Society: Its Origin and Development Part 1

Society.

by Henry Kalloch Rowe.

PREFACE

In studying biology it is convenient to make cross-sections of laboratory specimens in order to determine structure, and to watch plants and animals grow in order to determine function. There seems to be no good reason why social life should not be studied in the same way. To take a child in the home and watch it grow in the midst of the life of the family, the community, and the larger world, and to cut across group life so as to see its characteristics, its interests, and its organization, is to study sociology in the most natural way and to obtain the necessary data for generalization. To attempt to study sociological principles without this preliminary investigation is to confuse the student and leave him in a sea of vague abstractions.

It is not because of a lack of appreciation of the abstract that the emphasis of this book is on the concrete. It is written as an introduction to the study of the principles of sociology, and it may well be used as a prelude to the various social sciences. It is natural that trained sociologists should prefer to discuss the profound problems of their science, and should plunge their pupils into material for study where they are soon beyond their depth; much of current life seems so obvious and so simple that it is easy to forget that the college man or woman has never looked upon it with a discriminating eye or with any attempt to understand its meaning. If this is true of the college student, it is unquestionably true of the men and women of the world. The writer believes that there is need of a simple, untechnical treatment of human society, and offers this book as a contribution to the practical side of social science. He writes with the undergraduate continually in mind, trying to see through his eyes and to think with his mind, and the references are to books that will best meet his needs and that are most readily accessible. It is expected that the pupil will read widely, and that the instructor will show how principles and laws are formulated from the mult.i.tude of observations of social phenomena. The last section of the book sums up briefly some of the scientific conclusions that are drawn from the concrete data, and prepares the way for a more detailed and technical study.

If sociology is to have its rightful place in the world it must become a science for the people. It must not be permitted to remain the possession of an aristocracy of intellect. The heart of thousands of social workers who are trying to reform society and cure its ills is throbbing with sympathy and hope, but there is much waste of energy and misdirection of zeal because of a lack of understanding of the social life that they try to cure. They and the people to whom they minister need an interpretation of life in social terms that they can understand. Professional persons of all kinds need it. A world that is on the verge of despair because of the breakdown of harmonious human relations needs it to rea.s.sure itself of the value and the possibility of normal human relations. Doubtless the presentation of the subject is imperfect, but if it meets the need of those who find difficulty in using more technical discussions and opens up a new field of interest to many who hitherto have not known the difference between sociology and socialism, the effort at interpretation will have been worth while.

HENRY K. ROWE

NEWTON CENTRE, Ma.s.sACHUSETTS.

SOCIETY: ITS ORIGIN AND DEVELOPMENT

PART I--INTRODUCTORY

CHAPTER I

CHARACTERISTICS OF SOCIAL LIFE

1. =Man and His Social Relations.=--A study of society starts with the obvious fact that human beings live together. The hermit is abnormal.

However far back we go in the process of human evolution we find the existence of social relations, and sociability seems a quality ingrained in human nature. Every individual has his own personality that belongs to him apart from every other individual, but the perpetuation and development of that personality is dependent on relations with other personalities and with the physical environment which limits his activity.

As an individual his primary interest is in self, but he finds by experience that he cannot be independent of others. His impulses, his feelings, and his ideas are due to the relations that he has with that which is outside of himself. He may exercise choice, but it is within the limits set by these outside relations. He may make use of what they can do for him or he may antagonize them, at least he cannot ignore them. Experience determines how the individual may best adapt himself to his environment and adapt the environment to his own needs, and he thus establishes certain definite relationships. Any group of individuals, who have thus consciously established relationships with one another and with their social environment is a society. The relations through whose channels the interplay of social forces is constantly going on make up the social organization. The readjustments of these relations for the better adaptation of one individual to another, or of either to their environment, make up the process of social development. A society which remains in equilibrium is termed static, that which is changing is called dynamic.

2. =The Field and the Purpose of Sociology.=--Life in society is the subject matter of sociological study. Sociology is concerned with the origin and development of that life, with its present forms and activities, and with their future development. It finds its material in the every-day experiences of men, women, and children in whatever stage of progress they may be; but for practical purposes its chief interest is in the normal life of civilized communities, together with the past developments and future prospects of that life. The purpose of sociological study is to discover the active workings and controlling principles of life, its essential meaning, and its ultimate goal; then to apply the principles, laws, and ideals discovered to the imperfect social process that is now going on in the hope of social betterment.

3. =Source Material for Study.=--The source material of social life lies all about us. For its past history we must explore the primitive conduct of human beings as we learn it from anthropology and archaeology, or as we infer it from the lowest human races or from animal groups that bear the nearest physical and mental resemblance to mankind. For present phenomena we have only to look about us, and having seen to attempt their interpretation. Life is mirrored in the daily press. Pick up any newspaper and examine its contents. It reveals social characteristics both local and wide-spread.

4. =Social Characteristics--Activity.=--The first fact that stands out clearly as a characteristic of social life is _activity_. Everybody seems to be doing something. There are a few among the population, like vagrants and the idle rich, who are parasites, but even they sustain relations to others that require a certain sort of effort.

Activity seems fundamental. It needs but a hasty survey to show how general it is. Farmers are cultivating their broad acres, woodsmen are chopping and hewing in the forest, miners are drilling in underground chambers, and the products of farm, forest, and mine are finding their way by river, road, and rail to the great distributing centres. In the town the machinery of mill and factory keeps busy thousands of operatives, and turns out manufactured products to compete with the products of the soil for right of way to the cities of the New World and the Old. Busiest of all are the throngs that thread the streets of the great centres, and pour in and out of stores and offices. Men rush from one person to another, and interview one after another the business houses with which they maintain connection; women swarm about the counters of the department stores and find at the same time social satisfaction and pecuniary reward; children in hundreds pour into the intellectual hopper of the schoolroom and from there to the playground. Everybody is busy, and everybody is seeking personal profit and satisfaction.

5. =Mental Activity.=--There is another kind of activity of which these economic and social phases are only the outward expression, an activity of the mind which is busy continually adjusting the needs of the individual or social organism and the environment to each other.

Some acts are so instinctive or habitual that they do not require conscious mental effort; others are the result of reasoning as to this or that course of action. The impulse of the farmer may be to remain inactive, or the schoolboy may feel like going fishing; the call of nature stimulates the desire; but reason reaches out and takes control and directs outward activity into proper channels. On the other hand, reason fortifies worthy inclinations. The youth feels an inclination to stretch his muscles or to use his brains, and reason re-enforces feeling. The physical need of food, clothing, and shelter acts as a goad to drive a man to work, and reason sanctions his natural response. This mental activity guides not only individual human conduct but also that of the group. Instinct impels the man to defend his family from hardship or his clan from defeat, and reason confirms the impulse. His sociable disposition urges him to co-operate in industry, and reason sanctions his inclination. The history of society reveals an increasing influence of the intellect in thus directing instinct and feeling. It is a law of social activity that it tends to become more rational with the increase of education and experience.

But it is never possible to determine the quant.i.tative influence of the various factors that enter into a decision, or to estimate the relative pressure of the forces that urge to activity. Alike in mental and in physical activity there is a union of all the causative factors. In an act of the will impulse, feeling, and reflection all have their part; in physical activity it is difficult to determine how compelling is any one of the various forces, such as heredity and environment, that enter into the decision.

6. =The Valuation of Social Activities.=--The importance to society of all these activities is not to be measured by their scope or by their vigor or volume, but by the efficiency with which they perform their function, and the value of the end they serve. Domestic activities, such as the care of children, may be restricted to the home, and a woman's career may seem to be blighted thereby, but no more important work can be accomplished than the proper training of the child.

Political activity may be national in scope, but if it is vitiated by corrupt practices its value is greatly diminished. Certain activities carry with them no important results, because they have no definite function, but are sporadic and temporary, like the coming together of groups in the city streets, mingling in momentary excitement and dissolving as quickly.

The true valuation of activities is to be determined by their social utility. The employment of working men in the brewing of beer or the manufacture of chewing-gum may give large returns to an individual or a corporation, but the social utility of such activity is small.

Business enterprise is naturally self-centred; the first interest of every individual or group is self-preservation, and business must pay for itself and produce a surplus for its owner or it is not worth continuing from the economic standpoint; but a business enterprise has no right selfishly to disregard the interests of its employees and of the public. Its social value must be reckoned as small or great, not by the amount of business carried on, but by its contribution to human welfare.

Take a department store as an ill.u.s.tration. It may be highly profitable to its owners, giving large returns on the investment, while distributing cheap and defective goods and paying its employees less than a decent living wage. Its value is to be determined as small because its social utility is of little worth. When the value of activity is estimated on this basis, it will be seen that among the n.o.blest activities are those of the philanthropist who gives his time and interest without stint to the welfare of other folk; of the minister who lends himself to spiritual ministry, and the physician who gives up his own comfort and sometimes his own life to save those who are physically ill; of the housewife who bears and rears children and keeps the home as her willing contribution to the life of the world; and of the nurses, companions, and teachers who are mothers, sisters, and wives to those who need their help.

7. =Results of Activity.=--The product of activity is achievement. The workers of the world are continually transforming energy into material products. To clear away a forest, to raise a thousand bushels of grain, to market a herd of cattle or a car-load of shoes, to build a sky-sc.r.a.per or an ocean liner, is an achievement. But it is a greater achievement to take a child mind and educate it until it learns how to cultivate the soil profitably, how to make a machine or a building of practical value, and how to save and enrich life.

The history of human folk shows that achievement has been gradual, and much of it without conscious planning, but the great inventors, the great architects, the great statesmen have been men of vision, and definite purpose is sure to fill a larger place in the story of achievement. Purposive progress rather than unconscious, telic rather than genetic, is the order of the evolution of society.

The highest achievement of the race is its moral uplift. The man or woman who has a n.o.ble or kindly thought, who has consecrated life to unselfish ends and has spent constructive effort for the common good, is the true prince among men. He may be a leader upon whom the common people rely in time of stress, or only a private in the ranks--he is a hero, for his achievement is spiritual, and his mastery of the inner life is his supreme victory.

8. =a.s.sociation.=--A second characteristic of social life is that activity is not the activity of isolated individuals, but it is _activity in a.s.sociation_. Human beings work together, play together, talk together, worship together, fight together. If they happen to act alone, they are still closely related to one another. Examine the daily newspaper record and see how few items have to do with individuals acting in isolation. Even if a person sits down alone to think, his mind is working along the line on which it received the push of another mind shortly before. A large part of the work of the world is done in concert. The ship and the train have their crew, the factory its hands, the city police and fire departments their force.

Men shout together on the ball field, and sing folk-songs in chorus.

As an audience they listen to the play or the sermon, as a mob they rush the jail to lynch a prisoner, or as a crowd they riot in high carnival on Mardi Gras. The normal individual belongs to a family, a community, a political party, a nation; he may belong, besides, to a church, a few learned societies, a trade-union, or any number of clubs or fraternities.

Human beings a.s.sociate because they possess common interests and means of intercourse. They are affected by the same needs. They have the power to think in the same grooves and to feel a common sympathy.

Members of the same race or community have a common fund of custom or tradition; they are conscious of like-mindedness in morals and religion; they are subject to the same kind of mental suggestion; they have their own peculiar language and literature. As communication between different parts of the world improves and ability to speak in different languages increases, there comes a better understanding among the world's peoples and an increase of mutual sympathy.

Experience has taught the value of a.s.sociation. By it the individual makes friends, gains in knowledge, enlarges interests. Knowing this, he seeks acquaintances, friends, and companions. He finds the world richer because of family, community, and national life, and if necessary he is willing to sacrifice something of his own comfort and peace for the advantages that these a.s.sociations will bring.

9. =Causes of a.s.sociation.=--It is the nature of human beings to enjoy company, to be curious about what they see and hear, to talk together, and to imitate one another. These traits appear in savages and even in animals, and they are not outgrown with advance in civilization. These inborn instincts are modified or re-enforced by the conscious workings of the mind, and are aided or restricted by external circ.u.mstances. It is a natural instinct for men to seek a.s.sociates. They feel a liking for one and a dislike for another, and select their friends accordingly. But the choice of most men is within a restricted field, for their acquaintance is narrow. College men are thrown with a certain set or join a certain fraternity. They play on the same team or belong to the same cla.s.s. They may have chosen their college, but within that inst.i.tution their environment is limited. It is similar in the world at large. Individuals do not choose the environment in which at first they find themselves, and the majority cannot readily change their environment. Within its natural limits and the barriers which caste or custom have fixed, children form their play groups according to their liking for each other, and adults organize their societies according to their mutual interests or common beliefs. With increasing acquaintance and ease of communication and transportation there comes a wider range of choice, and environment is less controlling. The will of the individual becomes freer to choose friends and a.s.sociates wherever he finds them. He may have widely scattered business and political connections. He may be a member of an international a.s.sociation. He may even take a wife from another city or a distant nation. Mental interaction flows in international channels.

10. =Forms of a.s.sociation.=--It is possible to cla.s.sify all forms of a.s.sociation in two groups as natural, like a gang of boys, or artificial, like a political party. Or it is possible to arrange them according to the interests they serve, as economic, scientific, and the like. Again they may be cla.s.sified according to thoroughness of organization, ranging from the crowd to the closely knit corporation.

But whatever the form may be, the value of the a.s.sociation is to be judged according to the degree of social worth, as in the case of activities. On that basis a company of gladiators or a pugilist's club ranks below a village improvement society; that in turn yields in importance to a learned a.s.sociation of physicians discussing the best means of relieving human suffering. In the slow process of social evolution those forms that do not contribute to the welfare of the race will lose their place in society.

11. =Results of a.s.sociation.=--The results of a.s.sociation are among the permanent a.s.sets of the race. Man has become what he is because of his social relations, and further progress is dependent upon them. The arts that distinguish man from his inferiors are the products of inter-communication and co-operation. The art of conversation and the accompanying interchange of ideas and thought stimulus are to be numbered among the benefits. The art of conciliation that calms ruffled tempers and softens conflict belongs here. The art of co-operation, that great engine of achievement, depends on learning through social contact how to think and feel sympathetically. Finally, there is the product of social organization. Chance meetings and temporary a.s.semblies are of small value, though they must be noted as phenomena of a.s.sociation. More important are the fixed inst.i.tutions that have grown out of relations continually tested by experience until they have become sanctioned by society as indispensable. Such are the organized forms of business, education, government, and religion. But all groups require organization of a sort. The gang has its recognized leader, the club its officers and by-laws. Even such antisocial persons as outlaws frequently move in bands and have their chiefs. Organization goes far to determine success in war or politics, in work or play. Like achievement, organization is the result of a gradual growth in collective experience, and must be continually adapted to the changing requirements of successive periods by the wisdom of master minds. It must also gradually include larger groups within its scope until, like the International Young Men's Christian a.s.sociation or the Universal Postal Union, it reaches out to the ends of the earth.

12. =Control.=--The public mirror of the press reveals a third characteristic of social life. Activity and a.s.sociation are both under _control_. Activity would result in exploitation of the weak by the strong, and finally in anarchy, if there were no exercise of control.

Under control activities are co-ordinated, individuals and cla.s.ses are brought to work in co-operation and not in antagonism, and under an enlightened and sanctioned authority life becomes richer, fuller, and more truly free.

Social control begins in the individual mind. Instincts and feelings are held in the leash of rational thought. Intelligence is the guide to action. Control is exerted externally upon the individual from early childhood. Parental authority checks the independence of the child and compels conformity to the will of his elders. Family tradition makes its power felt in many homes, and family pride is a compelling reason for moral rect.i.tude. Every member of the family is restrained by the rights of the others, and often yields his own preferences for the common good. When the child goes out from the home he is still under restraint, and rigid regulations become even more p.r.o.nounced. The rules of the schoolroom permit little freedom. The teacher's authority is absolute during the hours when school is in session. In the city when school hours are over there are munic.i.p.al regulations enforced by watchful police that restrict the activity of a boy in the streets, and if he visits the playground he is still under the reign of law. Similarly the adult is hedged about by social control. Custom decrees that he must dress appropriately for the street, that he must pa.s.s to the right when he meets another person, and that he must raise his hat to an acquaintance of the opposite s.e.x.

The college youth finds it necessary to acquaint himself with the customs and traditions that have been handed down from cla.s.s to cla.s.s, and these must be observed under pain of ostracism. Faculty and trustees stand in the way of his unlimited enjoyment. His moral standards are affected by the atmosphere of the chapter house, the athletic field, and the examination hall. In business and civil relations men find themselves compelled to recognize laws that have been formulated for the public good. State and national governments have been able to a.s.sert successfully their right to control corporate action, however large and powerful the corporation might be. But government itself is subject to the will of the people in a democratic nation, and public opinion sways officials and determines local and national policies. Religious beliefs have the force of law upon whole peoples like the Mohammedans.

Social control is exercised in large measure without the mailed fist.

Moral suasion tends to supersede the birch stick and the policeman's billy. Within limits there is freedom of action, and the tacit appeal of society is to a man's self-control. But the newspaper with its sensation and police-court gossip never lets us forget that back of self-control is the court of judicial authority and the bar of public opinion.

The result of the constant exercise of control is the existence of order. The normal individual becomes accustomed to restraint from his earliest years, and it is only the few who are disorderly in the schoolroom, on the streets, or in the broader relations of life.

Criminals make up a small part of the population; anarchy never has appealed to many as a social philosophy; unconventional people are rare enough to attract special attention.

13. =Change.=--A fourth characteristic of social life is _change_.

Control tends to keep society static, but there are powerful dynamic forces that are continually upsetting the equilibrium. In spite of the natural conservatism of inst.i.tutions and agencies of control, group life is as continually changing as the physical elements in nature.

Continued observation recorded over a considerable period of time reveals changing habits, changing occupations, changing interests, even changing laws and governments. Inside the group individuals are continually readjusting their modes of thought and activity to one another, and between groups there is a similar adjustment of social habits. Without such change there can be no progress. War or other catastrophe suddenly alters wide human relations. External influences are constantly making their impression upon us, stimulating us to higher attainment or dragging us down to individual and group degeneration.

14. =Causes of Change.=--The factors that enter into social life to produce change are numerous. Conflict of ideas among individuals and groups compels frequent readjustment of thought. The free expression of opinion in public debate and through the press is a powerful factor. Travel alters modes of conduct, and wholesale migration changes the characteristics of large groups of population. Family habits change with acc.u.mulation of wealth or removal from the farm to the city. The introduction of the telephone and the free mail delivery with its magazines and daily newspapers has altered currents of thought in the country. Summer visitors have introduced country and city to each other; the automobile has enlarged the horizon of thousands. New modes of agriculture have been adopted through the influence of a state agricultural college, new methods of education through a normal school, new methods of church work through a theological seminary. Whole peoples, as in China and Turkey, have been profoundly affected by forces that compelled change. Growth in population beyond comfortable means of subsistence has set tribes in motion; the need of wider markets has compelled nations to try forcible expansion into disputed areas. The desire for larger opportunities has sent millions of emigrants from Europe to America, and has been changing rapidly the complexion of the crowds that walk the city streets and enter the polling booths. Certain outstanding personalities have moulded life and thought through the centuries, and have profoundly changed whole regions of country. Mohammed and Confucius put their personal stamp upon the Orient; Caesar and Napoleon made and remade western Europe; Adam Smith and Darwin swayed economic and scientific England; Washington and Lincoln were makers of America.

Through such social processes as these--through unconscious suggestion, through communication and discussion that mould public opinion, through changes in environment and the influence of new leaders of thought and action--the evolution of folk life has carried whole races, sometimes to oblivion, but generally out of savagery and barbarism into a material and cultural civilization.

15. =Results of the Process.=--The results of the process of social change are so far-reaching as to be almost incalculable. Particularly marked are the changes of the last hundred years. The best way to appreciate them is by a comparison of periods. Take college life in America as an example. Scores of colleges now large and prosperous were not then in existence, and even in the older colleges conditions were far inferior to what they are in the newer and smaller colleges to-day. There were few preparatory schools, and the young man--of course there were no college women--fitted himself as best he could by private instruction. To reach the college it was necessary to drive by stage or private conveyance to the college town, to find rooms in an ill-equipped dormitory or private house, to be content with plain food for the body and a narrow course of study for the mind. The method of instruction was tedious and uninspiring; text-books were unattractive and dull. There were no libraries worthy of the name, no laboratories or observatories for research. Scientific instruction was conspicuous by its absence; the social sciences were unknown. Gymnasiums had not been evolved from the college wood-pile; intercollegiate sports were unknown. Glee clubs, dramatic societies, college journalism, and the other arts and pastimes that give color and variety to modern university life were unknown.

In the same period modes of thinking have changed. Scientific discoveries and the principles that have been based on them have wrought a revolution. Evolution has become a word to conjure with.