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From the Latin word socius, society means an association,

togetherness, and group life. This refers to a relatively large grouping or
collectivity of people who share more or less common and distinct culture,
occupying a certain geographical locality, with the feeling of identity or
belongingness, having all the necessary social arrangements or institutions to
sustain it. Other definitions include:

✓ “A society is an autonomous grouping of people who inhabit a common

territory, have a common culture (shared set of values, beliefs,
customs, so forth) and are linked to one another through routinized
social interactions and interdependent statuses and roles” – Calhoun,
et.al (1994)
✓ Society consists of an overlapping, dynamic and fluid network of
economic, political, cultural and other relations at various levels.

A society can be recognized based on some of its basic features which

include:

✓ A relatively large grouping of people in terms of size.

✓ Members share common and distinct culture.
✓ Definite, limited space or territory.
✓ Feeling of identity and belongingness among people.

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✓ Members are considered to have a common origin and common

historical experience.
✓ Members may speak a common mother tongue or a major language
that serve as a national heritage.
✓ Autonomy and independence in the sense that it has all the necessary
social institutions and organizational arrangements to sustain the
system.

Many kinds of human societies have existed in history, and we still

find remarkable diversity today. But what is a society, in the first place? How
and why have societies changed over the course of human history?

Society as viewed by:

Gerhard and Jean Lenski
✓ Described the changing character of human societies over the last
10,000 years.
✓ Explained the importance of technology, and how new technology can
have revolutionary consequences for social life.
Karl Marx
✓ Understood human history as a long and complex process.
✓ The story of society spins around social conflict that arises from how
people produce material goods.
Max Weber
✓ The power of ideas also shapes society.
✓ Contrasted the traditional thinking of simple societies with the rational
thought that dominates our modern way of life.
Emile Durkheim
✓ Helped us to see the different ways that traditional and modern
societies hang together.

All four visions of society answer key questions:

✓ What makes simple people, such as the Tuareg of the Sahara, so
different from the society familiar to us?
✓ How and why do all societies change?
✓ What forces divide a society?
✓ What forces hold it together?
✓ Are societies getting better or worse?

Gerhard and Jean Lenski: Society and Technology

Members of our society, who take telephones and television as well as
schools and hospitals for granted, must wonder at the nomads of the Sahara,
who live the same simple life their ancestors did centuries ago. The work of

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Gerhard and Jean Lenski helps us understand the great differences among
societies that have flourished and declined throughout human history.
The Lenskis use the term sociocultural evolution to refer to the
changes that occur as a society acquires new technology. Societies with
simple technology, such as the Tuareg, have little control over nature, so they
can support only a small number of people. Technologically complex
societies, while not necessarily “better,” support large numbers of people who
live highly specialized lives.
In addition, the more technological information a society has, the faster
it changes. Technologically simple societies change very slow; Sididi Ag Inaka
says he “lives the life of his ancestors.” Modern high-technology societies, on
the other hand, change so quickly that dramatic transformation can occur
during a single lifetime. Imagine how someone who lived just a few years ago
would react to beepers, phone sex, artificial hearts, test-tube babies, genetic
engineering, e-mail, smart bombs, space shuttles, the threat of nuclear
holocaust, transsexualism, and “tell all” talk shows.
In short, new technology sends ripples of change through a society’s
way of life. When our ancestors discovered how to harness the power of the
wind using a sail, they set the stage for building sailing ships, which took them
to new lands, stimulated trade, and increased their military might. Consider,
as a more recent example, how our lives are being changed by the spread of
computer technology.
Drawing on the Lenski’s work, we will describe five types of societies
according to their technology: hunting and gathering societies, horticultural
and pastoral societies, agrarian societies, industrial societies, and post-
industrial societies.

I. Hunting and Gathering Societies

✓ The simplest of all kinds of societies.
✓ Existed from the emergence of our species 3 million years ago until just
12,000 years before the present. Even in 1800, there were many
hunting and gathering societies in the world. Today, however, just a
few remains, including the Aka and Pygmies of Central Africa, the
Bushmen of Southwestern Africa, the Aborigines of Australia, the
Kaska Indians of Northwest Canada, and the Batek and Semai of
Malaysia.
✓ Hunters and gatherers have little control over the environment so they
spend most of their time searching for game and collecting edible
plants. Only in lush areas where food is plentiful do hunters and
gatherers have leisure time.
✓ Organized as small bands with a few dozen of members because they
do not have enough land to support even few people.
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✓ Hunters and gatherers are nomadic, moving from one place to another
as they deplete vegetation in an area or follow migratory animals.
Although periodically, they return to their favored sites, they rarely form
permanent settlements.
✓ Built on kinship. The family obtains and distributes food, protects its
members, and teaches the children. Everyone’s life is focused on
getting their next meal.
✓ There is some specialization related to age and gender. The very
young and the very old contribute on what they can, while healthy
adults secure most of the food. Women gather vegetation—the more
reliable source of food—while men take on the less certain task of
hunting. Although men and women perform different tasks, most
hunters and gatherers probably saw the sexes as having about the
same social importance. Thus, hunting and gathering society is also
known as an egalitarian society—having equality in terms of age and
gender.
✓ Have few formal leaders. The shaman, mostly recognized as a
spiritual leader, enjoys high prestige but receives no greater material
rewards and must work to find food like everyone else.
✓ Hunters and gatherers employ simple weapons—the spear, bow and
arrow, the stone knife—but rarely to wage war. They are much more
likely to fall victim to the forces of nature. Storms and droughts can
destroy their food supply, and there is little they can do in the event of
accident or illness. Such vulnerability encourages cooperation and
sharing, raising everyone’s odds of survival. Nonetheless, many die in
childhood, and no more than half reach the age of twenty.
✓ Practice animism. They believe many spirits inhabit the world.

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The San have no formal authority

figure or chief, but govern
themselves by group consensus.
Disputes are resolved through
lengthy discussions where all
involved have a chance to make
their thoughts heard until some
agreement is reached. Certain
individuals may assume
leadership in specific spheres in
which they excel, such as hunting
or healing rituals, but they
cannot achieve positions of
general influence or power.

During the twentieth century, technologically complex societies closed

in on the few remaining hunters and gatherers, reducing their food supply.
The Lenskis claim that at this point, we may well have witnessed the end of
hunting and gathering societies on earth. Fortunately, study of this way of life
has produced valuable information about human history and our fundamental
ties to the natural world.

2. Horticultural Societies
✓ Existed ten to twelve years ago when a new technology—
horticulture—began to change the lives of human beings.
✓ Horticulturalists use a hoe to work the soil, and digging stick to punch
holes in the ground to plant seeds. It may seem simple and obvious
but horticulture allowed people to give up gathering in favor of
“growing their own.”
✓ Horticulturalists formed settlements, moving on only when they
depleted the soil.
✓ Humans first planted gardens to in the fertile regions of the Middle
East and then in Latin America and Asia. Within some 5,000 years,
cultural diffusion spread knowledge of horticulture throughout most of
the world.
✓ Practice ancestor worship and conceive of God as Creator.

Not all societies abandoned hunting and gathering in favor of horticulture.

Hunters and gatherers living amid plentiful vegetation and game probably took
little note of the new technology. Then, too, people inhabiting arid regions
(such as the Middle East or the Sahara in Western Africa) or mountainous
areas found horticulture of little value. Such people turned to pastoralism.

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The Yanomami practice slash-and-burn

agriculture and live in small, scattered,
semipermanent villages. They supplement their
crop of plantains, cassava, tubers, corn (maize),
and other vegetables with gathered fruits, nuts,
seeds, grubs, and honey.

The Yanomami live in vine-and-leaf-thatched

houses in palisaded villages surrounded by garden
plots. They relocate their villages when the soil
wears out or when a village has become too
susceptible to attack by other Yanomami.

3. Pastoral Societies
✓ Members rose to hundreds because of the domestication of plants and
animals that has greatly increased food production so that societies
could be able to support hundreds of people.
✓ Pastoralists remained nomadic, leading their herds to fresh grazing
lands.
✓ Carry the horticulturalists’ belief further, seeing God directly involved in
the well-being of the entire world. This view of God is widespread
among members of our own society because Christianity, Islam, and
Judaism all began as Middle Eastern pastoral religions.

Two patterns occur with pastoralism:

1. Transhumance
✓ Where parts of the group moves with herds, but most people
stay in the home village. There are examples from Europe and
Africa. In Europe’s Alps, it is just the shepherds and goatherds—
not the whole village—who accompany the flocks to highland
meadows in summer. Among the Turkana of Uganda, men and
boys accompany the herds to distant pastures, while much of
the village stays put and does some horticultural farming.
✓ Villages tend to be located in the best-watered areas, which
have the longest pasture season. This permits the village
population to stay together during a large chunk of the year.

2. Pastoral Nomadism
✓ The entire group—women, men, and children—moves with the
animals throughout the year. The Middle East and North Africa
provide numerous examples of pastoral nomads. In Iran, for

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example, the Basseri and the Quashqai ethnic groups

traditionally followed a nomadic route more than 300 miles (480
kilometers) long. Starting each year near the coast, they took
their animals to grazing land 17,000 feet (5,400 meters) above
sea level.

Once a society is capable of producing a material surplus—more

resources than needed to support day-to-day living—not everyone has to
secure food. Some make crafts, engage in trade, cut hair, apply tattoos, or
serve as priests. Compared to hunting and gathering societies, then,
horticultural and pastoral societies are more specialized and complex.
Expanding productive technology creates social inequality. As some
families produce more food than others, they assume positions of relative
power and privilege. Forging alliances with other elite families allows social
advantages to endure over generations. Along with social hierarchy, simple
government, backed by military force, emerges to shore up the dominance of
elites. However, without the ability to communicate or to travel over large
distances, a ruler can control only a small number of people, so there is little
empire-building.
Domestication of plants and animals made simpler societies more
productive. But advancing technology is never entirely beneficial. The Lenskis
point out that, compared to hunters and gatherers, horticulturalists and
pastoralists have more social inequality and, in many cases, engage in
slavery, protracted warfare, and even cannibalism. Thus, social inequality was
said to be given birth in these societies during these periods of the history of
social experience.
Horticultural and Pastoral societies are not a combination. They are two
different societies that coexisted at almost the same period of time.

4. Agrarian Societies
✓ Existed about 5,000 years ago when another technological revolution—
the discovery of agriculture—was underway in the Middle East and
would eventually transform most of the world.
✓ Social significance of the animal-drawn plow as well as other
technological innovations of the period—including irrigation, the wheel,
writing, numbers, and various metals was so great that this era
qualifies as “the dawn of civilization.”
✓ Using animal-drawn plows, farmers could cultivate fields vastly larger
than the garden-sized plots worked by horticulturalists. Plows have the
additional advantage of turning and aerating the soil to increase fertility.
✓ Permanent settlements were encouraged as a result of having the
same lands the farmers could work for generations.

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✓ Large food surpluses, transported on animal-drawn wagons, allow

agrarian societies to expand greatly their land area and population.
About 100 C.E., for example, the agrarian Roman Empire boasted a
population of 70 million over some 2 million square miles.
✓ Production increased due to large-scale cultivation. As always,
increasing production meant more specialization. Tasks once
performed by everyone, such as clearing land and securing food,
became distinct occupations. Specialization also made the early barter
system obsolete and money became the standard of exchange.
Because money made trade easier, cities grew and populations soared
into millions.
✓ Agrarian societies exhibit dramatic social inequality. In many cases,
including the United States early in its history, peasants or slaves
represent a significant share of the population. Freed from manual
work, elites can then engage in the study of philosophy, art, and
literature. This explains the historical link between “high culture” and
social privilege.
✓ Among hunters and gatherers and also among horticulturists, women
are the primary providers of food. Agriculture, however, propels men
into a position of social dominance.
✓ In many societies, religion reinforces the power of agricultural elites by
defining work as a moral obligation. Many of the “Wonders of the
Ancient World,” such as the Great Wall of China and the Great
Pyramids of Egypt, were possible only because emperors and
pharaohs wielded absolute power, commanding their people to a
lifetime of labor without wages. In agrarian societies, then, elites
acquire unparalleled power. To maintain control of large empires,
leaders require the services of a wide range of administrators. Thus,
along with the growing economy, the political system emerges as a
distinct sphere of life.

Of the societies described so far, agrarian societies have the greatest

specialization and the most social inequality. Agrarian technology also gives
people a greater range of life choices, which is why agrarian societies differ
more from one another than horticultural and pastoral societies do.

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Large numbers of slaves were employed in

agriculture. As a general rule, slaves were
considered suitable for working some
crops but not others. Slaves rarely were
employed in growing grains such as rye,
oats, wheat, millet, and barley, although at
one time or another slaves sowed and
especially harvested all of these crops.
Most favoured by slave owners were
commercial crops such as olives, grapes,
sugar, cotton, tobacco, coffee, and certain
forms of rice that demanded intense labour
to plant, considerable tending throughout
the growing season, and significant labour
for harvesting. The presence or absence of
such crops and their relative profitability
were among the major determinants of
whether or not a slave-owning society
became a slave society.

5. Industrial Societies
✓ Until the industrial era, the major source of energy was the muscles of
humans and other animals. But about 1750, mills and factories began
to use water and then steam boilers to power ever-larger machinery.
✓ With industrial technology, societies began to change faster. Industrial
societies transformed themselves more in one century than they had
during the past thousand years. As explained in Chapter 1 (The Nature
and Beginnings of Sociology and Anthropology), this stunning change
prompted the birth of Sociology itself.
✓ During the 19th century, railroads and steamships revolutionized
transportation, and steel-framed sky-scrapers dwarfed the cathedrals
that symbolized an earlier age.
✓ In the 20th century, automobiles further changed Western societies,
and electricity powered modern conveniences such as lighting,
refrigerators and washing machines. Electronic communication,
including the telephone, radio, and television, soon followed, making
the world seem smaller and smaller. During the last generation,
computers have dramatically increased our ability to process
information.
✓ Work, too, has changed. In agrarian societies, most men and women
work in or near the home. Industrialization, however, creates factories
filled with machinery and situated near energy sources. People may
travel great distances to their jobs in the factories. Lost in the process
are close working relationships, strong kinship ties, and many
traditional values, beliefs and customs that guide agrarian life.

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✓ Occupational specialization has become more pronounced than ever.

In fact, industrial people often size up one another in terms of their jobs
rather than according to their kinship ties (as non-industrial people do).
✓ Rapid change and movement from place to place also generate
anonymity, cultural diversity, and numerous subcultures and
countercultures.
✓ Industrial technology recasts the family, too, lessening its traditional
significance as the center of social life. No longer does the family serve
as the primary setting for economic production, learning, and religious
worship. It also underlies the trend away from traditional families to
greater numbers of single people, divorced people, single-parent
families, and stepfamilies.

Cases like the railways and Tomioka Silk Mill demonstrate how Western technicians and academics hired by the government
made great contributions to the vigor of Japanese industry. Some 3,000 foreign specialists came to Japan in total, with more
than 500 present in the peak year of 1876. While they were highly skilled, their services came at a price. For example, when
the Japanese high official Sanjō Sanetomi was earning ¥800 each month as grand minister of state, the British engineer
Thomas Kinder received a monthly salary of ¥1,045 for his work at the imperial mint. The bounteous rewards on offer to
Western experts indicate the fervor of the Japanese government to modernize the country’s industry.

The Lenskis point out that, early in the industrialization process, only a
small segment of the population enjoys the benefits that advancing
technology brings. In time, however, wealth spreads and more people live
longer and more comfortably. Though poverty remains a serious problem in
industrial societies, the standard of living has risen fivefold over the course of
the last century, and social inequality has declined.

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✓ Some social leveling (Social Stratification) occurs because industrial

societies required an educated and skilled labor force. While the
majority of people in non-industrial societies are illiterate, industrial
societies provide state-funded schooling and confer numerous political
rights on almost everyone. Industrialization, in fact, intensifies popular
demands for a political voice, as seen in South Korea, Taiwan, The
People’s Republic of China, the nations of Eastern Europe, and the
former Soviet Union.

Many industrial societies, including the United States, have now entered
yet another phase of technological development. This extends Lenskis’
analysis to take account of recent trends named post-industrialism.

6. Post-Industrial Societies
✓ Whereas production in industrial societies center on factories and
machinery generating material goods, postindustrial production is
based on computers and other electronic devices that create, process,
store and apply information.
✓ Members of industrial societies learn and apply mechanical skills while
people in post-industrial societies develop information-based skills for
working with computers and other forms of advanced technology
communication.
✓ With the shift in key skills, the emergence of post-industrialism
dramatically changes a society’s occupational structure. This society
uses less and less of its labor force for industrial production. At the
same time, the ranks of clerical workers, managers, and other people
who process information (in fields ranging from academia and
advertising to marketing and public relations) swell.
✓ Information Revolution became more pronounced in rich nations, yet
the new technology affects the entire world. A new worldwide flow of
goods, people, and information ties societies together and foster a
global culture. And just as industrial technology joined local
communities to create a national economy, so post-industrial
technology joins nations to build a global economy.

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Range and Limits of Technology

Technology remedies many human problems by raising productivity,
reducing infectious disease, and sometimes simply relieving boredom. But it
provides no quick fix for social problems. Poverty, for example, remains the
plight of millions of women and men in the United States, and 1 billion people
worldwide. Moreover, technology creates new problems that our ancestors
(and people like the opening vignettes’s Sididi Ag Inaka today) hardly could
imagine. Industrial societies provide more personal freedom, but often at the
cost of the sense of community that characterized pre-industrial life. Further,
although the most powerful nations in the world today rarely engage in all-out
warfare, they have stock piles of nuclear weapons that could return us to a
technologically primitive state of, indeed, we survived at all.

Advancing technology has also contributed to a major social problem

involving the environment. Each stage in socio-cultural evolution has
introduced more powerful sources of energy and increased our appetite for
the earth’s resources. An issue of vital concern is whether humanity can
continue to pursue material prosperity without permanently damaging our
planet.

In some respects, then, technological advances have improved life and

brought the world’s people closer into a “global village.” But establishing
peace, ensuring justice, and sustaining a safe environment are problems that
technology alone cannot solve.

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SHORT QUIZ. Encircle the letter of your answer to the multiple-choice items
and short answers to items that require such.

1. In a social group, members feel a sense of identity; they think of

themselves as united and interdependent, somewhat apart from other people.
A. Partly true
B. Partly false
C. True
D. False

2. In an abstract sense, all people of the earth may be considered a society.

A. Partly true
B. Partly false
C. True
D. False

Nos. 3 to 7. Provide five (5) elements and features of a society. Write your
answer on the spaces provided below.
______________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________

8. Which level of societies does Ilongos, Akeanons, and Ilocanos belong?

A. Continents
B. Nations
C. Ethnolinguistic groups
D. States

9. This concept developed by Gerhard and Jean Lenski refers to the changes
that occur as the society acquires new technology.
A. Social transformation
B. Sociocultural evolution of societies
C. Sociocultural reformation
D. Technological advancement

10. This type of society was characterized by domestication of animals.

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A. Hunting and gathering

B. Horticultural
C. Pastoral
D. Agrarian

Nos.11 to 30. Discuss the major changes that have happened to the society
as it acquired advancement in technology. Write your answer on the space
provided below.
______________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________
______________________________________________________________
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______________________________________________________________

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Collections of People

Almost everyone seeks a sense of belonging, which is the experience

of group life. A social group refers to two or more people who identify and
interact with one another. Human beings come together in couples, families,
circles of friends, churches, clubs, businesses, neighborhoods, and large
organizations. Whatever its form, a group is made up of people with shared
experiences, loyalties, and interests. In short, while keeping their individuality,
members of social groups also think of themselves as special “we.”
Not every collection of individuals can be called a group. People with a
status in common, such as women, homeowners, soldiers, millionaires, and
Roman Catholics, are not a group but a category. Though they know others
who hold the same status, the vast majority are strangers to one another.
What about students sitting together in a lecture hall or bathers
enjoying a day at the beach? Some people in such settings may interact, but
not very much. These temporary, loosely formed collections of people are
better termed a crowd. In general, crowds are too anonymous and transitory
to qualify as groups.
The right circumstances, however, can turn a crowd into a group.
People riding in an elevator that stalls between floors generally recognize their

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common plight and turn to each other for help. Sometimes out of accidents
and disasters, people form lasting relationships.
Another collection of people which is not considered as social group
but are labeled with other nomenclature is aggregate which refer to a cluster
of people who may be on close physical proximity but do not interact with one
another. They may look at each other occasionally, or they brushed shoulders
or any other part of their bodies unintentionally, but they are not really
concerned with one another. This is the case of people gathered in an
unstructured manner in a bus or jeepney stop; people sharing an escalator, or
people lining up to buy their movie tickets.

In sum, collections of people can be categorized into:

Collection of Level of Level of Status in
People Proximity Interaction Common
Social Group High High Not necessary
Crowd High Low Not necessary
Category Not necessary Low or none at Necessary
all
Aggregate High None at all Not necessary

The Social Group

To differentiate the social group from the other collections of people, its
characteristics can be described as follows:
1. Group members interact on a fairly regular basis through
communication. They affect and influence each other.
2. The members of the group develop a structure where each member
assumes a specific status and adopts a particular role. Each member
accepts certain duties and responsibilities and is entitled to certain
privileges.
3. The members of the group agree to some extent on important norms,
goals, and values. Certain orderly procedures and values are agreed
upon.
4. The members of the group feel a sense of identity. They think of
themselves as united and interdependent, somewhat apart from other
people.

Types of Social Groups

Diverse groups exist in the society. Knowledge of their important

distinctions is necessary in describing and analyzing group behavior.
Sociologists classify the different groups as follows:
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1. Groups According to Social Ties

Primary Group
✓ It is the most fundamental unit of human society. It is a long-lasting
group whose members have intimate, personal, continuous face to
face relationships. It is usually characterized by strong ties of love
and affection, personal identity with the group, mutuality of interest,
cooperation, and a “we” feeling.
✓ According to Charles Horton Cooley, it is a small social group
whose members share personal and enduring relationships. Bound
by primary relationships, people typically spend a great deal of time
together, engage in a wide range of activities, and feel that they
know one another well. Although not without conflict from time to
time, members of primary groups display real concern for each
other’s welfare.
✓ Primary relationships give people a comforting sense of security. In
the familiar social circle of family and friends, people feel they can
“be themselves” without worrying about the impression they are
making.
✓ Members of primary groups help one another in many ways, but
they generally think of their group as an end in itself rather than as
a means to other ends. In other words, we prefer to think that
kinship and friendship link people who “belong together.” Moreover,
members of the primary group tend to view each other as unique
and irreplaceable. Especially in the family, we are bound to others
by emotion and loyalty. Brothers and sisters may not always get
along but they will always remain as siblings.
✓ Examples of which are families, gangs, cliques, play groups, and
friendship groups.

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Secondary Group
✓ Refers to the group with which the individual comes in contact later in
life. This group has characteristics that are the opposite of primary
group.
✓ It is also referred to as a large and impersonal social group whose
members pursue a specific goal or activity.
✓ It is characterized by impersonal, business-like, contractual, formal,
and casual relationship. It is usually large in size, not very enduring,
and with limited relationships, weak ties of affection, weak personal
identity with the group and limited face-to-face interaction.
✓ Most secondary groups are short term, beginning and ending without
particular significance. Students in college course, for instance, who
may or may not see each other after the semester ends, exemplify the
secondary group.
✓ Secondary groups include more people than primary groups. For
example, dozens or even hundreds of people may work together in the
same office, yet most of them pay only passing attention to one
another. In some cases, time may transform a group from secondary to
primary, as with co-workers who share the same office for many years.
But generally, members of a secondary group do not think of
themselves as “we.”
✓ Whereas members of primary groups display a personal orientation,
people in secondary groups have a goal orientation. Secondary ties
need not be hostile or cold, of course. Interaction among students, co-
workers, and business associates is often pleasant even if it is
impersonal. But while primary group members define themselves
according to who they are in terms of kinship or personal qualities,
people in secondary groups look to one another for what they are or
what they can do for each other. Thus, people engage in secondary
relationships because people need other people for the satisfaction of
their complex needs or because they have certain obligations toward
them as in business.
✓ In secondary groups, we tend to “keep score,” mindful of what we give
others and what and what we receive in return. This goal orientation
means that secondary group members usually remain formal and
polite. In a secondary group, therefore, we ask the question “How are
you?” without expecting a truthful answer.
✓ Examples of which are industrial workers, business associates, faculty
staff, company employees.

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Keep in mind that these traits define two types of groups in ideal terms;
many real groups contain elements of both. But putting these concepts at
opposite ends of a continuum helps us describe and analyze group life.
Many people think that small towns and rural areas have mostly primary
relationships and that large cities are characterized by more secondary ties.
This generalization holds much truth, but some urban neighborhoods—
especially those populated by people of a single ethnic or religious category—
are very tightly knit.

2. Groups According to Self-Identification

Everyone favors some groups over others, whether because of political
outlook, social prestige, or just manner of dress. On the college campus, for
example, left-leaning student activists may look down on fraternity members,
whom they consider conservative; the Greeks, in turn, may snub the computer
“nerds” and “grinds,” who work too hard. Virtually, every social landscape has
a comparable mix of positive and negative evaluations.
Such judgments illustrate another important element of group
dynamics: the opposition of in-groups and out-groups. These groups are
based on the idea that “we” have valued traits that “they” lack.

In-Group
✓ It is a social unit in which individuals feel at home and with which they
identify. Members of the in-group have the “we” feeling for they are
similar in certain ways, such as being poor, being rich, being a
Tagalog, and other social categories.
✓ It is also a social group commanding a member’s esteem and loyalty. It
exists in relation to an out-group.
✓ Specifically, members generally hold overly positive views of
themselves and unfairly negative views of various out-groups.

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✓ Power also shapes intergroup relations. A powerful in-group can define

others as lower-status out-group. Historically, for example, white
people have viewed people of color as an out-group and subordinated
them socially, politically, and economically. Internalizing these
attitudes, minorities struggle to overcome negative self-images. In
short, in-groups
and out-groups
foster loyalty but
also generate
conflict.
Out-Group
✓ It is a social unit to
which individuals
do not belong due
to differences in
certain social
categories and
with which they do
not identify.
✓ One example is if we are law abiders, the out-group is the law violators;
if we violate the laws, the law abiders are the out-group.
Reference Group
✓ It refers to the group to which we consciously or unconsciously refer
when we try to evaluate our own life situations and behavior, but to
which we do not necessarily belong.
✓ It serves a comparison function; it provides us with standards against
which we evaluate ourselves. Thus, depending on which groups we
select to compare ourselves with, we can feel deprived or privileged,
satisfied or discontented, fortunate or unfortunate.
✓ Example: If we belong to the middle class, we may feel fortunate and
satisfied in comparison to the poor class or dissatisfied in comparison
with the rich or upper class. It all depends on which social category
serves as a reference group.
✓ Reference group also has a normative function. They provide us with
the guidelines we use in fashioning our behavior. They serve as a
model to which the individual patterns his lifestyles.
✓ A young man who imagines his family’s response to a woman he is
dating is using his family as a reference group. Similarly, a supervisor
who tries to gauge her employees’ reactions to a new vacation policy is
using them as standard of reference. As these examples suggest,
reference groups can be primary or secondary. In either case, our need
to conform means that others’ attitudes greatly affect us.
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✓ We also use groups that we do not belong to for reference. Being well
prepared for a job interview means showing up dressed the way people
in that company dress for work. Conforming to groups we do not
belong to is a strategy to win acceptance and illustrates the process of
anticipatory socialization.

3. Groups According to Purpose

Special Interest Group
✓ It refers to a group which is
organized to meet the special
interest of its members.
✓ Example: Hobby groups.
Task Group
✓ This group is assigned to
accomplish jobs which cannot
be done by one person.
✓ Example: Working Committee, Construction Workers.
Influence or Pressure Group
✓ This refers to a group organized to support or influence social actions.
✓ Example: Social Movements, Campaign Groups, Political Parties.

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4. Groups According to Geographical Location and Degree or Quality of

Relationship
Gemeinschaft
✓ It refers to a social system in which most relationships are personal or
traditional. It is a community of intimate, private, and exclusive living
and familism. The activities, interest, and personalities of the members
center around the large family groups and neighbors. Culture is
homogeneous and tradition-bound.
✓ Example: Tribal groups, agricultural and fishing villages, barrio.
Gesselschaft
✓ This is a social system in which most relationships are impersonal,
formal, contractual or bargain-like. Relationships are individualistic,
business-like, secondary and rationalized. Culture is heterogeneous
and more advanced.
✓ Example: City or urban groups.

5. Groups According to Form of Organization

Formal Group
✓ It is also called social organization. It is deliberately formed, and its
purpose and objectives are explicitly defined. Its goals are clearly
stated and the division of labor is based on member’s ability or merit.
✓ Formal organizations have a certain type of administrative machinery
which is aimed to enable members meet its goals. This administrative
structure is called “bureaucracy.” The best example of bureaucracy is
the government.

Bureaucracy—refers to a hierarchical arrangement in large-scale

formal organizations in which parts of the organization are ordered in
the manner of a pyramid based on a division of function and authority.
(Weber, M. 1965)

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Weber identified the following characteristics of a bureaucracy:

1. Positions and offices are clearly defined.
2. The hierarchical arrangement of authority, rights, and obligations is
specifically drawn and clear-cut.
3. The personnel are selected on the basis of technical or professional
qualification and expert training and competence through competitive
examination.
4. Definite rules govern official behavior.
5. Security of tenure and the pursuit of a career with promotion in the
hierarchy are assured.

Merton (1965) defines the bureaucracy as a formal, rationally

organized social structure involving clearly defined patterns of activity in which
every series of action is fundamentally related to the purpose of the
organization.
As Merton (1964) pointed out, “the chief merit of the bureaucracy is its
technical efficiency with a premium placed on precision, speed, control,
continuity, discretion, and optimal returns or input.”
Among the defects of bureaucracy includes the “red tape” or extreme
adherence to rigid procedures and paper work, the tendency of those in
power to maintain the status quo, “boss officials” who feel so powerful that
they are indispensable fixtures of the organization, and “gentlemanly
malingerers” or employees who have become so secure and contented in
their jobs, that they feel they do not have to work too hard. These defects
have resulted in non-productivity, graft and corruption, inefficiency in service,
delay in transactions, palakasan system, lagay system, official misconduct,
and malpractices.

Informal Group
✓ This group arises spontaneously out of the interactions of two or more
persons. It is unplanned: it has no explicit rules for membership and
does not have
specific objectives to
be attained. It has
the characteristics of
primary groups and
members are bound
by emotions and
sentiments.
✓ Example: Barkadas
and gangs.

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Group Size

If you are the first person to arrive at a party, you are in a position to
watch some fascinating group dynamics. Until about six people enter the
room, everyone usually shares a single conversation. But as more people
arrive, the group divides into two or more clusters. Size plays an important
role in how group members interact.
To understand the effects of group size, consider the mathematical
number of relationships among two to seven people. Two people form a
single relationship; adding a third person results in three relationships; adding
a fourth person yields six. Increasing the number of people one at a time, the,
expands the number of relationships much more rapidly since every new
individual can interact with everyone already there. Thus, by the time seven
people join one conversation, twenty-one “channels” connect them. With so
many open channels at this point, the group usually divides.

The Dyad
✓ This is the term used to designate a social group with two members.
This is according to German Sociologist Georg Simmel, who studied
group dynamics in smaller groups.
✓ Simmel explained that social interaction
in a dyad is typically more intense than
in larger groups because neither
member shares the other’s attention
with anyone else. In the United States,
love affairs, marriages, and the closest
friendships are dyadic.
✓ Like a stool with only two legs, dyads
are unstable. Both members of a dyad
must work to keep the relationship
going; if either withdraws, the group
collapses. Because the stability of
marriages is important to society, the marital dyad is supported with
legal, economic, and often religious ties.

The Triad
✓ Simmel also studied the triad, a social group with three members. A
triad contains three relationships, each joining two of the three people.

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✓ Is more stable
than a dyad
because one
member can act
as a mediator
should the
relationship
between the
other two
become
strained. Such
group dynamics
help explain Polyamorous triad with three kids
why members
of a dyad (say, a married couple) often seek out a third person
(counselor) to air tensions between them.
✓ On the other hand, two of the three can pair up to press their views on
the third, or two may intensify their relationship, leaving the other
feeling left out. For example, when two of the three develop a romantic
interest in each other, they will understand the old saying, “Two’s
company, three’s a crowd.”

As groups grow beyond three people, they become more stable and
capable of withstanding the loss of even several members. At the same time,
increases in group size reduce the intense personal interaction possible only
in the smallest groups. Larger groups are thus based less on personal
attachment and more on formal rules and regulations. Such formality helps a
group persist over time, though the group is not immune to change. After all,
their numerous members give large groups more contact with the outside
world, opening the world to new attitudes and behavior (Cooley, 1991).

Social Network
✓ A network is a web of weak social ties. Think of a network as a
“fuzzy” group containing people who come into occasional contact but
who lack a sense of boundaries and belonging. If we think of a group
as a “circle of friends,” then, we might describe a network as a “social
web” expanding outward, often reaching great distances and including
large numbers of people.

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✓ Some networks are close to

being groups, as is the case
with college friends who stay in
touch after graduation by e-
mail and telephone. More
commonly, however, a network
includes people we know of—
or who know of us—but with
who we interact rarely, if at all.
as one woman with a
widespread reputation as a
community organizer explains,
“I get calls at home, someone
says, ‘Are you Roseann Navarro? Somebody told me to call you. I
have this problem.”
✓ Network ties may be weak, but they can be a powerful resource. For
immigrants seeking to become established in a new community,
businesspeople seeking to expand their operations, or anyone looking
for a job, who you know is often as important as what you know.
✓ Networks are based on people’s colleges, clubs, neighborhoods,
political parties, and personal interests. Obviously, some networks
contain people with considerably more wealth, power, and prestige
than others—that is, they are connected to more people. Typically, the
most extensive social networks include people who are young, well
educated, and living in large cities.
✓ Gender, too, shapes networks. Although the networks of men and
women are typically the same size, women include more relatives in
their networks, whereas those of men include more co-workers.
Women’s ties, therefore, may not carry quite the same clout as “old
boy” networks. Even so, research suggests that as gender equality
increases, the networks of women and men are becoming more alike.
✓ Finally, new information technology has generated a global network of
unprecedented size in the form of the Internet through social network
sites like facebook and friendster.

Formal Organizations
A century ago, most people lived in small groups of family, friends, and
neighbors. Today, our lives revolve more and more around formal
organizations, large secondary groups that are organized to achieve their
goals efficiently.
Formal organizations such as business corporation and government
agencies differ from families and neighborhoods. Their greater size makes
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social relations less personal and fosters a formal, planned atmosphere. In

other words, formal organizations operate in a deliberate way, not to meet
personal needs but to accomplish complex jobs.
When you think about it, organizing some 725 million members or our
society is remarkable, involving countless jobs, from collecting taxes to
delivering the mail. To carry out most of these tasks, we rely upon large,
formal organizations. Large, formal organizations develop lives and cultures of
their own so that, as members come and go, the statuses they fill and the
roles they perform remain unchanged over the years.

Types of Formal Organizations

Amitai Etzioni (1975) identified three types of formal organizations,
distinguished by the reasons people participate—utilitarian organizations,
normative organizations, and coercive organizations.

1. Utilitarian Organizations
✓ Just about everyone works for income belongs to a utilitarian
organization, one that pays people for their efforts. Large businesses,
for example, generate profits for their owners and income for their
employees.
✓ Joining utilitarian organizations is usually a matter of individual choice,
although, obviously, most people must join one or another utilitarian
organization to make a living.

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2. Normative Organizations
✓ People join normative organizations not for income but to pursue some
goals which they think are morally worthwhile. Sometimes called
voluntary associations, these include community service groups (such
as PTA, the Lions Club, the League of Women Voters, and the Red
Cross), as well as political parties and religious organizations.

3. Coercive Organizations
✓ Coercive
organizations
have an
involuntary
membership.
That is,
people join
these
organizations
as a form of
punishment
(prisons) or treatment (psychiatric hospitals).
✓ Have special physical features, such as locked doors and barred
windows, and are supervised by security personnel. They isolate
people as “inmates” or “patients” for a period of time, seeking to
change radically attitudes and behavior. Total institutions have a great
role in transforming human being’s overall sense of self.

From differing vantage points, any particular organization may fall into
all of these categories. A psychiatric hospital, for example, serves as a
coercive organization for a patient, a utilitarian organization for a psychiatrist,
and a normative organization for a part-time hospital volunteer.
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I BELONG. IDENTIFY A SOCIAL ORGANIZATION INVOLVED INTO IN THE

PAST OR AT PRESENT AND DESCRIBE ITS GROUP DYNAMICS.

How?

1. Identify a social organization (utilitarian, normative or coercive)

involved into in the past or at present.
2. Describe the organization based on the following:
a. Name of the group
b. A little of its history or background (location, time it was established,
etc.)
c. Its mission and goals (Why and how it was created?)
d. Leadership (Who were its leaders and how they function to sustain
the group)
e. Activities (What were its activities that contribute to the fulfilment of
its vision)
3. Your involvement (What motivated you to join the group? What was
your primary function in the group? How was your experience when
with the group? How did you conform? Did you do some adjustments?
What were those? Other things you might want to include in your
presentation).
4. How did this organization influence you?
5. Organize your data into a presentation.
6. Your output must be in the form of a powerpoint presentation sent to
my email: floriejane_tamon@yahoo.com or our class messenger
account (which we will still need to make upon start of classes) and/or
a printed version of this powerpoint presentation.
7. You will be graded according to the following criteria:
a. Creativity of the presentation (30pts)
b. Substance of the information presented (35pts)
c. Clarity in organization of information presented (35)

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