Sociology’s Founders: Comte, Marx, and Durkheim
The Birth and Consecration of a New Science
The French Revolution and the 19th Century
The French Revolution (1789) brought down the old regime. The 19th century, in establishing a new social order, saw many changes, but the most important was increasing industrialization. It was the century of industrial capitalism, changes in the form of work, and a new social organization. Industrialization strengthened the alliance between science and its practical application: technique. The century saw a rebirth in sociology. Comte, Marx, and Durkheim analyzed how to organize the new society.
Auguste Comte (1798-1857)
Classification and Plan of Science
Comte regarded the modern world as a time of disorder and anarchy. In his work, “Plan of Scientific Work Necessary to Reorganize Society” (1822), he indicated that there was a need to reform the system of science, that is, an intellectual revolution. In his book, “The System of Positive Politics,” he held the same ideas. While Marx thought the causes were economic, Comte thought they were the product of social and mental anarchy. Marx’s philosophy has been called “historical materialism,” while Comte’s is “historical idealism.”
Taking a conservative position, Comte designed a “system of science” consisting of six core sciences: mathematics, astronomy, physics, chemistry, biology, and sociology. In his work, “Course of Positive Philosophy,” he discussed the law governing the research of social phenomena.
The Law of Three Stages
This law states that both the development of our intelligence and the development of societies pass through three stages:
- Theological or Fictitious: Man is at the mercy of divine will.
- Metaphysical or Abstract: Ontological thought.
- Positive or Scientific: Scientific knowledge.
In these stages, Comte tells the story of human societies.
Sociology and the Religion of Humanity
Sociology, to Comte, is the most important science because it is the only one that understands all aspects of life. The sociologist is one whose subject of study is science, through “research and development of the law governing order and social progress.”
Karl Marx (1818-1883)
Marx stated, “It is not the consciousness of men that determines their being, but on the contrary, their social existence that determines their consciousness.” Marx is not interested in human nature but in what man does with the world.
Alienation
Marx saw man as a subject who establishes himself by creating things. In capitalist society, man is alienated. Alienation is a state that makes man feel strange to himself. The causes are the social conditions of the capitalist system. This way, the relations between employers and employees escalate into conflicts, displaying the bourgeoisie and the proletariat.
Marx wanted to show that classical political economy is not a true social science for two reasons:
- Classical economists consider the search for self-interest and profit to be natural to man, but Marx indicates that it is a product of capitalist society.
- Marx argues that all economic phenomena are also social phenomena.
In “Capital,” Marx concludes that alienation is neither inherent nor eternal.
Historical Materialism
Man is part of nature. The material is that with which man establishes relations with nature, and other men. These are material relations that Marx called “social production of life.” Also, the material is historical in nature, determined by specific forms of production, consumption, and property. Therefore, history is a reality produced by man through activity.
Emile Durkheim (1858-1917)
Durkheim criticized Comte’s Law of Three Stages and positivism. He elaborated a set of rules for sociology:
- Consider social facts as things.
- Search for the cause that determines a social fact.
- Social facts are ways of doing or thinking.
His major works are: The Division of Labor in Society (1893), The Rules of Sociological Method (1895), Suicide (1897), and The Elementary Forms of Religious Life (1912).
Mechanical and Organic Solidarity
In “The Division of Labor in Society,” he posed the relationship between the individual and society through:
- Mechanical Solidarity: This derives from similarities and forms of social integration within a group.
- Organic Solidarity: This results from differentiation and is a form of social integration based on differences.
Durkheim stated, “It is the individual that comes from society and not the other way around.”
Societies Governed by Solidarity
- Mechanical: Based on similarities. Very strong collective consciousness. Characteristic of primitive societies.
- Organic: Based on individual differentiation. Greater division of labor. Characteristic of contemporary societies.
- Anomie: An unusual form of division of labor. Pathological individualism.
Anomie and Egoism
The third book of “The Division of Labor in Society” is entitled “Abnormal Forms of the Division of Labor.” There are three forms: anomie, inequality, and inadequate organization. In his most famous work, “Suicide,” he discovered that the cause of the lack of social integration is not anomie but egoism. The cause of egoism is the demystification of contemporary society.
The New Morality
Durkheim proposed to continue seeking a new ideal that participates in this sacred character, now almost forgotten. Society may acquire that sacredness. Durkheim tried to recover the social. What needs to be done now is to discover and spread a new ideal for a new morality, in place of this new religious morality. Durkheim based this on three ideas: the spirit of discipline, membership in social groups, and the autonomy of the will.