factors.

Comparative-Historical: Historical documents are used to examine how people and institutions change over time. Example: Michael Mann’s history of social power from when societies first started settled agriculture (the Neolithic revolution) to the present (10,000 years).

Cultural Turn: Sociology’s recent emphasis on the importance of understanding the role of culture in daily life. Cultural Universals: Characteristic of every known human society in history, Language, symbols.

Social Development

Cultural and Social Development:

• Hunter-gatherer societies (50,000 BCE)
• Pastoral and agrarian societies (12,000 BCE)
• Traditional societies and civilizations (6,000 BCE)
• Industrialized societies (1750-present)

Global South: Underdeveloped (Afghanistan), Emerging economies (China, India, South Korea).

Socialization

Becker’s Theory: From a strictly behavioral category (I have smoked) to a social one (gotten high) categories of meaning and understanding come into play.

Socialization: Social process through which children develop an awareness of social norms and values and achieve a distinct sense of self… they continue to some degree throughout life.

Who?:

• Primary socialization: (infancy and early childhood)
• Secondary socialization, traditional societies, contemporary industrial societies

Life course socialization: The relationship between social and self-identity continues for your whole life, albeit with varying intensity.

Theories of Socialization

Interactionist theories:

• Mead: A bundle of desires and wants unorganized gives way to the social self, the person considering how others view them.
• Piaget: (MCAT FLAG: comes from sense-making in the world as children interact with objects and people while they acquire language). Stages of progress: sensorimotor (learning by touch), preoperational (disordered symbolic representation, egocentric speech), concrete operational (abstraction, systematic interaction), formal operational (hypothetical reasoning, high abstraction).
• Freud: Repressed/sublimated feelings structure identity into adulthood.
• Chodorow: Instead of eventual identification, children break with their parents in different ways based on gender, and masculinity is a loss, not femininity.

Sociological Imagination

Sociological Imagination: C. Wright Mills: A quality of mind that will help them to use information and to develop reason in order to achieve lucid summations of what is going on in the world and what may be happening within themselves. Enables us to grasp history and biography and the relations between the two within society. Occurs within the character of the individual and within the range of his immediate relations with others, having to do with his self and with those limited areas of social life of which he is directly and personally aware. Has to do with matters that transcend these local environments of individuals and the range of his inner life.

Social Structure

Social expectation dependent on status and social position: Status is usually commensurable while social position isn’t as easily.

Groups versus aggregates:

• Aggregates: A simple collection of people who happen to be together in a particular place but do not significantly interact or identify with one another.
• Groups: A collection of people who regularly interact with one another on the basis of shared expectations concerning behavior and who share a sense of common identity.

Primary groups: Are intense, emotional, and usually have face-to-face interaction and a strong sense of commitment.

Secondary groups: Are much less intense versions of primary groups (examples: distant relatives, abstract humanistic).

Coercion and Conformity: Groups exert enormous pressure to conform, Asch Experiments, Milgram experiments.

Bureaucracy: Max Weber: modern societies are becoming increasingly bureaucratized.

Bureaucracies are enormously efficient and effective at specific things, but can be cumbersome.

Formal organizations: Formal organizations can experience decoupling of their formal and informal procedures. When “decoupled,” the organization may pay “lip service” to its stated goals but may do very different things informally.

Findings from network analysis: Network closure, homophily, contagion, brokerage.

Strength of weak ties: “Weak ties” (ties between friends-of-friends) that connect distant networks turn out to be crucial informal means of collecting information and getting exposed to opportunities.

Deviance and Crime

Crime: Modern societies (both in the developing world and contemporary industrial societies) are characterized by.

Subcultures: Subculture = values and norms distinct from those of the majority, held by a group within a wider society. Deviance = modes of action that do not conform to the norms and values held by most members of a group or society.

Example: Gun Culture Gallup numbers (national sample) 41% have a gun in the home, 55% want more strict gun control, 33% want it about the same, 11% want it less strict.

Theories of Deviance

Control Theory: Crime is an imbalance between impulses toward criminal activity and controls that deter it.

Conflict Theory: Deviance and crime are often political statements (even subtle ones) resisting the economic and social order as a whole.

Functionalist Theories:

• Durkheim: Crime and deviance can come from “anomie,” or a lack of social regulation. As the pressure of social norms weakens, people are more likely to break them. HOWEVER, deviance is also an opportunity for society to reassert its values. Example: Obama (after a mass shooting, in Hesston Kansas): “We cannot become numb to this.”
• Ohlin: Crime is caused by the existence of subcultures where it is accepted. Deviance from dominant cultural norms is conformity to a local subculture.
• Merton: Society endorses overall values (“work hard and you’ll achieve”) but doesn’t provide equal means to achieve. People can respond to this situation in one of five ways…

Interactionist Theories: The line between deviance and normal behavior is constructed through interaction processes. Over time (example: Marijuana) once-deviant behaviors can become normal. Another example: prohibition (1920-1933).

Social Stratification

Marx: Over time, the gap between rich and poor will widen, and conditions for workers will become increasingly miserable.

Weber: Different economic positions also have very different sets of skills (examples: welders, managers) that get them privileges and rewards compared to other members of their class. People are also stratified by status (the social honor or prestige that others accord them), so that someone can be relatively “high class” and still not a capitalist.

Other theories:

• Davis and Moore: Society is stratified because we need to reward rare and socially important talents better than more common ones.
• Erik Olin Wright: Economic resources are threefold: Investments or money capital, Physical means of production, Labor power.

Education and Lifestyle

Education: About 1.2 percent of the US population has a Ph.D.

Lifestyle (Anette Lareau): There is a difference in how working-class and middle-class parents behave toward their children. Working-class parents practice “the development of natural growth.” In non-school time, kids help out around the house or play with friends. Children are not expected to “reason” or negotiate when talking to their parents. Middle-class parents practice “concerted cultivation.” In non-school time, kids take extra lessons, do organized sports, and develop skills. From an early age, children “reason” and negotiate with their parents.

Lifestyle (Pierre Bourdieu): The cultural “taste” people express is heavily class-dependent. Social class, in turn, is determined both by how much money you have (“economic capital”) and how much of a connoisseur you are (“cultural capital”).

Social Classes

The upper class: Wealthiest Americans earning more than $180,800 a year, owning large suburban homes, driving new luxury cars. Wealth comes from investment income (usually). About 5% of all American households.

The “middle class”: Amorphous group of people earning stable incomes from white-collar (professional) and blue-collar (manual) labor. Together makes up about 55% of the American class system.

The upper-middle class: Well-off professionals, such as doctors, lawyers, professors, with incomes ranging from about $100,000 to about $180,000 or so. About 15% of all American households.

The lower-middle class: Skilled services, office workers, skilled craftsmen, with household incomes from about $38,000 to about $100,000. About 40% of American households.

Working Class: Factory workers, mechanics, office workers, etc. About 20% of American households. Income from about $20,000 to $38,000.

The “lower class”: People who work full-time at low wages, part-time, or not at all. About 20% of households. Income is below $20,000.

Inequality and Social Mobility

Inequality and social mobility: Mobility can happen in a few basic ways:

• Intergenerational mobility: Children move up or down relative to their parents.
• Intragenerational mobility: Over the course of a “personal career,” or one’s working life and dotage.
• Exchange mobility: “One-for-one” mobility where people must “exchange” positions in a system of fixed resources and size.
• Structural mobility: As the system as a whole gets richer or poorer, people have more or fewer opportunities.

One-third of middle-class people (30th-70th percentile of income) fall out of the middle class during their lifetimes (as of 2011).

Pierre Bourdieu: The “cultural capital” you receive during socialization is enormously important.

Cultural capital: The facets of upbringing valued and recognized in wider society as components to success. Cultural capital determines whether you can “make the most” of an opportunity. Wealthy parents can make sure their children have every advantage in education, healthcare, and physical development. Poorer parents can’t. Examples: SAT/ACT prep. Analogy: playing a video game on easy.

Poverty

Poverty:

• Absolute poverty: The minimal requirements necessary to sustain a healthy existence.
• Relative poverty: Poverty defined in terms of the standards of mainstream society.

Gallup (1998): 55% of respondents think the cause of poverty is “lack of effort.”

Class Matters

Class Matters: Three heart attacks, three classes:

• Jean Miele, Architect (upper-middle class): End of story: healthier than ever, retired comfortably.
• Will Wilson, Con Ed worker (middle class): End of story: o.k. health, preparing to retire on pension.
• Ewa Gora, Janitor: End of story: very poor health (and deteriorating), attempting to get back to work from precarious disability.

A matter of structural opportunity and cultural capital (and how the two combine).

Miele is around knowledgeable friends for his heart attack, who immediately put him in an ambulance that gives him a choice of the very best hospital nearby or a public city hospital. Very quickly gets the best standard of care (and angioplasty).

Wilson also gets an ambulance quickly but goes to the second-best hospital. Wilson gets angioplasty only after trying cheaper de-clotting drugs.

Gora only gets an ambulance after trying a home remedy (vodka) to the most crowded and poorest hospital of the three. Gora never gets angioplasty and suffers permanent heart damage.

Miele is able (thanks also to his wife) to focus exclusively on his health. Loses a huge amount of weight, retires on favorable terms, spends time relaxing on his huge Brookhaven estate. Focuses exclusively on his care—follows all doctor’s orders and never misses treatments.

Wilson also gets help but struggles with diet and exercise. His fiancée helps, and Wilson is able to lower his responsibilities at work.

Gora faces stupendous structural and cultural-capital obstacles. At first, doesn’t even understand that she’s had a heart attack until a follow-up appointment. Has to balance arguing with insurance, traveling on public transit for appointments, and trying to return to work with a husband working double shifts.

Gender

Gender: Biological extreme: genes/hormones/brain activity determine “gender.” Epigenetics: social environments significantly shape biological factors over time, which remain the key determinant of behavior.

Marriage is occurring later (source):

• 1960: 20 for women, 22 for men
• 1990: 23 for women, 26 for men
• 2010: 27 for women, 29 for men

MORE women than men graduate college (20.1 million women in 2011 had bachelor’s degrees, compared to 18.7 million men).

Developing world:

• Western/Middle Africa: 1970-89: 53% of women ages 15-19 had been married at least once. 1990-2000: 38.4%.
• Southeast Asia: 1970-89: 39% of women 15-19. 1990-2000: 32.3%.

Theories of Gender Inequality

Functionalism: Gender inequality persists because society “needs” a sexual division of labor.

Liberal feminism: Gender inequality is a civil rights issue!

Radical feminism: Gender inequality is a result of patriarchy, or the dominance.

Black feminism: “Speaking for ‘all women’ covers up the specific plight of black and other minority women, for whom solutions might look very different and whose relationship to femininity might not be like yours!”

Postmodern feminism: There is no shared basis of “femininity,” or even “womanhood” at all. Instead, the boundaries between feminine/masculine, and even male/female, are constantly reconstructed through performances.

Ethnicity

Ethnicity: Cultural values and norms that distinguish the members of a given group from others.

African Americans: Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) allows “separate but equal” institutions.

Civil Rights: Plessy overturned with Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, KS (1954). Widespread protest and civil disobedience (primarily in the American South) led by men and women like Martin Luther King Jr. peaks in the U.S. Civil Rights Act of 1964 and continues to today.

Migration

Migration:

• Traditional views: “Push” (factors causing people to leave a given country) versus “pull” (factors causing people to come to a country).
• Now: “Micro” (social networks, local knowledge of conditions) versus “macro” (political and economic) factors.

Assimilation: The acceptance of a minority into the majority, where the minority takes on the norms and values of the majority.

Power and Politics

Structure of power: Power: the ability of individuals or the members of a group to achieve aims or further the interests they hold.

The earliest forms of government were participatory or direct democracy, where decisions are made commonly by everyone affected by them.

In a world historical shift, “the state” emerged and was (usually very violently) brought into congruence with “the nation” to make “nation-states.”

• The state: An organization claiming a monopoly on the legitimate use of force in a given territory.
• The nation: People with a common identity that ideally includes shared culture, language, and feelings of belonging.

Generally (and ideally), nation-states today are sovereign, or the ultimate authority in a given territory.

Nation-state: They either achieve sovereignty and capacity (the ability to effectively govern their territory), or they become failed states. Example of failed states: modern-day Afghanistan, Sudan.

Forced expropriation and homogenization at different points in history. Example: France (in the 19th century) and the former Yugoslavia (in the 1990s). Big ethnic differences overlaid by rituals creating a common identity (plus violent expropriation). Examples: the United States and Britain. Anticolonial nationalism (where an educated elite is strongly motivated by nationalism, but the peasantry doesn’t necessarily follow). Example: India.

Nation-states in the world range from liberal democracies (U.S., Most of Europe, Australia, New Zealand, India) to autocratic states with democratic veneers (Russia) to nondemocratic states (China) to violent dictatorships (North Korea). Many nation-states face tensions with (and even rebellions from) suppressed nationalist minorities. Examples: Quebecois in Canada, Tibetans in China, Basques in France and Spain.

Democratic elitism: Leaders who possess appropriate judgment or technical expertise are elected as managers of the complex decisions necessary to run a state. This is usually accomplished effectively through competition among political parties.

Political party: An organization of individuals with broadly similar political aims, oriented toward achieving legitimate control of government through an electoral process.

Pluralism: Interest groups (business organizations, ethnic groups, labor unions, etc.) compete with one another to bend the ear of policymakers.

Levels of Government

State level: (excluding protectorates and territories, e.g., Puerto Rico). Similar breakdown of authority to the Federal government, but most actions usually under the control of and subject to federal authority.

Local Level: Group of Cities, Metropolitan Authorities, Counties, Villages, Incorporated Towns, etc. Controls provision of extra funding for schools, municipal services (garbage, public transit) and most policing.

Political Ideologies

Ideology of the electorate:

• “Liberal” or “Progressive”: In general, support higher social spending and an “ethic of social protection” resulting in liberal or progressive attitudes toward social issues.
• “Conservative”: In general, support strict budgetary controls and an “ethic of personal responsibility” resulting in more conservative attitudes toward social issues. Sometimes called “equality of opportunity.”

Theories of Political Polarization

Theories of why are attitudes polarized:

• What’s the Matter With Kansas? (Thomas Frank): White working-class voters abandoned the Democratic party as mainline Protestant groups declined, manufacturing jobs evaporated, and identity politics increased.
• Bowling Alone (Robert Putnam): Fewer people participate in organizations that span political attitudes (like bowling leagues), so people have less exposure to alternatives. There is a hard core of dedicated organizers (Occupy movement, Tea Party) that seek to mobilize passionate people to very right- or left-wing causes, while much of the population is demobilized.
• Echo Chamber: The media landscape is now highly fragmented, and people can practice “homophily”—talking to and consuming media from people who already agree with them (Source). Over time, this leads to “shutting out” alternative viewpoints. Think of unfriending your Uncle Roy.
• Diminished Democracy (Skocpol): Voluntary organizations have been pushed aside for nationalized, professionalized interest groups and lobbyists (on both the left and right). “Rather than volunteer, please donate!”

Capitalism

Phases of corporate:

• Family capitalism (entrepreneurial families).
• Managerial capitalism (technical experts).
• Welfare capitalism (corporation-as-state).
• Institutional capitalism.

Fordism: Mass production for mass markets. Tayloristic scientific management of the workforce and streamlining of factory production. Standardization and mass-marketing of products.

Post-Fordism: Flexible production for sometimes-niche markets. “Nimble” turn from one kind of product to another; quick turnarounds. From standardization to customization.