Download Marx and Durkheim

Marx and Durkheim
The seventeenth and eighteenth centuries were full of evolving social and
economic ideas. These views of the social structure of urban society came
about through the development of ideas taken from the past revolutions.
As the Industrial Revolution progressed throughout the world, so did the
gap between the class structures. The development of a capitalist society
was a very favorable goal for the upper class. By using advanced methods
of production introduced by the Industrial Revolution, they were able to
earn a substantial surplus by ruling the middle class. Thus, maintaining
their present class of life, while the middle class was exploited and
degraded. At this time in history, social theorists like Emile Durkheim and
Karl Marx challenged the aspect of social structure in their works. Emile
Durkheim is known as a functionalist states that everything serves a
function in society and his main concern to discover what that function
was. On the other hand Karl Marx, a conflict theorist, stresses that society
is a complex system characterized by inequality and conflict that
generate social change. Both Durkheim and Marx were concerned with
the characteristics of groups and structures rather than with individuals.
The functionalist perspective in society is a view of society that focuses
on the way various parts of society have functions, or possible effects
that maintain the stability of the whole. Durkheim developed the idea of
society as an integrated system of interrelated parts. He wanted to
establish ho w the various parts of society contribute to the maintenance
of the whole. He also focused on how various elements of social
structure function to maintain social order and equilibrium. Durkheim
stressed that culture is the product of a community and not o f single
individuals. He argued that the ultimate reality of human life is
sociological and not psychological. The sociological reality, which
Durkheim called the collective conscience, exists beyond the individual
and individual actions. Durkheim characte rizes collective conscience as
“a totality of beliefs and sentiments common to average citizens of the
same society forms a determinate system which has its own life” (Ritzer,
82). In Durkheim’s opinion a whole is not identical to the sum of its parts,
thus society is not just a mere sum of individuals.
A good example of functionalist perspective is Emile Durkheim’s theory
about religion. According to Durkheim, religion in not about
supernatural beings but rather about beliefs and practices, which are th
e collective representations of society and groups. Because Durkheim’s
main interest was the ways in which society is bound together, he
investigated the role and the origin of religion in various communities.
He believed that a simpler society has a simpl er religion. Durkheim
claims that, “a religion as closely connected to a social system surpassing
all others in simplicity may well be regarded as the most elementary
religion we can possibly know” (Ritzer, 91). For instance Durkheim
argues that totemism a religious system in which animal figures are
regarded as sacred is among the simplest religious forms in the world.
The totemic animal, Durkheim believed, was the original focus of
religious activity because it was the emblem for a social group, “the clan
” (Ritzer, 91). He thought the model for the relationships between
people and the supernatural was similar to the relationship between
individuals and the community. For him the function of religion was to
make people willing to put the interests of societ y ahead of their
desires. He also believed religion is an important part of society and that
the functions of religion are to maintain the equilibrium in the society.
Moreover, Durkheim compares religion to society. He says that society is
the cause of the unique sensations of the religious experiences, so called
“sui generis” (Ritzer, 84). This concept corresponds to the way in which
society considers the things of its own experience. By the mere fact that
society exists, there is a whole system of representations by means of
which men understand each other. In a way collective representation
guarantees objectivity because it is collective. Collective representation
has been able to maintain itself because there is sufficient amount of
men who accept it. Durkheim says that religious beliefs contain a truth,
which must be discovered. This comes in contrast with Marx’s notion
that religion is nothing more than an illusion.
In contrast to the functionalist perspective stated above, the conflict
perspective in society is a view of society that benefit some people more
than it would others, due to their social standings. Karl Marx was a
sociologist who embraced the social conflict theory and made his main
goal to not just understand society but to reduce social inequality.
Through dialectical materialism set by George Hegel, Marx was able to
create a theory of a classless society. This society would be achieved
through the joint union of the middle class, proletarians, and overthrow
of the governing upper class, bourgeois. Marx realized that with the
unification of the working class, they would be able to better themselves
and their lives, and in doing so, better society on the whole.
The focus of Marx’s philosophical writings about social structure is aliena
tion. He believes that social or psychological alienation arises out of
economic or material alienation. In other words, consciousness is
determined by material conditions.
Concerning alienated labour, Marx said that, “Labour produces itself and
the worker as a commodity – and does so in the proportion in which it
produces commodities generally” (Lemert, 31). He sees this as the
ultimate surrendering of the human spirit to the material alienation of
capitalism. Furthermore, Marx sees it as a cycle that can and must be
broken in order to allow the worker to express himself.
Marx sees material alienation as the cause of social or psychological
alienation. Material alienation he said is caused by the existence of
private property. Private property came into existence through the
unequal division of labour. Division of labour, therefore, is the central
idea in which Marx bases his arguments concerning the outcome of
alienated labour. According to Marx, division of labour began with the
family, “where wife and children are the slaves of the husband” and
therefore became husband’s property (Ritzer, 63). Marx says that this
corresponds precisely the definition of unequal division of labour in the
modern society. Where an employer degraded a worker until the
worker becomes the private property of the industry and therefore no
different than a slave. Just as a slave is not free to decide whether or not
to work on a given day, neither is the worker. Both must work in order
to survive. Ultimately, many social thinkers in the history of sociology
have challenged the topic of social structure in their works.
Social thinkers like Emile Durkheim and Karl Marx have spent their entire
lives formulating theories that would explain the status of individuals in
societies. From a functionalist perspective sociologist like Emile Durkheim
looks at society as a system with various parts that contribute to the
maintenance of the whole. On the other hand Karl Marx, a conflict
theorist, stresses that society is a complex system characterized by
inequality and conflict that generate social change. Both theorists looked
at a social system as a set of mutually supporting elements, unlike for
Marx, it was hard for Durkheim to explain how change might occur in a
society.