Social Change: Meaning

Social change is difficult to define, because there is a sense in which everything changes, all
of the time. Identifying significant change involves showing how far there are alterations in
the underlying structure of an object or situation over a period of time. In the case of human
societies, to decide how far and in what ways a system is in a process of change we have to
show to what degree there is any modification of basic institutions during a specific period.

Cultures and societies are dynamic. They constantly experience social change, meaning that
the structures of cultures and societies transform into new forms. In its most concrete sense,
social change means that large numbers of people are engaging in group activities and
relationships that are different from those in which they or their parents engaged in
previously. Society is a complex network of patterns of relationships in which all the
members participate in varying degrees. These relationships change, and behaviour changes
at the same time. Individuals are faced with new situations to which they must respond.

These situations reflect such factors as new technologies, new ways of making a living,
changes in place of residence, and innovations, new ideas, and new social values. Thus,
social change means modifications in the way people work, rear a family, educate their
children, govern themselves, and seek ultimate meaning in life. It also refers to a
restructuring of the basic ways people in a society relate to each other with regard to
government, economics, education, religion, family life, recreation, language, and other
activities. Social change is a product of a multitude of factors and, in many cases, the
interrelationships among them.

The process of social change has four major characteristics:

1. Social change happens all the time: Some societies change faster than others.
Hunting and gathering societies change quite slowly; members of today’s high-
income societies, by contrast, experience significant change within a single lifetime. It
is also true that in a given society, some cultural elements change faster than
others. William Ogburn’s theory of cultural lag states that material culture (that is,
things) usually changes faster than non-material culture (ideas and attitudes). For
example, the genetic technology that allows scientists to alter and perhaps even create
life has developed more rapidly than our ethical standards for deciding when and how
to use the technology.
2. Social change is sometimes intentional but often it is unplanned: Industrial
societies actively promote many kinds of change. For example, scientists seek more
efficient forms of energy, and advertisers try to convince us that life is incomplete
without a 4G cell phone or the latest electronic gadget. Yet rarely can anyone envision
all the consequences of the changes that are set in motion. Back in 1900, when
countries still relied on horses/cattle for transportation, many people looked ahead to
motorized vehicles that would carry them in a single day distances that used to take
weeks or months. But no one could see how much the mobility provided by
automobiles would alter everyday life, scattering family members, threatening
the environment, and reshaping cities and suburbs.
3. Social change is controversial. The history of the automobile shows that social
change brings both good and bad consequences. Capitalists welcomed the Industrial
Revolution because new technology increased productivity and swelled profits.
However, workers feared that machines would make their skills obsolete and resisted
the push toward “progress.” Today, as in the past, changing patterns of social
interaction between black people and white people, women and men, and
homosexuals and heterosexuals are welcomed by some people and opposed by
others.
4. Some changes matter more than others: Some changes (such as clothing fads) have
only passing significance; others (like the invention of computers) may change the
world. Like the automobile and television, the computer has both positive and
negative effects, providing new kinds of jobs while eliminating old ones, linking
people in global electronic networks while isolating people in offices, offering vast
amounts of information while threatening personal privacy.

Factors of Change:

Cultural factors: The first main influence on social change consists of cultural factors,
which include the effects of religion, communication systems and leadership. Religion
may be either a conservative or an innovative force in social life. A particularly important
cultural influence that affects the character and pace of change is the nature of
communication systems. The invention of writing, for instance, allowed for the keeping
of records, making possible increased control of material resources and the development
of large-scale organizations. With the advent of the Internet, communication has become
much faster and distance is less of an obstacle. Individual leaders have had an enormous
 influence in world history. A leader capable of pursuing dynamic policies and generating
a mass following or radically altering pre-existing modes of thought can overturn a
previously established order.

Physical environment: The physical environment has an effect on the development of

Political organization: A third factor that strongly influences social change is the type of
political organization. In hunting and gathering societies, this influence is at a minimum,
since there are no political authorities capable of mobilizing the community. In all other
types of society, however, the existence of distinct political agencies - chiefs, lords, kings
and governments strongly affects the course of development a society takes.

Economic influences: Of economic influences, the most far reaching is the impact of
capitalism. Capitalism differs in a fundamental way from pre-existing production
systems, because it involves the constant expansion of production and the ever-
increasing accumulation of wealth. Capitalism promotes the constant revision of the
technology of production, a process into which science is increasingly drawn. The rate of
technological innovation fostered in modern industry is vastly greater than in any
previous type of economic order.

THEORIES OF SOCIAL CHANGE:

1. Evolutionary Theory:

The Law of three stages, theory of human intellectual development was propounded by the
French social theorist Auguste Comte. According to Comte, human societies moved
historically from a theological stage, in which the world and the place of humans within it
were explained in terms of gods, spirits, and magic; through a transitional metaphysical
stage, in which such explanations were based on abstract notions such as essences and final
causes; and finally to a modern, “positive” stage based on scientific knowledge. The law of
three stages was one of the two foundational ideas of Comte’s version of positivism (in
general, any philosophical system that confines itself to the data of experience and excludes a
priori or metaphysical speculations), the other being his thesis that the sciences emerged in
strict order, beginning with mathematics and astronomy, followed by physics,
chemistry, and biology, and culminating in the new science of sociology, to which Comte
was the first to ascribe the name.

There is a parallel, as Comte saw it, between the evolution of thought patterns in the entire
history of humankind, on the one hand, and in the history of an individual’s development
from infancy to adulthood, on the other. In the first, so-called theological, stage, natural
phenomena are explained as being the result of supernatural or divine powers. It matters not
whether the religion is polytheistic or monotheistic; in either case, miraculous powers or wills
are believed to produce the observed events. This stage was criticized by Comte as
anthropomorphic—i.e., as resting on all-too-human analogies.

The second phase, called metaphysical, is in some cases merely a depersonalized theology:
the observable processes of nature are assumed to arise from impersonal powers, occult
qualities, vital forces etc. In other instances, the realm of observable facts is considered as
an imperfect copy or imitation of eternal forms. Again, Comte charged that no genuine
explanations result: questions concerning ultimate reality, first causes, or absolute beginnings
are unanswerable.

The sort of fruitfulness lacking in the second phase can be achieved only in the third phase,
which is scientific, or “positive” because it claims to be concerned only with positive facts.
The task of the sciences, and of knowledge in general, is to study the facts and regularities of
nature and society and to formulate the regularities as (descriptive) laws; explanations of
phenomena can consist in no more than the subsuming of special cases under general
laws. Humankind reached full maturity of thought only after abandoning the pseudo-
explanations of the theological and metaphysical phases and substituting an unrestricted
adherence to scientific method.

Herbert Spencer: He is best remembered for his doctrine of social Darwinism, according to
which the principles of evolution, including natural selection, apply to human societies, social
classes, and individuals as well as to biological species developing over geologic time. In
Spencer’s day social Darwinism was invoked to justify laissez-faire economics and the
minimal state, which were thought to best promote unfettered competition between
individuals and the gradual improvement of society through the “survival of the fittest,” a
term that Spencer introduced. The weakest members of what he called a “race” have died out
in the process of human evolution. Meanwhile, the average fitness of a race has improved as
those surviving pass on their characteristics to future generations. One strong implication of
this argument is that humans have evolved as naturally competitive. Furthermore, social
care for the sick and weak should be strictly limited. Such care, particularly by governments,
would only stop the winnowing process and reverse the process of steady social
improvement. The fittest would thereby not survive and the stock of people would be
weakened and die out.

Spencer also displayed a linear conception of evolutionary stages. The degree of complexity
in society was the scale on which he measured progress. The trend of human societies was
from simple, undifferentiated wholes to complex and heterogeneous ones, where the
parts of the whole became more specialized but remained integrated. He worked with an
organic analogy. Spencer compared society to the human body. Just as the structural parts of
the human body—the skeleton, muscles, and various internal organs—function
interdependently to help the entire organism survive, social structures work together to
preserve society.

2. Cyclical Theories:

In contrast to evolutionary theories, cyclical theories proposed that civilizations rise and fall
in an endless series of cycles.

Oswald Spengler divided world history into eight autonomous "cultural organisms":
Egyptian, Mesopotamian, Hindu, Chinese, Classical, Arabian, Mayan, and Western.
Each of the first seven, Spengler believed, began with the stage of "primitivism," achieved
maturity during the period of "culture," and finally reached the age of "civilization" which,
dominated by wars and metropolitan centers, led the "cultural organism" to an animal-like
existence, and death. The same cycle, according to Spengler, will also be followed by the
West, which will inevitably enter the last phase during the twenty-second century. Thus,
like any organism, a culture also passes through a life-cycle of birth, youth, maturity, old age
and death.

Arnold Toynbee also believed that civilizations rise and fall but these processes are not
always a result of life cycle changes. Rather it. These challenges may come from the natural
environment or human actions. Toynbee asserted that "civilization is not an organism. It is
a “product of wills". According to him, during the first period of each cycle, the
geographical factor constitutes the most influential force. Thus, Toynbee underestimates
man's role and, furthermore, does not explain how dissimilar historical developments may
occur under similar geographical conditions. At any rate, he attempts to interpret social
change in terms of the interaction between two phenomena which he terms "challenge"
and "response." Of these, "challenge" may be environmental or ideological. Thus, the
survival of a society depends on the kind of challenges that it faces and the way it responds to
these challenges.

3. Functional Theory:

Functionalists see the society as a system of equilibrium. Since all parts of a society are
inter-related and inter-dependent, a change in any one part of the society leads to
simultaneous changes in other parts. The structural-functional approach is a framework
for building theory that sees society as a complex system whose parts work together to
promote solidarity and stability. As its name suggests, this approach points to social
structure, any relatively stable pattern of social behaviour. Social structure gives our lives
shape—in families, the workplace, the classroom, and the community. This approach also
looks for a structure’s social functions, the consequences of any social pattern for the
operation of society as a whole. All social structures, from a simple handshake to complex
religious rituals, function to keep society going, at least in its present form.

In functionalist theory, the different parts of society are primarily composed of social
institutions, each designed to fill different needs. Family, government, economy, media,
education, and religion are important to understanding this theory and the core institutions
that define sociology. According to functionalism, an institution only exists because it
serves a vital role in the functioning of society. If it no longer serves a role, an institution
will die away. When new needs evolve or emerge, new institutions will be created to meet
them. From the functionalist perspective, if all goes well, the parts of society produce
order, stability, and productivity. If all does not go well, the parts of society must adapt to
produce new forms of order, stability, and productivity.

Functionalism emphasizes the consensus and order that exist in society, focusing on social
stability and shared public values. From this perspective, disorganization in the system, such
as deviant behavior, leads to change because societal components must adjust to achieve
stability. When one part of the system is dysfunctional, it affects all other parts and
creates social problems, prompting social change.
Many sociologists have critiqued functionalism because of its neglect of the often negative
implications of social order. Some critics, claim that the perspective justifies the status
quo and the process of cultural hegemony that maintains it. Functionalism does not
encourage people to take an active role in changing their social environment, even when
doing so may benefit them. Instead, functionalism sees agitating for social change as
undesirable because the various parts of society will compensate in a seemingly organic
way for any problems that may arise.

4. Conflict Theory:

The social-conflict approach is a framework for building theory that sees society as an arena
of inequality that generates conflict and change. Unlike the structural-functional emphasis on
solidarity and stability, this approach highlights inequality and change. Social-conflict theory
focuses on competition between groups. Whereas functionalists focus on balance and
stability within a social system, conflict theorists view society as comprised of social
relations characterized by inequality and change.

A conflict analysis rejects the idea that social structure promotes the operation of society as a
whole, focusing instead on how social patterns benefit some people while hurting others.
According to conflict theorists, groups are constantly competing for unequally distributed
resources, such as wealth and power, with each group seeking to benefit their own
interests. In this scenario, one or a few groups control these resources at the expense of
others. Thus, these theorists look at social structures and ask, “Who benefits?” This constant
conflict between groups also results in social change.

Marx observed inequality throughout the growing capitalist society. The economics of
capitalism, he felt, resulted in social classes that were constantly in competition for
society’s limited resources. Marx saw rich factory owners who obtained their wealth from
the labor of factory workers who were paid little, often toiled long hours in dangerous
conditions, and frequently lived in crowded and unhealthy spaces. Society, as Marx saw it,
was an ongoing struggle between the classes: the “haves” (the factory owners) and the
“have nots” (the workers).

Sociologists using the social-conflict approach look at ongoing conflict between dominant
and disadvantaged categories of people— the rich in relation to the poor, white people in
relation to people of colour, and men in relation to women. Typically, people on top of the
social hierarchy try to protect their privileges while the disadvantaged try to gain more
for themselves.
Conflict theory states that tensions and conflicts arise when resources, status, and power are
unevenly distributed between groups in society and that these conflicts become the engine for
social change. In this context, power can be understood as control of material resources and
accumulated wealth, control of politics and the institutions that make up society, and one's
social status relative to others (determined not just by class but by race, gender, sexuality,
culture, and religion, among other things).