one Theory and Methods - UniBG Bauman One could say that the main service the art of thinking ......

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one

Theory andMethods

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Why study sociology? 6

Understanding our world 6

Understanding our place in the world 6

Understanding ourselves 7

Freeing ourselves 7

Applying sociology 8

Careers in sociology 9

What is society? 10

A complex of institutions 10

Levels of society 11

Inequality and domination 12

Structure and culture 13

Is sociology a science? 14

What is a science? 14

Is sociology a natural science? 15

Is sociology a science at all? 16

Summary points 16

Key concepts 17

Further reading 17

Web links 17

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1

What is sociology?

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Zygmunt BaumanOne could say that the main service the art of thinkingsociologically may render to each and every one of us isto make us more sensitive; it may sharpen up our senses,open our eyes wider so that we can explore human con-ditions which thus far had remained all but invisible.Once we understand better how the apparently natural,inevitable, immutable, eternal aspects of our lives havebeen brought into being through the exercise of humanpower and human resources, we will find it hard to ac-cept once more that they are immune and impenetrableto human action—our own action included. Sociologicalthinking is, one might say, a power in its own right, an anti-fixating power. It renders flexible again theworld hitherto oppressive in its apparent fixity; it showsit as a world which could be different from what it is now. It can be argued that the art of sociologicalthinking tends to widen the scope, the daring and thepractical effectiveness of your and my freedom. Once the art has been learned and mastered, the individualmay well become just a bit less manipulable, more resilient to oppression and regulation from outside,more likely to resist being fixed by forces that claim to be irresistible.

Source: Bauman, Z. (1990) Thinking Sociologically (Oxford: BasilBlackwell), p. 16.

Zygmunt Bauman (19XX–) has been Professor ofSociology at the Universities of Leeds and Warsaw.Among his many reflections on sociological theory andcontemporary society are Modernity and the Holocaust(Cambridge: Polity), 1989; Globalization: The HumanConsequences (Cambridge: Polity), 1998; LiquidModernity (Cambridge: Polity), 2000. A second editionof Thinking Sociologically (written with Tim May) waspublished in 2001.

Steve BruceTo summarize, whatever reservations we may haveabout how closely actual scientists conform to the highstandards set in their programmatic statements aboutwhat they and why it works, we need not doubt that thenatural sciences offer the best available template for acquiring knowledge about the material world. Criticalreasoning, honest and diligent accumulation of evid-ence, subjecting ideas to test for internal consistencyand for fit with the best available evidence, seeking evid-ence that refutes rather than supports an argument, engaging in open exchanges of ideas and data uncon-strained by ideological commitments: all of those canbe profitably adopted by the social sciences. However,we need to appreciate the differences between the subject matter of the natural and the human sciences.People think. They act as they do, not because they arebound to follow unvarying rules but because they havebeliefs, values, interests, and intentions. That simplefact means that, while some forms of sociological re-search look rather like the work of chemists or physicists,for the sociologist there is always a further step to take.Our notion of explanation does not stop at identifyingregular patterns in social action. It requires that we understand.

Source: Bruce, S. (1999), Sociology: A Very Short Introduction(Oxford: Oxford University Press), pp . 18–19.

Steve Bruce (19XX–) has been Professor of Sociology at the University of Aberdeen since 1991. He is the author of The Edge of the Union: The Ulster LoyalistPolitical Vision (Oxford: Oxford University Press), 1994;Religion in Modern Britain (Oxford: Oxford UniversityPress), 1995; Choice and Religion: a Critique of RationalChoice Theory (Oxford: Oxford University Press); andmany other publications in the sociology of religion.

4 1: What is sociology?

We introduce you to sociology in this chapter. We begin by explaining why we think thatyou should study sociology, and by telling you what you can get out of it and what you canuse it for. We go on to tackle two fundamental questions. Sociologists study society butwhat do we mean by this term? How do sociologists study society—is sociology a science?

Four sociologists reflect on their subject

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C. Wright MillsThe sociological imagination enables its possessor tounderstand the larger historical scene in terms of itsmeaning for the inner life and the external career of avariety of individuals. . . . The sociological imaginationenables us to grasp history and biography and the relations between the two within society. That is its taskand its promise. . . . those who have been imaginativelyaware of the promise of their work have consistentlyasked three sorts of questions:

1 What is the structure of this particular society as awhole? What are its essential components, and howare they related to one another? How does it differfrom other varieties of social order? Within it, what isthe meaning of any particular feature for its continu-ance and for its change?

2 Where does this society stand in human history? Whatare the mechanics by which it is changing? What is itsplace within and its meaning for the development ofhumanity as a whole? How does any particular fea-ture we are examining affect, and how is it affectedby, the historical period in which it moves? . . .

3 What varieties of men and women now prevail in thissociety and in this period? And what varieties arecoming to prevail? In what ways are they selected andformed, liberated and repressed, made sensitive andblunted?

Source: Mills, C. W. (1959), The Sociological Imagination (NewYork: Oxford University Press), pp. 5–7.

C. Wright Mills (1916–62) was an American sociologistwell-known for his criticism of abstract approaches in sociology, and his belief that sociology should relate the ‘personal troubles’ of the individual to the ‘public issues’ of social structure. Apart from The SociologicalImagination, he is most well-known for White Collar: TheAmerican Middle Classes (New York: Oxford UniversityPress), 1951; and The Power Elite (New York: OxfordUniversity Press), 1956.

Peter BergerA more adequate representation of social reality nowwould be the puppet theatre, with the curtain rising onthe little puppets jumping about on the ends of their invisible strings, cheerfully acting out the little parts thathave been assigned to them in the tragi-comedy to beenacted. . . . We see the puppets dancing on their minia-ture stage, moving up and down as the strings pull themaround, following the prescribed course of their variouslittle parts. We learn to understand the logic of this theatre and we find ourselves in its motions. We locateourselves in society and thus recognize our own positionas we hang from its subtle strings. For a moment we seeourselves as puppets indeed. But then we grasp a decis-ive difference between the puppet theatre and our owndrama. Unlike the puppets, we have the possibility ofstopping in our movements, looking up and perceivingthe machinery by which we have been moved. In this actlies the first step towards freedom.

Source: Berger, P. (1963), Invitation to Sociology: A HumanisticPerspective (Harmondsworth: Penguin), pp. 140, 199.

Peter Berger (1929–) is an American sociologist, who(with Thomas Luckmann) wrote The Social Constructionof Reality: A Treatise in the Sociology of Knowledge(Harmondsworth: Penguin), 1971. Two other well-known books by him are: The Sacred Canopy: Ele-ments of a Sociological Theory of Religion (New York:Doubleday); The Capitalist Revolution: Fifty Propositionsabout Prosperity, Equality, and Liberty (Aldershot:Wildwood House), 1987.

What is sociology? 5

Four sociologists reflect on their subject

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Why study sociology?

Sociology enables us to understand the world we livein but also to understand ourselves, for we are theproducts of that world. This understanding can helpus to gain more control over our lives but it can alsobe put to more practical uses as well.

Understanding our worldWe live in a world of extraordinary choice. Our choiceof food to eat, holiday destinations to visit, and tele-vision channels to watch seems almost limitless. Wecan in many ways choose our own identity, by con-structing a lifestyle that suits us or creating a new persona in a virtual community. We can choose thebody shape that we want and through a combina-tion of diet, exercise, and cosmetic surgery at least try to change our body accordingly. The provision ofchoice, whether in education or health-care, has alsobecome one of the main priorities of governmentpolicy.

Although we have a strong sense of choice, we are,none the less, subject to social pressures that in manyways seem to make these choices for us. Our valuesand our opportunities are shaped by the society inwhich we grow up and our position in this society.We are under pressure to conform to other people’sideas of how we should look and how we should live.While we may think that we choose certain productsor decide to hold certain views, we are subject to extensive manipulation by advertisers, media moguls,and spin doctors. Many people anyway feel that workpressures and shortage of time leave them with verylittle opportunity to do anything but get up in themorning, work all day, and do the housework or lookafter the children when they get home at night.

We also live in a world where the ability to choosevaries enormously between people. In our own soci-ety the poor, the unemployed, the single parent, therefugee, all have less choice than others. In mostAfrican, Asian, or Latin American countries, wherethere is far more poverty and far fewer opportunitiesto escape it, many people struggle to just survive fromday to day. Choice is, therefore, unequally distrib-uted and has become steadily more so, as inequalityhas increased—not only within our own society butalso in the world as a whole, for the gap between richand poor countries has been widening as well.

How are we to understand and explain this strangeworld we live in, a world that gives us choice but also

takes it away, that provides some with enormouschoice but others with very little, that makes us thinkthat we have choice when we often have hardly any?It is above all sociology that has tackled these issuesand you will find that they come up again and againin this book, when we examine the way that beliefs,values, and identities are shaped and created; or analyse inequalities of class, gender, and ethnicity; ordiscuss the influence of the mass media on the waythat we think and behave; or consider the conflictingpressures of work demands and household obligations.

Understanding our place in the worldSociology enables us not only to understand the worldaround us but also our place within it. This is not justa matter of where we live, important as this is, but ofwhere we are located within social structures and thechanges taking place in these structures.

Sociologists use the term social structure to refer toany relatively stable pattern of relationships betweenpeople. In our panel of four sociologists, C. WrightMills refers to the structure of ‘society as a whole’ but any social group, however big or small, from a family to a political party, has a social structure. So does any organization, such as a university, awork-place, or a hospital. There are also the widerstructures of class, gender, and ethnicity that stretchacross a whole society and, indeed, beyond it. Someorganizations, such as transnational corporations,cross national boundaries, and national societiesthemselves exist within a global structure of inter-national relationships.

By describing such structures, sociology providesus with a map of society within which we can placeourselves, so that we can begin to understand the social forces that act upon us. These structures are,however, constantly changing and one of the maintasks of sociology is to understand and explain socialchange and the impact that it has on people. We examine social structures in Part Three of this bookand you will find that each of the chapters is cent-rally concerned with processes of social change.

Some recent changes that have in one way or another impacted on all of us are:

• Advances in communications that have made itpossible to transfer huge quantities of information

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and money instantly across the world, and enabledthe emergence of an electronic world of cyber-culture, virtual communities, and anonymousidentities.

• The decentralization of cities, as superstores, hos-pitals, hotels, and leisure complexes have movedfrom the centre to the edge of the city, and thetransformation of city centres by a rapidly expand-ing night-time world of pubs and clubs wherebouncers rule.

• Changes in family life, as more people have decided to live on their own, more couples havecohabited without marriage, women have increas-ingly found employment in paid work, divorcerates have risen, and the number of single-parentfamilies has increased.

• The transformation of work, with the decline ofold industries and the expansion of service occupa-tions requiring emotional labour, while more flexible and less secure forms of part-time and temporary work have spread, and more employeeshave teleworked from home.

• increasing inequality, as more people have experi-enced poverty and exclusion, and the gap haswidened not only between the rich and the poorwithin societies but also between rich and poorcountries.

You will find that we discuss all these changes and many others in this book. Each may seem to bequite distinctive in character, but they have manyprocesses in common and are interconnected in various ways. Globalization, for example, is centrallyinvolved in almost all of them and connects one process of change with another. It is sociology thathas the concepts that enable us to comprehend theseprocesses of change and grasp the connections be-tween them.

Understanding ourselvesPerhaps most fundamentally of all, sociology enablesus to understand ourselves. The way that we think,behave, and feel, indeed our very sense of identity, issocially produced. It is only through a knowledgeand understanding of the social processes that turnus into the people we are that we can truly under-stand ourselves.

Socialization is the general term that sociologistsuse for this process. We use this term, because this isa process that makes us into social beings, that turnsan individual into a member of society. It begins with

a child’s upbringing in the family and continuesthrough education but does not stop there, for it con-tinues throughout our life. Every time that we join anew group, perhaps of first-years at university or col-leagues at work, a process of socialization goes on.Each time that we enter a new stage in life, we learnto play certain roles, the role of a parent, the role of agrandparent, and so on. Socialization is so funda-mental to the understanding of the workings of a society that we discuss it at some length in Chapter 4.

Part Two of this book is primarily concerned withidentities. Our sense of personal identity seems sostrong and so individual that we think it is producedby some process going on mysteriously inside us that makes us who we really are. Sociologists argue,however, that identities are socially constructed.Even such basic features of our identity as sex, race, or age are socially not biologically constructed. Thecategories that we place ourselves in, such as ‘men’ or ‘women’, ‘blacks’ or ‘whites’, ‘young’ or ‘old’,‘healthy’ or ‘sick’, refer to our physical characteristicsbut they are, none the less, social categories that reflect certain ways of thinking about people thatvary between societies. We learn these categoriesthrough socialization and then see ourselves as hav-ing the characteristics that these categories specify.

Freeing ourselvesA knowledge of the social structures that constrainus, and the social processes that give us identities,does not, however, condemn us to passivity. Indeed,the reverse is the case, for by making us aware of theforces acting upon us, sociology also enables us to seethem for what they are, resist them if we wish to, and,to some extent, free ourselves from them.

This point is made well by two of the sociologists inour panel of four (see p. XXX). Berger uses the meta-phor of the puppet theatre to represent ‘social reality’.He suggests that, as in a puppet theatre, people act out certain parts that are prescribed for them, and are pulled this way and that by the ‘invisiblestrings’ of society. Through sociology, they can, however, see the strings that pull them and the socialmachinery that operates the strings. Once they dothis they are no longer puppets and have taken ‘thefirst step towards freedom’.

Bauman similarly points out that through sociologywe can become aware of, and can then explore, thepreviously invisible social context of our lives. Thismeans that we discover that much that appeared tobe beyond human control, that seemed natural or inevitable, is actually the result of human actions. To


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return to Berger’s metaphor, we find out that it is in fact other people who are pulling the puppets’strings. Once we realize this, we understand thatthings do not have to be the way they are. If humanactions make the world the way it is, then the worldcan be changed. If the way we live is not the result ofhuman nature, then we can live differently.

People have, for example, often thought that pat-terns of behaviour are biologically determined whenthey are not. It has been widely believed that the different roles performed by men and women are biologically prescribed. This can lead to the false ideathat for biological reasons men cannot be, say, nursesand women cannot be, say, pilots. In Britain, beliefsof this sort became established in the nineteenth cen-tury as men sought to exclude women from many occupations and confine them to domestic and caringroles. Knowledge of the way this idea became estab-lished and the socializing processes that maintainhelp us to understand that gender role differences aresocially constructed (we discuss this in Chapter 5).This awareness makes it possible to challenge themand change them, as people have done, for there arenow many male nurses and female pilots.

Applying sociologyYou may reasonably say that this is all very well butwhat is sociology useful for? Sociology may provideplenty of knowledge and understanding but whatelse can it do?

Sociological knowledge has important applicationsin many areas of work. It has made major contribu-tions to the study of social problems and the work of those who seek to deal with them. Thus, sociolog-ists have carried out research into drug use, crime, violence, industrial disputes, family problems, andmental illness, to name some of the more well-known problems of society. Indeed, no investiga-tion of the causes and consequences of these socialproblems would be complete without an input formsociology.

Sociologists have not just been concerned with explaining why some people behave in ways that are considered problematic. They are also interestedin the sources of such behaviour in, say, the patternsof family relationships, the structure of organiza-tions, or the social distribution of resources. They areconcerned, too, with the processes that lead to thetreatment of certain actions as deviant or criminalbehaviour. Why, for example, are poor people prose-cuted for a failure to pay the community charge,when the rich are allowed to avoid paying taxes byshifting their money into tax havens?

Sociology has also made a central contribution to the study of the management of people and thetraining of managers. One aspect of this is the devel-opment of structures that enable organizations tofunction productively and ebciently. This mightseem a relatively straightforward matter but, as weshow in Chapter 18, sociologists have demonstratedthat rationally designed organizations are commonlydisrupted by internal conflicts and the unintendedconsequences of their rules and regulations. Thosesociologists working in this area have not, however,just focused on issues of organizational ebciency.They are also concerned with the perspectives ofthose who find themselves under growing pressurefrom their employer and seek to find ways both ofcontinuing to carry out their work in a professionalway and protecting themselves against exploitation.One of the current frontiers here, which we discuss inChapters 15 and 18, is the struggle between managersand employees in call centres and, more generally, inthe ‘emotional labour’ of customer service work.

In the application of sociology, there is, indeed, aconstant tension between those who seek to use it tosolve social problems by making social control moreeffective and those who try to use it to change the


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Challenging gender stereotypes.

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structures that have generated these problems andbring about social reform.

Careers in sociologyWhat can you do with sociology? How can sociologyhelp you in finding a career?

One possible career is to become a professional sociologist, carrying out sociological research andcommunicating its results. This might be in an educational institution but not necessarily, as thereare many other organizations, such as specialized research institutes and think tanks, that employ pro-fessional sociologists. Sociology is an exceptionallyrewarding area in which to do research. It is an enormously diverse and dynamic field, with frontiersopening up in all directions, as our Frontiers Boxesand the Studies at the end of each of the Part Two andPart Three chapters will show. The range of methodsinvolved, which stretch from large-scale quantitativesurveys to intensive observational studies of the social life of small groups, provides scope for manydifferent skills and inclinations. Research is, further-more, not just a matter of acquiring knowledge, butalso of developing the ideas, concepts, and methodsof sociology itself.

As a subject to teach, it has much to offer, as it dealsall the time with topics and issues that are central tothe lives of those being taught. As you teach sociologyyou can draw on the experiences of those you areteaching, using their daily lives to illustrate sociolo-gical theories and concepts, while using sociology toprovide them with a greater understanding of theirsituation in the world, the forces acting upon them,and the sources of their own beliefs and identities.Those who teach in schools and colleges can also playtheir part in developing the subject by contributingarticles to such publications as the Sociology Review orwriting pieces for sociology web sites.

Most sociology graduates will probably not, how-ever, go into teaching or research careers. What otherthings can sociologists do? Sociology is not a voca-tional subject, in the sense of providing a training for a specific occupation. It is, however, relevant to avery wide range of occupations, a wider range thanyou probably realize, as the box on careers shows.Indeed, this broad range of occupational destinationsmakes sociology a good choice for those who havenot decided what career they wish to pursue or simply want to keep their options open. You can besure that a subject that gives you a greater understand-ing of social situations, social interaction, and humanbehaviour in general, will provide you with insights

that will come in useful whoever employs you andwhatever you do.

The skills and knowledge of the sociologist also become increasingly relevant as information aboutpeople becomes more and more central to the func-tioning of the society we live in. Most expanding occupations, in such areas as marketing, public relations, opinion formation, the media, human re-source management, education, research, and socialpolicy, depend on the collection, analysis, and com-munication of information about people, and this is,after all, what sociology is about.


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BRIEFING

Careers for sociologists

The traditional occupation for Sociology graduates hasbeen social work or some other form of public sector welfarework, such as the probation service. However, in practicesociology graduates go into a much wider range of jobs.In industry, for instance, human resource management(or personnel as it used to be called) is one applicationclose to welfare but, additionally, aspects of marketingdraw upon sociological skills. Virtually all sociologycourses include methods of social research and these can have an enlightening effect upon market research.

Some of the large retail firms, from Laura Ashley throughMarks and Spencer to Tesco, recognize that their chiefconcern is with people and consequently have takensociology graduates into their management trainingschemes. In fact the range has tended to broaden in boththe public and private sectors. For example, in recentreturns graduate entry into the police force is a noticeableaddition to the former and journalism to the latter.

Many sociology graduates go into teaching. Thisembraces school teaching, further education, and theoption to stay in higher education. Prospective schoolteachers and teachers in further education go on aftergraduation to take a postgraduate certificate ineducation (PGCE) . . . If you plan to study for a PGCE, youwill need to ensure that the subjects you study as part ofyour degree will allow you entry to a PGCE course, asthere are some restrictions. Talk to the Admissions Tutorof the course for more advice.

Students who achieve the best results during theirundergraduate courses may get the chance to go on topostgraduate research for a higher degree with the aimof making a career in higher education. . . . However,resources for this are scarce and therefore competition is fierce.

Source: British Sociological Association (2002), see Web Links.

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We can all agree that sociologists study society butwhat do we mean by this term? It is used in many dif-ferent ways in sociology but most commonly to referto a national unit, though some would argue that wenow live not in distinct national societies but a globalsociety. It is not really possible to give a short definitionof something as complex as a society and the easiestway to get a sense of what it means is to examine itsmain aspects in turn. These are also the main lines ofenquiry along which sociology has developed.

A complex of institutionsInstitutions are the established practices that regu-late the various activities that make up social life.Examples of institutions are marriages, markets, educa-tional curricula, religious rituals, and governments,which in their different ways all give order to differ-ent aspects of the way that we live. In contemporarysocieties, these institutions, and also the organiza-tions associated with them, are highly specialized.Thus, the educational, economic, political, military,and religious activities of society each have specializedinstitutions and organizations.

We speak of a complex of institutions becausethese specialized institutions are closely interrelatedwith each other. Consider, for example, educationalinstitutions and their organizations. In Britain, public-sector schools, colleges, and universities aredependent on political institutions for their funding.It is ultimately the government that decides how muchmoney to distribute to them. Governments are them-selves dependent on the economy. The amount ofmoney that the government has to spend on educa-tion depends on how much it can raise in taxes.While this is partly a political question, it also dependson the state of the economy. This itself depends,

however, on education, for it is education that sup-plies the economy with skilled labour. This has beenan important issue in Britain since the 1970s, for ithas been argued that education has not been givingpeople the skills that the economy needs, an issuethat we take up in Chapter 9, pp. XXX–XXX.

These interrelationships mean that institutionsshould not be studied in isolation from each other.Sociologists cannot, of course, study everything simul-taneously and they tend to specialize in the study ofparticular areas, such as the family or religion or themedia. Part Three of this book is divided into chap-ters that specialize in distinct areas of this sort. Toachieve a complete understanding of what is goingon in any one of these areas, you must always, how-ever, bear in mind its links with others. In this bookwe have indicated what we see as the more importantlinks through cross-references and hint boxes.

It is one of the distinctive features of sociology thatit is concerned with whole societies. As C. WrightMills put it, sociologists should ask: ‘What is thestructure of this particular society as a whole?’Sociology is, indeed, the only subject that sees societies as ‘wholes’ in this way. This distinctive perspective means that it overlaps with many otherfields of specialized enquiry. Economics and politics,


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Education and politics.

What is society?

Education Government

Economy

SkillsTaxes

Funds

Figure 1.1

Institutional interdependence

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we are making, here, however, is that the nationallevel is one level of society but only one level.

Most people live in family or household units con-sisting of a small number of closely related people.They have a sense of obligation to each other whichis greater than that to those outside the group, andthey see themselves as members of a family. Theyoften speak of themselves as living ‘in a family’. Inthinly populated rural areas where people practise aself-subcient form of agriculture one family mayhave very little contact with another and a person’ssociety may consist almost entirely of other membersof the immediate family group. This is a rare situ-ation, however, particularly nowadays, and the vastmajority of people are involved on a daily basis withmuch larger social units.

One such unit is the community. Two centuries or so ago most people lived in small, relatively self-subcient and self-contained communities based onthe rural village or the small town, where everyoneknew everyone else. Industrialization and urbaniza-tion disrupted communities of this sort and broughtlarge numbers of people who did not know each othertogether. As we show in Chapter 13, pp. XXX–XX, newkinds of community have, however, established them-selves within cities. Many people still see themselvesas members of communities of one kind or another.

Whether or not people feel that they are membersof a community, they are inevitably members of alarger social unit, the nation state, which during the nineteenth and twentieth centuries becamesteadily more important in people’s lives. With the

What is society? 11

Can family be a society.

for example, are subjects in their own right, whichexplore in detail the workings of the areas concernedand the issues specific to them. Economic and polit-ical institutions are, however, crucial to the function-ing of any society and there is also, therefore, a sociology of economic life and a sociology of politics.These particularly address the relationships betweenthese areas and the wider society.

Sociology’s concern with whole societies and all activities that occur within them means that any as-pect of social life can become a field within sociology.Indeed, one of the exciting and dynamic things aboutsociology is the way that new specialities are con-stantly opening up within it as sociologists begin toexplore new areas of activity that have not been studiedbefore or have newly emerged through social change.Examples of new fields are the sociology of sport, thesociology of tourism, and the sociology of the body.

Levels of societyIn discussing society as a complex of institutions we have been operating at one particular level, the national level, of society. People do commonly seethemselves as members of national societies. If some-one asks you which society you belong to, you willprobably reply that you live in, say, British or Americanor Indian society. If you live in Britain, you might ofcourse prefer to say that you live in Scottish or Welshsociety, for nationality is a contentious matter, whichwe discuss in Chapter 14, pp. XXX–XX. The point that

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development of the nation state, national institutionsemerged. At its centre is the state apparatus itself, butthere are also national educational systems, nationaleconomic institutions, national health services, na-tional armies, and national churches, to name someof the more obvious examples. As members of a nation state, people have the rights and responsibil-ities of citizens of that state, and a sense of nationalidentity. We examine the development of nationsand nation states in Chapter 14, pp. XXX–XX.

Nation states are not, however, self-subcient, forthey are interlinked with each other and dependenton each other in complex ways. These links developedparticularly strongly with industrialization, whichmade national economies highly dependent on oneanother through an international division of labour.The industrial societies specialized in producingmanufactured goods for the world as a whole, whileother parts of the world specialized in producingfood for the workers, and raw materials for the factor-ies, of the industrial societies.

National societies have become ever more integ-rated with each other through a process known asglobalization, which we discuss at length in Chap-ter 14. The world—the globe—has become a ‘smaller’place. Improvements in communication mean thatone can travel to most places in the world within aday or so, while information can be transmitted in-stantly to any part of it. Nowadays many companiesare global corporations operating in large numbers ofcountries on every continent. There are also globalpolitical organizations, such as the United Nations,and global movements such as Greenpeace. As well asbeing members of national societies, people are alsomembers of a global society. Indeed, the term ‘theglobal village’ is sometimes used to express the ideathat people have become closely linked with eachother across the globe.

As society has developed, social units have becomesteadily larger in their scale. Communities became partof national societies and national societies have be-come part of a global society. At one time or another ithas been argued that the family, the community, andthe nation went into decline as social units grew insize. Smaller-scale units have, however, not so muchdisappeared as changed, as society has become multi-level in character. There are many important issueshere for sociologists as they examine the relationshipsbetween the overlapping units that make up society.

Inequality and dominationIn our discussion of society as a complex of insti-tutions, we emphasized the way in which each organized a particular activity for society as a whole.Societies are also, however, divided by inequality.Some groups benefit more from these activities thanothers and seek to maintain or increase their advant-ages. Structures of inequality and domination maystretch right across a society, indeed across the worldas a whole, as a dominant group tries to gain controlof all areas of activity and secure benefits in all as-pects of life. We particularly address the issues raisedby inequality in Chapters 16 and 17, but you will findthem cropping up throughout the book.

There are various dimensions of inequality withinnational societies. There are class inequalities between,say, aristocracies and commoners or employers andworkers. There are ethnic inequalities between, say,whites, Asians, and African-Caribbeans. There are gen-der inequalities between men and women. In somesocieties, religion or nationality have become majorlines of division. There are also inequalities betweennational societies, for increasing global integrationhas not resulted in greater international equality, aswe show in Chapter 14.

The study of inequality and its consequencesbrings up a number of important issues that havebeen much discussed in sociology. These can begrouped under three headings:


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Upper class

Middle class

Lower class

Socialmobility

International and global organizations

Nation state Nation state

Community Community

Family Family

Figure 1.2

Levels of society

Figure 1.3

Social stratification by class

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• social stratification;

• social control;

• social conflict.

Social stratification. Social stratification is con-cerned with the way in which a structure of layers, or strata, emerge within society. Typically there is atop layer of the rich and powerful, a bottom layer ofthe poor and powerless, and various other layers inbetween. Important questions that are raised are thenumber of layers that exist in a society, where theboundaries between them should be drawn, the easewith which people can move between them (socialmobility), and the way in which the layers persist andchange from one generation to the next.

Social control. This raises the question of how inequality is maintained. How do the upper layerscontrol those below them and maintain their variousadvantages? One way is through control of the use of force—that is, control of the military and policeforces of a society. Sociologists generally emphasize,however, that there are more subtle means of controlthat operate by influencing beliefs and attitudes.Thus, it has been variously argued that people arecontrolled through education, religion, the massmedia, or social policy, and we discuss these argu-ments in the chapters on these areas.

Social conflict. Here the issue is whether and underwhat conditions inequality generates conflict. Do themechanisms of social control break down? Do thosein the lower layers organize themselves to improvetheir situation and challenge the domination of society by those with wealth and power? Under what conditions, for example, can workers organizethemselves collectively to demand higher wages andchallenge the power of the employer? Under whatconditions do women organize themselves throughfeminist movements to challenge male domination?

The study of inequality is linked to the study of institutions and their interrelationships, for the rich and powerful largely maintain their wealth andpower by controlling the institutions of society.Similarly, those who challenge their position have tocontest their control of these institutions. Thus, thestudy of this aspect of society is closely related to theissues we raised in our discussion of institutions.

Structure and cultureSociologists distinguish between the social structureof a society and its culture. As we explained earlier (see p. XXX), by social structure they generally meana relatively stable pattern of relationships between social groups or organizations. By culture sociologists

mean the beliefs of the society and their symbolicrepresentation through its creative activities. A sym-bol is simply a representation, such as a word or a gesture or an image, which communicates an idea orfeeling. Culture can best be discussed by distinguish-ing between beliefs, which are the content of the culture, and creative activities, which express thiscontent in actions or objects.

Beliefs are concerned with both ideas about theway things are and ideas about how they ought to be.Ideas about how things are include beliefs about thenature of things—the physical world, human nature,and the character of society. Ideas about how thingsought to be are embodied in values and norms:

• Values specify what people ought to do. Thus, thebelief that people should accumulate wealth or the belief that they should live in harmony withthe natural environment are both values, thoughrather different ones.

• Norms are rules of behaviour that regulate howpeople behave. A typical norm, for example, is therule that people should not accumulate wealth bystealing from each other. Such norms are often embodied in laws.

Beliefs about the way that the world is and the way that it ought to be are commonly linked togetherby religion and politics. Thus, Christianity containsideas about God’s creation of the world and the beliefthat human beings are naturally sinful. Christianityalso emphasizes certain values, such as love and char-ity, and provides a set of norms, such as the prohibi-tion of sexual behaviour outside marriage. Politicalbeliefs, such as socialism or liberalism, similarly linktogether ideas about the nature of society and dis-tinctive visions of what a society should be like.

Culture also takes the form of creative activities thatexpress ideas and feelings. The term culture is oftenused to refer to the high culture of a society, its collec-tions of paintings, its opera houses, and great works ofliterature. But there is also its popular culture, and thishas become an area of growing interest in sociology,which we discuss in Chapter 10. Cinema, popularmusic, magazines, and soap operas are part of our cul-ture in this sense. Activities as various as gardening,craftwork, dressing, cooking, and talking are all creat-ive activities that can be considered part of culture.

Indeed, the term culture is often used in a verybroad way to refer to the general customs and way oflife of a society or a group within it, as in references toworking-class culture or Asian culture. Culture in thissense includes the way that people meet and greeteach other, the way they behave towards each otherat work and at leisure, their sporting and religious activities, and so on. All social activity has a cultural

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Is sociology a science?

In the previous section we discussed what sociolo-gists mean by society. Here we take up issues raised by the way in which they study it. The question ofwhether sociology should be considered a science has been hotly debated both inside and outside thesubject. It is an interesting and important questionthat enables us to explore the nature of the subject,its distinctiveness, and its relationships with other subjects. Before discussing it, we must, however, firstconsider what is meant by science.

What is a science?It is first very important to clear away certain miscon-ceptions about science. It is popularly associated withtwo things, the use of the experimental method andthe collection of facts. Many scientists certainly docarry out experiments and collect facts but science in-volves considerably more than this.

The experiment is an important and powerfulmethod but not the only one used by science. It is apowerful method because it enables the isolation andmeasurement of the effect of one variable. Thus, forexample, the effect of an antibiotic can be establishedby preparing two identical dishes of bacteria, addingthe antibiotic to one only, and then comparing theresults after a suitable period of time. There are, how-ever, various fields of investigation, commonly regardedas sciences, that cannot make much use of the experi-mental method. Astronomy, geology, and meteorologyare obvious examples. They have to rely largely onother kinds of observational method for the collec-tion of data. Important as the laboratory experimentundoubtedly is to the natural sciences, the use of thismethod is not a defining characteristic of science.

If experimental methods are not the only methodused by scientists, surely, you might say, there can beno doubt that sciences are concerned with the collec-

aspect, for all social actions express people’s ideas andfeelings, and therefore communicate their culture.

The question then arises of the relationship betweenstructure and culture, an issue that has been much dis-cussed in sociology. One example of this is the rela-tionship between structures of inequality and culture.As we pointed out above, one way in which those atthe top of society dominate those at the bottom is

tion of facts by one means or another. The first prob-lem this raises is that facts are not simply collected.Scientists do not just look around to see what factsthey can discover, for scientific enquiry is directed bythe theoretical concerns of scientists. Scientific ideaslie behind the design of experiments or the search fordata of a particular kind. The ‘dark matter’ of the uni-verse was not exactly visible, by its very nature, andastronomers discovered it not because they cameacross it but because the currently dominant theoryof the origins of the universe suggested that there hadto be far more matter in the universe than could beaccounted for by its visible material.

Secondly, the conventional idea of a fact is ofsomething existing ‘out there’ waiting to be dis-covered. What actually happens is that scientists makeobservations, which then have to be interpreted andmade sense of before they can become facts. Inter-pretation always involves explanatory ideas and this returns us again to the importance of theories. Theexistence of ‘black holes’ is now an accepted fact inastronomy. This fact is certainly based on observa-tions of the behaviour of stars but it depends alsoupon a theory of what happens when matter be-comes so highly concentrated that nothing can escape its gravitational pull. Without this theory, wecould not conceive of black holes.

Science is both an empirical and a theoretical enter-prise. In saying that it is empirical we mean that it isbased on observations. The word empirical is derivedfrom the Greek word for experience and is commonlyused to refer to observational work that provides uswith experience of the world. In saying that science istheoretical we mean that it also involves systematicthought about the world. A theory is a logically con-nected set of ideas. Theories guide empirical workand are used to interpret and explain its observations,which may or may not fit the existing theory. If theydo not fit it, the theory needs at least to be revised

through their control of education, religion, and themass media. This enables them to influence people’sbeliefs and shape the way that they think and behave.Culture can, therefore, reinforce the existing struc-ture of society, though subordinate groups can alsochallenge this structure by developing alternativeideas and beliefs, as shown, for example, by the growthof oppositional socialist and feminist cultures.


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and may have to be abandoned. Science advancesthrough the constant interplay of theoretical andempirical work.

While it is important to be clear about the logic ofscientific activity, it is also important to bear in mindthe scientific spirit. By this we mean the set of idealswhich motivate and guide scientific work. Science isboth rational and critical. It is rational in that it rejectsexplanations of the world that are based on religiousbeliefs or mysterious forces, rather than reasonedthought. It is critical, as it questions received ideasand accepted beliefs. It is concerned with establish-ing the truth about how the world is and how thingsactually work, rather than how they ought to be orhow they are supposed to be.

This does not mean that scientists lack values andbeliefs. Like anyone else, they hold values and be-liefs, which may well influence what they do. For example, scientists concerned about the state of the natural environment might well carry out researchinto global warming. Values and beliefs should not,however, influence the scientist’s investigation or interpretation of observations. Thus, however con-cerned such a scientist might be about pollution, ifthe observations did not support the theory of globalwarming, the scientist would be expected to say so.

We have in some ways presented an idealized pictureof science. Most scientific enquiry is driven by the requirements of industry or government rather thanthe pursuit of knowledge. Scientists sometimes sup-press results that do not fit their theories or that mightdamage their careers, because they conflict with theiremployer’s interest in a particular policy or product.Research results are faked by some researchers whoare more concerned to achieve publications and ad-vance their careers than advance knowledge. At theheart of science there is, none the less, an ideal of dis-interested enquiry into the nature of things and it isagainst this ideal that the work of scientists is judged.

Is sociology a natural science?The first sciences to develop were the natural sciencesand they therefore became the model for scientificactivity. Some sociologists adopted this model andtried to develop a natural science of human beha-viour. Most contemporary sociologists would, how-ever, argue that society cannot be studied in the waythat the natural world is studied. Social behaviour is in important respects quite different from naturalbehaviour.

Human behaviour is meaningful behaviour, forwhatever human beings do means something to

them. It is a characteristic of human beings that theyact in the context of beliefs and purposes that givetheir actions meaning and shape the way that theybehave. If sociologists are to understand and explainhuman behaviour, they have to take account of themeanings that people give to their actions.

Thus, no universal statements can be made abouthuman behaviour, for the same behaviour means different things in different societies. Let us take eat-ing practices as a simple example. The eating of roastbeef has been traditional in England and regarded asone of the distinctive features of English life. In India,however, cows are considered sacred and may not bekilled, let alone eaten. On the other hand, while theeating of dogs in the Far East is commonplace, it isquite abhorrent to most British people. Behaviourconsidered quite normal in one society is quite unac-ceptable in another. This means that no general state-ments can be made about human eating behaviour inthe way that they can about the eating behaviour ofanimals.

Human behaviour is also different because peoplethink about what they are doing. They are at leastpartly aware of the forces acting upon them and can resist these forces and act differently. Thus, whilethe eating of snails and frogs’ legs is not a normal feature of the British diet and is generally viewed inBritain with some disgust, some British people mayconsider that there is no good reason for rejectingthese foods. They may decide that it must be possibleto enjoy them, if the French eat them with such relish, and may then try them out. Similarly veget-arians may reject traditional British beef-eating prac-tices. Behaviour is not entirely culture bound becauseindividuals can break out from their culture and, indeed, change their culture.

None the less, it clearly remains the case that thereare broad differences of culture between, say, Britishpeople and French people that result in different eat-ing habits. Furthermore, those who do break awayfrom established patterns will themselves be distinct-ive in certain ways. They may, for example, be edu-cated to a higher level. Thus, we are not arguing thatwhat people do is a matter simply of choice but ratherthat there is a cultural patterning of social behaviourthat makes it more complex than natural behaviour.

Weber particularly emphasized the importance tosociological explanation of understanding the meaning ofhuman action. See Chapter 2, pp. XXX–XX.

The cultural content of social behaviour means thatit cannot just be observed, it has to be understood.

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This special requirement of sociology comes outclearly in the reflections of the sociologists in ourpanel (see p. XXX). Thus, after arguing that many ofthe features of natural science should be adopted bythe sociologist, Steve Bruce insists that the sociologistmust go further. As he puts it: ‘Our notion of explana-tion does not stop at identifying regular patterns insocial action. It requires that we understand’.

C. Wright Mills insisted that the mechanical ap-plication of the rules of scientific method was insub-cient, that the understanding of social structures required a special quality of mind, what he calls the‘sociological imagination’. To Zygmunt Bauman it isthe ‘art of thinking sociologically’ that can make usfree. This does not mean that sociology can learnnothing from science—it can learn much, as SteveBruce indicates—but science alone is not enough.

Is sociology a science at all?Some have gone further and questioned whetherthere can be a science of society. If sociology is centrally concerned with understanding what peopledo, is there any real difference between sociologyand common sense?

The answer to this question is a resounding yes.In their everyday lives people are too involved

in what is going on around them to have any detachment from it. They are immersed in their own situations, their own families, their own workrelationships, and their own friendship and leisure patterns. These colour their view of the world. Theirknowledge of the world is limited to the situationsthat they have experienced. They generally interprettheir own and other people’s behaviour in terms ofpreconceived ideas and beliefs. In doing so they makelittle distinction between the way the world is andthe way they think it ought to be. Their experience isfitted into these ideas and beliefs, which are import-ant to their sense of identity, and they are thereforeusually very reluctant to alter them.

The sociologist’s knowledge of the world is verydifferent. Sociology builds up a knowledge of societythat is not based upon the experience of one indi-vidual but accumulated from the research of largenumbers of sociologists. This is knowledge of manydifferent aspects of many different societies at manydifferent times. It is a cumulative knowledge that is constantly being added to by further research. This bank of knowledge means that the experience of large numbers of people in many very different situ-ations and from very different cultures is available tothe sociologist.

Sociologists are trained to develop their ideas in alogical, disciplined, and explicit way by constructingtheories, which are quite unlike the everyday beliefsof common sense. They are explicit, because their as-sumptions have been brought into the open, thoughtabout, and justified. Logical connections are madebetween the various ideas that make up a theory sothat its train of thought can be followed. Theories arealso subject to the scrutiny of other sociologists, whowill critically examine their assumptions and checkthe logic of their arguments.

Sociologists then test out their theories in an object-ive and systematic way. They do not assume thatthey know the answers or that their theory is right.They demonstrate the truth or falsity of their ideas by collecting appropriate information, using a widevariety of methods to do this. These range from large-scale surveys to the small-scale, in-depth, participantobservation of particular situations. Sociologists drawon many different sources of material, from docu-ments to census data or interview responses. As weshow in Chapter 3, pp. XXX–XXX, different methodsare appropriate to different issues and different situ-ations but can also be used to complement and check upon each other. As with their theories, theirmethods and the way that they interpret their dataare open to the scrutiny of other sociologists.

Sociology is then a science. It has explicit theor-ies and ways of collecting data in an objective and systematic way, in order to check those theories andrevise them if they are found wanting. It is not a nat-ural science because there are important differencesbetween the social and natural worlds as objects ofstudy, differences that actually require sociologists,as we showed above, to go beyond the methods ofthe natural sciences. It is a social science, not a natu-ral science, but a science none the less.

Summary pointsIn this chapter we have discussed a number of gen-eral issues raised by the subject of sociology. Webegan by exploring why one should study sociology:

• We argued that sociology enables us to understandthe world that we live in and our place within thatworld.

• In doing so, sociology enables us to understandourselves, and self-understanding can help us tofree ourselves.

• Sociology also has many practical applications to social problems, though sociologists are also interested in the sources of these problems in


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Key concepts

• community

• culture

• family

• globalization

• household

• institutions

• nation state

• norms

• personal identity

• science

the structure of society, and in what leads to certain kinds of behaviour being defined as ‘a problem’.

• We also suggested that sociology can open the wayto a wide range of careers.

We then moved on to consider what sociologistsmean by society, by examining the main features ofsocieties:

• Societies consist of a complex of interdependentinstitutions.

• Societies are, however, organized at a number ofdifferent levels, from the family, through the com-munity and the nation state, to the global level.

• Societies also consist of structures of inequality anddomination.

• There is a cultural dimension to society, consistingof people’s beliefs and their symbolic representa-tion in actions and objects.

Lastly, we discussed whether sociology should beconsidered a science:

• Science involves systematic observation and the development of theories to explainobservations.

• Sociology is not a natural science because socialbehaviour is different from natural behaviour.

• The explanation of social behaviour requires theunderstanding of the meaning of actions.

• Sociology is, none the less, a social science that isbased on systematic observational methods andthe construction of explicit theories.

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• social stratification

• social structure

• socialization

• society

• values

The following, which we have quoted in our panel on p. XXX, all provide interesting andperceptive discussions of the nature of sociology:

Bauman, Z., and May, T. (2001), Thinking Sociologically, (2nd edn.), (Oxford: Basil Blackwell).

Berger, P. (1963), Invitation to Sociology: A Humanistic Perspective (Harmondsworth: Penguin).

Bruce, S. (1999), Sociology: A Very Short Introduction (Oxford: Oxford University Press).

Mills, C. W. (1959), The Sociological Imagination (New York: Oxford University Press).

Visit our own web site, with lots of interesting additional material and links for each chapter, at

http://www.oup.co.uk/best.textbooks/sociology/fulcher/

The web site of the British Sociological Association, where you can find general information aboutthe subject, including another answer to the question ‘What is sociology?’, and advice about careeropportunities for sociologists, is at

http://www.britsoc.org.uk/about/oppsociol.htm

For a comprehensive but carefully selected list of sociology web links, with very helpful descriptionsof what can be found at each one, visit

http://www.sosig.ac.uk/sociology

Further reading

Web links W

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