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Classical Sociological Theory Minnesota State University Moorhead Spring 2008 Think on these things… “We think it a fertile idea that social life must be explained, not by the conceptions of it created by those who participate in it, but by profound causes which escape awareness; and we also think that these causes must principally be sought in the way in which associated individuals are grouped.” Review of Antonio Labriola, ‘Essais sur la conception materialiste de l’historie’ [1897]; in M. Traugott (ed. & trans.), Emile Durkheim on Institutional Analysis, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1978, pg.127. “The first and fundamental rule is to consider social facts as things.” Emile Durkheim, The Rules of Sociological Method (first published in French in 1895); in Kenneth Thompson (ed. & trans.), Readings from Emile Durkheim, London: Routledge, 1985, pg. 67. “The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles. Freeman and slave, patrician and plebeian, lord and surf, guild-master and journeyman, in a word, oppressor and oppressed, stood in constant opposition to one another, carried on an uninterrupted, now hidden, now open fight, a fight that each time ended either in revolutionary reconstitution of society at large, or in the common ruin of the contending classes.” Karl Marx, Communist Manifesto [1848]; Moscow, Foreign Languages Publishing House, 1959, pg. 45-46. “It is not the consciousness of men that determines their being, but, on the contrary, their social being determines their consciousness.” Preface to A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy [1859]; trans. T.B. Bottomore in Karl Marx: Selected Writings in Sociology and Social Philosophy, ed. T.B. Bottomore and M. Rubel, Harmondworth, Penguin, 1963: 67. 1

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Classical Sociological Theory

Minnesota State University Moorhead Spring 2008

Think on these things…

“We think it a fertile idea that social life must be explained, not by the conceptions of it created by those who participate in it, but by profound causes which escape awareness; and we also think that these causes must principally be sought in the way in which associated individuals are grouped.” Review of Antonio Labriola, ‘Essais sur la conception materialiste de l’historie’ [1897]; in M. Traugott (ed. & trans.), Emile Durkheim on Institutional Analysis, Chicago: University of Chicago

Press, 1978, pg.127.

“The first and fundamental rule is to consider social facts as things.”Emile Durkheim, The Rules of Sociological Method (first published in French in

1895); in Kenneth Thompson (ed. & trans.), Readings from Emile Durkheim, London: Routledge, 1985, pg. 67.

“The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles. Freeman and slave, patrician and plebeian, lord and surf, guild-master and

journeyman, in a word, oppressor and oppressed, stood in constant opposition to one another, carried on an uninterrupted, now hidden, now open fight, a fight that each time ended either in revolutionary reconstitution of society at large, or in the common ruin of the contending classes.” Karl Marx, Communist Manifesto [1848];

Moscow, Foreign Languages Publishing House, 1959, pg. 45-46.

“It is not the consciousness of men that determines their being, but, on the contrary, their social being determines their consciousness.” Preface to A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy [1859]; trans. T.B. Bottomore in Karl Marx: Selected

Writings in Sociology and Social Philosophy, ed. T.B. Bottomore and M. Rubel, Harmondworth, Penguin, 1963: 67.

“Power [macht] is the probability that one actor within a social relationship will be in a position to carry out his own will despite resistance, regardless of the basis on

which this probability rests. Domination [herrschaft] is the probability that a command with a given specific content will be obeyed by a given group of persons.”

Max Weber, Economy and Society (3 vols.), ed. Guenther Roth and Claus Wittich, New York, Bedminster Press, 1968, vol. 1, pg. 4. First published in German in 1925.

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REQUIRED TEXTS:Gerth, H.H. and C. Wright Mills (Editors). 1946. From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology. New York: Oxford

University Press.Giddens, Anthony. 1972. Emile Durkheim: Selected Writings. UK: Cambridge University Press.Tucker, Robert C. 1978. The Marx-Engels Reader. New York: W.W. Norton &

Company

RECOMMENDED TEXTS:Arthur Asa Berger. 2003. Durkheim is Dead. NY: Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.Randall Collins. 1994. Four Sociological traditions. Oxford: Oxford University Press.Lewis A. Coser. 1977. Masters of Sociological Thought. Harcourt Brace Javanovich.Emile Durkheim. 1984. The Division of Labor in Society. NY: Free Press.Emile Durkheim. 1973. On Morality and Society. Chicago: University Press.Emile Durkheim. 1951. Suicide: A Study in Sociology. NY: Free Press.Eric Fromm. 1961. Marx’s Concept of Man. NY: Continuum.James B. Rule. 1997. Theory and Progress in Social Science. Cambridge: University Press.Georg Simmel. 1950. The Sociology of Georg Simmel. NY: Free Press.Max Weber. 1947. The Theory of Social and Economic Organization. NY: Free Press.

COURSE CONTENT:This course offers an introduction to the classical tradition in sociological theory through original readings from Karl Marx, Friedrich Engels, Emile Durkheim, and Max Weber. Along the way, “WE” will encounter the major traditions in sociology (conflict theory, structural functionalism, and theories of rational action). Some issues of paramount concern to this discourse are:

the structural contexts (or constraints) that informed classical theories.

the place of cumulative knowledge in the production of classical ideas. the role of human agency and freedom given profound structural

constraints.Moreover, “WE” consider the following strategic questions:

What scope conditions constrain the various classical paradigms? Do 19th Century theories have a time limitation? (Or, are classical

theories still viable?) What are the standards for “good” theory, and how are “WE” to

differentiate? Is there a place for epistemic-reflexivity in the production of scientific

ideas?

COURSE STRUCTURE & POLICIES:Class attendance and participation are required. Assigned readings should to be read before each class session. Students should be fully prepared to answer questions and make informed comments on assigned readings. In a typical class period, I will lecture for more than half of the apportioned time, but I will always try to set aside time for discussion and/or questions. In my classes, I endeavor to create a “safe space” so that no question or comment is ignored or seen as unimportant. In “safe spaces,” everyone should feel empowered to interrogate the professor and to engage other students in a manner that is respectful and caring, yet intellectually rigorous. A FOREWARNING: THIS COURSE IS READING &

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(W)RITING INTENSIVE. Conscientious students should anticipate (at least) 8 to 10 hours of reading per week.

GRADES & COURSE REQUIREMENTS:1. Three (3) Theory Meditations from Modules I, II, & III

60%2. Three (3) Scholarly Outlines & Discussant Leader Presentations from Modules I, II, & III 20%3. Consistent Class Attendance (I will deduct two points, or 10%, from this total for each absence) 20%

100%

I require three (3) scholarly outlines and discussant leader presentations, one for each module, of selected topics and readings. The scholarly outlines should be 1-2 pages in length, and your discussant leader presentations are based on your scholarly outlines. Your outlines might include (1) key quotations, (2) critical questions, and/or a general point-by-point summary of your selected reading. These outlines are due on the first day the topic is discussed (see underlined dates). For example, if you decided to do a scholarly outline for the essay Estranged Labor, then that scholarly outline will come due on January 14 th . You should make two (2) copies of your scholarly outlines (one for your professor and one for your discussant leader presentation). I will call for three to five (3-5) discussant leaders and scholarly outlines per reading. Then, you will highlight parts of your outline during the next class that follows its submission. I will not accept an outline after its due date has passed. A word of advice: Please do not wait until the end of a given module to complete your outline and presentation as I will only accept a maximum of five (5) scholarly outlines/discussant leaders per reading. If you insist on waiting until the last assigned readings in a module to do a scholarly outline & discussant leader presentation, then please be sure to sign up weeks in advance. If you miss the opportunity to do an outline & presentation for a module, you will forfeit 6.67 points. Together, the scholarly outlines & discussant leader presentations are worth 20% of your final grade.

There are three (3) theory meditations that will make up a combined 60% of your final grade.

Finally, you have the opportunity to earn a total of 20% percent of your course grade from daily attendance. Here’s how the attendance policy works: Everyone will begin the course with a total of 20 attendance points (20%) toward the course grade. Each time you miss a class, I will deduct 2 points (or 10%) from that total. For instance, if you miss four (4) classes during the semester, your attendance total will be 12 points. (I also deduct points for leaving class early or for being excessively late.) Of course, if you have perfect attendance, you will earn the full 20 attendance points. Please do not bring excuses for your absences or explanations for why you were gone. I will only accept a doctor’s note that explains your absence in the case of serious debilitating illness; no other excuses are considered: Please Do Not Ask!

I am available during my office hours (and beyond) for consultation on lectures, readings, and/or classroom interactions. I am pleased to assist you through this intellectual journey. I encourage the formation of weekend or evening study groups to discuss the readings and lectures: education is a collaborative and an interactive process -and so is my pedagogy. If you need special accommodations for exam

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meditations, please contact Greg Toutges in the Disability Services Office (Tele: 477-5859): I will freely to make these arrangements on your behalf.

THEMES & READING ASSIGNMENTS1. (Jan. 9th & 11th) Whither Classical Theory: An Introduction

Ceteris Paribus: The Industrial Revolution was a necessary & sufficient

condition for the birth of the science of sociology. It gave rise to three (3) initial theoretical traditions, namely conflict theory, functionalism, and rational action perspectives.

Module I: The Conflict Tradition of Karl Marx & Friedrich Engels

“For conflict theory, the basic insight is that human beings are sociable but conflict-prone animals. Why is there conflict? Above all else, there is conflict because violent coercion is always a potential resource, and it is a zero-sum sort. This does not imply anything about the inherence of drives to dominate; what we do know firmly is that being coerced is an intrinsically unpleasant experience, and hence that any use of coercion even by a small minority, calls forth conflict in the form of antagonism to being dominated.” Randall Collins, Conflict Theory: Toward an Explanatory Science, NY: Academic Press, 1975.

2. (Jan. 14 th – 18th) The Problem of Estranged Labor1. Karl Marx, Estranged Labor, The Marx-Engels Reader, pg. 70-81.2. Karl Marx, Production of Relative Surplus-Value. Machinery and Modern Industry, Marx-Engels Reader, pg. 403-417.

3. (Jan. 23 rd – Feb. 1st) “From Each According to His Ability, To Each According to His Need.” Communism & Social Classes Reconsidered“Society as a whole is more and more splitting up into two great hostile camps, into two great classes directly facing each other –bourgeoisie and proletariat.” -Karl Marx, Communist Manifesto, 1848.1. Karl Marx, Manifesto of the Communist Party, The

Marx-Engels Reader, pg. 473-491.2. Karl Marx, Private Property and Communism, The

Marx-Engels Reader, pg. 81-105.3. Karl Marx, Alienation and Social Classes, The Marx-

Engels Reader, pg. 133- 135.4. Karl Marx, Classes, The Marx-Engels Reader, pg.

441-442.5. Documentary : The Specter of Marxism.

4. (Feb. 4 th – 8th) The Question of a ‘German’ Ideology (or Marx’s Anti-Semitism?)“The ideas of the ruling class are in every epoch the ruling ideas: i.e., the class which is the ruling material force of society, is at the same time its ruling intellectual force.”1. Karl Marx, Ideology in General, German Ideology in Particular, The Marx-Engels Reader, pg. 148-175.

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2. Karl Marx, On the Jewish Question, The Marx Engels Reader, pg. 26-52.

5. (Feb. 11 th -22nd) “Money for (No)thing: Marx’s Critique of Capitalism “An oppressed class is the vital condition for every society founded on the antagonism of classes. The emancipation of the oppressed class thus implies necessarily the creation of a new society. For the oppressed class to be able to emancipate itself it is necessary that the productive powers already acquired and the existing social relations should no longer be capable of existing side by side.”1. Karl Marx, Wage Labor and Capital and The Coming Upheaval, Marx-Engels Reader, pg. 203-219.2. Karl Marx, Commodities and Money, Marx-Engels Reader, pg. 302-336.3. Friedrich Engels, Working-Class Manchester, Marx-Engels Reader, pg. 579-585.4. Friedrich Engels, The Origins of the Family, Private Property, and the State, The Marx-Engels Reader, pg. 734-759.

Module II: Emile Durkheim, the Functionalist Tradition, and the Problem of Order

“The Analysis of social and cultural phenomena in terms of the functions they perform in a sociocultural system. In functionalism, society is conceived of as a system of inter-related parts in which no part can be understood in isolation from the whole. A change in any part is seen as leading to a certain degree of imbalance, which in turn results in changes in other parts of the system as a whole. The development of functionalism was based on the model of the organic system found in biological systems.” –George A. Theodorson and Achilles S. Theodorson, eds., A Modern Dictionary of Sociology, NY: Thomas Y. Crowell, 1969.

6. (Feb. 25 th – 29th) Problem of Integration: “E Pluribus Unum?” “The Individual submits to society and this submission is the condition of his liberation. For man freedom consists in deliverance from blind, unthinking physical forces; he achieves this by opposing against them the great and intelligent force of society, under whose protection he shelters. By putting himself under the wing of society, he makes himself also, to a certain extent, dependent upon it. But this is a liberating dependence; there is no contradiction in this.” –Emile Durkheim1. Anthony Giddens, Introduction: Durkheim’s Writings in Sociology and Social Philosophy, Emile Durkheim: Selected Writings, pg. 1-48.

7. (March 10 th – 14th) The Emergence of (Academic) Sociology and the Study of Social

Facts“The function of a social fact can only be social, that is to say, it consists in the production of socially useful effects.” –Emile Durkheim

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1. Emile Durkheim, The Field of Sociology, Emile Durkheim: Selected Writings, 51-68.2. Emile Durkheim, Methods of Explanation and Analysis, Emile Durkheim: Selected Writings, pg. 69-88.

8. (March 17 th – 21st) “It’s Morality, Silly!” Toward a (Social) Science of the Moral Order

“It is psychologically impossible to pursue an end to which we are

indifferent –that does not appear to us as good and does not affect our sensibility. Morality must, then, be not only obligatory but also desirable and desired. This desirability is the second characteristic of all moral acts.” –Emile Durkheim1. Emile Durkheim, The Science of Morality, Emile Durkheim: Selected Writings, pg. 89-107.2. Emile Durkheim, Moral Obligation, Duty and Freedom, Emile Durkheim: Selected Writings, pg. 108-122.3. Emile Durkheim, Religion and Ritual and Secularization and Rationality, Emile Durkheim: Selected Writings, pg. 219-249.

9. (March 26 th - 31st) Social Morphology, the Division of Labor, and the Rise of Moral Individualism (w/Special Emphasis on the Problems of Anomie & Suicide)“In the same city, different occupations can co-exist without being obliged mutually to destroy one another, for they pursue different objectives. The soldier seeks military glory, the priest moral authority, the statesman power, the businessman riches, and the scholar scientific renown. Each of them can attain his end without preventing others from attaining theirs. It is still the same even when the functions are less separated from one another… This having been said, it is easy to understand that any condensation of the social mass, especially if it is accompanied by an increase in population, necessarily stimulates an advance in the division of labor.”-Emile Durkheim

&“No living being can be happy, or even exist unless his needs are adequately related to his means. In other words, if his needs require more than can be allocated to them, or even merely something of a different sort, they will be un continual friction and can only function painfully…Unsatisfied tendencies atrophy, and as the impulse to live is merely the result of all other motivations, it is bound to weaken as the others lose their hold.” –Emile Durkheim 1. Emile Durkheim, Forms of Social Solidarity, Emile Durkheim: Selected Writings, pg. 123-140.2. Emile Durkheim, The Division of Labor and Social Differentiation, Emile Durkheim: Selected Writings, pg. 141-1543. Emile Durkheim, Anomie and the Moral Structure of Industry, Emile Durkheim: Selected Writings, pg. 173-188.

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Module III: A Rational M(ODER)nity: the Emergence of the Weberian “Iron Cage”

“Rational choice theory contains one element that differentiates it from nearly all other theoretical approaches in sociology. This element can be summed up in a single word: optimization. The theory signifies that in acting rationally, an actor is engaging in some kind of optimization. This is sometimes expressed as maximizing utility, sometimes as minimizing cost, sometimes in other ways. But however expressed, it is this that gives rational choice theory its power. –James S. Coleman and Thomas J. Feraro, Rational Choice Theory, London: Sage, 1992.

&“In science, each of us knows that what he has accomplished will be antiquated in ten, twenty, fifty years. That is the fate to which science is subjected; it is the very meaning of scientific work, to which it is devoted in a quite specific sense, as compared to other spheres of culture for which the same holds. Every scientific ‘fulfillment’ raises new ‘questions’; it asks to be ‘surpassed’ and outdated. Who ever wishes to serve science has to resign himself to this fact.” –Max Weber

10. (April 2 nd & 4th) Macht und Herrschaft: Weber’s Views on Power and Authority

“There are three pure types of legitimate authority. The validity of their

claims to legitimacy may be based on: (1) Rational grounds, resting on a belief in the ‘legality’ of patterns of normative rules and the right of those elevated to authority under such rules to issue commands (legal authority); (2) Traditional grounds, resting on established belief in the sanctity of immemorial traditions and the legitimacy of the status of those exercising authority under them (traditional authority); (3) Charismatic grounds, resting on devotion to the specific and exceptional sanctity, heroism or exemplary character of an individual person, and of the normative patterns of order revealed or ordained by him (charismatic authority).” –Max Weber1. Max Weber, Structures of Power, From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology, pg. 159-179.2. Max Weber, Class, Status, Party, From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology, pg. 180-195.3. Max Weber, The Sociology of Charismatic Authority, From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology, pg. 245-252.

(April 7 th & 16th) Excessive and (Un) Necessary Rationality: Bureaucracy Problematic“Experience tends universally to show that the purely

bureaucratic type of administrative organization –that is, the monocratic variety of bureaucracy -is, from a purely technical point of view, capable of attaining the highest means of efficiency and is in this sense formally the most rational

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known means of carrying out imperative control over human beings.” –Max Weber1. Max Weber, Bureaucracy, From Max Weber: Essays

in Sociology, pg. 196-244.[Max Weber’s Theory of Action: (1) Instrumentally

Rational (Zweckrational); (2) Value-Rational (Wertrational); (3) Affectual (Emotional); and (4) Traditional (Ingrained habit)]

(April 16 th – 28) The Protestant Ethic and the Power of Religious (Social) Psychology “The religious valuation of restless, continuous, systematic work in a worldly calling, as the highest means to asceticism, and at that same time the surest and most evident proof of rebirth and genuine faith, must have been the most powerful conceivable lever for the expansion of that attitude toward life which we have here called the spirit of capitalism.” –Max Weber

&“Since every need for salvation is an expression of distress, social or economic oppression is an effective source of salvation beliefs, though by no means the exclusive source. Other things being equal, classes with high social and economic privilege will scarcely be prone to evolve the idea of salvation. Rather they assign to religion the primary function of legitimizing their own pattern and situation in the world.” –Max Weber1. Max Weber, The Social Psychology of the World

Religions, From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology, pg. 267-301.2. Max Weber, The Protestant Sects and the Spirit of

Capitalism, From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology, pg. 302-322.3. Max Weber, Religious Rejection of the World and

Their Directions, From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology, pg. 323-359.

Thought Leader: Dr. Lee Garth Vigilant (Associate Professor), A.M. and Ph.D., Boston CollegeElectronic Mail: [email protected]: web.mnstate.edu/vigilantTelephone: 218/477-2034 (Office) Office Hours: Sociology & Criminal Justice Department, Lommen 102-E M & W

(11:30a.m. – 4:30 p.m. w/o appointment)

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