sociology midterm

Lecture 10

I A common interpretation of Marxism is that culture, ideology, the state, and so forth are determined by the economic base. I Weber argues that the economic base can affect all of these elements of the superstructure, but also that these elements of the superstructure can affect the economic base.

I A person’s class position does not necessarily determine how they will act.

I People may organize as a class, but only if they subjectively understand themselves to have class interests.

I This does not happen automatically.

I Status groups, unlike classes, are typically communities that recognize themselves as communities.

I Status is based on honor and a style of life, not on economic resources.

I You cannot buy status; people who try to buy status are looked down upon.

I Sometimes economic classes form status groups, but this is not always so.

I There is often a zero-sum relationship between economic stratification and status stratification.

I Ethnic or racial groups are an extreme example of status groups.

I Interaction between these groups is often prohibited. I Both subordinate and dominant ethnic groups develop ideas about their own superiority.

I The existence of status groups interferes with free market exchange. People often trade with others not because it gives them an economic advantage but because they respect, trust, or socialize with those people. A lot of contemporary sociological scholarship on social networks is based on this insight.

I Weber defines a state as “a human community that successfully claims the monopoly of the legitimate use of physical force within a given territory” (78)

I “a relation of men dominating men, a relation supported by means of legitimate (i. e. considered to be legitimate) violence” (78)

I He argues that there are three types of legitimate domination:

I Traditional domination: we obey because this is the way things have always been

I Charismatic domination: we obey because of our devotion to an individual leader

I Legal domination: we obey because we believe in the legitimacy of the rules and codes that bind us

Review

Review

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I Markets need states to enforce contracts and uphold property rights.

I Bureaucracy is a mode of governance well-suited to capitalism.

I It is an example of legal domination.

I It is an indication of the growing rationalization of society.

I “Permanent and public office authority, with fixed jurisdiction, is not the historical rule but rather the exception” (196) I “Bureaucracy...is fully developed in political and ecclesiastical communities only in the modern state, and, in the private economy, only in the most advanced institutions of capitalism” (196)

I Administration: the transfer of as many tasks as possible to the organization of the state proper for continuous

management and discharge

I Transportation, communication, policing

I “Precision, speed, unambiguity, knowledge of the files, continuity, discretion, unity, strict subordination, reduction of friction and of material and personal costs—these are raised to the optimum point in the strictly bureaucratic administration, and especially in its monocratic form. As compared with all collegiate, honorific, and avocational forms of administration, trained bureaucracy is superior on all these points. And as far as complicated tasks are concerned, paid bureaucratic work is not only more precise but, in the last analysis, it is often cheaper than even formally unremunerated honorific service” (214)

I “The regular activities required for the purposes of the bureaucratically governed structure are distributed in a fixed way as official duties” (196)

I “The authority to give commands required for the discharge of these duties is distributed in a stable way and is strictly delimited by rules concerning coercive means, physical, sacerdotal, or otherwise, which may be placed at the disposal of officials” (196)

I “The management of the modern office is based upon written documents (‘the files’), which are preserved in their original or draught form” (197)

I “Methodological provision is made for the regular and continuous fulfillment of these duties and for the execution of corresponding rights; only persons who have the generally regulated qualifications to serve are employed” (196) I “Office management, at least all specialized office management—and such management is distinctly modern—usually presupposes thorough and expert training”

(198)

I “The principle of hierarchical office authority is found in all bureaucratic structures” (197)

I “Once established and having fulfilled its task, an office tends to continue in existence and be held by another incumbent” (197)

I “The modern organization of civil service separates the bureau from the private domicle of the official, and, in general, bureaucracy segregates official activity as something distinct from the spehere of private life” (197)

I “The ‘objective’ discharge of business primarly means a discharge of business according to calculable rules and

‘without regard for persons’” (215)

I “Normally, the position of the official is held for life, at least in public bureaucracies...As a factual rule, tenure for life is presupposed, even where the giving of notice or periodic reappointment occurs...Where legal guarantees against arbitrary dismissal or transfer are developed, they merely serve to guarantee a strictly objective discharge of specific office duties free from all personal considerations” (202) I “This stands in extreme contrast to the regulation of all relationships through individual privileges and bestowals of favor, which is absolutely dominant in patrimonialism, at least in so far as relationships are not fixed by sacred tradition”

(198)

Bureaucracy

Bureaucracy

Bureaucracy

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The upsides and downsides of bureaucracy

I Would you want an unaccountable person to determine your enrollment in this course? Or would you rather have it determined by rules that apply equally to everyone? I “Finally, the greater the bureaucratization of public life, the greater will be the attraction of violence. In a fully developed bureaucracy there is nobody left with whom one could argue, to whom one could present grievances, on whom the pressures of power could be exerted. Bureaucracy is the form of government in which everybody is deprived of political freedom, of the power to act; for the rule by Nobody is not no-rule, and where all are equally powerless we have a tyranny without a tyrant.” – Hannah Arendt

The upsides and downsides of bureaucracy

I What about mandatory minimum sentences for drug crimes?

The limits of science

I “Tolstoi has given the simplest answer, with the words: ‘Science is meaningless because it gives no answer to our question, the only question important to us: ‘What shall we do and how shall we live?’ That science does not give an answer to this is indisputable” (143)

The limits of science

I “the ultimately possible attitudes toward life are irreconcilable, and hence their struggle can never be brought to a final conclusion. Thus it is necessary to make a decisive choice. Whether, under such conditions, science is a worth while ‘vocation’ for somebody, and whether science itself has an objectively valuable ‘vocation’ are again value judgments about which nothing can be said in the lecture-room” (152) I “No science is absolutely free from presuppositions, and no science can prove its fundamental value to the man who rejects these presuppositions” (153)

Value neutrality

I Unlike Marx and Du Bois, Weber believed that social science should be value-neutral. It could answer only positive questions (questions about how things are) not normative questions (questions about how things should be).

Rationalization

I “The increasing intellectualization and rationalization do not, therefore, indicate an increased general knowledge of the conditions under which one lives. It means something else, namely, the knowledge or belief that if one but wished one could learn it at any time. Hence, it means that principally there are no mysterious incalculable forces that come into play, but rather that one can, in principle, master all things by calculation. This means that the world is disenchanted” (139)

Rationalization

I “The fate of our times is characterized by rationalization and intellectualization and, above all, by the ‘disenchantment of the world.’ Precisely the ultimate and most sublime values have retreated from public life either into the transcendental realm of mystic life or into the brotherliness of direct and personal human relations.” (155)

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