Emile Durkheim stressed that people are the product of their social environment and that behavior cannot be
understood fully in terms of individual biological and psychological traits. The father of sociology. (Structural
Functionalist)
• Believed that the limits of human potential are social, not biologically based.
• Concerned with functional interrelations between systems of beliefs and thought and the underlying social structure.
• We use the word “function,” in preference to “end” or “purpose” precisely because social phenomena do not generally
exist for the useful results they produce.
• Social facts are patterned ways of thinking and feeling, which exist outside the individual, but exert social control
over everyone. Societies are built on social facts.
• Anomie – a condition where social control becomes ineffective as a result of the loss of shared values and the sense
of purpose in society. Caused by rapid social change. It is not a state of mind, but a property of the social structure.
(i.e. industrial revolution)
• Egoistic Suicide happens to people who are isolated from a society
• Altruistic Suicide happens to people who are deeply integrated into society (i.e. military leaders who kill
themselves after a battle defeat)
• Anomic suicide results from a lack of social control
• Fatalistic suicide results form excessive regulation and oppressive (i.e. slaves)
• The Division of Labor in Society
• Elementary forms of Religious Life