In the modern world, there are various types of societies that differ from each other in many ways, both explicit (language of communication, culture, geographical location, size, etc.) and hidden (degree of social integration, level of stability, etc.). Scientific classification involves the selection of the most significant, typical features that distinguish some features from others and unite societies of the same group. The complexity of social systems called societies determines both the diversity of their specific manifestations and the absence of a single universal criterion on the basis of which they could be classified.

In the middle of the 19th century, K. Marx proposed a typology of societies, which was based on the method of production of material goods and production relations - primarily property relations. He divided all societies into 5 main types (according to the type of socio-economic formations): primitive communal, slave-owning, feudal, capitalist and communist (the initial phase is a socialist society).

Another typology divides all societies into simple and complex. The criterion is the number of management levels and the degree of social differentiation (stratification). The simple society this is a society in which the constituent parts are homogeneous, there are no rich and poor, leaders and subordinates, the structure and functions here are poorly differentiated and can be easily interchanged. Such are the primitive tribes, in some places preserved to this day.

Complex society - a society with highly differentiated structures and functions, interconnected and interdependent from each other, which necessitates their coordination.

TO. Popper distinguishes between two types of societies: closed and open. The differences between them are based on a number of factors, and, above all, the relationship of social control and freedom of the individual. For closed society characterized by a static social structure, limited mobility, resistance to innovation, traditionalism, dogmatic authoritarian ideology, collectivism. K. Popper attributed Sparta, Prussia, Tsarist Russia, Nazi Germany, the Soviet Union of the Stalin era to this type of society. open society characterized by a dynamic social structure, high mobility, ability to innovate, criticism, individualism and democratic pluralistic ideology. K. Popper considered ancient Athens and modern Western democracies to be examples of open societies.

The division of societies into traditional, industrial and post-industrial, proposed by the American sociologist D. Bell on the basis of a change in the technological basis - the improvement of the means of production and knowledge, is stable and widespread.

Traditional (pre-industrial) society - a society with an agrarian way of life, with a predominance of subsistence farming, a class hierarchy, sedentary structures and a method of socio-cultural regulation based on tradition. It is characterized by manual labor, extremely low rates of development of production, which can satisfy the needs of people only at a minimal level. It is extremely inertial, therefore it is not very susceptible to innovations. The behavior of individuals in such a society is regulated by customs, norms, and social institutions. Customs, norms, institutions, consecrated by traditions, are considered unshakable, not allowing even the thought of changing them. Performing their integrative function, culture and social institutions suppress any manifestation of individual freedom, which is a necessary condition for the gradual renewal of society.

The term industrial society was introduced by A. Saint-Simon, emphasizing its new technical basis. industrial society -(in modern terms) it is a complex society, with an industrial-based way of managing, with flexible, dynamic and modifiable structures, a way of socio-cultural regulation based on a combination of individual freedom and the interests of society. These societies are characterized by a developed division of labor, the development of mass media, urbanization, etc.

post-industrial society(sometimes called informational) - a society developed on an information basis: extraction (in traditional societies) and processing (in industrial societies) of natural products are replaced by the acquisition and processing of information, as well as predominant development (instead of agriculture in traditional societies and industry in industrial ) service industries. As a result, the structure of employment and the ratio of various professional and qualification groups are also changing. According to forecasts, already at the beginning of the 21st century in advanced countries, half of the workforce will be employed in the field of information, a quarter - in the field of material production and a quarter - in the production of services, including information.

The change in the technological basis also affects the organization of the entire system of social ties and relations. If in an industrial society the mass class was made up of workers, then in a post-industrial society it was employees and managers. At the same time, the significance of class differentiation is weakening, instead of a status (“granular”) social structure, a functional (“ready-made”) social structure is being formed. Instead of leading the principle of governance, coordination is becoming, and representative democracy is being replaced by direct democracy and self-government. As a result, instead of a hierarchy of structures, a new type of network organization is created, focused on rapid change depending on the situation.

True, at the same time, some sociologists pay attention to contradictory possibilities, on the one hand, ensuring a higher level of individual freedom in the information society, and on the other hand, the emergence of new, more hidden and therefore more dangerous forms of social control over it.

In conclusion, we note that, in addition to those considered, there are other classifications of societies in modern sociology. It all depends on what criterion will be the basis of this classification.

The social structure of society"

Completed by: 3rd year student

evening department

Zakhvatova G.I.

Lecturer: Vukolova T.S.

1. Introduction…………………………………………………… 3

2. The concept of the social structure of society ………………. 4

3. Social stratification …………………………………..6

4. Social mobility: ……………………………… 11

4.1. Group mobility……………………………….11

4.2. Individual mobility………………………..13

5. Features of social stratification in Russia ……..15

5.1. Prospects for the formation of the middle class………15

6. Conclusion …………………………………………………19

7. List of used literature ………………………..21

1. Introduction.

In the study of social phenomena and processes, sociology is based on the principles of historicism. This means that, firstly, all social phenomena and processes are considered as systems with a certain internal structure; secondly, the process of their functioning and development is studied; thirdly, specific changes and patterns of their transition from one qualitative state to another are revealed. Society is the most general and complex social system. Society is a relatively stable system of connections and relations between people, formed in the process of the historical development of mankind, supported by customs, traditions and laws, based on a certain method of production, distribution, exchange and consumption of material and spiritual goods. The elements of such a complex social system are people whose social activity is determined by a certain social status that they occupy, social functions (roles) that they perform, social norms and values ​​adopted in this system, as well as individual qualities (social qualities of a person, motives , value orientations, interests, etc.).

Social structure means the objective division of society into separate strata, groups, different in their social status.

Any society strives to preserve inequality, seeing it as an ordering principle, without which it is impossible to reproduce social ties and integrate the new. The same property is inherent in society as a whole. Theories of stratification are called upon to reveal the basic principles of the hierarchical structure of society.

The inviolability of the hierarchical structure of society does not mean that changes do not occur within it. At different stages, the growth of one and the reduction of the other layer is possible. These changes cannot be explained by natural population growth. There is either a rise or fall of significant groups. And even the relative stability of social strata does not exclude vertical migration of individual individuals. These movements along the vertical, while maintaining the very stratification structure, we will consider as social mobility.

2. The concept of the social structure of society

Interaction in society usually leads to the formation of new social relations. The latter can be represented as relatively stable and independent links between individuals and social groups.

In sociology, the concepts of "social structure" and "social system" are closely related. A social system is a set of social phenomena and processes that are in relationships and connections with each other and form some integral social object. Separate phenomena and processes act as elements of the system. The concept of "social structure of society" is part of the concept of a social system and combines two components - social composition and social ties. Social composition is a set of elements that make up a given structure. The second component is a set of connections of these elements. Thus, the concept of social structure includes, on the one hand, the social composition, or the totality of various types of social communities as the system-forming social elements of society, on the other hand, the social connections of the constituent elements that differ in the breadth of their action, in their significance in the characteristics of the social structure of society at a certain stage of development.

The social structure of society means the objective division of society into separate strata, groups, different in their social position, in their relation to the mode of production. This is a stable connection of elements in a social system. The main elements of the social structure are such social communities as classes and class-like groups, ethnic, professional, socio-demographic groups, socio-territorial communities (city, village, region). Each of these elements, in turn, is a complex social system with its own subsystems and connections. The social structure of society reflects the characteristics of the social relations of classes, professional, cultural, national-ethnic and demographic groups, which are determined by the place and role of each of them in the system of economic relations. The social aspect of any community is concentrated in its connections and mediations with production and class relations in society.

The social structure as a kind of framework for the entire system of social relations, that is, as a set of economic, social and political institutions that organize social life. On the one hand, these institutions set a certain network of role positions and normative requirements in relation to specific members of society. On the other hand, they represent certain rather stable ways of the socialization of individuals.

The main principle of determining the social structure of society should be the search for real subjects of social processes.

Individuals can be subjects, as well as social groups of various sizes, singled out for various reasons: youth, the working class, a religious sect, and so on.

From this point of view, the social structure of society can be represented as a more or less stable correlation of social strata and groups. The theory of social stratification is called upon to study the diversity of hierarchically arranged social strata.

Initially, the idea of ​​a stratified representation of the social structure had a pronounced ideological connotation and was intended to neutralize Marx's idea of ​​the class idea of ​​society and the dominance of class contradictions in history. But gradually the idea of ​​singling out social strata as constituent elements of society was established in social science, because it really reflected the objective differences between different groups of the population within a single class.

Theories of social stratification arose in opposition to the Marxist-Leninist theory of classes and class struggle.

3. Social stratification

The term "stratification" comes from the Latin stratum - layer, layer and facere - to make. Thus, social stratification is the definition of the vertical sequence of the position of social strata, layers in society, their hierarchy. Social stratification is "the differentiating ranking of individuals in a given social system", it is "a way of viewing individuals as occupying a lower or higher social place relative to each other in some socially important aspects." Thus, social structure arises over the social division of labor, and social stratification arises over the social distribution of the results of labor, i.e., social benefits.

Sociologists agree that the basis of the stratification structure is the natural and social inequality of people. However, the way inequality was organized could be different. It was necessary to isolate those foundations that would determine the appearance of the vertical structure of society.

So, for example, K. Marx introduced the only basis for the vertical stratification of society - the possession of property. Therefore, its stratification structure was actually reduced to two levels: a class of owners (slave owners, feudal lords, bourgeoisie) and a class deprived of ownership of the means of production (slaves, proletarians) or having very limited rights (peasants). Attempts to present the intelligentsia and some other social groups as intermediate strata between the main classes left the impression that the general scheme of the social hierarchy of the population was not well thought out.

M. Weber increases the number of criteria that determine belonging to a particular stratum. In addition to the economic - the attitude to property and the level of income - he introduces such criteria as social prestige and belonging to certain political circles (parties). Prestige was understood as the acquisition by an individual from birth or due to personal qualities of such a social status that allowed him to take a certain place in the social hierarchy.

The role of status in the hierarchical structure of society is determined by such an important feature of social life as its normative-value regulation. Thanks to the latter, only those whose status corresponds to the ideas rooted in the mass consciousness about the significance of their title, profession, as well as the norms and laws functioning in society, always rise to the “upper rungs” of the social ladder.

M. Weber's selection of political criteria for stratification still looks insufficiently substantiated. P. Sorokin speaks more clearly about this. He unequivocally points to the impossibility of giving a single set of criteria for belonging to any stratum and notes the presence in society of three stratification structures: economic, professional and political.

In the 1930s and 1940s, an attempt was made in American sociology to overcome the multidimensionality of stratification by asking individuals to determine their own place in the social structure. But this kind of research gave a different result: they showed that consciously or intuitively people feel, realize the hierarchy of society, feel the main parameters, principles that determine the position of a person in society.

So, society reproduces, organizes inequality according to several criteria: according to the level of wealth and income, according to the level of social prestige, according to the level of political power, and also according to some other criteria. It can be argued that all these types of hierarchy are significant for society, as they allow regulating both the reproduction of social ties and directing personal aspirations and ambitions of people towards acquiring socially significant statuses.

The introduction of such a criterion as the level of income led to the fact that, in accordance with it, it was possible to single out a formally infinite number of strata of the population with different levels of well-being. And the appeal to the problem of socio-professional prestige gave grounds to make the stratification structure very similar to the socio-professional one. This is how the division into: 1) the upper class - professionals, administrators; 2) mid-level technical specialists; 3) commercial class; 4) the petty bourgeoisie; 5) technicians and workers performing managerial functions; 6) skilled workers; 7) unskilled workers. And this is not the longest list of the main social strata of society. There was a danger of losing a holistic vision of the stratification structure, which was increasingly replaced by the desire of researchers to distribute individuals according to the "floors" of the social hierarchy.

In our opinion, when developing the most general idea of ​​the social hierarchy of society, it is sufficient to single out three main levels: higher, middle, and lower. The distribution of the population over these levels is possible on all grounds of stratification, and the significance of each of them will be determined by the values ​​and norms prevailing in society, social institutions and ideological attitudes. In modern Western society, which values ​​freedom, the degree of which, alas, is determined not only by political and legal acts, but also by the thickness of the wallet that provides wider access, for example, to education and, consequently, to a prestigious status group, criteria are brought to the fore, providing this freedom: material independence, high income, etc.

As noted above, the root cause of the hierarchical structure of society is social inequality generated by the objective conditions of the life of individuals. But each society strives to organize its own inequality, otherwise people, driven by a sense of injustice, will destroy in righteous anger everything that in their minds is associated with the infringement of their interests.

The hierarchical system of modern society is devoid of its former rigidity. Formally, all citizens have equal rights, including the right to occupy any place in the social structure, to rise to the top rungs of the social ladder or to be “below”. The sharply increased social mobility, however, did not lead to the "erosion" of the hierarchical system. Society still maintains and guards its own hierarchy.

It has been observed that the profile of the vertical section of society is not constant. K. Marx at one time suggested that its configuration would gradually change due to the concentration of wealth in the hands of a few and the significant impoverishment of the bulk of the population. The result of this trend will be the emergence of serious tension between the upper and lower layers of the social hierarchy, which will inevitably result in a struggle for the redistribution of national income. But the growth of wealth and power of the top is not unlimited. There is a "saturation point" beyond which society cannot move without the risk of a major catastrophe. As this point is approached, processes begin in society to contain the pernicious trend, either reforms are carried out to redistribute wealth through the taxation system, or deep revolutionary processes begin, in which broad social strata are involved.

The stability of society is linked to the profile of social stratification. Excessive "stretching" of the latter is fraught with serious social cataclysms, uprisings, bringing chaos, violence, hindering the development of society. The thickening of the stratification profile, primarily due to the “truncation” of the top of the cone, is a phenomenon that is repeated in the history of all societies. And it is important that it be carried out not through uncontrolled spontaneous processes, but through a consciously pursued state policy.

The described process also has a downside. Compaction of the stratification profile should not be excessive. Inequality is not only an objective reality of social life, but also an important source of social development. Equation in income, in relation to property. The authorities deprive individuals of an important internal stimulus to action, to self-realization, self-affirmation, and society - the only energy source of development.

The idea that the stability of the hierarchical structure of society depends on the proportion and role of the middle stratum or class seems fruitful. Occupying an intermediate position, the middle class performs a kind of connecting role between the two poles of the social hierarchy, reducing their confrontation. The larger (in quantitative terms) the middle class, the more chances it has to influence the policy of the state, the process of forming the fundamental values ​​of society, the worldview of citizens, while avoiding the extremes inherent in opposing forces.

4. Social mobility

Social mobility is a mechanism of social stratification, which is associated with a change in a person's position in the system of social statuses. If a person's status is changed to a more prestigious, better one, then we can say that upward mobility has taken place. However, a person as a result of job loss, illness, etc. can also move to a lower status group - in this case, downward mobility is triggered. In addition to vertical movements (downward and upward mobility), there are horizontal movements, which are made up of natural mobility (transition from one job to another without changing status) and territorial mobility (moving from city to city).

4.1. group mobility

Group mobility introduces major changes in the stratification structure, often affects the ratio of the main social strata and, as a rule, is associated with the emergence of new groups whose status no longer corresponds to the existing hierarchy system. For example: by the middle of the twentieth century, managers of large enterprises became such a group. It is no coincidence that on the basis of a generalization of the changed role of managers in Western sociology, the concept of a “revolution of managers” is being formed, according to which the administrative stratum begins to play a decisive role not only in the economy, but also in social life, supplementing and even displacing the class of owners somewhere.

Group movements along the vertical are especially intense during the restructuring of the economy. The emergence of new prestigious, highly paid professional groups promotes massive movement up the hierarchical ladder. The fall in the social status of the profession, the disappearance of some of them provoke not only a downward movement, but also the emergence of marginal strata, uniting people who are losing their usual position in society, losing the achieved level of consumption. Socio-cultural values ​​and norms that previously united them and predetermined their stable place in the social hierarchy are “washed out”. During periods of acute social cataclysms, a radical change in socio-political structures, an almost complete renewal of the highest echelons of society can occur.

Economic crises, accompanied by a massive decline in the level of material well-being, rising unemployment, a sharp increase in the income gap, become the root cause of the numerical growth of the most disadvantaged part of the population, which always forms the base of the pyramid of the social hierarchy. Under such conditions, the downward movement does not involve individuals, but entire groups. The fall of a social group may be temporary, or it may become permanent. In the first case, the position of the social group "corrects", it returns to its usual place as it overcomes economic difficulties. In the second, the descent is final. The group changes its social status and begins a difficult period of its adaptation to a new place in the social hierarchy.

So, mass group movements along the vertical are connected, firstly, with deep, serious changes in the socio-economic structure of society, causing the emergence of new classes, social groups, striving to win a place corresponding to their strength and influence in the social hierarchy. Secondly, with the change of ideological guidelines, value systems and norms, political priorities. In this case, there is a movement "upward" of those political forces that were able to catch changes in the mindset, orientations and ideals of the population.

4.2 Individual social mobility.

In a steadily developing society, vertical movements are not of a group, but of an individual nature. That is, it is not economic, political or professional groups that go up and down the steps of the social ladder, but their individual representatives, more or less successful, striving to overcome the attraction of the usual socio-cultural environment. The fact is that an individual who has set off on a difficult path “upstairs” goes on his own. And if successful, he will not only change his position in the vertical hierarchy, but also change his social professional group. A circle of professions that have a vertical structure, as, for example, in the artistic world - stars with millions of dollars, and artists who live by odd jobs; limited and of no fundamental importance to society as a whole. The worker who has successfully proved himself in the political arena and made a career, rising to the ministerial portfolio, breaks with his place in the social hierarchy and with his professional group. A ruined entrepreneur falls "down", losing not only a prestigious place in society, but also the opportunity to engage in his usual business.

In society, social institutions regulate the vertical movement, the uniqueness of culture, the way of life of each layer, allow each nominee to be tested "for strength", for compliance with the norms and principles of the stratum in which he falls. Thus, the education system provides not only the socialization of the individual, its training, but also plays the role of a kind of "social elevator", which allows the most capable and gifted to rise to the "higher floors" of the social hierarchy. Political parties and organizations form the political elite, the institution of property and inheritance strengthens the class of owners, the institution of marriage makes it possible to move even in the absence of outstanding intellectual abilities.

However, the use of the driving force of any social institution to rise "up" is not always enough. In order to gain a foothold in a new stratum, it is necessary to accept its way of life, organically fit into its socio-cultural environment, build your behavior in accordance with accepted norms and rules. A person is often forced to say goodbye to old habits, reconsider his entire system of values, and at first control his every act. Adaptation to a new socio-cultural environment requires high psychological stress, which is fraught with loss of connection with their former social environment. A person can forever be an outcast in the social stratum where he aspired, or in which he ended up by the will of fate, if we are talking about downward movement.

The phenomenon of a person being, as it were, between two cultures, associated with his movement in social space, is called marginality in sociology.

A marginal, a marginal person is an individual who has lost his former social status, deprived of the opportunity to engage in his usual activities, and, moreover, who is unable to adapt to the new socio-cultural environment of the stratum in which he formally exists. His individual value system, formed in a different cultural environment, turned out to be so stable that it cannot be replaced by new norms, principles, and rules.

In the view of many people, success in life is associated with reaching the heights of the social hierarchy.

5.Features of social stratification in Russia.

The “erosion” of the middle stratum, which is possible during periods of economic crises, is fraught with serious shocks for society. The impoverishment in the conditions of price liberalization and falling production of the bulk of the Russian population sharply upset the social balance in society, led to the forefront of the demands of the lumpen part of the population, which, as experience shows, carries a large destructive charge, aimed mainly at redistribution, and not for the creation of national wealth.

5.1 Prospects for the formation of the middle class.

What are the prospects for the formation of a middle class in our country today? In many ways, they depend on the successful adaptation of the population, the formation of productive models of socio-economic behavior that are adequate to the current economic situation. The characteristics of the adaptation process are now clear. First of all, the previously dominant hopes for the state are being replaced by a significantly greater orientation of the population towards their own strengths and capabilities. Rigidly defined and organic types of socio-economic behavior give way to a variety of types of social action. The direct and direct economic and ideological control of power is being replaced by such universal regulators as money and legal norms. New ways and standards of behavior are due to various sources of formation, although they are often not corrected either by stable moral norms or by legal sanctions.

The lack of demand for qualified personnel or demand only if there are necessary connections deforms the chain: education - qualifications - income - long-term savings - consumption level, which ensures the formation and development of the middle class. Education does not guarantee a job with growth prospects. Work does not guarantee income: salaries for representatives of the same profession in the private and public sectors differ by an order of magnitude. Income does not guarantee status, as many sources of high income are illegal. And the inconsistency of legislation, the imperfection of the tax system turn almost any enterprise into a delinquent and force the owners of enterprises, when hiring employees, to pay attention not only to their professional and business qualities, but to factors confirming their unconditional "reliability". Interestingly, the factor of having savings was not favored in any group. Today, only one third of the population answered positively to the question: "Do you have a certain margin of safety that will allow you to hold out if the economic situation deteriorates?" Twice as many respondents answered this question in the negative.

Studies have shown that with the growth of savings, their share in cash increases. In the responses received during focused interviews, the instability in the country and the unreliability of banks are indicated as the main reasons for reducing private investment potential. Respondents believe that society has not left the strip of instability, a sharp change in the principles of financial policy is not ruled out. The lack of trust in the government and its financial institutions deprives the potential middle class of the opportunity to build long-term strategies for the growth of well-being and transfers a significant part of possible savings into the sphere of consumption. the worst situation was the generation of 40-50 year olds, i.e. people who are of active working age and, thanks to their experience and qualifications, who have sufficiently high social ambitions. In this group of respondents, either disillusionment with the reforms is growing or their rejection is strengthening. This generation, which usually makes up the core of the middle class - the layer of social stability - did not become such, but, on the contrary, turned into a large destabilizing group.

Poorly adapted strata in half of the cases consider their social status as average, which primarily indicates the unfulfillment of the educational and professional qualification potential in the process of adaptation: the status positions formed in the past are not confirmed by the practice of adaptation, but remain in the minds of the respondents. The "success group" is rather characterized by an underestimation of social status (about 10% of respondents consider their social status as below average). In our opinion, the main reason for low social self-esteem here is the fact that the methods of adaptation (for example, sources of income that form a “decent financial position”) are not prestigious by the standards previously accepted in society.

Thus, the imbalance in the relationship between status-role positions and social identity also speaks of the crisis nature of adaptation, which “results” in unstable forms of social behavior. The impossibility of the majority of the population realizing their socio-economic aspirations, raising or at least maintaining their social status will block progress in all other areas of transformation and create social tension.

One cannot ignore the political self-identification of the potential middle class, which, in principle, should reflect its orientation towards the stability of the political situation. Political self-identification consists, first of all, in the delegation of power in the form of electoral behavior. Once in the sphere of interaction between various political parties and movements, the individual must make a “conscious choice” in favor of a political organization that best expresses his interests. In conditions when the traditional political scale of the Western European type does not “work”, and rational pragmatism is not supported institutionally, the task of finding a “working” indicator of political identification arises.

The results of our research clearly indicate the presence of a social base that supports pragmatic reformers who have levers of real power. For this part of the population of the electorate, it is not so much the ideological context and populist rhetoric that is important, but the guarantee of stability and continuity of power, ensuring the preservation of the rules by which a significant part of the population has already learned to live.

This is an extremely important issue, because the success of the reforms, the creation of a new democratic society with a market mechanism largely depends on the possibilities for the formation of a middle class. According to some data, today about 15% of the population employed in the national economy can be attributed to this social category, but it is likely that its social maturation to the “critical mass” will require a lot of time. Already, there has been a trend towards the formation of separate social strata classified as the middle class - businessmen, entrepreneurs, managers, certain categories of scientific and technical intelligentsia, highly skilled workers who are interested in implementing reforms. However, this trend is very contradictory, because common socio-political interests of various social strata, potentially forming the middle class, are not supported by the processes of their convergence on such an important criterion as the level of income and the prestige of professions.

6. Conclusion.

Based on all of the above, we can say that the middle class in Russian society is not large enough and its boundaries are very "blurred".

The emergence of the middle class is accompanied by a change in the entire social structure of society. Traditional classes and layers lose their clear outlines, blur. A highly skilled worker can be both a member of the working class and the middle class. According to some signs, spheres of life "stronger" may be his belonging to his class, to his stratum in it, and according to other signs - to the middle class. A second social structure appears, as it were, despite the fact that the first (traditional class) structure has by no means lost its significance. Leaving aside the question of the functions of the middle class, let us dwell on the obstacles that the process of the formation of the middle class in Russia is now encountering. These obstacles are:

Insufficiency of a layer of modern highly qualified workers, specialists, managers, etc., there are relatively few of them in Russia, the quality of an employee cannot significantly exceed the quality of the material and technical base on which he works;

Lack of demand by society and what is, due to the deep economic crisis that accompanies the transition of the economy to market relations;

The low standard of living, the incomes of those groups that could in the future make up the middle class;

The instability of the statuses of most social groups, including new ones, is due not only to the crisis and transition, but also to the fact that property is not yet provided with a system of social institutions that ensure its protection and normal functioning.

The formation of the middle class, apparently, is a necessary stage in the development of a socially oriented market economy. However, the period of its rather definite existence in the social structure of post-industrial society may turn out to be quite short. If the tendency to equalize the position of different classes, groups, strata is strong enough, then the boundaries of the middle class will gradually become less clear.

Thus, the structural formation of the middle class is possible in the presence of a consistent and complementary set of internal and external factors. The internal ones include the development of autonomous activity, a clear delineation of the range of social interests, group identification, the formation of a system of sociocultural values, norms and sanctions, and the external ones include the stabilization of socio-economic and political institutions and the ability of society to reproduce this stability, under which follows understand not the conservation of the existing order, but the predictability and openness of the actions of the authorities.

Social inequality and stratification

Completed by a student

2nd year Faculty of Economics

Kulkova Oksana Alexandrovna

Checked: ______________

Ryazan

Introduction

1. The essence of social inequality and its causes.

2. The system of social stratification. Basic class structures in an industrial society.

3. Dynamics of social stratification in Russia

Conclusion

Bibliography

Introduction

The history of all sociology as a science, as well as the history of its most important private discipline, the sociology of inequality, spans a century and a half.

In all ages, many scientists have thought about the nature of relations between people, about the plight of most people, about the problem of the oppressed and the oppressors, about the justice or injustice of inequality.

Even the ancient philosopher Plato reflected on the stratification of people into rich and poor. He believed that the state is, as it were, two states. One is the poor, the other is the rich, and they all live together, plotting each other all sorts of intrigues. Plato was “the first political ideologue who thought in terms of classes,” says Karl Popper. In such a society, people are haunted by fear and uncertainty. A healthy society must be different.

The essence of social inequality and its causes.

A variety of relations of roles, positions lead to differences between people in each particular society. The problem comes down to somehow streamlining these relations between categories of people that differ in many aspects.

What is inequality? In its most general form, inequality means that people live in conditions in which they have unequal access to limited resources of material and spiritual consumption. To describe the system of inequality between groups of people in sociology, the concept of “social stratification” is widely used.

When considering the problem of social inequality, it is quite justified to proceed from the theory of socio-economic heterogeneity of labor. Performing qualitatively unequal types of labor, satisfying social needs to varying degrees, people sometimes find themselves engaged in economically heterogeneous labor, because such types of labor have a different assessment of their social utility.

It is the socio-economic heterogeneity of labor that is not only a consequence but also the reason for the appropriation by some people of power, property, prestige and the absence of all these signs of advancement in the social hierarchy among others. Each of the groups develops its own values ​​and norms and is based on them; if they are placed according to a hierarchical principle, then they are social strata.

In social stratification tends to inherit positions. The operation of the principle of inheritance of positions leads to the fact that not all capable and educated individuals have equal chances to occupy positions of power, high principles, and well-paid positions. There are two selection mechanisms at work here: unequal access to truly high-quality education; unequal opportunities for obtaining positions by equally trained individuals.

Social stratification has a traditional character. Since, with the historical mobility of the form, its essence, that is, the inequality of the position of different groups of people, is preserved throughout the history of civilization. Even in primitive societies, age and sex, combined with physical strength, were important criteria for stratification.

Considering the dissatisfaction of members of society with the existing system of distribution of power, property and conditions for individual development, one must still keep in mind the universality of people's inequality.

Stratification, like any other science, has its own forms. So far, we have been talking about inequality without taking into account its form. Meanwhile, the intensity of stratification also depends on the form. The theoretical possibilities here fluctuate from such an extreme, when the same amount of both and the third is attributed to any status. There were no extreme forms of stratification in any historical object.

Let us compare the situation when there are numerous social strata in a society, the social distance between which is small, the level of mobility is high, the lower strata are a minority of members of society, rapid technological growth constantly raises the “bar” of meaningful work in the lower tiers of production positions, social protection of the weak, among other things, guarantees the strong and advanced peace and realization of potencies. It is hard to deny that such a society, such interlayer interaction is more of an ideal model in its own way than an everyday reality.

Most modern societies are far from this model. Or the concentration of power and resources in a numerically small elite is inherent. The concentration among the elite of such status attributes as power, property and education hinders social interaction between the elite and other strata, leads to excessive social distance between it and the majority, which means that the middle class is not numerous and the top is deprived of contact with other groups. Obviously, such a social order contributes to destructive conflicts.

The system of social stratification. Basic class structures in an industrial society.

In his work “The State”, Plato argued that the correct state can be scientifically substantiated, and not groped, fearing, believing and improvising.

Plato assumed that this new, scientifically designed society would not only implement the principles of justice, but also ensure social stability and internal discipline. This is how he imagined a society led by rulers (guardians).

Aristotle in "Politics" also considered the issue of social inequality. He wrote that now in all states there are three elements: one class is very rich; the other is very poor; the third is the middle one. This third is the best, because its members are most ready to follow the rational principle according to the conditions of life. It is from the poor and the rich that some grow up as criminals, and others as swindlers.

Realistically reflecting on the stability of the state, Aristotle noted that it is necessary to think about the poor, because the state, where many poor people are excluded from government, will inevitably have many enemies. After all, poverty gives rise to rebellion and crime where there is no middle class and the vast majority of the poor, complications arise, and the state is doomed to death. Aristotle opposed both the power of the poor, dispossessed, and the selfish rule of the rich plutocracy. The best society is formed from the middle class, and the state, where this class is more numerous and stronger than the other two put together, is best governed, for the social balance is ensured.

According to sociologists of all ideological directions, no one in the history of social thought emphasized as clearly as K. Marx that the source of social development is the struggle between antagonistic social classes. According to Marx, classes arise and fight on the basis of different positions and different roles performed by individuals in the production structure of society.

But K. Marx himself rightly noted that the merit of discovering the existence of classes and their struggle among themselves does not belong to him. Indeed, since the time of Plato, but, of course, especially since the bourgeoisie powerfully entered the stage of history in the 18th century, many economists, philosophers, historians have firmly introduced the concept of social class into the social science of Europe (Adam Smith, Etienne Condillac, Claude Saint - Simon, Francois Guizot, Auguste Mignet and others).

However, no one before Marx gave such a deep substantiation of the class structure of society, deriving it from a fundamental analysis of the entire system of economic relations. No one before him gave such a comprehensive disclosure of class relations, the mechanism of exploitation in the capitalist society that existed in his time. Therefore, in most modern works on the problems of social inequality, stratification and class differentiation, both supporters of Marxism and authors who are far from the positions of K. Marx, give an analysis of his theory of classes.

Decisive for the formation of modern ideas about the essence, forms and functions of social inequality, along with Marx, was Max Weber (1864 - 1920) - a classic of world sociological theory. The ideological basis of Weber's views is that the individual is the subject of social action.

In contrast to Marx, Weber, in addition to the economic aspect of stratification, took into account such aspects as power and prestige. Weber viewed property, power, and prestige as three separate, interacting factors that underlie hierarchies in any society. Differences in ownership give rise to economic classes; differences of power give rise to political parties, and differences of prestige give rise to status groupings or strata. From here he formulated his idea of ​​"three autonomous dimensions of stratification." He emphasized that "classes", "status groups" and "parties" are phenomena related to the distribution of power within the community.

Weber's main contradiction with Marx is that, according to Weber, a class cannot be the subject of action, since it is not a community. In contrast to Marx, Weber associated the concept of class only with capitalist society, where the market is the most important regulator of relations. Through it, people satisfy their needs for material goods and services.

However, in the market people occupy different positions or are in different “class situations”. Here everyone sells and buys. Some sell goods, services; others - the labor force. The difference here is that some people own property and others don't.

Weber does not have a clear class structure of capitalist society, so different interpreters of his work give inconsistent lists of classes.

Taking into account his methodological principles and summarizing his historical, economic and sociological works, one can reconstruct Weber's typology of classes under capitalism as follows:

1. The dispossessed working class. He offers his services on the market and differentiates by skill level.

2. Petty bourgeoisie - a class of small businessmen and merchants.

3. Dispossessed white-collar workers: technicians and intellectuals.

4. Administrators and managers.

5. Owners who also strive through education for the advantages that intellectuals have.

5.1 The class of owners, i.e. those who receive rent from owning land, mines, etc.

5.2 “Commercial Grade”, i.e. entrepreneurs.

Weber argued that property owners are a "positively privileged class". At the other extreme is the "negatively privileged class", here it included those who have neither property nor skills to offer on the market.

There are many stratification criteria by which any society can be divided. Each of them is associated with special ways of determining and reproducing social inequality. The nature of social stratification and the way it is established in their unity form what we call the stratification system.

When it comes to the main types of stratification systems, a description of caste, slaveholding, estate and class differentiation is usually given. At the same time, it is customary to identify them with the historical types of social structure observed in the modern world or already irrevocably gone into the past. We adhere to a slightly different approach, considering that any particular society consists of combinations of various stratification systems and many of their transitional forms.

Therefore, we prefer to talk about “ideal types” even when we use elements of the traditional terminology.

Below are nine types of stratification systems that, in our opinion, can be used to describe any social organism, namely:

Physical - genetic;

slaveholding;

Cast;

Class;

Ektaratic;

Socio-professional;

class;

Cultural - symbolic;

Cultural - normative;

The first type of physical-genetic stratification system is based on the differentiation of social groups according to “natural” socio-demographic characteristics. Here, the attitude towards a person or a group is determined by gender, age and the presence of certain physical qualities - strength, beauty, dexterity. Accordingly, the weaker, those with physical disabilities are considered defective and occupy a belittled social position.

Inequality in this case is affirmed by the existence of the threat of physical violence or its actual use, and then fixed in customs and rituals.

This "natural" stratification system dominated the primitive community, but continues to be reproduced to this day. It is especially strong in communities struggling for physical survival or expansion of their living space. The one who is able to carry out violence against nature and people or resist such violence has the greatest prestige here: a healthy young man is a breadwinner in a peasant community living on the fruits of primitive manual labor; courageous warrior of the Spartan state; a true Aryan of the national - socialist army, capable of producing healthy offspring.

The system that ranks people according to their capacity for physical violence is largely a product of the militarism of ancient and modern societies. At present, although devoid of its former significance, it is still supported by military, sports and sexually-erotic propaganda. The second stratification system - slaveholding - is also based on direct violence. But the inequality of people here is determined not by physical, but by military-physical coercion. Social groups differ in the presence or absence of civil rights and property rights. Certain social groups are completely deprived of these rights and, moreover, along with things, are turned into an object of private property. Moreover, this position is most often inherited and thus fixed in generations. Examples of slaveholding systems are quite diverse. This is ancient slavery, where the number of slaves sometimes exceeded the number of free citizens, and servility in Rus' during the Russkaya Pravda, this is plantation slavery in the south of the North American United States before the civil war of 1861-1865, and, finally, the work of prisoners of war and deported persons on German private farms during the Second World War.

The methods of reproduction of the slave-owning system are also characterized by considerable diversity. Ancient slavery was maintained mainly by conquest. For early feudal Rus', it was more debt, enslaving slavery. The practice of selling one's own children without being able to feed them existed, for example, in medieval China. In the same place, various kinds of criminals (including political ones) were turned into slaves. This practice was practically reproduced much later in the Soviet GULAG (although private slavery was carried out here in hidden non-legal forms).

The third type of stratification system is caste. It is based on ethnic differences, which, in turn, are reinforced by the religious order and religious rituals. Each caste is a closed, as far as possible, endogamous group, which is assigned a strictly defined place in the social hierarchy. This place appears as a result of the isolation of the special functions of each caste in the system of division of labor. There is a clear list of occupations that members of this caste can engage in: priestly, military, agricultural. Since the position in the caste system is inherited, the possibilities of social mobility are extremely limited here.

And the stronger caste is expressed, the more closed this society turns out to be. India is rightfully considered a classic example of a society dominated by the caste system (this system was legally abolished only in 1950). Today, although in a smoother form, the caste system is reproduced not only in India, but, for example, in the clan system of the Central Asian states. Obvious features of caste were affirmed in the middle of the twentieth century by the policy of fascist states (the Aryans were given the position of the highest ethnic caste, called to dominate the Slavs, Jews, etc.). The role of binding theological doctrines in this case is assumed by the nationalist ideology.

The fourth type is represented by a class stratification system. In this system, groups differ in legal rights, which, in turn, are strictly related to their duties and are directly dependent on these duties. Moreover, the latter imply obligations to the state, enshrined in law. Some estates are obliged to carry out military or bureaucratic service, others - "tax" in the form of taxes or labor duties.

Examples of developed estate systems are feudal Western European societies or feudal Russia. An estate is, first of all, a legal division, and not, say, an ethnic-religious or economic division. that is also important. that belonging to a class is inherited, contributing to the relative closeness of this system.

Some similarity with the estate system is observed in the ektaratic system representing the fifth type (from French and Greek - “state power”). In it, differentiation between groups occurs, first of all, according to their position in the power-state hierarchies (political, military, economic), according to the possibilities of mobilizing and distributing resources, as well as the prestige they feel, are connected here with the formal ranks that these groups occupy in their respective power hierarchies.

All other differences - demographic and religious - ethnic, economic and cultural play a secondary role. The scale and nature of differentiation (the amount of power) in the ektaratic system is under the control of the state bureaucracy. At the same time, hierarchies can be fixed formally - legally - through bureaucratic tables of ranks, military regulations, assignment of categories to state institutions, or they can remain outside the sphere of state legislation (a good example is the system of the Soviet party nomenclature, the principles of which are not spelled out in any laws). The formal freedom of members of society (with the exception of dependence on the state), the absence of automatic inheritance of positions of power also distinguish the etacratic system from the system of estates.

The etacratic system is revealed with all the greater force, the more authoritarian character the government assumes. In ancient times, societies of Asian despotism (China, India, Cambodia), located, however, by no means only in Asia (for example, in Peru, Egypt) were a vivid example of the etacratic system. In the twentieth century, it is actively asserting itself in the so-called socialist societies and, perhaps, even plays a decisive role in them. It must be said that the allocation of a special ektaratic system is not yet traditional for works on stratification typologies.

Therefore, we would like to draw attention to both the historical significance and the analytical role of this type of social differentiation.

This is followed by the sixth, socio-professional stratification system. Here the groups are divided according to the content and conditions of their work. A special role is played by the qualification requirements for a particular professional role - the possession of relevant experience, skills and abilities. Approval and maintenance of hierarchical orders in this system is carried out with the help of certificates (diplomas, grades, licenses, patents), fixing the level of qualification and ability to perform certain types of activities. The validity of qualification certificates is supported by the power of the state or some other sufficiently powerful corporation (professional workshop). Moreover, these certificates are most often not inherited, although there are exceptions in history.

Socio-professional division is one of the basic stratification systems, various examples of which can be found in any society with any developed division of labor. This is a system of craft workshops of a medieval city and a rank grid in modern state industry, a system of certificates and diplomas of education, a system of scientific degrees and titles that open the way to more prestigious jobs.

The seventh type is represented by the popular class system. The class approach is often opposed to the stratification one. But for us, class division is only a particular case of social stratification. Of the many interpretations of the concept of “class”, we will focus in this case on the more traditional - socio-economic. In this interpretation, classes represent social groups of politically and legally free citizens. Differences between groups are primarily in the nature and extent of ownership of the means of production and the product produced, as well as in the level of income received and personal material well-being. Unlike many previous types, belonging to classes - bourgeois, proletarians, independent farmers, etc. - is not regulated by the highest authorities, is not established by law and is not inherited. In its purest form, the class system does not contain any internal formal partitions at all (economic prosperity automatically transfers you to a higher group).

Economically egalitarian communities, where class differentiation is completely absent, are a rather rare and unstable phenomenon. But throughout most of human history, class divisions still bear a subordinate character. They come to the fore, perhaps, only in bourgeois Western societies. And the class system reaches its greatest heights in the liberal spirit of the United States of America.

Eighth type - cultural - symbolic. Differentiation arises here from differences in access to socially significant information, unequal and opportunities to filter and interpret this information, the ability to be a bearer of sacred knowledge (mystical or scientific). In ancient times, this role was assigned to priests, magicians and shamans, in the Middle Ages - to church ministers, who make up the bulk of the literate population, interpreters of sacred texts, in modern times - to scientists, technocrats and party ideologists. Claims to communicate with divine forces, to possess scientific truth on expression of public interest existed always and everywhere. And a higher position in this regard is occupied by those who have the best opportunities to manipulate the consciousness and actions of other members of society, who can prove their rights to true understanding better than others, own the best symbolic capital.

Simplifying the picture somewhat, we can say that pre-industrial societies are more characterized by theocratic manipulation; for industrial - partocratic; and for post - industrial - technocratic.

The ninth type of stratification system should be called cultural-normative. Here, differentiation is built on differences of respect and prestige that arise from the comparison of lifestyles and norms of behavior followed by a given person or group. Attitudes towards physical and mental labor, consumer tastes and habits, manners of communication and etiquette, a special language (professional terminology, local dialect, criminal jargon) - all this forms the basis of social division. Moreover, there is not only a distinction between “us” and “them”, but also a ranking of groups (“noble-not noble”, “decent-not decent”, “elite-ordinary people-bottom”). The concept of elites is surrounded by a certain mysterious veil. They talk a lot about it, but often, they do not outline any clear denoting boundaries.

The elite is not only a category of politics. In modern society, there are many elites - political, military, economic, professional. Somewhere these elites are intertwined, somewhere they compete with each other. It can be said that there are as many elites as there are areas of social life. But whatever area we take, the elite are a minority opposed to the rest of society. its middle and lower layers as a kind of “mass”. At the same time, the position of the elite as an upper class or caste can be fixed by a formal law or religious code, or it can be achieved in a completely informal way.

Elitist theories arose and were formed to a large extent as a reaction to radical and socialist teachings and were directed against various currents of socialism: Marxist, anarcho-syndicalist. Therefore, Marxists, in fact, were very skeptical about these theories, did not want to recognize them and apply them to the material of Western societies. For this would mean, firstly, the recognition that the lower strata are a weak or not at all organized mass that needs to be controlled, a mass incapable of self-organization and revolutionary action, and secondly, recognition to some extent of the inevitability and the “naturalness” of such a sharp inequality. As a result, views on the role and character of the class struggle would have to be radically revised.

But the elitist approach is directed against democratic parliamentarism. He is generally anti-democratic in nature. Democracy and accessories presuppose the rule of the majority and the universal equality of people as independent citizens, organized enough to realize their own goals and interests. And because of this, the champions of democracy treat any attempts at elite rule rather coldly.

Numerous approaches to the concept can be divided into two main groups - authoritative and meritocratic. In accordance with the first, the elite are those who have decisive power in a given society, and in accordance with the second, those who have certain special virtues and personal qualities, regardless of whether they have power or not.

In the latter case, the elite is distinguished by talent and merit. Sometimes domineering and meritocratic approaches are conventionally referred to as the “Lasswell line” and “Pareto line”. (Though the first approach might just as well be called the “Mosca line” or “Mills line”.)

One group of researchers understands the elite as layers that have the highest positions of power or the highest formal power in organizations and institutions. Another group refers to the elite of charismatic personalities, God-inspired, capable of leadership, representatives of the creative minority.

In turn, power approaches are divided into structural and functional. Those who choose a structural approach that is simpler from an empirical point of view consider the elite to be the circle of persons occupying the highest positions in the institutions under consideration (ministers, directors, military commanders).

Those who dwell on the functional approach set themselves a more difficult task: to single out groups that have real power in making socially important decisions (many representatives of these groups, of course, may not hold any prominent public posts, remain in the “shadow”) .

Let us dwell briefly on the positions of the classics of the imperious and meritocratic approaches.

4. Social mobility.

The study of social mobility was started by P. Sorokin, who published the book “Social Mobility, Its Forms and Fluctuation” in 1927.

He wrote: “Social mobility is understood as any transition of an individual or a social object (value), i.e. everything that is created or modified by human activity, from one social position to another. There are two main types of social mobility: horizontal and vertical. Horizontal social mobility, or displacement, refers to the transition of an individual or social object from one social group to another, located at the same level. The transfer of an individual from a Baptist to a Methodist religious group, from one nationality to another, from one family (both husband and wife) to another in divorce or remarriage, from one factory to another, while maintaining his professional status - these are all examples of horizontal social mobility. They are also the movement of social objects (radio, car, fashion, ideas of communism, Darwin's theory) within one social layer, like moving from Iowa to California or from some place to any other. In all these cases, "movement" can occur without any noticeable change in the social position of the individual or social object in the vertical direction.

Vertical social mobility refers to those relationships that arise when an individual or a social object moves from one social stratum to another. Depending on the directions of movement, there are two types of vertical mobility: upward and downward, i.e. social ascent and social descent. According to the nature of stratification, there are downward and upward flows of economic, political and occupational mobility, not to mention other less important types. Updrafts exist in two main forms: the penetration of an individual from a lower stratum into an existing higher stratum; the creation by such individuals of a new group and the penetration of the whole group into a higher stratum to the level with the already existing groups of this stratum. accordingly, the downward currents also have two forms: the first consists in the fall of the individual from the higher initial group to which he previously belonged; another form is manifested in the degradation of the social group as a whole, in the lowering of its rank against the background of other groups, or in the destruction of its social unity. In the first case, the fall reminds us of a person who has fallen from the ship, in the second, the ship itself is submerged with all the passengers on board, or the ship crashes when it shatters.

Social mobility can be of two types: mobility as a voluntary movement or circulation of individuals within the social hierarchy; and mobility dictated by structural changes (eg industrialization and demographic factors). With urbanization and industrialization, there is a quantitative growth of professions and corresponding changes in the requirements for qualifications and vocational training. As a consequence of industrialization, there is a relative increase in the labor force, employment in the category of "white collars", a decrease in the absolute number of agricultural workers. The degree of industrialization actually correlates with the level of mobility, as it leads to an increase in the number of high-status occupations and to a fall in employment in lower-ranking occupational categories.

It should be noted that many comparative studies have shown: under the influence of forces changes in stratification systems. First of all, social differentiation increases. Advanced technology gives impetus to the emergence of a large number of new professions. Industrialization brings professionalism, training and rewards into greater alignment. In other words, individuals and groups are characterized by a tendency towards relatively stable positions in a ranked stratification hierarchy. The result is increased social mobility. The level of mobility increases mainly as a result of the quantitative growth of professions in the middle of the stratification hierarchy, i.e. due to forced mobility, although voluntary mobility is also activated, since the orientation towards achievement acquires great weight.

Equally, if not to a greater extent, the level and nature of mobility is influenced by the system of social organization. Scholars have long drawn attention to the qualitative differences in this respect between open and closed societies. In an open society, there are no formal restrictions on mobility and there are almost no abnormal ones.

A closed society, with a rigid structure preventing the increase in mobility, thereby resists instability.

It would be more correct to call social mobility the reverse side of the same problem of inequality, because, as M. Beutl noted, “social inequality increases and legitimizes in the process of social mobility, the function of which is to divert to safe channels and contain discontent.

In a closed society, upward mobility is limited not only quantitatively, but also qualitatively, so individuals who have reached the top, but do not receive the share of social benefits that they expected, begin to consider the existing order as an obstacle to achieving their legitimate goals and strive for radical changes. Among those whose mobility is directed downwards, in a closed society there often turn out to be those who, by education and abilities, are more prepared for leadership than the bulk of the population - it is from them that the leaders of the revolutionary movement are formed at a time when the contradictions of society lead to a conflict of classes in it. .

In an open society where there are few barriers to upward movement, those who rise tend to diverge from the political orientation of the class into which they have passed. The behavior of those who lower their position looks similar. Thus, those who rise to the top stratum are less conservative than the permanent members of the top stratum. On the other hand, the "thrown down" are more left than the stable members of the lower stratum. Therefore, the movement as a whole contributes to the stability and at the same time the dynamism of an open society.

Dynamics of social stratification in Russia

The 1990s of the 20th century will most likely go down in the history of Russia as the era of three revolutions, or, perhaps, three stages of one revolution, rigidly predetermining each other. The first, political, ended in August 1991; the second, economic, yields the first tangible results. However, in parallel with it and overtaking it, the third social revolution will gain momentum, which will become a reality very soon, but will finally change the face of Russia only at the end of the millennium.

Such a prioritization is quite natural: politics and economics are hot topics, and the topic of the day today is the task of "feeding the people." There is nothing more obvious from the point of view of common sense. According to certain politicians, the government can quickly implement its declarations: stabilize the market, strengthen the financial system and balance the state budget. The dream of the reformers will come true: the people will be "fed" (that is, they will satisfy the critical minimum of their needs) without rebelling.

It is obvious, however, that for this idyll, in all likelihood, the country will have to pay long and painfully. The blows of the axe, which are used to build a bright market tomorrow, will inevitably have something to do with our destiny: the future tends to cruelly avenge the lightness with which the problems of the present are solved.

The most terrible result of the reforms will be a crushing blow to the social structure inherited from the Soviet era. This structure turned out to be so stable and shock-resistant that it withstood the fall of "real socialism." society on the basis of power. The fall of the partocratic elite was relatively mild, since other signs that stratify an industrial-type society (income, possession of property, education, profession, social prestige, etc.) in Soviet society were not significant to the extent that inevitably causes severe conflict relations social strata.

The strong cohesion of heterogeneous strata in Soviet conditions took place not only due to the short social distance between them, but also due to such a phenomenon as a certain mutual balance of statuses: the low salary and absolute anarchy of the intellectual depreciated his high educational rank and relative freedom in the eyes of the worker, who had, according to at least a more solid income - which did not allow latent ill will to develop into open hatred. On the contrary, the representative of mental labor compensated for his humiliation with the consciousness of the prestige of higher education and the intellectual profession, career prospects and greater freedom to dispose of his working time.

In other words: the financial situation was not the dominant factor of stratification; it was counterbalanced by no less significant - non-economic - parameters.

These foundations of social integration are rapidly coming to an end before our very eyes. The transfer of control over property from the state to the citizens threatens to follow the worst scenario: a huge part of the national product irresistibly enters not even at the disposal, but into the legal property of new and old economic elites, and a disproportionately small part flows through the fingers of the majority of the population. The level of income becomes the main parameter of stratification, not balanced by any counterbalance. Income levels are leveling off, which means that a highly integrated, stable social structure is in danger of being replaced by the most unstable kind of class society.

A society of this type is doomed to constantly balance on the brink of social war. The sharper and one-dimensional social stratification, the higher the charge of negative social sentiments (hatred, envy, fear) experienced by different layers towards each other, the deeper their mutual rejection. In this sense, the future of social peace in the country depends on whether the government will be able to prevent the monstrous disproportions in the distribution of former state property between various socio-economic groups that are growing like an avalanche in the process of spontaneous privatization.

In Western societies, the trend towards a reduction in social distance takes place precisely due to the strong position and long-term growth of the middle class, which thereby smooths out the sharpness of social stratification and is the main guarantor of stability. On the contrary, in the countries of the "third world" the colossal gap in income, in the level and style of consumption, in the very way of life between the upper and poorest strata of the population is enormous, and the share of the middle strata is incomparably (with the West) low.

The new stratification may turn out to be social dynamite that will blow up society, because if it is not possible to ensure the minimum necessary level of income, the volume and influence of the middle class, the most dangerous kind of social identification, from the point of view of stability, will inevitably prevail in society - class. The beginning of this disintegration of society into class identifications will most likely take place not before, but after the stabilization of the market (and, let's not forget, stabilization at a very low level). By this time, a huge number of people, having lost hope for a change in their personal situation, glimmering during a period of economic chaos and uncertainty, will understand that food shortages are not yet the worst tragedy in this life - and with the sobriety of disappointment they realize the rigid limits of their social rank .

In this situation, each of the main three classes will, in its own way, carry a potential threat to stability. The upper class (large entrepreneurs and owners, shareholders of monopoly enterprises, bureaucracy connected with the public sector and the comprador bourgeoisie servicing relations with the world market), having concentrated huge wealth in their hands, will turn out to be a red rag for almost the entire society. Conspicuous consumption, oriented towards Western consumer standards, which even today our nouveau riche cannot refuse, will fuel the unquenchable fury of the lower strata.

On the other hand, the abyss that will lie between the rich and the middle classes will not allow the former to count on parties that have a social base in the person of the latter.

The most active part of the poor class (workers of ruined and unprofitable enterprises, former collective farmers who never became farmers, the unemployed, as well as the vast majority of people who failed to rationally use the opportunities of the privatization era) will become a supplier of "mass crowd" for various kinds of revolutionary movements.

But even if it were not for all this, the large poor will in itself create an unbearable burden on the economy. High taxes, the need to help the poor (not to help means rebellion and blood), is unlikely to become an incentive for the development of business activity. The government, forced to burden other classes with them, will not earn gratitude from the lower and will become an enemy in the eyes of the higher and middle - which will bear the brunt of taxes.

The middle class - small and medium-sized entrepreneurs, the prosperous part of the intelligentsia, the workers of profitable enterprises, the new owners who have benefited from privatization - in a situation of sharp stratification will experience double frustration: fear of an angry lower class and hatred of an inaccessible higher class. The saddest possible outcome of privatization is the creation of a layer of "frustrated owners" - that potential base of fascism (which, by Seymour Lipset's definition, is middle-class extremism).

The fate of a society dominated by a one-dimensional perspective of evaluation is sad. The more the distribution of wealth coincides with the distribution of social prestige, the greater the likelihood of mutual rejection of the strata - lower, middle and higher, the closer and sharper the danger of disintegration with its varieties from revolution to civil war.

Of course, there is no country in the world where the poor do not feel hostility towards the rich. But this natural dislike can be strengthened or weakened - depending on factors of a socio-cultural rather than economic order. If the representatives of the poor strata learn that they have no chance of society promoting their "non-commodity" virtues, this will lead not only to a frightening moral degradation, but also to an explosive exacerbation of class hatred. On the contrary, where society, along with a commercial scale of evaluation, cultivates some other (for example, ethical, cultural ..) - the social hatred of the poor for the rich can be balanced by the desire of the first for moral (aesthetic, etc.) superiority over the second. Having no chance to get rich, he can achieve recognition and honor in a completely different field.

Conclusion

Social policy is a policy of regulation of the social sphere, aimed at achieving well-being in society. The social sphere of public relations includes forms of regulation of labor relations, the participation of workers in the management of the production process, collective agreements, the state system of social security and social services (unemployment benefits, pensions), the participation of private capital in the creation of social funds, social infrastructure (education, health care, housing, etc.), as well as the implementation of the principle of social justice.

Thus, the subject of social policy (social groups that have power in the social sphere), ensuring the achievement of well-being in society - the totality of historically established forms of joint activity of people - implements the principle of social justice, which, as the most general, is the goal of the social sphere. public relations.

SOCIAL-CLASS ORGANIZATION OF SOCIETY- the totality of social class relations between individuals united in social classes, social class groups and in elementary professional, property and volume-legal groups and these individuals themselves. S.-K.O. covers a wider range of social relations than the social class structure. The first includes not only stable, essential, non-random, regularly recurring, but also unstable, random, irregular relationships.

For a long time, the complexity of studying social relations in Soviet society, in addition to epistemological reasons, was influenced by the party approach to the study of all phenomena of public life, which dominated until the communist party lost its leading position in society. At the same time, it should be noted that, to the credit of Russian social scientists in the 1960s-1980s, despite the ideological circumstances that make it difficult to impartially analyze the social class structure, they made a significant contribution to the development of ideas about the nature of social relations and structures. At the same time, many scientific problems associated with social class structuring in modern domestic (as well as foreign) literature have not been disclosed at all. It should be especially noted that one cannot speak of any significant separation of Western sociology from Russian sociology. In modern foreign social science, there is a huge variety of mutually exclusive ideas about social and socio-class structures. Western authors traditionally invest in this concept a very different meaning.

Some researchers consider the social structure as a system of social inequality, others define it as a set of groups of associations and institutions, others consider it a system of statuses and roles, reducing the analysis to a functional interdependence between them, etc. As the leading French sociologist P. Ansart writes in his book "Modern Sociology": "In general, from 1945 to the 1970s in France, Italy, as well as in Germany and the USA, many researchers in the field of social sciences, without dogmatically linking themselves with individual details of Marx's theses, extracted from them the most essential with the intention to overcome the boundaries of narrow economism (Sartre, 1960) or in order to undermine the authority of functionalist conservative models (Mills, 1967; Habermas, 1968). However, this author further notes, "The 1970s and 1980s were marked by a departure from this content side of Marxism in the social sciences, which was due to various reasons in which historical events played an important role." To date, domestic social scientists are ahead of Western ones in a number of substationary issues related to the study of social relations. Therefore, highlighting the specifics of social relations, it is logical to turn specifically to domestic developments.

Patriarch of national sociology Rutkevich M.N. in substantiating the expediency of singling out a social-class structure in contemporary conditions for him (the work was published in 1979), he put forward the following main arguments: firstly, the social structure of society, while remaining class-based even under socialism, also includes other types of social structures of this type. At the same time, the social class structure should in no case be confused with the national-ethical, socio-demographic, socio-territorial, professional and other types of social structure of this type. However, since the first is, according to this author, the most important of all the listed types of social structure and leaves its mark on any of them, in the literature it is often referred to simply as a social structure. Secondly, overcoming the essential differences between the two forms of socialist property - public and collective-farm-cooperative - and at the same time between the working class and the collective-farm peasantry does not exhaust the tasks of building a classless society. The term "social-class structure" has that advantage, according to M.N. Rutkevich, which focuses on overcoming not only the differences between the two "friendly classes" of Soviet society, but also a number of social differences as necessary to "achieve a classless society."

Close to this point of view is the understanding of social and class differences, set forth in the monograph "Problems of Changing the Social Structure of Soviet Society", where they are understood as "a category that characterizes those phenomena in the system of social relations that are eliminated during the transition to communism, which are a rudiment class antagonistic society".

The work "The Social Structure of a Developed Socialist Society in the USSR" also states that "since there are often attempts to present the class structure of a socialist society in the USSR only as a division of society into two friendly classes, without taking into account other differences inherited from the class antagonism of society, , insofar as it seems justified to use the term "social-class structure", which focuses on the isolation of the structure under consideration from the social structure of society in a general sense.

The above approach, which was quite typical at that time, is characterized by the following errors: 1) The authors do not give a clear criterion for social and social-class structures, they do not show the relationship between these categories. Hence, social-class, professional, demographic, property and other types of social structures are considered as one-order, which is methodologically incorrect, since the social-class structure includes a number of structures (professional, property, etc.), which these researchers put with it in one row as single-order categories. Based on the principles of a systematic approach, it should be recognized as obviously erroneous to recognize social phenomena of the same order, some of which are completely included in others. 2) The need to single out a social class structure is associated with the ultimate goal of the development of socialism - the construction of a classless society. In this regard, the authors tried to consider the social class structure as a relic of capitalism (that is, in any case, they try to appeal to the period either before or after socialism).

Today in the social sciences it has become axiomatic both the impossibility of building a Marxist model of communism and the recognition of the fact that the society built in the USSR was not socialist. Naturally, in the light of these new theoretical principles, appeals to the postulates of the theory of "scientific communism" are obviously absurd. To the credit of domestic social scientists, attempts were already made at that time (sometimes quite successful in methodological terms) to consider the real social structures of Soviet society. It was noted that our society developed on its own basis and its social structure was formed according to the laws inherent exclusively in itself (Gerasimov N.V.). Accordingly, it was concluded that the social class structure is also formed according to the laws inherent in Soviet society. “However, the predominant part of modern studies of the social structure of Soviet society,” notes M.Kh. Titma, “especially its social class structure, is devoted to studying ways to achieve social one-sidedness. At the same time, the fact of overcoming the socio-economic division of labor as the basis of the movement in in this direction. But in the nearest historical perspective, it is difficult to expect the complete disappearance of even simple physical labor. It is even more unjustified to consider mental labor as socially homogeneous. "

Thus, already within the framework of Marxist theory, Soviet social scientists realized the need to look for differences between the concepts of "social structure" and "social-class structure" in phenomena inherent in real society. In Russian literature, if we leave aside the factual identification by some authors of social relations with social relations in general (Selunskaya V.M.), three main points of view on the specifics of social relations can be distinguished.

A number of researchers share M.N. Rutkevich's understanding of social relations as "equality and inequality of various groups of people and, above all, social classes according to their position in society." We must agree with A.K. Belykh and V.M. Alekseeva, who believed that the specifics of social relations are not disclosed in the above point of view: "These types of relations cover all social relations. Indeed, economic, political and spiritual-ideological relations are all relations between people, their communities represented by nations, classes , social groups, labor collectives. And the relations of equality and inequality also function in all social spheres - economic, social, political and spiritual-ideological equality and inequality. " These authors believed that "the methodological criterion for isolating one or another type of social relations is the object, about which relations are formed between people." The last remark in itself also does not raise objections today.

According to A.K. Belykh and V.M. Alekseeva, social relations are "relationships between people, their teams as carriers of qualitatively different types of labor, various labor functions." "And the social structure," notes A.K. Belykh, "is the diversity of social and labor subjects." A similar approach to this problem is followed by R.I. Kosolapov, who writes that the social structure is based on the social division of labor. "The social structure is a natural reflection of the division of labor in the form of groups of people belonging to various specialized spheres of production and social life, in the relations of these groups to each other ...". G.V. Mokronosov also concluded that "the social division of labor and the social structure of society essentially coincide, since we are talking about the same thing - the place of groups, classes in the system of production relations."

With this approach, the actual identification of social and labor relations is allowed; it can be completely replaced by the category "social division of labor". This leads to the fact that family, age, religious, political and many other relations fall out of social relations and only labor relations remain.

Other authors adhere to the views of V.P. Tugarinov, according to which the field of social relations includes classes, estates, nations, nationalities, professions and categories that reflect its various relationships between these human groups. This point of view gives a fairly accurate idea of ​​the specifics of social relations. At the same time, with this approach, relations between individuals are excluded from social relations, which leads to an artificial narrowing of their sphere of activity. Having supplemented the above list with relations between individuals, we will consider all subject-subject relations as social relations. This point of view corresponds to the views on the specifics of social relations by M. Weber ( cm.), who, considering the whole variety of these relations, always had in mind "... only a certain type of behavior of individual people." He also noted that "social" we mean such an action, which, according to the meaning assumed by the actor or actors, correlates with the action of other people or is oriented towards it.

It should be noted that two approaches to the study of social structures coexist in social science for a long time. In one of them, only social strata are considered as the main components of this structure, which does not allow the researcher to reveal real socio-economic, political, ethnic and other social contradictions, as well as to determine real, rather than imaginary (abstract) trends in the development of society and factors their defining ones. In the second approach, classes are accepted as the main components of the social structure, and within this direction itself there are fundamentally different approaches.

First, when adherents of the class theory emphasize that the social structure is connected first of all with differentiation between individuals. In this case, first of all, it is not the occupation of people that is considered, but their professional position, not people's incomes, but the distribution of incomes between subjects, which makes it possible to reveal social inequality. At the same time, the necessity of revealing and explaining the historical forms and degrees of differentiation and the influence of the latter on social evolution is proclaimed as a theoretical goal. An obvious shortcoming of this narrow approach is the narrowing, nullifying its methodological significance, of the content invested in the concept of "social structure of society" only to differentiation between individuals. In fact, the named structure also includes demographic, moral and many other relations.

Secondly, when researchers broadly interpret the concept of "class structure", actually talking about "the same hierarchies of social groups as the representatives of the proper stratification approach" (Radaev V.V., Shkaratan O.I.).

Thirdly, when researchers recognize that the category "social-class structure" is narrower than the concept of "social structure" and that the first structure is fully included in the second (integration approach). At the same time, there is a real opportunity both to distinguish between these structures and to give them clear, internally consistent definitions.

Any society is a complex social aggregate, consisting of a set of interacting subjects that break up not directly into individuals, but into two or more social communities, which, in turn, are already subdivided into individuals. The allocation of a particular social structure is based on a functional or causal relationship of interacting individuals. Depending on the degree of intensity of this connection, the possibility arises of the existence of a number of structures in the same set of people.

The nature of such a connection will show the proximity and intersecting coexistence of social groups. "The degree of intensity of the functional connection and its nature," Sorokin wrote ( cm.), - this is the basis for the possibility of coexistence of a number of collective unities in the same population. "He further points out that the social variety of interaction processes or the nature of the connections" entails a variety of collective unities formed by variously combining individuals - on the one hand, on the other - belonging of each individual not to one, but to a number of real aggregates. "All social groups, depending on the number of features that combine them, can be defined as elementary or cumulative (integral)." Under elementary or simple collective unity / social group. - S.S./, - writes Sorokin, - I understand the real, and not the imaginary set of persons united into one interacting whole by any one sign, sufficiently clear and definite, not reducible to other signs. " Such signs can be: profession, race , the scope of rights, language, territorial affiliation, gender, etc. "Under the cumulative group ... is understood the totality of interacting individuals connected into one organized whole by ties of not one, but a number of elementary groupings" (Sorokin).

Correspondingly, a social structure formed on the basis of social groups differentiated according to one feature (clear and definite, not reducible to other features) can be defined by us as an elementary social structure (for example, a professional structure). A structure that combines several elementary structures is a cumulative or integral structure. The elements of such a structure will be cumulative groups, which, in turn, break up into elementary groups. The cumulative group, in particular, is the social class. Accordingly, characterizing the social class structure, one can speak of it as a cumulative, or integral, social structure. A class in modern science means a concept that expresses a set of objects that satisfy some similar conditions or features. There is nothing supernatural in this category, and since in social structures there are significant (in terms of size and social status) subject groupings that unite individuals on the basis of some similar characteristics, it is legitimate to describe the most significant of them using the concept of "social class".

Already in Medieval Western Europe attempts were made by the Church Fathers to divide humanity into certain categories (or classes). Initially, under the categories they understood groups of people with homogeneous political, social and professional characteristics, charismatic and corporate community. This "anthropological spiritualism", according to which the division into categories occurred from top to bottom, depending on the set of perfections predetermined by the Augustine exegesis of the three characters of the Bible - Moses, Daniel and Job, embodying three types of human character: contemplative, religious and secular, caring only about earthly things. With this approach, even feudal overlords did not have to count on any prominent place in the hierarchy. Therefore, along with the traditional approach mentioned in 8 Art. there is a "sociological anthropology", which proposed a three-member division of society into: free, warriors and slaves. The named scheme, however, was not successful, because, firstly, it ignored the activities of the clergy in society and, secondly, since the intermediate position of warriors between free and slaves was characteristic only of the empire. French authors (Adalbert of Laon and others) suggested dividing society into "prayers" (clerics), "warriors" and "unarmed people" (workers). The last sociological scheme then became universally recognized. In the 17th century science stated the existence of social classes (C. Fourier, A. Smith, physiocrats, O. Thierry, etc.). In the subsequent period, the role and significance of these social formations were described in the works of A. Smith, D. Ricardo, utopian socialists, K. Marx ( cm.), M. Weber, P.A. Sorokin. Interesting considerations on the inconsistency of social class interests were expressed by Lenin ( cm.).

With all the differences in the views of these thinkers on social classes, their points of view were similar in regard to the methodology of the class differentiation of society. They were unanimous that social class stratification is based on the social division of labor ( cm.) and socio-economic inequality of individuals. By itself, this scientific approach has not lost its epistemological significance even today. As already noted, in modern Western social science there are significant differences in the interpretation of social classes and social class structure. "The concept of classes," pointed out R. Dahrendorf ( cm.), is one of the clearest illustrations of the inability of Western scholars to achieve even a minimum of agreement on this range of problems.

However, with all the diversity of views on the social class structure, there are a number of dominant trends. This is explained by the fact that all the authors of Western concepts, to one degree or another, resorted to one of two sources - the works of M. Weber or P. Sorokin.

According to M. Weber, social classes are categories that differ in economic characteristics, in other words, these are groups of people who are in a similar economic situation, or who have the same "life chances". This author proposes a three-term model of social structure, which includes classes, status groups and parties. The largest number of Western sociological developments is devoted to Weberian status groups, although different authors interpret them differently. So, R. Dahrendorf distinguishes classes based on the proximity or remoteness of certain groups to the system of power. There is also a sociological differentiation of social subjects according to the volume-legal criterion. This approach rightly emphasizes the importance of social differentiation depending on the scope of power prerogatives, but incorrectly ignores such fundamental criteria of social class stratification as ownership of economic goods and other elements of economic relations.

In the period before the CPSU lost its leading position in society, practically all Soviet scholars emphasized the use of the Leninist definition of classes as a general methodological premise for defining the category of "social class" and "social class relations." As you know, under the social classes of V.I. Lenin understood "large groups of people, differing in their place in a historically defined system of social production, in their relation (for the most part fixed and formalized in laws) to the means of production, in their role in the social organization of labor, and consequently in the methods of obtaining and the size of that share of the social wealth that they have. Classes are such groups of people, of which one can appropriate the labor of another due to the difference in their place in a certain way of social economy. However, in interpreting the Leninist definition of classes, in interpreting its individual points, in assessing the place and role of class-forming features, their subordination, in the question of the degree of applicability of the Leninist criteria apparatus to modern society for that time, a number of researchers managed to overcome the narrow confines of the dogmas of Lenin's theory of classes. Often the latter was replaced by interpretations of social classes based on the traditions of the Russian and American sociological schools.

So, T.I. Zaslavskaya ( cm.), considering as criteria for class selection: 1) attitude to the means of production; 2) the role in the social organization of labor and 3) the share of social wealth, notes that "the peculiarity of classes lies in the fact that they differ simultaneously according to all the above criteria. But each of these criteria, considered independently of the others, also has a considerable socially differentiating force and allows you to distinguish groups, although not of a class nature, but playing an important role in the social functioning of society. The last statement, in fact, lies in the context of the views of P.A. Sorokin. These groups, singled out according to one of the criteria ("united into one interacting whole by some one feature" - Sorokin) - are elementary collective unities, and social classes act as cumulative (integral) groups.

To determine the essence of social class relations, it is necessary to consider social classes from two sides: 1) from the point of view of their place and functional role in society; 2) through the contradiction of social class interests. The essence of one of the aspects of social class relations lies in the contradiction of interests, primarily economic, of certain social groups (which will stem mainly from the possibility of some social groups to appropriate the labor of others). The presence of a conflict of interests (primarily economic) as a criterion for distinguishing social classes in itself does not cause controversy in domestic social science (another matter is the presence of discrepancies in its application to real social systems). When considering social classes in terms of their place and functional role in society, there is still no consensus. In many ways, this was predetermined by the fundamental orientation that existed for a long time for the direct application of Lenin's criteria when considering social classes and groups in society.

This was due to: firstly, the lack of an unambiguous, well-established view in modern economic science (and in social science in general) on what should be understood by "relation to the means of production", by "role in the social organization of labor" and "by way of obtaining and the size of that share of social wealth which they dispose of. In other words, in fact, in political economy, one unknown (social class) was defined through other unknowns (that is, through categories about which there is no unambiguous and accurate idea). Secondly, there was a mutual discrepancy between the criteria for distinguishing social classes in V.I. Lenin. As a working definition of social classes according to their place and functional role in society, the definition given by P.A. Sorokin. In his opinion, the social class "is a cumulative, normal, solidary, semi-closed, but approaching an open, typical for our time group, composed of the cumulation of three main groupings: 1) professional; 2) property; 3) volume-legal".

In other words, a social class can be defined as a solidary set of individuals who are similar in profession, in property status, in terms of the scope of rights, and, therefore, have identical professional, property, social and legal interests. The professional structure determines the existence of professional groups united by the type of labor activity, owning a complex of special theoretical knowledge and practical skills acquired as a result of special training and work experience. Dismemberment according to professions deals with the formation in society of different groups, which are separated primarily not by the difference in mutual relations to each other, but by the difference in their relations to the object of activity. This kind of technical stratification can reach a huge number of species, subspecies, various small divisions, and among the infinite number of these divisions social inequality is already forming. A profession is the usual long-term occupation of an individual, giving him a livelihood. This professional occupation, as a rule, is also the main activity. In other words, "... the source of income and the social function of the individual are connected with each other and form in their totality a profession" (Sorokin). This qualification-professional differentiation will generate social inequality. It is different specialties, different qualifications in the labor process that lead to social differences between individuals.

The formation of social classes is based on enlarged professional groups (the genetic aspect). At the same time, in a socially-class-differentiated society, representatives of the same profession can be included in different social-class formations (functional aspect). The property structure (or grouping according to the degree of wealth and poverty), regardless of whether it approaches the type of more closed groups or less closed in a given country, causes the stratification of the whole society into groups of rich and poor. Moreover, the wealth and poverty of an individual do not entirely depend on his will. "Members of the same property group ... fatally become solidary in many ways, members of different property groups - fatally antagonists" (Sorokin). The similarity of property status leads to a spontaneous organization of individuals with similar property. Persons belonging to the same profession, depending on the amount of their income, may belong to different groups with opposing interests. The volume-legal structure (or grouping according to the volume of rights and obligations), not coinciding with the previous two structures, is divided into two main groups: privileged, constituting the highest social rank, and deprived, giving the lowest social rank. The privileged constitute a solidary collective unity; the same unity is formed by the "deprived" (Sorokin). At the same time, in any society with developed social structures, the real differentiation of individuals and groups depending on the scope of their rights and obligations is much more complicated than the above.

Thus, the following are distinguished as signs of social classes: 1) professional; 2) property; 3) volume-legal. As soon as stable professional, property and volume-legal groups are formed in society; as soon as they acquire some stability (as a social combination), interaction immediately begins between society, taken as a whole, and between individual social groups, each of the parties influencing the nature of the other. It was noted earlier that a profession, property status and the scope of rights have a huge impact on individuals. If belonging to each of these groups determines the behavior of people very strongly, then this conditioning will be much stronger when the influence of all these three structures merges. Individuals united by all three ties will have similar economic interests, which acts as a material condition for their association into social classes, in order to more successfully implement and protect their interests. Social groups that differ sharply from each other in three of the above characteristics at once will be repulsed and opposed much more strongly than groups that differ only in one of these characteristics.

At the same time, speaking about the unification of social groups into social classes, it is necessary to take into account the entire system of socio-economic relations as an exhaustive characteristic of a social class. So, Yu.S. Polyakov, emphasizing this, points out that "obviously, only the totality of production relations that develop in the process of production, exchange, distribution and consumption of material goods provides an exhaustive political and economic description of the class." Since all social groups in society interact with each other and at the same time strive for the most optimal realization of their interests (primarily economic ones), the whole society should objectively break up into certain large groups of people opposing each other depending on the degree of coincidence (opposition) of their interests. interests (primarily economic). What will predetermine this coincidence (opposition)? In our opinion, this is still the same opportunity for some social groups to appropriate the labor of others (depending on their place and functional role). In order to protect their economic interests, there is a spontaneous unification of both into social classes. Such an association acts as an economic basis for the formation of social classes.

Dahrendorf in his work "Class and class conflict in industrial society" (1957) wrote on this subject that "class is a category that is used in the analysis of the dynamics of social conflict and its structural roots." At the same time, the social class is not only an economic, but also a social, political, spiritual and ideological formation. K. Marx in The Poverty of Philosophy writes: “Economic conditions first turned the mass of the population into workers. The dominance of capital created for this mass the same position and common interests. Thus, this mass is already classes in relation to capital, but not yet for itself itself. In the struggle ... this mass unites, it constitutes itself as a class for itself. The interests it defends become class interests." This quote clearly shows that in the process of the emergence and development of social classes, according to K. Marx, there is such a form when people who are in a position determined by the above criteria (place and role in the system of functional labor relations, property relations, managerial relations and special economic interests), are not yet connected by an internal connection of conscious (ideological) relations, but only by a connection of subjective relations and objective dependencies that exist within the framework of production relations. Then we say that they form a "class in themselves", which, it is true, is not a simple aggregate, since it is connected by a system of objective relations, but it does not yet represent a class "for itself", i.e. does not yet have a fully developed consciousness of its class economic and political interests. Moreover, objective class interests are not mirrored in the subjective class consciousness. Awareness of one's essential, true interests, without which the transformation of a "class in itself" into a "class for itself" is impossible, inevitably occurs through a system of psychological attitudes given by previous historical experience. A social class can become a "class for itself" only by developing its own ideology.

On the basis of all this, its organizational design takes place. We note in particular that under the influence of Marx's proposition about "a class for itself," M. Weber proposed to distinguish between "class" and "social class" in the social class structure. Under the class, this author understood the social community, connected only by the similarity of economic interests, the "economic position" of this category of subjects. The category "social class" M. Weber showed that the highest manifestation of a class community is awareness of one's class economic and political interests and goals that mobilizes and encourages collective action.

The modern classic of French sociology P. Bourdieu ( cm.) also proposed to distinguish between possible (logical) and real social classes. This author writes that on the basis of knowledge of economic and other relations, one can "isolate classes in the logical sense of the word, i.e. classes as a set of agents occupying a similar position, which, being placed in similar conditions and subject to similar conditions, have every chance for having similar dispositions and interests, and consequently to developing similar practices and holding similar positions." P. Bourdieu rightly believes that this class "on paper" has a theoretical existence, "it allows you to explain and foresee the practices and properties of the classified and ... behavior leading to their unification into a group / into a real social class. - S.S./". "... This is only a possible class, since it is a set of agents who will objectively offer less resistance if they need to be "mobilized" than any other set of agents. "The transformation of a logical class into a real social class, writes it is further possible only through the development in its members of a sense of the position "occupied in the social space" / social class relations. S.S./. I. Kraus also writes: "Classes ... are conflict groups that, uniting, challenge the existing distribution of power, advantages and other opportunities ... classes are formed when a set of individuals defines their interests as similar to the interests of others from the same set and as different and opposing the interests of another set of persons. This researcher emphasizes the important role in the formation of a social class that the latter has its own ideology.

Thus, objective class interests are not mirrored in subjective class consciousness. Awareness of one's essential, true interests, without which the transformation of a "class in itself" into a "class for itself" is impossible, inevitably occurs through a system of psychological attitudes given by previous historical experience. A social class can become a "class for itself" only by developing its own ideology. On the basis of all this, its organizational design takes place. In connection with the non-reducibility of all components of the social class structure of society only to social classes and elementary professional, property and volume-legal groups, it is epistemologically necessary, based on the goal of more or less adequate reflection in the theory of the diversity of corporate social subjects, to introduce for a meaningful description of the named structure a number of categories, as well as to supplement the above definition of the social class of P.A. Sorokin.

Under the social class in modern science is understood a cumulative, normal, solidary, semi-closed, but approaching an open group, connected by a positive social class complementarity, made up of the cumulation of three main groupings: 1) professional; 2) property; 3) volume-legal. The concept of positive (negative) complementarity was introduced by L.N. Gumilev to characterize the ethnosphere. It was understood as "a feeling of subconscious mutual sympathy (antipathy) of members of ethnic groups, which determines the division into "us" and "them." Social class complementarity is understood as a feeling of subconscious mutual sympathy (antipathy) of members of social classes, leading to the formation of a single ideology among them and the defining division into “us” and “them.” Positive social-class complementarity is what (according to P. Bourdieu's terminology) distinguishes a “real social class” from a “possible (logical) class”.

It seems epistemologically promising to introduce into social philosophy a number of concepts that fix a certain stage in the development of a social class community - these are "class-layer", "class-estate", "distracho-class", "syncretic class". It is also advisable to single out socio-economic categories that show the intra-class differentiation of subjects: "social class group", "marginal social class group" and "caste social class group". Why is it promising to introduce the concept of "class-layer"? The fact is that modern sociology not only lacks clear criteria for distinguishing between the categories "class" and "stratum", but, as O.I. Shkaratan "for many authors, they are generally synonymous."

Today, in social science, the notion is typical that any modern society consists of groups or many individuals who have or wear certain characteristics. At the same time, these characteristics are considered as classification criteria, which can be one- or, more often, multidimensional (in our terminology, these are elementary or cumulative structures). With this approach, the researcher's attention is traditionally shifted from production to distribution, without comprehending the objective relations between them. This situation has led today to the fact that, as rightly noted by V.V. Radaev and O.I. Shkaratan: "in a significant part of the research, the same features are used to distinguish both classes and layers." And hence follows the widely held opinion among social scientists that the category of class covers heterogeneous social subjects, depending on the epistemological context that various scientists put into this term. “The meaning is also different,” as O.I. Shkaratan notes, “invested by different authors in the term “social stratum.” Most sociologists use this term to denote social differentiation within a hierarchically organized society. "class". In the same cases when these concepts are distinguished, the term "stratum" denotes groups within "classes", distinguished on the same grounds as the "classes" themselves. Therefore, it is promising in scientific terms to introduce into circulation instead of the category "layer "the concept of "class-layer", which makes it possible to emphasize that the named state of the social-class community is one of the stages of the life of the social class and at the same time allows you to clearly highlight the specifics of this stage. "Class-layer" is a community that differs from the social class by the absence of positive complementarity, i.e. close in essence to Bourdieu’s “possible class.” The degree of commonality of the individuals that make up the class-layer, the level of awareness of their common needs and interests (primarily economic), the degree of their cohesion and organization is less, than those of the social class. To characterize intraclass groups, the category "social class group" is used. The named groups are understood as such intra-class groups that partially differ from each other in one (or two) main cumulations: either professional, or property, or volume-legal; on the remaining two (or one) completely coinciding with other subjects of this social class.

To analyze the process of evolution of the social class structure of society today, the category of the social "distracho-class" (from the Latin word - distractor - torn apart) is often used. This class is understood as a cumulative, semi-closed, but approaching an open, group, composed of the cumulation of three main groups: 1) professional; 2) property; 3) volume-legal, and characterized by an increased degree of dismemberment and looseness of internal structures. A distracho class is a social class in the process of strengthening the autonomization of its intra-class (social-class) groups, leading in the long term to its disintegration into several new social classes. As a rule, the aforementioned social-class community is characterized by even less opportunity for joint action than the class-stratum; there is no single ideological position among the subjects of its constituents.

Recognition of the expediency of using the category "social distracho-class" in modern social science required the introduction of the concept of "embryonic (syncretic) social class" (or, for brevity, "syncretic class") into scientific circulation. The named social community is a social-class group included in the distracho-class, in the process of its transformation into a proper social class. The syncretic class is distinguished by its fusion, non-segmentation due to the initial underdevelopment of the state.

In recent years, much attention has been paid in philosophical and sociological literature to such a phenomenon as marginality, which acts as one of the characteristics of the state of social, including social class structures. The named concept, as a rule, is used "... to refer to relatively stable social phenomena that arise on the border/ highlighted by me. - S.S./ interaction of different cultures, social communities, structures, as a result of which a certain part of social subjects is beyond them "(Popova I.P.). Despite the apparent simplicity of defining the named phenomenon and its more than seventy years of scientific history, so far category "marginality" there are a large number of epistemological difficulties. One should agree with I.P. Popova that the reason for this state of affairs is threefold: "Firstly, in the practice of using the term itself, several approaches have developed (in sociology, social psychology, cultural studies, political science, economics, etc.), which gives the concept a fairly general, interdisciplinary character. Secondly, in the process of refinement and evolution of the concept in sociology, several meanings associated with various types of marginality have been established. Thirdly, its vagueness, uncertainty makes it difficult to measure the phenomenon itself, its analysis in the context of social processes. "Thus, in modern social science it is advisable to talk not about any abstract marginality of some unmarked social phenomenon, but only about the marginality of certain types (or classes) of phenomena and relations.The use of the concept of "marginality" in characterizing the components of the social class structure puts forward in the first place such attributive features as "boundary", "intermediate", "ambiguous" and "uncertainty" (which emphasizes the increased degree entropy of marginal social class subjects In our opinion, it is impossible to describe the social class organization and structure of society in modern systemic language without introducing the category of "marginal social class group" (or, for short, "marginal group"), which is a social a class group that is part of one social class, but in a number of ways is also close to another social class. This group occupies a specific "borderline" position in the social class structure of society. The named group with a high degree of probability can be characterized as an entropy element at the group level.

The social class-estate (or, for short, "class-estate") is a semi-closed group, approaching a closed one; access to it is limited, including by customs and traditions, its representatives have inherited rights and obligations. Japan in the second half of the 20th century can serve as an example of such social class communities. This country has a widely developed system of succession of political power, "when the sons, daughters and grandchildren of politicians of older generations almost automatically take seats in parliament from the same electoral districts ( Nisei or sansei giin). In the mid-1990s, these second- or third-generation parliamentarians held up to a quarter of the seats in the lower and up to one-fifth of the seats in the upper house of the Japanese parliament. If we add to them spouses, brothers-in-law, nephews and other relatives, as well as former secretaries of retired parliamentarians, then the scale of the phenomenon of inheritance of power will be even more impressive "(Kravtsevich A.I.) It should also be added that the Japanese cabinet of ministers ( the highest executive power) is formed from acting politicians-parliamentarians from the ruling or ruling parties.At the same time, the real government of the country is not in the hands of ministers and their deputies (politicians elected by the people), who are traditionally replaced annually, but in the hands of a career bureaucracy. is also today a class-estate.The system of consultative meetings at the authorities, "combining the collective experience of bureaucracy, business and academic circles, trade unions and consumers and designed to promote the achievement of public consensus on the adopted policy" (Kravtsevich A.I), in In most cases, it is a front for giving the appropriate entourage to the decisions prepared by the bureaucracy.

Caste social-class groups (or, for short, "castes") are social-class groups that occupy a certain (strictly ranked) place in the social hierarchy, are associated with rigidly fixed activities and are limited in communicating with each other.

Thus, a social class is a real sociological category that makes it possible to single out, according to a number of (socio-economic) features, a group of individuals acting in social and socio-economic relations as a large closed system with a certain dynamic algorithm of behavior and a specific internal structure that changes depending on from the stage of development of the class - from the degree of its "maturity" (class-stratum, social distracho-class, etc.).

In modern social science, a social class is understood as a cumulative, normal, solidary, semi-closed, but approaching an open group, connected by positive social class complementarity, made up of the cumulation of three main groupings: 1) professional; 2) property; 3) volume-legal. Social-class complementarity is understood as a feeling of subconscious mutual sympathy (antipathy) of members of social classes, leading to the formation of a single ideology among them and a defining division into "us" and "them". In the course of their life activity, social classes and social class groups can unite into social class groupings (“social superclasses”) with the aim of joint struggle to optimize the conditions for realizing their socioeconomic interests. At the same time, the main condition for this integration is the temporary coincidence of the interests of the merging subjects and the obvious contradiction of their socio-economic interests of other social classes. Such an association of certain social-class subjects can occur for a certain, as a rule, rather short historical period. It should also be noted that the potential possibility of the named association is largely determined by the moral relations of a particular society (customs, traditions, moral norms, ideals, etc.).

Based on the above, it is possible to define social class relations in the narrow sense as relations between individuals included in specific cumulative (integral) groups - social classes. Accordingly, social class relations in a broad sense are understood as relations between people united in elementary professional, property and volume-legal groups and cumulative (integral) groups - social class groups and social classes.

The social class structure of society is a combination of: 1) the most stable, essential, regularly recurring social class relations that arise between individuals united in social classes, social class groups and in elementary professional, property and volume-legal groups; 2) these individuals themselves, united in social classes and social-class elementary social groups. In any real society there exists, constantly reproducing or disappearing, a wide variety of social-class relations. If we assume that in any society all of these relationships will be stable, essential, regularly repeated, that is, that there will be no chaotic social-class processes or phenomena, then in the named society there will be no dynamism and it will be doomed. to stagnation.

As already noted in the special literature (E.A. Sedov), for normal functioning and more or less adequate response to changes in the surrounding socio-economic realities (that is, for the perception of information), chaotic processes must not only be present, but also occupy a fairly significant proportion in the totality of socio-economic relations. At the same time, if these chaotic processes go beyond a certain limit, that is, if the presence of non-chaotic processes becomes insufficient to maintain certain structures in society, then this society dies. At the same time, the degradation of the social class structure occurs. Therefore, to characterize real social class relations, it is necessary to use the concept of "social class organization of society", which covers a broader aspect of social relations than the social class structure. The first includes not only stable, essential, non-random, regularly recurring, but also unstable, random, irregular relationships. Some changes in the social class organization of society will act as a specific social "embryo" of the evolution of the social class structure.

Thus, S.-K.O. A dynamic society is always a continuously changing social phenomenon, the dynamics of which cannot be fully described in the language of modern mathematics, even using "mathematical chaos" as a means. At the same time, it seems theoretically possible with a sufficient degree of probability to describe the social class organization of society for a certain period of time. To fix this state, it is legitimate to use the category "social-class fractal". The named concept refers to a certain static social configuration, acting as if an instantaneous statistical (mathematical) "snapshot" of the social class organization. Somewhat simplified, the real existence of the social class organization of society can be represented as an infinite number of social class fractals continuously replacing each other. The category "social-class structure of society", as noted above, does not describe the entire variety of social-class relations and does not carry an evolutionary potential.

In other words, if we imagine that the whole variety of social-class relations in a certain socio-economic system has been reduced only to the most stable, essential, regularly repeated, i.e. to non-random deterministic relationships, then such a system could exist only under constant external conditions (stable natural and climatic conditions, constant sources of raw materials, lack of scientific and technological progress or regression, a frozen demographic structure with a constant population, etc.), i.e. .e. it is basically non-life. In order to respond to changes in external conditions in the socio-economic system, entropy (entropy is a measure of the uncertainty of stochastic processes) social class relations must necessarily exist.

All real, and not imaginary, social class relations are divided into two types: 1) stable, essential, regularly recurring - forming a social class structure and being in this case an expression of structural information; 2) unstable, random, stochastic - which are the embodiment of entropy processes leading to the transformation of the social class structure and allowing the latter to adequately respond to changes in the socio-economic system. It is the totality of all these relations (stable and unstable, statistical and stochastic, etc.) that is described by the term "S.-K.O." In S.-K.O. of any real society there will be elements that are not part of the social class structure - individuals who can unite in certain, fairly stable groups. In turn, in any social class there will also be entropy elements - providing the possibility of its change, and structural-informational elements - providing the possibility of its self-preservation. (The distracho class is the class with maximum entropy, and the social class-estate is the class with minimum entropy.) The actual level of diversity at the higher levels of the social class structure can be ensured by effectively restricting it at the lower levels.

Demographic processes in a social context

1. Russia entered the third millennium not in the best demographic shape. Unjustifiably high mortality, low birth rate, population decline, fading migration. All of this is taking place against a backdrop of broader, more profound and painful economic and social changes, and it is not surprising that public opinion tends to view negative demographic trends as a direct consequence of these changes.

2. The understanding of not only the demographic present, but also the demographic future of Russia depends on whether such a view is true or false. If we are really talking about a simple reaction to the economic and social crisis of the 1990s, then we can hope that as this crisis is overcome, the demographic situation will also improve. If the main demographic trends have deeper causes and a more ancient origin, then there may be no reason for such optimism.

3. Although the author of the report belongs to those demographers who consider demographic processes as relatively autonomous in relation to other social processes, he certainly does not consider them absolutely independent of the social, economic or political context. Moreover, he believes that demographic trends in Russia should be considered in two contexts: domestic and global. This applies to all major demographic processes: mortality, fertility and migration.

4. Mortality trends in Russia can most justifiably be characterized as a crisis, although they can in no way be associated only with the events of the last 10-15 years, they have been clearly traced at least since the mid-1960s. The main reason is the preservation of conservative state-paternalistic attitudes, which greatly limit the scope of individual activity and responsibility, including when it comes to protecting one's own health and life. This is especially noticeable in the later stages of the modernization of mortality, when it is more dependent on individual behavior. Through its earlier and very important stages, the process of the extinction of generations in Russia in the 20th century was quite successful. Nevertheless, the entire system of values ​​- both individual and public - is still largely archaic, predetermines such a distribution of priorities, in which both society and each individual sacrifice health and even life in the name of other, considered more important goals, protection health is invariably financed on a "leftover" principle, due freedom of choice of a doctor, hospital, method of treatment, insurance, etc. is not ensured. All this led to the fact that several decades ago, modernization changes were blocked and the situation with mortality ceased to improve. This, in fact, is the long-term crisis of mortality in Russia, the last decade has not brought fundamental changes.

5. Oddly enough, but frankly crisis, long-term trends in mortality disturb Russian public opinion much less than fertility trends, which are much more difficult to give an unambiguous assessment. There is no doubt that, from the point of view of the internal Russian context, the extremely low birth rate, the main reason for the decline in the population of Russia, is extremely unfavorable for the country. However, unlike very high mortality, it is not something exceptional, a similar birth rate is observed in many developed countries with completely different socio-economic conditions. This could be interpreted as a general crisis of the entire modern "post-industrial" civilization, the causes of which cannot be found and eliminated in one country. However, even with this approach, it is impossible not to see that the decline in the birth rate in post-industrial societies is associated with many changes that are usually interpreted as positive attributes of modernization: the almost complete elimination of infant mortality, the emancipation and self-realization of women, the growing specific investment in children, the growth of education, etc. Given this, perhaps we should speak not about a crisis, but about the internal inconsistency of the modernization process, and perhaps that modernization objectively shifts the emphasis from quantitative to qualitative characteristics of social life.

However, the decline in fertility should also be viewed in a broader, global context. This decline can be seen as a systemic reaction to the global demographic crisis generated by the global population explosion and the growing pressure on the planet's limited resources. With this interpretation, the decline in the global birth rate below the level of simple reproduction for a sufficiently long period is a blessing, and the decline in the birth rate in Russia, as well as in the "West", is only an episode of such a global turn. No matter how unpleasant this may be for all developed countries, and especially for Russia with its vast territory, nothing can be done about it, because the interests of preserving all mankind are higher than the interests of individual countries.

6. The connection of internal migrations with the social context, mainly domestic, is obvious. For most of the 20th century, the multi-million movements of the rural population to the cities were one of the main instruments and, at the same time, the results of modernization shifts that changed the face of the country. With the same shifts, in particular, with the industrial development of new areas, the creation of new cities, etc. inter-district, in particular, inter-republican migrations of the Soviet period were also connected. At the same time, external migration was artificially blocked for most of this period.

The political changes at the end of the century, the collapse of the USSR and the emergence of a new Russia within borders that never existed before greatly changed the overall context and brought external migration to the fore (especially since the potential for internal migration had been largely exhausted by that time).

The new internal Russian context in which external migrations now have to be considered is contradictory. On the one hand, the apparent discrepancy between the declining Russian population and the vast territory of the country (greater than in Soviet times) makes immigration desirable, and this is a demographic process that is much easier to manage than mortality or fertility. On the other hand, any immigration gives rise to economic, social, and sometimes political tensions, problems of intercultural interaction, etc., which is inevitable in Russia, where anti-immigration and sometimes openly xenophobic sentiments still prevail. Therefore, it is not necessary to count on a too benevolent attitude of Russians towards immigration in the near future.

But there is also a global context, which is determined by the rapid increase in the number of inhabitants in poor developing countries and the growing demographic pressure on developed countries. It manifests itself, in particular, in the growing legal and illegal migration to these countries, the search for political asylum in them, and so on. The final result is formed under the influence of all components of both the domestic and global context, which makes this result difficult to predict.

7. Answering the question posed at the beginning of the report, it should be said that Russia's main current demographic problems should hardly be associated with the country's economic and social development over the past 10-15 years. Perhaps this period highlighted and exacerbated some problems, but at their core they have long historical and sociocultural roots. Moreover, most of these problems are immanent to the type of development that Russia chose more than one decade and even more than one century ago, when it embarked on the path of catching up modernization. Any reasonable strategy of society must take into account the deep conditioning of the current Russian demographic trends, and not proceed from the illusory possibilities of their easy and quick change.

Youth as a socio-demographic group. The controversy between scientists about the definition of youth, the criteria for separating it into an independent group, age limits have a long history. In this context, it is impossible to consider, like some researchers, youth only as a demographic group, thereby emphasizing only its biologically given features. After all, the category of age is biosocial. This is not just a biological "counter" of human life, an indicator of physiological and psychological changes in a person, it affects the social status of a person, his place and role in the system of social division of labor, his performance of certain social roles, the existence of rights and obligations. etc. Age changes the characteristics of the labor activity of the individual, its performance, professional skills, creativity, mobility. With age, the structure of needs for the satisfaction of material and spiritual benefits is transformed. From this we can conclude that the age factor is undoubtedly a social phenomenon. In addition, young people perform a specific social role in society, which is expressed in their social and innovative activities. It is not for nothing that sociologists introduced the concept of juventization, which refers to such social changes and innovations that are the result of the vigorous activity of young people. This allows us to talk about young people not only as a demographic, but also as a social group. At the same time, the resource of social-innovative behavior and the group-forming factor is the "capital of dispositions" - a specific type of "cultural capital" that the youth possesses and thanks to which it differs from other social groups. It is he who predetermines all the actual social functions of young people, determining their activities aimed at training and inclusion in various spheres of public life, in the social mechanism, as well as a specific youth subculture, internal differentiation, which does not always coincide with established forms of general social differentiation. Thus, youth can be spoken of as a socio-demographic group, therefore. That the individuals belonging to it have a common social attribute and perform the necessary function of juventization of society. And the main sign of a social group is precisely the implementation of a socially significant function.

A traditional society is a predominantly rural, agrarian and pre-industrial association of large groups of people. In the leading sociological typology "tradition - modernity" it is the main opposite of the industrial one. According to the traditional type, societies developed in the ancient and medieval eras. At the present stage, examples of such societies have been clearly preserved in Africa and Asia.

The distinctive features of a traditional society are manifested in all spheres of life: spiritual, political, economic, economic.

The community is the basic social unit. It is a closed association of people united by a tribal or local principle. In the relationship "man-earth" it is the community that acts as an intermediary. Its typology is different: they distinguish feudal, peasant, urban. The type of community determines the position of a person in it.

A characteristic feature of a traditional society is agricultural cooperation, which is made up of clan (family) ties. Relations are based on collective labor activity, land use, systematic redistribution of land. Such a society is always characterized by weak dynamics.

A traditional society is, first of all, a closed association of people, which is self-sufficient and does not allow external influence. Traditions and laws determine its political life. In turn, society and the state suppress the individual.

The traditional society is characterized by the predominance of extensive technologies and the use of hand tools, the dominance of corporate, communal, state ownership, while private property still remains inviolable. The standard of living of the majority of the population is low. In labor and production, a person is forced to adapt to external factors, thus, society and the characteristics of the organization of labor activity depend on natural conditions.

Traditional society is a confrontation between nature and man.

The economic structure becomes completely dependent on natural and climatic factors. The basis of such an economy is cattle breeding and agriculture, the results of collective labor are distributed taking into account the position of each member in the social hierarchy. In addition to agriculture, people in a traditional society are engaged in primitive crafts.

The values ​​of a traditional society are to honor the older generation, old people, observe the customs of the clan, unwritten and written norms and accepted rules of conduct. Conflicts that arise in teams are resolved with the intervention and participation of a senior (leader).

In a traditional society, the social structure implies class privileges and a rigid hierarchy. At the same time, social mobility is practically absent. For example, in India, transitions from one caste to another with an increase in status are strictly prohibited.

The main social units of society were the community and the family. A person, first of all, was a part of a collective that was part of a traditional society. Signs indicating the inappropriate behavior of each individual were discussed and regulated by a system of norms and principles. The concept of individuality and following the interests of an individual person are absent in such a structure.

Social relations in a traditional society are built on subordination. Everyone is included in it and feels like a part of the whole. The birth of a person, the creation of a family, death take place in one place and surrounded by people. Labor activity and life are built, transmitted from generation to generation. Leaving the community is always difficult and difficult, sometimes even tragic.

A traditional society is an association on the basis of common features of a group of people in which individuality is not a value, the ideal scenario of fate is the fulfillment of social roles. Here it is forbidden not to match the role, otherwise the person becomes an outcast.

Social status affects the position of the individual, the degree of proximity to the leader of the community, the priest, the leader. The influence of the head of the clan (senior) is indisputable, even if individual qualities are called into question.

The main wealth of a traditional society is power, which was valued higher than law or law. The army and the church have a leading role. The form of government in the state in the era of traditional societies was predominantly a monarchy. In most countries, representative bodies of power did not have independent political significance.

Since power is the greatest value, it does not need justification, but passes to the next leader by inheritance, its source is God's will. Power in a traditional society is despotic and concentrated in the hands of one person.

Traditions are the spiritual basis of society. Sacred and religious-mythical representations have dominance both in the individual and in the public consciousness. Religion has a significant impact on the spiritual sphere of traditional society, the culture is homogeneous. The oral way of exchanging information prevails over the written one. Spreading rumors is part of the social norm. The number of people with education, as a rule, is always insignificant.

Customs and traditions also determine the spiritual life of people in a community that is characterized by deep religiosity. Religious dogmas are also reflected in culture.

The totality of cultural values, revered unconditionally, also characterizes the traditional society. Signs of a value-oriented society can be general or class. Culture is determined by the mentality of society. Values ​​have a strict hierarchy. The highest, no doubt, is God. The desire for God forms and determines the motives of human behavior. He is the ideal embodiment of good behavior, supreme justice and the source of virtue. Another value can be called asceticism, which implies the rejection of earthly blessings in the name of gaining heavenly ones.

Loyalty is the next principle of behavior expressed in the service of God.

In a traditional society, second-order values ​​are also distinguished, for example, idleness - the rejection of physical labor in general or only on certain days.

It should be noted that they all have a sacred (sacred) character. Estate values ​​can be idleness, militancy, honor, personal independence, which was acceptable for representatives of the noble strata of the traditional society.

Traditional and modern society are closely interconnected. It was as a result of the evolution of the first type of society that mankind entered the innovative path of development. Modern society is characterized by a fairly rapid change of technology, continuous modernization. Cultural reality is also subject to change, which leads to new life paths for future generations. Modern society is characterized by the transition from state to private ownership, as well as the neglect of individual interests. Some features of the traditional society are also inherent in the modern one. But, from the point of view of Eurocentrism, it is backward due to its closeness to external relations and innovations, the primitive, long-term nature of changes.

Signs of a traditional society

According to one of the most popular classifications, the following types of society are distinguished: traditional, industrial, post-industrial. The traditional view stands at the very first stage of the development of society and is characterized by a number of specific features.

The vital activity of a traditional society is based on subsistence (agriculture) with the use of extensive technologies, as well as primitive crafts. Such a social structure is typical for the period of antiquity and the Middle Ages. It is believed that any society that existed in the period from the primitive community until the beginning of the industrial revolution belongs to the traditional type.

During this period, hand tools were used. Their improvement and modernization took place at an extremely slow, almost imperceptible rate of natural evolution. The economic system was based on the use of natural resources, it was dominated by agriculture, mining, trade, construction. The people were mostly sedentary.

The social system of a traditional society is class-corporate. It is characterized by stability, preserved for centuries. There are several different estates that do not change over time, maintaining the same nature of life and static. In many traditional societies, commodity relations are either not characteristic at all, or are so poorly developed that they are focused only on meeting the needs of small members of the social elite.

Traditional society has the following features. It is characterized by the total dominance of religion in the spiritual sphere. Human life is considered the fulfillment of God's providence. The most important quality of a member of such a society is the spirit of collectivism, a sense of belonging to one's family and class, as well as a close connection with the land where he was born. Individualism is not characteristic of people in this period. Spiritual life for them was more significant than material wealth.

The rules of coexistence with neighbors, life in a team, attitude to power were determined by established traditions. A person acquired his status already at birth. The social structure was interpreted only from the point of view of religion, and therefore the role of the government in society was explained to the people as a divine destiny. The head of state enjoyed unquestioned authority and played an important role in the life of society.

The traditional society is demographically characterized by a high birth rate, a high mortality rate and a fairly low life expectancy. Examples of this type today are the ways of many countries of Northeast and North Africa (Algeria, Ethiopia), Southeast Asia (in particular, Vietnam). In Russia, a society of this type existed until the middle of the 19th century. Despite this, by the beginning of the new century, it was one of the most influential and largest countries in the world, possessing the status of a great power.

The main spiritual values ​​that distinguish the traditional society are the culture and customs of the ancestors. Cultural life was mainly focused on the past: respect for one's ancestors, admiration for the works and monuments of previous eras. Culture is characterized by homogeneity (homogeneity), orientation to its own traditions and a rather categorical rejection of the cultures of other peoples.

According to many researchers, traditional society is characterized by a lack of choice in spiritual and cultural terms. The dominant worldview in such a society and stable traditions provide a person with a ready-made and clear system of spiritual guidelines and values. Therefore, the world around us seems understandable to a person, not causing unnecessary questions.

Features of traditional society

A traditional society is characterized by the absence of statehood or there are several states in one society that seek self-isolation. Which of the values ​​are characteristic of a traditional type of society? The traditional type of society is characterized by the predominance of traditional values ​​and a patriarchal way of life. The traditional type of society is characterized by the priority of collectivism, belonging to the community. In industrial societies, unlike traditional ones, states exist, and in post-industrial societies covered by the process of globalization, there are both national states and supranational authorities. Also, the traditional society is characterized by the long existence of the community, subsistence farming.

In a traditional society, unlike industrial and post-industrial, a person is almost completely dependent on the forces of nature, and his influence on nature is minimal. In an industrial society, a person actively tames the forces of nature, and in a post-industrial society he dominates them. What sign characterizes an industrial society? Correct Answer: mass production. The traditional society is characterized by the predominance of agriculture and animal husbandry, and industrial production is either completely absent or insignificant.

Work ethic attitudes such as the preference for leisure over work, the desire to earn no more than is necessary to meet basic needs, are characteristic of a traditional type of society.

A traditional society, unlike an industrial society, has a class type of social stratification. A traditional society, unlike an industrial one, does not have as its goal the production of consumer goods. The goal of a traditional society is to maintain the existence of the human species. The development of a traditional society is aimed at spreading humanity over large areas and collecting natural resources. The goal of post-industrial society is the extraction, processing and storage of information.

The main relationship in traditional and industrial society is between people and nature. In a post-industrial society, the main relationships take place between people.

The concept of "traditional society" is often used in sociology and other social sciences, although there is no exact definition of it, and there are controversial points in its use. So, for example, there are societies that are somewhat similar to the traditional type of society, but still have clear differences. Sometimes I mistakenly believe that a synonym for traditional society is: an agrarian society, a tribal society, an ancient society or a feudal society.

There is also an erroneous belief that no change occurs at all in traditional societies. Of course, traditional societies, unlike industrial ones, do not develop as dynamically, but still they do not freeze in time, but develop, just in a different direction than industrial and post-industrial societies.

The traditional society is the earliest, it arose along with the emergence of society in general. The time of industrial society is the 19th-20th centuries. Post-industrial society exists and develops now.

Development of traditional society

Economically, the traditional society is based on agriculture. Moreover, such a society can be not only landowning, like the society of ancient Egypt, China or medieval Rus', but also based on cattle breeding, like all the nomadic steppe powers of Eurasia (Turkic and Khazar Khaganates, the empire of Genghis Khan, etc.). And even fishing in the exceptionally rich coastal waters of Southern Peru (in pre-Columbian America).

Characteristic of a pre-industrial traditional society is the dominance of redistributive relations (i.e., distribution in accordance with the social position of each), which can be expressed in a variety of forms: the centralized state economy of ancient Egypt or Mesopotamia, medieval China; the Russian peasant community, where redistribution is expressed in regular redistribution of land according to the number of eaters, etc. However, one should not think that redistribution is the only possible way of the economic life of a traditional society. It dominates, but the market in one form or another always exists, and in exceptional cases it can even acquire a leading role (the most striking example is the economy of the ancient Mediterranean). But, as a rule, market relations are limited to a narrow range of goods, most often objects of prestige: the medieval European aristocracy, getting everything they needed on their estates, bought mainly jewelry, spices, expensive weapons of thoroughbred horses, etc.

In social terms, traditional society is much more strikingly different from our modern society. The most characteristic feature of this society is the rigid attachment of each person to the system of redistributive relations, the attachment is purely personal. This is manifested in the inclusion of everyone in a collective that carries out this redistribution, and in the dependence of each on the “seniors” (by age, origin, social status), who are “at the boiler”. Moreover, the transition from one team to another is extremely difficult, social mobility in this society is very low. At the same time, not only the position of the estate in the social hierarchy is valuable, but also the very fact of belonging to it. Here you can give specific examples - caste and class systems of stratification.

Caste (as in traditional Indian society, for example) is a closed group of people who occupy a strictly defined place in society.

This place is delineated by many factors or signs, the main of which are:

Traditionally inherited profession, occupation;
endogamy, i.e. the obligation to marry only within one's own caste;
ritual purity (after contact with the "lower" it is necessary to undergo a whole purification procedure).

The estate is a social group with hereditary rights and obligations, enshrined in customs and laws. The feudal society of medieval Europe, in particular, was divided into three main classes: the clergy (the symbol is a book), chivalry (the symbol is a sword) and the peasantry (the symbol is a plow). In Russia before the revolution of 1917 there were six estates. These are nobles, clergy, merchants, petty bourgeois, peasants, Cossacks.

The regulation of estate life was extremely strict, down to minor circumstances and minor details. So, according to the “Charter to Cities” of 1785, Russian merchants of the first guild could travel around the city in a carriage drawn by a pair of horses, and merchants of the second guild could only travel in a carriage with a pair. The class division of society, as well as the caste division, was consecrated and fixed by religion: everyone has his own destiny, his own destiny, his own corner on this earth. Stay where God placed you, exaltation is a manifestation of pride, one of the seven (according to medieval classification) deadly sins.

Another important criterion of social division can be called a community in the broadest sense of the word. This refers not only to a peasant neighboring community, but also to a craft workshop, a merchant guild in Europe or a merchant union in the East, a monastic or knightly order, a Russian cenobitic monastery, thieves' or beggarly corporations. The Hellenic polis can be viewed not so much as a city-state, but as a civil community. A person outside the community is an outcast, outcast, suspicious, an enemy. Therefore, expulsion from the community was one of the most terrible punishments in any of the agrarian societies. A person was born, lived and died tied to the place of residence, occupation, environment, exactly repeating the lifestyle of his ancestors and being absolutely sure that his children and grandchildren would follow the same path.

Relationships and bonds between people in traditional society were permeated through and through with personal loyalty and dependence, which is understandable. At that level of technological development, only direct contacts, personal involvement, individual involvement could ensure the movement of knowledge, skills, abilities from teacher to student, from master to journeyman. This movement, we note, had the form of transferring secrets, secrets, recipes. Thus, a certain social problem was also solved. Thus, the oath, which in the Middle Ages symbolically and ritually sealed relations between vassals and lords, in its own way equalized the parties involved, giving their relationship a shade of simple patronage of a father to his son.

The political structure of the vast majority of pre-industrial societies is determined more by tradition and custom than by written law. Power could be justified by the origin, the scale of controlled distribution (land, food, and finally water in the East) and supported by divine sanction (that is why the role of sacralization, and often direct deification of the figure of the ruler, is so high).

Most often, the state system of society was, of course, monarchical. And even in the republics of antiquity and the Middle Ages, real power, as a rule, belonged to representatives of a few noble families and was based on these principles. As a rule, traditional societies are characterized by the merging of the phenomena of power and property, with the determining role of power, that is, having more power, also had real control over a significant part of the property that was at the aggregate disposal of society. For a typical pre-industrial society (with rare exceptions), power is property.

The cultural life of traditional societies was decisively influenced precisely by the substantiation of power by tradition and the conditionality of all social relations by class, communal and power structures. Traditional society is characterized by what could be called gerontocracy: the older, the smarter, the older, the more perfect, the deeper, the true.

Traditional society is holistic. It is built or organized as a rigid whole. And not just as a whole, but as a clearly prevailing, dominant whole.

The collective is a socio-ontological, not a value-normative reality. It becomes the latter when it begins to be understood and accepted as a common good. Being also holistic in its essence, the common good hierarchically completes the value system of a traditional society. Along with other values, it ensures the unity of a person with other people, gives meaning to his individual existence, guarantees a certain psychological comfort.

In antiquity, the common good was identified with the needs and development trends of the policy. A polis is a city or society-state. Man and citizen in it coincided. The polis horizon of ancient man was both political and ethical. Outside of its borders, nothing interesting was expected - only barbarism. The Greek, a citizen of the polis, perceived the state goals as his own, saw his own good in the good of the state. With the policy, its existence, he linked his hopes for justice, freedom, peace and happiness.

In the Middle Ages, God was the common and highest good. He is the source of everything good, valuable and worthy in this world. Man himself was created in his image and likeness. From God and all power on earth. God is the ultimate goal of all human aspirations. The highest good that a sinful man is capable of is love for God, service to Christ. Christian love is a special love: God-fearing, suffering, ascetic-humble. In her self-forgetfulness there is a lot of contempt for herself, for worldly joys and comforts, achievements and successes. In itself, the earthly life of a person in its religious interpretation is devoid of any value and purpose.

In pre-revolutionary Russia, with its community-collective way of life, the common good took on the form of a Russian idea. Its most popular formula included three values: Orthodoxy, autocracy and nationality.

The historical existence of a traditional society is slow. The boundaries between the historical stages of "traditional" development are barely distinguishable, there are no sharp shifts and radical shocks.

The productive forces of traditional society developed slowly, in the rhythm of cumulative evolutionism. What economists call pent-up demand, that is, was missing. the ability to produce not for the sake of immediate needs, but for the sake of the future. Traditional society took from nature exactly as much as needed, and nothing more. Its economy could be called environmentally friendly.

Culture of traditional society

The main feature of the culture of a traditional society is that it is based on tradition. Actually, the presence of such a culture can serve as a criterion for defining a society as traditional. Attempts to define a traditional society through a way of managing or the presence or absence of writing are controversial, since attributing all pre-industrial societies to traditional ones is an oversimplification, and some authors consider the appearance of writing to be the end of the traditional type of society, others (E. Hobsbawm, R. Rappaport, T. Ranger, D. Goody, J. Watt, G. Gadamer and P. Riker) - on the contrary - the basis for the formation of tradition, and still others - not decisive for distinguishing between traditional and non-traditional.

Speaking of tradition as the basis of culture, we rely on the more or less generally accepted meaning of this term for all socio-humanitarian sciences, which, usually used in the singular, means “the process of transferring established patterns of behavior, ideas, etc. from generation to generation. within a certain community”, which in our case is a traditional society. The second meaning of this term (in this case it is more often used in the plural) is "these established patterns of behavior, ideas, etc., transmitted from generation to generation." We believe that the presence of traditions in the second sense is characteristic of any type of society, as well as the presence of innovations. But the process of tradition itself is characteristic only of a traditional society, while innovation as a process - the constant search for new, more rational ways of life - is characteristic of the type of society that we would call innovative.

Without touching on the issue of cultural genesis, which has no unambiguous solution, it can nevertheless be stated with confidence that culture itself is an integral feature of human society as a whole and each of its members individually, necessary for their existence as such. Accordingly, there is a need to transmit culture as such an immanent feature of humanity from generation to generation. A human child torn out of culture does not become a human being (the so-called Mowgli children); and if culture, on the one hand, was not perceived by people and, on the other hand, did not absorb them into itself, then culture itself, and human society as such, and, probably, physically man as a species, would cease to exist.

Traditions are an intangible part of what is passed down from generation to generation in order to preserve our existence as a special species - humans. Naturally, they do not remain unchanged. Various laws operate here, including variability similar to that inherent in biological organisms, which leads to the fact that a person first adapts better and better to the existing natural conditions, and then more and more actively transforms the environment in accordance with his own ideas (ideas of his own culture) about world and a comfortable life in it. Thus, the mutation of traditions and the emergence of innovations are inevitable, which eventually cease to be such, replenishing or modifying a set of traditions - stereotypical patterns of behavior, thinking and worldview.

It is more difficult to understand what tradition is as a mechanism for the continuity of culture, as a process. The continuity of the existence of culture is ensured by the fact that a newborn child enters a certain cultural environment. In the process of purposeful training and education, as well as as a result of being in this environment, he is imbued with culture and becomes a part of humanity, and a person is a product, user and creator of culture at the same time. In each generation, a cultural heritage is mastered and reproduced, at least part of which (the core of tradition - according to S. Eisenstadt and E. Shils) remains unchanged (or changing form, but not essence) for many generations in one community. Approximately this is how modern cultural studies formulates the definition of tradition as a mechanism for preserving culture. At the same time, any functional element of culture can become the content of tradition: knowledge, moral norms, values, customs, rituals, techniques of artistic creativity, political ideas, and the way of broadcasting cultural heritage largely depends on the characteristics of communication technologies that are available to society at that time. or any other historical period.

However, if we are not talking about human culture in general, but about the culture of any specific traditional society, then it is necessary to add to the understanding of tradition as a mechanism for the preservation and transmission of culture an aspect that is partly expressed by the views of traditionalists (especially traditionalists of the twentieth century). We formulate it as follows: in such a society they do not blindly repeat the experience of previous generations, preventing innovation and development, but follow the tradition, which is the original ideal model for organizing life on sacred grounds and is the core on which the whole culture of this society is strung. Basically, sacred knowledge is transmitted within the framework of religious or worldview systems, often directly from a mentor to a student, and as long as it exists, is recognized by representatives of the community and determines their identity, this society is traditional, and its culture develops, carefully interacting with the natural living environment. If, under the influence of external influences or internal factors, tradition as the meaning and form of existence gradually or suddenly disappears, then this culture loses its support and also begins to degenerate.

Thus, a traditional society is not one where a large block of traditions, strictly determining the life of its members, occupies a dominant position in culture and prevents the introduction of innovations, but a society where sacred tradition is the soul of society, which determines its worldview and mentality.

Let us cite as an opposition an innovative society, which in its development and existence relies not on tradition, but on innovation as a way of existence.

Here, science and technology, production and consumption are intensively developing in order to quickly obtain practical benefits. Such a society is aggressive and striving to conquer nature and other communities, develop new territories and gain new experience. It is generally accepted that individual freedom is a value in an innovative society, and the traditional one enslaves it.

We believe that such a judgment in no way reflects the complexity of the interaction between the individual and society and is the result of Eurocentric thinking. In a traditional society with a living tradition, the determination of which the individual is subjected to voluntarily, certain restrictions themselves are a value and a way of the harmonious development of the individual. On the contrary, in an innovative society with blurred values, a person, independently choosing ideals for himself, has no support in the sacred and, as a result, is guided by the momentary, changeable, often imposed, which leads to stress and enslavement of a person by the material side of life.

There is an opinion that "the trend in the history of mankind is the movement from traditional culture to innovative".

The second group includes the Western world, starting from the Renaissance, and those cultures that adopted the "achievements of modern civilization." We believe that the innovative type of culture existed before: we refer to it the ancient world and its heir - Western civilization, as well as our national culture. Unlike traditional societies that are represented in the history of mankind, for example, Ancient Egypt, Sumer, Babylon, India, China, the Muslim world and Jewish culture, innovative communities are not built around a single sacred tradition; at the same time, they constantly borrow something from other cultures, transform, invent - all this changes their way of life and directly affects development. So, in the culture of Ancient Greece and Rome there was no sacred tradition, at the same time, the philosophy of the first, starting from the mythological consciousness and opposing itself to it, created a fundamentally new type of thinking, which made it possible to further develop according to an innovative type. Ancient Rome, also intensively developing in technical, political and military aspects, brought innovation to the fore, without, however, having a spiritual support that neither the mythological worldview nor the later Christianity that spread in the empire, which remained one of the innovations for this community, could give. .

Russian culture, perhaps due to its geographical location and ethnic diversity, also did not rely on a single sacred tradition: paganism was replaced by Christianity (more precisely, mixed with it, which makes it possible to speak of dual faith), and both were reformed, then atheism, then - the activation of various religious movements and the strengthening of the role of the Orthodox Church. Relations with the Horde, transformations of Peter I, revolutions and upheavals - the history of Russia is full of transitions from one extreme to another. Contradictions and dualism are immanent in Russian culture, and the holiness of autocratic power supported by Orthodoxy (the model: a just “priest” who rules according to God’s will and the people are his children), although it sometimes resembles the sacred tradition, does not become a single center of culture. Having a sacred beginning, Christianity did not become the core on which culture is strung, since in the countries that adopted it it was used and is being used as an ideological support for what is happening, changing and receiving different interpretations depending on changes in the social and political situation, the dominant worldview. Thus, in an innovative society, traditions serve culture and are its consequences, while in a traditional society, culture itself follows from a tradition that has a sacred origin.

Both types of culture are viable and have their advantages and disadvantages. Traditional culture has proved its ability to exist, developing in a certain way, for thousands of years (India, Jews, China); and such communities perished as a result of conquests by their neighbors, leaving the features of their culture for centuries (Sumer, Ancient Egypt), or fading away with the loss of the sacred tradition as a central core (part of modern Asian countries, nomadic communities). The innovative type of culture has also proved its ability to give rise to a long-term civilization: if we consider the modern West to be the successor of antiquity, then we are talking about more than two millennia.

However, if we consider Ancient Greece and Ancient Rome separately from each other and the further development of the West, then the conclusion suggests itself that the innovative type of culture led the civilizations it created not only to rapid prosperity, but also to inevitable death, provoked by internal causes. This may also end the power of the modern Western world, which today has spread its influence over the entire globe, and with it, given the phenomenon of globalization and the achieved level of destructive power, of all mankind. In this regard, it would be wrong to perceive the traditional society as an anachronism doomed to disappear, and the innovative society as the only one suitable for the modern world. Among the tasks of social and culturological science is an adequate description and analysis of both types, the study and preservation of the sacred tradition as a culture-forming beginning of a traditional society.

Values ​​of traditional society

Labor is seen as a punishment, a heavy duty.

Trade in handicrafts, agriculture were considered second-class activities, and the most prestigious were military affairs and religious activities.

The distribution of the produced product depended on the social position of the person. Each social stratum was entitled to a certain share of public material goods.

All the mechanisms of a traditional society are aimed not at development, but at maintaining stability. There is a wide system of social norms that hinder technical and economic development.

The desire for enrichment that does not correspond to the social status of a person is sharply condemned by society.

In all traditional societies, giving money at interest was condemned.

The wealthy subject their lives to endless enrichment and are therefore also deprived of leisure. The basis of a well-organized society should be the middle class, which has property, but does not strive for endless enrichment.

The European traditional society possessed all the features characteristic of other traditional societies, however, starting from the era of antiquity, cultural and economic phenomena were established, which later led to the emergence of a fundamentally new system of economic values.

In antiquity, private ownership of land and the idea of ​​its legal protection arose.

In antiquity, a democratic method of government arose, based on the principles of election, turnover and the existence of electoral legislation.

A rational solution has arisen, which includes philosophy and science, rational thinking is based on the principles of using abstract concepts and generalized evidence according to certain rules. (The appearance of Christianity played the most important role in the development of European civilization. Christianity is a world religion and therefore unites all people with a single system of values, regardless of nationality. In addition, Christianity is characterized by an activity orientation and a minimal system of prohibitions compared to other world religions). New economic relations partly began to take shape in the era of the European Middle Ages. The main role in this process was played by medieval cities. Cities were centers of handicraft production and trade, thanks to which the division of labor and trade and money relations developed. Cities had a certain degree of independence and elements of democracy were preserved in them.

In the cities, the traditions of rational thinking were preserved, and a new European education system was formed, the basis of which was universities.

Despite the general negative attitude towards technical innovations in the Middle Ages, inventions were made or borrowed in the east that had a huge impact on social and cultural development: paper, printing, gunpowder, compass, mechanical clocks.

Traditional society classes

An estate is a group of people in a traditional society, belonging to which is inherited, and attempts to leave it are strictly condemned. For each of the estates there are special rituals, prohibitions and labor duties; own patron saints.

Medieval man is always a member of the group with which he is most intimately connected. Medieval society is corporate from top to bottom.

Unions of vassals, knightly associations and orders; monastic brethren and Catholic clergy; urban communes, merchants' guilds and craft workshops; - these and similar human collectives rallied individuals into tight microworlds that gave them protection and help and were built on the basis of the reciprocity of the exchange of services and support.

The bonds that united people in a group were much stronger than the bonds between groups or individuals belonging to different groups.

In one of them (worlds) there are well-groomed, put in order lands. This order is maintained here by priests, warriors and people in their service - managers, tax collectors, large tenants, as well as entrepreneurs half independent of them - millers and blacksmiths. Church, castle tower, people in service - three orders - estates. Indeed, the ideology of three complementary functions is emerging again.

All of them (knights) boasted of their noble ancestors. It was thanks to their origin that these knights were considered noble people. Nobility obliges to be virtuous following the example of ancestors, but it also frees from any submission.

Philip was eight years old when his father died, and at the age of six he was already anointed. No one was surprised that a small child was on the throne. Royal service was an honor, and the honor was passed from father to son, according to seniority in all the noble families of Francia.

The serf peasant could leave the master's estate, and if he left it, he was subject to widespread persecution and return by force. The peasant is subject to the court of the master, who monitors his private life, punishing for intemperance and laziness.

The peasants repaired and maintained order in the master's estates, delivered the products of the economy to the market, drove their master and carried out his instructions.

Life in a traditional society

The most important feature of traditional relations is the connection between the individual and the group (family, clan, community, corporation, etc.), its inseparable unity with it. The individual is formed and socialized as a member of the group, realizes himself through participation in it, enjoys its protection and support. As a member of the group, he can claim an appropriate share of common property (land, pastures, part of the common crop, etc.), rights and privileges. At the same time, he occupies a strictly defined place in the hierarchy of the group, and his rights and material well-being itself are limited in accordance with this place. His individual qualities, interests and aspirations, as it were, dissolve into group ones, the traditional individual, both in social and spiritual aspects, is inseparable from the group. A person in the modern "Western" sense of this concept, as an independent, completely autonomous individual, responsible only before the formal law and before God, does not exist in a traditional society.

The economic life of traditional societies is based on a system of interpersonal relations. This means that a person participates in the economy as a member of a certain primary community, his participation in labor activity, distribution, consumption is determined by his place in the social hierarchy, social status.

Even proper access to the main means of production is due to membership in an established social group - a community, tribe, clan, craft workshops, merchant guilds, etc. Within the framework of the community, the peasants received land plots, the community redistributed them, maintaining justice in the appropriate sense. In the workshop, the craftsman not only learned the skill, but also received the right to manufacture products. Merchant corporations gave their members rights and benefits, supported the organization of large commercial enterprises, expeditions, etc. The dependence of economic activity on group affiliation was most vividly expressed in the Indian caste system, where a strictly defined profession is prescribed for each caste. In addition, the sacred books - dharmashastras - strictly regulate the forms of professional activity: what crops to cultivate, with what tools, what handicrafts to produce and from what materials, etc.

The production of a traditional society is oriented towards direct consumption. V. Sombart writes: "The starting point of any economic activity is the need of a person, his natural need for goods. How many goods he consumes, so much should be produced; how much he spends, so much he should receive." Production is focused primarily on survival and satisfaction of primary needs, producing or earning in excess of what is physically necessary seems meaningless and irrational: "man "by nature" is not inclined to earn money, more and more money, he wants to just live, live as he is used to, and earn as much as is necessary for such a life.

Production beyond this is not considered necessary, and sometimes even causes a negative reaction, since the size and forms of consumption depend not so much on the individual inclinations of the subject, but on the place he occupies in the system of interpersonal relations and the established tradition: "The very need for goods does not depend on the arbitrariness of the individual , but took over time within individual social groups a certain size and form, which is now considered as invariably given. This is the idea of ​​​​worthy content, corresponding to the position in society, dominating all pre-capitalist economic management.

Consumption, both physically necessary and prestigious, is determined primarily by social status. At the same time, the status in the traditional community is also a vital need of the individual, for the satisfaction of which he works. The tops of society, tribal elders, leaders of squads, and then the feudal nobility, chivalry and nobility had a high standard of consumption and maintained their privileged position with their whole way of life: “To lead the life of a seigneur means to live a “full cup” and let many to spend your days in war and hunting, and to spend your nights in a merry circle of cheerful drinking companions, playing dice or in the arms of beautiful women.This means building castles and churches, it means showing splendor and pomp at tournaments or other solemn occasions, it means living in luxury as far as means allow and even do not allow".

In addition to constantly demonstrating one’s status with the help of luxurious dwellings and clothes, expensive jewelry and an idle lifestyle, it was necessary to maintain it by providing patronage to those below: distribute rich gifts to combatants and vassals, generous offerings to the church and monasteries, donate to the needs of the city or community, organize festivities and refreshments for the common people.

In archaic societies, conspicuous consumption took the form of extravagance, expressed in magnificent festivities, feasts with excesses, designed to emphasize the wealth and high status of the owners. Some peoples, for example, the Indians of North America, had a tradition of potlatch - a multi-day festival, accompanied not just by consumption and donation, but by the demonstrative destruction of huge amounts of valuables (food, utensils, furs, blankets, etc. were burned and thrown into the sea). This was done in order to show the power and wealth of the clan, capable of neglecting so many material values, which increased authority in the eyes of others and increased power and influence. This custom was banned by the US government at the beginning of the 20th century. due to its extreme ruin and irrationality in terms of power.

The social lower classes - simple community members, peasants and artisans - were forced to be content with only the most necessary for survival. Moreover, the poverty of consumption was often not just determined by the general limited resources and products produced, but was intended to demonstrate a low status: in India, the caste dharma, which strictly regulated the products and products allowed for consumption, introduced strict restrictions on the lower castes and untouchables, forbidding them, for example, to use products made of iron or expensive materials, eating certain types of food, etc.

A traditional individual, whose personality was inextricably linked with a certain social group and was not conceived outside of it, and, as a rule, had no desire to change consumer stereotypes. Inequality in income and consumption was not in itself perceived as an injustice, as it corresponded to a difference in social status. Injustice arose when the measure of inequality established by tradition was violated, i.e. the individual could not consume what he was entitled to, for example, when taxes and requisitions became too high and did not leave a legitimate share for subsistence or reproduction of himself as a bearer of professional and social identity.

Traditional societies of the east

The development of the modern world community takes place in the spirit of globalization: a world market, a single information space have developed, there are international and supranational political, economic, financial institutions and ideologies. The peoples of the East are actively participating in this process. The former colonial and dependent countries gained relative independence, but became the second and dependent component in the "multipolar world - periphery" system. This was determined by the fact that the modernization of Eastern society (the transition from traditional to modern society) in the colonial and post-colonial period took place under the auspices of the West.

The Western powers are still striving under the new conditions to maintain and even expand their positions in the countries of the East, to tie them to themselves with economic, political, financial and other ties, entangling them with a network of agreements on technical, military, cultural and other cooperation. If this does not help or does not work, Western powers, especially the United States, do not hesitate to resort to violence, armed intervention, economic blockade and other means of pressure in the spirit of traditional colonialism (as in the case of Afghanistan, Iraq and other countries).

However, in the future, under the influence of changes in the development of the economy, scientific and technological progress, it is possible to move world centers - economic, financial, military-political. Then, perhaps, the end of the Euro-American orientation of the evolution of world civilization will come, and the eastern factor will become the guiding factor of the world cultural basis. But for now, the West remains the dominant feature of the emerging world civilization. Its strength rests on the continued superiority of production, science, technology, the military sphere, and the organization of economic life.

The countries of the East, despite the differences between them, are mostly connected by an essential unity. They are united, in particular, by the colonial and semi-colonial past, as well as their peripheral position in the world economic system. They are also united by the fact that, compared with the pace of intensive perception of the achievements of scientific and technological progress, material production, the rapprochement of the East with the West in the sphere of culture, religion, and spiritual life is relatively slow. And this is natural, because the mentality of the people, their traditions do not change overnight. In other words, with all the national differences, the countries of the East are still related by the presence of a certain set of values ​​of material, intellectual and spiritual being.

Throughout the East, modernization has common features, although each society modernized in its own way and got its own result. But at the same time, the Western level of material production and scientific knowledge remains for the East a criterion of modern development. In various eastern countries, both Western models of a market economy and socialist planned ones, modeled on the USSR, were tested. The ideology and philosophy of traditional societies experienced corresponding influences. Moreover, the “modern” not only coexists with the “traditional”, forms synthesized, mixed forms with it, but also opposes it.

One of the features of public consciousness in the East is the powerful influence of religions, religious and philosophical doctrines, traditions as an expression of social inertia. The development of modern views occurs in the confrontation between the traditional, past-facing pattern of life and thought, on the one hand, and the modern, future-oriented, marked by scientific rationalism, on the other.

The history of the modern East shows that traditions can act both as a mechanism that promotes the perception of elements of modernity, and as a brake blocking transformations.

The ruling elite of the East in socio-political terms is divided, respectively, into "modernizers" and "protectors".

"Modernizers" are trying to reconcile science and religious faith, social ideals and moral and ethical prescriptions of religious doctrines with reality through the consecration of scientific knowledge with sacred texts and canons. "Modernizers" often call for overcoming the antagonism between religions and admit the possibility of their cooperation. A classic example of countries that have managed to adapt traditions with modernity, material values ​​and institutions of Western civilization are the Confucian states of the Far East and Southeast Asia (Japan, "new industrial countries", China).

On the contrary, the task of the fundamentalist “guardians” is to rethink reality, modern socio-cultural and political structures in the spirit of sacred texts (for example, the Koran). Their apologists argue that religions should not adapt to the modern world with its vices, but society should be built in such a way as to comply with basic religious principles. Fundamentalist "guardians" are characterized by intolerance and "search for enemies". In many ways, the success of radical fundamentalist movements is explained by the fact that they point people to their specific enemy (the West), the "culprit" of all its troubles. Fundamentalism has become widespread in a number of modern Islamic countries - Iran, Libya, etc.

Islamic fundamentalism is not just a return to the purity of authentic, ancient Islam, but also a demand for the unity of all Muslims as a response to the challenge of modernity. Thus, a claim is put forward to create a powerful conservative political potential. Fundamentalism in its extreme forms is about uniting all the faithful in their resolute struggle against the changed world, for a return to the norms of true Islam, cleansed of later accretions and distortions.

Japanese economic miracle. Japan emerged from the Second World War with a ruined economy, oppressed in the political sphere - its territory was occupied by US troops. The period of occupation ended in 1952, during this time, with the filing and with the assistance of the American administration, transformations were carried out in Japan, designed to direct it to the path of development of the countries of the West. A democratic constitution, the rights and freedoms of citizens were introduced in the country, and a new system of government was actively formed. Such a traditional Japanese institution as the monarchy was preserved only symbolically.

By 1955, with the advent of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), which was at the helm of power for the next few decades, the political situation in the country finally stabilized. At this time, the first change in the economic orientation of the country took place, which consisted in the predominant development of the industry of group "A" (heavy industry). Mechanical engineering, shipbuilding, and metallurgy are becoming key sectors of the economy.

Due to a number of factors, in the second half of the 1950s and early 1970s, Japan demonstrated unprecedented growth rates, surpassing all countries of the capitalist world in a number of indicators. The gross national product (GNP) of the country increased by 10 - 12% per year. Being a very scarce country in terms of raw materials, Japan was able to develop and effectively use energy-intensive and labor-intensive technologies of heavy industry. Working for the most part on imported raw materials, the country was able to break into world markets and achieve high profitability of the economy. In 1950, national wealth was estimated at 10 billion dollars, in 1965 it was already at 100 billion dollars, in 1970 this figure reached 200 billion, in 1980 the threshold of 1 trillion was crossed.

It was in the 60s that such a thing as the "Japanese economic miracle" appeared. At a time when 10% was considered high, Japan's industrial production increased by 15% per year. Japan has twice surpassed the countries of Western Europe in this regard and 2.5 times the USA.

In the second half of the 1970s, the second change of priorities took place within the framework of economic development, which was connected, first of all, with the oil crisis of 1973-1974 and a sharp rise in the price of oil, the main energy carrier. The rise in oil prices most acutely affected the basic sectors of the Japanese economy: mechanical engineering, metallurgy, shipbuilding, and petrochemistry. Initially, Japan was forced to significantly reduce the import of oil, in every possible way to save on domestic needs, but this was clearly not enough. The crisis of the economy, its energy-intensive industries, was exacerbated by the country's traditional lack of land resources and environmental problems. In this situation, the Japanese have made the development of energy-saving and high-tech technologies, such as electronics, precision engineering, communications, a top priority. As a result, Japan reached a new level, entering the post-industrial information stage of development.

What made it possible for a country of many millions destroyed after the war, practically devoid of minerals, to achieve such success, relatively quickly become one of the world's leading economic powers and achieve a high level of well-being of citizens?

Of course, all this was to a large extent due to all the previous development of the country, which, unlike all other countries of the Far East, and indeed most of Asia, initially embarked on the path of the predominant development of private property relations in conditions of insignificant state pressure on society.

Very important was the previous experience of capitalist development, which followed the Meiji reforms. Thanks to them, an isolated island country with very specific cultural features was able to adapt to the new realities of world development, changes in social and economic life.

A good impetus was given by the reforms of the period of occupation after the Second World War. Having finally put the country on the path of democratic development, they released the internal forces of Japanese society.

The defeat in the war, which hurt the national dignity of the Japanese, also stimulated their high economic activity.

Finally, the absence, due to the ban, of its own armed forces and the cost of them, American industrial orders, and a favorable political environment also played an important role in the formation of the "Japanese miracle".

The combined influence of all these factors gave rise to the phenomenon known as the "Japanese economic miracle", which reflected the nature of the development of Japanese society in the second half of the 20th century.

Man in traditional society

This society is called traditional because tradition is the main means of social reproduction. As in any other, new, unintentional social inventions constantly appear in traditional society. But a person and society as a whole represent their own activity as following the established from time immemorial. Tradition dictates, its rhythm fascinates.

The life of traditional societies is based on personal connection. A personal bond is a multiple complex bond that is based on personal trust. A personal connection is observed in any society: the neighborhood community, teenage "tribes", the mafia. One can also recall the Russian intelligentsia, whose circle was rather narrow: from reading memoirs one gets the impression that everyone knew each other. In societies that are called traditional, this connection is predominant. From the point of view of social philosophy, these are the main characteristics of both society and the people who live in this society. When it comes to the predominance of this connection in society as a whole, expressions of a personal type connection are usually used. Here, people's trust in each other acts as a source of the legitimacy of the world.

Social ties of a personal type are classified as short ones. The peasant community and the society of the nobly born are the two poles of any kind of traditional society. Everyone in the village knows each other. Noble society also constitutes a narrow (at first absolutely, and then relatively) vicious circle, which is created to a large extent on the basis of family ties. Here, too, everyone knows each other. It can be recalled that already at the end of the XIX century. a number of European monarchs were related. The Faubourg Saint-Germain, as we know it from the brilliant descriptions of O. Balzac or M. Proust, still exists.

In a traditional pre-industrial society, people live mainly in small communities (communities). This phenomenon is called localism. Society as a whole (as opposed to a small community) cannot exist without long-term ties. In a traditional society, long ties are external (transcendental) in relation to a small community: the power of a king or despot, who represent "all", world religions (recall that the word "religion" goes back to the Latin religare - to bind).

"Gentleman" - the nobleman is seen as the complete opposite of the peasant. He is dressed differently, behaves differently, speaks differently. At the same time, one cannot but pay attention to the fact that there are a number of features that unite him with the peasant. No wonder both of them are representatives of the same society. They are united by a personal connection. Everyone knows to whom he is subordinate and who depends on him.

Any relationship here is personified, i.e. appear as a person. So, God (gods) is personified, power is personified. The knight develops a personal relationship with his weapon - a sword or a spear and a horse, a peasant - with a plow and cattle. Often in relation to weapons or tools, i.e. inanimate things, pronouns are used that apply to living beings.

Power in traditional societies is exercised in the form of personal dependence. Those in power directly and directly take away surplus product or life from those who depend on them. The peasant is personally dependent on the landowner. Power at the same time acts under the protection of the subject. Protection of the humiliated and offended was a form of legitimation of power. The landowner is a patron. Warrior is a protector.

An excellent illustration that allows you to feel what was said above is provided by a modern photograph taken by the famous French historian F. Braudel. In the photo we see a castle surrounded by a village and fields with vineyards. The castle and its surroundings have grown together and form one whole.

The castle and the village are in the same physical space. But their inhabitants live in different social spaces. In society, they are united by a connection of a personal type, but they are at different poles. They perform different social functions, they have different social resources. The nobleman can bet in those social games that are not available to the peasant. The peasant is personally dependent on the landowner, even if he is not a serf.

In a traditional society, there is no category of honestly acquired wealth: people do not understand how wealth is formed through exchange. The ideal form of wealth is that which is obtained through the ownership of land. The peasant, the landowner - revered figures. The merchant is not. It is believed here that it is not wealth that gives power, but, on the contrary, power gives wealth. There is no idea of ​​impersonal extramoral forces that a person cannot directly operate with. We can say that there is no habit and ability to live in a world of practical abstractions. The peasant does not understand how it is possible to receive money for the carriage of sand, which nature gives free of charge, to which labor is not applied. The nobleman does not understand why he should repay the debt to the merchant on time. In short, in this society, relatively little appeal is made to abstract social mediators.

In a traditional society, there is practically no concept of innovation. This happens because a person lives in the Circle of Time. Circle time is a reminder of the endless change of seasons. Change comes from God, from mystical natural forces.

A traditional society is a society where not individuality is valued, but the ideal fit into a social role as much as possible. This role is perceived as given from time immemorial, given by God, as fate, and you cannot change fate. In a traditional society, it is simply impossible not to match the role, and everyone has one role. If you don't fit in, you're an outcast.

Peasants and nobles have a concept of honor as a conformity to a role. There is the honor of the nobility, but there is the honor of the peasant. As an example, let us recall the obligatory duel code for the nobles. It was considered dishonorable for a peasant not to come to clean-up (a kind of mutual assistance, when, for example, the whole community builds a house for one of its members). Both of them had a code of honor that did not apply to strangers. The code of honor of the nobleman dictated the indispensable return of card debts (debt of honor), but it was considered not necessary to return the debt to creditors, artisans and merchants.

The "embeddedness" of sociality is ideal here. Social memory, social mechanisms "work" not through the "consciousness" of the individual, but through ritual. Traditional society is highly ritualized. This applies to both social bottoms and tops. Ritual - work with the body, not with consciousness. At the level of language, behavior is regulated, for example, by sayings that embody a social norm.

The scope of life choice is narrow: a person must follow the assigned role, even if this role is the role of the king. What is evidenced by the words of Louis XIV "The State is I"? Not about the highest degree of freedom, but quite the contrary. The human king is a slave to his role. In traditional societies, freedom is the ability to either follow a good path or be self-willed. Man does not choose, but he can be "called". Calling is experienced as an event in which superhuman forces participate. A vivid example is the "voices" of Jeanne D "Arc. Jeanne did not choose her own path, but entered it by divine command. People living in the 20th century associate a vocation with a personal-individual autonomous decision of an individual. In traditional societies, life frames are created by custom and ritual: everyone knows what to do, how to act, the path is predetermined.

Changes in traditional societies occur slowly, over centuries. The life of the peasants is changing most slowly. Methods of tillage, clothing, diet, physical appearance of the peasant were preserved (taking into account local characteristics) almost until the beginning of this century, and in some places to this day. In peasant communities, practical schemes of activity are codified: through the daily routine and year, customs and rituals, through folk wisdom contained in proverbs and sayings. These codes have existed for a long time and, as a rule, are not fixed in writing (there are no codes of customary law).

If we turn to the practices of the life of the privileged strata of society, it turns out that there changes occur much faster. On the surging surface of society, new behavioral norms arise, symbolic civilizational codes appear, including those recorded in writing. An effective self-control apparatus is an important source of power. Self-control is more likely to take shape in privileged social spaces. To transcend and to be free in one's actions is the privilege of masters, not slaves.

In traditional societies, unintentional social inventions arise that are used by all people. These are the tactics of everyday resistance, born in the peasant environment, and the polite manners that arose in the court environment, and the gradual centralization of violence, which led to the formation of states in their modern sense. These "inventions" gradually changed society, but did not yet make it modern industrial. In order for society to change, a new person had to appear.

Modernization of traditional societies

The historical situation of the end of the 20th century is characterized by a complex ethno-cultural situation. The fundamental problem of the modern era is increasingly becoming the confrontation between traditional and modernized (modern) cultures. It is this confrontation that has an increasing influence on the course of the cultural-historical process. The confrontation between the “modern” and the “traditional” arose as a result of the collapse of the colonial system and the need to adapt the countries that appeared on the political map of the world to the modern world, modern civilization. However, in reality, the modernization processes began much earlier, back in colonial times, when European officials, firmly convinced of the beneficence and usefulness of their activities for the "natives", exterminated the traditions and beliefs of the latter, which, in their opinion, were harmful to the progressive development of these peoples. . Then it was assumed that modernization primarily implies the introduction of new, progressive forms of activity, technologies and ideas, it is a means of accelerating, simplifying and facilitating the path that these peoples still had to go through.

The destruction of many cultures that followed such forced "modernization" led to the realization of the viciousness of such an approach, to the need to create scientifically based theories of modernization that could be applied in practice. In the middle of the century, many anthropologists attempted a balanced analysis of traditional cultures, starting from the rejection of the universalist concept of culture. In particular, a group of American anthropologists led by M. Herskovitz, during the preparation of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, held under the auspices of the UN, proposed to proceed from the fact that in each culture standards and values ​​have a special character and that therefore every person has the right to live according to that understanding. freedom that is accepted in his society. Unfortunately, the universalist point of view, which followed from the evolutionary approach, prevailed, it was the evolutionist paradigm that formed the basis of the theories of modernization that appeared then, and today this declaration states that human rights are the same for representatives of all societies, regardless of the specifics of their traditions. But it's no secret that the human rights written there are postulates formulated specifically by European culture.

According to the then prevailing point of view, the transition from a traditional society to a modern one (and it was considered mandatory for all cultures and peoples) is possible only through modernization. This term is used today in several senses, so it should be clarified.

Firstly, modernization means the whole complex of progressive changes in society, it is a synonym for the concept of "modernity" - a complex of social, political, economic, cultural and intellectual transformations that have been carried out in the West since the 16th century and have reached their apogee. This includes the processes of industrialization, urbanization, rationalization, bureaucratization, democratization, the dominant influence of capitalism, the spread of individualism and motivation for success, the establishment of reason and science.

Secondly, modernization is the process of transforming a traditional, pre-technological society into a society with machine technology, rational and secular relations.

Thirdly, modernization refers to the efforts of the backward for the underdeveloped countries, undertaken by them in order to catch up with the developed countries.

Proceeding from this, modernization in its most general form can be viewed as a complex and contradictory socio-cultural process, during which the institutions and structures of modern society are formed.

The scientific understanding of this process has found its expression in a number of modernization concepts, heterogeneous in their composition and content and not representing a single whole. These concepts seek to explain the process of a natural transition from traditional societies to modern ones and further to the era of postmodernity.

This is how the theory of industrial society (K. Marx, O. Comte, G. Spencer), the concept of formal rationality (M. Weber), the theory of mechanical and organic modernization (E. Durkheim), the formal theory of society (G. Simmel) arose, which, differing in their theoretical and methodological principles, nevertheless they are united in their neo-evolutionary assessments of modernization, stating that:

1) changes in society are unilinear, therefore, less developed countries must go the way after the developed ones;
2) these changes are irreversible and go to the inevitable final - modernization;
3) the changes are gradual, cumulative and peaceful;
4) all stages of this process must inevitably be passed;
5) internal sources of this movement are of great importance;
6) modernization will bring an improvement in the existence of these countries.

In addition, it was recognized that modernization processes should be started and controlled "from above" by the intellectual elite. In fact, this is a deliberate copying of Western society.

Considering the mechanism of modernization, all theories claim that this is a spontaneous process and if the interfering barriers are removed, everything will go by itself. It was assumed that it was enough to show the advantages of Western civilization (at least on television), and everyone would immediately want to live the same way.

However, reality has refuted these excellent theories. Not all societies, having seen the Western way of life closer, rushed to imitate it. And those who followed this path quickly got acquainted with the underside of this life, faced with increasing poverty, social disorganization, anomie, crime. Recent decades have also shown that not everything in traditional societies is bad, and some of their features are perfectly combined with cutting-edge technologies. This was proved primarily by Japan and South Korea, which cast doubt on the former firm orientation towards the West. The historical experience of these countries made us abandon the theories of unilinearity of world development as the only true ones and formulate new theories of modernization, which revived the civilizational approach to the analysis of ethno-cultural processes.

Among the scientists who have dealt with this problem, it is necessary to mention, first of all, S. Huntington, who named nine main characteristics of modernization, which are found in an explicit or hidden form in all authors of these theories:

1) modernization is a revolutionary process, because it involves the cardinal nature of changes, a radical change in all institutions, systems, structures of society and human life;
2) modernization is a complex process, because it does not come down to any one aspect of social life, but embraces society as a whole;
3) modernization is a systemic process, because changes in one factor or fragment of the system induce and determine changes in other elements of the system, lead to a holistic systemic revolution;
4) modernization is a global process, since, having begun sometime in Europe, it covered all countries of the world that have either already become modern or are in the process of change;
5) modernization is a long process, and although the pace of change is quite high, it takes the life of several generations to carry it out;
6) modernization is a stepwise process, and all societies must go through the same stages;
7) modernization is a homogenizing process, since if traditional societies are all different, then modern ones are the same in their basic structures and manifestations;
8) modernization is an irreversible process, there may be delays, partial retreats on its way, but once started, it cannot but end in success;
9) modernization is a progressive process, and although peoples may experience many hardships and suffering along this path, in the end everything will pay off, since in a modernized society the cultural and material well-being of a person is immeasurably higher.

The direct content of modernization is several areas of change. In the historical aspect, this is a synonym for Westernization, or Americanization, i.e. movement towards the type of systems that has developed in the United States and Western Europe. Structurally, this is the search for new technologies, the movement from agriculture as a way of life to commercial agriculture, the replacement of the muscular strength of animals and humans as the main source of energy with modern machines and mechanisms, the spread of cities and the spatial concentration of labor. In the political sphere - the transition from the authority of the tribal leader to democracy, in the field of education - the elimination of illiteracy and the growth of the value of knowledge, in the religious sphere - liberation from the influence of the church. In the psychological aspect, this is the formation of a modern personality, which includes independence from traditional authorities, attention to social problems, the ability to gain new experience, faith in science and reason, aspiration for the future, a high level of educational, cultural and professional claims.

The one-sidedness and theoretical shortcomings of the modernization concepts were recognized fairly quickly. Their fundamental provisions were criticized.

Opponents of these concepts noted that the concepts of "tradition" and "modernity" are asymmetric and cannot constitute a dichotomy. Modern society is an ideal, and traditional ones are a contradictory reality. There are no traditional societies in general, the differences between them are very great, and therefore there are no and cannot be universal recipes for modernization. It is also wrong to imagine traditional societies as absolutely static and immovable. These societies are also evolving, and violent measures of modernization may come into conflict with this organic development.

It was also not entirely clear what is included in the concept of "modern society". Modern Western countries undoubtedly fell into this category, but what was to be done with Japan and South Korea? The question arose: is it possible to talk about modern non-Western countries and their difference from Western ones?

The thesis that tradition and modernity mutually exclude each other was criticized. In fact, any society is a fusion of traditional and modern elements. And traditions do not necessarily impede modernization, but may in some way contribute to it.

It was also noted that not all results of modernization are good, that it is not necessarily of a systemic nature, that economic modernization can be carried out without political modernization, that modernization processes can be reversed.

In the 1970s, additional objections were raised against modernization theories. Among them, the most important was the reproach of ethnocentrism. Since the United States played the role of a model to strive for, these theories were interpreted as an attempt by the American intellectual elite to comprehend the post-war role of the United States as a world superpower.

A critical assessment of the main theories of modernization ultimately led to the differentiation of the very concept of "modernization". Researchers began to distinguish between primary and secondary modernization.

Primary modernization is usually viewed as a theoretical construct, covering a variety of socio-cultural changes that accompany the period of industrialization and the emergence of capitalism in certain countries of Western Europe and America. It is associated with the destruction of former, primarily hereditary traditions and the traditional way of life, with the proclamation and implementation of equal civil rights, and the establishment of democracy.

The main idea of ​​primary modernization is that the process of industrialization and the development of capitalism presupposes, as its prerequisite and main basis, the individual freedom and autonomy of a person, the expansion of the scope of his rights. In essence, this idea coincides with the principle of individualism, formulated by the French Enlightenment.

Secondary modernization covers socio-cultural changes taking place in developing countries (countries of the "third world") in a civilized environment of highly developed countries and in the presence of established patterns of social organization and culture.

In the last decade, when considering the process of modernization, the modernization of the former socialist countries and countries that have freed themselves from dictatorship has been of the greatest interest. In this regard, some researchers propose to introduce the concept of "tertiary modernization", denoting the transition to modernity of industrially moderately developed countries that retain many features of the former political and ideological system, which hinder the very process of social transformation.

At the same time, the changes that have accumulated in the countries of developed capitalism require a new theoretical understanding. As a result, theories of post-industrial, super-industrial, information, "technotronic", "cybernetic" society appeared (O. Toffler, D. Bell, R. Dahrendorf, J. Habermas, E. Guddens, etc.). The main provisions of these concepts can be formulated as follows.

The post-industrial (or informational) society is replacing the industrial one, in which the industrial (environmental) sphere is predominant. The main distinguishing features of the post-industrial society are the growth of scientific knowledge and the shift of the center of social life from the economy to the sphere of science, primarily to scientific organizations (universities). It is not capital and material resources that are the key factors in it, but information multiplied by the dissemination of education and the introduction of advanced technologies. The old class division of society into those who own property and those who do not own it (characteristic of the social structure of an industrial society) is giving way to another type of stratification, where the main indicator is the division of society into those who own information and those who do not. The concepts of “symbolic capital” (P. Bourdieu) and cultural identity arise, in which the class structure is replaced by a status hierarchy determined by value orientations and educational potential.

The former, economic elite is replaced by a new, intellectual elite, professionals with a high level of education, competence, knowledge and technologies based on them. Educational qualifications and professionalism, and not origin or financial situation - this is the main criterion by which access to power and social privileges is now carried out.

The conflict between classes, characteristic of industrial society, is replaced by a conflict between professionalism and incompetence, between an intellectual minority (elite) and an incompetent majority.

Thus, the modern era is the era of the dominance of science and technology, educational systems and mass media.

In this regard, key provisions have also changed in the concepts of modernization of traditional societies:

1) it is no longer the political and intellectual elite that is recognized as the driving force behind the processes of modernization, but the broadest masses, who begin to actively act if a charismatic leader appears, drawing them along;
2) modernization in this case becomes not a decision of the elite, but a mass desire of citizens to change their lives in accordance with Western standards under the influence of mass media and personal contacts;
3) today, not internal, but external factors of modernization are already being emphasized - the global geopolitical alignment of forces, external economic and financial support, the openness of international markets, the availability of convincing ideological means - doctrines that substantiate modern values;
4) instead of a single universal model of modernity, which the United States has long considered, the idea of ​​driving centers of modernity and exemplary societies appeared - not only the West, but also Japan, and the "Asian tigers";
5) it is already clear that there is not and cannot be a unified process of modernization, its pace, rhythm and consequences in various areas of social life in different countries will be different;
6) the modern picture of modernization is much less optimistic than the former one - not everything is possible and achievable, not everything depends on simple political will; it is already recognized that the whole world will never live the way the modern West lives, so modern theories pay a lot of attention to retreats, backtracking, failures;
7) today, modernization is evaluated not only by economic indicators, which for a long time were considered the main ones, but also by values, cultural codes;
8) it is proposed to actively use local traditions;
9) today the main ideological climate in the West is the rejection of the idea of ​​progress - the main idea of ​​evolutionism, the ideology of postmodernism dominates, in connection with which the very conceptual foundation of the theory of modernization collapsed.

Thus, today modernization is seen as a historically limited process that legitimizes the institutions and values ​​of modernity: democracy, the market, education, sound administration, self-discipline, work ethic. At the same time, modern society is defined either as a society that replaces the traditional social order, or as a society that grows out of the industrial stage and carries all its features. The information society is a stage of modern society (and not a new type of society), following the phases of industrialization and technologization, and is characterized by a further deepening of the humanistic foundations of human existence.

Characteristics of a traditional society

A traditional society is a society governed by tradition. The preservation of traditions is a higher value in it than development.

The social structure in it is characterized (especially in the countries of the East) by a rigid class hierarchy and the existence of stable social communities, a special way of regulating the life of society based on traditions and customs.

Traditional society is characterized by the following features:

1. Dependence of the organization of social life on religious or mythological ideas.
2. Cyclical, not progressive development.
3. The collectivist nature of society and the lack of a personal principle.
4. Primary orientation to metaphysical rather than instrumental values.
5. Authoritarian nature of power. Lack of ability to produce not for the sake of immediate needs, but for the sake of the future.
6. The predominant distribution of people with a special mental warehouse: inactive individuals.
7. The predominance of tradition over innovation.

Traditional (pre-industrial) society - a society with an agrarian way of life, with a predominance of subsistence farming, a class hierarchy, sedentary structures and a method of socio-cultural regulation based on tradition.

It is characterized by manual labor, extremely low rates of development of production, which can satisfy the needs of people only at a minimal level. It is extremely inertial, therefore it is not very susceptible to innovations.

The behavior of individuals in such a society is regulated by customs, norms, and social institutions. Customs, norms, institutions, consecrated by traditions, are considered unshakable, not allowing even the thought of changing them.

Performing their integrative function, culture and social institutions suppress any manifestation of individual freedom, which is a necessary condition for the gradual renewal of society.

Spheres of traditional society

The sphere of traditional society is stable and immobile, social mobility is practically absent, throughout life a person remains within the same social group.

The community and the family are the most significant units of society. Human social behavior is subject to stable corporate norms, traditions, customs and beliefs.

Politically, the traditional society is conservative, changes in it are slow, the society dictates the norms of behavior to the individual. Oral tradition is of great importance, literacy is a rare phenomenon.

According to the concept of D. Bell, the stage of traditional society includes the history of mankind from ancient civilizations to the 17th century.

The economy of a traditional society is dominated by subsistence agriculture and primitive crafts.

Man adapted to environmental conditions using extensive technology and hand tools. Traditional society is characterized by communal, corporate, conditional, state forms of ownership.

Progressive changes in human society cannot be localized in one sphere of social life; they inevitably affect both the material and spiritual life of people. The development of productive forces, moral culture, science, law - all these are the criteria for social development.

This development has been uneven throughout the history of mankind and can be the result of both revolutionary and evolutionary changes in different areas. There are several ways to classify societies. It is possible to typify societies according to such features as language, the presence or absence of writing, economy and way of life. It is possible to take as criteria for the development of society the complication of the social structure, the growth of labor productivity, the type of economic relations, the system of value attitudes.

Economics of traditional society

The traditional society is considered agrarian, as it is based on agriculture. Its functioning depends on growing crops with a plow and draft animals. Thus, the same plot of land could be cultivated several times, resulting in permanent settlements.

The traditional society is also characterized by the predominant use of manual labor, an extensive mode of production, and the absence of market forms of trade (the predominance of exchange and redistribution).

This led to the enrichment of individuals or classes. Forms of ownership in such structures, as a rule, are collective. Any manifestations of individualism are not perceived and denied by society, and are also considered dangerous, as they violate the established order and traditional balance.

There are no impetuses to the development of science and culture, so extensive technologies are used in all areas.

Features of a traditional society:

A. The dominance of manual labor;
b. Weak division of labor (labor begins to be divided by profession, but not by operations);
V. Only natural energy sources are used;
d. The main part of the population is employed in agriculture and lives in the countryside;
e. Technology develops at a very slow pace, and technical information is passed on as a recipe for activity;
e. Most traditional societies lack science;
and. Traditional society is characterized by various forms of dependence of a person on a person or a person on a state (tribe).

Economic values ​​of traditional society:

1. Labor is regarded as a punishment, a heavy duty.
2. Trade in handicrafts, agriculture were considered second-class activities, and the most prestigious were military affairs and religious activities.
3. The distribution of the produced product depended on the social status of the person. Each social stratum was entitled to a certain share of public material goods.
4. All mechanisms of a traditional society are aimed not at development, but at maintaining stability. There is a wide system of social norms that hinder technical and economic development.
5. The desire for enrichment that does not correspond to the social status of a person is sharply condemned by society.
6. In all traditional societies, giving money at interest was condemned.

The system of economic values ​​of a traditional society in ancient philosophy was most fully formulated by Aristotle. Unlike his teacher Plato, Aristotle believed that private property is useful and necessary for a well-ordered society. The usefulness of property was that it gives a person leisure, and this in turn allows a person to improve himself. The poor man is deprived of leisure and therefore cannot participate in the government of a properly ordered state.

The wealthy subject their lives to endless enrichment and are therefore also deprived of leisure. The basis of a well-organized society should be the middle class, which has property, but does not strive for endless enrichment.

Traditional society transition process

Special terms are needed to analyze the problem of modernization. These include the concepts of “traditional society” and “modern society”. A traditional society is a society that reproduces itself on the basis of tradition and has the past, traditional experience as a source of activity legitimation. Modern society is a system of economic, political structure, ideology and culture, characterized by industrialization and the technological principle of social organization.

If we are talking about the present day, about the present, there is no doubt for everyone that any society that exists in it, from the usual point of view, is modern. At the same time, it can be said that all societies are traditional to a certain extent in the sense that they keep the tradition or inherit it even when they want to destroy it. However, the uneven development has called into question the commonly used meaning of these words: the present of these societies is similar to the past of others or, on the contrary, represents the desired future for the third.

The uneven development has led to the fact that the terms "traditional" and "modern" society have been given a scientific meaning. These terms are very important because modernization is a special form of development, the essence of which is the transition from the traditional time to the new, from the traditional society to the modern one.

The unevenness of the development process has led to the fact that non-Western and Western societies, located in different times, began to be called the same as (respectively) traditional and modern. The beginning of this trend was laid by M. Weber. The West for him was a unique phenomenon, identical to modernity. What is the meaning of the transition to these new terms, why are the old concepts of "West" - "not the West" not enough? First of all, because the concepts of "West" - "not the West" presuppose in the foreground the historical and geographical aspect. However, countries of the Western spirit may appear in other parts of the world, for example, in the East. It is customary to speak of Japan as part of the West, but that is for lack of a better term. On the other hand, not all countries in the West are Western. Germany is located in the geographical west, but it became a western country only in the middle of the 20th century.

Thus, if in the 19th century modern societies and the West were identical concepts, then in the 20th century, societies that break with their traditional identity began to be called modern in theory. Modern society began to be understood as a special type of civilization that initially arose in Western Europe and then spread to other regions, as a system of life, economic, political structure, ideology and culture.

As such, the development centers of Southeast Asia were recognized. Neither Turkey, nor Mexico, nor Russia, countries that have advanced towards a Western understanding of life, nor China, which has an extraordinary acceleration of development, nor Japan, which has reached and surpassed Western technical capabilities, have become the West, although they have become modern to one degree or another. A number of authors believe that the term "modernity" covers the entire post-traditional order based on rational knowledge, and includes all the institutions and behavioral norms of post-feudal Europe.

The change of terms opens up the prospect of deepening the essential characteristics of Western and non-Western societies, considering their relations not only in today's perspective, but taking into account the future of the non-Western world. (The change in the Western world was considered for a long time going in the direction set by its previous development, i.e. not changing its essence). The heuristic meaning of the concepts of "traditional" and "modern" society was such that on the basis of new concepts, theories of modernization began to be built - the transition from a traditional society to a modern one. The introduced pair of concepts makes it possible to comprehend the uneven development of the countries of the world, the backwardness of some of them, the leading positions of the West and the decisive role of its challenge, as well as the reasons for modernization.

Traditional societies differ from modern ones in a number of ways. Among them: the dominance of traditions; the dependence of the organization of social life on religious or mythological ideas; cyclical development; the collectivist nature of society and the absence of a single personality; predominant orientation to metaphysical rather than instrumental values; authoritarian nature of power; the absence of pent-up demand (the ability to produce in the material sphere not for the sake of immediate needs, but for the sake of the future); pre-industrial character; lack of mass education; the predominance of a special mental warehouse - an inactive personality (called in psychology a type B person); orientation to worldview knowledge, and not to science; the predominance of the local over the universal. The most important feature of traditional societies is the prevalence of tradition over innovation. This causes the absence of a dedicated personality, because the social demand for individuality is a request for a subject of creative activity capable of producing something new. It occurs in modern societies.

The second most important sign of a traditional society is the presence of a religious or mythological justification for tradition. The possibility of rapid transformations is blocked by these forms of consciousness, and modernizing attempts that may take place are not completed, there is a backward movement. It is this - moving forward and returning back - that creates the cyclical nature of development, characteristic of traditional societies.

The non-singling out of individuality, personality is determined not only by the lack of interest in innovations, but also by the collectivist nature of religious and mythological ideas. The collectivist nature of traditional cultures does not mean that they do not have bright, special people who are not like other people. They undoubtedly exist, but their social role is determined by the ability to express collective ideas. The individual does not appear here as a political subject. The specific behavior of people in a traditional society is determined by the norms that are set by tradition, religion, community or collective. Accordingly, the predominant type of values ​​in them are authoritarian values. In these societies there is still no clear division into instrumental and ideological values. There is a subordination of instrumental values ​​to ideological ones, strict ideological control, internal and external censorship of people's behavior and thinking, which inevitably leads to political authoritarianism, the justification of activities by authority, and the lack of personal freedoms.

Authoritarian values ​​are values ​​that are supported by tradition and support it and collectivist ideas. Instrumental values ​​are values ​​that regulate everyday behavior and activities. Worldview values ​​- values ​​associated with the idea of ​​the world.

Since the whole structure of consciousness of traditional societies, their culture and power guarantees the reproduction of the old, people in them economically live for today. A critical attitude towards entrepreneurship and hoarding is being formed. In Russia, this was presented in the criticism of money-grubbing. It corresponds to the psychological types of heroes of Russian literature - the metaphysically inactive Oblomov (A.I. Goncharov), the pseudo-active Chichikov and Khlestakov (N.V. Gogol), the nihilist and destroyer Bazarov (I.S. Turgenev). Rarely, rarely, a positive image of a figure flashes in Russian literature - Levin (L.N. Tolstoy). All the rest - inactive and pseudo-active heroes - people, however, are not bad and even good. They are just not able to separate instrumental and ideological values ​​from each other. They apply to instrumental values ​​a worldview high standard, which immediately makes the first type of values ​​insignificant, unworthy of effort. The positive hero of Russian literature is rather not a doer, but a contemplator. All of them are far from accepting the values ​​of modern society. Such are the heroes of the literatures of all traditional societies.

The orientation of such societies not towards science, but towards a worldview is quite understandable. In the spiritual sense, this society does not live for today: long-term semantic contents are being accumulated in it.

In the course of modernization, there is a transition to a modern society (modern society). It includes, first of all, the fundamental difference between a modern society and a traditional one - an orientation towards innovation. Other features of modern society: the secular nature of social life; progressive (non-cyclical) development; distinguished personality, predominant orientation towards instrumental values; democratic system of power; the presence of deferred demand; industrial character; mass education; active active psychological warehouse (type A personality); preference for worldview knowledge of the exact sciences and technologies (technogenic civilization); the predominance of the universal over the local.

Thus, modern societies are essentially the opposite of traditional ones.

The focus of modern societies is individuality, which grows at the intersection of innovation, secularization (liberation of "earthly" life from church interference, separation of church and state) and democratization (transition to the path of liberal democratic reforms, which manifests itself in providing citizens with basic freedoms, the opportunity to have a political choice , as well as in increasing participation in society). Vigorous activity for the sake of the future, and not just today's consumption, gives rise here to the type of workaholic, constantly ready for the race of life. Its formation in Western Europe was carried out on the basis of such a way of secularization of life as Protestantism, the emergence of the Protestant ethics of capitalism. But later non-Protestant modernizations also produced the same result in changing the personality. Not only society, but also man is becoming modern. He is distinguished by: interest in everything new, readiness for change; diversity of views, orientation to information; serious attitude to time and its measurement; efficiency; efficiency and time planning, personal dignity, particularism and optimism. Individual modernization is a process no less dramatic than social one.

The challenge of the West is the challenge of modernity. Modernity is not only the New, otherwise the current time, which arose in the unique experience of the West. It is also something advanced, the best. The English word "modernity" has not only the meaning of something that exists today, but shows the highest character of the level reached. It is easy to see this by using, say, the expression "modern technology". This means: not only the technology that is now, but also the latest, the best. Likewise, the concept of "modern society", referring to the West in the 19th and 20th centuries. and countries that followed the West, is used to characterize the highest model of the development of society.

Crisis of traditional society

The crisis of a traditional society is a decrease in the number of people in this society, a period of development of a more progressive era for people. The traditional society is characterized by the absence of machine labor and its division, predominantly natural economy, feudal relations, and limited production.

The despotic eastern state could slow down, but not completely stop the development of more progressive private property relations within the traditional society. This process was of an objective nature and intensified as the traditional model exhausted its possibilities and began to slow down the development of society.

In the XVII - XVIII centuries. in a number of eastern countries, crisis phenomena began to grow, which manifested themselves in the destruction of established orders. The most intensive decomposition of the old society took place in Japan, where at the end of the 18th century. there was a crisis of feudal relations. The first indication that the old economic system had run its course was the slowing and then halting of growth in rice production in the 18th century. At the same time, in the Japanese countryside, a covert dispossession of land began, the peasants, who became financially dependent on the rural rich and usurers and were forced to pay double rent: to the landowner and creditor.

The crisis in the social sphere manifested itself in the destruction of class boundaries and class regulations. The peasantry gradually disintegrated into a prosperous rural elite and a huge mass of land-poor tenants and paupers. The village rich, merchants and usurers acquired land, creating a stratum of "new landlords" who were both landowners, merchants and entrepreneurs. The decay also swept the samurai class, who increasingly switched to non-military activities. Some of the princes, due to the reduction in income from rent, began to create manufactories and trading houses. Ordinary samurai, losing rice rations from their owners, became doctors, teachers, workers in the manufactories of princes. At the same time, merchants and moneylenders, formerly the most despised classes, gained the right to buy samurai titles.

At the end of the XVIII century. In Japan, signs of a political crisis began to appear. At this time, the number of peasant uprisings increased, while in the 17th century. the struggle of the peasants took place in the form of petition campaigns. At the same time, opposition to the shogun began to form as part of the "new landowners", merchants, usurers, samurai intelligentsia, and the princes involved in the entrepreneurial activities. These layers were dissatisfied with internal customs, regulations, the lack of legal guarantees for the inviolability of property and life.

Japan was on the eve of a social revolution. However, the opposition until the middle of the XIX century. refrained from open speeches, fearing reprisals from the shogun.

In China, the crisis began to grow in the last third of the 18th century. and manifested itself in the mass dispossession of peasants, the growth of social tension, the weakening of the central government. Numerous Qing wars required large expenditures, causing an increase in taxes, and hence rents. At the same time, rapid population growth began, which led to higher land prices and worsening lease conditions. As a result, the peasants became poor, became dependent on usurers and were often forced to sell land, which was bought by landowners, merchants, and the rural elite. A huge mass of ruined peasants poured into the cities, joining the ranks of the poor. The appearance of robber gangs in the countryside became a common occurrence. The central government could not stop this process of impoverishment and dispossession of land, since the state apparatus by the end of the 18th century. turned out to be corrupted from the inside by corruption and embezzlement - the inevitable companions of any bureaucratic state. The governors of the provinces turned into unlimited rulers and had little regard for the central government. The imperial decree of 1786 on the return of the occupied lands to the peasants remained on paper.

The impotence of the central government led to the growth of anti-government and anti-Manchu sentiments among the peasants, who saw the cause of their troubles in "bad" officials. At the turn of the XVIII - XIX centuries. a wave of peasant uprisings swept the country, many of which were led by secret anti-Manchu societies. The emperor succeeded in suppressing these uprisings, but they further weakened China, which was already under increasing pressure from Western countries.

In the Mughal Empire and the Ottoman Empire, the crisis of traditional society was expressed in the decomposition of state ownership of land and military-fief relations. The feudal lords sought to turn the fiefs into private property, which led to the growth of separatism and the weakening of the central government.

In India, where the feudal lords were tax collectors, the rise of separatism led to a reduction in revenues to the treasury. Then the Mughals switched to using a tax-paying system, transferring the right to collect taxes to persons who paid the amount of tax to the treasury at once for several years in advance. This made it possible to temporarily increase state revenues, but very soon separatist sentiments swept over tax farmers, who also sought to become owners of controlled lands.

In the middle of the XVII century. Sultan Aurangzeb, seeking to put an end to separatism, embarked on the path of forcible Islamization of Indian feudal lords, confiscating the property of those who refused to convert to Islam. In response, a liberation anti-Mughal movement was launched, which was led by the rulers of the Maratha people. At the beginning of the XVIII century. they created in Central India a confederation of principalities independent of Delhi. Other Indian principalities also declared independence - Oudh, Bengal, Hyderabad, Mysore. Only the lands adjacent to Delhi remained under the rule of the Mughals. The huge empire actually collapsed.

The collapse of the Mughal empire was used by the Afghan tribes, who in the 30s. 18th century began to make regular raids on Indian lands. The Marathas entered the fight against the Afghans, but in the decisive battle of 1761 they were defeated. The collapse of the empire and the defeat of the Marathas - the main military force of India - made it much easier for the British to conquer the country.

In the Ottoman Empire, the decomposition of the military fief system began in the 16th century, when the ban on having several fiefs for one person began to be violated. In the 17th century fiefs began to be acquired by people who were not in military service: merchants, usurers, officials. In an effort to get out of fief dependence, the feudal lords began to transfer fiefs to the Muslim church and by the end of the 18th century. 1/3 of the arable land passed into the category of waqf (church). Already in the XVII century. Sipahi feudal lords began to evade military service and stopped at the first call of the Sultan to appear with their detachments in the army. In the 18th century, when the Turkish army began to suffer defeats, the sipahis began to pay main attention to income not from military campaigns, but from fiefs. At this time, the desire of the feudal lords to turn their fiefs into private property is clearly manifested.

The rulers of the empire could no longer punish the recalcitrant fiefs, since the decomposition also affected the Janissary corps - the main source of the power of the sultans. In the 17th century the Turkish nobility achieved the right to give their children to the Janissaries, which led to the decomposition of the original spirit of the Janissaries. Nobility and wealth come to the place of personal prowess. The new janissary governors quickly became corrupt, acquired connections, imbued with the interests of the local nobility and were no longer unquestioning executors of the orders of the central government.

The growth in the number of the Janissary corps required large expenditures. Having no funds for this, the sultans allowed the Janissaries to engage in crafts and trade, they started families. This further intensified the decomposition of the Janissaries and greatly weakened the combat effectiveness of the Janissaries. In the XVIII century. the power of the Sultan actually turned into a fiction. The sultans themselves become a toy in the hands of the Janissaries, who periodically revolted, replacing the rulers of the empire that they did not like.

The decay of the foundations of the traditional Ottoman society immediately affected the combat capability of the Turkish army. After the defeat in 1683 under the walls of Vienna, the Ottomans stopped their military pressure on Europe. In the XVIII century. the weakening Ottoman Empire itself became the object of aggressive aspirations on the part of the European powers. In 1740, France forced the Sultan to sign the so-called General Surrender, according to which the Turkish side could not independently revise the privileges of French merchants given to them during the 16th - 17th centuries. Soon the same agreement was imposed on the Ottoman Empire by England. By the end of the XVIII century. the country's foreign trade was in the hands of French and British merchants. The less economically strong Russia, in its pressure on the Ottoman Empire, relied on military force. During the Russian-Turkish wars of the last third of the XVIII century. the Turks lost the Northern Black Sea region, the Crimea, the lands between the Dnieper and the Southern Bug.

Thus, the objectively progressive process of development in a traditional society of private property relations has led to the growth of internal contradictions and the weakening of the central government. For the countries of the East, this was especially dangerous, since they were increasingly turning into an object of colonial aspirations of the European powers.

The structure of traditional society

The social structure of society is an element of the social system.

The social structure is a set of stable, ordered links between the elements of the social system, due to the distribution and cooperation of labor, forms of ownership and the activities of various social communities.

A social community is a collection of individuals functionally united for a time by specific connections and interactions. An example of a social community can be young people, students, etc.

A kind of social community is a social group. Social group - the number of people connected with each other by a form of activity, a commonality of interests, norms, values ​​has become relatively.

Depending on the size of the group are divided into:

Large - include a significant number of people who do not interact with each other (enterprise team);
- Small - a relatively small number of people who are directly connected by personal contacts; united by common interests, goals (student group), as a rule, there is a leader in a small group.

Depending on the social status and method of formation, social groups are divided into:

Formal - organized for the implementation of a specific task, goal or on the basis of specialized activities (student group);
- Informal - a voluntary association of people based on interests, sympathies (company of friends).

The social structure is also defined as a set of social-class, socio-demographic, vocational, territorial, ethnic, confessional communities connected by relatively stable relationships.

The social class structure of society is a set of social classes, their certain connections and relations. The basis of the social class structure is made up of classes - large social communities of people, differing in their place in the system of social production.

The English sociologist Charles Booth (1840-1916), based on the division of the population depending on the conditions of its existence (area of ​​residence, income, type of housing, number of rooms, presence of servants), distinguished three social classes: "higher", "middle" and "lower" . Modern sociologists also use this distribution.

The socio-demographic structure includes communities distinguished by age and gender. These groups are created on the basis of socio-demographic characteristics (youth, pensioners, women, etc.).

The professional qualification structure of society includes communities that are formed on the basis of professional activity in various sectors of the national economy. The more types of production activity, the more professional categories (doctors, teachers, entrepreneurs, etc.) differ.

The socio-territorial structure is an obligatory component of the social structure of any society. Territorial communities are distributed according to the place of residence (residents of the city, residents of the village, residents of some regions).

Ethnic communities are communities of people united along ethnic lines (people, nation).

Confessional communities are groups of people that are formed on the basis of religion, on the basis of belonging to a particular faith (Christians, Buddhists, etc.).

The role of traditional society

Social norms are usually understood as the rules established in society, patterns, standards of human behavior that regulate social life.

There are the following types of social norms:

1) moral norms, i.e. such norms in which people's ideas about good and bad, about good and evil, about justice and injustice are expressed, the implementation of which is ensured by the internal conviction of people or the power of public opinion;
2) norms of traditions and customs. A custom is a historically established rule of behavior that has become a habit as a result of its repeated repetition. The implementation of this kind of norms is provided by the force of habit of people;
3) religious norms, which include the rules of conduct contained in the texts of sacred books or established by religious organizations (church). People follow these rules, guided by their faith or under the threat of being punished (by God or the church);
4) political norms - norms established by various political organizations. These rules of conduct, first of all, must be observed by members of these organizations. The implementation of such norms is ensured by the internal convictions of the people who are members of these organizations, or by the fear of being excluded from them;
5) legal norms - formally defined rules of conduct, established or sanctioned by the state, the implementation of which is ensured by its authority or coercive force.

Being genetically the primary form of streamlining and structuring sociocultural experience and the activities of social objects, tradition is the basis for the emergence of sociocultural norms. However, in developed social systems, tradition itself can be considered as a special type of normative regulation. If the norm presupposes to the limit heteronomous, authorial sources of its origin, as if introduced into the array of available experience by the subject from the outside and supported by certain social institutions, then the tradition can be interpreted as a kind of autonomous in origin and non-institutionalized norms. The position between the actual norm and the actual tradition can also be occupied by fragments of the tradition that have undergone institutionalization, for example, the so-called customary law.

On the other hand, the norms themselves, being stereotyped in the activities of subjects, lose the need for constant institutional support and can evolve in tradition. The regulation of social systems mainly on the basis of tradition or the innovative norm itself serves (along with others) as one of the criteria for distinguishing between so-called traditional and modern societies. In modern (industrial and post-industrial) societies, the sphere of activity of tradition is narrowing. Tradition becomes the subject of a series of intellectual operations in order to justify the chosen future behavior through a reference to the authority of the past or, conversely, the subject of criticism under the slogan of "liberation from the yoke of the past." However, in these societies the role of traditions as an indispensable mechanism for the development of culture is preserved.

Destruction of traditional society

The destruction of the traditional way of life was not the goal of the colonialists (in India, the British left the caste system intact), nevertheless, the traditional way of life of the peoples of the colonial and dependent countries underwent changes under the influence of European colonialism.

The onslaught of European goods ruined local artisans. The peasantry, forced to pay taxes not only to local authorities, but also to the colonial administration, was ruined and deprived of its land. This destroyed the system of communal farming, subsistence farming, that is, an extremely conservative way of life, incompatible with any development. The social differentiation of the population increased, the land passed into the hands of local landowners and administration officials.

The freed-up cheap labor force was used in the newly created industries that served the economy of the metropolitan countries, primarily on the plantations of tea, coffee, and rubber. The production of grain crops was reduced, which complicated the problem of supplying the population with food. All this, in turn, expanded the scope of commodity-money relations and accelerated the erosion of traditional ways.

By the end of the XIX century. The Ottoman Empire turned into a state dependent on Western countries. Formally, the Porte retained its sovereignty. The sultan was an unlimited monarch, in addition to secular power, the sultan had the title of caliph ("viceroy of the Prophet"). As caliph, he claimed spiritual authority over the entire Muslim world. The Turkish government was called the "Brilliant Port", and the Prime Minister continued to bear the magnificent title of Grand Vizier. The country concluded international treaties, had an army and navy, sent and received diplomatic missions.

However, in reality, these were purely external attributes of a sovereign power, since foreigners increasingly became the real masters of the country. In the middle of the XIX century. Russian Emperor Nicholas I declared the Ottoman Empire the "sick man" of Europe, on this basis, Russia and Western countries considered it their duty to interfere in its internal affairs, to decide its fate.

Without the participation of Turkey, its territorial problems were solved. In particular, the "Ottoman" inheritance was divided openly and secretly. Many provinces only formally belonged to the Sultan. In fact, Bosnia and Herzegovina were occupied by Austria-Hungary; Tunisia - France; Cyprus and Egypt - England.

Foreign advisers filled all state structures. They were instructors in the army and navy, worked in government agencies.

Unequal treaties (regime of capitulations) led to the fact that foreign citizens had more rights in the country than the Turks themselves. European entrepreneurs were exempted from many taxes and paid low customs duties.

All foreign trade was monopolized by Western European trading companies and their own comprador elite. Domestic trade was suffocated by customs duties, and therefore also fell into the hands of foreign merchants, for they were exempted from internal taxes.

Western countries had not only their trading offices in Turkey, but also their own post office, telegraph, and built railways for their own needs.

Thus, the position of Turkey was deplorable. And yet the country did not become a colony. Why? Probably, the main reason was the rivalry of Russia, England, France, Germany in the Balkans, Asia Minor and the Middle East, which made possible the joint exploitation of the country while maintaining the external attributes of state sovereignty.

Family in traditional society

Family is one of the greatest values. Not a single nation, not a single cultural community could do without a family. Where, if not in the family, we can get in touch with history, with traditions. Everything that was accumulated by our ancestors is passed on from generation to generation by our grandfathers and fathers.

The educational ideal of Ancient Rus' was Old Testament, severe, excluding the independence and freedom of the child's personality, which subordinated children to the parental will. Education was church-religious and consisted in the study of church-liturgical books. In the “Teachings of Prince Vladimir Monomakh to Children”, the author, as the ruler of the country, along with advice on the organization of the earth, touches upon the qualities of a worthy person and a good Christian, and with a few words also touches education. Recommending children philanthropy, tireless diligence, respect for the church and the clergy, commanding them to go to bed at noon, because at noon both the beast, and the bird, and man sleep.

In Russian society, from ancient times, a large family has been an exemplary family, and a mother surrounded by numerous children has been an exemplary woman. Children are the main wealth of the family, and motherhood is the main value of a woman. It was considered a great sin to prevent pregnancy.

Having many children was a vital necessity. Diseases, epidemics, wars claimed tens of thousands of human lives, and only having many children guaranteed the preservation of family property.

In Russian families, the birth of a son was more preferable than the birth of a daughter. The boy, having grown up and married, brought a daughter-in-law into the house, who replenished the number of working hands in the family. The appearance of the girl meant that in the future she would have to be given to another family, providing a dowry even at the wedding. The desire to have a male child gave rise to the belief that there is a need to eat special food. In order for a boy to be born, you need to eat more “male food” meat, salty and peppery food. And if you drink mainly herbal teas, eat vegetables and fast, a girl will be born.

Immediately after the birth of the child, the boy's umbilical cord was cut with a bread knife or other male tool - carpentry, carpentry. Sometimes this was done on a cleanly washed ax blade, which also symbolized masculinity. The girl's umbilical cord was cut with tailor's scissors (a female symbol), so much so that it fell on some kind of "women's" work, for example, on begun sewing. It was believed that then the girl would grow up as a housewife and a hard-working worker. Sometimes, when cutting the umbilical cord, the girls put a comb or a spindle, passed the baby's body to each other through the spinning wheel - so that they could spin well all their lives. If tying the umbilical cord was practiced at first, then the boy was tied with the father's hair twisted with linen yarn, and the girl with the hair from the mother's braid.

The main event of the newborn in the family was considered the baptism of the child in the church. After the christening, a baptismal dinner, or "Babina porridge", was arranged.

A small spinning wheel was hung to the cradle with the girl as a charm, and a spindle or a tiny comb was placed next to it. Next to the cradle of the boys, small “male” objects were placed or hung from below.

The family was held together by the greatest moral authority. Kindness, tolerance, mutual forgiveness of offenses turned into mutual love. Swearing, envy, self-interest - it was considered a sin.

The owner - the head of the house and family, was primarily an intermediary in the relations of the farmstead and the land society. He was in charge of the main agricultural work, plowing, and construction. Grandfather (father of the owner) - had a decisive voice in all these matters. Any important matters were decided on family councils. Children could not contradict their parents. Even an adult son who already had a family in all household and personal affairs had to obey his father.

The theme of the role of the family is raised by Mikhail Sholokhov in the novel Quiet Flows the Don. Before us are the harsh customs of the Cossacks. Life in the villages, life in the family is based on daily work.

In the Cossack families that we meet in the novel, such norms of human communication were brought up with mother's milk, such as:

- Respect for elders - respect for the years lived, the hardships endured, this is the Christian commandment to observe the words of the Holy Scriptures: “Arise before the face of the gray-haired one”;
– Observance of the form of etiquette: take off your hat when the elder appears. It was instilled in the family and from an early age;
- Honoring the elder sister, whom the younger brothers and sisters called the nanny to gray hair;
- Whoever the woman was, she was treated with respect and protected: she is the future of your people;
- In public, strange as it seems today, there should be restraint between husband and wife, with an element of alienation;
- Among the Cossack children, and among adults, it was customary to greet even strangers.

Motherhood is a great happiness, an unlimited responsibility for children until the end of life. Father - the head of the family, had indisputable authority. He is the main place at the table, the first piece, his word in the family is the last.

Caring, attentive relationships in a healthy family were maintained between children all their lives. From early childhood, children were taught to respect their elders: “Do not laugh at the old, and you yourself will be old”, “Old age knows the nearest way to the truth.”

The most faithful and reliable educators in the family were grandfather and grandmother. They will tell a fairy tale, save a treat and make a toy. Grandparents helped their grandchildren realize important truths: you can’t do what the elders condemn, don’t do what they don’t tell you, you can’t sit back when the father and mother are working, you can’t demand from the parents what they cannot give.

A particularly trusting relationship was often established with the grandmother, which is confirmed by the proverb: "The son of the mother will lie, but the old woman will not lie." The educational influence on grandchildren was reinforced by the cult of ancestors, the unconditional fulfillment of their covenants, customs, traditions: “As our parents lived, so they told us.”

Particular importance was attached to parental blessing, they knew: the parental word is not spoken to the wind. The blessing was given before the wedding, before leaving on a long journey, before the death of a father or mother. People say that a mother's prayer raises from the bottom of the sea. Father and mother were sacred to children. Back in the days of the tribal system, a person who raised his hand against his parents was expelled from the clan, and no one dared to give him fire, water, or bread. Folk wisdom taught: "Parents are alive - read, Died - remember."

The family of the late 20th - early 21st century is preoccupied with progressive inflation, unemployment, and insufficient earnings.

In modern society, the family and family education are experiencing significant difficulties for a number of reasons:

– increasing stratification of families by income level;
- the number of divorces, illegitimate children is growing;
- the traditional family structure is being destroyed;
- the old, generally accepted norms of behavior, the nature of marital relations, the relationship between parents and children, and the attitude to education are changing.

As a result, the centuries-old, spontaneous transfer of folk pedagogical experience from parents to children, from older to younger was destroyed, many values ​​that were considered the basis of education for centuries were lost. The decline in the role of the family in the formation of personality, the deterioration of living conditions and the upbringing of children in the home, at school - these are facts that take place in our reality.

Family traditions are created by generations, passed from hand to hand, from mouth to mouth. So that children appreciate what is dear to their parents. It is necessary from early childhood to develop in them a sense of belonging to their family, love for loved ones and a reverent attitude towards family values.

The family is the continuation of the family, the preservation of primordial Russian traditions - these are the Sholokhov ideals, according to which, like a tuning fork, history should be tuned. Any deviation from this life that has been established for centuries, from people's experience, always threatens with unpredictable consequences, can lead to the tragedy of the people, the tragedy of man. The 20th century with its cataclysms has sufficiently disrupted the music of folk life. There is true wisdom in this music, which is lacking today.

TOPIC: Traditional Society

INTRODUCTION………………………………………………………………..3-4

1. Typology of societies in modern science……………………………….5-7

2. General characteristics of a traditional society…………………….8-10

3. Development of a traditional society…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… 11-15

4. Transformation of traditional society……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… 17- 17

CONCLUSION…………………………………………………………..18-19

LITERATURE…………………………………………………………….20

Introduction.

The relevance of the problem of traditional society is dictated by global changes in the worldview of mankind. Civilization studies today are especially acute and problematic. The world oscillates between prosperity and poverty, the individual and the digital, the infinite and the private. Man is still looking for the real, the lost and the hidden. There is a “tired” generation of meanings, self-isolation and endless waiting: waiting for light from the West, good weather from the South, cheap goods from China and oil profits from the North. Modern society requires initiative young people who are able to find "themselves" and their place in life, restore the Russian spiritual culture, morally stable, socially adapted, capable of self-development and continuous self-improvement. The basic structures of personality are laid in the first years of life. This means that the family has a special responsibility for cultivating such qualities in the younger generation. And this problem becomes especially relevant at this modern stage.

Arising naturally, the "evolutionary" human culture includes an important element - a system of social relations based on solidarity and mutual assistance. Many studies, and even ordinary experience, show that people became human precisely because they overcame selfishness and showed altruism that goes far beyond short-term rational calculations. And that the main motives for such behavior are irrational and connected with the ideals and movements of the soul - we see this at every step.

The culture of a traditional society is based on the concept of "people" - as a transpersonal community with historical memory and collective consciousness. An individual person, an element of such - the people and society, is a "cathedral personality", the focus of many human ties. He is always included in solidarity groups (families, village and church communities, labor collectives, even a gang of thieves - acting on the principle "One for all, all for one"). Accordingly, the prevailing attitudes in traditional society are such as service, duty, love, care, and coercion. There are also acts of exchange, for the most part, which do not have the nature of free and equivalent sale and purchase (exchange of equal values) - the market regulates only a small part of traditional social relations. Therefore, the general, all-encompassing metaphor for social life in a traditional society is the “family”, and not, for example, the “market”. Modern scientists believe that 2/3 of the world's population to a greater or lesser extent has features of traditional societies in their way of life. What are traditional societies, when did they arise and what characterizes their culture?

The purpose of this work: to give a general description, to study the development of traditional society.

Based on the goal, the following tasks were set:

Consider different ways of typology of societies;

Describe traditional society;

Give an idea of ​​the development of traditional society;

To identify the problems of the transformation of traditional society.

1. Typology of societies in modern science.

In modern sociology, there are various ways of typifying societies, and all of them are legitimate from certain points of view.

There are, for example, two main types of society: first, pre-industrial society, or the so-called traditional society, which is based on a peasant community. This type of society still covers most of Africa, a significant part of Latin America, most of the East, and dominated Europe until the 19th century. Secondly, the modern industrial-urban society. The so-called Euro-American society belongs to it; and the rest of the world is gradually catching up to it.

Another division of societies is also possible. Societies can be divided according to political characteristics - into totalitarian and democratic. In the first societies, society itself does not act as an independent subject of public life, but serves the interests of the state. The second societies are characterized by the fact that, on the contrary, the state serves the interests of civil society, the individual and public associations (at least ideally).

It is possible to distinguish the types of societies according to the dominant religion: Christian society, Islamic, Orthodox, etc. Finally, societies are distinguished by the dominant language: English-speaking, Russian-speaking, French-speaking, etc. It is also possible to distinguish societies along ethnic lines: single-ethnic, binational, multinational.

One of the main types of typology of societies is the formational approach.

According to the formational approach, the most important relations in society are property and class relations. The following types of socio-economic formations can be distinguished: primitive communal, slave-owning, feudal, capitalist and communist (includes two phases - socialism and communism).

None of the above basic theoretical points underlying the theory of formations is now indisputable. The theory of socio-economic formations is not only based on the theoretical conclusions of the middle of the 19th century, but because of this it cannot explain many of the contradictions that have arisen:

· Existence along with zones of progressive (ascending) development of zones of backwardness, stagnation and dead ends;

· the transformation of the state - in one form or another - into an important factor in social production relations; modification and modification of classes;

· the emergence of a new hierarchy of values ​​with the priority of universal human values ​​over class ones.

The most modern is another division of society, which was put forward by the American sociologist Daniel Bell. He distinguishes three stages in the development of society. The first stage is a pre-industrial, agricultural, conservative society, closed to outside influences, based on natural production. The second stage is an industrial society, which is based on industrial production, developed market relations, democracy and openness. Finally, in the second half of the twentieth century, the third stage begins - a post-industrial society, which is characterized by the use of the achievements of the scientific and technological revolution; sometimes it is called the information society, because the main thing is no longer the production of a certain material product, but the production and processing of information. An indicator of this stage is the spread of computer technology, the unification of the whole society into a single information system in which ideas and thoughts are freely distributed. Leading in such a society is the requirement to respect the so-called human rights.

From this point of view, different parts of modern humanity are at different stages of development. Until now, maybe half of humanity is in the first stage. And the other part is going through the second stage of development. And only a smaller part - Europe, the USA, Japan - entered the third stage of development. Russia is now in a state of transition from the second stage to the third.

2. General characteristics of traditional society

A traditional society is a concept that focuses in its content a set of ideas about the pre-industrial stage of human development, characteristic of traditional sociology and cultural studies. There is no unified theory of traditional society. Ideas about a traditional society are based, rather, on its understanding as a socio-cultural model that is asymmetric to modern society, than on a generalization of the real facts of the life of peoples who are not engaged in industrial production. Characteristic for the economy of a traditional society is the dominance of subsistence farming. In this case, commodity relations either do not exist at all, or are focused on meeting the needs of a small stratum of the social elite. The main principle of the organization of social relations is a rigid hierarchical stratification of society, as a rule, manifested in the division into endogamous castes. At the same time, the main form of organization of social relations for the vast majority of the population is a relatively closed, isolated community. The latter circumstance dictated the dominance of collectivist social ideas, focused on strict observance of traditional norms of behavior and excluding individual freedom of the individual, as well as an understanding of its value. Together with caste division, this feature almost completely excludes the possibility of social mobility. Political power is monopolized within a separate group (caste, clan, family) and exists mainly in authoritarian forms. A characteristic feature of a traditional society is either the complete absence of writing, or its existence in the form of a privilege of certain groups (officials, priests). At the same time, writing quite often develops in a language different from the spoken language of the vast majority of the population (Latin in medieval Europe, Arabic in the Middle East, Chinese writing in the Far East). Therefore, intergenerational transmission of culture is carried out in a verbal, folklore form, and the main institution of socialization is the family and the community. The consequence of this was the extreme variability of the culture of the same ethnic group, manifested in local and dialectal differences.

Traditional societies include ethnic communities, which are characterized by communal settlements, the preservation of blood and family ties, predominantly handicraft and agrarian forms of labor. The emergence of such societies dates back to the earliest stages of human development, to primitive culture.

Any society from a primitive community of hunters to the industrial revolution of the late 18th century can be called a traditional society.

A traditional society is a society governed by tradition. The preservation of traditions is a higher value in it than development. The social structure in it is characterized (especially in the countries of the East) by a rigid class hierarchy and the existence of stable social communities, a special way of regulating the life of society based on traditions and customs. This organization of society seeks to preserve the socio-cultural foundations of life unchanged. The traditional society is an agrarian society.

For a traditional society, as a rule, are characterized by:

· traditional economy - an economic system in which the use of natural resources is determined primarily by tradition. Traditional industries predominate - agriculture, resource extraction, trade, construction, non-traditional industries practically do not receive development;

the predominance of the agrarian way of life;

the stability of the structure;

class organization;

· low mobility;

· high mortality;

· high birth rate;

low life expectancy.

A traditional person perceives the world and the established order of life as something inseparably integral, sacred and not subject to change. A person's place in society and his status are determined by tradition (as a rule, by birthright).

In a traditional society, collectivist attitudes prevail, individualism is not welcome (because the freedom of individual actions can lead to a violation of the established order). In general, traditional societies are characterized by the primacy of collective interests over private ones, including the primacy of the interests of existing hierarchical structures (state, clan, etc.). It is not so much individual capacity that is valued, but the place in the hierarchy (bureaucratic, class, clan, etc.) that a person occupies.

In a traditional society, as a rule, relations of redistribution rather than market exchange prevail, and elements of a market economy are tightly regulated. This is due to the fact that free market relations increase social mobility and change the social structure of society (in particular, they destroy estates); the system of redistribution can be regulated by tradition, but market prices are not; forced redistribution prevents "unauthorized" enrichment, the impoverishment of both individuals and estates. The pursuit of economic gain in a traditional society is often morally condemned, opposed to selfless help.

In a traditional society, most people live all their lives in a local community (for example, a village), ties with the “big society” are rather weak. At the same time, family ties, on the contrary, are very strong.

The worldview of a traditional society is conditioned by tradition and authority.

3.Development of traditional society

Economically, the traditional society is based on agriculture. Moreover, such a society can be not only landowning, like the society of ancient Egypt, China or medieval Rus', but also based on cattle breeding, like all the nomadic steppe powers of Eurasia (Turkic and Khazar Khaganates, the empire of Genghis Khan, etc.). And even fishing in the exceptionally rich coastal waters of Southern Peru (in pre-Columbian America).

Characteristic of a pre-industrial traditional society is the dominance of redistributive relations (i.e., distribution in accordance with the social position of each), which can be expressed in a variety of forms: the centralized state economy of ancient Egypt or Mesopotamia, medieval China; the Russian peasant community, where redistribution is expressed in regular redistribution of land according to the number of eaters, etc. However, one should not think that redistribution is the only possible way of the economic life of a traditional society. It dominates, but the market in one form or another always exists, and in exceptional cases it can even acquire a leading role (the most striking example is the economy of the ancient Mediterranean). But, as a rule, market relations are limited to a narrow range of goods, most often objects of prestige: the medieval European aristocracy, getting everything they needed on their estates, bought mainly jewelry, spices, expensive weapons of thoroughbred horses, etc.

In social terms, traditional society is much more strikingly different from our modern society. The most characteristic feature of this society is the rigid attachment of each person to the system of redistributive relations, the attachment is purely personal. This is manifested in the inclusion of everyone in a collective that carries out this redistribution, and in the dependence of each on the “seniors” (by age, origin, social status), who are “at the boiler”. Moreover, the transition from one team to another is extremely difficult, social mobility in this society is very low. At the same time, not only the position of the estate in the social hierarchy is valuable, but also the very fact of belonging to it. Here you can give specific examples - caste and class systems of stratification.

Caste (as in traditional Indian society, for example) is a closed group of people who occupy a strictly defined place in society. This place is delineated by many factors or signs, the main of which are:

traditionally inherited profession, occupation;

endogamy, i.e. the obligation to marry only within one's own caste;

Ritual purity (after contact with the "lower" it is necessary to undergo a whole purification procedure).

The estate is a social group with hereditary rights and obligations, enshrined in customs and laws. The feudal society of medieval Europe, in particular, was divided into three main classes: the clergy (the symbol is a book), chivalry (the symbol is a sword) and the peasantry (the symbol is a plow). In Russia before the revolution of 1917 there were six estates. These are nobles, clergy, merchants, petty bourgeois, peasants, Cossacks.

The regulation of estate life was extremely strict, down to minor circumstances and minor details. So, according to the “Charter to Cities” of 1785, Russian merchants of the first guild could travel around the city in a carriage drawn by a pair of horses, and merchants of the second guild could only travel in a carriage with a pair. The class division of society, as well as the caste division, was consecrated and fixed by religion: everyone has his own destiny, his own destiny, his own corner on this earth. Stay where God placed you, exaltation is a manifestation of pride, one of the seven (according to medieval classification) deadly sins.

Another important criterion of social division can be called a community in the broadest sense of the word. This refers not only to a peasant neighboring community, but also to a craft workshop, a merchant guild in Europe or a merchant union in the East, a monastic or knightly order, a Russian cenobitic monastery, thieves' or beggarly corporations. The Hellenic polis can be viewed not so much as a city-state, but as a civil community. A person outside the community is an outcast, outcast, suspicious, an enemy. Therefore, expulsion from the community was one of the most terrible punishments in any of the agrarian societies. A person was born, lived and died tied to the place of residence, occupation, environment, exactly repeating the lifestyle of his ancestors and being absolutely sure that his children and grandchildren would follow the same path.

Relationships and bonds between people in traditional society were permeated through and through with personal loyalty and dependence, which is understandable. At that level of technological development, only direct contacts, personal involvement, individual involvement could ensure the movement of knowledge, skills, abilities from teacher to student, from master to journeyman. This movement, we note, had the form of transferring secrets, secrets, recipes. Thus, a certain social problem was also solved. Thus, the oath, which in the Middle Ages symbolically and ritually sealed relations between vassals and lords, in its own way equalized the parties involved, giving their relationship a shade of simple patronage of a father to his son.

The political structure of the vast majority of pre-industrial societies is determined more by tradition and custom than by written law. Power could be justified by the origin, the scale of controlled distribution (land, food, and finally water in the East) and supported by divine sanction (that is why the role of sacralization, and often direct deification of the figure of the ruler, is so high).

Most often, the state system of society was, of course, monarchical. And even in the republics of antiquity and the Middle Ages, real power, as a rule, belonged to representatives of a few noble families and was based on these principles. As a rule, traditional societies are characterized by the merging of the phenomena of power and property, with the determining role of power, that is, having more power, also had real control over a significant part of the property that was at the aggregate disposal of society. For a typical pre-industrial society (with rare exceptions), power is property.

The cultural life of traditional societies was decisively influenced precisely by the substantiation of power by tradition and the conditionality of all social relations by class, communal and power structures. Traditional society is characterized by what could be called gerontocracy: the older, the smarter, the older, the more perfect, the deeper, the true.

Traditional society is holistic. It is built or organized as a rigid whole. And not just as a whole, but as a clearly prevailing, dominant whole.

The collective is a socio-ontological, not a value-normative reality. It becomes the latter when it begins to be understood and accepted as a common good. Being also holistic in its essence, the common good hierarchically completes the value system of a traditional society. Along with other values, it ensures the unity of a person with other people, gives meaning to his individual existence, guarantees a certain psychological comfort.

In antiquity, the common good was identified with the needs and development trends of the policy. A polis is a city or society-state. Man and citizen in it coincided. The polis horizon of ancient man was both political and ethical. Outside of its borders, nothing interesting was expected - only barbarism. The Greek, a citizen of the polis, perceived the state goals as his own, saw his own good in the good of the state. With the policy, its existence, he linked his hopes for justice, freedom, peace and happiness.

In the Middle Ages, God was the common and highest good. He is the source of everything good, valuable and worthy in this world. Man himself was created in his image and likeness. From God and all power on earth. God is the ultimate goal of all human aspirations. The highest good that a sinful person is capable of is love for God, service to Christ. Christian love is a special love: God-fearing, suffering, ascetic-humble. In her self-forgetfulness there is a lot of contempt for herself, for worldly joys and comforts, achievements and successes. In itself, the earthly life of a person in its religious interpretation is devoid of any value and purpose.

In pre-revolutionary Russia, with its community-collective way of life, the common good took on the form of a Russian idea. Its most popular formula included three values: Orthodoxy, autocracy and nationality.

The historical existence of a traditional society is slow. The boundaries between the historical stages of "traditional" development are barely distinguishable, there are no sharp shifts and radical shocks.

The productive forces of traditional society developed slowly, in the rhythm of cumulative evolutionism. What economists call pent-up demand, that is, was missing. the ability to produce not for the sake of immediate needs, but for the sake of the future. Traditional society took from nature exactly as much as needed, and nothing more. Its economy could be called environmentally friendly.

4. Transformation of traditional society

The traditional society is extremely stable. As the well-known demographer and sociologist Anatoly Vishnevsky writes, “everything is interconnected in it and it is very difficult to remove or change any one element.”

In ancient times, changes in traditional society occurred extremely slowly - over generations, almost imperceptibly for an individual. Periods of accelerated development also took place in traditional societies (a striking example is the changes in the territory of Eurasia in the 1st millennium BC), but even during such periods, changes were carried out slowly by modern standards, and upon their completion, the society returned to a relatively static state. with a predominance of cyclical dynamics.

At the same time, since ancient times, there have been societies that cannot be called completely traditional. The departure from the traditional society was associated, as a rule, with the development of trade. This category includes Greek city-states, medieval self-governing trading cities, England and Holland of the 16th-17th centuries. Standing apart is Ancient Rome (until the 3rd century AD) with its civil society.

The rapid and irreversible transformation of traditional society began to occur only from the 18th century as a result of the industrial revolution. To date, this process has captured almost the entire world.

Rapid changes and departure from traditions can be experienced by a traditional person as a collapse of landmarks and values, a loss of the meaning of life, etc. Since adaptation to new conditions and a change in the nature of activity are not included in the strategy of a traditional person, the transformation of society often leads to the marginalization of part of the population.

The most painful transformation of a traditional society occurs when the dismantled traditions have a religious justification. At the same time, resistance to change can take the form of religious fundamentalism.

During the period of transformation of a traditional society, authoritarianism may increase in it (either in order to preserve traditions, or in order to overcome resistance to change).

The transformation of traditional society ends with a demographic transition. The generation that grew up in small families has a psychology that differs from that of a traditional person.

Opinions on the need to transform traditional society differ significantly. For example, the philosopher A. Dugin considers it necessary to abandon the principles of modern society and return to the "golden age" of traditionalism. Sociologist and demographer A. Vishnevsky argues that the traditional society "has no chance", although it "fiercely resists." According to the calculations of the academician of the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences, Professor A. Nazaretyan, in order to completely abandon development and return society to a static state, the human population must be reduced by several hundred times.

Based on the work carried out, the following conclusions were drawn.

Traditional societies are characterized by the following features:

· Predominantly agrarian mode of production, understanding of land ownership not as property, but as land use. The type of relationship between society and nature is built not on the principle of victory over it, but on the idea of ​​merging with it;

· The basis of the economic system is community-state forms of ownership with a weak development of the institution of private property. Preservation of the communal way of life and communal land use;

· Patronage system of distribution of the product of labor in the community (redistribution of land, mutual assistance in the form of gifts, marriage gifts, etc., regulation of consumption);

· The level of social mobility is low, the boundaries between social communities (castes, estates) are stable. Ethnic, clan, caste differentiation of societies, in contrast to late industrial societies with class division;

· Preservation in everyday life of combinations of polytheistic and monotheistic ideas, the role of ancestors, orientation to the past;

· The main regulator of public life is tradition, custom, adherence to the norms of life of previous generations. The huge role of ritual, etiquette. Of course, the "traditional society" significantly limits scientific and technological progress, has a pronounced tendency to stagnation, and does not consider the autonomous development of a free person as the most important value. But Western civilization, having achieved impressive successes, is currently facing a number of very difficult problems: ideas about the possibilities of unlimited industrial and scientific and technological growth turned out to be untenable; the balance of nature and society is disturbed; the pace of technological progress is unsustainable and threatens a global environmental catastrophe. Many scientists draw attention to the merits of traditional thinking with its emphasis on adaptation to nature, the perception of the human person as part of a natural and social whole.

Only the traditional way of life can be opposed to the aggressive influence of modern culture and the civilizational model exported from the West. For Russia, there is no other way out of the crisis in the spiritual and moral sphere, except for the revival of the original Russian civilization on the basis of the traditional values ​​of national culture. And this is possible provided that the spiritual, moral and intellectual potential of the bearer of Russian culture, the Russian people, is restored.

LITERATURE.

1. Irkhin Yu.V. Textbook "Sociology of Culture" 2006.

2. Nazaretyan A.P. Demographic utopia of "sustainable development" Social sciences and modernity. 1996. No. 2.

3. Mathieu M.E. Selected Works on the Mythology and Ideology of Ancient Egypt. -M., 1996.

4. Levikova S. I. West and East. Traditions and modernity. - M., 1993.

Introduction.

The relevance of the problem of traditional society is dictated by global changes in the worldview of mankind. Civilization studies today are especially acute and problematic. The world oscillates between prosperity and poverty, the individual and the digital, the infinite and the private. Man is still looking for the real, the lost and the hidden. There is a “tired” generation of meanings, self-isolation and endless waiting: waiting for light from the West, good weather from the South, cheap goods from China and oil profits from the North.

Modern society requires initiative young people who are able to find "themselves" and their place in life, restore the Russian spiritual culture, morally stable, socially adapted, capable of self-development and continuous self-improvement. The basic structures of personality are laid in the first years of life. This means that the family has a special responsibility for cultivating such qualities in the younger generation. And this problem becomes especially relevant at this modern stage.

Arising naturally, the "evolutionary" human culture includes an important element - a system of social relations based on solidarity and mutual assistance. Many studies, and even ordinary experience, show that people became human precisely because they overcame selfishness and showed altruism that goes far beyond short-term rational calculations. And that the main motives for such behavior are irrational and connected with the ideals and movements of the soul - we see this at every step.

The culture of a traditional society is based on the concept of "people" - as a transpersonal community with historical memory and collective consciousness. An individual person, an element of such - the people and society, is a "cathedral personality", the focus of many human ties. He is always included in solidarity groups (families, village and church communities, labor collectives, even gangs of thieves - acting on the principle "One for all, all for one"). Accordingly, the prevailing attitudes in traditional society are such as service, duty, love, care, and coercion.

There are also acts of exchange, for the most part, which do not have the nature of free and equivalent sale and purchase (exchange of equal values) - the market regulates only a small part of traditional social relations. Therefore, the general, all-encompassing metaphor for social life in a traditional society is the “family”, and not, for example, the “market”. Modern scientists believe that 2/3 of the world's population to a greater or lesser extent has features of traditional societies in their way of life. What are traditional societies, when did they arise and what characterizes their culture?

The purpose of this work: to give a general description, to study the development of traditional society.

Based on the goal, the following tasks were set:

Consider different ways of typology of societies;

Describe traditional society;

Give an idea of ​​the development of traditional society;

To identify the problems of the transformation of traditional society.

Typology of societies in modern science.

In modern sociology, there are various ways of typifying societies, and all of them are legitimate from certain points of view.

There are, for example, two main types of society: first, pre-industrial society, or the so-called traditional society, which is based on a peasant community. This type of society still covers most of Africa, a significant part of Latin America, most of the East, and dominated Europe until the 19th century. Secondly, the modern industrial-urban society. The so-called Euro-American society belongs to it; and the rest of the world is gradually catching up to it.

Another division of societies is also possible. It is possible to divide societies on political grounds - into totalitarian and democratic. In the first societies, society itself does not act as an independent subject of public life, but serves the interests of the state. The second societies are characterized by the fact that, on the contrary, the state serves the interests of civil society, the individual and public associations (at least ideally).

It is possible to distinguish the types of societies according to the dominant religion: Christian society, Islamic, Orthodox, etc. Finally, societies are distinguished by the dominant language: English-speaking, Russian-speaking, French-speaking, etc. It is also possible to distinguish societies along ethnic lines: single-ethnic, binational, multinational.

One of the main types of typology of societies is the formational approach.

According to the formational approach, the most important relations in society are property and class relations. The following types of socio-economic formations can be distinguished: primitive communal, slave-owning, feudal, capitalist and communist (includes two phases - socialism and communism). None of the above basic theoretical points underlying the theory of formations is now indisputable.

The theory of socio-economic formations is not only based on the theoretical conclusions of the middle of the 19th century, but because of this it cannot explain many of the contradictions that have arisen:

· Existence along with zones of progressive (ascending) development of zones of backwardness, stagnation and dead ends;

· the transformation of the state - in one form or another - into an important factor in social production relations; modification and modification of classes;

· the emergence of a new hierarchy of values ​​with the priority of universal human values ​​over class ones.

The most modern is another division of society, which was put forward by the American sociologist Daniel Bell. He distinguishes three stages in the development of society. The first stage is a pre-industrial, agricultural, conservative society, closed to outside influences, based on natural production. The second stage is an industrial society, which is based on industrial production, developed market relations, democracy and openness.

Finally, in the second half of the twentieth century, the third stage begins - a post-industrial society, which is characterized by the use of the achievements of the scientific and technological revolution; sometimes it is called the information society, because the main thing is no longer the production of a certain material product, but the production and processing of information. An indicator of this stage is the spread of computer technology, the unification of the whole society into a single information system in which ideas and thoughts are freely distributed. Leading in such a society is the requirement to respect the so-called human rights.

From this point of view, different parts of modern humanity are at different stages of development. Until now, maybe half of humanity is in the first stage. And the other part is going through the second stage of development. And only a smaller part - Europe, the USA, Japan - entered the third stage of development. Russia is now in a state of transition from the second stage to the third.

General characteristics of traditional society

Traditional society is a concept that focuses in its content a set of ideas about the pre-industrial stage of human development, characteristic of traditional sociology and cultural studies. There is no unified theory of traditional society. Ideas about a traditional society are based, rather, on its understanding as a socio-cultural model that is asymmetric to modern society, than on a generalization of the real facts of the life of peoples who are not engaged in industrial production. Characteristic for the economy of a traditional society is the dominance of subsistence farming. In this case, commodity relations either do not exist at all, or are focused on meeting the needs of a small stratum of the social elite.

The main principle of the organization of social relations is a rigid hierarchical stratification of society, as a rule, manifested in the division into endogamous castes. At the same time, the main form of organization of social relations for the vast majority of the population is a relatively closed, isolated community. The latter circumstance dictated the dominance of collectivist social ideas, focused on strict observance of traditional norms of behavior and excluding individual freedom of the individual, as well as an understanding of its value. Together with caste division, this feature almost completely excludes the possibility of social mobility. Political power is monopolized within a separate group (caste, clan, family) and exists mainly in authoritarian forms.

A characteristic feature of a traditional society is either the complete absence of writing, or its existence in the form of a privilege of certain groups (officials, priests). At the same time, writing quite often develops in a language different from the spoken language of the vast majority of the population (Latin in medieval Europe, Arabic in the Middle East, Chinese writing in the Far East). Therefore, intergenerational transmission of culture is carried out in a verbal, folklore form, and the main institution of socialization is the family and the community. The consequence of this was the extreme variability of the culture of the same ethnic group, manifested in local and dialectal differences.

Traditional societies include ethnic communities, which are characterized by communal settlements, the preservation of blood and family ties, predominantly handicraft and agrarian forms of labor. The emergence of such societies dates back to the earliest stages of human development, to primitive culture. Any society from a primitive community of hunters to the industrial revolution of the late 18th century can be called a traditional society.

A traditional society is a society governed by tradition. The preservation of traditions is a higher value in it than development. The social structure in it is characterized (especially in the countries of the East) by a rigid class hierarchy and the existence of stable social communities, a special way of regulating the life of society based on traditions and customs. This organization of society seeks to preserve the socio-cultural foundations of life unchanged. The traditional society is an agrarian society.

For a traditional society, as a rule, are characterized by:

· traditional economy - an economic system in which the use of natural resources is determined primarily by tradition. Traditional industries predominate - agriculture, resource extraction, trade, construction, non-traditional industries practically do not receive development;

the predominance of the agrarian way of life;

the stability of the structure;

class organization;

· low mobility;

· high mortality;

· high birth rate;

low life expectancy.

A traditional person perceives the world and the established order of life as something inseparably integral, sacred and not subject to change. A person's place in society and his status are determined by tradition (as a rule, by birthright).

In a traditional society, collectivist attitudes prevail, individualism is not welcome (because the freedom of individual actions can lead to a violation of the established order). In general, traditional societies are characterized by the primacy of collective interests over private ones, including the primacy of the interests of existing hierarchical structures (state, clan, etc.). It is not so much individual capacity that is valued, but the place in the hierarchy (bureaucratic, class, clan, etc.) that a person occupies.

In a traditional society, as a rule, relations of redistribution rather than market exchange prevail, and elements of a market economy are tightly regulated. This is due to the fact that free market relations increase social mobility and change the social structure of society (in particular, they destroy estates); the system of redistribution can be regulated by tradition, but market prices are not; forced redistribution prevents "unauthorized" enrichment, the impoverishment of both individuals and estates. The pursuit of economic gain in a traditional society is often morally condemned, opposed to selfless help.

In a traditional society, most people live all their lives in a local community (for example, a village), ties with the “big society” are rather weak. At the same time, family ties, on the contrary, are very strong.

The worldview of a traditional society is conditioned by tradition and authority.

Development of traditional society

Economically, the traditional society is based on agriculture. Moreover, such a society can be not only landowning, like the society of ancient Egypt, China or medieval Rus', but also based on cattle breeding, like all the nomadic steppe powers of Eurasia (Turkic and Khazar Khaganates, the empire of Genghis Khan, etc.). And even fishing in the exceptionally rich coastal waters of Southern Peru (in pre-Columbian America).

Characteristic of a pre-industrial traditional society is the dominance of redistributive relations (i.e., distribution in accordance with the social position of each), which can be expressed in a variety of forms: the centralized state economy of ancient Egypt or Mesopotamia, medieval China; the Russian peasant community, where redistribution is expressed in regular redistribution of land according to the number of eaters, etc. However, one should not think that redistribution is the only possible way of the economic life of a traditional society. It dominates, but the market in one form or another always exists, and in exceptional cases it can even acquire a leading role (the most striking example is the economy of the ancient Mediterranean). But, as a rule, market relations are limited to a narrow range of goods, most often objects of prestige: the medieval European aristocracy, getting everything they needed on their estates, bought mainly jewelry, spices, expensive weapons of thoroughbred horses, etc.

In social terms, traditional society is much more strikingly different from our modern society. The most characteristic feature of this society is the rigid attachment of each person to the system of redistributive relations, the attachment is purely personal. This is manifested in the inclusion of everyone in a collective that carries out this redistribution, and in the dependence of each on the “seniors” (by age, origin, social status), who are “at the boiler”. Moreover, the transition from one team to another is extremely difficult, social mobility in this society is very low. At the same time, not only the position of the estate in the social hierarchy is valuable, but also the very fact of belonging to it. Here you can give specific examples - caste and class systems of stratification.

Caste (as in traditional Indian society, for example) is a closed group of people who occupy a strictly defined place in society.

This place is delineated by many factors or signs, the main of which are:

traditionally inherited profession, occupation;

endogamy, i.e. the obligation to marry only within one's own caste;

Ritual purity (after contact with the "lower" it is necessary to undergo a whole purification procedure).

The estate is a social group with hereditary rights and obligations, enshrined in customs and laws. The feudal society of medieval Europe, in particular, was divided into three main classes: the clergy (the symbol is a book), chivalry (the symbol is a sword) and the peasantry (the symbol is a plow). in Russia before the revolution of 1917. there were six classes. These are nobles, clergy, merchants, petty bourgeois, peasants, Cossacks.

The regulation of estate life was extremely strict, down to minor circumstances and minor details. So, according to the “Charter to Cities” of 1785, Russian merchants of the first guild could travel around the city in a carriage drawn by a pair of horses, and merchants of the second guild could only travel in a carriage with a pair. The class division of society, as well as the caste division, was consecrated and fixed by religion: everyone has his own destiny, his own destiny, his own corner on this earth. Stay where God placed you, exaltation is a manifestation of pride, one of the seven (according to medieval classification) deadly sins.

Another important criterion of social division can be called a community in the broadest sense of the word. This refers not only to a peasant neighboring community, but also to a craft workshop, a merchant guild in Europe or a merchant union in the East, a monastic or knightly order, a Russian cenobitic monastery, thieves' or beggarly corporations. The Hellenic polis can be viewed not so much as a city-state, but as a civil community. A person outside the community is an outcast, outcast, suspicious, an enemy. Therefore, expulsion from the community was one of the most terrible punishments in any of the agrarian societies. A person was born, lived and died tied to the place of residence, occupation, environment, exactly repeating the lifestyle of his ancestors and being absolutely sure that his children and grandchildren would follow the same path.

Relationships and bonds between people in traditional society were permeated through and through with personal loyalty and dependence, which is understandable. At that level of technological development, only direct contacts, personal involvement, individual involvement could ensure the movement of knowledge, skills, abilities from teacher to student, from master to journeyman. This movement, we note, had the form of transferring secrets, secrets, recipes. Thus, a certain social problem was also solved. Thus, the oath, which in the Middle Ages symbolically and ritually sealed relations between vassals and lords, in its own way equalized the parties involved, giving their relationship a shade of simple patronage of a father to his son.

The political structure of the vast majority of pre-industrial societies is determined more by tradition and custom than by written law. Power could be justified by the origin, the scale of controlled distribution (land, food, and finally water in the East) and supported by divine sanction (that is why the role of sacralization, and often direct deification of the figure of the ruler, is so high).

Most often, the state system of society was, of course, monarchical. And even in the republics of antiquity and the Middle Ages, real power, as a rule, belonged to representatives of a few noble families and was based on these principles. As a rule, traditional societies are characterized by the merging of the phenomena of power and property, with the determining role of power, that is, having more power, also had real control over a significant part of the property that was at the aggregate disposal of society. For a typical pre-industrial society (with rare exceptions), power is property.

The cultural life of traditional societies was decisively influenced precisely by the substantiation of power by tradition and the conditionality of all social relations by class, communal and power structures. Traditional society is characterized by what could be called gerontocracy: the older, the smarter, the older, the more perfect, the deeper, the true.

Traditional society is holistic. It is built or organized as a rigid whole. And not just as a whole, but as a clearly prevailing, dominant whole.

The collective is a socio-ontological, not a value-normative reality. It becomes the latter when it begins to be understood and accepted as a common good. Being also holistic in its essence, the common good hierarchically completes the value system of a traditional society. Along with other values, it ensures the unity of a person with other people, gives meaning to his individual existence, guarantees a certain psychological comfort.

In antiquity, the common good was identified with the needs and development trends of the policy. A polis is a city or society-state. Man and citizen in it coincided. The polis horizon of ancient man was both political and ethical. Outside of its borders, nothing interesting was expected - only barbarism. The Greek, a citizen of the polis, perceived the state goals as his own, saw his own good in the good of the state. With the policy, its existence, he linked his hopes for justice, freedom, peace and happiness.

In the Middle Ages, God was the common and highest good. He is the source of everything good, valuable and worthy in this world. Man himself was created in his image and likeness. From God and all power on earth. God is the ultimate goal of all human aspirations. The highest good that a sinful person is capable of is love for God, service to Christ. Christian love is a special love: God-fearing, suffering, ascetic-humble. In her self-forgetfulness there is a lot of contempt for herself, for worldly joys and comforts, achievements and successes. In itself, the earthly life of a person in its religious interpretation is devoid of any value and purpose.

In pre-revolutionary Russia, with its community-collective way of life, the common good took on the form of a Russian idea. Its most popular formula included three values: Orthodoxy, autocracy and nationality. The historical existence of a traditional society is slow. The boundaries between the historical stages of "traditional" development are barely distinguishable, there are no sharp shifts and radical shocks.

The productive forces of traditional society developed slowly, in the rhythm of cumulative evolutionism. What economists call pent-up demand, that is, was missing. the ability to produce not for the sake of immediate needs, but for the sake of the future. Traditional society took from nature exactly as much as needed, and nothing more. Its economy could be called environmentally friendly.

Transformation of traditional society

The traditional society is extremely stable. As the well-known demographer and sociologist Anatoly Vishnevsky writes, “everything is interconnected in it and it is very difficult to remove or change any one element.”

In ancient times, changes in traditional society took place extremely slowly - over generations, almost imperceptibly for an individual. Periods of accelerated development also took place in traditional societies (a striking example is the changes in the territory of Eurasia in the 1st millennium BC), but even during such periods, changes were carried out slowly by modern standards, and upon their completion, the society returned to a relatively static state. with a predominance of cyclical dynamics.

At the same time, since ancient times, there have been societies that cannot be called completely traditional. The departure from the traditional society was associated, as a rule, with the development of trade. This category includes Greek city-states, medieval self-governing trading cities, England and Holland of the 16th-17th centuries. Standing apart is Ancient Rome (until the 3rd century AD) with its civil society.

The rapid and irreversible transformation of traditional society began to occur only from the 18th century as a result of the industrial revolution. To date, this process has captured almost the entire world.

Rapid changes and departure from traditions can be experienced by a traditional person as a collapse of landmarks and values, a loss of the meaning of life, etc. Since adaptation to new conditions and a change in the nature of activity are not included in the strategy of a traditional person, the transformation of society often leads to the marginalization of part of the population.

The most painful transformation of a traditional society occurs when the dismantled traditions have a religious justification. At the same time, resistance to change can take the form of religious fundamentalism.

During the period of transformation of a traditional society, authoritarianism may increase in it (either in order to preserve traditions, or in order to overcome resistance to change).

The transformation of traditional society ends with a demographic transition. The generation that grew up in small families has a psychology that differs from that of a traditional person.

Opinions on the need to transform traditional society differ significantly. For example, the philosopher A. Dugin considers it necessary to abandon the principles of modern society and return to the "golden age" of traditionalism. Sociologist and demographer A. Vishnevsky argues that the traditional society "has no chance", although it "fiercely resists." According to the calculations of the academician of the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences, Professor A. Nazaretyan, in order to completely abandon development and return society to a static state, the human population must be reduced by several hundred times.

CONCLUSION

Based on the work carried out, the following conclusions were drawn.

Traditional societies are characterized by the following features:

· Predominantly agrarian mode of production, understanding of land ownership not as property, but as land use. The type of relationship between society and nature is built not on the principle of victory over it, but on the idea of ​​merging with it;

· The basis of the economic system is community-state forms of ownership with a weak development of the institution of private property. Preservation of the communal way of life and communal land use;

· Patronage system of distribution of the product of labor in the community (redistribution of land, mutual assistance in the form of gifts, marriage gifts, etc., regulation of consumption);

· The level of social mobility is low, the boundaries between social communities (castes, estates) are stable. Ethnic, clan, caste differentiation of societies, in contrast to late industrial societies with class division;

· Preservation in everyday life of combinations of polytheistic and monotheistic ideas, the role of ancestors, orientation to the past;

· The main regulator of public life is tradition, custom, adherence to the norms of life of previous generations.

The huge role of ritual, etiquette. Of course, the "traditional society" significantly limits scientific and technological progress, has a pronounced tendency to stagnation, and does not consider the autonomous development of a free person as the most important value. But Western civilization, having achieved impressive successes, is currently facing a number of very difficult problems: ideas about the possibilities of unlimited industrial and scientific and technological growth turned out to be untenable; the balance of nature and society is disturbed; the pace of technological progress is unsustainable and threatens a global environmental catastrophe. Many scientists draw attention to the merits of traditional thinking with its emphasis on adaptation to nature, the perception of the human person as part of a natural and social whole.

Only the traditional way of life can be opposed to the aggressive influence of modern culture and the civilizational model exported from the West. For Russia, there is no other way out of the crisis in the spiritual and moral sphere, except for the revival of the original Russian civilization on the basis of the traditional values ​​of national culture. And this is possible if the spiritual, moral and intellectual potential of the bearer of Russian culture, the Russian people, is restored.

¦ The level and scope of education: the nature of the development of the institution of education (primarily formal) and its impact on the nature and pace of social change.

¦ The nature and level of development of scientific knowledge: the development of science as an independent social institution and its connection with other institutions of society.

Of course, in a more detailed study of the social changes that occur when societies move from one type of civilization to another, we would need to consider a much larger number of characteristics. For example, to add to those already listed above the principles of social structuring, the nature of interaction with the natural environment, the role and place of religion in social life, the institution of marriage and family, etc. However, this, it seems to us, would significantly clutter up our analysis, so we will limit ourselves to eight above.

What types of societies do we distinguish? The answer to this question can be found in the scheme of transition from one type of society to another as a result of one or another global revolution (see Fig. 21). Thanks to the work of Walt Rostow in sociology, the division of societies into traditional and modern is generally accepted. However, in modern sociological studies, "modern" societies are often further subdivided into "industrial" and "post-industrial". At the same time, V. L. Inozemtsev, analyzing the views of generally recognized theorists of post-industrial society, rightly points out that “none of them studied the economic problems of pre-industrial societies in any detail, only occasionally mentioning their individual aspects in their works.” Meanwhile, the true significance of modern trends in the development of human society can be understood only in the context of historical development. Extrapolation of the future is possible at least in three points - from the past through the present to the future. It seems to us that such a scheme is not complete enough, since, when studying the dynamics of the development of human society as a whole, it is hardly legitimate to exclude pre-traditional, that is, primitive societies from analysis. We will try to fill these gaps to a certain extent.

§ 1. Primitive society

It must be admitted that in sociology the very term "primitive society" is not used very often. This concept came rather from evolutionary anthropology, where it is used to designate societies that represent a certain initial stage, from which the development of more complex societies is counted. This concept implies that modern man is more intelligent than his wild, irrational ancestors. Outside of this implied sense, primitive society is regarded simply as small-scale communities, illiterate, technologically simple and based on extremely simplified social relations, although it is recognized that these relations have already gone beyond the purely gregarious, that is, herd. interactions based on instincts and conditioned reflexes developed by the conditions of the herd existence of even higher animals.

However, some sociologists have paid rather close attention to primitive society, since it is in it that most of those social institutions are born that form the framework of the social system in the later phases of evolutionary development. Recall that it was the study of the elementary forms of religious life in this type of society that allowed Durkheim to develop a generalized sociological concept of religion applicable to higher levels of social development. We must not forget that at least nine-tenths of the entire period of time during which the evolution of society took place falls precisely on primitive societies, and in some remote corners of the planet such forms of societal organization are still preserved.

The poor development of the sociological concepts of primitive societies is primarily due to the lack of reliable information about the nature of social relations in them, since they lack writing. Recall that the intellectual and social life of all stages of primitive societies, described by H. Morgan as savagery and barbarism, is based on oral tradition - legends, myths, accounting and observance of kinship systems, the dominance of customs, rituals, etc. Some theorists (for example, L. Levy-Bruhl) assumed that these societies are dominated by (from the French prelogique - pre-logical) "pre-logical" forms of primitive mentality, which are associated with similar forms of technological and social organization.

Nevertheless, we should not forget that at this simplest (but already significantly superior to that characteristic of animals) level of development, we are dealing with human society. And this means that even primitive communities should be the object of sociological analysis, and the eight parameters of social institutions we have defined above may well be applied as an instrument of such analysis.

In a primitive society, the entire social organization is based on the tribal community. Recall that, by virtue of the maternal law prevailing during this period, the concept of “clan” refers to the circle of relatives on the maternal side (having a common ancestor), who are forbidden to enter into marriage and sexual relations with each other. Probably, it is the need to search for marriage partners outside of one's clan that determines the need for constant interaction of several genera located in greater or lesser territorial proximity. The system of such interactions forms a tribe

1. (Of course, this scheme is somewhat simplified, since between the clan and the tribe there is also an intermediate structural unit - the phratry.) The need to maintain constant contacts affects the commonality of the language. Gradually, a certain level of economic ties is also taking shape. Nevertheless, the social organization of primitive societies does not rise above the level of tribal unions, formed mainly to fight some common enemy and disintegrating after the danger has passed. In more complex types of social organization, there is simply no need: neither the size of the population, nor the level of division of labor, nor the regulation of economic relations require this.

The nature of the participation of members of society in the management of its affairs. This character is largely determined by the small size of the primitive community. Research by anthropologists and ethnographers shows that the participation of members of a primitive society in managing its affairs is relatively direct, although poorly organized, disordered, and spontaneous. This is largely due to the fact that management functions fall into the hands of individual members of the community (leaders, elders, leaders) on the basis of random factors and are performed unprofessionally, most often, so to speak, “on a voluntary basis”. Generally recognized and permanent mechanisms for selecting the "elite" have not yet developed. In some cases, everything depends on physical strength; in others, age and associated life experience are the deciding factor; sometimes - external data, gender, or psychological (for example, strong-willed) traits. Cases of the physical destruction of the leader are also described after the expiration of some predetermined and consecrated by custom period. One thing is clear: the members of the tribal community are much more informed than ever later about the general state of affairs in the community - already because of its relatively small number, and each of them can make a more significant and real contribution to managerial decision-making compared to their distant descendants.

It is clear that the power of the elders - that is, the most experienced and most respected members of the family - could not be inherited. Engels, describing the system of power among the Iroquois, points to such a very characteristic moment: "The son of the previous sachem was never elected sachem, since the Iroquois had maternal right, and the son, therefore, belonged to a different genus." By the way, the election of a sachem was a collegial act, not only because it was performed by all members of the clan, but also because it was subject to approval from the other seven clans that made up the Iroquois tribe, and the newly elected sachem was solemnly introduced to the general council of the tribe.

The status of an elder was not ascriptive, but attainable by definition. To acquire this status, it was necessary not only to live to a certain age, but also to accumulate such experience, knowledge, skills and abilities that could be useful not only to their owner, but also to all other members of the community. As the demographic growth, as well as the development and complexity of social relations, the stratification of society gradually intensified, since at the same time the number of power strata increased and the concentration of power in them increased. “The political cone was starting to grow, but never evened out.”

Dominant nature of economic relations. In primitive societies one can hardly speak of any significant development of the economy as such. Right up to the agrarian revolution, the level to which tools of labor and technology develop does not allow the emergence on a noticeable scale of production, i.e., the processing of natural products into products of labor suitable for further direct use. Production (except for the heat treatment of food) is limited here to the manufacture of the simplest tools for mining and fishing, as well as clothing - almost exclusively for personal use. The absence of a surplus product, and as a result, the impossibility of the emergence of private property and commodity exchange does not necessitate the development of more complex production relations, making them simply meaningless. The economy of this period is natural in the full sense of the word, when everything that is produced is consumed without a trace by the producer himself and his family members.

The general nature of the organizational and technological level. The life of a primitive society up to the agrarian revolution is a constant obtaining of means of subsistence, and directly from nature. The main occupations of the members of the society are the gathering of edible plants, fruits and roots, as well as hunting and fishing. Therefore, the main products of labor are the tools used in these industries. However, these tools, as well as the tools for their manufacture, are as primitive as the whole life of society.

The cooperation of members of society is manifested mainly in joint actions, most often in the form of a simple addition of physical forces, in extreme cases, in an elementary distribution of duties (for example, during driven hunting). In one of the footnotes in Capital there is a reference to the French historian and economist Simon Lenge, who calls hunting the first form of cooperation, and hunting people (war) one of the first forms of hunting. At the same time, as Marx states, “that form of cooperation in the labor process, which we find at the initial stages of human culture, for example, among the hunting peoples or in the agricultural communities of India, rests, on the one hand, on social ownership of the conditions of production, on the other On the other hand, the individual is still as firmly attached to the genus or community as the individual bee is to the beehive.

Employment structure. A primitive society is characterized by an elementary gender and age division of labor. Most of the men - members of primitive communities, depending on the natural conditions of their habitat, are engaged in one of the trades - either hunting, or fishing, or gathering. There is no need to talk about any deep specialization of the members of the communities according to the types of employment - both because of their small number, and because of the low level of development of the productive forces. The virtual absence of a surplus product is the most serious barrier to the social division of labor. People of a primitive society are universal and comprehensive to the extent of the knowledge, skills and abilities accumulated in the community and due to the need to maintain the conditions of their existence, which takes almost all the time that is left for nothing else. At the boundary separating primitive from traditional society, the first major social division of labor takes place - the separation of pastoral tribes from the rest of the mass of barbarians. This means that the first sector of employment appears - the agricultural sector, which for a long time retains a leading position among the rest.

The nature of the settlements. The nature of the settlements. The nature of the settlements. The nature of the settlements. The nature of the settlements. Throughout the vast period of existence of a primitive society, most clans and tribes lead a nomadic lifestyle, moving after migrating food sources - fish and game. The first rudiments of localized settlements, that is, villages, are attributed by Morgan, and then by Engels, to an even higher stage of savagery. The first urban settlements appear only at the end of barbarism and at the dawn of civilization (in Morgan's sense), that is, with the transition to a traditional society.

In a primitive society, the formation of social and individual intelligence (more precisely, its prerequisites) was accompanied by a number of important specific features. The accumulation of knowledge and their transmission to subsequent generations was carried out orally and individually. In this process, a special role belonged to the elderly, who in this society acted as guardians, guardians and even, in necessary cases, reformers of established customs, customs and the whole complex of knowledge that constituted the essence of material and spiritual life. Old people were the "accumulators" of social intelligence and, to some extent, were considered its embodiment. Thus, the respect that the rest of society held for them was not so much moral as largely rational. As A. Huseynov notes, “the old people acted as carriers of labor skills, the mastery of which required many years of practice and, therefore, was available only to people of their age. The old people personified in themselves the collective will of the clan or tribe, as well as the scholarship of that time. During their lives, they mastered several dialects necessary for communication with other kinship associations; knew those rites and traditions filled with mysterious meaning, which had to be kept in deep secrecy. They regulated the implementation of blood feuds, they had the honorable duty of giving a name, etc. Therefore, the extraordinary honor and respect shown to the elderly in the primitive era should by no means be interpreted as a kind of social philanthropy, charity.

If we take into account the average life expectancy, which in a primitive society was half, or even three times less than in modern societies, it becomes clear that the proportion of old people in populations at that time was much lower than now. Although it should be noted that even in the current primitive tribes (for example, among the Australian aborigines), as noted by the same A. Huseynov, a distinction is made between simply decrepit old people and those old people (elders) who continue to take an active and creative part in the life of the community.

The nature of the development of scientific knowledge. As mentioned above, in a primitive society, the accumulation of knowledge and its transmission to subsequent generations was carried out orally and individually. Under such conditions, the accumulation and systematization of accumulated knowledge, which, in fact, is a necessary condition for the development of science, does not occur. Of the four types of knowledge that we singled out in the first chapter, the stock of information of primitive society about the world around us is limited only by common sense knowledge, mythology and ideology, and at an elementary level, to the extent that Durkheim's mechanical solidarity manifests itself in oppositions such as "one's own -stranger".

The process of transition from a tribal to a new type of social structure - a state one - is usually characterized by the formation of so-called chiefdoms, which are formed in fairly large associations of people, as a rule, no less than a tribe. Chiefdom is a special form of centralized social organization, based initially on devotion (loyalty), and not on formal institutions of coercion. Chiefdoms are already characterized by the emergence of certain patterns of social stratification and economic system, as well as by the redistribution of material wealth.

The chiefdom is seen as a proto-state organization. This is a hierarchically organized system, in which there is still no branched professional administrative apparatus, which is an integral feature of a mature state. But its main characteristic features already exist in an embryonic form - such as, for example, separate detachments of warriors who obey only the leader and recognize in him the only source of power, as well as a certain pyramid of power. The number of management levels here ranges from two to ten. Of course, this is incomparable with complex societies, but it already represents a serious step in this direction.

§ 2. Traditional society

Some sociologists, when describing the periodization of the development of human societies from the lowest to the highest, use the term "civilization", talking about "traditional civilization", "industrial civilization", "post-industrial civilization". It is no coincidence that we avoid this concept here and use the generalized term "society". The point is that this is dictated by the completeness of the picture of social dynamics given by us. The concept of "civilization" is, by definition, inapplicable to primitive societies, since there is no written language (it is no coincidence that the term "pre-literate societies" is sometimes used in relation to them).

Let's turn once more to the scheme of progressive development of human societies (see Fig. 21) in order to constantly keep in mind that the transition from one type of society to another takes place as a result of a certain global revolution. Comparing the transformations that take place during the transition from one type of society to another, we could consistently identify those social changes that are the result of this revolution. A primitive society is transformed into a traditional one in the course of the development of the agrarian revolution, and the social changes that it brings to life just form the common specificity of all traditional societies. These social changes we will try to describe in this paragraph.

The nature of the social structure. So, the transformation of primitive communities into a traditional society takes place in the course of the agrarian revolution, which caused enormous social changes not only in the economy and technology, but in all spheres of social life without exception. The appearance of a surplus product, and with the development of private property - and a surplus product, means the emergence of material grounds for the formation of a qualitatively new form of social structure - the state.

There is reason to believe that the institution of the state is more likely to arise among agricultural peoples. The fact is that farming requires a lot of labor and, because of this, leaves practically no time for those who are involved in it for military (or hunting) exercises. Labor costs in cattle breeding are much less, which is probably why every adult nomad is also a warrior. Agricultural communities are more in need of professional military protection of their territorial boundaries: because of this, they have an earlier and more distinct objective need for separate armed detachments that form the backbone of the state.

The emergence of the state is closely connected with the emergence of first a surplus product, and then a surplus product, which means private property and the possibility of alienating this product from its producer. Moreover, alienation takes place not only through sale and purchase, but also through the withdrawal of a certain part of the product in the form of tribute and taxes. This part of the surplus product goes to the maintenance of the professional administrative apparatus, the army and coercive forces, which ensure the ordering of social life.

Thanks to the emergence of the possibility of creating a surplus product and alienating it in favor of the state, a layer of people is gradually forming in society who are not involved in the productive process, and therefore have a sufficiently large amount of free time necessary for intellectual pursuits. This is the elite not only in the social, managerial, but also in the intellectual sense. Let us pay attention to the fact that a certain part of its representatives are professionally engaged in management, which means that they are quite constant and long-term processing of information required for making managerial decisions. The institution of the state begins to require more and more professionally trained officials to serve its needs, thereby giving rise to the institution of education. The state is also very closely connected with the development of the institution of law.

Gradually, in each of the traditional states, special, as a rule, also armed groups are created and grow, which are entrusted with the functions of coercive social control, regardless of what they are called - police, city guards, or something else. These organized civilian forces carry out the tasks of "internal" protection of the established law and order and property. Although formally the professional police appear in most societies in a later, rather industrial age, in one form or another it has been present throughout the existence of traditional societies.

The forms of government in most traditional states, with very few exceptions, are purely authoritarian. This is the power of one ruler or a very narrow elite circle - a dictatorship, a monarchy or an oligarchy. Of course, the monarchy had the oldest and strongest traditions, and most often everything came down to it; even dictators who seized power personally and did not have the formal title of monarch, ultimately sought to legitimize their power precisely in the form of a monarchy. The trends in the development of monarchies in mature traditional societies approaching the industrial revolution are such that, as a rule, they eventually develop a strong centralized state - most often in one form or another of an absolute monarchy. This is one of the important prerequisites for the success of the subsequent industrialization process.

Above, we briefly described the mechanisms of social change in a traditional society associated with the development of professionalism in the managerial sphere. This professionalization, combined with the formation of the institution of monogamous family and inheritance, leads to the emergence of an elite, isolated from the rest of society. The emergence of the institution of state and law simultaneously determines the emergence of politics as such and the development of the political sphere of life. This sphere, like all others, is closely woven into the entire system of social relations. What is it expressed in?

In particular, in the fact that in Europe, for example, until the twentieth century, the vast majority of adults (including almost all women) were economically and legally dependent on the head of the family to which they belonged, since it was the family that constituted the main production unit in both agricultural and handicraft production. And only the heads of these families could be considered as full-fledged participants in the system of relations of local (community) self-government. The level of state administration could not be taken into account at all, since it was entirely within the competence of those who belonged to a minority of the ruling elite. All other members of society, even when they were formally free, occupied a third-class position in the community, and possibly even lower.

The fact that the vast majority of the population is excluded from participation in government is characteristic not only of monarchical states, but also of ancient and medieval democracies. Suffice it to recall, for example, classical Athenian democracy. What was the Athenian demos, which we are accustomed to translate as "the people"? This concept here denoted the free population of a state or city-polis, which had civil rights (as opposed to meteks, perieks, slaves, etc.). And not all the free population: only the male part of the adult free population, and exclusively urban, belonged to the demos of the city-state of Athens. By the time of the highest prosperity of Athens, the total number of free citizens, including women and children, was approximately 90 thousand people, and there were 365 thousand slaves of both sexes, foreigners and freedmen who were under patronage - 45 thousand. “For every adult male citizen , concludes Engels, “thus, there were at least 18 slaves and more than two who were under patronage.” In other words, in fact, the Athenian demos made up less than 5% of the total population of the policy.

Dominant nature of economic relations. Traditional society takes shape simultaneously with the appearance of a surplus product, and consequently, with the emergence of private property and commodity exchange. Private property remains dominant throughout the entire period of development of traditional and then industrial societies. We can only talk about the change of its main object in different periods. In the slave-owning formation, the main object of private property is people, in the feudal - land, and in the capitalist - capital.

Due to the relatively low level of development of the productive forces in the various production sectors of traditional societies, the so-called subsistence economy prevails. The subsistence economy, also referred to as the "self-sufficient" or "natural" economy, is characterized by the following features.

1. An economic unit produces a product mainly for its direct consumption (and the most common production unit in a traditional society is a peasant family; to a lesser extent, this applies to an artisan workshop, although it is also usually organized within a family.

2. This unit in its consumption is rather weakly dependent on the market; in any case, only a small part of the produced product goes directly to the market.

3. An extremely weak specialization or division of labor develops in the economic unit. This is no longer quite subsistence farming, but still closer to it than to commercialized production.

The subsistence economy is considered typical of the pre-capitalist period of development. It is determined by the weak development of economic exchange. Of course, in reality, all these so-called self-sufficient farms actually buy and sell the product they produce on the market. So we are talking only about the relative share of the surplus product intended for sale or commodity exchange. And yet the peasant family is extremely weakly dependent on the market and its conjuncture.

A characteristic feature of all traditional societies is a sharp inequality in the distribution of produced goods (a pointed stratification profile). With the transition from the tribal to the state system, this inequality sharply escalates. Engels, describing the birth of the Athenian state, points out that "the peasant could be satisfied if he was allowed to remain on the site as a tenant and live on a sixth of the product of his labor, paying the remaining five-sixths to the new owner in the form of rent." It is economic inequality that forms the basis of all other types of the main stratification of traditional society - political and professional.

Undoubtedly, the variety of labor tools in traditional societies, especially at fairly mature stages of development, is immeasurably wider, and the level of technology is immeasurably higher. The art of artisans here is sometimes distinguished by such achievements that it is not always possible to repeat even with the help of modern technical means. However, as we have already said, sociology, being a "generalizing" science, is primarily interested in the general features characteristic of any era as a whole. When considering traditional society, two such common features should be noted.

First, one of the reasons for the existence of limits to the increase in per capita output of a traditional society is the use in the productive process as an energy source exclusively or mainly of the muscular strength of humans and animals. You can literally list on the fingers those areas where inanimate sources of energy are used: the energy of falling water (for the rotation of the mill wheel) and wind (the movement of sailing ships or the rotation of the same mill shaft).

Secondly, as we have already mentioned, the family, the home enterprise, acts as the main economic unit throughout the traditional era. In feudal agricultural production, a group of households is headed by a landowner; his relations with domestic servants and with peasants are built on the principles of paternalism, according to the patriarchal model. Further along the hierarchy are members of his family, household managers, servants, then peasants. The most common primary cell of production is a peasant family headed by a peasant and consisting of his children and household members, who, as already mentioned, were to one degree or another dependent on the head of the family, and all the families of the community were dependent on the landowner, owner of land and agricultural land. . At the same time, the field of their activity (in the literal sense) is located in close proximity to the dwelling.

And in handicraft production, the master artisan is at the head of the workshop; as a rule, the direct employees are members of his family - his wife and children, unmarried apprentices and apprentices, civilian (also most often unmarried) artisans. Usually, almost all of them live under the same roof - usually the same one under which they work, and it is precisely on the rights of family members - for shelter, food and clothing. You can literally count on the fingers the professions whose representatives worked away from home - sailors, fishermen, miners, cab drivers.

employment structure. The structure of employment in a traditional society is formed during the agrarian revolution. It is determined by a gradual increase in the level of productivity and the share of surplus labor in the total volume of labor. Most likely, in the early stages of development, the division of labor here is still not very significant. Initially, "the second major division of labor takes place - the craft separated from agriculture." This means the emergence of a second sector of employment - handicrafts, which will not soon develop into an industrial (or industrial) one. Then there is “production directly for exchange” - commodity production, and with it trade, not only within the tribe, but already with overseas countries, this lays the foundation for the future service sector of employment. Finally, managerial activity is being professionalized, followed by religious worship; both belong to the information sector, which combines all professional activities related to the processing and accumulation of social information. Hereinafter, we include in the information sector all those “who produce, process and disseminate information as their main occupation, as well as who create and maintain the functioning of the information infrastructure”.

It is likely that the character of the distribution of members of a traditional society in various sectors of employment that eventually develops can differ significantly from one particular society to another, depending on the general level of development, ethnic, cultural, geographical and other conditions, but there are also general patterns.

First, due to a certain variety of social needs (which, of course, increases with the development of society), all four main sectors are gradually filled.

Secondly, the overwhelming majority of members of society are employed in the agricultural sector, which must “feed”, i.e., provide food not only for its own workers, but also for representatives of other sectors. Given the extremely low productivity of agricultural labor in these eras, it should be assumed that more than half of the able-bodied members of traditional societies belonged to the agricultural sector.

The nature of the settlements. One of the most important characteristics of the development of traditional societies, starting from the earliest stages, should be considered the emergence of fundamentally new types of settlements - cities.

“The city, surrounding stone or brick houses with its stone walls, towers and battlements, has become the focus of a tribe or an alliance of tribes - an indicator of great progress in the art of building, but at the same time a sign of increasing danger and need for protection.”

Cities become centers of residence for members of society belonging to the second and third sectors of employment - merchants and artisans, and after that - for representatives of the fourth sector, information. Stone walls, the protective power of which becomes a factor that attracts many of the representatives of these estates, surround not only the houses of the leaders of tribal unions (and then states), but also monasteries. Therefore, the entire political, industrial (more precisely, handicraft), as well as the intellectual life of traditional societies is concentrated here. However, as already mentioned, throughout the traditional era, the vast majority of members of society are rural residents. This already follows from the employment structure of traditional societies described above, where the basis of the economy is the agricultural sector, absorbing a huge part of the working population.

Level and scope of education. The emergence of education as a special social institution belongs to the traditional era. In the previous period, the lack of material information carriers did not allow to reliably store, accumulate and systematize knowledge, and also to avoid numerous distortions (including the inevitable normative and value coloring) in the process of their oral transmission, as in the case of a “damaged telephone”. At the same time, in all traditional societies, education is the privilege of a rather thin social stratum. And it's not just the lack of trained teachers. One of the main reasons is the extreme high cost of books on which one could study.

The material prerequisites for the growth of mass literacy arise only towards the end of the traditional era, after the invention of printing. Nevertheless, printed books and periodicals that appeared later, especially secular ones, for quite a long time remain the property of only the elite part of society. This is partly due to the high price of printed editions, due to their small circulation. Prosper Merimee in his short story "Tamango" mentions a curious fact from the life of one of its heroes - Ledoux - when he was his assistant captain on a privateer ship: "The money received from booty taken from several enemy ships gave him the opportunity to buy books and engage in theory navigation". But this is already the era of the Napoleonic wars - in fact, the beginning of the industrial revolution in France.

However, the main obstacle to the growth of the number of educated people is the lack of needs and serious incentives for the overwhelming majority of members of society to receive any kind of education: their daily work activity most often does not require any new information, no new knowledge beyond what was received from the first mentors and acquired with experience; in addition, the work itself, exhausting and lasting half a day or more, leaves almost no time or energy for additional intellectual pursuits. Moving up the social ladder in a society divided by fairly strong class barriers (and this is precisely the social structure of most traditional societies) also has little to do with getting an education.

The above applies to three of the four sectors of employment that we have identified above, with the exception of the information sector, where even at that time the very content of labor required a relatively large amount of knowledge, which can only be obtained with the help of systematic education. However, in a traditional society, the proportion of people employed in this sector is still negligibly small compared to all other sectors and cannot have a serious impact on increasing the role of education for successful professional activity and on the emergence of a corresponding need on a massive scale.

The nature of the development of scientific knowledge. With the advent of writing, there is a potential opportunity for the formation of scientific knowledge. Its development, especially at the initial stages, is significantly hampered by the dominance of three other types of knowledge in the public consciousness. Nevertheless, as history shows, in traditional societies the development of science, of course, does not stand still.

Thinkers of the pre-industrial era made many important discoveries in almost all areas of scientific knowledge. Thanks to the fact that by the beginning of the industrial revolution the foundation had been laid in almost all branches of scientific knowledge, and above all in the natural sciences, it was possible to relatively quickly and effectively create a very branched system of applied and technical sciences, which began to be used in technological production processes with in order to improve their efficiency.

However, as D. Bell, one of the founders of the concept of post-industrial society, notes, science and technology developed autonomously in a traditional society, practically independently of production. People who did science quite often (if not in a significant majority) did it almost disinterestedly, for the sake of satisfying their own intellectual needs. This, on the one hand, ensured their greater dedication. However, on the other hand, the overall, total efficiency of such activities, not "supported" by the needs of the economy, could not be too high. Therefore, the increment of scientific knowledge proceeded gradually, relatively slowly, was rather linear in nature and required considerable time for its accumulation.

§ 3. Industrial society

In the previous chapter, we described the conditions for the emergence and course of development of the industrial revolution - a process also called industrialization. Recall that the industrial revolution puts into action three socio-economic laws - the law of saving time, the law of increasing needs and the law of labor change, the influence of which in the previous traditional era was hardly noticeable, had a latent character. As a result, the law of acceleration of history enters the phase of explicit manifestation (see Figure 19, Chapter 10). It is obvious that over a quarter of a millennium, which includes the era of industrialization, the total amount of social changes - both quantitatively and qualitatively - turned out to be in fact much greater than over the previous hundred thousand years of the development of society as a whole.

There is a certain logic of industrialization, according to which countries and peoples, approaching this stage of development, regardless of the initial historical, ethnic, cultural and religious-ideological foundation, from the socio-political structure, inevitably acquire similar characteristics.

In other words, the more industrialized societies are, the more they gravitate towards the uniformity of the social order.

This thesis, known in sociology as the convergence thesis, argues that the process of industrialization produces common and uniform political and cultural characteristics of societies that, prior to industrialization, may have had very different origins and social structures. All societies eventually move towards a common level of development, since industrialization, for its successful implementation, requires the fulfillment of certain, and the same conditions. These required conditions include:

¦ deep social and technical division of labor;

¦ separation of the family from the enterprise and workplace;

¦ the formation of a mobile, disciplined workforce;

¦ a certain form of rational organization of economic calculations, planning and investment;

¦ the trend towards secularization, urbanization, increased social mobility and democracy.

Throughout the 20th century, especially in the second half of it, we can observe how the industrial order of organizing industrial and agricultural production, which has developed in Western societies, is rapidly spreading and being introduced into the fabric of the social life of many societies that from time immemorial had fundamentally different ways of life. Using the examples of the most advanced societies in Asia and Africa, one can be convinced of the validity of many provisions of the convergence thesis: the new order produces social changes not only in the sphere of economy, technology and organization of production, but also entails changes in most other areas, giving them a qualitative originality inherent in West. Leisure activities, style of dress, forms of service, manners of behavior, rational architecture of business buildings - all this, one way or another, is built according to Western models, creating the basis for mutual understanding and recognition and refuting the famous phrase of the English poet of the times of militant colonialism. Even the dominant "cell of society", the nuclear family - both as a social type and as a collection of certain values ​​- has become, according to a number of researchers, "one of the most successful exports from the Western world.

It quickly spread to Asia and Africa and is becoming a universal phenomenon today.”

Let us try to trace briefly what expression these social changes found in industrial societies for each of the system-forming features we have chosen.

The nature of the social structure. In an industrial society, in the period of overcoming feudal fragmentation, on the basis of capitalist economic ties, the formation of internal markets, nations are formed from various tribes and nationalities.

A nation is the highest level of historical communities of people known to us today; it is characterized by the unity of the language (in any case, the literary language and, on the basis of it, the official state language), the common territory of habitation, economic ties, and culture. The emergence of clearly defined geographical boundaries is dictated by the requirements of protectionism, the protection of national entrepreneurship from outside intervention. Recent history records many diplomatic, military and other actions by all states aimed at securing the territorial outlines of the state, their recognition by external partners, and reliable protection.

Thus, one of the main social changes in the field of social structure in the transition from a traditional society to an industrial one is the formation of nation-states with clearly defined territorial boundaries. Within these boundaries, there is a tendency for the emergence of approximately the same claims of the entire population for the territorial space inhabited by them at a given point in time. This is expressed in the fact that the territorial claims of the state, as a rule, correspond to cultural, linguistic and ethnic divisions.

The certainty and stability of state borders to some extent testifies to the closeness to the completion of the territorial division of the world. On the whole, it probably is. Most of the wars that were fought during the era of industrialization were connected - at least formally - not so much with territorial, but with economic and political reasons. In the course of the industrial revolution, as industrial societies mature, a system of national communities gradually takes shape, i.e., a territorial division of the world in the form of a kind of “network of national political communities”, which displaces both the former simpler traditional societies and the system of former absolutist empires.

The vital activity of traditional states was permeated with religious influence. Virtually all modern industrial states have a distinctly secular character. In each of them, the industrial revolution sooner or later leads to secularization, a process in which religious ideas and organizations lose their influence due to the increasing importance of science and other forms of knowledge. Formally, this can be expressed in legal acts on the separation of the state from the church and the church from the school, as well as on freedom of conscience, that is, the right of citizens to profess any religion or not profess any.

The nature of the participation of members of society in the management of its affairs. Industrial society, as unanimously noted by most historians and philosophers, for its free development needs the maximum development of democracy: it is this form of government that allows the most reliable timely and relatively painless for the economy adjustment of the legal and political space in accordance with the rapidly changing requirements of the economy.

Along with the development of the industrial revolution, gradually, throughout the 19th and then the 20th centuries, there is a transformation of the civil rights of all members of the industrial society. This process, although quite rapid by historical standards, nevertheless takes the life of more than one generation. In any case, universal suffrage (as the right of all, regardless of gender and social origin, adults who have reached the age of 21 to elect and be elected to representative bodies of at least local government) was introduced in England only after the First World War. But, one way or another, the proportion of members of society who gained access, if not to management, then at least to minimal participation in political life, along with the success of the industrial revolution, increases significantly - mainly at the expense of women, as well as younger and less economically independent members. society.

The implementation of democracy always requires more or less active participation of members of the demos in political life, primarily in the electoral process. We will not touch here on the possibility of manipulating public opinion, the pressure exerted in one form or another by the opposing sides in the pre-election struggle on its formation. It is clear, however, that it is one thing when the entire demos (or, in modern terms, the electorate) consists of several tens of thousands of people, and quite another if it includes hundreds of thousands or even millions. Namely, this situation develops in the course of the first of the industrialization processes we are considering - the formation of large national states. For an effective struggle for power, it is already necessary:

¦ firstly, the involvement of mass media (which will have to be created and thoroughly developed), since without their use it is virtually impossible to permanently and massively influence public opinion;

¦ secondly, the involvement of an instrument of organizational support for the election campaign; mass political parties turn out to be such an instrument

One of the characteristic features of industrial societies, which R. Aron pointed out, is the institutionalization of political life around mass parties. The formation of stable political orientations, attitudes, likes and dislikes among citizens presupposes a fairly long and stable assimilation of a whole complex of both elementary and more complex knowledge by them, allowing them to: determine their intentions; understand the alignment of various political forces and their real possibilities; be aware of your interests and preferences; understand the mechanisms of one's own participation in the election campaign, etc.

Assimilation of this kind of knowledge is gradually growing, as if active participants in the political struggle do not spare funds for the development of a kind of system of "political education", which is organically woven into the fabric of the social process of industrialization. Lenin's famous phrase that an illiterate person is outside of politics only summarizes the many years of painstaking and lengthy work of many different parties to win over the political sympathies of the largest possible part of the population. And this involvement of an increasing part of the population, sometimes against its own will and desire, in political games, even as passive participants, a kind of "weight background", undoubtedly has its effect on raising the general intellectual level of society.

In the economic sphere, one of the most characteristic features of an industrial society is the almost complete commercialization of production. The essence of commercialization, especially at the initial stages of the development of the industrial revolution, is expressed as briefly as possible in the simplest slogan: “Everything is for sale!” This means almost undivided dominance of the market. While in a traditional society a relatively small share of the produced product enters the market, and the rest is consumed by the producers themselves, the vast majority of economic units of an industrial society produce the lion's share of their product, if not all of its volume, for the market; and on the market they acquire everything that they need both for the productive process and for personal consumption. Thus, in the course of the industrial revolution, the subsistence economy disappears or remains for some time only in peripheral regions where capitalism has not yet penetrated.

The core basis of all production and non-production relations in an industrial society is private ownership of capital, which Marx defined as "self-increasing value". The colossal growth in turnover, of course, presupposes the existence of a highly developed and reliable financial, credit and monetary system. Both the formation of such a system and the maintenance of uninterrupted functioning, and even more so its development, presuppose the presence of a sufficiently large and ever-increasing number of specially trained people employed in it. Such preparation leads to the build-up of both social and individual intellects, as well as to a general rationalization of all social life. In the general culture of an industrial society, muscular labor is less and less valued. In almost any production, not the quantity, but the quality of workers, which depends on the education they have received, begins to play a more important role.

The pace of economic growth is more and more confidently outpacing the pace of demographic growth: the increase in the population at first rapidly accelerates, then gradually decreases, and in some places it completely stops. Fertility loses its former value. Parents no longer see in their children those who will ensure their peaceful old age, and the authorities no longer see fertility as a source of economic or defense potential. "Producing offspring is expensive and forced to compete with other demands and forms of self-satisfaction and self-realization."

The economic well-being of almost all members of society is also changing. One of the components of the industrial revolution is the revolution in labor productivity, which in the 75-80 years of the twentieth century actually turned the proletarian into a representative of the middle class with an income gradually approaching the level of the upper class. Additional productivity is embodied in an increase in the purchasing power of the population, in other words, leads to an increase in living standards.

The increase in productivity is also realized in the increase in the length of free time of workers.

Continuous and stable economic growth, the development of mass production lead to the fact that the main criterion for assessing the effectiveness of a society is not just the feeling of its members of the state of well-being (which, in principle, is possible even with a relatively low standard of living, combined with equally low demands), but a steady growth of real economic welfare. This leads to a gradual leveling (flattening) of the profile of economic stratification and a decrease in its height. The differences between economic statuses that exist in an industrial society are distributed on a scale of inequality more evenly and smoothly in comparison with a traditional society.

The general nature of the organizational and technological level. The industrial revolution sets in motion two interrelated factors that determine the level of development of both technology and the organization of production.

The first factor is the dominance of machine production based on mechanization. First of all, the application of inanimate sources of energy to the mechanization of production is increasing - steam engines in the first stages of industrialization, electricity and internal combustion engines in the subsequent ones. In this case, the possibilities for increasing power are practically unlimited.

In addition, the process of industrialization is closely related to the constant introduction of technical and technological innovations into production, as well as the rapid obsolescence (which is increasingly ahead of purely physical wear and tear) of existing machines, mechanisms, equipment and production technologies.

As a result, all participants in the productive process, regardless of their desire, must constantly master more and more new types of equipment and technologies - this is how the law of labor change mentioned above manifests its effect. This, in turn, forces people to constantly improve their intellectual level, and many to engage in technical creativity.

The second factor is the reorganization of production on a factory basis. It is closely connected with the general process of increasing concentration of capital and reflects it. The family is losing its former role as the main economic unit. A lot of people, machines and mechanisms are concentrated in spatially limited areas. There is a density of contacts and such an exchange of information (moreover, special information, which is largely of a scientific and technical nature), which was impossible in a traditional society with its predominantly agricultural and handicraft production, characterized by intra-family or intra-shop isolation.

A sharp decrease in the role of the so-called "small family business" in the production of goods and services leads to the fact that only a very narrow range of professions allows a person to earn a living while remaining within his own home. The place of work of the absolute majority of members of society is located at a greater or lesser distance from their homes, since the nature of modern production requires the concentration of technology and labor in a special localized space. Even the work of scientists is impossible outside of libraries and technically equipped laboratories concentrated in universities and research centers.

All these changed social conditions in a colossal volume increase the density of professional and personal contacts and direct interactions, which people now have to enter into among themselves during the working day and throughout life. Moreover, these contacts in the vast majority are by no means related in nature. According to some data, the total number of such contacts, falling today on one "average" member of society during one calendar year, is approximately equal to their volume for a lifetime a hundred years ago. As a result, the total volume of information circulating in society, including (and perhaps even in a special way) of a scientific nature, also increases accordingly.

employment structure. A characteristic feature of industrial societies is the fall in the share of the population employed in agricultural production, and, accordingly, the increase in the share of workers employed in the industrial sector. The beginning of this process in England, the birthplace of the industrial revolution, was very dramatic and closely associated with the so-called "enclosure" policy. Beginning in the 15th century, this policy became all-encompassing in connection with the industrial revolution. As a result of an avalanche-like increase in production volumes in the textile industry, prices for its raw material - wool - soared. The landowners, landlords and squires, frantically rushed into sheep farming, which promised unprecedented opportunities for rapid enrichment. The tenants were driven away, and they, deprived of the main means of production - land, turned mostly into vagabonds and beggars (according to the expression common at that time - "sheep ate people"). The so-called parliamentary (i.e., permitted by legislative acts) "enclosures" in England led to the virtual disappearance of the peasantry as a class.

Where did all this destitute mass rush in search of means of subsistence? Of course, to the cities where a real economic boom took place at that time. The newly created factories and factories had practically unlimited capacity of the labor market for their time. The simplification of the labor process, sometimes reduced to a few simple manipulations with the machine, did not require special special training, which, in the old handicraft production, could take years. They paid pennies for work, actively used child labor, entrepreneurs did not bear practically any costs for the social sphere. However, there was nothing to choose from. Several processes have merged here, in particular, the growth of cities and the restructuring of the employment system, which has found its expression primarily in the growth of the number of people employed in industry and the decrease in the share of those employed in agriculture.

In 1800, 73% of the employed population was employed in agriculture in the United States, in 1960 this share decreased to 6.3%, and in the 1980s it more than halved. In general, this indicator - the share of the population employed in agriculture - is for many researchers an important indicator of the level of industrial development of society. For example, the American sociologist R. Bendix considers modern a society where less than half of the present population is employed in agricultural labor; at the same time, industrial societies classified as “modern” can differ quite significantly by this criterion. So, if by the beginning of the 70s of this century, about 5% of the population was employed in the agrarian sector of the UK economy, and less than 6% in the USA, then for the USSR and Japan these figures were 45 and 49%, respectively.

The nature of the settlements. With the beginning of the industrial era, a process called urbanization is rapidly unfolding, a significant increase in the role of large urban settlements in society. This becomes a natural consequence of a number of different aspects of industrialization discussed above.

The growth of urban settlements in the 19th century and the replenishment of the three non-agricultural sectors of employment occurred largely due to migration from the countryside. Cities provided a livelihood for millions of people who might have died or never been born had they (or their parents) not migrated to the cities. Those who moved to these cities or to their outskirts were most often driven there by need. Usually the reason for the move was not at all the benevolent advice of more affluent village neighbors and not the ostensible charity of some townspeople providing jobs for those who wanted to earn a living. As a rule, the immediate motive for the move was rumors about the poor who saved themselves by moving to the growing cities, from which information came about the presence of well-paid jobs there.

In 1800, 29.3 million people (3% of the world's population) lived in the cities of the world, by 1900 - 224.4 million (13.6%), and by 1950 - 706.4 million (38.6%). In industrialized Western societies, the process of urbanization during the 19th century was especially rapid: for example, in Great Britain, the birthplace of the industrial revolution, in 1800 there were about 24% of the urban population, and in 1900 already 77% of the British lived in cities.

If we consider that urbanization is not just an increase in the proportion of the urban population, but the population of super-large cities, those that are called megacities, then we could refer to the data on the rates of urbanization, which Alvin Toffler cites in his work "Futuroshock": "In 1850 only 4 cities had a population of more than 1 million people, in 1900 - 19, in 1960 - 141 ... In 1970, the growth of the urban population was 6.5%.

Speaking of a specific urban way of life, we mean by it, first of all, a complex of cultural and educational institutions, as well as household amenities, which the vast majority of rural residents are deprived of. Indeed, it is in cities that theaters, libraries, museums, universities and colleges are concentrated. There is a network of catering establishments. Urban housing is equipped with water supply, external heat sources, sewerage. Good roads and uninterruptedly working urban transport ensure quick movement to any desired point in the city. The phone provides reliable communication at any time of the day. A city dweller, as a rule, has more opportunities to access various government agencies to solve their current problems.

At the same time, it is impossible not to notice some specific aspects of the existence of the inhabitants of urban settlements, which are, if not negative, then by no means indisputably positive. Citizens rarely have dwellings located in the immediate vicinity of their place of work. The proportion of the so-called "pendulum migration", determined by the movement of people in the morning from home to work, and in the evening back, is from 30 to 60% of the population of large cities. This dictates serious requirements for public transport and determines the importance of its place in the urban infrastructure. And the mass transition to the use of personal vehicles almost everywhere reveals the unpreparedness of the infrastructure of large cities for this: many hours of traffic jams, smog and an increase in the number of traffic accidents is far from an exhaustive list of problems of this kind.

But what happens in an industrial society with a rural way of life? During the long period of the industrial revolution, even with the intrusion of industrial methods into agricultural production, patriarchal customs and the general conservatism inherent in the countryside change very slowly. Perhaps this is due to the sparsely populated rural settlements, as well as the homogeneity of occupation, with the fact that here, as before, the field of labor activity is located in close proximity to dwellings. In other words, with the fact that the village will never experience those three factors that L. Wirth considered determining for the urban way of life - the number, density and heterogeneity of the population. One way or another, the rural way of life is perceived by most members of society (including the villagers themselves) as a second-rate, "backward" lifestyle. Perhaps the concept of "village" arises in almost all societies that have embarked on the path of industrialization, and everywhere it has approximately the same normative and evaluative meaning.

However, it should be noted that, oddly enough, in the city dweller's value system, this contemptuous attitude towards the village way of life most often coexists with envy of it. Clean air, fresh natural food, the measured rhythm of life, silence - all this cannot but attract the city dweller, tormented by constant fuss and haste, the roar of vehicles passing under the windows, the stench and soot of factory fumes, canned food, the anonymity of relationships, when most city dwellers quarters are unfamiliar even with neighbors on the porch. In fact, experiments repeatedly conducted by sociologists and psychologists demonstrate the striking callousness and indifference of urban residents in relation to others. Staging on busy streets a fainting spell or molestation of hooligans on a girl, the researchers filmed the reaction of numerous passers-by with a hidden camera. More precisely, the complete absence of such a reaction. The vast majority continue to habitually rush about business, calmly moving away from the scene of the incident. This, of course, would be impossible on any village street.

Level and scope of education. One of the most characteristic features of an industrial society is mass literacy. This is influenced by a number of factors.

First, the complication of technology and technology creates an increase in incentives for education both among workers and employers who hire them - in full accordance with the law of labor change. Upgrading skills as a condition for obtaining higher income and social status is increasingly dependent on the level of education received. Although in real practice, at least at the micro level, this connection is not so unambiguous and straightforward. However, primary and then secondary education is increasingly becoming a permanent and necessary requirement even for unskilled workers.

Secondly, publishing, like all other industries that have reached the level of industrial production, is affected by the law of economy of time: the market is increasingly filled with huge volumes of relatively inexpensive printed products.

As a result of the emerging social need for mass literacy, a corresponding proposal is born - in all developed societies, the institution of education is radically transformed. Extensive and ramified systems of education are being created, a huge number of schools, colleges and universities are being established. Their founders and founders are both the state and private individuals. Many industrialists establish schools for the professional training of specialists for their enterprises. The number of members of society who have received a formal education and continue it throughout almost their entire professional life, as well as schoolchildren and students, increases many times over during a very short historical period and continues to grow. According to Randall Collins, in the United States, the number of high school graduates, normalized to the total population under the age of 17, increased 38 times between 1869 and 1963, and the same ratio for graduates from local colleges (which, like our technical schools, in largely take over the functions of training mid-level technical specialists) - more than 22 times. Significantly, although not to the same extent, the number of bachelors, masters and doctors of sciences also increased.

The nature of the development of scientific knowledge. The change in economic, organizational and technological conditions turns the introduction of innovations into the production process into a powerful weapon of competition that has become more acute with the beginning of industrialization. If earlier, in traditional societies, the laboratory experiments of researchers had difficulty finding sponsors - mainly from among the enlightened monarchs and representatives of the aristocracy (although their interest might not be completely disinterested - as was the case with alchemy), now the main source of funding for research become the most forward-thinking entrepreneurs. Often a researcher and a successful entrepreneur are united, so to speak, in one person. A whole galaxy of outstanding inventors, working at the dawn of the industrial revolution, founded (and not without success!) Their own enterprises. Among them we can include the great social experimenter Robert Owen, who, being a talented and successful entrepreneur, concentrated a solid fortune in his hands, although he spent the lion's share of it on the foundation of several utopian colonies, including New Harmony. An outstanding businessman and manager was also one of the first heroes of the industrial revolution, James Watt, who, together with his partner R. Bolton, founded the first enterprise for the serial production of steam engines (which he himself invented).

For no more than a century, applied research, i.e., the search for a specific practical application and use for direct production purposes of certain laws and patterns discovered by fundamental science, has become almost the predominant form of scientific research. In any case, investments in this industry in total terms at the initial, and especially at subsequent stages, significantly exceed the funds allocated for fundamental research. At the same time, the development of applied research techniques, and of the industry itself as a whole, along with the general growth of the gross national income, leads to an unprecedented expansion of the possibilities of fundamental research. Science has made a giant leap in just two hundred years, completely incomparable with the increase in scientific and technical knowledge that took place over the previous millennia. It is becoming a truly productive force and practically an independent branch of the national economy. Science, as well as the development and implementation of technological innovations, are turning into a professional field, attracting more and more capable people. This, in turn, increases the "gross" volume of intellectual products produced by society.

§ 4. Post-industrial society

The consistent development of the system of ideas of industrial society was the theory of post-industrial society. This concept was formulated in 1962 by the American sociologist Daniel Bell, who later developed and summarized this concept in his 1974 work The Coming of the Post-Industrial Society. The most concise description of this type of civilization could be the idea of ​​an information society, because its core is the extremely rapid development of information technologies. If the industrial society is the result of the industrial revolution, then the post-industrial society is the product of the information revolution.

D. Bell proceeds from the fact that if in pre-industrial and industrial societies the axial principle around which all social relations are built is the ownership of the means of production, then in modern societies that dominate in the last quarter of the twentieth century, the place of such an axial principle is increasingly beginning to take information, more precisely, its totality - the knowledge accumulated by this moment. This knowledge is the source of technical and economic innovation and at the same time becomes the starting point for policy-making. In the economy, this is reflected in the fact that the share and importance of industrial production itself as the main form of economic activity is significantly reduced. It is superseded by the service and production of information.

The service sector in the most advanced societies includes more than half of the employed population. The information sector, which “comprises all those who produce, process and disseminate information as their main occupation, as well as those who create and maintain the functioning of the information infrastructure,” is also rapidly growing - both in size and in the growth of social influence.

Of course, the sphere of material production - neither in the agricultural nor in the industrial sectors - cannot lose its importance in the life of society. Ultimately, the same scientific and information activities in general require an ever-increasing volume of equipment, and the people employed in it must eat every day. We are talking only about the ratio of the number of people employed in a particular sector, as well as the ratio of the share of value in the total volume of the gross national product.

Thus, in a post-industrial civilization, the main wealth is not land (as in a traditional agrarian society), not even capital (as in an industrial civilization), but information. Moreover, its features, unlike land and capital, are such that it is not limited, in principle it becomes more and more accessible to everyone and does not decrease in the process of its consumption. In addition, it is relatively inexpensive (because it is immaterial), and the means of storing and processing it are becoming cheaper and cheaper to manufacture, which increases its efficiency.

The technical basis of the information society is the development of computer technologies and means of communication. Modern means of storing, processing and transmitting information allow a person to receive the required information almost instantly at any time from anywhere in the world. A huge amount of information accumulated by mankind and continuing to grow like an avalanche circulates in modern society and for the first time in history begins to act not just as a social memory (for example, in books), but already as an active tool, as a means of decision-making, and more and more often - without the direct participation of a person.

And now let's consider what social changes the information revolution causes according to the parameters we have chosen in those societies where it manifested itself most clearly. At the same time, we should not forget that none of the societies that exist today, including the most advanced ones, can be considered completely post-industrial. We are talking only about trends that in some general society of the "third wave" will be built on the basis of three key principles.

1. The principle of the minority, which is intended to replace the former principle of the majority. Instead of the former political stratification, in which several large blocs formed the majority, a "configurative society is emerging in which thousands of minorities, the existence of many of which is temporary, are in continuous circulation, forming completely new transitional forms."

2. The principle of "semi-direct" democracy, which means, in fact, the rejection of representative democracy. Today, parliamentarians actually proceed, first of all, from their own views, at best, they listen to the opinion of a few experts. Raising the educational level and improving communication technologies will enable citizens to independently develop their own versions of many political decisions. In other words, opinions formed outside the legislature will increasingly acquire legal force.

3. The principle of "sharing responsibility in decision-making", which will help eliminate overload, often blocking the activities of government institutions. So far, too many decisions are made at the national level and too few at the local (municipal) and international levels. At the transnational level, it is necessary to delegate the right to make decisions on the functioning of international corporations, arms and drug trafficking, the fight against international terrorism, etc. This kind of decentralization of management will ensure the transfer of part of the competence, on the one hand, to local authorities, on the other hand, to supranational entities.

Dominant nature of economic relations. In a post-industrial society, the dominant role is increasingly played not so much by private as by corporate and institutional ownership of the means of production. The corporatization of the majority of any large enterprises, a trend towards which was outlined even in the time of Marx, in a mature industrial society becomes of decisive importance. Shares symbolizing property relations, becoming securities, significantly intensify the overall process of circulation of capital.

However, the main feature of a post-industrial society, its theorists consider the transfer of the center of gravity from property relations as the core around which all social relations developed in previous eras, to knowledge and information.

For example, Alvin Toffler sees here the main difference from the economic system that dominated the industrial society, in the way social wealth is created. "The new method is fundamentally different from all the previous ones and in this sense is a turning point in social life." At the same time, a super-symbolic system of creating social wealth is being formed, based on the use of information technology, that is, on the use of a person’s intellectual abilities, and not his physical strength. Obviously, in such an economic system, the mode of production must be based primarily on knowledge.

With the development of the service and information sectors of the economy, wealth is losing the material embodiment that land gave it in an agrarian civilization, and capital in an industrial one. It is interesting that, according to the same Toffler, the emergence in the post-industrial civilization of a new - symbolic - form of capital "confirms the ideas of Marx and classical political economy, which foreshadowed the end of traditional capital."

The main unit of exchange is not only and not so much money - metal or paper, cash or non-cash - as information. “Paper money,” says Toffler, “this artifact of the industrial age, is becoming obsolete, credit cards are taking their place. Once a symbol of the emerging middle class, credit cards are now ubiquitous. Today (the beginning of the 90s - V.A., A.K.) there are about 187 million of their owners in the world. If you think about it, then electronic money, expressed by a credit card, is information (on the degree of solvency of the owner of this card) in almost pure form. The expansion of electronic money in the global economy is beginning to have a serious impact on long-established relationships. In a competitive environment, private financial companies that provide credit services are beginning to push back the previously unshakable power of banks.

The general nature of the organizational and technological level. Most theorists of post-industrial society - D. Bell, Z. Brzezinski and others - consider a sharp reduction in the number of "blue" and an increase in the number of "white" collars as a sign of the new system. However, Toffler argues that the expansion of the scope of office activity is nothing more than a direct continuation of the same industrialism. "Offices function like factories, with a significant degree of division of labor that is monotonous, stupefying, and humiliating." In a post-industrial society, on the contrary, there is an increase in the number and variety of organizational forms of production management. Cumbersome and heavy bureaucratic structures are increasingly being replaced by small, mobile and temporary hierarchical unions. Information technologies destroy the old principles of division of labor and promote the emergence of new unions of owners of common information.

One example of such flexible forms is the return to a new round of the “spiral” of progress of a small family business. "Decentralization and de-urbanization of production, a change in the nature of work, make it possible to return to the domestic industry based on modern electronic technology." Toffler believes, for example, that the "electronic cottage" - by which he means home work using computer technology, multimedia and telecommunication systems - will play a leading role in the labor process of a post-industrial society. He also argues that domestic work in modern conditions has the following advantages.

¦ Economic: stimulating the development of some industries (electronics, communications) and reducing others (oil, paper); savings in transportation costs, the cost of which today exceeds the cost of installing telecommunications at home.

¦ Socio-political: strengthening of stability in society; reduction of forced geographic mobility; strengthening the family and the neighborhood community (neighbourhood); revitalization of people's participation in public life.

¦ Environmental: creating incentives to save energy and use cheap alternative energy sources.

¦ Psychological: overcoming monotonous, overly specialized work; increasing personal moments in the labor process.

employment structure. Today, in the most advanced countries - where the trends of the post-industrial society are most clearly manifested - one worker directly employed in agriculture is able to provide food for up to 50 or more people employed in other sectors. (Although, of course, such efficiency cannot be achieved by the efforts of farmers alone, for each of which, in fact, several people work in other sectors of the economy, providing him with machines, energy, fertilizers, advanced agronomic technologies, accepting raw agricultural products from him and processing it into a ready-to-eat product.)

We presented the general trends in the restructuring of the employment system in three types of societies in the diagram (Fig. 22). If we try to track the trends of changes along the Z axis, which reflect in this diagram a consistent increase in the levels of development of society, then it is easy to see the following. During the transition from one civilization to another, there is a consistent and very significant outflow of people employed from the agricultural sector, who, of course, are redistributed to other sectors. (Today, in developing societies, these processes are probably still less dramatic and painful than in Europe at the dawn of the industrial revolution.) In addition, there is no less consistent and steady growth in such sectors as the service and information sectors. And only the industrial sector, which reached its maximum number in developed countries by the 1950s, is noticeably declining in the post-industrial society.

The nature of the settlements. The trend of urbanization, so characteristic of industrial societies, is undergoing major changes in the transition to a post-industrial society. In almost all advanced societies, the development of urbanization followed an S-curve, starting very slowly, spreading very quickly, then slowing down, and then moving smoothly (sometimes even more intensively than the previous period of urbanization) in the opposite direction.

Rice. 22. Restructuring of employment in societies of various types. A hypothetical diagram constructed by the authors based on data gleaned from various sources (including those presented in the lectures of some experts)

new direction - suburban (i.e., suburban) development (Suburban way of life - "suburban way of life" (...).

Computerization and the development of telecommunications, as well as the widespread introduction of computer networks, enable an increasing number of people employed in industries related to the production and processing of information to "go to work without leaving home." They can communicate with their employers (receiving assignments, reporting on their completion, and even making payments for the work done) and clients over computer networks. The American textbook “The Office: Procedures and Technology” describes a situation that is quite typical for a post-industrial society: “A young man is employed by a large company located in a large city, but he would like to live in a rural area. area 45 miles from the city. He is hired as a word processor and is able to complete office assignments from the comfort of his home. The company provides it with the necessary equipment for work, including that required for the electronic transfer of finished products to the company's office. Now this young worker performs his duties in a home office, admiring the view from the window of the herds grazing peacefully in a picturesque valley. Letters and reports prepared by him in this secluded village are immediately received by those to whom they are intended, no matter where they are on the globe.

Let us note that such a way of life is probably accessible only to those members of society whose professional activity is of an intellectual nature. However, we have repeatedly noted above that the share of this category of the population in post-industrial societies is steadily increasing.

Level and scope of education. In most advanced societies, getting a sufficiently high level of education is becoming more and more valuable. Thus, the proportion of American men who studied at least four years in college increased from 20% in 1980 to 25% in 1994, the proportion of women - from 13% to 20%, respectively. There has been a sharp increase in competition among applicants for admission to universities and institutes that are considered the best (prestigious). Thus, in 1995, Harvard University received 18,190 applications for 2,000 places, indicating a competition of 11 people for each place. Five years before, the ratio was 8 people per seat.

However, no matter how paradoxical it may sound, at the turn of the millennium, a fundamentally new problem arises: the fight against functional illiteracy. Moreover, it occurs primarily in the most advanced societies, where, it would seem, the level of elementary literacy is much higher than anywhere else in the world. According to the UNESCO definition, functional illiteracy is, firstly, the practical loss of skills and abilities in reading, writing and elementary calculations; secondly, such a level of general educational knowledge that does not allow them to fully “function” in a modern, continuously becoming more complex society. Information, unlike material goods, cannot be appropriated, but must be precisely mastered (i.e., understood, comprehended from the standpoint of the general system of information already available in the thesaurus of a person; placed in the right place in the pantry of his memory; in addition, it must be ready for extraction and use at the right time and in the right place). And what can be said about the “reader” who, after reading a short and very simple text, is unable to answer a single question about its content? Only one thing: he cannot read (despite all his certificates and diplomas). This is one of the most important manifestations of functional illiteracy.

Russia, alas, has not yet fully realized the enormity of this problem, probably due to the fact that we have not really reached the frontiers of highly developed societies yet. It is perhaps for this reason that a study of the level of functional illiteracy in Russia has not been carried out either on a national or even on a regional scale.

It should be noted that in most developed countries, information about the total growth of functional illiteracy caused not only discouragement, but also an adequate reaction in political circles. Based on the data and conclusions of the National Commission report mentioned above, then US President Ronald Reagan demanded that Congress allocate substantial funds for the campaign against functional illiteracy. His successor, George W. Bush, pledged to become "president of education" during his campaign period. At the third meeting of the president in US history with all the governors of the states (September 1989), a statement was made providing for the promotion of educational goals that "make us competitive."

The nature of the development of scientific knowledge. The most important driving force of change in the post-industrial society is the automation and computerization of production processes and the so-called "high technologies". The acceleration of change in the second half of the 20th century is generally closely related to the rapid improvement of technological processes. The time interval between three cycles of technological renewal has been significantly reduced: 1) the emergence of a creative idea, 2) its practical implementation, and 3) its introduction into social production. In the third cycle, the first cycle of the next circle is born: "new machines and techniques become not only products, but also a source of fresh ideas."

New technology also suggests new solutions to social, philosophical, and even personal problems. “It affects the entire intellectual environment of a person - the way he thinks and sees the world,” says Alvin Toffler. The core of technology improvement is knowledge. Paraphrasing F. Bacon's saying “knowledge is power”, Toffler argues that in the modern world “knowledge is change”, in other words, the accelerated acquisition of knowledge that feeds the development of technologies means the acceleration of change.

In social development as a whole, a similar chain can be traced: discovery - application - impact - discovery. The speed of transition from one link to another also increases significantly. Psychologically, it is difficult for people to adapt to the many changes that occur in the shortest possible time. Toffler characterizes the acceleration of change as a social and psychological force - "external acceleration is transformed into internal". The provision on the acceleration of changes and their social and psychological role serves as a rationale for the transition to a kind of "super-industrial" society. It seems to us that the most successful name for such a society should be the "information society".

1. Comparative analysis of various types of human societies that differ in their level of development should be carried out by comparing typical parameters that are similar for different countries and peoples at the same level of social development, and differ in their content for societies at different levels. development. There are eight such parameters: 1) the nature of the social structure; 2) the nature of the participation of members of the society in the management of its affairs; 3) the dominant nature of economic relations; 4) the general nature of the organizational and technological level; 5) structure of employment; 6) the nature of the settlements; (7) level and scope of education; (8) the nature and level of development of scientific knowledge.

2. A primitive society, in accordance with the indicated eight parameters, can be described as follows. The dominant type of social structure here is tribalism - tribalism. Most members of society are directly involved in governance, but in a chaotic, disordered way. "Economy" (for a primitive society this concept is very arbitrary) is based on subsistence economy; communal ownership of the means of production prevails; observed random nature of the relations of commodity exchange. These societies are characterized by primitive processing of fishing tools (gathering, hunting, fishing), as well as an elementary age and sex division of labor, since most members of the community are engaged in the same trade. The habitats of members of primitive societies are small temporary settlements (cities, camps). Systematization of the accumulated knowledge does not occur, and their transfer to subsequent generations is carried out orally and individually.

3. The traditional society, in comparison with the primitive one, is undergoing serious social changes. In the initial stages, the weakly centralized state becomes the main type of social construction here, which, as it develops, acquires more and more clearly expressed tendencies towards absolutism. Politics here is the business of a narrow stratum of the elite, and the vast majority of members of society are excluded from participation in governance. The foundation of economic life is private ownership of the means of production. In traditional societies, there is a predominance of the subsistence economy. Here, the variety of tools of labor is increasing more and more consistently, but mainly on the basis of the muscular energy of man and animals. The main organizational and economic unit is the family. In urban areas, there is an increasing development of the handicraft and service sectors, but the vast majority of the population is employed in the agricultural sector. This majority lives in rural areas. Cities are gaining more and more influence as centers of political, industrial and spiritual life. Education, like politics, is the lot of a thin layer of the elite. Science and production are autonomous, loosely connected spheres of society's life.

4. Industrial society in the course of the process of industrialization acquires, according to R. Aron, the following typical features. The main type of social structure is becoming nation-states with clearly defined territorial boundaries; these states are formed around common forms of economy, language and culture. Universal suffrage is granted to the population, as a result of which there is a consistent institutionalization of political activity around mass parties. The economy is acquiring more and more pronounced market relations, which means the almost complete commercialization of production and the disappearance of the subsistence economy. The core basis of the economy is private ownership of capital. The technological dominant is the dominance of machine production. It should be noted the fall in the share of workers employed in agricultural production, and the increase in the share of the industrial proletariat. Production is reorganized on a factory basis. An important sign of industrialization is the urbanization of society. Strengthening the effect of the law of change of labor leads to an increase in mass literacy. From the very beginning of the industrial revolution, science has been applied at an increasing pace to all spheres of life, especially to industrial production, as well as the consistent rationalization of all social life.

5. The development of the information revolution leads to the gradual formation of a post-industrial society. Judging by the trends observed today in the most advanced societies, it will have the following characteristics. The most important social change in the system of social construction should be considered the increased transparency of national borders and the influence of supranational communities. Economic life is increasingly characterized by the increasing role of information and its possession, the increasing importance of intellectual property, the emergence of electronic money and the transformation of information into the main medium of exchange. In the technological sphere, the development of “high technologies”, as well as automation and computerization of production processes, is becoming increasingly important. It should be noted that there is a clearly pronounced downward trend in the share of workers employed in the industry, with a simultaneous increase in the share of those employed in the information and especially in the service sectors. Industrial urbanization is being replaced by a trend towards suburbanization. A manifestation of the crisis of social institutions of education is the awareness of the problem of functional illiteracy. Science becomes a directly productive sphere.

In fact, this summary is summarized in a single matrix called "Types of Societies and Criteria for Their Distinction." This matrix can be analyzed in two directions:

¦ line by line: then we see what kind of social changes are taking place in a given sphere of social life, or (which is the same) what changes in this area are caused by this or that global revolution;

¦ by columns: as a result, we get a comprehensive description of each of the four types of societies (which is reflected in the summary for chapter 12).

Control questions

1. List eight defining parameters that can be used to compare social change in different types of societies.

2. What does the term "tribalism" mean?

3. What should be understood by "demos"?

4. What is the essence of the "subsistence economy"?

5. What are the main reasons for the lack of mass literacy in a traditional society?

6. What is the main reason for the limit ("ceiling") of labor productivity growth in a traditional society?

Table 12

Types of societies and criteria for their distinction

7. What is the essence of the convergence thesis?

8. What does such a characteristic feature of an industrial society, noted by R. Aron, mean as “the institutionalization of political life around mass parties”?

9. What is the essence of the commercialization of production in an industrial society?

10. What are the main trends in the restructuring of employment in societies of various types?

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