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JAMIA MILLIA ISLAMIA

NEW DELHI

NAME:- RAHUL GUPTA


FIRST YEAR (B.A. LLB) REGULAR BATCH

PROJECT WORK OF SOCIOLOGY

TOPIC:- THEORIES OF ORIGIN OF SOCIETY

GUIDED BY :- RASHEED SIR


Introduction
In this assignment I have discussed about the definition of society given by some
sociologist and origin of societies and comparison.

DEFINITION OF SOCIETY
A society is a group of people involved in persistent social interaction, or a large
social group sharing the same geographical or social territory, typically subject to
the same political authority and dominant cultural expectations. The aggregate of
people living together in a more or less ordered community.

Linton: Any group of people who have lived and worked together long enough to
get themselves organized and to think of themselves as a social unit with well
defined limits".

A.W. Green: It is the largest group in which individual have relationships.

Maclver: It is a web of social relationship, which is always changing.

Adam Smith: Society is an artificial device of Natural economy.

Prof Wright: It is a system of relationships that exists among the individuals of


the groups.

The Origin of Society:

A number of theories have been put forward to explain the origin of society. Thus
the Divine Origin theory makes society the creation of God. Just as God created all
the animals and inanimate objects of this world, so he created the society as well.
This theory in course of time, particularly in the sixteenth and seventeenth
centuries took the form of Divine Right Theory.

The Force theory makes society the result of superior physical force. According to
this theory, the society originated in the subjugation of the weaker by the
stronger. In the primitive times the man of exceptional physical strength was able
to overawe his fellowmen and to exercise some kind of authority over them.

Thus through physical coercion or compulsion men were brought together and
made to live in society. The Patriarchal and Matriarchal theories make society the
expansion of family system. Sir Henry Maine defines patriarchal theory as ‘the
theory of the origin of society in separate families, held together by the authority
and protection of the eldest male descendant’.

He believed that society is the family writ large. The matriarchal theory suggests
that polyandry and transient marriage relations were more common in primitive
times than monogamy or polygamy. Under such circumstances descendance is
traced through the mother for, as Jens point out motherhood in such cases is a
fact, while paternity is only an opinion.

Theories of origin of society


There are many theories to explain the origin of society. Many researchers have
propounded their theories to explain how the society was originated. Some of the
theories that explain the origin of society are Divine origin theory, The force
theory, Patriarchal and Matriarchal theories, Social contract theory and
Evolutionary theory.

Divine origin theory: According to this theory, the creation of society was due
to god just as be created the animate and inanimate objects of the world.

The force theory: According to this theory the society is the result of superior
physical forces. The society originated by the congress of the weaker by the
strengthen.
In the primitive times the man of exceptional physical strength was able to
control his fellowmen and exercise some kind of authority over them. Thus the
physical coercion men were brought together and made to live in society.

Patriarchal and Matriarchal Theories: The patriarchal system where the


authority and administration lies on values and matriarchal system when the
authority and administration lies on female developed the groups and there by
evolved societies.

Social contract theory: This theory was proposed by Thomas Hubbes.


According to this theory, all men were born free and equal individuals made a
mutual agreement and created society. To protect himself against the evil
consequences man organised himself in society in order to live in peace with all.

Evolutionary theory: According to this theory society is not a make but a


growth it is the result of a gradual evaluation. It is a continuous development
from unorganized to organised, from less perfect to more perfect. Various factors
helped in its development from time to time. Kinship and family were the earliest
bonds unities man with man. Kinship creates society.

The society emerged spontaneously and followed its own line of development. It
passed through several stages of evaluation before reaching its modern complex
form. According to Comte, the society has passed through these stages the
theological, the meta physical and the positive. In his view, society came into
being as result of a need for association, a felt need of human beings which
evolved in accordance with definite law. According to Herbert Spencer, human
society has advanced from a savage state to a civilized state. He marked out three
stages, the primitive, the militant and the industrial in the course of social
evolution.

The kinds of theories we’re interested in for understanding schools are those that
attempt to explain why societies have the features they do. I’m going to describe
three kinds of theories of society, three general ways to make sense of the world
around us. When someone tells a story about why things are the way they are,
that story will usually fit into one or another of these three categories.

Functionalism
Functionalist theories assume the different parts of a society each have their own
role to play (their own "function"), and work together smoothly in order to form a
harmonious whole. The metaphor often used to describe functionalism is that it
views society as a body, with the different parts of society—government, media,
religion, the family, etc., and, of course, schools—being like the different organs
in a body, each contributing in a different way to keeping the entire body healthy.

Functionalism assumes that the various institutions of a society always operate so


as to support that society as it is. If they didn’t, the society would perish;
therefore, functionalism believes, it’s safe to assume that they do in any society
one may encounter, for otherwise the society would no longer be here for us to
study.

The early sociologist Emile Durkheim is often associated with functionalism. You
may recall that in our first class meeting, during the discussion of the purpose of
education, I mentioned that Durkheim had said the purpose of education is not
the same across all societies, but that its purpose in any given society will instead
be whatever it needs to be in order to maintain that society. That’s clearly a
functionalist sentiment.

Liberal/Enlightenment theory
A second general perspective is sometimes called Liberal theory or Enlightenment
theory. It’s important to distinguish the term "liberal" as used here from the way
it’s used in everyday language to describe where someone resides on the left-
right political spectrum (i.e., to mean the opposite of "conservative"). Here it
refers to "classical" liberalism—liberal political theory as expressed by Thomas
Hobbes, John Locke, Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Adam Smith, the American founding
fathers, etc. (The closest equivalent on the contemporary scene would probably
be the libertarians.) Liberal and Enlightenment thinkers emphasize freedom of the
individual (same root as "liberate"), the priority of reason over religious or
hereditary authority, and social progress. Free individuals, they believe, guided by
their powers of rational thought, will, over time, accumulate greater knowledge
and wisdom, and form societies that inevitably become more prosperous,
humane, and egalitarian. The future will be better than the past.

If any one perspective can be said to form the basis of what’s considered
"common sense" in American culture, it’s this one. That does not necessarily
mean, however, that it is an accurate description of American society.
Liberal/Enlightenment thinking has a hard time explaining some of the less savory
aspects of our history. The spread of justice and equality has not been steady,
enjoyed equally by all residents of the nation, or automatic. It has involved—
despite the popular mythology—setbacks, advances for some that came at the
expense of others, and considerable struggle among competing factions. Which
brings us to...

Conflict theory
In contrast to the consensus orientation of the other two perspectives, conflict
theories view society as composed of distinct groups with opposing interests, and
view social change as resulting from struggle among those groups. Different
varieties of conflict theory recognize different kinds of divisions, but all view
society as fundamentally characterized by conflict rather than consensus. Marxist
conflict theorists see society as divided into classes, with owners and workers
having opposing interests; feminist conflict theorists see society as divided by
gender, with women generally being less privileged than men; anti-racist conflict
theorists emphasize conflict across racial lines; anti-imperialist conflict theorists
emphasize global conflict between wealthy and poor nations; etc.

From the perspective of a conflict theorist, functionalism and


Liberal/Enlightenment theory both attempt to sweep social divisions under the
rug. A conflict theorist would say that by claiming existing social arrangements
work to everyone’s benefit (functionalism), or current deficiencies will diminish
automatically over time as we grow more enlightened (Liberal/Enlightenment),
the other two perspectives obscure the power imbalances between groups within
the society and discourage the oppressed from recognizing their relative
disadvantage and doing something about it. In short, from this perspective, rather
than helping clarify how society works, the other two function as ideologies that
cloud the minds of the less powerful, inducing them to accept society as it exists.

Comparison
As illustrated in the chart , functionalism and Liberal/Enlightenment theory share
an assumption of consensus, an assumption that all members of a society have
common interests and generally concur with the direction the society takes,
whereas conflict theory assumes the opposite, that various groups have
conflicting interests and that historical developments are determined by that
conflict.

Meanwhile, there’s also something that Liberal/Enlightenment theory and conflict


theory share: both find it easier to explain social change, when it occurs, than
social stability. Liberal/Enlightenment theory asserts that progress and general
improvement is the natural state of society, and in conflict theory the dynamism
of ongoing conflict provides the impetus for change. But neither does very well at
explaining stability, at explaining why things don’t change any more than they do,
why social features last to the extent they do. Functionalism, on the other hand,
does well at explaining continuity, assuming, as it does, that stability is the natural
state of society. What it has trouble with is explaining change, why anything ever
changes at all.

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