The Classical Approaches to Understanding Contemporary Society - Essay Example

How relevant are the ical approaches in understanding contemporary society? History of man is the history of the study of human nature in relation to himself, in relation to society and in relation to his environment and it is the nature of the human beings since birth to explore his environment and the fundamental concepts of the nature around him. This thought since centuries has been conceptualized by our philosophers and scientists who have tried to bring about the notions such as interactions, fusion, integration, or systems to understand this very nature of the human beings and how they develop within the set paradigms of society. The essay will trace back to the classical approaches towards understanding of human beings with the Marxism, Functionalism and Interactivism theories and then will confer to the relevance of these theories for understanding the contemporary society. The roots of the phenomenon of this beginning traces back to our philosophers who first attempted to study the basic elements of our Universe and the nature. It was found that around 600 BC, a Greek named Thabes of Miletus (640-546 BC), became the first philosopher to speculate about the nature of the Universe in order to predict a solar Eclipse. (Lerner 2001: 20) It is amply clear that before the philosophical disposition towards the study of human beings started, philosophers were more delving into the mysteries of nature. It was only 200 years later that philosophers began to disperse their knowledge and skills in the study of the nature of human development and Plato’s philosophical statements regarding the human development was first significant contribution. But his derivations and statements of the many of the philosophers following him were indirect. For complete 2000 years, their major works were concern on physical, spatial, and temporal body, mind and soul. (Lerner 2001: 20) But his ideas presented before us not only the study of intricate human nature rather on nature or nurture issue. He said that it is not necessary for human beings to learn about their own nature, as it is inherent in them, in the form of their soul. Plato divided the soul into three parts desire, spiritual and rational whereas Aristotle looked at human beings as having only two souls: the philosophical/ theoretical and the rational. Even Giddins pinpointed to the fact that the systemic study of the human behavior and society only began during late 1700 and early 1800 after the world saw complete change in their social, economic and political set up at the aftermath of French revolution and Industrial revolution respectively and the analysis was being done according to the Science. (Giddins & Griffiths 2006: 10) In the nineteenth century, Karl Marx who was the German philosopher, political economist as well as socialist revolutionary tried to understand the human nature in context to social, political and economic conditions of the society and his ideas began to be formulated under Classical Marxism. Marx and before that Aristotle too had said that human nature could be divided into two parts: firstly drives and secondly capacities. Human nature is not only one person’s phenomenon but it is derived which is common to all. It is a combination of equanimity in aims and thought processes of several human beings together and the most important element here is power. It is a certain tendency of human beings to behave in a certain way. Looking at a particular view of human nature, power for some people is seen as basic while for the others is seen as secondary, which comes from the aggression and the aggressive behavior in turn depends on the conditions prevalent in the society at the time. Marx views on human nature and ethics had been derived from ‘utopia’ and the any change in power or human behavior depends on the changes in society. His theories and ideologies culminated in what is known as Classical Marxism. An important aspect to this theory and ideology is the importance of socialism and considering capitalism as the source of exploitation. In socialism, there is no ownership of private property rather is abolition of exploitation. In twentieth century, Western Marxism tried to develop the ideas of Marx into new ways relating to their study of humanism, dialectics, history and democracy. Many of the thinkers like Adorno, Horkheimer, Gadamer, and Habermas (Geuss 1981) expanded the Marx ideas related to critical theory. Their theory is the theory of class struggle. During the year 1960s, following on the path of Marx, Western Marxists covered the issues what we know today inequalities and the class struggle. The term Western Marxists is used as thinkers like Marxist humanists who think Marx more as a philosopher and lay stress on his Hegelian and humanist elements but sometimes they also refer to the anti humanist movements like Structural Marxism. Marxists says that, “The agency of revolutionary transformation from feudalism to capitalism is the bourgeoisie, and in the case of capitalism to socialism, it is the class that the industrial bourgeoisie creates through factory production, the industrial proletariat.” Such an account is central to Marxism because it provides “the theoretical underpinnings that guarantee the final success of socialism. Clearly, this provides useful ideological support for Marxist political parties and intellectuals since it vindicates the ultimate correctness of their diagnoses.” (Penn 1985: 5) Marx is involved in the class struggle or class conflict with the capitalists. Hook has explained why the industrial working class acquired the most important aspect for Marx convention of socialism and revolution. He said, “ [F]irst, the members of the working class are more numerous than the members of any other class and have acquired a certain discipline and capacity for organization in virtue of their function in production; second, they occupy a strategic role in society and can paralyze the economy by general strikes; third, and most important, the conflicts between all other groups can be composed without altering in any fundamental way the basic property relations of society, whereas the conflict between the workers and the owners of the instruments of production is endemic and breaks out again and again in acute form. It cannot be solved short of transformation of the entire system - by a social revolution carried out in democratic countries peacefully and in non-democratic countries violently.” (Hook 1955: 31) Marx further said that alienation is the most important aspect of the capitalist mode of production. In other words, in the Capitalist mode of production, human beings do not get the fruit of their labour. In the factories, labourers work for the wages but they are devoid of the products created by them. The Capitalists have the ownership rights of these products. Marx had explained this concept in his ‘Economic and Philosophical Manuscripts’ of 1844. Marx also attacked on the accumulation of wealth by the Capitalists indirectly leading to exploitation of the labour class. It is through socialism only Marxists sought to remove the alienation and exploitations and only revolution could bring about socialism. Marxists were not just theorists but applied their ideologies and principles in the political sphere too. Karl Marx had induced upon his followers not just to interpret the world as was being done by earlier Marxists but also brought about relevant changes and they gained tremendous success. Among them Vladimir Lenin was also one of the most influential leader of the Soviets following the October Revolution of 1917 and the result was the communist reign spread in most parts of the world. The reign of Bolshevik party and the rule of the Communist parties like in Vietnam were seen as the proof and the effect of the Marxism theory. But communism and socialism did not last long and the nations who were themselves Communists regimes had to get back to Capitalism. Classical Marxism conceptualized the society having a definite pattern with a concrete social formation, but with an interdependent economic, political, legal and cultural levels with several parts of modes of production and it is the relationship between these different modes of production that runs the society. In his preface to a contribution to the ‘Critique of Political economy’ Marx said, “In their social production of existence, men inevitably enter into definite relations, which are independent of their will, namely relations of production appropriate to a given stage in the development of their material forces of production.” (Cutler 1977: 174) From this, forms the economic structure of society and from here arises legal and political institutions forming society’s superstructure. (Cutler 1977: 175) In other words, the whole of social and political life revolves around the materialistic mode of production and in turn this materialistic mode of production is dependent upon the social and political life. Cutler rightly said that the consciousness of not a single human being determines the prevalent conditions of his survival but it is his social existence that becomes the most important constituent factor of his consciousness, which determines its direct and indirect relationship. There are certain criticisms of the Marx’s theory also. Feminists and cultural critics have said that the thoughts of Marx are too economistic and ignored many other forms of exploitations and discriminations. According to Green socialists, both the capitalism and socialism approaches are not environment friendly in 21st century. Democratic socialists said that Marx’s class politics gives very little importance to democracy. But despite all these criticism, the most vital theory that has occupied the central position in today’s society is the Marxist’s stress for the freedom of man from all types of exploitations, domination’s and alienation’s. We can say that the Marx’s theory helps us to analyze the various aspects of the human development and society and has been the topic of discussion among various theorists of this century. Nineteenth century saw the emergence of theorists who idealized the society on the basis of harmonious relationships. It is also known as the consensus theory because it is based on the fact that all societies have some needs, which are very important for them to grow and develop. These are their functional needs necessitating the society to run. The main priority of theorists is to meet the basic needs and desire to maintain the social order. In the theory, society is more important than the individuals. Functionalists treat human body as similar to higher organisms. Like the animal’s lungs and organs do for the whole body, in the same way each separate individual do for the society at large. Auguste Comte had incorporated functionalism as a fusion of conservatism and science. Emile Durkheim too pinpointed to the fact that each individual section or body contributes on the individual level to join together to form collective life. To raise the importance of the society, Comte and Durkheim conceived several aspects of the societal or macrolevel realities that could be succumbed to the wants or impulses of individuals and even groups. Meanwhile, another approach was adopted by Herbert Spencer, on the lines of Adam Smith and looked in the profit of the society in the hands of individuals pursuing their goals. Spencer believed that the needs of the individuals are the foundation stone on which the needs of the societies depend. He further said that different types of societies need to be competitive and undifferentiated soldiers in the need of their survival. Similarly the Sociologist Vilfredo Pareto also considered the individuals having more important disposition than others do. Religion too had a very crucial element of trust in functionalism. According to Durkheim, “Religion sacralized social life itself and, because the perspective of society was implicit in all cognition, religion thus served as the foundation of all knowledge”. (Blasi: Online Edition) With this method, we have seen the social world in the same way as the physical world. Therefore functionalists look at the social world as objectively real, which can be analyzed with the help of social surveys and interviews but modern societies are not conformable to any type of analysis. The studies on Functionalism have been done very little and what ever has been done is based on religion. Classical Functionalism focused on the positive purpose served by the particular variable within the context of the phenomenon under study. Critics believe the functionalism as conservative. Merton cited the critics who observed that, “Functional theory is merely the orientation of the conservative social scientists who would defend the present order of the things, just as it is, and who would attach the advisability of the change, however moderate.”(Grey 1996: 221) The human society is also understood in the form of the interactionist perspective. It is a theological approach to the most elementary and every day type of interactions being carried on in society. To understand the society, theorists first try to understand and visualize the ways the small groups act. They study the every day behavior of the people and how they act or react with each other and its surroundings. These surroundings are all materialistic objects, people’s actions or symbols. The most prominent of the interactionist theorists is George Herbert Mead followed by Charles Horton Cooley. Mead as a professor at the University of Chicago, did a deeper and in depth study on how small groups act or interact with each other. He would look at the body language of the individuals forming the part of the groups like frowning or nodding and would ask the other member of the groups how they would be effected with these gestures. (Schaefer & Lamm 1998) The basis of the interactionist’s view of society depends on the fact how people create influences on each other in their every day social interactions. Interactionists came to the conclusion that individuals establish their own small world through their own contacts, interacting with each other and there may be changes in the order in our own established small societies and it happens only when there are changes in the positions and communication levels. The main concept behind the study is the way nonverbal communication takes place between the small groups and these small groups pay particular attention to these small objects or things. Besides Marxism, Functionalism and Interactivism, there have been since centuries various scientific discoveries and the importance of the theoretical approaches toward understanding of various dimensions of human nature and society cannot be ignored. Marx understanding of man as Capitalist has been very crucial to understand from which angle the humans take their economic goals. Owners of the capital take deep interest to increase their capital and see their financial growth in the market and all the capitalists have the common interest to work together to achieve their goals. On the other hand, workers sell their labour for the wages and their important goal lies in the interest and welfare of the workers in a particular industry. Functionalists and Interactivism approaches are very near to the basic nature of human beings. The individual’s personal goals become the basis for societies and the societies fulfill the individual’s personal goals. But it is not necessary all the desires of human beings are fulfilled, as societies create blockade in fulfillment of the their needs and desires. These individualistic and structure theories are in essence the Macro theories as they study about the whole society and the world. Their studies are very important to the study of society, patriarchy system, racism and nationalism but Weber and Simmel laid the foundation for micro sociology. George Herbert Mead, a social scientist, delved towards the interrelation between the mind, self and society. By mid of the twentieth century, both the micro and macro approaches were used in all social, economic and political spheres. On one hand, we can also say that we cannot always predict the people and also the societal actions and interactions. If it is said that their behaviors are predictable, we can also say that if there were no regularities then there would have been no society and it was these regularities and irregularities that Durkheim had identified and Marx also decided to analyze in his macro writings. In the same way Hobbes, Locke, Voltaire, Rousseau, Milgram, Linton etc delved in various ways. All the theoretical approaches are in one way or the other similar to each other. They all have tried to study the intricate nature and behavior of the people, ‘why we are so if we are’ and all the theories are just taking us toward more and more understanding of ourselves though in different ways. Therefore the importance of the classical approaches in understanding the contemporary society has notwithstanding played a very important part in every aspect of our life. Reference List Blasi, A. Functionalism. Encyclopedia of Religion and Society. [Online] Available: http://hirr.hartsem.edu/ency/functionalism.htm [5 May 2008] Cutler, A. 1977. Marxs Capital and Capitalism Today. Routledge. Geuss, R. 1981. The Idea of a Critical Theory: Habermas and the Frankfurt School. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Giddens, A & Griffiths, S. 2006. Sociology. Cambridge & Malden: Polity Press. Gray, R. 1996. Archetypal Explorations: An Integrative Approach to Human Behavior. Routledge. Hook, S. 1955. Marx And The Marxists: the ambiguous legacy. London: Van Nostrad Reinhold. Leahy, T. 2000. Marx and Aristotle on Human Nature, Ethics and the State. [Online] Available: http://www.octapod.org:8000/gifteconomy//content/marxaristotle.html [ 5 May 2008] Lerner, R. M. 2001. Concepts and Theories of Human Development. New Jersey: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates. Penn, R. 1985. Skilled Workers In The Class Structure. Cambridge: CUP Schaefer, R. T. & Lamm, R. P. 1998. Sociology. 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