Essentials of Sociology. George Ritzer
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Название: Essentials of Sociology
Автор: George Ritzer
Издательство: Ingram
Жанр: Социология
isbn: 9781544388045
isbn:
Engels believed that female oppression was rooted in the hidden and underlying structure of private property rights in capitalism. As a result, he thought that the key to ending that oppression was to abolish private property. The connections he drew between gender inequality and the underlying structure of society have proved to be enduring, and many contemporary feminist theorists have built more sophisticated analyses on them (Chae 2014).
A structuralist approach is useful because it leads sociologists to look beyond the surface for underlying structures and realities, which determine what transpires on the surface. Thus, for example, military threats made by North Korea, and its test-firing of missiles, may not really be about military matters at all but instead about that country’s failing economic system. North Korea may hope that the symbolic expression of military power will distract its citizens, strengthen its global prestige, frighten others, and perhaps coerce other countries, especially the United States, into providing economic aid. The threat posed by North Korea’s nuclear missiles prompted President Trump to meet with North Korea’s leader Kim Jong-un in 2018 and to make various concessions such as halting, at least temporarily, “war games” with South Korea. A follow-up meeting between these leaders in early 2019 broke down early without any agreement.
Conflict/Critical Theories
Several theories are discussed under this heading: conflict theory, critical theory, feminist theory, queer theory, critical theories of race and racism, and postmodern theory. They all tend to emphasize stresses, strains, and conflicts in society. They are critical of society in a variety of different ways, especially of the power exercised over less powerful members of society.
Conflict Theory
The best known of these theories, at least in American sociology, is conflict theory (R. Collins 2012). It has roots in Marx’s theory, and much of it can be seen as an inversion of structural-functionalism, which conflict theory was designed to compete with and to counteract. While structural-functionalism emphasizes what is positive about society, conflict theory focuses on its negative aspects. To the structural-functionalist, society is held together by consensus; virtually everyone accepts the social structure, its legitimacy, and its benefits. To the conflict theorist, in contrast, society is held together by coercion. Those adversely affected by society, especially economically, would rebel were it not for coercive forces such as the police, the courts, and the military.
Ralf Dahrendorf (1959) was strongly influenced by Marx, but he was more strongly motivated by a desire to develop a viable alternative to structural-functionalism. For example, while structural-functionalists tend to see society as static, conflict theorists like Dahrendorf emphasize the ever-present possibility of change. Where structural-functionalists see the orderliness of society, conflict theorists see dissension and conflict everywhere. Finally, structural-functionalists focus on the sources of cohesion internal to society, while conflict theorists stress the coercion and power that holds together an otherwise fractious society.
The high pay and decision-making power of McDonald’s executives contrasts sharply with the relative powerlessness of the company’s low-paid employees. Some of those employees and their supporters are shown here demonstrating for higher pay. Structural conflicts like this one are the focus of conflict theory.
Scott Olson/Getty Images News/Getty Images
Dahrendorf offered a very sociological view of authority, arguing that it resides not in individuals (e.g., Donald J. Trump) but in positions (e.g., the presidency of the United States) and in various associations of people. In his view, those associations are controlled by a hierarchy of authority positions and the people who occupy them. However, there are many such associations in any society. Thus, a person may be in authority in one type of association but be subordinate in many others.
What most interested Dahrendorf was the potential for conflict between those in positions of authority and those in subordinate positions. They usually have very different interests. Like authority, those interests are not characteristics of individuals but rather are linked to the positions they hold. For example, the top management of a retail or fast-food corporation such as Walmart or McDonald’s is interested in making the corporation more profitable by keeping wages low. In contrast, those who hold such low-level jobs as cashier or stock clerk are interested in increasing their wages to meet basic needs. Because of this inherent tension and conflict, authority within associations is always tenuous.
Critical Theory
While Marx’s work was critical of the capitalist economy, critical theory shifts the focus to culture. Marx believed that culture is shaped by the economic system. In contrast, the critical school has argued that by the early twentieth century, and at an ever-accelerating rate to this day, culture has become important in its own right. Furthermore, in many ways it has come to be more important than the economic system. Instead of being controlled by the capitalist economy, more of us are controlled—and controlled more often—by culture in general, specifically by the culture industry.
The culture industry consists of the rationalized and bureaucratized structures that control modern culture. In their early years, the 1920s and 1930s, critical theorists focused on radio, magazines, and movies. Today, movies remain important, but the focus has shifted to television and various aspects of the internet, especially Facebook. These are critiqued for producing, or serving as an outlet for, mass culture, or cultural elements that are administered by organizations, lack spontaneity, and are phony. Two features of mass culture and its dissemination by the culture industry are of particular concern to critical theorists:
• Falseness. True culture should emanate from the people, but mass culture involves prepackaged sets of ideas that falsify reality. The so-called reality shows (e.g., Survivor) are a contemporary example of mass culture. These programs are also highly formulaic. They are presented as if they are authentic, but in fact they are scripted, highly controlled, and selectively edited—although in a different way than fictional dramas, comedies, and soap operas are. They are also false in the sense that they give consumers of mass culture the sense that there is a quick and easy route to fame and fortune.
• Repressiveness. Like Marx, the critical theorists feel that the masses need to be informed about things such as the falseness of culture so that they can develop a clear sense of society’s failings and the need to rebel against them.
The effect of mass culture is to pacify, stupefy, and repress the masses so that they are far less likely to demand social change. Those who rush home nightly to catch up on their favorite reality TV shows are unlikely to have much interest in, or time for, revolutionary activities, or even civic activities and reforms.
Critical theory can be applied to some of the newest media forms, such as YouTube, Twitter, Snapchat, Instagram, and especially Facebook (Denegri-Knott and Zwick 2012). Despite there being plenty of false and stupefying content on these sites, along with all the edifying material, the sites are not totally controlled by large rationalized bureaucracies—at least not yet. Almost all the content that appears on sites such as YouTube, Facebook, and Twitter is provided by those who also consume material on the sites. The sites exercise little control over original content; that content is arguably spontaneously produced by those who use the sites. It’s tempting to conclude that these new aspects of the СКАЧАТЬ