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Hierarchies. Critique of Individual theories. In the last section, theorists focused on how people come to share common understandings of a situation In other words, how people come to know the rules of the game People’s behavior will reflect this understanding
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Critique of Individual theories • In the last section, theorists focused on how people come to share common understandings of a situation • In other words, how people come to know the rules of the game • People’s behavior will reflect this understanding • Once they know the rules, they will follow them • But this approach ignores the possibility of self-interest • Even people who know the rules might be tempted to cheat
Critique of Individual theories, cont’d • Common language and concepts may be necessary to produce cooperation, but they are insufficient • Cohen and Vandello’s South • Intrafamily conflict
Critique, cont’d • How then do we get people to follow the rules? How do we get people to cooperate even when doing so is counter to their self-interest?
Hobbes’ question • How is social order possible?
Hobbes’ assumptions • People have the capacity to reason • They weigh the costs and benefits • They consider the consequences of their actions
Hobbes’ assumptions, cont’d • People are self-interested • They seek to attain what they desire • Security (avoid death and injury) • Reputation (status) • Gain (possessions)
Assumptions, cont’d • Their ability to attain what they desire depends on their power • Because men want a happy life, they seek sufficient power to ensure that life • All men have a “restless desire for power”
Assumptions, cont’d • But men are equal in body and mind • Everyone is pulled into a constant competitive conflict for a struggle for power • Or at least to resist his powers being commanded by others
Assumptions, cont’d • Without a power that is able to enforce rules, people don’t enjoy their interactions with each other
Implications • The natural state of man is a war of all against all (‘the state of nature’) • People who want the same things will be enemies • They will use all means (including ‘force and fraud’) to attain their ends
Characteristics of the ‘state of nature’ • People are insecure, and live in a constant fear of injury and death • There is no place for industry, because the fruit of it is uncertain • Hence, no agriculture, navigation, building, culture, science • Life is short and unpleasant
Characteristics of the ‘state of nature’ • Nothing can be unjust • The notions of right and wrong, justice and injustice have no place
Hobbes’ defense of his assumptions • The fact that people lock their doors at night (even in the 16th century!) provides support for Hobbes’ view that people are naturally inclined to use ‘force and fraud’
Hobbes • People don’t like the state of nature • They therefore have a desire for social order
Summary of the problem of social order • Man is a rational egoist who fears death • His egoism competition and war with all others • He is engaged in a zero-sum game • His fear of death and desire for ‘commodious living’ demand for social order
Hobbes’ solution • Under these conditions, how can social order be attained? • In the state of nature, people have liberty • Since man is rational, he will never use his power to harm himself • Man will try to attain peace only if he is convinced that everyone else will do the same
How to make sure that everyone would seek peace? • No use for everyone to merely agree to give up their individual sovereignty • because men would still be rational egoists and would renege whenever it was to their advantage • They would have to transfer them to some person or body who could make the agreement stick • By having the authority to use the combined force of all the contractors to hold everyone to it • Agreements alone don’t have any force without some coercive power to back them up
The solution: surrender of sovereignty • The only way to provide social order is for everyone to acknowledge a perpetual sovereign power (the state, or Leviathan) against which each of them would be powerless • This represents a coercive solution to the problem of social order. Due to rational egoism, the only means of providing order is by establishing a state that would punish would-be miscreants.
Hobbes: Summary of causal relations and mechanisms • Macro-level cause: war of all against all • Situational mechanism: people want security • Individual internal state: desire order • Behavioral mechanism: rational egoists decide to give up sovereignty to the state • Individual action: People give up sovereignty to the state • Transformational mechanism: Aggregation • Macro-level outcome/cause: state • Situational mechanism: Individuals evaluate new costs of deviance • Individual internal state: Recognize that deviance is costly • Behavioral mechanism: Individuals want to avoid costs • Individual action: Obedience • Transformational mechanism: Aggregation • Macro-level outcome: Social order
Hobbes: Draw the theory Social order War of all against all Formation of the state Unhappy life Individuals give up rights Individual compliance Costs of disobedience
Hobbes • How do we know if the theory has merit? • Look at the empirical world • For example, do societies without government have more violence than societies with governments? (Cooney 1997)
Engels on the state • Like Hobbes, Engels views the state as necessary for social order • However, the origin of the state is different • Hobbes: a world of equal individuals • Engels: a world of unequal classes
Classes • Defined by their relation to the means of production • Owners • Non-owners • Are important because production determines consciousness (Marx)
Classes • The interests of the dominant and subordinate classes conflict • Their behavior reflects their conflicting interests • So, societies are prone to conflict
Classes • The class with the most economic power becomes the political power
Engels: How the state encourages compliance • It represents the interests of the ruling class as against the class made up of non-owners • Mechanism: coercion, supplemented by ideology/religion • Coercion • Fines • Prison • Ideology/religion • Makes dominance by the ruling class seem natural
Engels: How the state encourages compliance, cont’d • Example: 1984 • Coercion via • Monitoring (telescreens) • Sanctioning • Ideology/persuasion • Control over information • Ministry of truth
Engels: Draw the theory Dominance by Powerful = State Social Order Class Conflict Costs of deviance, view of what’s appropriate Compliance
Engels • How do we know if the theory has merit? • Look at the empirical world • E.g. Do governments protect the interests of the wealthy? • Do religion, education, and so forth benefit the wealthy?
Education (Bowles and Gintis) • Education perpetuates inequality • Those with wealthy, educated parents have more years of school and are more likely to attend college • Parental socio-economic status is a better predictor of college attendance than the student’s IQ • Children of highly educated parents do better on standardized test scores • Less money is spent on schools that poor children attend
Education, cont’d • Education perpetuates existing status structures • The structure of schools corresponds to the structure of the economic world • Role relationships replicate the hierarchical division of labor • Students don’t control curriculum content • Rewards are external (grades) rather than internal/intrinsic
Education, cont’d • There is a hierarchical division of types of schools like there is for types of jobs • At work: lower levels emphasize rule-following; middle levels emphasize dependability and ability to act without supervision; higher levels stress internalization of norms • At school: lower levels (junior and senior high) limit and channel activities of students. Community colleges have more independent activity. Elite four year colleges even more so. • As students master each level, they either progress to the next or are channeled into the corresponding level in the hierarchy of production.
Critique of coercive theories of social order • Hobbes cannot explain social order • Why should rational egoists in the state of nature ever be willing to lay down their arms and surrender their liberty to a coercive ruler?
Critique of coercive solutions • Hobbes’ solution to the problem of order stretches the conception of rationality beyond its scope in the rest of the theory, to a point where the actors come to be concerned about the social interest rather than their individual interests (Parsons 1937) • In the absence of normative limits on the use of force and fraud there will be an unlimited struggle for power • But there are no normative elements in Hobbes (nor are these central in Marx-Engels)
Critique of coercive solutions • Very high levels of coercion would be required to produce social order. But, • Coercion is expensive • Need a cop on every corner • A telescreen in every room (1984) • Coercion is ethically unappealing • Proudhon’s list of the ‘domestic inconveniences of the state’
Max Weber’s contributions • 1. The concept of legitimacy • 2. Three types of social order
Legitimacy • In every social order, commands will be obeyed by a given group of individuals • To ensure this, there must be some voluntary compliance • people must have an interest in obeying the rules/laws • Thus, every type of social order cultivates the belief in its legitimacy
Legitimacy implicitly recognized in Marxism • To forestall class conflict, the ruling class attains intellectual hegemony by supporting • (State) churches– religion = ‘the opiate of the people’ • Schools • The mass media • In capitalism, political, military, religious, media institutions are dependent on the ruling class • Serve the interests of the ruling class • Justify exploitation of the working class • The Orwellian conclusion • In 1984, the ruling class molds thinking, through its control over media, language, etc.
Legitimate orders • Requires administrative staff to rule large numbers of people • Staff = a specialized group normally trusted to execute policy • Every system of order • Has a way to bind the staff to the ruler • Has a way to bind the ruled to the ruler
Three ‘ideal types’ of social order • Abstract models of social conditions • Patrimonial (‘Traditional order’) • Rests on the belief in the sanctity of traditions, and the legitimacy of the rulers selected thereby • Bureaucratic (‘Legal order’) • Rests on the belief in the legality of enacted rules, and the right of those elevated in authority under such rules to issue commands • Charismatic • Rests on devotion to the exceptional sanctity, heroism, or exemplary character of an individual person
How are these types arrived at? • By assuming what instrumental, self-interested actors would do, if they found themselves in the given social conditions • Weber imagines how rational egoists would behave in these conditions
Charismatic order • There are no fixed rules • Leaders make their own rules (said to come from a higher power) • Gandhi • Order does not depend on a continuous source of income • Wealth not pursued in a methodical manner • Regards as undignified all rational economic conduct • Master and disciples must be free of ordinary worldly attachments
Charismatic order, cont’d • Followers are not materially compensated • They often share in the goods the leader receives as donations • Ability of leader to provide goods sets a limit on charismatic authority • Leader’s mission must prove itself by fulfilling the values of faithful followers (and providing some subsistence to them)
Patrimonial order • Rests on the sanctity of age-old rules and powers • Masters chosen according to these rules, obeyed because of their traditional status • Motivational basis • Personal loyalty • When exercising power, the master must consider how far he can go without inciting resistance • When resistance occurs, directed against the master personally, not against the system as such
Recruitment to staff • People are recruited to a patrimonial staff either via • Traditional ties of loyalty • Kinsmen, slaves, dependents, clients, etc. • Example: Saddam Hussein recruits from Tikrit • Voluntarily • People who willingly enter into a relation of loyalty to the leader • (Tom Hagen, the consigliere to the Corleone family)
Factors absent from patrimonial orders • Clearly defined spheres of competence subject to impersonal rules • Rationally established hierarchies • An orderly promotion system • Technical training as a requirement • Fixed monetary salaries
How are patrimonial staff compensated? • By living from the lord’s table • By allowances in kind • By rights of land use in exchange for services • By the appropriation of property income, fees, or taxes • By fiefs
