The Father of Sociology Durkheim,Marx,Weber`.

Georgina Whiters

SOCY1010

12 /07 /06

In its present form , sociology embraces a range of different views concerning both what a social science should comprise , and what might be the proper subject-matter of sociology in particular . There are three general conceptions of the object of sociological interest - although these are not mutually exclusive . All three can be said to define the study of society but what is meant by society is in each case rather different

The first states that the proper object for sociology is social structure , in

the sense of patterns of relationships which have an independent existence , over and above the individuals or groups that occupy positions in these structures at any particular time : for example , the positions of the nuclear family (mother , father , children might remain the same from generation to generation and place to place independently of the specific individuals who fill or do not fill those positions . One of the main versions of this approach is Marxism , which conceptualizes the structures of modes of production . The second perspective deems the proper object of sociology to lie in something that Durkheim calls collective representations : meanings and ways of cognitively organizing the world which have a continued existence over and above the individuals who are socialized into them . Much modern structuralist and post-modernist work , in particular discourse analysis can be seen as part of this tradition . Finally , there are those for whom the proper object of sociological attention is meaningful social action in the sense intended by Max Weber . The implicit or explicit assumption behind this approach is that there is no such thing as society : merely individuals and groups entering into social relationships with each other . There are widely differing ways in which such interaction can be studied , including Weber 's own concerns with rational action and the relationships between beliefs and actions . These three figures mentioned in the context of each conception are regarded to be fathers of modern sociology and this work briefly considers their contribution to the science of sociology

Karl Marx was a German social theorist and founder of revolutionary communism , and in sociology of historical materialism . Marx 's more or less simultaneous discovery of socialism and the works of the British political economists , principally Adam Smith , David Ricardo , and James Mill , enabled him to distinguish himself clearly from his Hegelian mentors and so lay the foundations for his own theoretical system . As his starting point Marx defined the thesis that stated that `the essence of man is not an abstraction inherent in each particular individual . The real nature of man is the he moved on to the specification of the concrete nature of these relations . In The German Ideology of 1846 he distinguished four different forms of society covering the whole span of human history primitive communism , ancient or slave society , feudalism , and capitalism . He also began to explore the issue of how one form was succeeded by another . His suggestion was that , over time , contradictions gradually developed within each form of society because of the constraints imposed upon the development of the productive forces by the ruling ideologies of property . These contradictions resulted in struggles over the distribution of any surplus between the classes created in all societies , except communist ones , by the organization of the division of labor . Marx identified the principal classes of capitalist societies as the bourgeoisie and the proletariat . The theory lying behind the concept of class was still incomplete since the theoretically critical varying modes of surplus appropriation had yet to be specified . Nevertheless , Marx was extremely excited by the analytical possibilities opened up by his possession of this concept , and he spent the following years writing empirically orientated texts in which he sought to demonstrate them . He read and absorbed the Marx 's works influenced his near contemporaries , including Ymile Durkheim , and this perhaps explains why Durkheim 's thought has variously been depicted as idealist , realist , positivist and evolutionist (Smelser ,

.339

Ymile Durkheim is the most famous French sociologist , long acknowledged as the founding figure of functionalism , but more recently hailed by leading authorities on structuralism , sociolinguistics , and post-modernism , all of whom have found in Durkheim 's writings ideas which are easy to incorporate . Durkheimian heritage is identified by such the key concepts , dichotomies , and arguments like collective conscience , collective representations , and social facts (Smelser br

.340 ) These were concepts which argued for the distinctiveness of sociology against other social sciences , notably psychology . These concepts were suited to the object of sociological explanation - namely collective phenomena not reducible to the individual actor or psyche Furthermore , the central problem for sociology was to explicate the relationship between the individual and society , recognizing that these analytical levels were distinct . The association created by individuals has its own characteristics , its own `facticity , which can only be explained by social facts located at that level . His strong opposition to methodological individualism pushed him in the direction of a holism which occasionally appeared to reify society itself . Other dichotomies flowed from this key coupling of individual and society . For example , in the distinction between the sacred and the profane , the former was created by the collectivity while the latter expressed the private and individual life . The former was moral whereas the latter was sensual Durkheim saw his task as the creation of a science of sociology , with its own subject-matter , methodology , and explanatory models

Max Weber , together with Ymile Durkheim , is often regarded as the founder of modern sociology as a distinct social science . Weber offered a philosophical basis for the social sciences a general conceptual framework for sociology and a range of learned studies covering all of the great world religions , ancient societies , economic history , the sociology of law and of music , and many other areas . Whereas Durkheim 's attempt to found a science of sociology was based on the scientific positivism of his day , Weber 's intellectual training was in the neo-Kantian school of philosophy . The proper object of social science according to Weber , is social action : action directed towards significant others and to which we attach a subjective meaning . Weber developed a fourfold classification of social action : traditional action undertaken because it has always been so performed affectual action based on or driven by emotion value-rational action directed towards ultimate values and end-rational or instrumental action . Weber saw the development of modern societies as a process of increasing rationalization in which the world loses its mystery . The growth of large-scale modern bureaucracy is a major part of that process and one of Weber 's criticisms of socialism was that it would simply hasten this `disenchantment ' of life

In sum , the brief account of Marx , Durkheim and Weber 's achievements in the field of scientific sociology is far from being complete but even such a short summary allows call them fathers of sociology

References

Albrow , Martin (1999 ) Sociology : The Basics . London : Routledge

Goldstein , Robyn A (1996 ) The Essentials of Sociology . Research Education Association

Smelser , Neil J (1967 ) Sociology : An Introduction . New York : John Wiley Sons ...