ritzer y bell - durkheim integrador de paradigmas

mile Durkheim: Exemplar for an Integrated Sociological Paradigm?Author(s): George Ritzer and Richard BellSource: Social Forces, Vol. 59, No. 4, Special Issue (Jun., 1981), pp. 966-995Published by: Oxford University PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2577976 .Accessed: 17/06/2014 22:30

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Emile Durkheim: Exemplar for an Integrated Sociological Paradigm?*

GEORGE RITZER, University of Maryland RICHARD BELL, University of Maryland

ABSTRACT Stipulating that an adequate integrated paradigm for sociology must

embrace two basic social dimensions, macro- to micro-social and the objective- subjective aspects of social life, we ask whether Durkheim's work meets these requirements. We find that although his work can contribute to this end (with its recognition of multiple levels of reality, the relations among these levels and their change through history, and with its marked contributions at the macro- subjective level) it is nonetheless an inadequate exemplar for an integrated paradigm. His work is marred by one-way causal attributions, by an overemphasis on the macro-subjective level, by an undeveloped conception of human nature, and a restricted view of science.

The objective in this paper is to assess the degree to which tmile Durk- heim would be an adequate exemplar for an integrated sociological paradigm.I Before we can get to the body of this paper, an assessment of Durkheim's work from this perspective, we need to outline the need for, and parameters of, an integrated paradigm.

In his earlier work the senior author of this paper (Ritzer, a, b) argued that sociology was dominated by three paradigms which he labeled the social facts, social definition, and social behavior paradigms. Briefly, those sociologists who work within the social facts paradigm focus on macrostructures, look to the work of Emile Durkheim as their exemplar, use structural-functional and conflict theory, and tend more often to employ the interview/questionnaire and historical/comparative methods. Those who accept the social definition paradigm focus on the action and interaction that result from the minding (i.e., creative mental) process, accept Max Weber's work on social action as the exemplar, employ various theories including symbolic interactionism, and phenomenology-ethnomethodology, and are more prone in their research to use the observational

*We would like to thank Jere Cohen and Whitney Pope for their helpful comments on an earlier draft of this paper.

01981 The University of North Carolina Press. 0037-7732/81/040966-95$03.00 966


Durkheim: Exemplar for a Paradigm? 1967

method. Finally, those who accept the social behavior paradigm focus on behavior and contingencies of reinforcement, view B. F. Skinner's work as their exemplar, operate from behavioral or exchange theory, and tend to more often employ the experimental method.

One of the problems with each of the dominant paradigms is their tendency to focus on one, or a few, level(s) of social reality and to argue that it is the most important aspect of social reality. Ritzer concluded his 1975 work with a plea for a more integrated paradigm and in a recent paper (c) and book (d) he outlined the structure of that paradigm. It is the schema for that paradigm that will provide us with the basis for deciding whether Durkheim offers a sufficiently integrative approach to qualify as an exemplar for such a paradigm.

The key to an integrated paradigm is the notion of "levels" of social reality. We do not mean to imply that social reality is really divided into levels. In fact, social reality is best viewed as an enormous variety of social phenomena that are involved in continuing interaction and ongoing change. In order to deal with this, given its enormous complexity, sociologists have abstracted out various levels for sociological analysis. Thus the levels are sociological constructs rather than really existing in the social world.

For our purposes the major levels of social reality can be derived from the interrelation of two basic social continua-the macroscopic- microscopic and objective-subjective. The macroscopic-microscopic di- mension (Blalock and Wilken; Edel; Wagner) relates to the magnitude of social phenomena ranging from whole societies to social acts, whereas the objective-subjective continuum (Blau; Jackman and Jackman) refers to whether the phenomenon has a real, material existence (e.g., bureaucracy, patterns of interaction) or exists only in the realm of ideas and knowledge (e.g., norms and values). Figure 1 is a schematic representation of the intersection of these two continua and the four major levels of social reality that are derived from it.

It is our contention that a new sociological paradigm must deal in an integrated fashion with the four basic levels of social reality identified in the figure.2 An integrated sociological paradigm must deal with macroscopic objective entities like bureaucracy, macro-subjective structures like culture, micro-objective phenomena like patterns of interaction, and micro-subjective facts like the process of reality construction. Remember that in the real world all of these gradually blend into the others as part of the larger social continuum, but we have made some artificial and rather arbitrary differentiations in order to be able to deal with social reality. These four levels of social reality are posited for heuristic purposes and are not meant to be an accurate depiction of the social world.

An obvious question is how these four levels relate to the three paradigms outlined in Ritzer's earlier work as well as to the integrated


968 / Social Forces Volume 59:4, June 1981

MACROSCOPIC

I. Macro-objective II. Macro-subjective Examples include Examples include society, law, bureaucracy, culture, norms architecture, technology, and values. and language.

OBJECTIVE SUBJECTIVE

III. Micro-objective IV. Micro-subjective Examples include Examples include patterns of behavior, the various facets of action, and interaction. the social construction

of reality.

MICROSCOPIC

Figure 1. MAJOR LEVELS OF SOCIAL REALITY

paradigm being discussed here. Figure 2 relates the four levels to the four paradigms.

The social facts paradigm focuses primarily on the macro-objective and macro-subjective levels, the social definition paradigm is largely concerned with the micro-subjective as well as that part of the micro-objective world that depends on mental processes (action), and the social behavior paradigm deals with that part of the micro-objective world that does not involve the minding process (behavior). Whereas the three extant paradigms cut across the levels of social reality horizontally, the new integrative paradigm cuts across vertically. This depiction makes it clear why the proposed paradigm does not supercede the others. Although each of the three existing paradigms deals with a given level or levels in great detail, the proposed integrated paradigm deals with all levels, but does not examine any given level in anything like the degree of intensity of the existing paradigms. Thus the choice of a paradigm depends on the kind of question being asked. Not all sociological issues require an integrative approach, but it is certain that at least some do.

To some, tmile Durkheim might seem like an unlikely choice as a possible exemplar for an integrated sociological paradigm. After all, Durk- heim is already an exemplar for the social facts paradigm, and that would seem to eliminate him as a possible exemplar for an integrated paradigm. It was Durkheim (b) who argued that sociology should focus on social facts, or what we have termed the macro-objective and macro-subjective levels of social reality. This implies, and Durkheim at times rather baldly took the position, that the micro-objective and micro-subjective levels are not part of sociological explanations. As Durkheim said: "The determining cause of


Durkheim: Exemplar for a Paradigm? / 969

Level of Social Reality SOCIOLOGICAL PARADIGMS

Macro-subjective Social Facts

Macro-objective

0 0 0

Micro-subjective O 0 Social Definition a

Micro-objective >

Social Behavior

Figure 2. LEVELS OF SOCIAL REALITY AND THE MAJOR SOCIOLOGICAL PARADIGMS

a social fact should be sought among the social facts preceding it" (b, 110). It is this kind of orientation, as well as Durkheim's effort to carry it through by using social facts to study such individual acts as suicide,3 that led Tiryakian to see Durkheim as the prototype of sociologism, "the viewpoint of those sociologists who, making sociology a science completely irreduc- ible to psychology, consider it as necessary and sufficient for the total explanation of social reality" (11). If Durkheim in fact consistently took such an extreme position, then there would be little possibility of finding the outlines of an integrated paradigm in his work. But Durkheim does take a softer position on this issue with the result that he does have something to offer on paradigmatic integration. We will see that what he has to say is severely limited, but his work can nevertheless be useful to the development of an integrated paradigm.

Despite this enunciation of a general integrative interest, there remains the issue of whether Durkheim tells us enough about the microscopic levels to warrant further investigation. Although one would have to begin such an enterprise with grave doubts, the fact is that there is sufficient evidence of his interest in the microscopic level to at least begin such an exploration. Nisbet, for example, argues that there is little difference between the approaches of Durkheim and George Herbert Mead. If this were only partially true, it would lend considerable weight to the idea that Durkheim has something to offer on the microscopic levels since these



were Mead's primary foci. Alpert, in one of the earliest serious analyses of Durkheim's work in this country, argued forcefully that Durkheim not only understood the micro-levels of social reality, but gave them a significant role in his system. He says that Durkheim was keenly aware of the recalcitrant nature of human beings, of the give and take element in the process of acculturation, and of the fundamental tendency of individuals to be refractory to social discipline. It is erroneous to attribute to Durkheim, as Malinowski does, the theory of unswerving, automatic, 'slavish, fascinated, passive' obedience to social codes. (208). This theme is repeated in a much more recent analysis of Durkheim's work by Wallwork: "Durkheim was quite willing to accept Kant's claim that the self is free, in some sense to choose. To see man as a being-in-society, he states, 'it is not necessary to believe that the human personality is totally absorbed in the bosom of the collective being"' (36). Finally, Pope also stresses the microscopic level in Durkheim's work, but in a slightly different way by focusing on the conflict between the unsocialized individual and society: "The force opposing society is the nonsocial (unsocialized) individual .. ., an opposition that constitutes the central dynamic of his theory" (a, 363). Thus there seem to be enough claims (although there are certainly many counter-claims) to lead us to believe that Durkheim has some insights into the microscopic levels and these, in concert with his elaborate analyses or the macroscopic levels, might well make him a candi- date for an exemplar for an integrated paradigm.

Levels of Social Reality

Also leading us to look to Durkheim as a potential exemplar is the fact that he had a sense of "levels" of social reality, although he did not spell them out in precise detail. However, Lukes (1972:9-10) made Durkheim's interest in levels of social reality very explicit: Durkheim saw social facts as lying along a continuum. At one end are structural, 'anatomical or morphological' social phenomena, making up the 'substratum (sub- strat) of collective life': these consist in-

The number and nature of the elementary parts of which society is composed, the way they are arranged, the degree of coalesence they have attained. The distribution of population over the surface of the territory, the number and nature of channels of communication, the form of dwell- ings, etc.

Then there are what one might call institutionalized norms, which may be more, or less, formal-'legal and moral rules, religious dogmas, financial systems, etc.'- 'established beliefs and practices' which have their origin or 'substratum' either in 'the political society as a whole, or in one of the partial groups which comprise it!


Durkheim: Exemplar for a Paradigm? 1 971

Finally, occupying the rest of the continuum are social facts which are not institutionalized but 'without presenting these crystallized forms, have both the same objectivity and the same ascendancy over the individual.' These are 'social currents'; and these may be relatively stable 'currents of opinion,' or, at the extreme, 'transitory outbreaks' such as occur when 'in an assembly of people, great movements of enthusiasm, of indignation or of pity are generated.' Durkheim argued that 'a whole series of degrees without a break in continuity links facts of the most clearly structural character with those free currents of social life that are not yet caught within any definite mould.'

Translating Durkheim's terms into ours, we can see that Durkheim was aware of a continuum of social reality encompassing the macro-objective (anatomical or morphological social facts), macro-subjective (norms, beliefs and practices, and stable social currents) and micro-subjective and micro-objective (the transitory outbreaks in an assembly of people). We are perhaps stretching Lukes meaning here by interpreting the latter phenomena as part of the microscopic realms, but Lukes has not gone far enough in his analysis of Durkheim's levels. Durkheim had a far clearer conception of the microscopic levels, particularly the micro-subjective, than Lukes implies here and we will deal with them later in this chapter along with an analysis of the weaknesses of Durkheim's work in this realm.

Social Reality as a Continuum

Before we get to Durkheim's specific insights into the macro-subjective level (the primary focus of his work), it is worth returning to the theme just discussed-the fact that Durkheim views social reality as a continuum rather than a discrete set of levels of social reality. This is an essential insight, and one that we accept wholeheartedly, even though it is necessary for heuristic purposes to divide social reality into levels. Durkheim's conception of a continuum leads him (and us) to be unclear on precisely where one level ends and another begins. They all meld imperceptibly into each other.4

For example, Durkheim is not clear precisely where the macro-subjective phenomena like norms end and the macro-objective phenomena like morphological factors begin. Norms and social currents are certainly macro-subjective, but we begin to move to the micro-subjective level in talking about currents of opinion and transitory outbreaks. The lack of a clear dividing line between the macro-subjective and micro-subjective is highlighted by Durkheim's use of the French word conscience in his early and crucial concept of the collective conscience. Says Lukes, "The French word 'conscience' is ambiguous, embracing the meaning of the two English words 'conscience' and 'consciousness.' Thus the beliefs and sentiments comprising the conscience collective are, on the one hand, moral and reli-



gious, and, on the other, cognitive" (4). The collective conscience encompasses both macro-subjective ("moral and religious") and micro-subjective ("cognitive") phenomena, although Durkheim almost always used the term to refer to macroscopic phenomena. Wallwork, in his analysis of Durkheim's moral theories, confirms Lukes' conclusion: "Durkheim claims that the collective conscience refers not only to shared moral norms, but to the individual's 'awareness of' cultural norms or the 're-presentation' in consciousness, or conscience of shared moral meanings" (37).

The fact that Durkheim did not in general clearly separate the macro-subjective from the micro-subjective is also found in a number of his specific arguments. We can take one example from his work on primitive classification where Durkheim (and Mauss) try to show the roots of the classification system used in the mind in the social world. Needham, in his introduction to Primitive Classification, points out how it is impossible to clearly separate the two levels in their work: They aptly call their essay a 'contribution to the study of collective representations,' but their real concern throughout is to study a faculty of the human mind. They make no explicit distinction between the two topics, and indeed they argue as though there were none to be made, so that conclusions derived from a study of collective representations are taken to apply directly to cognitive operations (xxvi). Thus we begin this discussion of Durkheim's work at the macro-subjective level with the clear sense that Durkheim systematically refused to clearly differentiate this level from at least some of the others, indeed his commitment to the idea of levels of social reality as part of a social continuum made such a rigid differentiation impossible.

Morality

As we have already pointed out, 'Durkheim's richest insights lie at the macro-subjective level. In fact, when Durkheim talked of social facts, he most often had in mind moral facts, or macro-subjective phenomena. Among the aspects of macro-subjectivity that interested Durkheim were, most generally, morality as well as more specifically the collective conscience, collective representations, social currents, and most questionably from a modern sociological perspective, group mind.

At the most general level, Durkheim was a sociologist of morality, indeed Wallwork argues that his sociology was a mere "by-product of his concern with moral issues" (183). That is, Durkheim's concern with morality led him as a sociologist to devote most of his attention to the moral elements of social life. The problem with saying that Durkheim focused on morality at the macro-subjective level is that morality is so abstract and general a concept that we learn very little. The same is true if we equate mo-



rality with culture as Tiryakian did. We learn an ifnportant lesson from this and that is that we need to go beyond talking about the macro-subjective level (morality, culture) in general and focus on the various components, or sub-levels, within the macro-subjective level. We need to explicate the various sub-levels within each of the four main levels of social reality rather than being satisfied solely with generalizations about these broad levels.

Collective Conscience

In his early efforts to deal with morality Durkheim developed the idea of the collective conscience. Durkheim defined this basic concept in the Divi- sion of Labor in Society: The totality of beliefs and sentiments common to average citizens of the society forms a determinate system which has its own life; one may call it the collective or common conscience.... It is, thus, an entirely different thing from particular con- sciences, although it can only be realized through them (a, 79- 80). Several points are worth underscoring about this definition in terms of our interest in macro-subjectivity. First, it is clear that Durkheim conceives of the collective conscience as occurring globally, or societal-wide, when he speaks of the "totality" of people's beliefs and sentiments. Second, Durk- heim clearly views the collective conscience as being an independent, determinate, macro-subjective system. But, third, although he holds such a view, he is also aware of its ties to the micro-subjective level when he speaks of it being "realized" through individual consciousness.

That the collective conscience is also related to the macro-objective form of society is made clear by the fact that Durkheim relates the collective conscience to the type of society in which it is found. Societies are di- chotomized into those characterized by mechanical and organic solidarity. Giddens performs a useful service by pointing out that the collective conscience in these two types of societies can be differentiated on four dimensions-volume, intensity, rigidity, and content. In societies characterized by mechanical solidarity the collective conscience covers virtually the entire society and its members, is believed in with great intensity (as reflected, for one thing, by the use of repressive sanctions when it is violated), is ex- tremely rigid and its content is highly religious in character. In societies with organic solidarity the collective conscience is much more limited in its domain and in the number of people enveloped by it, is adhered to with much less intensity (as reflected by the.substitution of restitutive for repressive laws), is not very rigid, and its content is "moral individualism," or the elevation of the importance of the individual, the human being, to a moral precept.


9741 Social Forces Volume 59:4, June 1981

Collective Representations

As we have seen the collective conscience is very general and Durkheim's dissatisfaction with its amorphous character led him to progressively abandon it in favor of the much more specific, but still macro-subjective, notion of collective representation. Collective representations may be viewed as specific states, or substrata, of the collective conscience (Lukes). In contemporary terms, we may most often think of them as the norms and values of specific groups such as family, occupation, state, educational and religious institutions. Although they are more specific than the collective conscience, collective representations are not reducible to the micro-subjective realm: "representations collectives result from the substratum of associated individuals . . . but they cannot be reduced to and wholly explained by features of individuals: they have sui generis characteristics" (Lukes, 7). It is the sui generis character of collective representations (as well as the collective conscience) that places them generally within the macro-subjective realm. They transcend the individual because they do not depend on any particular individual for their reality. In addition, they have independent existence because their temporal span is greater than the lifetime of any individual. They are, in other words, macro-subjective.5

Social Currents

Durkheim became even more specific (and more dynamic) in his analysis of macro-subjectivity in his discussion of the even less crystallized "social currents": But there are other facts without such crystallized form which have the same objectivity and the same ascendancy over the individual. These are called 'social currents.' Thus the great movements of enthusiasm, indignation, and pity in a crowd do not originate in any of the particular individual consciousness. They come to us from without and can carry us away in spite of ourselves (b, 8). While Durkheim explicated the idea of social currents in The Rules of Socio- logical Method, he used it as a major explanatory variable in Suicide. In brief his argument there was that suicide rates change as a result of changes in social currents. At the most basic level this means that more or less people commit suicide as a result of what happens at the macro-subjective level of social currents. Here is the way Durkheim describes his thinking on the relationship between social currents and suicide: Every social group has a collective inclination for the act, quite its own, and the source of all individual inclination, rather than their result. It is made up of currents of egoism, altruism or anomy running through the society under consideration with the tendencies to languorous melancholy, active renunciation or exasperated



weariness derivative from these currents. These tendencies of the whole social body, by affecting individuals, cause them to commit suicide (c, 299-300). It is difficult to think of a clearer or more explicit statement of Durkheim's conception of social currents and their impact on the thoughts (e.g., "languorous melancholy") and actions (suicide) of individuals.

Group Mind

Although given the emphasis on norms, values, and culture in contemporary sociology, we have little trouble accepting Durkheim's focus on macro- subjectivity, we do have problems with the idea of "social currents." One source of difficulty is Durkheim's use here of an electrical analogy. But even more troublesome is the sense that there are a get of independent currents coursing throughout the social world as if they are somehow sus- pended in a social void. It is this imagery, as well as other aspects of Durk- heim's work at the macro-subjective level, that have led many to accuse him of a "group mind" perspective. Pope says: "Durkheim clearly held the concept of a group mind' (b, 171). Simpson (1964:xxii-xxiii) offers a similar conception of Durkheim's "prejudice in favor of regarding social facts as the manifestation of the will or purpose of some occult collective mind." If these and other critics are correct and Durkheim does have a group mind orientation, then Durkheim's insights into the macro-subjective realm would be less useful to us. But we do not think they are right; Durkheim's position is defensible in several ways.

On a specific level, Durkheim's conception of social currents can be defended as an unfortunately named, but otherwise widely accepted, part of the macro-subjective world. Social currents can be viewed as a set of meanings that are shared (although not fixed) intersubjectively by members of a population. As these meanings change and the changed meanings are communicated from one actor to another, a change in the suicide rate (as well as various other rates) will occur. Thus social currents can be seen as a major causal factor in Durkheim's work on suicide (Douglas, 42). But it could be argued that one needs to defend Durkheim's entire conception of macro-subjectivity, not just his notion of social currents, from the charge of being a group mind orientation.

In defense of Durkheim at this most general level, it seems to us that Durkheim had a very modern conception of macro-subjectivity that is easily defended on the group mind charge. However, the task is compli- cated by the fact that in order to lay out a separate domain for sociology Durkheim often made some highly exaggerated statements about macro- subjectivity, and social facts in general. At times Durkheim talked as if social facts were clearly separated from psychological facts and it is this



separation that is supportive of a group mind point of view. However, in other places Durkheim did not adhere to this dichotomous view; in other words the macro-subjective world was rooted in the micro-subjective, and vice versa. While some moral facts are separated from individuals (e.g., cultural artifacts), most can only exist in and through the minds of individuals. In modern terms we would say that these phenomena are shared intersubjectively. In contradiction to the group mind idea, Durkheim makes his more reasoned position on macro-subjectivity in a number of places and in a number of different ways. It is stated most explicitly in the Division of Labor in Society: Of course, it is a self-evident truth that there is nothing in social life which is not in individual conscience. Everything that is found in the latter, however, comes from society. They come, then, not from the psychological nature of man in general, but from the manner in which men once associated mutually affect one another, according as they are more or less numerous, more or less close (a, 350). At the same time that Durkheim was making outrageous claims for sociology and for the independent status of macro-subjective social facts, he also was willing to link social facts to the micro-subjective base: We see no objection to calling sociology a variety of psychology, if we carefully add that social psychology has its own laws which are not those of individual psychology (c, 312). Individuals, forming groups by mingling and fusing, give birth to a being, psychological if you zvill, but constituting a psychic individuality of a new sort (b, 103; emphasis added). Lukes neatly summarizes Durkheim's integration of the macro-subjective with the micro-subjective: "In the course of his career he became increas- ingly insistent that the realities studied by sociology and psychology were equally mental, though of a different nature and governed by different laws" (16; emphasis added). Durkheim does an even better job of making essentially the same point and putting to rest the group mind mythology: Either the conscience collective floats like a void, a kind of indescribable absolute, or else it is connected to the rest of the world by a substratum upon which, conse- quently, it is dependent. Moreover, what can this substratum be made up of, if it is not the members of society as they are combined socially? (Durkheim, cited in Giddens, 159).

Thus, outside of some outrageous argumentation, Durkheim's views on macro-subjectivity are in line with modern thinking on this level which focuses on such phenomena as culture, norms, values, and inter- subjectivity. Durkheim began with a focal interest in this level, retained it throughout his career, and if anything grew even more interested in it in his later years (Wallwork).

This increasing concern is best seen in The Elementary Forms of Reli-



gious Life which can be viewed as focusing almost exclusively on the macro- subjective level. Religion, itself, may be seen as a macro-subjective phenomenon and Durkheim defines this aspect of macro-subjectivity very broadly as "systems of ideas which tend to embrace the universality of things and to give us a complete representation of the world" (165).

One of Durkheim's concerns in The Elementary Forms Of Religious Life was the source of religion in earlier forms of macro-subjectivity. Durkheim argued that the roots of modern religion lay in primitive totemism and he makes it clear that totemism, too, was part of the macro-subjective domain: Totemism is the religion, not of such and such animals or men or images, but of an anonymous and impersonal force, found in each of these beings but not to be confounded with any of them. No one possesses it entirely and all participate in it. It is so completely independent of the particular subjects in whom it incarnated itself, that it precedes them and survives them. Individuals die, generations pass and are replaced by others; but this force always remains actual, living and the same. It animates the generations of today as it animated those of yesterday and as it will animate those of tomorrow (217). Not only does Durkheim make clear the macro-subjective character of totemism, and the roots of religion in totemism, but he also underscores an essential focus of an integrated paradigm-the historical analysis of social forms. On the issue of history, Durkheim is not only making clear the historic roots of religion, but also the fact the people in the past, present, and future are faced with macro-subjective forms that shape their lives.

But there is even more to Durkheim's analysis of religion that is of significance for understanding macro-subjectivity. For one thing, Durk- heim also demonstrates the degree to which primitive religion is at the root of other forms of macro-subjectivity including morality and systems of scientific thought. Beyond linking religion to other macro-subjective forms, Durkheim also links it to the micro-subjective level: "we have established the fact that the fundamental categories of thought . . . are of religious origin" (d, 466).

We will have much more to say about this kind of relationship between levels of social reality in ensuing sections.

By way of summarizing this discussion we can say that Durkheim made the macro-subjective level the focus of his analysis and offered us a number of insights including his unwillingness to completely and arbi- trarily separate this level from the others, his sense of the multidimension- ality of macro-subjectivity as a level of social reality composed of a number of sub-levels, and his sense of the historicity of the macro-subjective as well as of its historical impact on the other levels of social reality. Further- more, and perhaps most importantly, we have encountered in great detail the ways in which the various levels of social reality interpenetrate in Durkheim's work. Although our focus in this section was on macro-subjec-



tivity, we have been exposed to much discussion of the other levels as they relate to macro-subjectivity. We will encounter more of Durkheim's insights into macro-subjectivity as we proceed for Durkheim was ever aware of the way it affects, and is affected by, the other levels.

Material Social Facts

The macro-objective level in conjunction with the macro-subjective are what Durkheim means when he talks about social facts. "A social fact is every way of acting, fixed or not, capable of exercising on the individual an external constraint" (b, 13). All of the elements of macro-subjectivity discussed above fit this definition as do the macro-objective phenomena we are about to discuss. Macro-objective phenomena occupy a curious role in Durkheim's thinking. They often occupy a position of causal priority, but they also seemed to interest Durkheim far less than macro-subjectivity despite their causal priority. At other times they are treated as dependent variables determined by macro-subjective forces. In either case, they never receive the attention from Durkheim that macro-subjective phenomena do.

At the most general level, Durkheim discusses society as a macro- objective phenomenon, but he is not always consistent in the way he deals with society. As Lukes points out, society was sometimes "real, concrete society," e.g., France or the State (21). At other times Durkheim tended to talk about more microscopic phenomena as society such as the family or an occupation. This tendency to identify disparate phenomena as society is underscored by Pope: "Durkheim's conception exhibits great 'displacement of scope' . . . He treated France as a society; he also referred to a married couple as a society" (b, 192).6 Although this is a problem, the situation is made even worse by the fact that Durkheim sometimes wrote about society as if it was the same as common morality. In this case, his refusal to differentiate the macro-objective and macro-subjective levels becomes a problem for US.7 In our view, a society is a structural reality that encompasses a common morality, but for heuristic purposes it is best to think of society as a macro-objective (structural) phenomenon. More generally, we can say that while it is desirable to view the real world as a series of interpenetrating levels, it is best to keep them conceptually distinct for analytic purposes.

Durkheim's overwhelming interest in the macro-subjective often led him to think of macro-objective phenomena as of secondary significance. For example, Durkheim clearly identifies the church as a macro- objective phenomenon.8 A church is seen as a structure whose major function is to translate the common ideas of a religion into common practices (d, 59). But Durkheim is not interested in the church per se, but more in its



functions for the macro-subjective religion. Thus, Durkheim defined the church as the structure which serves to differentiate one form of macro- subjectivity (religion) from another (magic). In politics Durkheim saw the state performing a variety of macro-subjective functions including the maintenance of the common morality and more specifically in modern society, the cult of the individual (Giddens, 18; Lukes, 272).

A similar argument can be made about another macro-objective structure, occupational associations, which receives even more attention from Durkheim. Durkheim conceived of these associations as a means of coping with the pathological moral (macro-subjective) problems that he saw as part of the transition from mechanical to organic solidarity. Anomie is seen as the most important of these moral pathologies and the occupational association was to be designed to help resolve it: For anomy to end, there must then exist, or be formed a group which can constitute the system of rules actually needed . .. Neither political society, in its entirety, nor the State can take over this function . .. The only one that could answer all these conditions is the one formed by all the agents of the same industry united and organized into a single body. This is what is called the corporation or occupational group (a, 5). Durkheim is espousing a structural resolution that starnds in stark contrast to the one offered by Karl Marx to the ills of capitalist society. While Marx saw class antagonisms as the key structural problem, Durkheim saw no in- herent differences between classes. Indeed he felt that the different classes could be unified within these occupational associations and create a common morality that would serve as an antidote to the ills of capitalism.9

In addition to structural factors like society and occupational associations, Durkheim also makes much of what he calls morphological factors. Durkheim sometimes uses these morphological factors as the causes of important social changes and on other occasions he treats them as outcomes of these changes, or as indexes to these outcomes. Perhaps the best known of the former type of morphological factor in Durkheim's work is "dynamic density." It is the main causal factor in the Division of Labor in Society: If we agree to call this coming together, and the active commerce resulting from it, 'dynamic' or 'formal' density, we can say that the progress of the division of labor is in direct ratio to the moral or dynamic density of society (Durkheim, cited in Giddens, 151). Key factors in dynamic density are detailed by Durkheim: If condensation of society produces this result, it is because it multiplies intra-social relations. But these will be still more numerous, if, in addition, the total number of members of society becomes more considerable. If it comprises more individuals at the same time as they are more intimately in contact, the effect will necessarily be re-enforced (a, 260).



It is the increasing number of people, and their increasing interaction, that leads to the transition from mechanical to organic solidarity, or more generally from a society characterized by one form of macro-subjectivity to another. Thus, somewhat ironically given Durkheim's focus on macro- subjectivity, the central causal factor in his theory of social change is a macro-objective force. He is not focally interested in these morphological factors per se, but rather in their impact on macro-subjectivity.

Tiryakian underscores Durkheim's tendency to accord causal priority to morphological forces: For Durkheim, morphological facts are the ultimate source of change in collective representations. Morphological phenomena ... give rise to collective representations ... Collective representations, or collective beliefs may then interact to give rise to further social facts which are not traceable to a morphological origin" (17). 10

Consciousness

Given his well-known orientation toward the study of social facts, and the clear preference for the macro-subjective level discussed above, it is often assumed that Durkheim had little or nothing to say about consciousness (micro-subjectivity). As we will see (and have already seen to some degree) this is far from the truth.

It was Durkheim's overly zealous position for sociology and against psychology that led many of his critics to assume that Durkheim was weak on the micro-subjective level. As Lukes put it: "Very many of his critics ... have regarded this exclusion of psychology as his major theoretical failing" (228). One exponent of this point of view is Pope. Durkheim has ruled out appeal to individual intentionality as too subjective (a, 368). Human intentions were hidden, subjective and changeable through mere acts of will and as such eluded, and therefore did not constitute proper subject matter for, scientific analysis (a, 374). Another exponent of this point of view is Nisbet who argues that one of Durkheim's objectives in the Rules of Sociological Method was to "make unnecessary exploration of individual consciousness, feeling, and other internal states falling within the realm of psychology as then understood" (32).

As Pope points out above, a major reason that Durkheim is sup- posed to have ruled out concern for the micro-subjective is his concern for science. Nisbet, too, makes this clear: We cannot go to internal states of mind . . . consciousness, though real enough, will not serve the austere tests of scientific method. If we are to study moral phenomena in an objective fashion, we must substitute for the internal fact of



consciousness an external index which symbolizes it and study the former in the light of the latter (52). Pope makes essentially the same point in discussing why Durkheim did not deal with intent in his study of suicide: "Insofar as intent is employed, though, it will, in Durkheim's estimation, lack the objectivity that is the sine qua non for scientific definitions" (b, 10-11).

Although there is some truth to these claims, they grossly exagger- ate the reality to be found in Durkheim's work. While Durkheim may have made politically motivated statements against the study of micro-subjectivity, the fact remains that he did deal with this level in a variety of places and in a variety of ways. However, it is also true that he treats micro- subjectivity as a secondary, or residual, factor, or more commonly as a dependent variable to be explained by the more independent and focal social facts.

Although one can cite many places where Durkheim was critical of dealing with the micro-subjective level, there are a number of places in which he demonstrated his awareness of the significance of micro-subjectivity and he even integrated it directly into his work. Although he makes a similar point in several places (e.g., Suicide, 315), the following is Durk- heim's clearest statement on his ultimate interest in micro-subjectivity: In general, we hold that sociology has not completely achieved its task so long as it has not penetrated into the mind . . . of the individual in order to relate the institutions it seeks to explain to their psychological conditions . . . man is for us less a point of departure than a point of arrival (Durkheim, cited in Lukes, 488-9). It appears that Durkheim focused on "external" facts, e.g., suicide rates, laws, etc., because they were amenable to scientific analysis, but he did not deem such a macroscopic focus sufficient in itself. The ultimate goal was to integrate an understanding of micro-subjectivity into his theoretical system. Even though he never quite achieved an adequate integration, he did address the issue of micro-subjectivity in several different ways.

Assumptions About Human Nature

One of the most important places to gain insight into Durkheim's work on micro-subjectivity is his assumptions about human nature. At an obvious level are a variety of biological drives, but of greater significance to sociology are a set of social penchants including "love, affection, sympathetic concern, and associated phenomena" (Wallwork, 28). People were viewed by Durkheim as naturally social: "If men were not naturally inclined toward their fellows, the whole fabric of society, its customs and institutions, would never arise" (Wallwork, 28). However, these sentiments did not play an active role in his sociology and were therefore relegated to psy-



chology. Another basic assumption that receives only scant attention from Durkheim is the idea that people are able to think. His position here is close to Mead's, but it is largely an unexplored assumption: "Men differ from animals, Durkheim contends, precisely because images and ideas intervene between innate inclinations and behavior" (Wallwork, 30).

While the preceding are of marginal significance to his work, another of his assumptions about human nature may be viewed as the basis of his entire sociology. That assumption is that people are endowed with a variety of egoistic drives11 that if unbridled constitute a threat to themselves as well as the larger society. To Durkheim, people were characterized by an array of passions. If these passions were unconstrained, they would grow and multiply to the point where the individual would be en- slaved by his own passions. This leads Durkheim to his curious (on the surface) definition of freedom as external control over passions. People are free when their passions are constrained by external forces and the most general and most important of these forces is the common morality. It can be argued that Durkheim's entire theoretical edifice, especially his emphasis on macro-subjectivity, is erected on this basic assumption about people's passions. As Durkheim puts it, "Passion individualizes, yet it also enslaves. Our sensations are essentially individual; yet we are more personal the more we are freed from our senses and able to think and act with concepts" (d, 307-8). This same issue is manifest in the differentiation Durkheim makes between body and soul and the eternal conflict between them. The body represents the passions while the soul stands for common morality. Clearly, Durkheim wishes this conflict to be resolved in the direction of the soul rather than the body.

To return to an issue raised above, freedom for Durkheim comes from without rather than from within. As was pointed out, this requires a morality to constrain the passions. But freedom, or autonomy, has another sense in Durkheim's work. That is, that freedom does not come from within, but rather is a characteristic of the common morality that is internalized in the actor. Individual autonomy is derived from the internalization of a common morality that emphasizes the significance and independence of the individual (Lukes, 115, 131). Thus freedom is a characteristic of society, not individuals. Here, as elsewhere, we see the degree to which Durkheim emphasizes the macro-subjective (in this case "moral individualism") over the micro-subjective.

We can also include "individual representations" within Durk- heim's assumptions about human nature. While collective representations are created by the interaction of people, individual representations are formed by the interaction of brain cells. As such they are, as many other parts of Durkheim's thoughts on micro-subjectivity, relegated to psychology. This is the portion of the minding process that Durkheim is un- willing to explore. It is here that Durkheim is most vulnerable to attack.



Homans, for example, argues that Durkheim had a very limited conception of psychology. He limited psychology to the study of instincts, but the psychology of today goes much beyond the study of instincts and encompasses a number of social phenomena that Durkheim would have seen as part of sociology. Homans concludes that "Sociology is surely not a corol- lary of the kind of psychology Durkheim had in mind" (18). However, it is much harder, if not impossible, to clearly separate sociology from the psychology of today.

Socialization

Given his views on innate human passions and the need to constrain them by common morality, it should come as no surprise that Durkheim was very much interested in the internalization of social morals through education and more generally through socialization. Social morality is simultaneously both inside and outside of us; common morality "penetrates us" and "forms parts of us" (Durkheim, cited in Lukes, 131). Although he based much of his work on it, Durkheim, in Pope's view of his work in Suicide, had "a primitive notion of internalization," one that lacked an adequate "social psychology of internalization" (b, 195). Thus, despite the fact that it is basic to his sociology, Durkheim did not, because of his pull to the macro-subjective level, explore the process of internalization in any detail.

Durkheim is not focally interested in the issue of internalization, but rather in how it bears on his interest in the macroscopic problems of his day. The essence of the problem for Durkheim is the decline in the degree to which macro-subjectivity exercises constraint over consciousness. As Nisbet put it: "Durkheim would never really abandon the idea that the Western society he knew was undergoing a major crisis and that that crisis consisted at bottom in a pathological loosening of moral authority upon the lives of individuals" (192). Durkheim's concern with anomie in both Suicide and The Division of Labor in Society can be seen as manifestations of this concern.

Not only was Durkheim interested in this problem, but also in sug- gesting reforms aimed at coping with the problem of inadequate socialization. Much of Durkheim's work on education, and socialization in general, can be seen in this context. Education, and socialization, were defined by Durkheim as the process by which the individual learns the ways of a given group or society. Learned in the process are the necessary physical, intellectual, and, most importantly to Durkheim, moral tools to function in society (e, 71). Moral education has three important aspects (Wallwork). First, its goal is to provide the individual with the discipline s/he needs to restrain the passions that threaten to engulf him/her. Second, the indi-



vidual is instilled with a sense of autonomy, but it is a characteristically atypical kind of autonomy in which "the child understands the reasons why the rules prescribing certain forms of behavior should be 'freely de- sired,' that is to say, 'willingly accepted' by virtue of 'enlightened assent"' (Wallwork, 127). Finally, the process of socialization is aimed at developing a sense of devotion to society as well as to its moral system. All of these aspects of moral education can be seen as efforts to combat the pathological loosening of the grip of macro-subjectivity on micro-subjectivity in modern society.

At the most general level, Durkheim is concerned with the way in which collective morality constrains micro-subjectivity both externally and internally. In one sense, macro-subjectivity stands outside people and shapes their thoughts (and actions). Of course, macro-subjectivity cannot act on its own, but only through agents. Of greater importance, however, is the degree to which the individual constrains himself by internalizing social morality. For the collective force is not entirely outside of us; it does not act upon us wholly from without; but rather, since society cannot exist except in and through individual consciousness, this force must also penetrate us and organize itself within us (d, 240). In addition to making clear the process of internalization, the preceding quotation also shows once again that Durkheim rejects the idea of a group mind since he states that collective forces can only exist in individual consciousness. Wallwork does an excellent job of clarifying the importance of the internalization of morality in Durkheim's system: A normal mind, Durkheim observes, cannot consider moral maxims without con- sidering them as obligatory. Moral rules have an 'imperative character'; they exercise a sort of ascendancy over the will which feels constrained to conform to them. This constraint is not to be confused with physical force or compulsion; the will is not forced to conform to the norms it entertains even if these norms are enforced by public opinion. Moral 'constraint does not consist in an exterior and mechanical pressure; it has a more intimate and psychological character.' But this intimate, psychological sense of obligation is, nevertheless, none other than the authority of public opinion which penetrates, like the air we breathe, into the deepest recesses of our being (38). Durkheim offers a specific example of this process of internal constraint in his study on religion: if he acts in a certain way towards the totemic beings, it is not only because the forces resident in them are physically redoubtable, but because he feels himself morally obligated to act thus; he has the feeling that he is obeying an imperative, that he is fulfilling a duty (d, 218).

These concerns with internalization, socialization, and education



can all be seen in the context of the constraining effect of macro-subjectivity on micro-subjectivity. Whether the constraint is external, or internalized, it still comes down to external morality controlling the thoughts and actions of people.

Durkheim's limited thoughts on the micro-subjective level led many to assume that his ideal actor was one who was almost wholly controlled from without. His ideal actor would seem to be a total conformist. Al- though there is much to recommend this view, and some modern sociologists in following Durkheim seem to have adopted this position, Durkheim himself did not subscribe to a view of the actor as a total conformist: "conformity must not be pushed to the point where it completely subju- gates the intellect. Thus, it does not follow from a belief in the need for discipline that it must be blind and slavish" (Durkheim, cited in Giddens, 113). Although Durkheim left open the possibility of individual freedom, the thrust of his work was in the direction of outlining external constraints on actors and furthermore the desirability of such constraint.12

Dependent Variables

Micro-subjectivity most often occupies the position of dependent variable in Durkheim's works determined by various macro-objective and especially macro-subjective phenomena. "Durkheim viewed sociologically relevant subjective states as the product of social causes. They 'are like prolongations . . . inside individuals' . . . of the social causes on which they depend. They may enter sociological explanations as effects, but never as causes. Appeal to subjective states as causal agents, according to Durkheim, threatened the legitimacy of sociology's claim to scientific status by reducing it to psychology" (Pope, et al., 419). Although we will discuss several examples of micro-subjective dependent variables, it should be made clear that although Durkheim deals with them, it is often only in a vague and cursory sense. In Suicide, for example, Durkheim is quite uncer- tain how social currents affect individual consciousness and how changed consciousness in turn leads to a heightened likelihood of suicide (Pope, b). The same could be said about every other treatment by Durkheim of micro- subjectivity.

In The Division of Labor micro-subjectivity is dealt with in a most indirect sense, but it is clear that it is a dependent variable. That is, the sense of the argument there is that changes at the macroscopic level lead to changes in micro-subjective processes. In mechanical solidarity, individual consciousness is limited and highly constrained by a powerful collective conscience. In organic solidarity, individual potentialities expand as does individual freedom. But again, although this sense of micro-subjectivity as a dependent variable is there, it is largely unexplored by Durkheim and is



left largely implicit. In Suicide, however, the status of micro-subjectivity as a dependent variable is much clearer. Schematically, the main independent variables are collective morality and the ultimate dependent variable is suicide rates, but intervening is another set of dependent variables which can only be micro-subjective states. Lukes' point in the following quotation about "weak points" in the individual implies the micro-subjective level: "The currents impinge from the outside on suicide prone individuals at their 'weak points"' (214).

Lukes (216-17) goes further on this issue and argues that there is a social psychological theory hidden beneath the aggressively sociologistic language found in Suicide. One part of that theory is the belief that individuals need to be attached to social goals. Another aspect is that individuals cannot become so committed to such goals that they lose all personal autonomy. Finally, as we've discussed before, there is Durkheim's belief that individuals possess passions and they can only be contented and free if these passions are constrained from without.

One can find in Suicide specific micro-subjective states associated with each of the three main types of suicide. These subjective states, themselves effects of given social conditions, impel the individual to suicide . . . 'the egoistic suicide is characterized by a general depres- sion in the form either of melancholic languor or Epicurean indifference' . . . Ano- mic suicide is accompanied by anger, disappointment, irritation, and exasperated weariness... , while the altruistic suicide may experience a calm feeling of duty, the mystic's enthusiasm, or peaceful courage . . . (Durkheim c, 277-94; Pope, b, 197). Thus Durkheim saw well-defined micro-subjective states accompanying each form of suicide. Just as clear is the fact that these are peripheral interests to Durkheim who maintained a steady focus on the macroscopic level. Even Nisbet wishes that Durkheim had given more attention to this level: Admittedly, one might wish that Durkheim had given more attention to the specific mechanisms by which collective representations in society are translated, in dis- tinctly human, often creative ways, into the individual representations that reflect man's relationship to society (115). Lukes makes the same point: his (Durkheim's) exclusive concentration on the society end of the schema, on the impact of social conditions on individuals rather than the way individuals perceive, interpret and respond to social conditions, led him to leave inexplicit and unex- amined the social-psychological assumptions on which his theories rested (35).

We can find a specific example of this in Durkheim and Mauss' work in the impact of the structure of society on the form of individual thought. Basically, Durkheim (and Mauss) argued that the form that society took



affected the form that thought patterns took. They were contesting those who believed that mental categories shape the social world. Their view is that it was the social world that shapes mental categories. They first make it clear how their position differs from those of their predecessors: "Far from it being the case ... that the social relations of men are based on logical relations between things, in reality it is the former which have provided the prototype for the latter" (82). While specific components of macro-objectivity (e.g., family structure, economic or political systems) played a role in shaping logical categories, Durkheim and Mauss devoted most of their attention to the effect of society as a whole:

Society was not simply a model which classificatory thought followed; it was its own divisions which served as divisions for the system of classification. The first logical categories were social categories; the first classes of things were classes of men ... It was because men were grouped, and thought of themselves in the form of groups, that in their ideas they grouped other things, and in the beginning the two modes of grouping were merged to the point of being indistinct (82-3).

Durkheim's emphasis on the macroscopic level is well illustrated by this discussion of the impact of society on logical categories. An essential problem is that Durkheim does not analyze the corresponding process-the way in which the operation of mental categories in turn shapes the structure of society.

It is our view that to do a more adequate sociology, Durkheim had to do more with the micro-subjective level than to treat it as an unexplored dependent variable. An almost total focus on the macroscopic level leaves out important elements of an adequate sociological model. Lukes makes some telling points here in his discussion of Suicide. He argues, quite rightly, that an adequate explanation of suicide cannot stop with an exami- nation of social currents. In his view, "explaining suicide-and explaining suicide rates-must involve explaining why people commit it" (221; emphasis added). Second, Durkheim was wrong in assuming that micro- subjectivity was not amenable to scientific inquiry and explanation. It can be done and furthermore must be done if we are to go beyond partial theories of social life. Nothing is solved by simply acknowledging the existence of the micro-subjective, but refusing to examine it. Durkheim's commitment to a narrow view of science led him awry as did his tendency of making radically sociologistic statements that ruled out recourse to the micro-subjective: He need only have claimed that 'social' facts cannot be wholly explained in terms of 'individual' facts; instead he claimed that they can only be explained in terms of social facts ... it would have been enough to have claimed that no social phenomenon, indeed few human activities, can either be identified or satisfactorily explained without reference, explicit or implicit, to social factors (Lukes, 20).



In addition to not dealing with micro-subjectivity in any detail, Durkheim also failed to give it an active role in the social process. Despite his disclaimer mentioned above, people are in general controlled by social forces in his system, they do not actively control those systems. This leads Wallwork to contend that "the principal weakness ... is Durkheim's fail- ure to consider active moral judgment" (65; emphasis added). Durkheim (Pope and Cohen, 1364) gave too little independence to actors. They can reject some, most, or perhaps even all of the moral principles they are exposed to. When Durkheim did talk of autonomy it was in terms of the acceptance of moral norms of autonomy. The individual only seemed capable of accepting these norms and of controlling himself through the internalization of those norms. But as Wallwork points out, autonomy has a much more active component, "Autonomy also involves willful exploration, spontaneous initiative, competent mastery, and creative self-actuali- zation . . . The child must also be encouraged to exercise his own will, initiative and creativity" (148). Indeed research into cognitive processes, in part done by Piaget who was working in the Durkheimian tradition, indicates that this micro-subjective creativity is an important component of social life. Wallwork in summarizing the work of Piaget, Kohlberg, and others says the following: In addition to culture conditioning, the cognitive activity of the subjective is necessary to constitute the experience. Piaget and Kohlberg conclude from their studies that the distinctive phenomenological character of moral experience is always as much a product of the cognitive construction of the subject as it is an accommoda- tion to cultural conditioning by the subject (67). In other words, a more complete sociology requires a more creative actor and insight into the creative processes. 13

In summary we have seen that contrary to the view of many, Durk- heim does have a variety of things to say about micro-subjectivity. How- ever, its residual character in his theoretical system makes his insights vague and amorphous. More damning is the fact that the thrust of his work leads to a passive image of the actor while an active actor is, in our view, an essential component of an integrated sociological paradigm.

Action and Interaction

Given his primary orientations to macroscopic and subjective factors in general, Durkheim is weakest on the micro-objective level. He has little or nothing to say directly on individual action and interaction. Implied in his system are various changes at this level as a result of changes at the macroscopic level, but they are not detailed. For example, it seems clear that the nature of action and interaction is quite different in mechanical and organic



solidarity. The individual in mechanical solidarity is likely to be enraged at a violation of the collective conscience and act quickly and aggressively toward the violator. In contrast, an individual in organic solidarity is likely to take a more measured approach such as calling a policeman or suing in the courts. Similarly, in Suicide the assumption behind changes in suicide rates is that the nature of individual action and interaction has changed as a result of changes in social currents. People may be more or less likely to interact with peers; they would be more or less likely to kill themselves. Suicide rates are used as cumulative measures of changes at the individual level, but the nature of these changes is not explored, at least in any detail. Similar points could be made about Durkheim's other works, but the critical point is that micro-objectivity is left unanalyzed in Durkheim's work. We need to look to other theorists (e.g., Blau; Blumer; Homans) for insight into this level.

DURKHEIM S INTEGRATIVE MODEL

We have seen that Durkheim addressed all of the levels of social reality, although his treatment of some are weaker than others. Unevenness is a basic problem in Durkheim's work from the point of view of an integrated paradigm. Another weakness is a lack of a dialectic; or a systems model; there is great concern for the impact of macro-structures on micro-level phenomena, but the feedback effects are largely ignored. But while these are weaknesses from the point of view of the integrated model we are interested in developing, they form the basis of Durkheim's own integrative model which obviously therefore has basic weaknesses as far as we are concerned.

Although we cannot present one theory that summarizes Durk- heim's overall integrative model, it is our view that his theory of suicide is representative of the kind of causal model he used in all of his work. The following, Figure 3, is Pope's (b, 59) schematic model of Durkheim's theory of suicide which catches the heart of Durkheim's causal model as well as its weaknesses:

We need to translate this model back into our four-fold schema. It begins at the macro-objective level with the morphological structure of society; number of people, and rate of interaction. Changes at these macro- objective levels lead to changes at the macro-subjective level-strength of collective sentiments. This, in turn, affects macro-objective structures of integration and regulation, i.e., the structures and mechanisms of social control. In Part B and C we see the link between the macroscopic level and the micro-subjective level in terms of meaning of life for the individual and the degree to which means are proportional to individual needs. Changes at the macroscopic level affect micro-subjectivity in these ways. Then changes in micro-subjectivity lead to changes in action (micro-objectivity),



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Durkheim: Exemplar for a Paradigm? 1991

in this case suicide, as summarized by changes in the suicide rates. In this model, we see that Durkheim touches on all four levels of social reality. Although this is to his credit, Pope's schematic representation also underscores the two key problems in Durkheim's thinking-his focus on the macroscopic levels and, most importantly, his use of a one-way causal model that does not allow for microscopic levels to impact on macro-levels.

Conclusions

Does Durkheim offer us an integrated theory of social reality? The answer, given the preceding discussion, must be yes, but it is an integrated theory with a number of serious liabilities. These liabilities would tend to indi- cate that Durkheim would not be an adequate exemplar for an integrated paradigm, but he does offer insights that would be useful in the development of that paradigm. We can close this discussion with an enumeration of the strengths of Durkheim's work and then turn to the problems which prevent him from being an adequate exemplar.

On the positive side, Durkheim has a number of things to offer to an integrated paradigm:

1. A sense of the multiple levels of social reality. 2. Some insight into the interrelationships among these levels; in-

deed of the fact that in the real world they meld imperceptibly into each other.

3. A schema that makes it clear that not only are there major levels of social reality, but also a number of sub-levels within each. For example, his identification of collective conscience, collective representations, and social currents within the macro-subjective level.

4. A powerful theory of the macro-subjective level and its significance in the social world.

5. A sense of the importance of historicity and the need to study the multiple levels of social reality historically.

However, a number of problems point to the fact that Durkheim would not be an adequate exemplar for an integrated paradigm:

1. His overemphasis on the macro-subjective level. 2. The corresponding tendency to downgrade the significance of the

other levels. a. Macro-objective forces tend to be comparatively unexplored causes or results in his theoretical system.14 b. Micro-subjectivity, although there, tends to be underdevel- oped. More importantly, it is viewed as a passive force, a dependent variable, that cannot play a dynamic role in his system.



c. Micro-objectivity is almost entirely unexplored. 3. Although his lack of clear dividing lines is laudable, it sometimes

led him to confuse phenomena that need to be kept distinct, at least heuris- tically (e.g., using collective conscience to refer to both macro- and micro- subjective phenomena simultaneously).

4. Although he has clear assumptions about human nature, they are comparatively unexplored in his work.

5. Durkheim's narrow sense of the nature of science and the scientific method led him to downplay the significance of factors, especially the micro-subjective, which need to be examined more fully if we are to develop a more integrated paradigm.

6. His conservative politics led him to focus too much attention on the macroscopic level and on reforms that needed to be made at that level. 15

7. Finally, and most importantly, there is Durkheim's tendency to think in one-way causal terms. Although he often addressed feedbacks between various levels, he did not have an overall model that allowed the microscopic levels a dynamic role in shaping the macroscopic levels.

In sum, Durkheim is not a suitable exemplar for an integrated paradigm, but he is not without fruitful insights for those who are interested in developing such a paradigm.

Notes 1. In this paper, as well as Ritzer's earlier work, the exemplar concept is used differently from Kuhn from whom we are borrowing it as well as the more important concept of a paradigm. Kuhn sees an exemplar as a concrete piece of research that serves as a model for groups of scientists. In our view, and here we are in disagreement with Eckberg and Hill, there are no such exemplars in sociology. Instead, our exemplars tend to be bodies of work done by a particular sociologist that serves as a model for groups of sociologists. Relatedly, while Kuhn in his later work tends to equate exemplars with paradigms, we are inclined to see paradigms in sociology as closer to what Kuhn calls disciplinary matrices, or groups of sociologists who share an exemplar, an image of the subject matter of sociology, theories and methods. 2. We are using the concept of levels here despite the fact that it causes some difficulties. Although it is clear that macro-levels stand "above" the micro-levels, there is no clear hier- archy among the two macro-levels or the two micro-levels. Dimensions of social reality might be a better way of conceptualizing this issue, but it loses the hierarchical sense associated with macroscopic and microscopic. Although it is not ideal, we are using the levels notion rather than dimensions or similar conceptualizations which have even greater problems associated with them. 3. Although Durkheim is careful to point out that he is dealing with suicide rates, and not individual suicides, it seems clear that the basis of suicide rates is the individual suicide. Furthermore, a suicide rate is no more than the sum of individual suicides. 4. Although we see this as a strength in his work, and a necessary part of an adequate integrated paradigm, it also sometimes becomes a weakness in Durkheim's work. As we will see, Durkheim sometimes fails to keep the different levels conceptually distinct. Even though they form a continuum in the real world, there is a need in doing sociology to keep them distinct conceptually. 5. Although collective representations exist outside actors, it is also true that they may extend



into the individual and be manifest in cognitive and affective states. This is similar to our contemporary view on norms and values and the degree to which ty they become internalized. 6. It is this tendency that led Marks into an unfortunate analysis of Durkheim's work on anomie. Marks argues that the early Durkheim had a microscopic conception of anomie, but later took a more macroscopic approach. However, what Marks identifies as microscopic are simply specific components of the macroscopic level. Microscopic phenomena are defined by Marks as "specific groups" and he concludes that "The would-be corporations were the perfect embodiment of Durkheim's microsociological commitment" (335). It is clear that these phenomena do not quality as microscopic, at least as we are using the term here. We have little difficulty with Marks' argument that Durkheim identifies the macroscopic level with "whole societies" or "the march of civilization." 7. Tiryakian makes this point, but in a more general way. That is, Tiryakian argues that Durkheim developed two orders of social facts, macro-objective and macro-subjective, "but he did not explicitly differentiate them" (17). Wallwork makes a similar point: "neither morality nor society exists without the other, for morality only begins with social life and group life depends upon moral consensus" (75). Wallwork also sees Durkheim's definition of society encompassing both macro-objective and subjective components:

Durkheim views society in two different ways, which generally complement each other. On the one hand, he sees society as an interdependent set of beliefs and ideas ... linguistic symbols, religious beliefs, moral norms and legal formulas . . . On the other hand, Durkheim looks upon society as a structural system composed of individuals or subgroups. Seen from this morphological angle, the structure or pattern of the group, the order or arrangement of its elements, gives to the group its characteristic physiognomy (19).

Gouldner contends that Durkheim fails to distinguish "patterns of social interaction, or social structures, and cultural patterns of moral beliefs or sentiments" (xxi). 8. Of course, a church also has a macro-subjective component. 9. This is but one of the many political differences between Durkheim and Marx. 10. One possible exception to his tendency to accord causal priority to morphological factors is Durkheim's macro-subjective notion of collective effervescence. The idea appears in several places in Durkheim's work, but is never spelled out in great detail. These are the great moments in history when a collectivity is able to achieve a new level of collective mental exaltation which in turn can lead to great changes in the structure of society such as happened during the Reformation and Renaissance. Although potentially very important, Durkheim never spells out collective effervescence with the effect that it plays a negligible role in his sociology. 11. Which were no doubt stimulated by society. 12. In an interesting paper, Mulligan and Lederman argue that Durkheim could have conceived of a more creative actor had he adequately differentiated between rules that regulate social life (his focus) and rules "which bring into being novel forms of behavior" (539). They argue, in effect, that had Durkheim analyzed these "rules of practice" he would have been able to account for creativity macroscopically. While this may be true, it does not negate the fact that Durkheim also needed a more creative conception of the actor. 13. Nisbet (119) disagrees, in part, with the position taken here and argues that Durkheim "promises" an active, acting person. Of course, a "promise" of an active actor, and the carrying through of such a promise are two different things. In fact, Nisbet (vi) praises Durkheim for not engaging in the kind of subjective analysis that would be required if one is to develop the notion of a creative actor; Durkheim is seen as being useful in the "liberation of American sociology from its recent and short-lived plunge into subjectivism-call it what we will, ethnomethodology, consciousness-, reflexive-, or egocentric-sociology." Furthermore, although Nisbet is inclined to see similarities between Mead and Durkheim on a number of counts including seeing society as sovereign over the individual and rejecting the dualism of the individual and society, Nisbet is quite aware that Durkheim does not offer the insights into micro-subjectivity found in Mead: "We find little in Durkheim anywhere to suggest the kind of thinking in Mead that bore fruit in his treatment of the "I" and "Me," the concrete process of interaction among individuals, the roots of the self in perception of the 'generalized


9941 Social Forces Volume 59:4, June 1981

other,' and so on. None of this can be taken from Mead or asserted in any degree of specificity to Durkheim" (113). 14. His work in The Division of Labor is something of an exception to this. 15. While he is conservative in terms of our political views, Durkheim was in the French politics of his day more of a liberal and he thought of himself as such.

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Issue Table of ContentsSocial Forces, Vol. 59, No. 4, Special Issue (Jun., 1981), pp. 897-1358Volume Information [pp. 1353 - 1358]Front Matter [pp. 897 - 1073]Durkheim Lives!In Appreciation of Everett K. Wilson's Contribution to Sociology [pp. 898 - 899]Introduction: From Wilson to Durkheim [pp. 900 - 901]A Marxist Consideration of Durkheim [pp. 902 - 917]Moral Integration and Po

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