Durkheim’s Social Facts • It is a concept created by Durkheim. • It means something similar to social causes. • Durkheim studied about Suicide (1897). He said that if he could link individual behavior of suicide to social facts (social causes), he can make a case of sociology. • Here he did not studied the individual reason, but was rather interested in the different causes and suicide rate among groups, regions, countries, and different categories of people (e.g. married and single). • For him, it is the nature of social facts that leads to differences in suicide rates. • Durkheim focused on nonmaterial social facts (e.g. culture, religion, social institutions). • His another work, The Division of Labor in Society (1893). • There, he created a concept of collective conscience, which indicates common morality of people. • He said that in modern society, collective conscience decrease because of complex life. • For him, the more division of labor in industrial societies grows, the more workers become specialized in their tasks, the more, what he called, anomie increases.
Anomie • It is Durkheim’s another concept.
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• It refers to the loss of direction that felt in a society when social control of individual behavior has become ineffective. • The state of anomie often occurs during a time of big social change. • People are so confused and cannot cope with the new social environment. • Durkheim shared Comte’s belief that sociologist should provide direction of social change. • He advocated the creation of new social groups – mediators between the individual’s family and the state, such as trade unions.
By 1910, Durkheim had established a strong center of sociology in France.
Limitations of Positivism • Positivists believe that knowledge is neutral. • They think that they can keep human values out of their work. • However, they are criticized that they miss individual human activity. They regard human actors as passive, determined by “natural forces.” • Positivism is conservative, and not be able to challenge the existing social system.