Part 1
The contributions of four sociologists are considered as the basis of the modern day sociology; they are Max Weber, Emile Durkheim, Vilfredo Pareto and George Simmel. This paper is intended for tracing the comparison and contrast of theories proposed by Emile Durkheim and George Simmel. Their theories are one of the bricks of the foundation of Sociology as an independent discipline. While reading the works of these sociologists, it is quite conspicuous to find the transition of thoughts from social philosophy to sociology proper. Here, the contributions to sociology by these great proponents are examined in brief. Though both Durkheim and Simmel belong to the classical period in the history of sociology, their theories do not have common train of thought and also do not have significant antagonistic standpoints, but fundamentally different approaches. Hence the approaches of both theories are presented here in brief for the reader to infer the deeper contrasts.
Approaches of Durkheim
Durkheim saw the existence of a special subject-matter that can be pursued by methods of science i.e. sociology. He suggested that sociology should study social reality and pointed out that this discipline had special qualities inherent only in it, Durkheim, 1895. The elements of social reality are social facts and the collection social facts is the society. They have, according to Durkheim, distinctive social characteristics, which cannot be satisfied by the explanations at the biological or psychological level. These social facts in isolation or combination constitute the subject-matter of sociology. The recognition of the characteristics of the society such as its integrative principle, the dichotomies of society’s healthy and pathological states, the methods of sociological investigation, and the status of sociology as a science, are viewpoints expressed by Durkheim.
A social fact Durkheim defines as "every way of acting, fixed or not, capable of exercising on the individual an external constraint. Durkheim “Although in his early contributions Durkheim defined social facts as influenced by their exteriority and constraint, he later changed his views significantly. The advanced Durkheim began to consider social facts and moral rules, as effective guides and controls of conduct as they become internalized in the consciousness of the individuals. In his lifetime he accepted the interplay of influence from societal factors and the individual’s internal conditions that shape the society. In the later part of his life he considered social constraint having limited controls on the individual and the individual will with a moral obligation to obey a rule is also needed. He said society is "something beyond us and something in ourselves” Durkheim 1858.
The main thrust of Durkheim's standpoint is his assertion that the study of society must avoid studying society as an hierarchy of components and consider social phenomena sui generis (Lukes, 1973). He focused on the social-structural causes of social problems. He considered socialism as a movement and shared agreements with people such as Saint-Simon, Marx, etc.
Durkheim was also interested in the characteristics of the groups and its structures rather than with individual attributes. He is one of the first social scientist to show that group’s properties are independent of individual qualities and must, therefore be studied in its own right. He examined units of behavior as characteristics of particular groups or changes of such characteristics. For example, Durkheim considered increase of suicide rates in a particular group is due to the weakened social cohesion in that group and the members are not sufficiently protected against existential crises.
Another noteworthy aspect of Durkheim’s way is that he relied on empirical data in formulating his theories. For example, to explain differential rates of suicide in various religious, geographical areas or occupational groupings, Durkheim gathered the demographical and statistical information, and then studied the character of these groups, their characteristic ways of bringing about cohesion and solidarity among their members. He was able to link the data with the behavior of the groups. However, he did not overly concern himself with the psychological traits or motives of the individuals of the group (Durkheim).
Through the observation of the data on suicide, Durkheim discovered that the suicide varies inversely with the degree of integration, i.e. "When a society is well integrated, it holds its individuals together under its control." Communities that are well integrated have a cushion to protect from the impacts of frustrations and tragedies that afflict the society; hence, the individuals in such communities are less likely to display extreme behavior such as suicide.
Durkheim distinguished between mechanical and organic solidarity. Mechanical solidarity exists when ideas, attitudes and tendencies are common to all members of the society, outnumber in quantity and intensity than the personal idiosyncrasies. This solidarity, Durkheim (1958) suggests, can grow in inverse ratio to individual personality. Which means mechanical solidarity prevails where individual differences are discouraged, and the community members have a common weal? Organic solidarity, on the other hand, develops out of differences between individuals. Here Durkheim introduces the concept of division of labor and explains that this is possible only if the individuals are different. He suggests that by increasing differentiation of functions in the society differences between individuals also increases.
He predicted that a society’s members would engage in differentiated ways of life depending on one another and the networks of solidarity. In such systems, there may escape from external controls.
Approaches of Simmel
Simmel’s approach to sociology differs from Durkheim’s. He rejects the notion that society can be studied as a whole and discourages the attempt to discover laws of evolution and development that govern a society. He considers society as a moral and cultural enterprise in which free individuals can associate. Society cannot be approached as we explore the nature and nature’s laws in the physical sciences. For Simmel, society consists of interactions between and among individuals, and the sociologist is supposed to study the patterns and forms of interactions, rather than formulate social laws.
The complexity and the ambiguity of social life can be studied only in context and not through standardized template (Simmel ). Individuals in the society are part of the socialization process, and the process continues eternally. Simmel attempted to propose his social theory in the context of this perpetual and dynamic socialization process. Simmel’s proposals of social forms and social types revolve around a vortex of interactions. Simmel’s typology of the ‘stranger’ speaks about the marginality of a person who exists on the boundaries of a group, at the same time it suggests how a stranger becomes an element in the life of a group when its members choose to trust the stranger. The dynamics of marginality of the stranger and the centrality of the group is what Simmel tries to project in his writings.
While Durkheim attempts tops down approach, Simmel inquiries from bottom up way. , By observing the smallest of social interactions and Simmel imagines seeing how large institutions emerged from them. Through his unique way of looking at social phenomenon, he often discovered features that other theorists missed. For example, Simmel observed that the number of people in an interaction can affect its process and outcome. The interaction between two people (a dyad) will be very different from that of a three person’s interaction (a triad)
Also, Simmel was very interested in relation between the individual and society. He was sharp at exploring the most intimate details of individual psychology to larger social structures. He is of the view that the modern civilization can both be an aid as well as a hindrance to the development of an individual.
Part 2
Human beings are socialized completely and throughout; hence, all human cognition in reality is social cognition. The beginning of social life for an individual is a significant step in the evolution of cognition. This statement forecasts that at a future evolutionary point, human cognition will equate itself to social cognition, Pierre Steiner &, John Stewart 2009. Though, social systems are made up of interactions among autonomous individuals and these interactions cannot be reduced to mere individual actions, there is always a set of norms define our behavior. Along with autonomy, this view emphasizes the heteronomy also. The modern view is “fully blown autonomy requires heteronomy” Pierre Steiner &, John Stewart 2009, which acknowledges that the constraints of social institutions enables the individuals to enter new planes of shared meaningfulness.
Autonomy is a concept found in many disciplines. In sociology, it is the capacity or freedom of making a rational, informed and un-coerced decision by any individual. On the other hand, heteronomy refers to an individual’s action that is influenced by an outside force or entity.
Heteronomy is the opposite of autonomy. While societies create their own establishments of laws, rules, traditions and behaviors, autonomous societies are aware of the value of institutions; hence they explicitly self-institute. But, the members of heteronomous societies voluntarily subject to extra-social authority such as God, the constitution, religious text, ancestors, culture, heritage, etc. Though, Durkheim and Simmel did not refer to these concepts explicitly, their theories refer to these concepts tacitly, and that gives a challenge while interpreting their standpoints in the light of autonomy vs. heteronomy.
Durkheim defines a social fact as a situation that is capable of exercising an external constraint on an individual. Such social facts imply the role of coercion and control of individual behaviors. As we have seen earlier, he has taken a view point that sociology is the study of social facts, Durkheim 1895. We have also seen that later in his life he discovered that external conditions have limited influence on the moral behavior of the individual. It is the individual who decides what and how to act in a given situation. From this account, it can be inferred that in the earlier part of his life, Durkheim was holding staunch values of heteronomy but in the later part of his life he began to accommodate the autonomic viewpoints too.
Durkheim showed extreme interests in answering the questions "how is a society created" and "what holds a society together" and in his book The Division of Labor in Society, Durkheim answered the questions by taking a stand point that humans are inherently egoistic, it is the norms, beliefs and values (he calls them as collective consciousness) integrates the society. He even said that society cannot function or survive without this collective consciousness. Collective consciousness produces the society, holds it together, and individuals produce collective consciousness merely through interactions. Again, strong heteronomy doctrines are projected by Durkheim.
Classifying suicides and attempting to derive useful explanations for societal good is a remarkable contribution of Durkheim. In the book Suicide (1897), Durkheim explained about the differing rate of suicide among Protestants and Catholics. Lower suicide rate among the Catholics is attributed to robust social control than the Protestants. According to Durkheim, Catholic community had normal levels of integration while Protestant society had lower levels of togetherness. Durkheim considered suicide as a social fact, depicting variations in its rate on a macro level. The unit of analysis for studying suicide was the community, not the individuals. Suicide victim’s feelings and motivations were not given any attention by Durkheim confirming that he belonged to Heteronomy School.
Simmel developed a typology of social types in support of his inventory of social forms. Along with the depiction of "the stranger," he phenomenologically described other diverse types of individuals such as "the mediator," "the adventurer," "the poor," "the renegade," and "the man in the middle." Probably this typology may have influenced other later social scientists to come up with more rigorous types such as Eyesenck’s personality types, Cattel’s 15 PF, etc. Simmel conceived that each social type has characteristic reactions and expectations of others. The type bears influence on relations with others, performance in particular position and behavior in specific situations. His classifications of individuals are seen as attributes of the social reality / structure. Contrary to Durkheim’s arguments, Simmel seem to favor the autonomy.
Simmel's most important contribution which had great influence on the later developments was that the number of people influences the interactional process and the interpersonal outcome. He demonstrated that Dyad is very much different from Triad. He discovered that in a triad there is a possibility of forming a dyad within itself. The dyad with a triad can threaten the remaining individual's independence and causing him / her to become the subordinate of the group. The dyad and triad dynamics are the microcosm of the society or social structure. As the group (structure) becomes increasingly larger, the individuals in the group become separated, isolated and segmented. This contribution of Simmel suggests a domination of heteronomy. In a group situation, the individual has limited influence, thus tilting the balance towards heteronomy. The observation of the changes in dynamics of interaction with respect to number of people within the group was inadvertently presented to Simmel.
Though the dyadic and triadic phenomenon suggests heteronomy, Simmel held on to autonomy argument. For example, Simmel engrossed on methods of association and did not pay attention to individual consciousness. Simmel invested his faith on the creative consciousness of the individual and one can find him referring to the ability of actors in creating social structures and the tragic effects those structures had on the ingenuity of the individuals. Simmel's early reflections on a social phenomenon strongly suggest autonomy, but at later stage he also moved towards the middle path of accepting both schools. For example, Simmel also believed that social and cultural structures have a life of their own.
The theories proposed by the doyens Durkheim and Simmel; particularly in the early stages of the shaping of sociology have significance even today. The astonishing fact is that the contemporary sociologists presented the arguments from diverse standpoints making them not only attractive but also plausible and useful in explaining social issues.
REFERENCES
Steven Lukes, “Emile Durkheim. His Life and Work. A Historical and Critical Study”, Allen Lane, London, 1973.
Durkheim, Émile, "The Rules of Sociological Method" 8th edition[1895], translated by Sarah A. Solovay and John M. Mueller, ed. George E. G. Catlin (1938, 1964 edition), pp. 13. (Emile Durkheim. Les règles de la méthode sociologique (Felix Alcan, Paris, 1895).
Emile Durkheim. “Socialism and Saint-Simon”, Translated by Charlotte Sattler, The Antioch Press, Yellow Springs, 1958.
Emile Durkheim. Le suicide, 1897
Anthony Giddens, “Capitalism and Modern Social Theory. An Analysis of the Writings of Marx, Durkheim and Max Weber”, Cambridge U.P., London, 1971.
Pierre Steiner & John Stewart, “From autonomy to heteronomy (and back): The enaction of social life, Phenomenology and the Cognitive Sciences”, Volume 8, Issue 4, pp 527-550, December 2009.
Kenneth Allan & Kenneth D. Allan. Explorations in Classical Sociological Theory: Seeing the Social World. Pine Forge Press, 2 November 2005.
Craig J. Calhoun, “Classical sociological theory”, Wiley-Blackwell. (2002).
