Copyright 2012, SAGE Publications, Inc.

Chapter 1

An Introduction to Sociology in the Global Age

Copyright 2012, SAGE Publications, Inc.

Sociology

• The systematic study of the ways in which people are affected by, and affect, the social structures and social processes that are associated with the groups, organizations, cultures, societies, and world in which they exist

Copyright 2012, SAGE Publications, Inc.

The Changing Nature of the World –and Sociology

• 18th and 19th centuries: Industrial Revolution• Sociologists focused on factories, production,

and blue collar workers.

• Mid-20th century: Post-Industrial Age• Sociologists focused on offices, bureaucracies,

and white collar workers.

• Present day: The Information Age• Sociologists focus on knowledge, information,

and technologies.

Copyright 2012, SAGE Publications, Inc.

Central Concerns for a 21st-Century Sociologist: Globalization

• No social change today is as important as globalization.

• Globalization is a central issue in sociology as well as the social world.

• Globalization is defined by increasingly fluid global flows and the structures that expedite and impede these flows.

Copyright 2012, SAGE Publications, Inc.

Central Concerns for a 21st-Century Sociologist: Globalization

• Positives• Greater access to goods, services, and

information throughout the world

• Negatives• Undesirable things (diseases, illegal drugs)

flow more easily around the world.

Copyright 2012, SAGE Publications, Inc.

Central Concerns for a 21st-Century Sociologist: Consumption

• The process by which people obtain and utilize goods and services

• As consumption increased so did the proliferation of credit cards and, predictably, credit card debt.

• Consumption and globalization are deeply intertwined.

Copyright 2012, SAGE Publications, Inc.

Central Concerns for a 21st-Century Sociologist: The Digital World

• Sociologists have always been interested in the social aspects of technology.

• Technology: the interplay of machines, tools, skills, and procedures for the accomplishment of tasks

Copyright 2012, SAGE Publications, Inc.

Central Concerns for a 21st-Century Sociologist: The Digital World

• Sociologists have tracked the evolution of technology, from assembly lines to automated factories to the digital world (computers, cell phones, and the Internet).

• Social networking and multitasking

Copyright 2012, SAGE Publications, Inc.

Globalization, Consumption, the Digital World and You

• College students have fellow students and professors from other parts of the world.

• You shop on the Internet.

• An increasing portion of your education is obtained through the Internet.

Copyright 2012, SAGE Publications, Inc.

Sociology: Continuity and Change• The Sociological Imagination says that

sociologists have a distinctive way of looking at the world.

• C. Wright Mills (1959) argued that sociologists have a unique perspective.

Copyright 2012, SAGE Publications, Inc.

The Sociological Imagination

• Private Troubles and Public Issues

• Increasing levels of consumption and debt (private trouble) morphed into a near collapse of the global economy (public issue).

• Will fleeting electronic social relationships (via Facebook and Twitter) lead all types of social relationships in the future?

Copyright 2012, SAGE Publications, Inc.

The Sociological Imagination: The Micro Relationship

• Micro-small scale• Individual thoughts and actions

• Macro-large scale• Groups, organizations, cultures, society, and

the world

Copyright 2012, SAGE Publications, Inc.

The Sociological Imagination: The Micro Relationship

• Karl Marx (1818-1883) was interested in what workers thought and did (micro) and the capitalist economic system (macro).

• Randall Collins (2009) has sought to develop a theory of violence that deals with individuals skilled in violent interactions (micro) and material resources used by violent organizations (macro).

Copyright 2012, SAGE Publications, Inc.

The Sociological Imagination: The Agency-Structure Relationship

• Agency is the micro level; structure is the macro level.

• Agency gives priority to the agent having power and a capacity for creativity.

• Agents both create and are constrained by social and cultural structures.

Copyright 2012, SAGE Publications, Inc.

The Social Construction of Reality• This approach argues that agents (people

at the micro level) create social reality.

• For example, designers (agents) create the world of fashion.

Copyright 2012, SAGE Publications, Inc.

Structure and Process

• Social structures are enduring and regular social arrangements (a shopping mall).• These change very slowly.

• Social processes are aspects of the social world (shopping).• These change rapidly.

Copyright 2012, SAGE Publications, Inc.

Sociology’s Purpose: Science or Social Reform?

• The scientific view states that examining the relationship between structure and process should be a purely scientific endeavor.

• The social reform view states that as these relationships are discovered, this knowledge should be used to solve social problems.

Copyright 2012, SAGE Publications, Inc.

Sociology, the Other Sciences, and Common Sense

• Sociology, with its emphasis on studying various aspects of the social world, is one of the social sciences.

• Sociology, generally speaking, is the broadest of these fields.

Copyright 2012, SAGE Publications, Inc.

The Other Sciences and Globalization

• Anthropology: studies cultural aspects of societies around the world

• Communications: studies mediated and nonmediated communication across the globe

• Economics: examines production, distribution, and consumption of resources through markets across the globe

Copyright 2012, SAGE Publications, Inc.

The Other Sciences and Globalization

• Geography: mapping of spatial relationships on a global scale

• Political Science: nation-states

• Psychology: ways in which individual identities are shaped by awareness of the rest of the world