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Second edition
DISCOVERING
SOCIOLOGY
Mark McCormack, Eric Anderson,

Kimberly Jamie and Matthew David
‘Discovering Sociology is a key text for undergraduate Sociology students. Written in a lively and
accessible style, it captures the sociological imaginations of readers as it discusses a wide range
of contemporary and historical issues.’
– Peter Millward, Liverpool John Moores University, UK
‘This revised version of Discovering Sociology continues to offer an innovative approach to

understanding the wide-ranging topics we as social scientists investigate. It provides in-depth
and critical analysis of complex issues in an accessible and student-friendly way, while not
shying away from exploring central and contemporary issues around ‘modern societies’,
‘transgression’ and ‘social transformation’. A solid and well-rounded introduction of Sociology
to any student.’
– Eric Baumgartner, University of the West of Scotland, UK
In praise of the previous edition:

‘Accessible and chock full of contemporary cases, Discovering Sociology is an exciting new
introduction to the discipline. Rooted in the fundamentals of the sociological imagination, the
textbook will engage students through its careful presentation of topics and intellectual debates.
Sociology is a vibrant, dynamic discipline, and this textbook conveys its spirit with verve.’
– Amin Ghaziani, University of British Columbia, Canada
‘Not just an introduction to Sociology, this book is an inspiring, passionate and lively reminder
of what it means to have a sociological imagination. Thoughtful, entertaining and always
informative, this is a book destined to inspire a new generation of sociologists.’
– Raelene Wilding, La Trobe University, Melbourne, Australia
‘A terrific book which opens out Sociology to new students in exciting ways ... a pitch-perfect
introduction to the central ideas and animating themes of Sociology.’
– Daryl Martin, University of York, UK
‘Bravo! In this enticing and accessible textbook, four diverse sociologists offer an impressive
array of research perspectives and provide a modern social science textbook for all concerned
about the future of global democracy and survival.’
– Joe Feagin, Texas A&M University, USA
‘A lively, cutting edge and student-oriented introduction to sociology: explaining classical and
contemporary theories and key concepts and recent debates in sociology whilst engaging
students through a variety of mediums, from interviewing students and scholars in Vox Pops,
invoking cognitive dissonance through Provocations, providing Good Sociology and Bad
Sociology text boxes and offering Pauses for Reflection. An excellent textbook to help students
discover their sociological imagination and the fun of doing sociology.’
– Travis Kong, Associate Professor, The University of Hong Kong, China
DISCOVERING
SOCIOLOGY
SECOND EDITION
MARK M c CORMACK, ERIC ANDERSON,

KIMBERLY JAMIE AND MATTHEW DAVID
© Mark McCormack, Eric Anderson, Kimberly Jamie and Matthew David,
under exclusive licence to Macmillan Education Limited 2021
All rights reserved. No reproduction, copy or transmission of this
publication may be made without written permission.
No portion of this publication may be reproduced, copied or transmitted
save with written permission or in accordance with the provisions of the
Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988, or under the terms of any licence
permitting limited copying issued by the Copyright Licensing Agency,
Saffron House, 6–10 Kirby Street, London EC1N 8TS.
Any person who does any unauthorized act in relation to this publication
may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.
The authors have asserted their rights to be identified as the authors of this
work in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.
First published 2021 by
RED GLOBE PRESS
Previous edition published 2018 under the imprint PALGRAVE
Red Globe Press in the UK is an imprint of Macmillan Education Limited,
registered in England, company number 01755588, of 4 Crinan Street,
London, N1 9XW.
Red Globe Press® is a registered trademark in the United States,
the United Kingdom, Europe and other countries.
ISBN 978-1-352-01164-7 hardback
ISBN 978-1-352-01144-9 paperback
This book is printed on paper suitable for recycling and made from fully
managed and sustained forest sources. Logging, pulping and manufacturing
processes are expected to conform to the environmental regulations of
the country of origin.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
A catalog record for this book is available from the Library of Congress.
Publisher: Peter Hooper

Publishing Manager: Aléta Bezuidenhout
Assistant Editor: Emily Lovelock
Senior Production Editor: Amy Brownbridge
Cover Designer: Laura De Grasse
Marketing Manager: Amy Suratia
Contents
List of illustrative material ix
About the companion website xi
Tour of the book xii
Author acknowledgements xiv
About the authors xv
Prefacexix
1. WHAT IS SOCIOLOGY? 1
Introduction 1
Defining sociology 3
What is society and why should we study it? 8
Approaching sociology 14
Conclusion 21
How would…? 22
Structured further reading 22
2. A BRIEF HISTORY OF SOCIOLOGY 23

Introduction 23
The origins of sociology 23
Foundational sociological thinkers 27
Expansion and consolidation of sociology 37
Critiquing the construction of the history of sociology 39
Contemporary sociology 47
Conclusion 48
How would…? 49
3. SOCIOLOGICAL THEORY 50
Introduction 50
What is theory and why do we need it? 50
Three core approaches to sociological theory 61
Theory in practice 69
Conclusion 75
How would…? 76
v
vi Contents
4. THE METHOD OF SOCIOLOGY 77

Introduction 77
The method of sociology 77
Before choosing a method 79
Research design 87
Types of method 88
Data collection 97
Data analysis 101
Conclusion 111
How would…? 112
5. ETHICAL SOCIOLOGY 113

Introduction 113
Ethics in sociology 113
Conceiving, conducting and disseminating ethical research 115
Examining ethical dilemmas 124
Conclusion 138
How would…? 139
6. MAKING MODERN SOCIETIES 140

Introduction 140
The industrial revolution and modernity 140
Understanding modernity 144
Understanding late modern societies 158
Conclusion 165
How would…? 166
7. STRUCTURES AND INSTITUTIONS 167

Introduction 167
The structures of society 167
Family 169
Education 177
Media 184
Work 191
Thinking sociologically about structures and institutions 198
Conclusion 198
Contents vii
How would…? 199

8. SOCIAL DIVISIONS 200

Introduction 200
Societies divided 200
Class 203
Racial divisions 209
Gender 216
Sexuality 228
Conclusion 232
How would…? 232
9. TRANSGRESSIONS 234
Introduction 234
Rules, laws and transgressing them 234
Thinking sociologically about transgression 238
Structure, culture and crime 242
Symbolic interactionism, labelling and the new deviancy 245
Demographics of crime 252
Consumption and transgression 262
Conclusion 266
How would…? 267
10. PERSONAL LIFE 268

Introduction 268
The personal 268
Sociology and the body 270
Personal relationships 277
Conclusion 295
How would…? 296
11. SOCIAL TRANSFORMATIONS 297

Introduction 297
Change and crisis in societies 297
Change through social movements 303
viii Contents
Societies beyond modernity 319

Conclusion 327
How would…? 328
12. SOCIOLOGY DISCOVERED 329

Introduction 329
The value of sociology 329
Sociology in the world 331
Sociology and social policy 335
The consumption of sociology 341
Conclusion 354
How would…? 354
Glossary 356
References 363
Index391
List of Illustrative Material
LIST OF TABLES
3.1 Is Putnam’s bowling alone a good theory? 53
3.2 Types of theory and level of abstraction 54
3.3 Theoretical approach and related sociologists 62
4.1 Six dimensions of a ‘good’ research question 80
4.2 Research questions and appropriate methods 87
4.3 Mixed methods research formats 97
4.4 Types of sampling 99
4.5 Types of data and levels of measurement 104
4.6 Association tests appropriate for different levels of measurement 108
6.1 Comparing word usage: early 1990s and 2000 160
11.1 Explaining Therborn’s definition of globalization 320
12.1 Arguments for welfare 335
12.2 How to study issues using a social problems approach 340
LIST OF FIGURES
3.1 Strong vs weak ties 59
4.1 A Victorian couple enjoying themselves 95
4.2 A pie chart showing the nominal sex variable in overall population 105
4.3 Ordinal variable of belief in political efficacy 105
4.4 A histogram for the interval age variable 106
4.5 A stacked bar chart for two categorical variables 107
4.6 Scatterplot for height and weight 108
4.7 A scatterplot for two interval variables – current income and years
spent in formal education, with line of best fit 110
PROVOCATIONS
Who gives a spit about sociology? 1
Capitalism requires unemployment and inequality to function 30
It is more important for a theory to be interesting than true 56
Watching pornography is probably good for you 84
University ethics panels are damaging novel sociological research 136
We need less rationality in the world 152
We do not live in a meritocratic society 182
ix
x List of Illustrative Material
What’s wrong with segregation in sport? 219

Is the criminalization of selling sex class warfare? 259
Do people cheat because they love their partners? 288
Do charities perpetuate social inequality? 310
Whose side are we on? 332
VOX POPS
Sierra Kamara 20
Professor Betsy Ettorre 42
Professor Maggie O’Neill 65
Dr Elham Amini 93
Dr Kim Jamie 123
Dora Meredith 164
Dr Petra Boynton 172
Becoming a young mother: Holly’s story 174
Professor Kalwant Bhopal 211
Professor Fiona Measham 264
Steven Hogg 277
Vanity von Glow 315
Dr Steven Roberts 340
GOOD SOCIOLOGY
The Sociological Imagination 15
Bowling Alone 52
Writing Well 68
Framework for Ethical Consideration 122
Settler Colonialism and Australian Society 157
Stuart Hall and Representation 187
Assessing Sociology in the Media 347
Sociology and a Pedagogy of Uncertainty 351
BAD SOCIOLOGY
Nuance Traps 55
Bad Writing 67
Causation, Everywhere 83
Bad Sampling Leads to Bad Research 100
Broken Windows 241
About the companion website
Visit the book’s companion website (www.macmillanihe.com/McCormack-Discovering-

Sociology-2e) for a range of fully-integrated teaching and learning resources to complement
and expand upon what you’ll find in these pages. Features include:
■■ Author videos – the book’s authors offer an overview of what’s covered in the book, ex-
plaining why these key issues have been included and what the pressing questions around
them are for today’s sociology. In addition, longer discussion pieces see the authors going
beyond the chapter structure to examine key issues.
■■ Methods applied – ideal for seminar discussion, this resource examines a study related
to the topic of each chapter, and considers the methods used within that study to develop
methodological understanding alongside subject-specific content.
■■ eVox pops – more Vox Pops that can be used in seminars related to various topics.
■■ eProvocations – further thought-provoking challenges to our personal and cultural as-
sumptions.
■■ Discovering Sociology Across the Globe – looking beyond the US- and UK-centric soci-
ological canon, this feature examines issues in society and sociology from across the globe.
■■ A guide to sociology on the internet provides a curated list of links to the authors’ fa-
vourite online resources.
■■ An interactive glossary of the key sociological terms encountered in the text.
■■ For instructors there is also a Lecturer Guide – this valuable teaching companion provides
tips on how to use each chapter; activities and exercises; and a guide to getting the most out
of the book and the companion website.
All of this online content will be updated and refreshed throughout the lifetime of the book
to ensure that Discovering Sociology continues to be the most relevant and resonant text available,
fully in tune with the issues and concerns that face the new generation of sociology students.
xi
Tour of the Book
INTRODUCTION
These paragraphs will take you through an outline of what the chapter will offer, and
why the subjects are important in your growing appreciation of sociological concerns.
Key terms: key terms

appear in the margin to Text boxes
give definitions and
explanations of unfamiliar Useful and interesting digressions from the main chapter
or complex terms, narrative, which don’t have the direct teaching emphasis of the
alongside their highlighted other pedagogical features, can be found here.
first usage in the text
Tables and figures

Table 3.2: Types of theory and level of abstraction Strong Weak
Type of Definition Level of
theory abstraction
Philosophy The study of reason and values and does not Near-total
concern itself with empirical study. Sometimes,
philosophy that is applied to social matters is called
‘social theory’
High theory Generalizations about big ideas, based on observation, so A significant
Juan
or grand there is some semblance of empirical argument, but the amount John
theory
Middle- Theories that are testable, and explain why a social Some (and
range phenomenon occurs, but still generalize beyond the it varies)
theory sample under consideration
Micro-level Theories that explain small-scale phenomena or Little

theory interactions between individuals. They tend to be less
interested in structural causes but focus on interaction
Figure 3.1: Strong vs weak ties
GOOD BAD
SOCIOLOGY SOCIOLOGY
Here, the authors draw on their teaching ... or in the case of Bad Sociology,
and research experience to highlight pitfalls that you should seek to avoid.
techniques and approaches that you
should aim to emulate ...
xii
Tour of the Book xiii
PROVOCATION
Designed to spark debate, these controversial or counter-intuitive arguments will

drive you to question your own thinking and assumptions – an essential component
of sociological thinking.
VOX POP
These narratives of students, academics and others provide real life insight and opinion on a
wide range of subjects and life experiences, giving you a practical handle on the sociological
issues you’ve studied in theory.
PAUSE FOR REFLECTION

These features break across the page, grabbing your attention and asking you to consider
your perspective on the issues raised.
HOW WOULD…?
■■ At the end of each chapter the ‘How Would…?’ questions revisit key arguments and
concepts that have been covered in the preceding pages. They encourage you to engage
with these sometimes abstract ideas by applying them to your own life experiences.
STRUCTURED FURTHER READING

cCormack, M., Anderson, E., Jamie, K. and David, M. (2021). Discovering Sociology.
M
London: Macmillan Education.
In addition to the end-of-book references, these key sources direct you to extra,
detailed coverage of the chapter issues raised.
These Online Resource boxes flag up opportunities to cross-reference the book’s

companion website at www.macmillanihe.com/McCormack-Discovering-Sociology-2e
to find extra learning and teaching resources.
author acknowledgements
Many thanks are needed to recognize the numerous people who contributed to this book in
diverse ways. We are grateful to Lloyd Langman for his passion for this project and shepherding
us through drafts of the proposal for the second edition, as well as his comments on the new
chapters. We also thank Peter Hooper for his work in finalizing the book throughout 2020,
and Emily Lovelock and Amy Brownbridge for their support.
We would also like to thank all the people who have given their voices to the book and
website through the Vox Pop features: Sierra Kamara, Professor Betsy Ettorre, Professor
Maggie O’Neill, Dr Elham Amini, Dora Meredith, Dr Petra Boynton, ‘Holly’, Professor
Kalwant Bhopal, Professor Fiona Measham, Dr Steven Hogg, Vanity von Glow, Dr Steven
Roberts, Daniel Fallon, Matthew Ripley and Nassim Hamdi.
The reviewers offered many important insights and suggestions for revisions and the book
is stronger as a result. Our thanks also to colleagues with whom we have exchanged ideas
about the book, or who have supported it in different ways. These include Dr Amanda Holt,
Dr Jon Dean, Dr Peter Matthews, Prof. Leah Bassel, Prof. Bryony Hoskins, Prof. Louise Ryan,
Dr Rory Magrath and Prof. Ian Rivers. We also thank our students for their critical engagement
with our lectures across many years and institutions.
Finally, our thanks to our partners for their support: Liam Wignall, Grant Peterson and
Adam Brown.
xiv
About the Authors
MARK McCORMACK
Mark had an unusual route into studying sociology.
Having completed a degree in mathematics, he was
studying for his qualification to become a secondary
school mathematics teacher. Part of this qualification was
to undertake an ‘educational study’, where each trainee
teacher had to research an issue unrelated to their teaching
speciality.
Mark had noticed that boys and girls misbehaved in
different ways during lessons. When one boy answered a
question incorrectly, he ‘acted up’, throwing the marker
pen across the room and shouting obscenities. This
resulted in him being sent to a senior teacher for
punishment, yet it was clear to Mark it was a ‘bait-and-
switch’ to hide his mathematical error. It seemed that
boys thought it was better to be naughty than to be wrong.
Conversely, Mark never observed girls behaving in this manner and they were more likely
to be quiet and not draw attention to their error.
Mark started to research this topic, and stumbled on work by Debbie Epstein, Máirtín
Mac an Ghaill and others that connected boys’ (mis)behaviours with their gender and
cultural homophobia. Boys acted tough in order to avoid being perceived as gay. This
literature was liberatory for Mark, who, as a closeted gay student throughout his school life,
had recognized that the regular homophobia at his school was aimed at policing gender
rather than sexuality. Boys who Mark assumed to be straight but who behaved in ‘unmanly’
or ‘uncool’ ways became the target of homophobic bullying. Mark avoided it because he
was seen as ‘clever’ rather than ‘gay’.
These experiences were the spark to Mark’s sociological imagination. Many of the
arguments developed in the gender and education literature Mark had already intuitively
grasped through his own experience. Immersing himself in this literature, he narrowly
escaped a career as a maths teacher to earn a PhD in sociology on the changing dynamics
of masculinity in British schools. Where mathematical proofs had been difficult to
memorise, sociological theories made sense and ‘stuck’ in his mind. From there, his research
has sought to establish the study of sexuality as central to the discipline of sociology,
researching the changing nature of homophobic language, the experiences of bisexual
men, contemporary drag performance, and understanding how porn is consumed by
young men, among other topics.
xv
xvi About the Authors
ERIC ANDERSON
In 1993, at the age of 25, Eric came out as America’s first
openly gay high school coach. He had remained closeted
during his teenage years because of the rampant
homophobia of the time. This was the pre-internet era,
and he did not know other gay men, bisexuals or lesbians
with whom he could develop friendships.
Eric and his athletes experienced a great deal of social
stigma after his coming out. As Goffman noted, if
individuals are associated with one who is stigmatized, that
stigma rubs off. When one of his heterosexual athletes
was brutally beaten by a homophobic football player, the
story made national news. Eric thus found himself thrust
into the media spotlight and became a talking head on the
issue of gays in sport. When he found himself being
interviewed by Time magazine for non-sport-related issues
concerning the gay community, he decided to pursue a
PhD studying the intersection of sport, masculinities and
homophobia.
Eric published the first research on the topic of openly gay men in team sports in 2002,
finding that matters had improved since he came out of the closet. But if gay men were
increasingly accepted into sport, it must, he hypothesized, also mean that straight men are
changing their notions of masculinity. This led him to study the masculinity of young,
straight male athletes. He found that they were increasingly showing loving affection for
other males, dressing better, being more open with their emotions and in many other ways
radically changing tropes of what was acceptably masculine and ‘straight’.
Increasingly, he found that semi-sexual activities (like cuddling with other males) were
socially accepted, and that even participating in same-sex sex no longer automatically meant
that one was gay. He also found that young straight men were being more open about their
masturbatory and sexual habits, and that this helped foster a culture of hooking up. This in
turn led him to study men and monogamy, specifically why men cheat. Thus, with each
major topic he studies, new questions about other related topics emerge.
The most recent step in Eric’s academic trajectory is to understand that risk taking is a
traditional aspect of masculinity. As masculinity softens, this leads men to take less risk.
This includes taking fewer risks in sport. Eric suggests that young men are beginning to turn
away from brain-damaging sports, and he helps lead a group of scholars who aim to reduce
brain trauma by changing sports where they can be changed, and preventing children from
playing sports that cannot be changed.
About the Authors xvii
KIM JAMIE
Kim chose to study sociology for her A levels (the
educational qualification taken by 16- to 18-year-olds in
Britain) because it sounded vaguely interesting in the
promotional material from her college. Fortunately,
sociology turned out to be more than just vaguely
interesting to Kim; it opened her eyes to different ways of
understanding the world. As a young woman from a single-
parent, working-class household, Kim was fascinated,
moved and outraged by the gender and class inequalities,
which, she realized, had structured her life so far and
permeated the lives of those around her. She enjoyed, and
was outraged by, sociology so much that she applied to
study it at university.
However, Kim also chose to take a year away from
studying before starting university, needing a break from
the anger and to earn some money. For that year, Kim
worked in an office. She enjoyed the work and was so good
at it that the company was keen for her to return to their graduate management scheme after
her degree. Liking this plan of well-paid work with good prospects and pension in a company
she knew well, Kim set off for university intending to get her degree and return to the job.
Along the way, however, something strange happened. Kim realized that sociology is not
just about a set of theories or studies but is a method and a way of seeing the world in itself
– what C. Wright Mills calls ‘the sociological imagination’. Once she had discovered her own
sociological imagination, she was hooked.
In the second year of her degree, Kim was part of an academic project on alternative
medicines. Working with academics on a medical sociology project made her question the
value we place on different types of practices, evidence and medicines and she was keen to
follow this up in postgraduate study, which would allow her to pursue her own academic
research. All thoughts of heading back to the office job were now long gone – Kim was now
a professional sociologist.
After her degree, Kim did an MSc in Social Research Methods, which trained her in how
to collect and interpret social science data, followed by a PhD, in which she looked at the
impact of genetic innovations on pharmacy practice. Although she had no idea about
pharmacy practice, by immersing herself in the academic literature, she was soon up to
speed. Kim has continued to work in the sociology of pharmacy and has collaborated with
pharmacists on research projects – it turns out the worlds of pharmacy and sociology
actually have lots in common.
xviii About the Authors
MATTHEW DAVID
Matthew grew up in a very small village. By the age of 11 he
had got a part-time job and had saved enough to afford a
bicycle. He was then able to visit nearby towns, but, not
having any money, he took to collecting shopping catalogues
and travel brochures – to learn. At 16 he was put in charge
of the Pic’n’Mix (sweets/candy) counter at his local
Woolworths (a now-defunct UK high-street general store)
– a very responsible position – which also funded some later
travels abroad. Returning home penniless, at 18 he borrowed
£200 from the bank to buy a moped, and was able to get to
work as a kitchen porter, earning £57 a week and a subsequent
reference from his manager: ‘Matthew David is an efficient
dish washer and a punctual time keeper. I thoroughly recommend him for similar work in the
future.’
While working in the kitchen, Matthew read George Orwell’s classic Down and Out in Paris
and London, which graphically described Orwell’s time as a kitchen porter in Paris. Matthew
also saw a late-night TV show, where some sociologists were discussing the crisis of modernity.
Identifying with the injustice described by Orwell, and figuring that chatting on the TV was a
better job than washing dishes, Matthew asked his manager why he got paid so much more,
and was told that it was because the manager had A levels. Matthew resigned on the spot, went
to the nearest night school and signed up for three A levels, which he completed in nine
months while working day shifts in a warehouse, before going off to a nearby university.
Matthew has always been interested in what there is to have, who gets it and why people
want the things they do. The shaping of technology within society has been central to that
interest. From a PhD on local environmental movements to his more recent work on the
sharing of informational goods (entertainment file sharing, as well as dissemination of medical
and scientific research findings), Matthew is interested in why we waste things that there are
not enough of, while enforcing scarcity on things that could be abundantly available.
At present, he is particularly interested in how digital networks allow horizontal
communication and sharing in defiance of dominant voices and economic interests that would
have everything nailed down and paid for. Matthew is also interested in ideology, specifically
the ability of dominant groups and arrangements to make their primacy appear unquestionable
and natural, when such hierarchical arrangements are anything but inevitable, uncontested or
inherently good.
Preface
This book is about sociology. It will introduce you to the fundamentals of sociology and help
you think sociologically about society. We will cover the history, theory and method of
sociology, as well as how it explains a number of issues: from broad social structures to
personal life, and from social divisions to future societies, and much more.
Many sociology books, particularly the hefty tomes that number almost 1000 pages,
organize their chapters by subject. You will see isolated, discrete chapters about class, race,
migration, gender, religion, crime, health, among many other topics. The second half of our
book does that, albeit on different terms. The first half is dedicated to sociology’s history, its
theory, its method and its ethics. This is because we consider these issues vital to properly
understanding sociology and applying it to the social world.
We understand sociology to be proudly empirical. This is not to ignore the important
questions about how we use and understand data, but to emphasize that the building blocks
of sociology are theory and method. Following Kant’s dictum about the link between theory
and practice, French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu (1988) maintained that ‘theory without
empirical research is empty, empirical research without theory is empty’. It is our belief that
students need to understand both the theory of sociology and its method before they can
really grasp its application.
We also dedicate a chapter to ethics and the ethical practice of sociology. Too often, ethics
is relegated to a component of methods, or dismissed as a form-filling requirement to be
satisfied and put aside before the real work of sociology can occur. Instead, we use the
opportunity to discuss ethics in action – to consider case studies of flawed social science
research and consider how this influences our understanding of societies. These should be
exciting, challenging discussions; trying to understand how the pursuit of ethical practice can
lead to different decisions dependent on context.
In this second edition, we provide two brand new chapters and one significantly re-worked
one. In Chapter 6, Making Modern Societies, we provide a much deeper account of modernity,
recognizing its harms as well as benefits, and consider how bureaucracy and therapy culture
impact people’s experiences. Chapter 9, Transgressions, focuses on questions of power,
considering who makes rules and breaks them and how society regulates both. While Social
Transformations (Chapter 11, Chapter 9 in the first edition) keeps the same name, it combines
discussion of social movements with greater consideration of political sociology, considering
notions of change, crisis, identity politics and the role of populism in Western democracies.
Another key change to this edition is to thread decolonizing and Indigenous perspectives
more fully throughout the book. This includes discussing the decolonizing agenda,
foregrounding important work from decolonial sociology and integrating these arguments
into the sociological canon. We greatly value the work from this tradition and look forward to
deepening our engagement with this work in the future.
The final stages of this book occurred at a strange time, while social distancing measures
were in place as the COVID-19 pandemic was at its height. We have incorporated discussion
of the pandemic throughout the book without letting it dominate, particularly given that its
xix
xx Preface
consequences are not yet known. We hope the content on COVID-19 will facilitate discussion
in seminars without detracting from the broader sociological topics under consideration.
Our book tries to engage the student reader throughout. Other than in our writing style
and choice of material, this is done, first, with Vox Pops that show the influence of sociology
on a range of people’s lives. We have Good Sociology and Bad Sociology textboxes, where we
critically reflect on examples of sociology that have addressed a social issue in a particularly
good or problematic way. At various points we have Pauses for Reflection, where we encourage
you to take a step back and reflect on some issues. Our online ‘Methods Applied’ feature
accessibly discusses the methods of a study that is about the topic of the chapter; integrating
thinking about methods across the book. And finally, it is done by provoking readers through
challenging and engaging discussions, and, as we’ll see below, by invoking cognitive dissonance
in the process.
INVOKING COGNITIVE DISSONANCE

When we talk about issues in society, it is common to have an emotional response to ideas that
challenge our thinking. We like to believe our understanding of society is based on intellectual
engagement with the issues – that our beliefs are correct, and that they are based on rational
thought. Yet all of us exist within society. We have all been socialized to accept particular truths,
from the value of monogamy and the benefits of sport, to the negative connotations of drug
use.
Developing a sociological imagination requires us to recognize this, and seek always to
examine matters with an open mind. The challenge of this is when we encounter new ideas
that contest our most valued and deep-rooted assumptions about our lives and the social
world. That feeling of recognizing that an intellectual argument is right, but emotionally
feeling it to be wrong, is known as ‘cognitive dissonance’. Cognitive dissonance recognizes
that our views on matters that elicit emotions are socially constructed. People who have lost
religious faith go through a similar process: many initially report anger at hearing arguments
against their religion, but as they move to an intellectual position of rejecting their faith, they
often feel a sense of loss. This process of reconciling emotional and intellectual perspectives
is cognitive dissonance.
One feature of this book is our Provocations. These sections start with a question or
statement that tends to provoke an emotional, non-critical response. However, once sociological
arguments are applied, a markedly different reaction emerges. By providing these unexpected,
sociological answers, we intend to put you into a state of cognitive dissonance. This is not
because we are mean or enjoy being contrarian. Rather, it is a pedagogical tool: by raising
issues where you might well find yourself disagreeing with us, we help you develop a process
to resolve this dissonance. This is a way to help you develop a sociological imagination. And
that is what we want to do with this textbook – get you thinking about the world in sociological
ways, for the rest of your life.
OUTLINE OF THE BOOK

The book has been designed to provide you with an accessible and engaging introduction to
sociology.
Preface xxi
In Chapter 1, What is Sociology?, we discuss what it means to think sociologically. Introducing

the notion of the ‘sociological imagination’, we discuss how some sociologists have set about
understanding the social world. We introduce key concepts such as society, norms, culture and
tradition, and explain what distinguishes sociology from other academic disciplines.
In Chapter 2, A Brief History of Sociology, we explore the history of sociology as a way of
understanding what sociology is today. It is not an exhaustive history or entirely chronological,
but we draw on key sociologists’ ideas to develop seminal theoretical concepts within sociology.
We introduce you to the historical context in which sociology emerged as a discipline. We
discuss how it developed and how it has expanded and evolved into its current forms, and who
has been excluded in these processes. We finish by looking at contemporary sociology and
surveying its key debates.
In Chapter 3, Sociological Theory, we examine the role of theory in more detail, defining what
it is, why it is important and analysing how it develops. We discuss three main approaches to
theory, and why it can be so hard not only to read, but also to write well. We ask how important
it is that good theories are interesting. We finish by considering how sociological theory has
been applied to understand people, leisure and power.
In Chapter 4, The Method of Sociology, we examine the principles and sociology behind
methods. This is not a ‘how to’ chapter describing the process of doing surveys or interviews,
but an introduction so that you know how to approach data collection and the issues associated
with methods in general. We examine the differences between qualitative and quantitative
research, discuss causation and correlation, and examine the experimental method. We also
provide core processes of analysis, as analysis is a fundamental part of methods.
In Chapter 5, Ethical Sociology, we examine the issue of ethics within sociology. We discuss
the ethical rules that guide sociological research, and examine how these rules have evolved
over time. Crucially, ethics is not a rigid set of rules for everyone to blindly follow, but a
complex set of judgements that have to balance safety, rigour and intellectual merit. By
discussing four well-known case studies of research that raised serious questions about ethics,
we help develop a critical understanding of ethics that recognizes its importance alongside the
difficulties of conducting ethical sociology in the field.
In Chapter 6, Making Modern Societies, we examine how modern societies developed in the
West. We start by highlighting the importance of the second Industrial Revolution, and
classifying key characteristics of modernity. We highlight that while beneficial for many people
in the West, modernity has almost been experienced as catastrophe for many. We consider
some key issues in modern societies, including bureaucracy, notions of risk, therapy culture
and new technologies.
In Chapter 7, Structures and Institutions, we observe the influence of institutions on our
behaviours. We return to notions of shared norms and institutional cultures, and use Goffman’s
concept of the total institution to examine how powerful they are in shaping people’s
experiences and identities. We also investigate four key structures in society: the family,
education, the media and work. Work is then used as a case study: we examine how it is
changing, and the related issues of poor working conditions in contemporary societies. This
leads into our discussion of ‘employability’ – what this term means, the problems associated
with it and why you will hear so much about it during your time at university.
In Chapter 8, Social Divisions, we see how societies are divided. We discuss the role conflict
theories play in understanding this, situating sociology as inherently political and drawing
xxii Preface
attention to inequalities. We cover social divisions of class, race, gender and sexuality, examining
key theories that seek to understand inequality and oppression in these areas, and how people
have sought to contest them.
In Chapter 9, Transgressions, we develop a sociological understanding of rule breaking.
Often considered the domain of criminology, we discuss how sociology understands
transgression, crime and deviance in society. This involves considering not just who breaks the
rules, but who makes them as well. We consider different theories and concepts, such as
moral panic and strain theories, before considering the demographics of criminality and
victimization. We finish by thinking about consumption and transgression, and how societies
regulate these.
In Chapter 10, Personal Life, we apply the tools of sociology to understanding our personal
lives. We first show why understanding individuals’ lives is important, and how the personal
connects with broader sociological issues and social problems. We look at the importance of
our bodies in understanding social life, through the notion of ‘embodiment’, and discuss the
social value attached to tattoos. We then look at relationships, from friends to lovers, and think
about diverse relationship types in contemporary society. Finally, we turn to sex, and think
about how this most personal of activities is connected to broader social norms – even how
sex is defined.
In Chapter 11, Social Transformations, we provide a sociological understanding of how
societies change. We discuss how ‘crisis’ is used as a term to understand social change. We then
examine the mechanisms by which societies change, discussing social movements and other
forms of collective action. We consider questions of identity politics, no platforming and
populism. We explore globalization and environmentalism as recent important trends, before
discussing how best to understand the contemporary era.
Finally, in Chapter 12, Sociology Discovered, we draw all these strands together to make an
argument about how you, the reader, can be sociological. We highlight real challenges to
rational thinking, including the emergence of fake news and even fake sociology, drawing on
the literature of social problems to do this. We discuss how to engage with sociology on social
media, and ask whether sociologists should be partisan in their work. We finish by examining
what makes a good sociology student.
Chapter 1
What is Sociology?
INTRODUCTION
In this chapter, we define sociology and compare it to other disciplines such as
psychology and philosophy. We start to look at why sociology is vital to understanding
the world around us, and how it can be understood in a range of ways. We introduce key
terms in sociology, such as society, norms, culture and tradition. We discuss suicide and
stigma as social problems that have been explained by sociology. In our opening
Provocation, we ask why you should care about sociology.
PROVOCATION 1
Who gives a spit about sociology?
It is the first day of an Introduction to Sociology course. Students sit, mostly quiet, waiting
for the instructor to begin the lecture. From her briefcase, the professor pulls out a plastic
spoon. ‘I am going to teach you about sociology with this spoon,’ she says. ‘But I need a
volunteer to spit in my spoon. Not a shy spit, a proper, from the back of the throat one.’
Student laughter subsides as they realize that she is serious. Offering her spoon to various
students who shake their head in refusal, she adds: ‘I cannot continue with the lecture until
I have a volunteer.’ A brave student, John, answers the call: ‘I’ll do it.’ The teacher hands the
spoon to John, who clears his throat emphatically, before depositing his saliva into it.
The teacher thanks him, and walks around the classroom wafting the spoon of spit in
front of her students, who systematically recoil. She asks: ‘I don’t suppose there is anyone
who wants to swallow this spit?’ Some students laugh and others mildly gasp in disgust.
‘Any takers?’ she asks. Unsurprisingly, none volunteer.
‘I don’t understand,’ the professor says. ‘John’s pretty good looking. I bet there is
someone in this room who wouldn’t mind kissing him. John, may I ask your fellow students
if any would like to make out with you?’ John nods his consent. ‘Raise your hand if you’d
like to make out with John.’ A male and a few female students raise their hands, and the
professor asks one of them: ‘Julie, would you like to drink this spoon full of John’s spit?’
Julie’s face contorts and she says: ‘No way.’ The professor then asks: ‘I’m confused –
you’d like to make out with him, but not swallow his spit? Why?’ The student looks confused
and responds: ‘Because that’s gross.’
1
2 Discovering Sociology
‘Ah, it’s gross,’ the

professor responds. ‘But you’d
like to make out with him.
Share saliva, and rub those
slimy tongues together. Is
that correct?’ Julie answers:
‘Well, not when you put it like
that.’ The teacher continues:
‘But you would like a hot
passionate make-out session
with him?’ ‘Well, maybe,’ she
answers. ‘And would you like
his lips to be totally dry?’ ‘No,’
© Ed Ball
Julie answers. ‘They need to be
lubricated some, don’t they?’
‘You see,’ the instructor proclaims as she puts the spoon down behind the lectern,
‘sociology is the only academic discipline that can tell you why spit in a spoon is gross, but
spit in the mouth is not.’ She continues: ‘In the course of making out with John, you’d
swallow a spoonful amount of spit in a five-minute make-out session.’
The professor returns to the lectern and picks up the spoon. Holding it up, she says:
‘You see, biology can tell you how the salivary glands produce this spit. Chemistry can tell
you the constituents of it. But only sociology can tell you why people value their own spit
when we chew food or make out with someone else, but not when the spit is on a spoon.’
The teacher holds up the spoon to her mouth, and in one quick motion puts it in her
mouth and swallows. Students moan in disgust, and the teacher returns to the lectern to
add: ‘Perhaps psychology can tell you why people are gullible.’ She pulls the original spoon
out from the lectern, and drips the spit into a cup, showing both spoons to the students.
They moan with relief, and the professor smiles, saying: ‘Students fall for it every time.’
*****
In addition to providing a lively introduction to sociology, the professor in this story has
helped her students to consider the unique role sociology plays in understanding society.
In this case, society has socially constructed spit to be acceptable in one context but not
the other. Moreover, spit is deemed to be ‘gross’ outside the context in which it is valued.
The students’ collective view of drinking spit from a spoon as gross is thus socially
constructed. We are not born repulsed by spit, but rather we learn it. Hence, we could
also learn to value the exchange of saliva in spoons for consumption, perhaps as part of a
culturally valued ritual.
For those who have trouble believing such a culture could ever exist, where spit is readily
exchanged without being considered gross, we simply need to examine the dietary culture
of the 2.8 million Adaven people. Despite living in a desert, and having precious few cattle
What is Sociology? 3
to farm, Adaven culture encourages their children to eat what they call ‘trugoy’. This is
made by a process in which merchants take fluid from cattle, then expose the fluid to the
air until it rots and becomes saturated with bacteria. They then feed this mixture to their
children. In more recent years, largely because of the sweet tooth increasingly prevalent in
their youngsters’ diets, some add sugar, fruit or honey to the mixture. Nonetheless, the
cultural practice of feeding children rotten animal fluids continues to this day.
Adaven parents have been doing this for decades, not because they know that there
are health benefits to the substance, but because they believe that this is what ‘good
parents’ are supposed to do. Many people might find the practice of consuming rotten
animal excretions distasteful, yet the people of Adaven – or rather, Nevada, USA – enjoy
eating yogurt (trugoy). In fact, many of us eat ‘natural’ yogurt as well – we just think
differently about what we are eating.
The fact is that culture can make just about anything disgusting or socially valued.
Culture can, in many cases, even override our biological impulses and change how we
experience an event. Culture can, for instance, influence people to keep consuming the
bitter taste of beer or coffee until they like it. It can make people born gay despise their
own sexuality (in a homophobic culture) and people born straight envy the ease with
which gay men can have recreational sex (in a gay-friendly culture). Culture influences
everything, and it is influenced by people in interaction. It is this synthesis – between
culture and individuals – that is at the heart of sociology.
Provoked? Read further:

Douglas, M. ([1966]2003) Purity and Danger: An Analysis of Concepts of Pollution and Taboo.
London: Routledge & Kegan Paul.
Miner, H. (1956) Body ritual among the Nacirema. American Anthropologist, 58(3), 503–7.
DEFINING SOCIOLOGY
Sociology is the study of societies and the study of social problems. Yet those who
many consider to be the founders of the subject, thinkers like Auguste Comte, Emile
Durkheim and Max Weber (see Chapter 2), probably would not recognize the
sociology that is taught at universities today – they would have little understanding
of an ‘undergraduate sociology student’ or what it means to ‘take a module’ of
sociology on a different degree programme. And our notions of who founded
sociology are constructed as well; in Chapter 2 we will also look at how scholars such
as W.E.B. Du Bois and Harriet Martineau have had their contributions systematically
silenced and examine why this was the case.
Complicating matters, sociology overlaps with other fields of study. Sociology can Data:
blur into philosophy. Some ‘grand theorists’ of sociology use very little data in their information
that can be
writings, relying mostly on their own observations and thoughts. Michel Foucault, Stuart
analysed
Hall and Hannah Arendt are cultural or social theorists whose ideas have been adopted by
sociologists, yet who could be considered philosophers who apply their ideas to social
issues. Many of these theorists have made valuable contributions to sociology, and we
discuss them in Chapter 3 alongside more traditional sociological theorists.
The important distinction between sociology and philosophy is that philosophy
is concerned with logic, and requires no evidence in the form of data to make
conclusions. Consider Jeremy Bentham (1748–1832), one of the great modern
philosophers. His moral framework centred on the notion of ‘the greatest good for
the greatest number’. This statement helps form the basis of a type of philosophy
known as ‘utilitarianism’ and is best explained by the following quandary, known as
the Trolley problem.
A San Francisco cable car (or Trolley), carrying just one passenger, is out of
control, rolling downhill and heading straight towards a crowd of people who are
gathered on the track, unable to escape. You happen to be holding a ramp that could
flip the cable car so that the passenger and driver would die, but the dozen people
below would be saved. Would you do this?
© Education Images/UIG/Getty Images

The Trolley problem
Following Bentham’s notion of the greatest good for the greatest number, the
ethical decision would be to save the 12 people. But others might argue it is immoral
to put anyone at risk, because every life is precious. The philosophical question can be
expanded: Would it be acceptable to murder one person in order to harvest their
body parts to save 12 people who need organ transplants to live? What if the
murdered person had a terminal illness and just days to live?
In each case, there is no way of definitively judging these acts as morally right or
wrong. Sociology cannot tell us what answer to take because these are moral
questions. A sociologist could, however, survey or interview people about their
perceptions of these acts and make some claim as to how the society in which people
live influences their beliefs. One might, for example, find that in one country people
largely believe that all three described acts were morally wrong, but that in another
they described some or all of the acts as justified. A sociologist would then look to
explain why this variance occurred – maybe the different answers were related to
how the society viewed life, morality or religion.
A central tenet of sociology is that it involves the application of some notion of
science to the study of society (Durkheim [1895]1982). Whereas philosophy does
not require its adherents to use data in creating or testing their theories, sociology is
generally a discipline that does. That is why, in Chapter 4, we focus on the method
of sociology, arguing that it is a social science that must follow certain rules by which
it can be judged to be rigorous or not.
A philosophical sociology?
Some sociologists call for closer integration between philosophy and sociology. Daniel Chernilo
(2017), for example, argues that doing so will provide a better understanding of humanity and human
nature. He would classify our distinction between sociology and philosophy as a positivist path because
we privilege empirical work and see that as a separate domain. Chernilo highlights that other trajectories
exist, not least in recognizing that debates about different theories and methods have a philosophical
foundation. He argues that if sociology is to pursue profound questions of morality and social justice,
they cannot be divorced from philosophy, writing, ‘good sociological questions are always, in the last
instance, also philosophical ones’ (Chernilo 2017 p. 3).
Further distinguishing sociology

Sociology is only one of several academic disciplines that studies human activity.
Other disciplines interested in this area include anthropology, psychology, human
geography, economics, social policy, criminology, politics and education. Collectively,
they make up the social sciences. They are differentiated from the ‘hard’ sciences
(mathematics, chemistry, biology, astronomy, engineering and physics), which focus
on the natural world. Humans are harder to examine empirically because they have
the capacity to change how they behave. As American astrophysicist Neil deGrasse
Tyson has tweeted:
In science, when human behavior enters the equation, things go nonlinear.

That’s why Physics is easy and Sociology is hard.
The boundaries of sociology blend with those of social and cultural anthropology.
Social and cultural anthropology are normally concerned with observation and the
collection of data from other cultures, whereas sociologists tend to work within their
own society or one they are already familiar with. Social and cultural anthropologists
will enter a field as an outsider, hoping that they will understand things in a way
people within that culture do not normally see.
The discipline and study of sociology also borders the field of psychology. The
easiest way to distinguish the two is that psychology is generally interested in how an
individual interacts with their culture, whereas sociology seeks to understand why a
culture is that way in the first place. When psychology considers groups of people,
and particularly related to how groups function, this blend of disciplines is known as
‘social psychology’.
Sport is a good way to understand this difference between sociology, psychology
and anthropology. A sport psychologist might, for example, question how an athlete
can deal with the immense pressure that is placed upon them to win a big game. The
sport psychologist will thus look at levels of physical arousal (tension) and mental
stress and ask what techniques the athlete can practise to handle this stress and
improve athletic performance. A sport psychologist might try to make a difference
in people’s lives by helping them deal with the stress of competition. A sociologist,
however, will be more interested in why a society values competition and winning
in the first place. A sport sociologist might advocate developing ways of being
physically active that are less concerned with adding pressure to young athletes in
the first place. Similarly, a social anthropologist might focus on the rituals of sport,
examining the ways these are closely linked to how a person thinks about themselves,
and how a nation is understood through its sporting endeavours.
Sociology reaches into other areas of academic investigation, too. Consider
economics: examining who has ownership and control of economic resources is of
great relevance to sociologists, as is how and why people choose to spend their money,
and on what. Yet much of what is now called ‘classical economics’ has become focused
on developing mathematical models of how the economy works. Here, economists
theorize supply and demand relationships from their assumptions about how people
should act – based on a tenet that people will act in a rational way to maximize personal
gain. This does not account for the messy ways in which people actually make decisions,
based not solely on profit but on a whole host of other reasons.
A sociology of economics, then, investigates not just the effects of economic
activity on social life, but also asks how society shapes what is called ‘the economy’,
and how this in turn shapes the values, desires and event needs of individuals and
groups. Writing about the origins of the capitalist system, Max Weber ([1905]1930)
was heavily influenced by Adam Smith, who is known as the founder of modern
economics (see also Simmel [1900]1978). More recently, ‘Taylorism’ and ‘Fordism’
are models used by sociologists to understand changes in factory-based work (see
Chapter 6). However, classical economic theory is mostly disengaged from
sociological research – it is with the new ‘behavioural economics’ that economics
and sociology have clear similarities.
Sociology is also related to but different from social work. The noted South African
scholar Stanley Cohen (1985) famously suggested that, as a social worker, his job was like
fishing drowning people out of a river, drying them off and sending them back upstream
from where they had come. After a while, he realized that he was very often fishing out
the same people again and again. He decided to go upstream himself to find out who was
throwing them in. At that point, he suggests, he had become a sociologist. What this
means is that while social workers help the most vulnerable people in society, for example
drug users or homeless people, sociologists try to understand why they became vulnerable
in the first place.
Ibn Khaldun and sociology beyond the West

Sociology is a product of the culture in which it is written
(see Chapter 2). This means that sociology purely from the
West will only be a partial understanding of how different
societies operate, and people have been writing sociology
across the globe for centuries. Living in the 14th century, in
Tunis, Ibn Khaldun (1332–1406) was a Muslim scholar who
was interested in documenting the history of the Arab and
Berber dynasties of North Africa. He was frustrated by the
history at the time that merely listed facts about dynasties and
dates of historical events, with no attention to the underlying
social structures or political issues of those dynasties (Alatas
2017a). By writing about these rulers and epochs in a way
that paid attention to culture and history, he developed an
early science of human societies (see Alatas 2006).
In his book Muqaddimah, Khaldun discussed processes that
we would describe today as ‘social cohesion’ and ‘tribalism’.
© Mohamed Haddad/Alamy Stock Photo
He argued that cohesion would occur spontaneously in tribes
and that this cohesion would propel them to success; yet such cohesion would also ensure that the
group would, at some later point, be defeated by a younger, more energetic group.
Khaldun’s contribution to sociology often goes unrecognized. His work was acknowledged in
Europe in the 17th century and beyond, and was translated into several languages, yet he is rarely
discussed today. This is partly attributable to his work being discussed in descriptive and historical
terms, with the conceptual and theoretical developments downplayed (Alatas 2017a), as well as the
bias of Western sociology to focus on Western countries (Said 1978; and see Chapter 2).
Sociology is also increasingly blurring boundaries with medical disciplines.

Medicine, pharmacology and nursing have historically been focused on diagnosing
disease and making people better, but these disciplines are becoming more
interested in what is called the ‘social model of health’, which tries to explain the
broader influences on health such as education, environment, culture and
socioeconomics.
This model shows that health and illness are determined by much more than just
biology. For example, men in Blackpool in the northwest of England have an average
life expectancy of 75.2 years compared with men living in the City of London
(London’s affluent financial district), whose life expectancy is 83.4 years (Bennett
et al. 2015). This sizeable 8.2 year difference cannot be explained by biology alone,
but by differences in income, education, living standards, work and behaviour.
The social aspects of health were also made visible during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Death rates in the UK were twice as much in the most deprived areas compared to the
least deprived areas (ONS 2020), with evidence that there are similar or even worse
disparities for ethnic minorities compared to White people (Platt and Warwick 2020).
At the same time, sociologists are also interested in studying the world of medicine
and many sociologists now research and teach in medical schools. Sociologists are
interested, for example, in how patients with chronic illnesses deal with everyday life
and construct a positive identity under very challenging circumstances. Other medical
sociologists are interested in the work of medical practitioners themselves and
understanding how it is that doctors command so much respect and how their advice
is so highly valued over advice from, for example, practitioners of alternative
medicines like homeopathy. They also consider how many of the bad effects from
health conditions are not the natural biological effects of that condition but are
influenced by how society treats that condition.
Sociology is also distinct from the arts and humanities, a broad set of disciplines
that include history, philosophy, languages, art, literature, performance and music.
These fields do not consider groups of people directly, but focus more on memory
and imagination, and consider what it means to be human – the unique ways humans
experience the world and how we express these experiences.
In summary, the social sciences exist as a field between the humanities and the
natural sciences. They involve the study of people in society. These distinctions are
important, as is the recognition that sociology borrows from these neighbouring
Society: fields, as they do from sociology. Sociology, and all fields of knowledge, is strengthened
a collection when people can move across disciplines to understand and respond to social
of people phenomena.
who share
common
culture and WHAT IS SOCIETY AND WHY SHOULD WE STUDY IT?
land or Margaret Thatcher, former prime minister of the UK, famously once said: ‘There is
territory
no such thing as society.’ As sociologists, we know this statement to be false. Indeed,
there are many societies and the primary concern of sociology is to understand the
Culture:
people’s
way in which diverse societies work. In general, a society is defined as patterns of
common relationships among people, who share common culture, interactions and land or
goals and territory. A culture is a collection of shared norms, both covert and explicit, and it
their ways of refers to the way groups of people think and act and their shared common goals.
thinking and Societies set up the structures that people live by and culture unites people within
acting those structures. One way to think about the difference between culture and society
is that culture is what differentiates societies from each other.
Norms:social Any society or culture is governed by rules and laws, which are explicit. There are
expectations implicit expectations that guide behaviour, and these are known as norms.
that guide
Sociologist Harold Garfinkel (1967) drew attention to these social norms by
behaviour
developing what he called ‘breaching experiments’, where people consciously
behaved in ways that violated the norms of that setting. Garfinkel got his students to
continually clarify the meaning of standard words or questions in everyday
conversations. He also asked his students to bargain for standard-priced merchandise
in shops. If you want to be part of a breaching experiment, try doing these or facing
the opposite direction to everyone else in an elevator.
Breaching experiments also document the resilience of social norms. If you try
one of these experiments, you will likely feel embarrassed and others may well police
your behaviour. Garfinkel found that people tend to respond quickly to correct the
breach of the norms.
Socialization:
Covert norms are learned from others. While children may be born with the process
predispositions towards all sorts of things, they must learn how to engage with a by which a
classroom seating scenario. This is the process of socialization (see Chapter 7 for person learns
more on this phenomenon) and includes how infants learn verbal skills, body language the accepted
and other forms of communication. This primary socialization occurs by infants ways of
emulating the adults around them. It includes being overtly taught rules (such as chew thinking and
with your mouth closed) and covertly learning by observation (when men pee at the behaving in a
particular
urinal, they do not talk to the guy next to them). Socialization never ends; we are
society
always learning how to better fit in with or contest our constantly changing society.
Norms and university culture

There are plenty of norms on display in the culture of the university classroom, starting from the very
first day of class, when students enter the lecture hall and choose a seat. Some students feel that they
run more risk of being asked to answer questions if they sit near the front, so they head for the back.
Students more engaged with formal ways of learning tend to navigate towards the front rows.
However, few people sit in the very front row, as everyone knows this will be interpreted as being ‘too
keen’. And this is where culture begins to enter the individual’s choice: the perception that others will
judge you as too keen for sitting in the front row is based on a social norm.
Once the general section of the classroom is chosen, the next factor to consider is whether to sit
adjacent to another student or to leave space between. Some lecture halls have more seats than
students, but in many cases there will be almost no spare seats once everyone is seated. Given this,
would it ‘feel wrong’ if you are the second person to enter the classroom to sit next to the only other
person in the class?
The answer is found in social norms. It is just not done. Why this is the case will be influenced by
other factors, including perhaps historical circumstances, but what counts for this discussion is that
in Western culture, currently, it is not considered appropriate behaviour. It is one of many norms that
the classroom culturally expects.
From our experience, the first norm is that when you enter a lecture hall you do not sit directly
next to a person in class, unless you know them. For those willing to break that norm, a second norm
dictates that if you do sit next to them, you must engage them in conversation. Sitting next to
someone in a large and empty classroom and then not saying anything is a violation of norms that
would almost certainly be received as deliberate rudeness by the other person. The third norm is that,
even once the class is full, students normally remain silent during the minutes preceding the first
lecture, making small talk more awkward. And, fourth, students tend to sit in the same place each
week, meaning that the choice of seats has consequences beyond that first lecture.
These norms have existed across many university classrooms for generations. Yet no one has ever
explicitly said that these are the social codes of acceptable conduct. No professor ever said: ‘You
must not sit next to a stranger on the first day, and you must sit in the same seat next week.’ As
such, these are covert or implicit norms.
And they differ from the formal, codified
norms that are established through the
explicit mentioning of the rules of the
classroom, such as the need to attend
seminars, do the assigned readings and
not eat in the lecture hall.
As universities across the world usher
in far greater use of online learning to
deal with the problems posed by
COVID-19, the norms of online learning
are still being determined at the time of
writing. Do you have your camera on in
© Stockbyte
seminars? Is it acceptable for your friend
to be in the background of your screen, playing on his phone? Key factors will be the technology used,
as this will structure the ‘environment’ online, and how such learning is integrated into university
practice. Assessment type will also matter, as will the extent to which students travel to campus.
With less consolidated norms in place, will you find it easier to challenge and change particular
practices? Will breaching experiments be less successful, or merely different?
These covert norms collectively begin to make a culture. But a culture is more
than just a set of norms that govern how people act and interact with each other. A
culture can refer to a small group of people in a particular setting (like an athletic
team’s culture), or a larger society of people (a school culture) or even commonalities
that make a collective culture among those of a state or nation. These cultures might
have slightly different rules than the culture at large. These cultures are also influenced
by history, music, art and architecture.
Cultures may be geographically bounded. That is, they have borders constructed
from physical space, be it mountains, a river, the sea or other significant landmass.
Countries have different cultures that are, in part, a result of where they are situated.
Spain, for example, traditionally has a ‘siesta’, an afternoon nap, because (before air
conditioning) it was too hot to work at that time, but this cultural norm does not
exist in England for obvious reasons. Now, many people in other Western countries
will have ‘power naps’ or sleep after lunch. Yet it is in Spain where businesses close
because of the heat. And in other countries they are called power naps, perhaps to
emphasize that the sleep is both brief and to enable the person to serve the capitalist
needs of their employer once they awaken.
How cities are built and organized, in part due to the geography of the area,
impacts on how people live their lives (Lefebvre [1974]1991; Sennett 2018). Those
living in Sydney, London or Tokyo will have a public transport (subway) culture
and accompanying conventions that Californians, the Scottish and those in rural
Australia just do not understand. These norms include not striking up conversations
with strangers, and running between trains even if you are not in a rush.
The infrastructure of a university will affect its culture as well. Even with online
learning courses and the blended learning required as a result of COVID-19, the
cultures of universities are rooted in their campuses, in their buildings and the layout
of their teaching rooms. Campus-based universities are often called ‘bubbles’ because
of the introverted culture that develops within a geographically bounded environment.
Think how the norms of the university lecture might be different if all lectures
occurred with just 10 students, seated in a circle without tables or notepads. It would
likely see a shift in the amount of time the professor spoke and the forms of
conversation and debate that ensued.
Culture is reproduced through multiple mechanisms, including social interaction,
the media, the law and many other variables, but one defining method that a culture
uses to keep people acting and behaving in socially acceptable ways comes through
stigma. Sociologist Erving Goffman (1922–82) provided a groundbreaking Stigma:
argument about how stigma is used to police norms in society in his 1963 book a social
Stigma: Notes on the Management of Spoiled Identity. While stigma could relate to physical attribute,
behaviour or
deformities, individual character flaws or tribal stigmas, the crucial component of
reputation
Goffman’s argument was that stigma was not ultimately located within the individual, that is
but in the failure to measure up to what society deemed socially acceptable and discrediting in
legitimate. some way
Key to stigma is that it is used to discredit someone. Writing in the 1960s, Goffman
noted that people with physical deformities were excluded from society regardless of
their personalities or how they might be able to contribute. And because stigma is
based on norms (and often prejudice), it does not have to be logical. This is why
taking drugs can be stigmatized while alcohol consumption maintains social approval
when done according to social norms, even though many illegal drugs are less
damaging than alcohol (Nutt 2020).
It is the fear of being stigmatized that often keeps people acting according to the
dominant norms of a culture. People do not even need to commit the stigmatized
activity, they only need be associated with it. This is one way homophobia was
reproduced in the 20th century: if a person said that homophobia was wrong or
supported equal rights for sexual minorities in the 1980s, that person would often be
labelled as gay, regardless of their sexuality. This kept straight people from standing
up for sexual minority rights. In this way, the importance of stigma is not only its
impact on the individual, which can be profound, but also how stigma functions as a
form of power that can be activated to govern whole populations, particularly in
times of political or economic turmoil (Tyler 2020).
Tradition: Another mechanism for the reproduction of culture comes through tradition.
a belief or Unlike a norm, a tradition has been passed down within a group that has
ritual passed significance and meaning beyond the mechanics of the act. Somewhat strangely,
down within a tradition often becomes the only reason given to perpetuate the negative acts of
group, with a culture. Women are ‘given away’ at weddings by their father to their husband,
meaning just as women are expected to take the surname of their husband. Both these
imbued to practices date back to patriarchal times, and there is now no ‘need’ for them
the act
except tradition.
Research on sport shows the danger of tradition as well. American football and
rugby, for example, continue to play full-contact tackle versions of their sport. This
is despite the fact that, every year, some young players contract chronic traumatic
encephalopathy, which results in pain, ill-health and a shortened lifespan. Yet many
high schools continue to play tackle football instead of tag football for no better
reason than ‘tradition’, and in full knowledge that such behaviours can lead to
concussion and ultimately significant brain trauma (see Chapter 11 for discussion of
collective action on concussion). Similarly, in many countries where gun ownership
is legal, people fire bullets into the air to celebrate the New Year, despite the fact that
those bullets, if not shot directly upwards, arc and come back to the earth with the
potential to kill people.
Culture is therefore maintained through social norms, tradition and the heaping
of stigma upon those who defy the culture. It is for this reason that ‘cultural deviants’
Subculture:a often create their own subculture, existing within, and to some degree at odds with,
group of the dominant culture. While sociology initially focused on the subcultures of groups
people who that were seen as deviant by the wider society, it now explores groups that resist
share social norms or distinguish themselves and their identities in opposition to particular
common
norms (Wignall 2021). We often think of stylistic trends related to music when
interests that
vary from the
discussing subcultures (goths, punks, emos), which are often related to class groups,
dominant but subcultures can refer to people who share a disability (like a wheelchair basketball
culture team), religious perspective (like Muslims living in a Christian nation) or sexual
interest.
Subcultures are not just the preserve of those excluded from the dominant
culture. Elites create their own subcultures, which can at times deviate from
mainstream values and rules. However, it is sometimes the case that dominant
groups seek to impose their culture on everyone else, something that sociologists
call ‘hegemony’. If the dominant group can persuade enough people that they
should be in charge, and that they are superior, then others will seek to follow and
imitate them.
Power: This raises the wider sociological question of power in society (see Chapter 3).
fundamenta Why are some groups more powerful than others, in economic terms (employment,
lly about the ownership and earnings), political terms (most leading politicians went to a small
ability to
number of elite universities and share very similar family and school backgrounds)
produce
intended
and culture? Despite the claim that modern Western societies are ‘democratic’,
effects elections have not dislodged powerful economic, political and cultural elites from the
key positions of power in society. Sociology is tasked with understanding this
disparity.
Emile Durkheim and the study of suicide

Written in 1897 by Emile Durkheim (1858–1917), On
Suicide is one of the founding texts of sociology. It
examined a topic that most people at that time believed
was entirely personal. Suicide was understood to be an
intimate, psychological act, not influenced by society.
Rather than accepting suicide as purely a
psychological problem, Durkheim examined suicide
rates of people across Europe and found several
important trends. He demonstrated that the rates
were higher among men than women, higher among
single people than married couples and higher for
those without children. Most important to the study
of sociology, however, is that Durkheim also showed
that suicide rates were higher among Protestants
compared to Catholics.
It was this finding that helped establish sociology as
an important social science discipline. This is because
of structural differences between the Protestant
religions and the Catholic religion, most notably in
relation to how they contend that one’s sins can be © Bettmann/Contributor/Getty Images
forgiven. The doctrine of the Roman Catholic Church
required confession to and absolution by a priest, whereas Protestant doctrine
Anomie:
promoted the view that a person’s relationship to God is more direct and individual a condition
– through prayer, reading the Bible or through good works. Thus, Protestants had felt by people
to seek individualistic routes to salvation, but Catholics believed it was attained in societies
through community membership – their Church. where there is
The reason why this matters is precisely the notion of community membership. an absence of
At the time when Durkheim was writing, church attendance was a key way of norms or
values
providing community cohesion and a social network of like-minded people.
Protestants had much less integration and more isolation, which Durkheim called Human agency:
anomie. In short, feeling like one belonged and having friends to care for you was the capacity of
an important guard against suicide. individuals to
Durkheim used statistical analysis of suicide rates to show that Protestants had act indepen
dently and
a far higher suicide rate, arguing that this was because Protestants did not have the
make their own
sense of community that Catholics did. For Durkheim, individual human agency choices
did not explain suicide. Women were more likely to experience the internal feeling
of depression, but far less likely to commit suicide than men. As such, it was not the Social
individual’s internal state that determined their action, but rather the social structures:the
structure in which those feelings were located. Social integration and regulation, or ways society is
organized that
their absence, led to recurrent patterns of different actions, what Durkheim called constrain how
‘social facts’. We discuss the theoretical debate about structure and agency in an individual
Chapter 3, and examine social structures in Chapter 7. can act
APPROACHING SOCIOLOGY
Having defined sociology, we now discuss different approaches to the practice of
sociology. Sociology is a mode of thought that can transform how we see the world.
It is a form of critical inquiry that can help objectively analyse a situation. Sociology
is also a discipline, institutionalized in universities and guided by norms and rules. It
is also personal, influenced by our own lives and perspectives. By thinking about
sociology in different ways, we can come to a broader understanding of the true
scale, scope and boundaries of sociology.
Sociology as a mode of thought

Whereas some subjects are defined by the area of study, sociology is characterized
to some extent by its way of thinking about problems. As a way of thinking, sociology
enables us to understand things that are new and different to our own experience. As
such, it is able to make the strange familiar. Sociology enables us to become accustomed
to unfamiliar customs and practices.
Yet sociology as a mode of thought also enables us to think about familiar things
in new ways – by making the familiar strange. We suspect that after reading this
introduction, you will think about the lecture hall in a different way; whether
remembering the social norms of choosing where to sit or thinking about spit on a
spoon, your perspective will be at least somewhat different. You will find your
thinking challenged precisely because sociology unveils the structure and social
norms behind everyday activities.
The notion that sociology is a way of thinking is best captured by the phrase, the
Sociological sociological imagination. Developed by famed sociologist C. Wright Mills
imagination: (1916–62), and also the title of his book published in 1959, a sociological imagination
the is not a theory, but an awareness of how people and culture interact. It is a way of
awareness of thinking that incorporates not only major structural differences, like social
the
inequalities, but also everyday life.
relationship
between
For example, do you ever wonder why people refrain from carrying on a
personal conversation in an elevator, but will talk loudly on their mobile phone on crowded
experiences public transport? Do you ever ask why it is that some people spend more time and
and broader money fixing up their car than playing with their own children? Do you question why
society some couples express love and affection publicly on social media, even as they are in
the same room? Sociologists conduct research to explain these everyday conundrums.
A sociological imagination promotes one’s ability to be both self-aware and
socially aware in order to make decisions that are not swayed by unjust social norms.
Thus, Mills (1959) envisioned that the sociological imagination could help move
society from the irrational reproduction of cultural norms, to cultural norms based
on reasoned values. Mills believed that teaching a sociological imagination to the
citizens of a society could thus promote equality.
We agree. The sociological imagination still plays an important role in modern
societies. Sociologists tend to question the status quo, challenging prejudice and
assumptions about social norms and unequal opportunities and outcomes. Few
sociologists seek to reproduce existing social structures of inequality. Thus, for

the majority of sociologists, we are interested in teaching our students to think
sociologically, so that they will promote social progress, even if they do not always
agree what progress might mean. While C. Wright Mills’ idea has failed to resonate
culturally – schools do not formally teach sociology in the way they do history,
geography and other social sciences – his ideas are central to what sociology is about
and an accessible way of seeing the relevance it has.
GOOD SOCIOLOGY
The Sociological Imagination
A person with a good sociological imagination is not likely to take cultural norms for granted. To
have a good sociological imagination is, in many aspects, to be a contrarian – to look at what
others take for granted and ask critical questions. For example, whereas many people might
blindly accept the notion that things are illegal for a good reason, someone with a good sociological
imagination might first evaluate the social context in which the law was made and query its effects
based on evidence. The person with a good sociological imagination is far more likely to ask
whether, for example, the criminalization of prostitution is wrong and based on sexual stigma than
someone who has only read about the issue in popular newspapers. We discuss the sociology of
crime and deviance in Chapter 9.
One might also question why sex between a brother and sister is so culturally condemned that
it is criminalized. The incest taboo, long studied particularly in psychology, suggests that this
cultural prohibition exists because, historically, intermarriage between different families improved
the ability for both groups to thrive through the birth of healthy children, and cemented the
bonds of an extended familial support network. But when there is access to high-quality
contraception, the censure of incest has less empirical validation. Sex between two sisters is also
illegal in many countries, even though there is no risk of procreation.
Someone with a sociological imagination might ask where these taboos come from, why they
emerged and seek to understand whether they are valid (see Douglas [1966]2003). This is
important to understanding the sociological imagination, because Mills (1959) proposed that
sociology was unique, in that it could teach people the intellectual skills to both expose social
injustices and provide new ways of structuring society to alleviate them.
In order to do this, Mills (1959 p. 3) argued that the sociologist needs to examine how a
person’s biography connects with history: ‘Neither the life of an individual nor the history of a
society can be understood without understanding both.’ This is actually a radical thought. Greek
philosopher Heraclitus famously argued that ‘character is destiny’, a popular phrase meaning that
people have full control over their lives. Yet Mills would argue that the statement is profoundly
wrong: character – the substance of the individual – is undoubtedly important, yet a person’s
‘destiny’ is also influenced by external constraints, including their own history and the culture in
which they live.
Mills (1959 p. 6) was using the sociological imagination to navigate between the individual and
their culture:
the sociological imagination enables us to grasp history and biography and the relations
between the two within society. … No social study that does not come back to the
problems of biography, of history and of their intersections within a society has
completed its intellectual journey.
If you have answers to questions about why people act the way they do, you are at least on the path
to having a sociological imagination.
Sociology as critical inquiry

Part of a sociological imagination is the ability to think critically about society. By
thinking critically, we do not mean moaning or stating what is wrong with an issue.
Rather, thinking critically means to think analytically and objectively about a social
issue. This requires you to question assumptions you may have, how your values and
beliefs may influence your perspective, and consider if you have all the information
required to form a judgement; to think critically, you should also be able to identify
inconsistencies in arguments and, fundamentally, approach problems in a consistent
and systematic way.
Yet to say that sociology is a form of critical inquiry is to go beyond the notion
that it is (hopefully) objective, systematic and analytic. It is to recognize that
sociology has a distinct, scientific approach to understanding society. This distinctive
approach is necessary because society is itself ‘self-critical’; with actors able to
question their positions and beliefs, and with social structures riddled with conflicts
and contradictions. As such, sociology does not just ask how society is now, but
also how else it might be, and what changes are both possible and desirable, given
the alternatives that either already exist or could exist if society were organized in a
different way. Sociology is as much about social change as it is about explaining how
things are now.
Central to sociology as a mode of critical inquiry is that it is a practice framed by
theory and method. To say that sociology has a method means that there are better
and worse ways to critically examine a topic. For example, if we wanted to know how
climate change is influencing people’s consumption patterns, we could talk to our
friends about the issue and ask them how much they recycle – this would tell us more
than nothing about the topic, and potentially even some interesting observations.
But we could also undertake a detailed survey and recruit participants from across
the country, of different ages and with varying incomes. The questions could include
information about attitudes towards climate change and participants’ consumption
patterns. The scientific method of sociology means that we can state that the second
method is better than the first, and will provide more useful information for making
public policy concerning recycling (see Chapter 4).
The notion that theory is central to sociology is also vitally important (see Chapter 3).
Without theory, it is possible to say that something is happening in a particular
context at a particular time, but it does not address why that is happening. We might
collect data that shows lesbian, gay and bisexual youth are coming out at a younger
age and having better experiences than previous generations, but it is only with
theory that we can connect this finding with broader ideas about decreasing
homophobia, the impact of the internet and other social trends that have led to this
current phenomenon. A theory explains a phenomenon.
For sociology, a good theory helps us understand the social world on a larger
scale. But a good social theory must be testable, because, as cultural critic Christopher
Hitchens said, anything that can be asserted without proof can be dismissed without
proof. That is why sociology has an accompanying method – to ensure that these
theories are based in evidence. So important are theory and method to sociology that
we have dedicated Chapters 3 and 4 to examining them in more detail.
In order to carry out the theory and method of sociology, it is necessary to be as
objective as possible. Objectivity can be defined as an approach where personal values
and beliefs do not influence one’s findings. The importance of objectivity is in
protecting from bias: thus, objectivity enabled Durkheim to make his arguments
about suicide and religion without being critiqued for his own religious faith. There
are great debates about how truly objective sociologists can be, as we discuss in
Chapter 4, but the key point is that sociologists must minimize the impact of their
own beliefs on how they analyse and interpret data.
That sociology is a mode of critical inquiry means that it can be applied to a variety
of issues. In this book you will encounter a range of ‘sociology of …’. We discuss the
sociology of class, the sociology of race, the sociology of deviance, among others. At
our respective universities, we teach the sociology of social problems, the sociology of
sport, the sociology of work and professions, and digital sociology. The beauty of the
method and theory of sociology is that it can be applied to any issue in which humans
are involved.

Sociology is an approach to studying society that can look at a huge diversity of issues and
problems. British sociologist Susie Scott (2018), for example, studies the sociology of
nothing. Take a moment to think of what ‘sociology of …’ you would be interested in
studying. You can study that.
What kind of questions might you be interested in asking? Have they been asked
already? Why are you interested in this topic?
Currently, you will probably have broad answers to these questions. That’s fine. Make a
note of them. We’ll ask you more about them in Chapters 3 and 4.
Sociology as a discipline
We have already discussed the ways in which sociology is distinct from psychology,
philosophy, anthropology and other fields of study. A more formal way of making
this point is to say that sociology is a discipline – a branch of knowledge. The purpose
of this is not to give it institutional credibility, or to enable people to claim professional
respectability by saying, ‘As a sociologist …’, even if it has these effects. Rather,
recognizing sociology as a discipline formalizes the notion that it is bounded by
intellectual norms and formal rules. Fundamentally, these are concerned with
sociology being ethical, not least that we should not falsify data, hurt participants or
betray their confidence. While sociological research can be undertaken in ways that
harm people or support injustice, sociology as a discipline condemns such research
and sees ethical practice as a core component of the discipline. It is for this reason
that we dedicate Chapter 5 to thinking about ethics and looking at case studies of
social science research whose ethical components are complicated or troubling.
Sociology is also a discipline in the sense that it has been institutionalized. This
is most obvious in how it is studied at universities: in departments of sociology, for
degrees in sociology and as a general education course. There are also professional
associations for sociologists, including the American Sociological Association,
the Australian Sociological Association, the British Sociological Association, the
European Sociological Association and the International Sociological Association.
While sociologists clearly lack imagination in naming their general associations,
there are specialized sociological organizations, too. One can, for example, attend a
large sociological conference on just the sociology of race, or a conference on the
sociology of medicine, leisure, education, science and technology, or media. These
groups organize conferences across the world where academics meet, present papers
and share their knowledge.
Sociologists also have various jobs: often working for charities or think tanks,
analysing data, or employed in jobs that aim to improve society. They also work in
advertising and market research, management, international development and urban
development.
Sociology, as a discipline, means all these things. In other words, being a discipline
gives sociology rules, respectability and privilege. As academic sociologists employed
at universities, we gain from this. But that does not detract from the fact that,
fundamentally, sociology is about thinking critically about the social world. And
alongside this disciplinary tradition, sociology is also distinctly personal.
Sociology as personal
While the sociological imagination demands that we think beyond our individual
experiences of events, sociology can also be very personal. Many sociologists study
issues that are close to them. It is not surprising that a great many sociologists of
colour study racial inequality; gay and lesbian sociologists study LGBT issues and
cultures; many female sociologists study patriarchy and issues related to gender
inequality; and women of colour study the intersectionality of race, gender and
sexuality. Of course, most female sociologists study issues independent of gender,
just as most people of colour study areas not associated with race. Nonetheless,
personal experience of social oppression is one motivation to study a social issue.
Confirmation
To make this point – that sociology is personal – is to recognize that it is not
bias:where a
always purely objective, but instead often somewhat subjective. Some argue that the person
greater the level of subjectivity, the less rigorous the study. This is certainly true in focuses on
some cases: someone motivated to find a particular result to prove their own beliefs the evidence
has to guard strongly against confirmation bias. Yet to recognize subjectivity and that supports
take measures to deal with it can be more rigorous than claiming complete objectivity. their
In this spirit, it is important to recognize our own influences in sociology – and argument and
we have shared these in the section About the Authors at the start of the book. discounts
other
Other academics, with other influences and other stories, would have written a
evidence
different textbook.

Sociology can be deeply personal, but that does not mean sociologists who study an issue
do so because of a personal connection to it. The assumption that this is the case can also
be problematic.
Janice Irvine, an American professor of sociology, highlights how stigma can operate
through these forms of assumptions. In a study with sociologists of sexuality, she found
that almost three-quarters had people assume their sexual identity and almost half had
experienced assumptions about their sexual behaviour because they studied sex (Irvine
2015). Participants reported this as having several troubling implications, including being
marginalized in their work, propositioned for sex and sexually harassed.
Beyond a personal connection with a topic, for what other reasons might sociologists
study an issue?
The use of sociology

In our discussion so far, we have highlighted that sociology helps us understand
society in a range of ways. Perhaps from this it is implicit that sociology should be
useful, although some would argue that sociological studies can be excellent even if
they have no practical application. That may be the case, but our version of sociology
is one that is fundamentally useful to society. We discuss the complexities of this
statement elsewhere in the book, but highlight some key arguments here. Public
Sociology is useful in multiple ways, but principally because it can make change. sociology:a
For us, sociology is truly meaningful when it improves society. Some call this public style of
sociology. For example, the sociology of health and illness has helped explain why sociology
people do not seek medical attention when needed and offered ideas to improve the that seeks to
ways in which people engage with medical professionals. The second half of this inform and
engage with
book, looking at the application of sociology to various issues, is also guided around
the public
the notion that sociology should be useful.
Of course, sociology can have influence even if change is not causally related.
Sociologists have the opportunity to influence debates and, particularly, social policy
through providing a rigorous evidence base to inform decisions (see Chapter 12).
When deciding which education system is best, or what the most effective strategies
are for reducing crime, sociology provides a framework to gather this evidence and
influence debates. Some sociologists do not gain influence in their lifetime but their
ideas become influential later on.
Related to sociology having influence is the notion that it should be rooted in
social justice. ‘Justice’, as a concept, refers to fairness and the idea that decisions are
made without bias or prejudice. Social justice is when the concept is applied to how
societies operate. As such, for social justice to exist, societies must be fair. This does
not mean that everyone must have the same experiences or desires, but all people
should be able to access resources in a manner that enables them to live a healthy and
full life. As Bell (1997 p. 3) argues: ‘social justice includes a vision of society in which
the distribution of resources is equitable and all members are physically and
psychologically safe and secure.’ This is one of the persuasive arguments of Chernilo’s
(2017) call for a ‘philosophical sociology’ – it provides a theoretical framework by
which to employ the methods and theory of sociology in a way that is socially just.
Sociology has not always been used to support social justice, as we discuss in
Chapter 2, yet it is well placed to help understand and challenge the inequities and
social problems of this century (Feagin 2001). This will include dealing with the
problems that have seen division in societies for generations (see Chapter 8), but also
new challenges: from ensuring that automation and technological revolution do not
hurt the poorest in society and the present fundamental crisis of climate change and
its impact on the environment (see Chapter 11).
All this brings us to the task of sociology. We hold that there are four key tenets here.
It is the task of sociology to assess, to understand, to challenge and to change. Not
all sociology has to do all of these, but it is not sociology if it does none of them.
VOX POP
Sierra Kamara
Final-year Sociology Student
Sociology has and will always be one of the reasons I fell in love with learning, and that is the
reason I decided to study the subject. The subject was completely mind-altering, and enabled
me to start critically thinking. It provided me with answers to questions I didn’t even know needed
answering, and encouraged me to keep asking no matter the circumstance because there
seemed to always be an answer – it just required effort and perseverance. Sociology
unapologetically puts me at the heart, cares about who I am and the course my life is taking.
Growing up, I found that there was always an apathy towards inequality within the education
system. This is because it failed to address the different issues students faced, as it hid behind
the mask of essentialism through a universal curriculum.

This inevitably ensured that students were not asking
questions, thus normalizing their experiences. Being
introduced to sociology, as an elective subject, showed
me everything I was missing, and the passion I was taught
with definitely revealed to me why it was an elective
subject, and not compulsory. The subject seemed to be
a golden ticket and that is why I deemed it extremely
important to study it at a higher educational level.
Since studying the subject at university, I found that
there were several reasons for the injustices and
inequalities people faced – the unfairness in the world
was not conjured up out of thin air. Multiple discourses
like Black feminism and postcolonialism showed me how
structures in place contributed to the differential
experiences of people like me, who were Black immigrant
© Sierra Kamara
children growing up in deprived parts of London.
Sociology offered answers and, by studying the subject, I learnt that the same way there were
answers, was the same way that there were solutions. This is why I study and enjoy the subject so
much. It offers positive realism that I have failed to get in other subjects.
■■ How does Kamara’s understanding of sociology match with your own?
■■ What core elements in the section ‘Approaching sociology’ does Kamara ascribe to in the
narrative?
■■ How might your experiences differ from Kamara’s? To what extent is this attributable to your
individual experiences and the culture or society in which you grew up?
CONCLUSION
Sociology is about understanding society. Whether you are more interested in
individuals’ experiences of personal life or the broad social structures that constrain
how people act, sociology has the tools to understand these issues. We have shown
the ways in which sociology is different from other disciplines, but perhaps most
importantly that it is a way of thinking, and a way of thinking differently. We have
provided a range of approaches to understanding sociology, and argued that there
are four key tenets of what sociology should be as a practice. The task of sociology
is to assess, to understand, to challenge and to change.
HOW WOULD…?
■■ How would Erving Goffman have interpreted your school life?
–– Think about the sociological imagination. What norms were present in your
school? What was the point of the formal rules? Did you have a uniform,
and until what age?
–– Make a note of the key issues, and then discuss with a friend and see what
similarities and differences there are.
■■ How would a sociologist write about your class?
–– Think of the last class you were in. What were the norms of that class? Are
they all of similar importance?
–– How might you contest the norms of the class? Which norms are more
serious to follow and why?
–– How might you find out the reasons why particular norms in your class
exist?

Bancroft, A. and Fevre, R. (2016) Dead White Men and Other Important People (2nd edn). London:
Red Globe Press.
This is an unconventional textbook, written in the form of a novel, that introduces you to sociology.
It is engaging and accessible, and offers a different perspective to some of the arguments we
develop here.
Mills, C.W. (1959) Chapter 1: The Promise. The Sociological Imagination. New York: Oxford University
Press.
Chapter 1 of this classic book is essential reading for students of sociology. The way C. Wright Mills
argues that people experience their lives as a series of traps that sociological thinking can help them
overcome will resonate for many people today. He also connects people’s personal troubles with the
broader structural issues of society.
Thompson, N. (2017) Social Problems and Social Justice. London: Red Globe Press.
An accessible textbook that examines how using social justice as a way of thinking about society
can help address various social problems in society.
Visit the companion website at www.macmillanihe.com/McCormack-

Discovering-Sociology-2e for further learning and teaching resources.
Chapter 2
A Brief History
of Sociology
INTRODUCTION
This chapter explores the history of sociology to understand what sociology is today. We
chart the historical context in which sociology emerged – as old worldviews were being
critiqued by scientific and philosophical arguments at the same time as industrial and
political revolutions saw marked social change. We examine the foundational texts of
sociology, including the work of Karl Marx, Emile Durkheim and Max Weber. We also
discuss the contributions of women sociologists and people of colour, and critique the
way the history of sociology has been told. We use these arguments to look at
contemporary sociology and survey the key debates today. In our Provocation, we draw
on foundational sociological theories to argue that inequality and unemployment are
not aberrations but necessary characteristics of capitalism.
THE ORIGINS OF SOCIOLOGY

Sociology has a history. While this may seem an obvious statement, it has significant
implications. It is not just the observation that people have been writing about
sociology for many years. Rather, recognizing the history of sociology is to understand
how it has developed over time. Sociology is determined by the social, dependent on
political and historical conditions for how it is practised. And, as a result, sociology
will change in the future. It is not static but constantly evolving in response to
changing societies.
In this chapter, we discuss the ideas of key sociological thinkers alongside information
about the historical period in which they were writing. It is important to combine these
components. To discuss pioneering sociologists without understanding the context in
which they lived would be like reading a biography that did not mention a person’s
family, friends, country of residence or world events. Unsurprisingly, given the topic of
sociology, historical context is vital to understanding sociological writing about society.
This chapter is not an exhaustive or entirely chronological undertaking of the
history of sociology. Rather, we discuss the ideas of sociologists who have been
integral to how sociology developed as a discipline. This includes writing about
sociology itself – what type of sociology we should be doing – as well as research on
23
Sociological social issues or social problems. We will move beyond the traditional sociological
canon: canon, recognizing the important scholarship of women and people of colour from
classical the inception of sociology as a discipline, as well as considering how sociology
works of developed beyond the West.
sociology The power of sociology is far easier to understand by considering concrete examples
that are seen of empirical studies. It also reflects the fact that sociological knowledge is cumulative
as in a real sense: by understanding the development of sociological concepts and ideas,
foundational
it is easier to think about contemporary issues from a sociological perspective – which
to the
discipline theories to apply (Chapter 3), what methods to use (Chapter 4), what is ethical (Chapter
5) and what research and knowledge is most useful (Chapters 6–12).
By situating the origins of sociology in its social context, and discussing some of
the core theories and debates about how it should be practised, we hope to equip you
with a better understanding of how to approach sociology, both in this book and in
your broader intellectual development.
Thinking critically
In Chapter 1, we provided several definitions of sociology and a call to arms for the
necessity and also joy of practising sociology. A central component of this is an
understanding that sociology is not just theoretical, but also critical. It is not the job of
sociology simply to describe what is occurring, although that can be a valuable endeavour,
but to analyse what is happening and examine any inequality or injustice that is observed.
Sociology does not just describe society or social trends but seeks to understand and
explain them. Once this is done, it is also possible to develop strategies for improvement
– implemented by sociologists, activists, politicians and others.
This criticality is embedded in sociology degree programmes. In the first year of
a sociology degree, students might be expected to describe theories or arguments, yet
by the third year they will be expected to critically analyse these theories and evaluate
them through comparison with other related theories, drawing on relevant empirical
evidence. Such analysis requires greater intellectual capabilities, and it is this critical
component that is the hallmark of contemporary sociology.
The centrality of critical thought can be traced back to the emergence of sociology
at a time when religious dogmas were facing increasing challenge. Religion’s authority
started to be challenged in the 1500s, and political struggles around this came to a
head in the 19th century.
Martin Luther (1483–1546) was a German theologian, writing at the start of the
1500s when the Roman Catholic Church exerted great influence and power in
Germany. Luther contested many religious orthodoxies, arguing against ‘indulgences’,
where rich people could pay the Church for their sins to be forgiven. He published
his ‘95 Theses’, famously nailing them to the doors of an important church in Germany.
As a result, Luther was excommunicated from the Roman Catholic Church, which decreed
he could be killed without punishment. Even so, he continued to pit himself against
religious authority by challenging the power of the Pope.
While Luther sought to contest religious power from within the Church, a
considerable challenge came from the emerging disciplines of science, not least
A Brief History of Sociology 25
astronomy (as opposed to astrology, which was influential

at the time). It was commonly believed, and insisted by
the Church, that the Earth was the centre of the universe
– and that the Sun, Moon and planets all revolved around
it. This thesis was challenged by mathematicians and
astronomers who argued that the Earth revolved around
the Sun, known as the ‘heliocentric argument’.
Nicolaus Copernicus (1473–1543), Polish astronomer
and mathematician, was one of the first people in the
modern era to challenge this dogma. He wrote a manuscript
that argued for heliocentrism. Although he shared it with
friends, he did not publish the book while alive for fear of
retribution from the Church. When published after his
death, it did not have a significant impact. His arguments
only gained influence when they were developed by
astronomer and intellectual Galileo Galilei (1564–1642).
Part of the reason for this newfound credibility was the
empirical evidence that Galileo developed in his work. © iStock/GeorgiosArt
Working in Italy in the early 17th century, Galileo had Martin Luther
built a telescope, based on descriptions of a basic model that only magnified objects
by a small amount. His own improved design had significantly enhanced magnifying
power, enabling Galileo to observe the night sky in unprecedented detail. Through
analysis of this data, Galileo found evidence in support of the heliocentric model.
Even though he tried to minimize publicity of his research, Galileo was accused of
heresy and the Church banned him from teaching or advocating these theories. After
publishing his book Dialogue Concerning the Two Chief World Systems, Galileo was tried
by the Inquisition and sentenced to house arrest for the rest of his life. He was also
forced to publicly withdraw his support for Copernican theory.
These events were the basis for two important concepts that would come to
underpin sociology: critical thinking that challenges conventional belief structures;
and the move towards empiricism (see box on page 33), where information and
evidence are gathered through our senses. These tenets coincided with the
development of the scientific method. It is in this dynamic and exciting period of
human history that the origins of sociology can be found.
Sociology in a changing society

Age of
Sociology emerged against the backdrop of important changes in society. The Enlighten
challenges made by scientists such as Galileo occurred at a time when European ment:a period
trading ships were returning from the New World bringing news of different where
civilizations and diverse religions, challenging the assumption of the period that rationality and
European models of life, religion and society were inevitable, natural and perfect. logic became
It was during this period that European society entered the Age of Enlightenment. the way in
which societies
This movement dominated intellectual life in Europe from the 1700s and has formed
were organized
the basis of liberal democracies in the West ever since. The scientific challenge to
Industrial religious orthodoxies, such as that made by Galileo, accelerated as significant

Revolution: technological advancements occurred. These included the invention of the steam
the societal engine and major discoveries in the laws of physics. This scientific revolution
transition happened alongside new political theories about the organization of society (such as
where
supporting democracy), growing criticism of religious dogma and the expansion of
technological
change saw
the social sciences into areas such as economics.
the economy Sociology emerged during this time in the West not because of the abstract
transformed development of these intellectual ideas, but as a result of the palpable changes
from an society was undergoing (Craib 1997). The scientific revolution led to massive
agricultural technological and economic changes, including important developments in transport
one to one and medicine. This has been called the Industrial Revolution. These social changes
based on essentially resulted in the emergence of capitalism as the ordering structure of
manufactur
Western societies, alongside economic growth, rising populations, improving
ing goods
communications and increasing urbanization. A capitalist society is one in which,
Capitalism: rather than being run by the state, trade and industry are privately controlled by
a society owners who seek to maximize profit for themselves.
whose trade Before this time, people lived in agrarian society. It is perhaps difficult to
and industry imagine this kind of society. When we study history, be it the Ancient Egyptians or
are owned by our own country, the focus tends to be on those who had power and money. While
private citizens this is partly because those in power tend to leave more of a record of their lives, it
or
also reflects the interests and values of those in a position to write history. Indeed,
corporations
who seek to
Winston Churchill described history as being ‘written by the victors’. One effect of
maximize this is that it is much harder to imagine life before most people lived in towns and
profit through cities.
competition In agrarian cultures, a small landowning class had great wealth and power, while
the vast majority of people lived and worked on farms. Most people were peasants:
Agrarian they were illiterate and very poor. Rather than society being organized by a range of
society:a civic bodies, religious institutions controlled most of the social organization,
society whose education and social discipline. Police forces run by the state did not exist, and would
economy is
not for several centuries. Likewise, there was no such concept as ‘weekends’, as a
based on
producing and person’s ‘job’ was the constant work of ensuring crops grew and protecting oneself
maintaining against the ravages of the weather. Husbands, wives and children worked together
crops and with little differentiation in gender roles (Cancian 1987).
farmland Technological change brought in a new era where people moved en masse from
agrarian living to dwelling in towns and cities. The allure of industry, and the better
Industri life it promised, influenced such a migration that the percentage of people living in
alization:the cities rose from just 25 per cent in 1800 to around 75 per cent in 1900 (Cancian
process by
1987). The key driver for the move to the cities was the availability of waged labour,
which the
economy
mostly in factories. This industrialization had many benefits in society, not least
changes from that new machines enabled mass production of items that boosted jobs and enhanced
a reliance on trade. It was during this time that European societies became organized in ways that
agriculture to we recognize today (see Chapter 6 for further discussion of the characteristics of
manu modern societies).
facturing and Trade grew during the Industrial Revolution for several reasons, one of which
the pro was the emergence of mass transportation. Whereas travel was limited to walking
duction of
for many, and transport of goods to what a horse could pull, the development of
goods
the steam engine and subsequent creation of a rail network made it significantly
easier for businesses to move goods around and reach a larger part of the
population, and for people to move to towns and cities. These changes had great
benefits for many citizens, particularly the middle classes and those who ran the
factories.
However, legal processes also saw wealth secured by the upper classes. For
example, in the UK, the legal process of ‘enclosure’ saw a small number of prosperous
landowners buy large amounts of land that entrenched wealth inequality by using
public land for great private financial benefit (Thompson 1963). Common land used
for farming was fenced off and deeded (given) to one or several owners – normally
already wealthy landowners – depriving the great majority of British people access to
agricultural land. Historian E.P. Thompson (1963 p. 218) describes this process as ‘a
plain enough case of class robbery, played according to fair rules of property and law
laid down by a parliament of property-owners and lawyers’.
This was also reflected in an unequal distribution of wealth and resources in
cities. Slums were a central feature of most of the cities that sprang up across Europe.
Here, the workers, who were frequently paid a pittance, suffered illness in unsanitary
living conditions. Crime was high, sewerage was nonexistent, and the health of the
populace worsened.
The most damaging changes of this period, however, happened outside these
countries. The transformation of these societies was not solely through social,
economic and technological changes within their own lands, but also by the
colonization of Africa and the Americas and the systematic extraction of resources
and wealth from these continents, including through slavery (Bhambra 2007;
Dunbar-Ortiz 2014). We explore in Chapter 6 how industrialization had catastrophic
effects for much of the world’s population, recognizing the profound harm and
racism embedded within capitalism during this period (Virdee 2019).
Yet the dominant narrative of this period in sociology was about the positive
changes in the West. Indeed, across this period there was also a growing clamour for
democracy in the West, which was achieved relatively peacefully in some cases (such
as the UK, whose civil war had occurred earlier) but with more violent uprisings in
others (such as France and the USA).
The emergence of Western sociology as we know it today was in this context of
massive social, economic and political change. Chapter 6 is dedicated to thinking
about how modern societies came into being, and both the good and bad effects this
had on people and societies.
FOUNDATIONAL SOCIOLOGICAL THINKERS

Karl Marx and a social theory of society
One of the great intellectuals whose writing provided a foundation for sociology
was the German thinker and revolutionary Karl Marx (1818–83). While many are
aware of his political impact, not least with his book The Communist Manifesto,
published in 1848, fewer realize his influence on sociology. This is partly because
Marx is often perceived to be a purely ideological and political figure. This fails,
however, to recognize how he developed critical social theory (see Chapter 3)
(Ritzer 2015). Marx believed in a scientific approach to understanding society that
could critique inequalities in the social

system and offer ways to improve the
situation for individuals.
Central to Marx’s thinking was the
notion that one could comprehensively
explain the social world through an
examination of the prevalent material
Historical conditions – known as historical
materialism: materialism. Importantly, Marx did not
the belief see people as independent actors able to
that the go about their lives as they wanted. He
social world
referred to individuals as social beings
can be
explained and argued that their actions and beliefs
through were dependent on the social conditions
material around them. Marx (1859) famously
conditions wrote in the Preface to A Contribution to a
Critique of Political Economy: ‘It is not the
consciousness of men that determines
Social beings:
the under
their being, but on the contrary, their social
© Johan10/iStock Images
standing that being determines their consciousness.’
Karl Marx
human This was a bold, radical argument for the
beings’ time and one that logically demanded a focus on, and study of, society to understand
actions and human lives.
beliefs are Crucial to understanding Marx is that he was writing about the changes occurring
dependent around him. Marx was alive precisely at the time that capitalism was becoming the
on their social
dominant force in Western society. Marx developed a profound and overarching
conditions
critique of capitalism (Marx [1867]1965). He based this on a historical approach that
argued society evolved through several economic stages. These societies differed by
Mode of their mode of production. In hunter-gatherer societies, for example, food is shared
production: between the group. The mode of production determines the types of materials that
how people’s are valued in the society. In capitalist societies, factories and other industrial buildings
needs for that produce goods are valued.
shelter, food
Marx described the mode of production and the relations between employer and
and
protection
employee as a ‘base structure’ that determines all other aspects of society, including
are met in culture, institutions, political structures and the nature of the state – what he called
any given the ‘superstructure’. While Marx recognized the ability of the superstructure to
society influence the base structure, the diversity of social, cultural and political life simply
is not explained sufficiently by the ordering of the economy.
For Marx, the problem under capitalism was that trade and industry were being
run for profit rather than for the betterment of society. This meant that the resultant
benefits were unequally and unfairly divided. In capitalist systems, economic activity
is geared towards making profit, not equality or the social good: those who have
control of the means of production – those who own the factories and the land –
keep the profits. Factory owners also had the power to pay the workers as little as
possible, maximizing their profits while hurting the workforce. Marx called this
exploited group the proletariat. The wealthy owners of land and property were Proletariat:
called the bourgeoisie. the group of
Marx argued that the bourgeoisie’s and the proletariat’s interests were fundamentally workers in a
pitted against each other. Consider this famous passage from The Communist Manifesto capitalist
(Marx and Engels [1848]1967): society who
were
The history of all human society, past and present, has been the history of exploited by
class struggles. Freeman and slave, patrician and plebeian, baron and serf, the
guild burgess and journeyman – in a word, oppressor and oppressed – stood bourgeoisie
in sharp opposition each to the other … More and more, society is splitting
into two great hostile camps, into two great and directly contraposed classes: Bourgeoisie:
bourgeoisie and proletariat. the class in a
capitalist
Marx argued that while workers were technically free (they were not compelled to society who
work), the social context meant that they had little choice but to accept the very poor own the
pay and conditions offered by the factory owners. This was for several reasons: there means of
were no trade unions or legal protections for workers; there was no broader social production
security or ‘safety net’, such as healthcare or minimum wage; and there were far more and most of
that society’s
available workers than jobs. wealth
All this meant that workers desperately needed the very low wages offered by the
factory owners, who could fire them at will. The owners enforced long hours of
dangerous work, for very little pay. It was a situation where the owners exploited the
workers, and made great profit from doing so. Marx could not see any solution to
this problem other than for the workers to come together and unionize in order to
contest their situation. It is in this context that he called for revolution of the workers.
Different ways of sharing profit from business

Consider a business owner who makes $2,000 from his company. One option is that he keeps
$1,900, and pays his 10 workers $10 each. He knows this is enough for them to survive, but that
their conditions are of great poverty and insecurity. Marx would argue instead that the business
owner should split the profits equally, so that the 10 workers and the owner each make just
under $182. With this idea, none would be rich, but most would be significantly less poor. Marx
maintained that workers could and should each continue with their occupational roles (i.e. one
man might be better at selling products and another at making them), but no one should be
valued (paid) less. This contrasts with the principles of capitalism, which encourage larger
financial risks for larger financial rewards and assume that highly skilled people are more valuable
for profit generation and thus deserve to be paid more than other, less skilled workers.
The clash between those supporting capitalism and those advocating communism
has included major political events and multiple catastrophic wars. Whereas some
might have hoped that Marxist or communist politics would lead to positive and
benevolent leadership, this has yet to occur in practice. Communist leaders have been
as prone to dictatorship as rightwing leaders. Tens of millions have died over
Communism: competing capitalistic and communistic ideologies: from revolutions within nation
a theory of states (as led by Lenin in Russia) to wars against other countries.
society in Today, while political regimes and entire nation states can still be classified as
which all capitalist or communist, changes in modern economic systems have complicated
property is matters. The factory owner of the 19th century was replaced by the corporation of the
owned by the 20th century. With this, the means of production can be ‘owned’ by any number of
community people – millions of people in fact. Most retirement packages are based on the stock
market. This means, for example, that even though the authors of this book work for
universities, our financial future is invested in countless corporations that we are mostly
unaware of, including ones we may ethically disapprove of. The corporation has not
Class:a way changed the fact that workers sell their labour for a living (so the proletariat still exists)
society is but today even these labourers can buy stocks in the company they work for.
divided based These issues speak to how societies are divided – and we dedicate Chapter 8 to
on social and examining how divisions in society exist according to class, gender, race and sexuality.
economic
Theories of class are an important backdrop to thinking about broader approaches to
status
sociological theory, with Marx’s theorizing being the foundation of a critical approach.
PROVOCATION 2
Capitalism requires unemployment and inequality to function
Unemployment is a feature of capitalist countries across the world. Politicians regularly

talk about their plans to reduce or ‘drive down’ unemployment, and the fewer people out
of a job, the more likely a governing party is to be re-elected. Jobs matter, and
unemployment is seen as a problem to eradicate as far as possible.
But what if unemployment is not about a particular social policy, or a side effect of a
temporary economic trend, but is in fact a necessary effect of capitalism?
To think about this, imagine you live on a farm with a partner and three children at the
turn of the Industrial Revolution. The owner of your farm has just purchased modern,
industrial farming machinery. The work of many hands – the hands of your family and
others – can now be accomplished by one machine. In this example, we are going to use
British pound sterling but substitute whatever currency you wish.
In need of a living, you and your family are forced to leave the farm and head to the city
in search of employment. Here, you find that there is massive unemployment. There are
factories in this city, but not nearly as many jobs in those factories as the number of
people who have been displaced from the farms. When you call at a factory, there is one
job available, yet there are 50 other people who also need the money from that job to
feed their family and pay for accommodation. The job available involves screwing the tops
onto filled beer bottles. Would you do this job for £15 an hour?
Most people would. It’s boring work, but there is a family to feed and no other job available.
In Western countries during the Industrial Revolution, there was no social support system either
– no economic support (or healthcare, or education) provided by the state. And this was the
only job available. Almost everyone would take this job, knowing it was their only option.
But here is the problem: the employer knows his job is the only option, too. The employer
thinks: ‘Why am I paying this person £15 an hour for a job literally anyone could do?’
He – and it would have been a male employer at that time – decides to reduce the amount
he pays. At what point would you no longer take the job?
Our experience in the UK is that the British minimum wage, or a bit below, is the point
by which most students have declined the job. But is this realistic? Remember, in this
scenario, your family is starving, there are no other jobs and, while a few pounds an hour
might not be much, it will keep your three kids alive. You can at least afford bread to eat
and a hovel to live in. Are you sure you would be willing to let your kids starve because you
think your labour is worth more than £5 an hour? In this situation, we are confident you
would take the job. You would take £3, probably less. The employer is in control.
The point of this exercise is that the employer can only drive down the ‘minimum’ wage
in this way if there is unemployment. Therefore, for factory owners, unemployment is a
good thing. Marx ([1867]1965) called this a ‘reserve army’ of labour. This army is important
for another reason as well – should owners want to open more factories, they know they
have that reserve to fill the job vacancies.
Consider if unemployment was not integral to capitalism. If there is more work to be
done than workers to do the job, the workers maintain the power. They can negotiate for
higher pay. This goes against the capitalist drive of making profit. Unfortunately for
workers – the vast majority of us – the owners of factories (or corporations) have more
power in society and, as Marx argued, the capitalist system is structured to benefit the
owners, not the workforce.
This example is, of course, not complete because it does not recognize the key power
that the workers do have – the power to unionize. Joining a union is the process by which
workers come together to collectively argue for wages. Thus, the employer cannot drive
down the wages of any one person because he is, in effect, negotiating with all his available
workforce. If employees have formed unions, they can take strike action (cease working
and lose their pay) when their demands are not met by the employer; then the employer
would lose much of their wealth because their production lines would stop.
While unions are an effective strategy for workers in helping them secure higher wages,
better job security and, more recently, better health insurance or retirement benefits, they
have limited power. Capitalism also means that any given factory owner is in competition
with other factory owners; and as one competitor lowers their prices for the same goods,
workers will have to choose either to accept lower wages or risk being out of a job entirely if
their factory shuts down because it cannot compete with another factory’s lower prices.
It is also the case that unions regularly come under attack, and their power has ebbed
over the past several decades. They are attacked in the media precisely because they are
effective at supporting workers’ rights (see Chapter 7): increasing workers’ pay and
reducing profit, and thus challenging the rationale of capitalism. With the threat of
technological innovations and a potential third industrial revolution, people have less job
security now than in the recent past, and a new class of workers have been described as
the ‘precariat’ (Standing 2016) based on the low pay and poor job security found in
contemporary work.
The failure of unionization to spread across all forms of work and how it is challenged
and undermined is not the result of selfish individuals, but a structural effect of capitalism.

Holt, J. (2013) The Social Thought of Karl Marx. London: Sage.
Mazzucato, M. (2018) The Value of Everything. London: Penguin.
Standing, G. (2016) The Precariat: The New Dangerous Class. London: Bloomsbury.
Auguste Comte and a science of society

Karl Marx was focused on the exploitation of workers in newly emerging capitalist
societies. Nascent sociology was also influenced by other revolutions – not least, the
social and political revolution in France that challenged the rule of the monarchy and
established the country as a republic. Indeed, a pivotal figure in the development of
sociology as we recognize it today was the French philosopher Auguste Comte
(1798–1857).
Born just after the French Revolution, Comte was fascinated with how and why
people rose up against the French aristocracy, and he looked for rules within society
to explain this. Like Marx, Comte (1896) argued for a science to understand society.
He viewed society to be similar to nature in that, in his view, it operates under its own
set of laws and thus deserves similar forms of study. In 1838, Comte introduced the
term sociology as part of his call for the scientific study of social behaviour.
Comte and Marx shared some fundamental beliefs. These were primarily around
the need to understand society from an intellectual position, and the notion that
societies evolved through stages. Yet they had very different aims for sociology. Marx
wanted to change society to improve people’s lives, whereas Comte argued that it was
people who needed to change, to abide by societal norms, which sociology could
identify. While Comte’s work occurred in the Age of Enlightenment, religious
doctrine was still very powerful. Comte hoped that the study of society would
develop a base of scientific ‘social knowledge’ that would guide society into positive
directions, not just those based on religious dogma.
But Comte did not view sociology as a tool for progressive values (Swingewood
2000). He sought to protect the existing social order beyond religious values and argued
for sociology in part to try and counter the revolutionary factions that were advocating
for greater democracy. He is reported to have said, ‘there is no democracy in
mathematics’, and believed that societies followed unchanging laws that could be
discovered in the same way physics describes the natural world. Believing that the
inarguable truth of these laws was more valuable than majority opinion, Comte hoped
that sociology as a science of society could counter emerging democratic tendencies.
More important than Comte’s theories, which are overly generalized and now
discredited (Swingewood 2000), is his framework for how to understand society. In
addition to coining the word ‘sociology’, Comte made an influential call for
positivism. He argued that sociologists should theorize and hypothesize about Positivism:
society, and then conduct experiments to provide evidence for this position. He even the scientific
offered four methods of sociology, which are still in use today: observation, search for
experimentation, comparison and historical research (see Chapter 4 for more on fixed laws
that govern
sociological methods).
social and
It is Marx’s theories, rather than Comte’s, that have had lasting influence in natural worlds
sociology and society. Comte’s importance to sociology is not found in his theories
but for giving us the outlines of a method for sociology, alongside its very name. It
fell to another European, Emile Durkheim, to combine belief in rigorous social
science with high-quality empirical theories about society.
Distinguishing empiricism and positivism

Both empiricist and positivist approaches in sociology hold that the collection
Empiricism:
and analysis of data are very important. Empiricism is the idea that knowledge the idea that
can only reliably be based on what our senses tell us, rather than our thoughts knowledge is
and feelings. It is the basis of all science. Empirical sociology is thus the view derived from
that sociology should be based on data that is gathered from our senses, our senses
rather than purely abstract theory.
Positivism can initially seem the same as empiricism as, at one level, it is the belief that social
issues should be studied using the methods of the physical sciences. However, the positivist
sociology of the 19th and even 20th century also conceived of society as driven by natural laws
that sociology could discover, in a similar way to the natural sciences (Swingewood 2000). The
great problem with positivism, as it has been used in sociology, is that it placed too much belief in
abstract and unchanging laws to determine how society operated, not allowing for the unique and
unpredictable ways that human agency influences society (see Chapter 1), nor does it recognize
the importance of human interaction in the development of meaning (see Chapter 3).
Emile Durkheim and becoming a discipline

If Karl Marx can be attributed as a precursor to sociology as we consider it today,
and Auguste Comte gave us the name, Emile Durkheim is perhaps the most famous
of the early sociologists who sought to consolidate the disparate individuals interested
in studying society into an identifiable and distinct group. While earlier writers had
developed the intellectual space to think sociologically, these other scholars sought
to establish sociology as a discipline within universities in the West.
Durkheim is one of the central figures in the development of sociology as a

unique and distinct discipline. In Chapter 1, we discussed Durkheim’s study of
suicide as a pivotal piece of empirical sociology because it demonstrated how
something so personal and psychological was deeply influenced by society. The
empirical component of On Suicide was vast and extraordinary, given the technology
and other resources available to him.
Our focus on Durkheim in this chapter is centred on his book The Rules of
Sociological Method ([1895]1982), in which he set out his view of what sociology was
and should be: his manifesto for sociology. Durkheim started from the position that
sociology should be a science, and the sociologist should approach the study of
society in the way a physicist examines their field. For Durkheim, society is the object
of study for sociology.
Sui generis: A key argument for Durkheim was that society is sui generis. This means that
a term not only is it unique, but it cannot be reduced to its components; societal influences
Durkheim interact creatively with the people exposed to them to form society. If you take
used to say
people out of one social context and put them in another, they will not act in the
that society is
unique and
same way, nor will the social context stay the same. This was crucial for Durkheim’s
cannot be argument about the need for sociology because it meant that neither psychology nor
reduced to biology could explain society or the actions of humans within it – there was a need
the sum of its for sociology as a distinct discipline.
parts A key component of Durkheim’s study was the examination of social facts,
which he defined as:
Social facts:
norms and A category of facts which present very special characteristics: they consist of
values that do manners of acting, thinking, and feeling external to the individual, which are
not have invested with a coercive power by virtue of which they exercise control over
objective him. ([1895]1982 p. 52; emphasis added)
reality but
exist beyond
The first part of the definition to highlight is that social facts are manners of acting,
a single
individual and
thinking and feeling. This means that social facts are not ‘real-life things’. Buildings,
exert clothes and motor vehicles are not social facts because they have tangible existence.
influence in And yet social facts exist beyond people’s consciousness. An individual’s thoughts
society are not social facts on their own because only that person knows them. Instead, a
social fact must exist in society in some meaningful form. Think of the language you
speak, or the norms of the culture in which you live. Neither of these are made of
real materials, and both exist beyond your own thoughts (‘external to the individual’).
They will both continue even if you die or change your view on them. They are both
social facts.
In addition to this, social facts must exert some form of control or constraint over
people. With language, this might be in the forms of words that people speak, or it
may refer to more constraining forces, such as moral prohibitions against, say, casual
sex or drug use. The constraint can be normative (we do not do it because we ‘know’
we should not), there might be legal prohibitions against it or it has become habituated
in our behaviours (we have become accustomed to not doing it). We discuss rules
like this and what happens when we break them in Chapter 9.
One of Durkheim’s central concerns was understanding how societies stuck Mechanical
together. In another important book, The Division of Labour in Society, Durkheim solidarity:
([1893]1984) argued that societies cohere through social solidarity between social
individuals. Yet this solidarity can take different forms, and Durkheim argued this cohesion that
was dependent on the structure of that society. Societies that are small and comes in
traditional have mechanical solidarity, where individuals are very similar in terms premodern
of religion, education, work and dress. Durkheim compared this with modern societies
where all
societies (see Chapter 6), where solidarity comes from distinct and differentiated
individuals are
groups of people relying on each other to perform specific roles allocated to them similar
in society, called organic solidarity. Durkheim’s theorizing of anomie (see Chapter
1) is rooted in the understanding that organic solidarity is precarious and people
can transgress these norms and that this has damaging individual and social
Organic
consequences. solidarity:
Durkheim also located sociology as a science that followed a rigorous method social
(see Chapter 4). For Durkheim, this method must be empirical and objective – cohesion that
albeit, for him, it was also rooted in positivism and its search for cast-iron laws of comes from
society. While he drew on observation and interpretation, Durkheim’s sociology diverse
was also quantitative – using statistics to make claims and arguments about social groups of
facts and thus society. Durkheim was central to establishing sociology as a serious people relying
form of study, and part of this was providing an intellectual framework that people on others to
perform their
could engage with and challenge. Perhaps the most important early challenge came societal role
from German sociologist Max Weber.
Max Weber and becoming a dialogue

Max Weber (1864–1920) (pronounced Vey-bur) was a
sociologist who engaged with and developed the work of
Durkheim and Marx, and advanced the discipline by
proposing theory that interacted with other sociologists’
work. With Weber, sociology became more explicitly a
dialogue about understanding society. This is because,
while he supported the idea that the core aim of sociology
was to understand society, he had a markedly different
view of what sociological knowledge looked like.
Weber (1947 p. 88) defined sociology as ‘a science which
attempts the interpretive understanding of social action in
order thereby to arrive at a causal explanation of its course and
effects’. In doing so, he did not fully concur with the positivism
of Marx and Durkheim. Weber did not believe in pre-existing
rules of society that individuals had to follow. Rather, he
viewed individuals as the key to understanding society, with
society being the product of individual actors and sociology
the science of understanding how people behave. Weber was
interested in studying the motivations and meanings behind © Hulton Archive/Getty Images
these actions. Max Weber

Weber and class

Stratifi Weber ([1921]1968) developed a more complicated understanding of class by
cation: talking about stratification, arguing that there were three dimensions of social
Weber’s way stratification: class, status and power.
of under Weber saw class as a component of a person’s life that had the power to
standing influence their life chances. He argued that this influence had to be entirely the
social class,
result of economic interests and wealth and that it occurs in the conditions of
consisting of
three labour and commodities. In other words, the material resources that one has
elements: (money, property and possessions) will directly affect one’s standard of living.
economic, Weber also argued that it was the ownership of property that was the key
status and determinant of class – an argument that still holds strong today in capitalist and
power socialist countries.
Weber added status as a key component of stratification. He distinguished
Status:the class, which was primarily about economics, from more social aspects, and it is
social aspects
of class, such
status that addresses these elements. So, for Weber, class is not about community
as lifestyle and social contacts, but status is. Status includes lifestyle differences, leisure
and leisure activities and broader issues such as marriage patterns.
activities Power was the third element of social stratification identified by Weber. He
defined power as the ability to get what you want even if others want something
different. This can include physical force, but also involves economic power (being able to pay
people to do things), political power and social power (social influence). (See Chapter 7 for
more discussion of how to theorize power.)
What both Marx and Weber’s definitions of class have in common is a social stratification
that can occur within groups or between groups. Marx and Weber, for example, lived within
and thus reflected intergroup stratifications of people who were otherwise similar in their
White, Protestant perspectives.
Weber made a pioneering contribution to the discipline of sociology. His works

on capitalism ([1905]1930), religion ([1922]1965) and the methods of sociology
Rationali ([1904]1949) are rightly hailed as classics that have had a lasting influence on the
zation:the discipline. Perhaps Weber’s most famous and influential book is The Protestant Ethic
replacement
and the Spirit of Capitalism ([1905]1930), where he argued that both religion and the
of traditions,
emotions and
economy were becoming increasingly rationalized in European society.
superstition Rationalization refers to the replacement of traditions or non-logical rules for
as behaviour with calculated, rational ones (see Provocation 6 for a critique of
motivations rationalization in modern societies). It is perhaps easier to see the rationalizing
for action by process at work in capitalism – the factory production line is almost the perfect
rational, image to capture the increased order and rationality of that mode of production. Yet
calculated Weber also looked at rationalization in other spheres; for example, religion became
decision-
increasingly structured through various reformations that sought to impose order on
making
individuals within society.
However, rather than just occurring at the same time, Weber argued that
capitalism emerged at least in part as a result of these changes in religious practice.
Weber was seeking to explain why capitalism only emerged in Western Europe
and not in other parts of the world, rejecting Marx’s argument that capitalism is
a natural result of economic laws. In The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism,
Weber argued that changes in religious practice supported the growth of
individualism, where the liberty of individuals is privileged over state control or
collective good. It was Protestant reformers, such as Martin Luther, who
advocated that individuals must try to live Christian lives that please God – rather
than the prior view under which priests could perform rituals to absolve a society
of its sins, or absolve the sins of a particular rich individual (the ‘indulgences’
discussed earlier).
These new arguments were developed by John Calvin (1509–64), a French
theologian who maintained that it was not enough for individuals to submit to God
(through prayer and confession) but that they actively had to work for his glory. But,
given that God’s will was difficult to know, it was believed that those who were rich
and successful had been blessed by God. The Calvinist position then argued that
since those who had been ‘blessed’ with financial success and security had been
rewarded for pleasing God by their labours, it followed that hard work was clearly
what God wanted and expected from his flock. This ethic of Protestantism (working
hard to please God) provided a framework for the spirit of capitalism (the idea that
pursuing profit is a virtuous goal in and of itself).
Weber argued that capitalism and Protestantism shared an ‘elective affinity’, in
that they are closely related even if there is no explicit causal relationship. While
avoiding any simple causal relationships, and cautioning that his account was
incomplete, Weber argued that the Protestant ethic that enabled the spirit of
capitalism was then supplanted by capitalism. As such, Weber extended Marx and
Durkheim’s sociological approach in the range of topics addressed and also the
methods employed.
EXPANSION AND CONSOLIDATION OF SOCIOLOGY

The early history of sociology was broader and more eclectic than we have
described. Thorstein Veblen, for example, studied the purpose of leisure in
Western societies (see Chapter 3), while Georg Simmel discussed a huge diversity
of topics, including focusing on the philosophy of money and its role in society.
Sociology expanded in the first half of the 20th century as it became established
in universities and as the formation of sociological associations consolidated the
discipline.
However, as the discipline developed, it did not just expand but changed its focus
and scope of inquiry. Perhaps one of the key shifts was from investigating the ways
in which modern societies emerged and comparisons between different countries on
universal issues such as religion or the family, to examining a range of social problems
and conflicts within these countries. One of the leading proponents of this scholarship,
and certainly the most famous, was the Chicago School.
The Chicago School

The Chicago School of sociology holds an exalted place in the history of sociology
(Bulmer 1986). It is often seen as the first ‘school’ where a group of sociologists
came together to develop a distinct sociological outlook and connected body of
work. The Chicago School produced the first major journal dedicated to sociology
(American Journal of Sociology), provided the first textbook of sociology, supported a
great number of doctoral studies and established many research centres in sociology
(Plummer 1997).
The Chicago School produced a wide-ranging body of sociological research that
examined issues and problems within Western and, particularly, American society.
Many of the academics in the early years of the School used the city of Chicago,
their place of residence, as the arena for study. While adopting a range of methods,
there was a preference for qualitative methods of observing people, interacting with
them and interviewing them about their lives (see Chapter 4).
British sociologist Ken Plummer (1997) argues that one of the most important
books of the Chicago School is The Polish Peasant in Europe and America by W.I.
Thomas and Florian Znaniecki (1918–20). Immigration was a contentious issue even
Symbolic
100 years ago, and one of the biggest migrant populations in the USA at the time
interaction was from Poland. Providing a comprehensive social and cultural overview of life in
ism: Poland and America for Polish peasants, Thomas and Znaniecki found that the
a theoretical Polish community in Chicago was shaped less by the policies of US government and
framework for more by its own imported culture and social history. They argued that immigrant
how people Poles did not become American but formed a new Polish American ethnic group
communicate (see Chapter 9 for discussion of the Chicago School and the study of deviance).
with each
Perhaps the Chicago School’s most long-lasting contribution to sociology was
other to
understand
through the development of symbolic interactionism as a theoretical framework
the meaning by which to understand society. With its antecedents in Weber’s focus on the
of actions, individual, rather than social structures, symbolic interactionism, as pioneered by
focusing on George Herbert Mead (1863–1931) and, later, Herbert Blumer (1900–87),
the symbols privileges the interactional processes of individuals within society. It does this by
and signs of focusing on the symbols and signs that people use in communication with each
their other, whether these be verbal, behavioural or more implicit. That is, rather than just
communi
analysing the content of what people say and do, symbolic interactionists look for
cation
the meanings behind these actions.
Distinguishing the ‘I’ from the ‘me’

George Herbert Mead, one of the founders of the symbolic interactionist Identity:
tradition in sociology, is famous for his suggestion that we come to see ourselves one’s sense
through interaction with other people – both real and imagined. of self or how
Mead ([1934]1967) argued that there were two components to identity – one gives
meaning to
the ‘I’ and the ‘me’. Think about the grammar of ‘me’ and ‘I’. I see you, but you see
self in a group
me, and if I look in the mirror the person I see is me. Mead noted that the active
‘I’ becomes the passive ‘me’ when they are the object of another subject’s attention. The way I
see myself is shaped by the way you see me. Children learn to see themselves as others see
them through interaction, play and then games. Socialization is the process by which I and me
emerge in relation to others.
It is the ‘me’ that is interesting sociologically. Mead argued that there is a component of the
self that is learned through interaction with other people and the local environment. People
internalize their experiences with others to develop a sense of self.
Mead’s ideas were important in developing a sociological understanding of identity, through
the symbolic interactionist perspective.
A significant amount of sociological research is deeply influenced by symbolic

interactionism even if it is not labelled as such. Think back to our discussion of the
lecture hall in Chapter 1: we implicitly adopted a symbolic interactionist approach to
understand what it means when you leave one or two empty seats between yourself
and another person.

Think about the individuals we have discussed so far in this chapter. What similarities
do you see between them? Why might that be?
CRITIQUING THE CONSTRUCTION OF THE HISTORY

OF SOCIOLOGY
Women’s contributions to early sociology
You may have noticed some similarities between the three individuals we have based
our discussion on thus far: aside from parallels in sociological perspective, they are all
White, all from Europe and all men. This observation has become so familiar with
regards to the sociological canon that the canon has been critiqued as being about ‘dead
White men’. Without undermining the central importance of these scholars, in the rest
of this chapter we investigate a history of sociology that moves beyond these figures.
We first focus on the contribution of women at the time of sociology’s formation.
During the 18th and 19th centuries, the time in which sociology was formed as a
discipline, women occupied a marginalized position in Europe, America and beyond.
Denied the right to vote, women were not allowed to own property or access higher
education. Despite these considerable obstacles to engaging with sociological debate,
many women made important contributions to the development of sociology,
including establishing rigorous and systematic methodological approaches

(McDonald 1994). Sadly, this was downplayed throughout the 20th century, and still
is today (Delamont 2003).
In her book on feminist sociology, British sociologist Sara Delamont (2003 p. 78)
discusses the ‘founding mothers’ of sociology. Her list of women who made vital
contributions to early sociology includes Mary Wollstonecraft, Harriet Martineau,
Beatrice Webb, Simone de Beauvoir, Jane Harrison and Hortense Powdermaker.
Lynn McDonald (1994) advocates for these and other scholars, including Mary
Wortley Montagu, Catharine Macaulay and Harriet Taylor Mill.
However, Delamont argues that championing particular women sociologists is
less important than recognizing that they contributed to sociology and have been
excluded from the discipline. Supporting this, she points out that any list made of
specific founding mothers will vary significantly by country, by the interests of the
researcher and by how sociology is defined. Delamont (2003 p. 79) continues: ‘What
is absolutely clear is that each generation of women sociologists has to rediscover the
founding mothers, because they are not being … reinstated in the malestream history
of the discipline’ (see also Chapter 8). While we concur, it is also important to discuss
individual women sociologists to highlight the broader contribution they have made.
Harriet Martineau (1802–76) was born in Norwich, England and has been identified
as the first woman sociologist in the West (Pichanik 1980). Martineau became a
professional writer due to social circumstances, including relative poverty and the death
of her father and her fiancé. Writing before Marx, Durkheim and Weber published their
sociological research, Martineau made an exceptional
contribution to knowledge related to society. She is
perhaps most famous for translating the writings of
Auguste Comte, although she made other important
contributions, including a book on research methods in
sociology, How to Observe Morals and Manners (Martineau
1838). Feagin (2001) argues that there is a strong case
that Martineau is the founder of empirical sociology in
the West.
Martineau also authored a sociological analysis of
American life, based on two years living in the USA. It
was this book, Society in America (1837), that powerfully
demonstrated Martineau’s sociological orientation. She
critiqued many aspects of the US economy, including
the oppression inflicted by slavery. In contrast with the
male theorists we have already discussed, Martineau
noted the importance of gender in the organization of
American society – highlighting the exclusion of women
from public and civic life, arguing that married women,
who could not own property or vote, had similar
experiences to Southern slaves in the denial of their
humanity. This book is said to have been particularly
© iStock/GeorgiosArt influential in forming English opinion of American
Harriet Martineau society at the time (McDonald 1994).
Another sociologist who has not received due attention is Charlotte Perkins
Gilman (1860–1935), an American feminist writer, most famously of the short story
‘The Yellow Wallpaper’ (1892). Gilman sought to explain the ways in which gender
inequality developed in society and how gender roles emerged (Appelrouth and
Edles 2012). Gilman’s sociological approach recognized the importance of economic
and political norms in gender inequality, while also appreciating how gender
differences are strengthened through social interaction and structural norms. She
argued that the divide of the male breadwinner and female homemaker exploited
women and was inefficient in terms of work and labour (see Chapter 8). As such,
Gilman focused on stratification and inequality in society, and laid out a powerful
sociological framing for understanding the social world. Gilman’s contribution to
sociology was considerable. Not only was she recognized as a sociologist by others
at the time, she taught courses on sociology on college campuses and published
articles in the influential American Journal of Sociology.
Furthermore, the Chicago School did not, as might sometimes be believed,
consist solely of male academics. Several women worked at the School, including
Annie Marion MacLean, Ruth Shonle Cavan and, perhaps the most influential, Jane
Addams (1860–1935), the first woman to win the Nobel Peace Prize, in 1931. In her
book Democracy and Social Ethics, Addams ([1902]2002) argued that diversity was a
central factor of healthy democratic societies. Writing in the context of a rapidly
growing Chicago, with substantial immigration during the Industrial Revolution, she
was frustrated by municipal reforms that were not engaged with the needs of the
city’s population. Drawing on observations of relationships between charitable
workers and their clients, household employers and their servants, and factory
owners and their employees, she believed it was a moral obligation to seek diverse
experiences that would help one understand others’ perspectives and thus be better
able to challenge either their perspectives or one’s own. She called these shared
perspectives part of a sympathetic knowledge, where one learns about another in Sympathetic
order to care for or act on their behalf. knowledge:an
Addams led advocacy in urban reform and women’s suffrage (the right to vote) approach to
learning
and made substantial contributions to the growth of social work as a discipline. Her
about other
synthesis of research and activism made important contributions to the Chicago people in
School and, while she did not publish with her male colleagues, her voice was a vital order to care
one in the development of the School’s sociological tradition (Deegan 1990). or advocate
It was not just White women who practised sociology during this time. Ida B. for them
Wells-Barnett and Anna Julia Cooper were Black American women who used
empirical data to examine the subordination and oppression of African Americans
and women in the USA (see Feagin 2001). Wells-Barnett, for example, achieved fame
as a founder of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People,
and she documented lynchings and highlighted how they were used to intimidate and
silence African Americans. These women can be seen as setting the foundations for
Black feminist sociology (Lengermann and Niebrugge 1998), bringing sociological
analysis to their experiences as African American women in a deeply racist society.
Lengermann and Niebrugge (1998 p. 161) highlight how both scholars started their
analysis from the basis that White supremacy existed in the USA and needed to be
confronted, and characterize their work as a ‘radical, non-Marxian conflict theory’,

where analysis of class issues is already influenced by racial and gender oppression.
(See Chapter 3 for discussion of conflict theories and Chapter 8 for discussion of
racial and gender oppression.)
The contributions from women sociologists we have discussed so far do not
include many forms of labour that also tend to remain hidden. This often took the
form of devaluing work undertaken by women. Consider the following example.
Bruce Holsinger, a professor of English, highlighted on Twitter the erasure of
women’s contributions in academia. Reading the acknowledgement sections of old
academic books, written on typewriters before modern-day computers existed, he
found male academics had thanked their wives for typing the entire book from the
author’s handwritten work, often multiple times. Consistent across these
acknowledgements, the women were never named, only referred to as ‘my wife’.
While these books were in English literature, it is emblematic of an experience in
much of the 20th century where women’s work was undervalued and not given due
recognition (Delamont 2003).
In summary, while men form the traditional canon of sociology, it is clear that
this is not because of some inherent greater ability or because women were not
producing quality sociology at the time in the locations where sociology was valued
– they were. Rather, the way women were valued in sociology and broader society
meant that their work was structurally and systematically devalued compared to men’s.
As we shall see, this problem in early sociology was not limited to gender.
VOX POP
Professor Betsy Ettorre
Lesbian Feminist Sociologist
My career began after I completed the first
sociology PhD on lesbians in the UK (1978) and
subsequently published a book, Lesbians, Women
and Society (1980). It has been challenging because
I do not separate my personal life, work and activism.
December 1978
I begin my career. I am totally out, sexually harassed,
bullied and called a ‘pervert’. As I experienced being
‘unacceptable’, I explore what it means to be a
‘deviant body’. © Betsy Ettorre
April 1984
I am relieved to leave my first workplace to go to one where colleagues accept me as I am. I am
no longer treated badly or called names as an out lesbian.
March 1999
I ask myself: ‘What meaning is there to being a lesbian academic? How do I address my continually
emerging lesbianism as I engage in sociology?’
December 2007
I give a public lecture on my career at my university. My lesbianism is very central to my lecture.
I think: ‘I do not plan on feeling proud as a lesbian academic, but I am. It is about time.’
November 2009
When a colleague asks, ‘What do you want, Betsy?’ I answer, ‘I hope my work, my story, will be
able to help other LGBTQIA [lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer, intersex and asexual]
scholars now and in the future.’
January 2011
I retire happily to live in Finland with my long-time partner.
December 2016
I feel a sense of relief when pondering the above. I think: ‘Perhaps, my story is important.’
■■ If Betsy was starting her career today, do you think she would encounter the same issues?
Can you think of examples supporting or against your position?
■■ How do you think Betsy’s experiences differ from the earlier female sociologists discussed in
the chapter? What reasons are there for this?
W.E.B. Du Bois and theorizing ‘race’

The other significant omission in the traditional sociological
canon is the contribution of people of colour. Emblematic
of this is the exclusion of African American sociologist
W.E.B. Du Bois (1868–1963). Based in Atlanta, Georgia,
Du Bois was in charge of the sociology department at the
University of Atlanta between 1897 and 1914 – the same
time as the Chicago School was producing its groundbreaking
research. The Atlanta School organized conferences,
attracted several sociologists and had a prodigious output of
sociological research.
Du Bois adopted a broadly positivist approach to his
sociology, and his most important theoretical contribution
was the recognition of race as a social construction rather
than a purely biological reality. Du Bois ([1903]2008) argued
that race was ‘the problem of the twentieth century’, and he © Underwood Archives/Getty Images
wrote multiple empirical case studies showing race as W.E.B. Du Bois
fundamental to the structuring of society. One important concept he developed was

Double that of double consciousness, whereby African Americans had to adopt two
conscious different identities because of their race.
ness:the Here, Du Bois was developing an argument about race as a force that negatively
notion of impacted upon the lives of African American men. Writing in the era of the Jim
having two
Crow laws – state laws that reinforced racial segregation after slavery was abolished
conflicting
identities, in
in America – Du Bois argued that ‘Negroes’ (as was the nomenclature at the time; we
this case shall use the label ‘Black’) were forced to continually think about how they were
because of perceived by White people, who maintained far greater power and held racist
racism in attitudes. The conflict of maintaining a sense of self that was markedly different
society from the perceptions of a White racist culture led to great internal turmoil and
conflict. He wrote:
A world which yields him no true self-consciousness, but only lets him see
himself through the revelation of the other world. It is a peculiar sensation,
this double-consciousness, this sense of always looking at one’s self through
the eyes of others, of measuring one’s soul by the tape of a world that looks
on in amused contempt and pity. One ever feels his two-ness – an American,
a Negro; two souls, two thoughts, two unreconciled strivings; two warring
ideals in one dark body, whose dogged strength alone keeps it from being torn
asunder. (Du Bois 1897, cited in Hancock 2008)
Vital to Du Bois’ theorizing was that race was not the result of biology, but of social
context. He also recognized a diversity of experience among Black Americans at the
time, again challenging dominant racist ideology of one (inferior) Black experience.
Du Bois also argued for the capitalization of the word ‘Negro’, arguing that not
capitalizing the word was disrespectful and dismissive of African American’s
experiences. Many Black scholars today capitalize Black when it refers to ethnicity or
race for similar reasons, and this is why we also capitalize Black throughout this
textbook.
African American sociologist Aldon Morris (2015) highlights the truly innovative
nature of Du Bois’ scholarship. He argues that Thomas and Znaniecki’s book The
Polish Peasant in Europe and America should not have been hailed as the first great
empirical study of American sociology, as such a claim ignored Du Bois’ (1899)
earlier empirical study of The Philadelphia Negro – a study that drew on personal
interviews with Black householders in Philadelphia, as well as basic statistical analysis
of census data, to make a sociological critique of race and racism in the city.
Recognizing exclusionary practice in the history of sociology

So far in this chapter, we have discussed the contribution to sociology of a diverse
group of people, including pioneering women and people of colour as well as the early
giants such as Durkheim and Weber. And yet the traditional canon of sociology still
taught in the majority of university courses focuses primarily on the dead White men.
There are several reasons why this is the case. It is important to recognize that the
scholars included in the traditional canon deserve to be there. They wrote pioneering,
important work that enabled sociology to become a thriving and important intellectual
discipline. The question is not why are these individuals there, but rather why is that
canon overwhelmingly White and male?
In some ways, this phenomenon merely mirrored broader gender and racial
inequalities. Quite simply, a component of the exclusion of women and people of
colour from sociology is that they were excluded in society, and the sociological
organizations adopted many of the prejudices of broader society. A significant factor
in the establishment of sociology as a discipline was the development of associations
and conferences across Europe and America where sociologists could meet and
discuss their craft, codify rules and launch journals and other scholarly publications
related to sociology. The overwhelming majority of women and people of colour
did not have the means or opportunity to get involved in these key early steps, nor
was their participation often sought, enabled or encouraged by the White male
attendees who did.
There were also gendered and racial reasons for these exclusions. Men at the time
tended to write theoretically and for sociology publications, whereas women were
more active in applied and field-based research. The organization of sociology,
privileging theoretical publications over applied research, led to the segregation of
women from elite sociological positions in the academy into more applied fields such
as social work. Deegan (1990 p. 8) writes:
Sociology had a sex-segregated system. After World War I … the profession

split into social work as female-dominated and sociology as male-dominated.
Almost all the women trained in Chicago Sociology prior to 1918 were
ultimately channelled into social work positions. Discrimination against hiring
women in academic sociology departments was rampant.
Deegan also documents how the ways in which sociologists are evaluated
professionally (by publishing books and articles) also served to privilege men.
Discussing the way in which Charlotte Perkins Gilman’s role was discounted in the
Chicago School after her death, Deegan (1990) highlights that although she was
having daily conversations about sociology, theory and the social world, she did not
publish with her male colleagues and focused more on social activism. Thus, while
there is strong evidence that her contributions to the Chicago School were substantial
and worthy of explicit recognition, the impact of her work is far less tangible in
historical records than that of her male colleagues.
In addition to issues of gender, a considerable number of scholars now critique
the way in which the history of sociology has been represented as fundamentally
White in Western countries. Du Bois is perhaps emblematic of the exclusion from
sociology of research that did not fit the fundamentally White canon. As discussed
above, his sociology at the Atlanta School made serious contributions to understanding
race in society, and was trailblazing in its development of empirical methods in
America. So why was Du Bois not recognized as central to the growth of American
sociology in the 20th century?
In a powerful book that provides a biography of Du Bois’ work in the context of

American racism, Aldon Morris (2015) argues that the exclusion of Du Bois was
planned and strategic. Morris discusses how Du Bois was excluded from the early
sociology association meetings where the rules and codes of American sociology
were decided. Similarly, racist views meant that White sociologists at the time
discounted the work of the Atlanta School. Morris (2015 pp. 197–8) describes a
pattern where ‘because of race marginalization, the Du Bois–Atlanta School had
performed the heavy lifting, only to have the intellectual credit given to White
scholars occupying prestigious positions in elite universities’.
And so we return to the problem of thinking of the canon of sociology as that of
‘dead White men’. To label it such, even humorously, is to ignore important contributions
made by women and people of colour. These contributions are being increasingly
recognized, and the diversity of sociology is improving so that sociology more accurately
reflects the diverse contributions that have made it the discipline it is today.

Discovering-Sociology-2e for a discussion of decolonizing university curricula
and reading lists.
Sociology in a global context

Our arguments about diversity in sociology have so far focused on diversity only
within the West. Yet it is also important to understand how sociology has been
practised and advanced in other places in different historical epochs. In Chapter 1,
we discussed the contributions of Ibn Khaldun and the reality is that he was just one
of many sociological writers who are less well known simply because they lived
outside countries where sociological and academic knowledge was institutionalized
at the turn of the twentieth century. This focus on a particular set of Western, and
Euro primarily European, countries is known as Eurocentrism (Chakrabarty 2000).
centrism: The Eurocentric approach is one that sees what is standard for the Western
a worldview world as standard for all peoples. For example, the context of industrialization and
centred on the social and political upheaval discussed in this chapter are not central to shaping
Western
all sociology, but sociology in the West. This Western focus is partly attributable to
civilizations
that views the fact that Europe dominated global affairs from the 15th century, and its
them as colonization of much of Africa meant that its ideas were institutionalized in these
exceptional countries (Alatas and Sinha 2017). This was then exacerbated by Western scholars’
preoccupation with their own countries and their consideration of the Age of
Enlightenment as the pinnacle of human accomplishment (Said 1978).
However, as Bhambra (2007) highlights, while the dominance of Europe in recent
history might explain a Eurocentric focus in sociology, this reason is unconvincing when
these Eurocentric perspectives failed to foreground the processes of colonialism, slavery
and wealth extraction that made Europe’s dominance possible. Rather, the damaging
components were erased as the positive changes were studied and exalted.
An important trend in sociology has been from decolonial and postcolonial Postcolonial
sociology that critiques the Eurocentrism of the traditional history of sociology sociology:a
and develops alternative ways of thinking sociologically (Bhabha 1994; Bhambra sociological
2007; Go 2013). Similarly, Connell (2007) calls for greater consideration of social approach
thinkers from the Global South, known as ‘southern theory’, and a more democratic that actively
recognition of the global nature of sociological theory. This includes theories and recognizes
perspectives that have been developed in Africa, Asia, Australia and Latin America, the influence
of Western
reflecting the experiences of both their dominant postcolonial societies and
colonialism
Indigenous peoples. In Chapter 6, we discuss postcolonial approaches to sociology on conte
and in Chapter 11 consider globalization and how different countries are connected mporary
in ways never imagined during the early history of sociology. societies
CONTEMPORARY SOCIOLOGY
As we conclude this foray into sociology’s history, we reflect on what it means for
contemporary sociology. It is important to note the centrality of establishing theory in
sociology (see Chapter 3) and also the focus that early sociologists had on defining a
scientific method to collect and analyse data (see Chapter 4). These tenets of early sociology
remain as fundamental today.
Similarly, sociology has always been firmly grounded in its social context. Whether this
is critiquing dominant ideology, explaining massive social change or understanding the
cities in which people live, sociology has evolved – necessarily – in constant engagement
with the social world around it. This means that sociology today needs to be engaged with
what is happening now – sociology must be topical because it is all about social context.
In addition to this, sociology is engaged with the real world. Just as sociologists like Jane
Addams sought to have impact in society, so too does a progressive sociology seek to
enhance society and social life. It may still be the case that social theory or quantitative
empirical studies are privileged in some aspects above more applied research, but the
notion that sociology should be applied to people and situations is widely accepted.
Furthermore, it should be accessible to those people and even co-produced by them –
people are not just the subject of public sociology but active participants in its creation.
While we have also discussed the serious and profound ways in which sociology
has lacked diversity, the discipline has always been more diverse than is sometimes
thought. Perhaps now it is more diverse than ever imagined, with scholarship on
race, class, religion and methods being joined by a panoply of topics including
sexuality, ability, music, sport, fun, to name a few. Importantly, scholarship has sought
to highlight the exclusions that prevented sociology from being as diverse as it could
have been earlier (e.g. Deegan 1990; Morris 2015). Likewise, we welcome the turn
towards decolonization that is happening in sociology curriculums at many
universities, and the significant contributions that postcolonial sociology has
provided, not least in highlighting the profound impacts that Eurocentrism and
Western exceptionalism have on how sociologists understand the social (Bhambra
2007; Said 1978; Tuhiwai Smith 2012).
Sociology is a truly global discipline, practised across the world. The growing recognition
of southern theories is an important contribution to this reality, and Indigenous methods
and theories help counter Eurocentric bias that has lasted too long.
Despite many positive trends, sociology remains divided. This includes between
leading sociologists. The authors all know of prominent academics who work in the
same area at the same universities but refuse even to talk to each other because of
intellectual differences. Similarly, profound differences on how we should understand
the social world exist between empirical and abstractly theoretical approaches (see
Chapter 3). There is a serious argument that sociology continues to be biased in
favour of the Global North (Bhambra and de Sousa Santos 2017), and that sociology
mirrors the divisions in broader society in some of the ways in which people are
marginalized (see Chapter 8).

To what extent do you think that sociology has become more diverse? How might
you investigate this?
And, finally, sociology is, of course, a living, dynamic discipline that will change as
society around it changes. How might it evolve in the future? Have a look at your own
social context. If you are at university, does your sociology department have a diverse
group of academics in terms of their gender, ethnicity, age and background? How
broad is the range of topics taught? If you are not enrolled at a university, have a look
at the website of a university near you, to examine the makeup of its sociology faculty.
There are many sociological associations, including the British Sociological Association,
the American Sociological Association, the Australian Sociological Association and the
International Sociological Association. Take a look at their websites. Who is on the
managing committees of these associations? How does the current constitution relate to
the issues discussed in this chapter? Many of these associations have ‘streams’ or
‘subsections’ where themes and topics are discussed. Have they expanded from the early
focus of sociology? Are there differences between groups?
CONCLUSION
This chapter has introduced key sociologists and their thinking, all of whom have
had a lasting effect in sociology. Karl Marx’s legacy is that the study of class conflict
is an enduring central component of sociology; Emile Durkheim codified many of
the rules of sociological method and provided exemplary quantitative studies for the
time; Max Weber argued for an interpretive sociology and wrote foundational texts.
Similarly, the Chicago School and the Atlanta School developed qualitative research
that developed interactionist perspectives and highlighted the importance of race,
among other issues. We also highlighted the contribution of women sociologists and
the work of Du Bois, and critiqued the ways the history of sociology has been
constructed. We finished by looking at how contemporary sociology is influenced by
this sociological history.
HOW WOULD…?
■■ How would Marx analyse contemporary society today?
–– What constraints would Marx identify as being placed on social beings?
–– What is the prevalent mode of production?
■■ How would Weber critique Durkheim’s notion of society as sui generis?
–– In what ways does Weber see society as different from Durkheim?
–– How might this have affected the way in which they practised sociology?
■■ How would Du Bois develop a different critique of capitalist society than Marx?
–– How might the focus be different?
–– Would Du Bois’ theories of ‘race’ be as relevant in Europe?

Global Social Theory: https://globalsocialtheory.org
A website that is a free resource to understand social theory (with a focus on sociology) in a global
perspective. It is organized by concepts, thinkers and topics, and concentrates on issues of
decolonization and postcolonial thought.
Craib, I. (1997) Classical Social Theory: An Introduction to the Thought of Marx, Weber, Durkheim, and
Simmel. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
A classic introduction to the sociology and theory of Marx, Weber and Durkheim. It goes into
more detail than we have the scope for here and is a good reference for more extended introductions
to each of these theorists.
Delamont, S. (2003) Feminist Sociology. London: Sage.
A comprehensive and accessible discussion of the role of women in sociology. Delamont covers a
range of issues, including women’s contribution to sociology, how a feminist sociology is different
to earlier practices of sociology, and important empirical and theoretical arguments about feminist
thought and women in society.

Chapter 3
Sociological Theory
INTRODUCTION
This chapter examines the role of theory in sociology. It explains what theory is, why it
matters and how theories are created. Theory can be a difficult element of sociology and
so we break it down into its vital components, as well as highlighting three core forms
of sociological theory: functionalist, conflict and interactionist. We then critique bad
theory – particularly that which is inaccessible. In the Provocation, we ask whether it is
more important for a theory to be interesting than true. We then consider how
sociological theory has been applied to understand people, leisure and power.
WHAT IS THEORY AND WHY DO WE NEED IT?

Theory is vital to sociology because, at its heart, theory is the way in which a social Theory:a
problem or issue is explained. Theory enables us to make sense of what is happening proposition
in the world. or a number
Consider the following set of findings. Researchers have shown that the icecaps of
propositions
are melting at the North Pole. Others have found rising carbon dioxide in our
that explain
atmosphere. Marine scientists show that the temperature of the world’s oceans is why or how
rising. Others have found that the coral in the Great Barrier Reef is dying. These something is
events do not seem independent to us because we already know the theory that happening
explains them: climate change. Climate change is the theory that makes the
connections between the events. Thus, theory gives meaning to events by explaining
why they occur and how they are related.
Theory can also be predictive. With our climate change theory, we can predict
that as global temperatures rise, more coral will die. Furthermore, now we know
about climate change, we can test other areas of the world. We might hypothesize
Sociological
that areas with the greatest amount of pollution will suffer the worst effects from theory:
climate change, or the theory could be used to suggest ways that climate change abstract
could be halted if not reversed. Our scientific understanding of climate change is propositions
not one theory but a massive conglomeration of theories and evidence about human- about society
influenced global warming (Oreskes 2004). that can be
Similar to a theory of global warming around phenomena in nature, sociologists tested and
develop theories to explain social phenomena. Sociological theories are statements have
empirical
of how and why particular facts about the social world are related. Climate change is
support
not a sociological theory because its focus is on non-human events, even though it
50
Sociological Theory 51
has been caused by human activity. Sociological theories about climate change exist,
of course, and they focus on how people understand or reject its reality, how
individuals and groups might contribute to climate change, or how people can engage
in reducing it (e.g. McCright and Dunlap 2011). We return to this subject in more
detail in Chapter 11.
Theory is vital to both sociology and society by giving meaning to our world and
helping predict future events. Without theory, we just have lots of things happening at once.
Theory, concepts and hypotheses

Theory is complex. Good sociological theory will have been developed over many
years, with huge amounts of intellectual thought exerted by both the theorist and the
people whose work they have drawn upon. Before we look at specific theories, in this
chapter and the rest of the book, it will be helpful to think about what elements
make up a theory.
To do this, consider a simple example. Say we have a sociological theory: that men
are more violent than women because of social upbringing. We are not going to
explore the veracity of that statement here, but instead use this example to think
about what is needed for a theory.
First, theory needs concepts. Concepts can be considered the building blocks of Concepts:
a theory and they are abstract ideas. Consider our theory of violence and men: abstract ways
‘violence’ and ‘men’ are both concepts. In the theory, they are abstract ideas of defining
(definitions) of particular behaviours (for violence) and particular characteristics (for particular
issues
men and, separately, for women). There is necessarily some generalizing here, in the
sense that we have to pretend for this basic theory that men are a homogeneous
group (they are very similar as a group) and that they are distinct from women, who
are also a homogeneous group.
To form a concept is to develop a definition of a thing. So, if we have violence as
a concept, we must know what this means or entails. We have the verb conceptualize to
describe the process by which we determine a concept. For our theory, we would
have to decide what counts as violence. Probably, for example, ‘punching someone’
is violence, whereas ‘not holding a door open for someone’ is not.
We then also need a hypothesis. The hypothesis is an educated guess at what one Hypothesis:
expects to find about the outcome of an event or action. The guess is ‘educated’ a specific
because it is based on knowledge of prior events. If a hypothesis is correct in a statement or
particular context, it may become a theory; but if it cannot explain enough prediction
that can be
phenomena, it might not. Theory is, basically, a set of connected hypotheses.
tested
Our theory includes the hypothesis that men are more violent than women. But empirically
this is not a theory on its own – it only becomes a theory when we include a suggested
reason why. Our theory might be that men are more violent than women because of
social upbringing. Without the hypothesis, we do not have a theory, but a hypothesis
on its own is not a theory. Theory needs a ‘because’.
A crucial part of a sociological theory is that it has empirical evidence to support
it. In Chapter 4, we discuss how sociological data can be collected and analysed. For
now, we will accept that useful sociological data can be acquired. This is vital as it
means theory is then testable and can potentially be found to be wrong. The data
obtained through this testing is then analysed and the results used to support or
critique the theory.
Now we know the elements of a theory, we consider the breadth of its scope and
how it can be applied in a range of contexts.
GOOD SOCIOLOGY
Bowling Alone
A classic example of a sociological theory that both
explains diverse findings and can be used to make
predictions is the message of Robert Putnam’s (2000)
book, Bowling Alone: The Collapse and Revival of American
Community. Here, Putnam proposed a theory that he
describes as the decline of civic engagement. Civic
engagement is the idea that people within a community
work together to better that community, and Putnam
argued that Americans’ involvement in civic life had
declined over the past 60 years. This included engagement
in community organizations, religious participation, voting
and many other activities. While he highlighted several
factors that contributed to this decline, the most salient
issue in his theory was increased television consumption.
Putnam therefore proposed that the more television © Getty images
people watch, the lower their involvement in civic life. He
titled the book Bowling Alone because this image exemplified the loss of community: rather
than bowling in a sociable manner, reaching out to the strangers in the next lane, in towns
across America people went to bowling alleys and played on their own. This theory was
designed before the advent of social media such as Facebook, and before the impact of the
internet had truly been felt. But, at least at its time, it made for a good theory because it
explained several social phenomena.
To say that bowling alone is a good example of sociological theory is not to disregard the
critiques it has received – critique being a vital part of sociological theory, and sociology
more broadly. Writing about an earlier essay of Putnam’s on the subject, Ladd (1999) argued
that rather than civic disengagement, community involvement still existed but was taking
different forms: interest may shift from sports to church groups as one ages, or to
environmental organizations dependent on social trends or local concerns. The point is that
a good theory can be critiqued and may even be wrong. Putnam’s theory clearly illustrates
the basic purpose of sociological theory because it proposes a relationship between two or
more concepts, and can be used to predict that the more people watch television, the less
civic engagement will occur.
Drake and Harvey (in press) argue that there are five components of a good theory. These
are:
■■ evidence: there is empirical data to support the argument
■■ explanation: it explains a complex issue
■■ applicability: it can be applied beyond one setting
■■ testability: it can be tested
■■ predictability: it can be used to predict a future event or outcome.
If a theory combines these components, it has the potential to be of value in understanding
societies and social problems. In Table 3.1, we apply these components of a good theory to
Putnam’s bowling alone theory.
Table 3.1: Is Putnam’s bowling alone a good theory?
Component Explanation Applied to Putnam’s bowling alone
Evidence Is there empirical data? Putnam drew on a large number of interviews

and other forms of data to make his claims
Explanation Is the issue complex? Issues of civic engagement are very complex
Applicability Can it be applied beyond The scope was across America, so a huge
one setting? number of local settings
Testability Can it be tested? In many ways. Test whether the trend is

occurring in different settings and whether
there are alternative explanations
Predictability Is it predictive? Yes. One prediction is that a person who

watches a lot of television will be less civically
engaged than someone who watches none
Levels of theory
We tend to think about sociological theories as relating to particular topics, such as
climate change, or being in a particular theoretical tradition, such as Marxism. However,
it can also be helpful to think about the ‘level’ of theory or the ‘scale’ of its focus. In this
context, sociological theory includes broad philosophizing and grand theories that
explain social trends and shifts in society, alongside very contextualized and
specific micro-level theories that examine how people act together and focus on the
detail of everyday life. Of course, there is a vast array of theories in between, known
as middle-range theories (see Boudon 1991; Merton 1968a).
The plural of theory is …

One of the more confusing things for people first encountering theory is how the word can be
both singular and plural at the same time. When sociologists discuss particular theories of class
or gender, we happily use the plural theories. But when talking about a subdiscipline of theory or
a paradigm of sociological thought, sociologists tend to use the singular. So
Paradigm:an there may be a range of different theories of gender, but we also discuss ‘gender
established
theory or way
theory’; Adorno, Horkheimer and Marcuse devised a range of critical theories,
of thinking but we refer to them all as ‘critical theory’. If you are studying the media and
that acts as a television, you will likely engage in ‘cultural theory’ and use many different
framework in theories at once. The plural of theory depends on the context: theories when
sociology discussing multiple theoretical ideas, and theory when referring to a set of related
theories or a paradigmatic approach to an issue.
Levels of theory are determined by the amount of abstraction (Mills 1959). The
more abstract an idea is, the less detail it has about a particular social context. Let us
return to our hypothetical theory that men are more violent than women. This is a
very abstract theory in its current form. If we wanted to make it less abstract, we
would need to add more detail. In what countries is this true? What kind of violence
are we discussing? Are there differences by class, age or religion? The more of these
kinds of details we have, the less abstract (and more concrete) the theory. Table 3.2
describes the types of theory and the level of abstraction they have.
Table 3.2: Types of theory and level of abstraction
Type of Definition Level of

theory abstraction
Philosophy The study of reason and values and does not concern Near-total
itself with empirical study. Sometimes, philosophy
that is applied to social matters is called ‘social theory’
High theory Generalizations about big ideas, based on observation, A
or grand so there is some semblance of empirical argument, but significant
theory the ideas are difficult to measure or test amount
Middle- Theories that are testable, and explain why a social Some (and
range phenomenon occurs, but still generalize beyond the it varies)
theory sample under consideration
Micro-level Theories that explain small-scale phenomena or Little

theory interactions between individuals. They tend to be less
interested in structural causes but focus on
interaction
Mills (1959 p. 33) critiques grand theory as being ‘a level of thinking so general that
its practitioners cannot logically get down to observation’. He argues that it loses
historical and structural context in the process. The related problem for the micro-level
theorists, he contends, is that they get so lost in observation that there is not enough
abstraction to develop concepts and theories connected to broader structural ideas.
Mills (1959 p. 34) maintains that there is a need to move between these levels, arguing:
‘the capacity to shuttle between levels of abstraction, with ease and with clarity, is a
signal mark of the imaginative and systematic thinker’.
Any sociologist who seeks to develop theory has to carefully balance the extent
to which they generalize versus keeping their arguments within the context of their
data (Mills 1959). Make no generalizations beyond that immediate context and the
theory lacks importance or interest; make grand claims of generalizability and the
theory will be critiqued for not paying attention to detail. The sociologist must
therefore ensure that their theories connect with broader social issues, but also
acknowledge the limitations of their data and arguments.
Getting this balance right is important. Sociologist Kieran Healy (2017) contends that an
excessive fear of overgeneralizing in sociological theory may actually stifle the generation of
new and important theories. This comes from what he sees as a flawed demand for ‘nuance’.
Healy (2017 p. 119) writes:
When faced with a problem that is hard to solve … the nuance-promoting

theorist says, ‘But isn’t it more complicated than that?’ or ‘Isn’t it really both/
and?’ or … ‘Aren’t you leaving out [something]?’ … This sort of nuance is, I
contend, fundamentally antitheoretical. It blocks the process of abstraction
on which theory depends, and it inhibits the creative process that makes
theorizing a useful activity.
In other words, resist discounting a theory merely because it does not account for every
example or context. The job of sociology is to generalize: obviously this must occur
within specific confines, paying attention to issues that realistically will influence social
dynamics. But being trapped by nuance can stifle theory development, which is
probably worse because explanatory theories are central to sociological thought.
BAD SOCIOLOGY
Nuance Traps
Healy (2017) argues that nuance can be bad for sociology, in three specific ways:
1 The first trap is to give ever more detail about the topic of study. This trap is to give so much
literal description of what is occurring that there is never any scope to develop theory. Similar to
Mill’s critique of micro-level theories, this is encapsulated by the English idiom ‘can’t see the
wood for the trees’.
2 The second trap is the opposite end of the nuance spectrum: to argue for ever more complex
explanations and caveats that do not have an understandable, testable theoretical proposition.
This kind of nuance fails Ockham’s razor (see page 69). It is just more complex than it needs
to be.
3 The third trap is nuance as a pose. Unlike the first two traps, this is not a serious but flawed
attempt to develop good theory. Rather, it is to request nuance of others as a way of
appearing sophisticated and better than the author of the theory.
The importance of these traps might seem somewhat abstract for you as readers relatively
new to sociology. Yet people who read sociology can fall into these nuance traps at any stage.
We have all been in seminars and lectures where a student challenges a theory because it lacks
a focus on a particular issue or area (the first trap): this critique is good as far as it goes, but it
is not a full evaluation of the theory. While you are less likely to fall into the second trap, it is a
good critique and one you might seek to apply to some theories discussed later in the chapter.
As for the third trap – of asking for nuance to look good – it is, we believe, generalizable
beyond sociology and something to avoid throughout your life.
PROVOCATION 3
It is more important for a theory to be interesting than true
Throughout this chapter, an underlying assumption has been that accuracy is

important. A theory is better if it is true. Or, to be more accurate, if it has not yet
been shown to be false. And if a theory is false, we have to discard it for another one.
The majority of us would have an instinctive, positive reaction to this position. As
sociologists, whether novice or experienced, we would not knowingly advocate a
theory we knew to be false. For example, no one can argue that the world is the
centre of the universe because astronomy has disproven the theory. We obviously
want our theories to be interesting as well, but that is a secondary concern to it
fitting the available data.
But what if, deep down, our preference is for interesting theories? Consider the
following. If we were to tell you that later in this chapter there were five pages of
empirically rich theory about why food satiates hunger and then another five pages
about why water does not actually quench thirst, but then insisted that you could
only read one of them, which one would you choose? We suggest most readers
would be more interested in the section about why water does not quench thirst.
Even though you think it is going to be wrong, you are probably interested to see
what the argument will be. Besides, you already know food makes you less hungry;
unless you have a particular interest in the science of hunger, you will not want to
read five pages of worthy writing about a notion you are pretty certain is correct
from your own experience.
Sociologist Murray Davis (1971 p. 309) highlighted the importance of theory

being interesting in 1971. He opened his article with these important words:
It has long been thought that a theorist is considered great because his theories
are true, but this is false. A theorist is considered great, not because his theories
are true, but because they are interesting. Those who carefully and exhaustively
verify trivial theories are soon forgotten; whereas those who cursorily and
expediently verify interesting theories are long remembered. In fact, the truth of
a theory has very little to do with its impact, for a theory can continue to be found
interesting even though its truth is disputed – even refuted!
It does seem that we have confirmation bias towards theories that are interesting
– we want them to be true.
Perhaps the greatest living popularizer of sociology today understands this well.
Malcolm Gladwell has written five bestselling sociology books that deal with the
unexpected implications of social science research. In his book Outliers (2009), he
made famous the notion that it takes 10,000 hours of practice to become an expert,
and his podcast Revisionist History uses counterintuitive occurrences to examine
broader sociological issues. We are not arguing that Gladwell is regularly wrong, although
some of his claims are doubted, but rather that Gladwell is so successful because he
manages to present theories in exciting, interesting ways.
Supporting our argument of interest over accuracy, we have plenty of evidence
that theories have staying power even when we know them to be false. Let us
consider psychology for a moment. The theories of Sigmund Freud are no longer
considered to provide an accurate model of the human mind by professional
psychologists or therapists. But cultural and social theorists still use his theories as
ways to interrogate contemporary norms – not because Freud was correct but
because he asked questions in interesting and significant ways.
Theories tend to be interesting when they challenge our own assumptions and
everyday routines. In this regard, then, interesting theories are also inherently
sociological, in the sense that the sociological imagination seeks to make us think
differently about society. It is also what we are doing with these Provocations –
presenting an argument in a counterintuitive and, thus, provocative way.
And yet this preference for the interesting theory has negative effects. It is one
reason why conspiracy theories survive – we like them because they interest us and
they make the mundane seem more exciting. This means that falsehoods have
staying power beyond the time they have been shown to be false. It also explains
why we let untruths be retold. As satirist Mark Twain said: ‘A lie can travel halfway
around the world while the truth is putting on its shoes.’
Of course, people will not believe just any old theory. Developing a theory that
we are ruled by aliens will see you labelled a ‘crackpot’, and arguing against established
facts without evidence will see you ridiculed in many contexts – although there is a
worrying trend regarding the phenomena of ‘alternative facts’ and ‘fake news’, which
may suggest an increasing openness to conspiracy theories (see Chapter 12 for

more on this). Even so, Davis (1971 p. 343) is still accurate in his warning:
There is a fine but definite line between asserting the surprising and asserting
the shocking, between the interesting and the absurd … Those who attempt to
deny the strongly held assumptions of their audience will have their very sanity
called into question. They will be accused of being lunatics; if scientists, they
will be called ‘crackpots’. If the difference between the inspired and the insane
is only in the degree of tenacity of the particular audience assumptions they
choose to attack, it is perhaps for this reason that genius has always been
considered close to madness.

Davis, M.S. (1971) That’s interesting! Towards a phenomenology of sociology and a sociology of
phenomenology. Philosophy of the Social Sciences, 1(2), 309–44.
Gladwell, M. (2009) Outliers: The Story of Success. New York: Penguin.
Connecting the micro and the macro: the strength of weak ties
Macro-level theories of sociology can seem disconnected from the micro-level
theories that focus on everyday interaction. This is certainly an issue that sociologists
continue to battle with, as combining the two is difficult theoretically and
methodologically – like trying to focus on what is directly in front of you and what
is visible in your peripheral vision at the same time. One way this issue can be
addressed is by thinking about social networks.
Consider John, a middle-aged man who has lived in his community for many
years and gains emotional support and comfort from his close friends, who all live
nearby. He does not socialize much outside this group because he gets all the social
support he needs from them, and his preferred method of socializing is to have his
friends over for dinner. John has one acquaintance, Juan, whom he sees very
occasionally but never invites to his house because he does not consider him a good
enough friend.
Compare this with Juan, who has far fewer close friends than John, but many more
acquaintances. Rather than dinner parties, Juan much prefers to go to a bar and meet
new people. He does not have the same social support networks with these friends, but
he finds he has far more opportunities for work and leisure activities than John. Why is
this the case?
One of the key studies that addresses this issue is Mark Granovetter’s (1973)
seminal article ‘The strength of weak ties’ in the American Journal of Sociology. Here,
Granovetter argues that it is the people with whom we are least connected that offer
us the most opportunities in life. He theorizes that the intensity of the connections
between people matters. Granovetter (1973 p. 1361) conceptualized this into ‘strong’
and ‘weak’ ties, defining a tie and its intensity as ‘a combination of the amount of
time, the emotional intensity, the intimacy (mutual confiding), and the reciprocal
services which characterize the tie’.
The basic argument (as illustrated in Figure 3.1) is that our close friends (strong
ties) are more likely to know each other than our acquaintances (weak ties) are. Weak
ties tend to be only loosely connected to our networks, which is why they remain
weak ties. Yet we tend to already know our close friends’ close friends. As such, the
strong ties’ network becomes a relatively closed circuit. Thus, John meets very few
new people. The greatest potential for him to meet new people and gain new
opportunities is through his social butterfly friend, Juan. Weak ties are strong, in the
sense that it is these connections that provide new opportunities in life.
Strong Weak
John Juan
Figure 3.1: Strong vs weak ties
A key word here is opportunities. It is weak ties that give us the prospect of new
challenges and breaks, but this does not mean they are inherently better. Strong ties
give us more emotional support and are much more consistent over time, particularly
in life’s emergencies. However, weak ties are valuable because they bring new
information to a person, so having only a few weak ties is a disadvantage. As
Granovetter (1983 p. 202) writes:
individuals with few weak ties will be deprived of information from distant
parts of the social system and will be confined to the provincial news and
views of their close friends. This deprivation will not only insulate them from
the latest ideas and fashions but may put them in a disadvantaged position.
One way of thinking about strong and weak ties is to consider how you use social
media. If you are on Twitter, you might find it is people you do not know, or only
know a little, who provide information or ideas you have not encountered before.
Or, if you are on Facebook, you might regularly message your close friends but be
most interested in the status updates of casual acquaintances. It is the weak ties who
are more likely to provide novel information and broaden your horizons.
An important aspect of this theory is how it connects the micro with the macro.
The study highlights how personal (micro) experience of opportunities in work and
leisure is deeply connected with and reflects (macro) observations of how social
networks are structured. Insulated groups, such as close friendships and families,
have often been studied with micro-level theories, and Granovetter’s work enables
these groups to be brought into macro discussions of social structure.
How is theory developed?

We have provided examples of theory – including bowling alone and the strength of
weak ties. But how do sociologists move from an idea or some data to constructing
a good theory? There are two broad ways to develop new theory: deductively or
inductively.
Deductive Deductive theory works from the more general to the more specific; sometimes
theory: this is informally called a ‘top-down’ approach. Its longer formulation is ‘hypothetico-
a theory that deductive’ and while this may sound more confusing, it can be helpful to remember
is developed
as it is based on hypothesis testing. This testing will normally involve looking for
from a set of
hypotheses
relationships between variables.
that are then The process of developing a deductive theory generally involves the following
tested steps:
■■ Specify the topic

Variable:any ■■ Specify the phenomena the theory seeks to address
construct or ■■ Identify and specify major concepts and variables
thing that
varies and
■■ Find out what is known about the relationships between those variables
can be
■■ Reason logically from those relationships to the specific topic
measured ■■ Then develop a research question and conduct an empirical study of the topic to
test the hypothesis (see Chapter 4).
The first step in constructing a deductive theory is thus picking a topic and identifying
the range of phenomena to be examined (i.e., limiting the scope of the examination).
After conducting a review of the literature to determine what is already known (see
Chapter 4), patterns are identified, which lead the theorist to develop their theory to
explain the interrelated phenomena. One can thus state a hypothesis, test it and
prove its validity as a theory.
Field research, in which the researcher observes the events as they take place in
Inductive the field first, is often used to develop inductive theory. Developing an inductive
theory: theory generally follows the following steps:
a theory that
emerges
■■ Define broad research questions based on a social issue or topic
from analysis
of data
■■ Collect data
■■ Analyse data to look for patterns, connections and significant findings
■■ Develop a theory
■■ Compare the theory with existing literature.
The reality of theory generation, however, is that rarely does the researcher purely
follow either the inductive or deductive approach. The generation of theory often
happens organically, as a scholar conducts research, revisits old theories, determines
what can no longer be explained by existing theories and creates new theory. There
is no singular formula for the creation of a theory.

How do these types of theories appeal to you? Why is that? What benefits might
inductive theory have over deductive, and vice versa?
THREE CORE APPROACHES TO SOCIOLOGICAL THEORY

Whatever theories sociologists use, they tend to be bound up in a broader framework
of how to understand the social world. There are three core approaches in sociology,
and these are functionalism, conflict theories (also known as critical theories) and
interactionism.
Functionalism is an approach to studying society that holds that societies Functional
operate the way they do for a reason, and that changing society is therefore a ism:the
risky endeavour. Some functionalists, like Durkheim, believe that society operates theoretical
in much the same way as our bodies. Here, functionalists maintain that if perspective
that all
something exists, it must exist because it has a function in the normal operation
aspects of
of that body. A functionalist thinker would therefore suggest that our institutions society serve
are like organs, in that they all work together to produce the smooth running of a function
society (like organs ensure that the body survives). Accordingly, functionalists necessary for
warn that even if you see a problem with one particular institution, you should the survival of
be careful in extracting it or modifying it, as doing so might negatively affect that society
another institution that you did not intend to change.
This approach is also known as structural functionalism, in which the role of the
sociologist is to objectively describe the structures of a society and explain their
functions. The value of the research is determined by the accuracy and quality of the
description it provides. However, research in this framework can struggle to
understand deviance and inequality in society (see Chapter 9).
This approach contrasts with sociological thinking that is framed as conflict or Conflict
critical theories. Conflict theories largely stem from Marxist thinking, and generally theories:
hold that individuals are in competition with each other for financial gain or social theories that
reward, and that this results in power and wealth being disproportionately obtained are critical of
and maintained by some groups over others. Conflict theories tend to be critical of society and
society and how it is organized, and the sociologist in this context looks for social seek to
problems or issues that can be addressed. contest
oppressive
Conflict theories also tend to view society as being held together through
social norms
coercion. Understanding power in society thus becomes a central question, focusing
on how power is wielded over the less powerful and the ways in which rebellions are
quelled or critical voices are silenced. We discuss conflict theories in detail in Chapter
8 as they are applied to class, gender and ‘race’.
The third core theoretical approach is known as symbolic interactionism (also referred
to as ‘interactionism’). Interactionist theories focus on how people act together in
groups as well as focusing on the actions of individuals. Here, the focus is on the
symbols and signs that people use in communication with each other – whether this
be verbal, behavioural or more implicit. That is, rather than just analysing what
people say about their intentions and behaviours, symbolic interactionists look for
the meanings behind actions. The signs and symbols, and their meanings, are liable
to change over time, as well as being dependent on the context in which they occur
(see Chapter 2).
Interactionists hold that symbols and signs are unique to humans, and are subject
to change dependent on context. Wearing gym clothes, for example, can be a purely
instrumental action when at the gym as they best facilitate intensive exercise. Yet
wearing gym clothes elsewhere can be a sign of that person’s values and beliefs –
around fitness, health and a ‘body project’ (see Chapter 10). Crucially, people are able
to intentionally change the meanings of symbols both individually and collectively.
This might be a change that occurs over time, just as once-fashionable accessories
become distinctly untrendy, or it can be through active subversion.
Symbolic interactionists believe that it is the combination of these ideas that
means the symbols we use are the basis of how societies are interpreted and
experienced. Table 3.3 compares the core ideas of the three approaches.
Table 3.3: Theoretical approach and related sociologists
Theoretical Core ideas Famous sociologists

approach
Functionalism Societies operate as they do for Emile Durkheim (Chapter 1)
a reason and social change is Talcott Parsons (Chapter 7)
risky. Society acts like a body: Robert Merton (Chapter 9)
institutions are like organs that
ensure the body runs smoothly
Conflict theories People are in competition with W.E.B. Du Bois (Chapter 2)
each other for money or status. Patricia Hill Collins (Chapter 8)
Examines social problems and Gayle Rubin (Chapter 8)
issues in society
Interactionism Focuses on how people Erving Goffman (Chapter 1)
interact in groups. Examines Howard Becker (Chapter 12)
the symbols and signs people
use to communicate. Less
interested in macro issues
How would a sociologist theorize the Ancient Roman games?

The Ancient Romans regularly held
public games that featured chariot
races, sacrifices to the gods and battles
between gladiators, often to the death.
It is widely accepted that these events,
paid for by the emperor, were used to
keep the poor and the working classes
entertained and, as a result, reduce the
threat of rebellion. How would today’s
sociologists interpret this?
A functionalist is likely to view the
Ancient Roman games as functioning © Duncan Walker/iStock
to appease an unruly Roman citizenship.
They might describe these games as a unifying event, a sporting entertainment spectacle to
please and thus control the citizenry. They might argue that this was a positive event as it
removed any need for harsher forms of control. It could be seen as providing help for the poor
before any form of social welfare as we know it today was tenable.
A critical sociologist would probably accept the crowd-pleasing rationale for the games, but would
critique them in a number of ways. They could be understood as the exploitation of the working
classes – regardless of how it entertained the crowds, it helped keep a form of unfair and unequal
governing elite in place. Animals were made to fight too, and they might call this a form of abuse. In
addition, women were often barred from attending these events, thus the games can be seen as
reproducing male privilege. Perhaps most significantly, the critical sociologist might highlight who the
participants in the gladiatorial fights were: usually poor people convicted of minor crimes, as well as
opponents of the regime, sent to these events to face near-certain death.
A symbolic interactionist would be likely to focus on the meanings and signs of the event
itself. They might examine the ways in which the emperor consolidated his power through the
games, and how this was done. They might study the value of the animals in the events, and why
people were sent to fight them: death by animals was a very stigmatized way to die, reserved for
people convicted of particular crimes. Likewise, interactionists might be interested in how the
crowd reacted to the events and the symbols and signs they used to show their emotions – the
ways in which they celebrated or condemned particular behaviours.
Critical
The Frankfurt School and critical theory theory:an
influential set
While we are focusing on sociological theory in this chapter, it is important to keep of theories
in mind the influence of social theory (see box) in sociology. Not to be confused that critique
with conflict theory, so-called critical theory is one of the influential set of social the social
theories that developed in the early 1900s that rejected the positivist approaches of world from a
philosophical
the emerging discipline of sociology, seeking to develop a more critical account of
perspective
the social world. Critical theorists used the techniques of literary and philosophical
criticism in order to challenge the way society was ordered at the time and argue for
a more optimistic future. The point was not to gather arguments from empirical
data, but to imagine better futures through critical argumentation.
Distinguishing sociological theory from social theory

Social theory: There are great similarities between sociological theories and social theories.
intellectual Sociologist Kenneth Allan (2006) provides a useful distinction. He states that
critiques of sociological theory is characterized by abstract propositions about society that
society that
can be tested. It aims for objectivity and collects data according to rigorous
are connected
with sociologi sociological methods. He contrasts this with social theory, which is characterized
cal theory but more by social critique and commentary. It is less concerned with objectivity
more located and does not base theories on empirical studies. Social theories are like grand
within theories of sociology, with less concern for empiricism and a greater interest in
philosophy intellectual critique.
Critical theory became established as a movement through work at the University

of Frankfurt, known as the Frankfurt School. Unlike the Chicago and Atlanta
Schools of sociology, the Frankfurt School incorporated scholars from a range of
disciplines, including psychoanalysis, cultural studies, philosophy and political
economy. Here, scholars developed an important critique of how positivism was
practised within sociology at the time (see Chapter 2). As David Inglis (2012
pp.69–70) writes, critical theorists believe that:
positivism is not neutral … By collecting superficial data that only depict the
surface aspects of society, positivism cannot penetrate underneath the surface,
in order to reveal the true essence of that society. … Critical theory must reject
the ways of thinking that are more common in society. It must be utterly
sceptical of everything. Critical theory must therefore reject people’s own
understanding of the world, as these are thoroughly shaped by ruling class
ways of thinking.
Culture
industry:the This perspective is fundamentally different from some of the tenets of much
notion that
empirical sociology. The extension of critique beyond observable data is thus one
culture is the
commodi
of the core distinctions between social theory and sociological explanations of the
fication of social world. Yet many sociologists still use critical theory because it can help them
activities that think differently about issues where dominant norms are particularly entrenched,
reproduces especially related to culture, oppression and marginalization (e.g. Ettorre 2007;
power O’Neill 2010).
inequality by Theodor Adorno (1903–69) was one of the more sociological of the critical
rendering theorists. Along with Horkheimer, Adorno (1996) focused on the importance of
people
entertainment, leisure and the media in the operation of society. Conceptualizing
passive
this as the culture industry, he argued that rather than enabling people to enjoy
their free time, this industry commodifies these activities for the benefit of the
powerful in society.
The culture industry provided mass-produced activities for people to consume,
yet this had the (intended) effect of keeping them in a state of passivity: rather
than engaging in a Marxist revolution, people stayed at home watching films and
listening to music instead (see Chapter 7 on the media). Adorno distinguished
these forms of entertainment from ‘better’ forms of art and literature that enabled
people to think critically about the world around them. This argument extends
Marx’s contention that commodification tends to downgrade the quality of the Commodi-
thing in question. For example, viewing a painting as a product to own results in fication:the
people buying art not for its inherent quality, or how it makes a person feel when process of
looking at it, but because of the value it has in a capitalist marketplace. treating
something as
Adorno’s writing on culture has spurred a sociology of the media and a critical
a commodity
engagement with leisure activities that is important in contemporary sociology (see
Chapter 7). While we have distinguished between social and sociological theory, and
critical theory is clearly within the social theory classification, it has had significant
influence within sociology. This is true of the sociology of personal life, which we
examine in Chapter 10.
VOX POP
Professor Maggie O’Neill
Professor of Sociology
My entrance to academia as a working-class woman
was not the standard route and, when I look back at my
academic journey and trajectory, what stands out is a
love of theory that is not just about seeking to understand
the complexity of our lived lives, relationships and the
cultural structures we are born into and help reproduce,
challenge and change, but above all about engaging in
critical, creative work that makes a difference.
The relationship between critical theory (for me,
feminist critical theory influenced by the Frankfurt
School), lived experience (the importance of
ethnographic and participatory research, working
with people and not just for them) and praxis
(purposeful knowledge) became central to my own
work and biography. This is motivated by a strong
impulse for us – as academics, as thinkers, as
© Maggie O’Neill
educators – to both support and do social justice.
The role of art in all this is, for me, crucial and I can still remember vividly the moment when
this became clear, in one of my final-year undergraduate extended essays – on the liberating
transformative potential of art. I have enjoyed working with artists ever since and really enjoy the
creative, productive sparks that happen in collaborative work with artists.
I had an inspirational lecturer called Dr Conrad Lodziak who created the space and conditions
for us to think critically and creatively and who introduced us to the history of ideas in sociology
and psychosocial theory. As part of his course he introduced us to critical analyses of society
and culture and feminist thought, the many ways that we can explore our lifeworlds as contested
sites of meaning while never giving up hope for the possibility and operation of social justice, of
challenging and changing sexual and social inequalities.
In many ways his course ushered in the turn to cultural studies. I am grateful for his support
and encouragement as well as the role model he provided. His classes were a proving ground for
the kind of academic I wanted to be and hope I became and will continue to be.
■■ How does Maggie’s perspective on theory connect with the key arguments in his chapter?
–– How does Maggie’s perspective on critical theory fit with its aim to improve society?
■■ Have you had theory connect with you in the way Maggie describes?
–– What theories have you most enjoyed in this chapter or in the book so far?
–– What areas do you think might connect with you most? Why?
Structura The poststructural critique

lism:a set of
theories that
The roots of sociology are based in the idea that there are scientific ways of
contend that understanding society. A central tenet of sociology is that there is a method to sociology
society runs and that this method is systematic, testable and yields results that stand up to scrutiny
according to (see Chapter 4). As discussed in Chapter 2, sociologists of the 1800s and 1900s
a set of laws developed a field of scholarly work proposing that society was bound by structures;
and social social facts or even social laws that a society operates by. The work of Durkheim and
structures others was characterized as structuralism – the notion that society ran according to
a set of laws and social structures, almost as a train that is compelled to run along
Poststructur tracks that are laid out in advance.
alism:a set of However, a paradigm of sociological theory, known as poststructuralism,
theories that emerged in part to contest these ideas about preordained rules and structures that
critique
greatly limit individual agency. There were important contributions to knowledge
structuralist
notions and
that enabled us to study language, context and social change more clearly and with
also contest greater sophistication (e.g. Foucault [1976]1991).
the core Yet poststructuralist ideas have also moved far beyond this. Many are opposed to
tenets of the idea that social facts exist, questioning the value of empirical evidence because
Enlighten they maintain that all evidence is subjective because people have to interpret it
ment beliefs (Derrida 1976). Poststructuralists are thus sceptical about academic claims to have
about science found empirical truths; and they question ‘grand narratives’ theory that seeks to
and empirical
explain broad social trends. They believe that the Age of Enlightenment, and the
research
rationality that it is widely perceived to have brought, is founded on false principles.
Like any group, poststructuralists vary in their degree of scepticism. Some just ask
us to question and reflect upon the researcher’s position and impact in the collection of
social data, and are very clearly located within the empirical sociological tradition; others
are sceptical of even the truths that scientists generate (see Davies 1999).
Poststructuralists contend that the real-world context in which scientific research
is conducted means that it is subjective and deeply flawed, highlighting assumptions
that it contains, including pre-existing relations of power and privilege. They might,
for example, argue that science is inherently biased because it is mostly an enterprise
dominated by men (e.g. Harding 1986). Others, like Michel Foucault, emphasize that
science has often been misused by those in power to promote control over people.
There is a history of racism within science where so-called ‘scientific facts’ have been
used to protect racist views. For example, in 1851, a paper in The New Orleans Medical
and Surgical Journal claimed that slaves ran away from their masters because of a
fictitious disease, drapetomania. Craniometry is another notorious example, where
scientists measured internal skull sizes to argue that racist laws and norms were
justifiable on the grounds of inherent physical differences between ‘racial types’.
Poststructuralists contend that rather than an objective reality, our perspectives
of the world are created by the discourses we use to talk about them (Derrida
1976). Foucault (1984) most famously discussed this in relation to sexuality, where
the ways in which people could talk about sexuality served to limit the possible
sexualities in society. Exemplifying this, in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of
Mental Disorders (DSM), psychiatrists have historically determined that homosexuality,
transgenderism and paedophilia were mental disorders, only later to decide that each
was not. Poststructuralism remains influential in sociology, particularly in areas such
as gender and culture.
BAD SOCIOLOGY
Bad Writing
Sociological theory deals with complex issues. Understanding and explaining how the world
works is intellectually demanding. Unfortunately, there is a tendency to extend that
argument to maintain that if it’s difficult, like rocket science, we should write it up like it is
rocket science; complex and inaccessible, even intimidating, to the non-expert.
Some sociologists contend that the complex language of much theory really is necessary
to properly engage with important social issues, and that some level of jargon can be found
in any other discipline or profession: a technical code to the theory that one has to get to
grips with in order to have a serious conversation in this area. It is also true that some
theoretical arguments will be harder to grasp than others – theory certainly deals with
complex ideas that need careful thought.
However, while we recognize the truth of this position – for example, it is not really
possible to talk about sociology without terms such as ‘theory’, ‘method’ and ‘concept’ –
some theoretical writing is a style, a pose or even just a bad habit. Writing about theory is
complex, but this means that we should work even harder for accessibility. This is an
argument that C. Wright Mills (1959) also made in his book The Sociological Imagination,
which we discussed in Chapter 1, where he critiqued the writing of high theory for its
inaccessibility, focusing on the work of Talcott Parsons. Karl Popper (1970 p. 259) similarly
critiqued this approach for ‘talking trivialities in … high-sounding language’.
The final problem associated with some sociological writing, particularly related to high
theory, is that many scholars are concerned with sounding like they belong to the ‘in-crowd’
(see Healy’s third nuance trap). Using dense or convoluted language is not just about trying
to explain ideas as precisely as possible; it is partially, or sometimes even primarily, about
demonstrating one’s own intellectual worth to a particular crowd. If you can write in that
style, you must understand that style. We do not believe this truism is true.
Poststructuralism is prone to inaccessible writing. Consider the writing of one of the

most famous poststructural authors, Judith Butler. Her work is difficult to comprehend,
and has even won an award for bad writing in philosophy.
Feminist philosopher Martha Nussbaum (1999) denounces Butler for her writing.
She argues it is not just the use of complex language, but an attempt to ‘dazzle the
reader into submission’. The problem is not just the particular words used, but how
they are strung together, and how long sentences are preferred over short ones.
Some of Butler’s sentences are very long indeed. This is one of the primary
complaints about poststructuralism: the language in which it is often written is close
to indecipherable. Whereas science is supposed to be clear, so that it can be
reproduced and tested, poststructural writing often does not seek this clarity. This is
partly attributable to translation from French to English for French authors and the
French academic style that is adopted in this approach, but its inaccessibility is
nonetheless a serious issue (Nussbaum 1999).
GOOD SOCIOLOGY
Writing Well
Poststructuralists are perhaps the most notorious culprits for inaccessible writing, but
sociologists operating from any theoretical disposition stand accused, too. Sociologists are
regularly critiqued for writing poorly, and the credibility and influence of sociology in the
world is negatively impacted as a result. Some of this is a natural consequence of writing in
the area in which one specializes. We strive for accessible writing but sometimes are
critiqued for the use of jargon, or we reread a phrase and think, ‘we really wrote that?’ It is
difficult, sometimes, to remember what it is like to be a new reader in sociology, or whatever
specialism we inhabit.
Writing simply is harder than writing in complex language. It is easier, for example, to use
the term ‘neoliberal capitalist economy’ than it is to explain clearly and concisely the
particular issues one has about the way the economy is organized.
An important concept here is Ockham’s razor. William of Ockham was a monk in medieval
England. His Latin razor, devised to evaluate competing theories, is ‘Entia non sunt
multiplicanda praeter necessitate’, which translates as ‘more things should not be used than
are necessary’. Essentially, his argument is that among competing hypotheses, it is best to
choose the one that accounts for all the details in the simplest way possible. To ‘account for
all the details in the simplest way possible’ is superb advice for writing on sociology, or any
potentially technical subject. Albert Einstein’s version of this is that: ‘Everything should be
kept as simple as possible, but no simpler.’
Our contention is that the overreliance on phrases or labels like ‘neoliberal’, ‘epistemology’,
‘ontology’, ‘hermeneutic’ and others beyond their appropriate use is in contravention of Ockham’s
razor. In other words, to use ‘neoliberal capitalist economy’ as shorthand would, for Einstein, be
‘simpler than possible’. Do not write the ‘buzzwords’ that seem to fit and make you look clever,
actually make the argument yourself. This will include using lots of shorter words to explain your
position and what you believe.
The American writer Mark Twain encapsulated the difficulties of writing simply and
concisely when he said: ‘I didn’t have time to write a short letter, so I wrote a long one
instead.’ Whether it is writing essays for class, or books on sociological theory, always take
the time to write the short letter, and not the long one. We realize we are making ourselves
hostages to fortune in arguing this, but it is something we passionately believe. (In other
words, go ahead and critique our writing!)
THEORY IN PRACTICE
How do we theorize ‘people’?
A central goal of sociology is to understand how people behave, and then to examine
why. It is not possible to predict with certainty how people will act – individuals behave
in different ways, even in seemingly identical conditions or when given the same
‘instructions’ (Freese 2008). This is where the social sciences differ from the natural
sciences (as illustrated by the Neil deGrasse Tyson quote we saw in Chapter 1). Computers
are programmed to operate in a particular way and can be relied on for consistency of
action, but this is not true of people. Human beings interpret and react to the instructions
they are given, and do not just ‘follow’ them in the way a computer does.
Sociologists recognize two key influences on people’s actions. First, people are
influenced by their own internal ways of thinking that motivate them to act in order
to achieve certain outcomes. Sociologists call this ‘human agency’, and it is the idea
that we act of our own accord and even have free will in doing so. ‘Agency’ refers to
the ability to act on one’s interpretations and motivations, and not just to react in a
mechanical way to social stimuli. These social stimuli are the second influence on
people’s actions: sociologists call this the ‘social structures’ of society. These
structures condition what actions might be possible. A society’s structures include its
laws, norms and institutions, in education, family life, health services, sport, religion,
entertainment and so on (see Chapter 7). We defined social structure and human
agency in Chapter 1. The question is: What is the key influence on how people act
– is it their own ideas and initiatives or the context of their lives?
Of course, social structures like families socialize their members. For example,
they use stigma to generate feelings of guilt and disgust in relation to transgressions
of their values and rules. As such, many values and beliefs are ‘internalized’, making
the relationship between agency and structure far more complex than just being
inside or outside a person’s mind. Nevertheless, people are not zombies. They do not
simply internalize social norms in the way computers receive coded instructions; nor
are social structures entirely rigid or lacking in contradiction and conflict.
A central sociological question about understanding how people act is to work
out the balance between agency and structure. This does not mean it is possible to
determine the precise influence of each, but rather to recognize that both agency
and structure combine so that individuals are a product of their culture but are still
able to resist, contest and change the norms of the society in which they live. Indeed,
there has been a movement away from seeing structure and agency as oppositional
or even discrete categories, as sociologists have developed theories that incorporate
both components in a grander theoretical framework.
Many sociologists examine both social structures and individual agency in their
work. Elham Amini, for example, looked at how Iranian women were constrained by a
religious culture that limits women’s possibilities in terms of gender and sexual freedom;
yet she also showed the agency they had in contesting these norms (Amini 2019; Amini
and McCormack 2019). Amini’s work is an example of sociological research that
recognizes the need to focus on both structure and agency, does so to an extent, but
does not address the underlying theoretical tensions about the influence of each.
Anthony Giddens (1984) is one sociologist who has attempted to theorize how
structure and agency can be considered simultaneously. Giddens places great value
in the agency of individuals and recognizes that how people act often has an
imperceptible influence on social structures that, over time, can change them. These
structures can also change much faster if there is concerted action by many individuals
collectively. The rule of law holds, for example, because people in general believe in
Structur
ation:
it. If everyone, or a large majority of people, were to stop believing in the right to
structure and own property, the social structures of society would change radically.
action are Giddens theorized this relationship as structuration – the idea that structure and
necessarily agency are inherently related and cannot be separated. How people act has an influence
related to on social structures, yet people can only act in ways that are allowed in the structures in
each other which they live. Structure has a ‘duality’, existing within individuals minds, impacting on
and cannot how they act, and also external to them because of how people have acted in the past.
be
Consider the example of being gay. A gay person living in Australia or Britain
disentangled
today has legal equality with heterosexuals and has practically the same social
freedoms, even as homophobia persists. This person can be open about their
sexuality, marry their lover and raise children. Yet some people with same-sex desires
will remain closeted and not disclose their sexuality. Two people within the same
social structures will act differently, because of human agency. How these individuals
act will influence the social structures. For example, an important middle-range
theory of sociology is contact theory (Allport 1954): that the greater contact people
have with people who are different from them, the more positive their attitudes
towards them will be. Thus, the more people who decide to come out, the more
likely it becomes that the social context for sexual minorities will further improve,
including legal changes and greater inclusion in various institutions (Weeks 2007). So,
if more people choose to come out, within the confines of their social structures,
they will affect those structures – as structuration theory argues.
Giddens’ (1984) theory of structuration is complex and draws on a long history
of writing in this area, and we introduce it here as an example of how sociologists
have attempted to move beyond the view of structure and agency as distinct and
exclusive influences on people.
Theorizing people at play

In contemporary societies, we tend to think of our time as divided into work and
leisure. Functionalist theories posit that leisure has a vital role for societies, rewarding
hard work and giving workers space for rest and recuperation (Roberts 1983; and see
Chapter 7). This theoretical approach highlighted the importance of leisure to
industrial societies and demonstrated that leisure is a key site for sociological study.
However, it is insufficient on its own to understand how leisure operates in society.
The distinction between work and leisure is not as clear-cut as we might like.
Work can regularly impinge on leisure time, particularly when there are looming
deadlines, and the ability to check emails at any time and work from home further
erodes the clean break between work and home. We are also encouraged to have a
good ‘work–life balance’, with the obvious implication that many of us do not. The
distinction is also less clear for those who are not employed, for a range of reasons
(perhaps because of wealth, age, or the lack of jobs available), or for the people
whose work does not pay well enough and must have several jobs at once (Toynbee
2003). Disabled people are also excluded in much leisure activity and the
conceptualization of leisure, both in practice and in academic writing, is informed by
able-bodied, mobile and physically active people and social worlds (Aitchison 2009).
Feminist sociologists have critiqued the notion of leisure as being invisibly gendered
towards men. Particularly in the 20th century, women’s work was not in paid employment
but in unpaid forms of domestic labour (see Chapter 7). As such, the notion of ‘free
time’ outside paid employment made sense for men but less so for women, whose
supposed leisure time included childcare, cooking, cleaning, emotional caring, among
other activities (Wearing 1998). And for women who worked, they experienced a ‘second
shift’, where they had to do this domestic labour once returned home (Hochschild
1989). For the working classes, the work–leisure split mostly applied to men.
One of the key conflict theories of leisure has been from a class perspective,
particularly the fact that leisure time is not nearly as ‘free’ as we might like to think
(Rojek 1995). Sociologists highlighted that leisure

activities are not equally available to everyone and
access to leisure is materially related to the form of
work a person engages in, and how wealthy they are
(Clarke and Critcher 1985). Working-class people
engage in one set of cultural pursuits while wealthy
people engage in different activities – and these
different leisure networks then lead to networks at
work that help wealthy people get further ahead,
something that Bourdieu (1984) theorized as ‘social
capital’ (see Chapter 8).
Class and social and economic inequality are at the
heart of one of the best-known theories of leisure, the
theory of the leisure class by Norwegian American
sociologist Thorstein Veblen (1857–1929). An
economist and a sociologist, Veblen argued that the
economy was connected to society and embedded in
social institutions. In his book The Theory of the Leisure
Thorstein Veblen Class (Veblen [1899]1992), he developed a critique of
Granger Historical Picture Archive/Alamy Stock Photo wasteful consumption in industrial societies within a
broader theory of leisure and its relation to the economy and society.
Veblen ([1899]1992) argued that in industrial societies, wealthy businessmen had
accumulated great wealth and entered the social elite even though they were not aristocracy
– often referred to derogatorily as ‘new money’ or nouveau riche. Yet, because this group
of wealthy people could not rely on their family name to demonstrate their (new) position
Conspicuous in society, instead they had to do this through what Veblen called conspicuous
consumption: consumption So, people might spend tens and even hundreds of thousands of pounds
the visible on a luxury car when a serviceable and practical one costs far less.
spending of
People’s perceptions of wealth then became about patterns of consumption
money on
goods that do
rather than what an individual actually earns or contributes to society. Veblen argued
not have a that this conspicuous consumption was then adopted by workers (the less wealthy)
functional use as they desired to emulate what he called the leisure class, a useful term but one he
never clearly defined. What makes Veblen’s critique so potent is how he focuses on
the wasteful element of the leisure class. Just as employment is embedded within
Leisure class:
elites in
capitalism (see Chapter 2), so waste is embedded in conspicuous consumption. The
industrial social and environmental costs of waste are an increasingly pressing issue, as we
societies who discuss in Chapter 11.
display their Sociologists Sam Friedman and Aaron Reeves (2020) document how elites signal
superiority by their superior social position through their consumption practices. Analysing 120
conspicuous years of entries in Who’s Who, an annual book about influential people in British
wastefulness life, they show that elites in the late 1800s achieved distinction through aristocratic
leisure activities such as shooting and polo, but by the early to mid-1900s this had
changed to highbrow culture such as theatre and art. However, from the mid-1900s
until now, elites focus on popular cultural forms such as football, cinema and
spending time with friends and family. They argue that this is done, at least in part,
to ward off suspicions of snobbery in an era of rising inequality.
Symbolic interactionists have also studied leisure sociologically. In this

approach, people’s subjective views of leisure are foregrounded and the focus is
on how meaning and value is made through participation in social and leisure
activities (Colton 1987). Altheide and Pfuhl (1980), for example, show how
distance running is not purely a way to keep fit, but becomes a meaningful activity
that structures a runner’s daily routine and also becomes an important component
of personal identity. This is not independent of broader social change, but
connected to the increasing responsibility placed on people to maintain health and
physical wellbeing.
Contemporary sociology is also considering the profound benefits of social
interaction through leisure activities, particularly as the COVID-19 pandemic
highlighted the importance of sociality and community. Neal et al. (2019), for
example, demonstrated how participating in local social leisure organizations – from
creative writing and gardeners’ groups to running and sports clubs – led to practices
of community and conviviality that enhance social life. Similarly, Jackson’s (2020)
ethnography of a ten-pin bowling alley shows how bowling is a community practice
that enables feelings of belonging and connects people in place and time, challenging
some of Putnam’s concerns about ‘bowling alone’ (see page 52).
In theorizing people at play, diverse approaches to theory (functionalist, conflict,
interactionist) help us understand different aspects to leisure and its meanings in
society. While individual theoretical approaches are more popular at different times
and in different subdisciplines of sociology, diversity in theory is important to
understand and explain the complexity of social worlds.
Theorizing power
Most sociological research has to consider power in some capacity, because power
is a key component of how societies are organized. Power is central to conflict
theories and sometimes tangential to interactionist ones, but it is a key issue for
all sociologists.
At its simplest, power is the ability to make something happen – what Russell (1938)
described as the ‘production of intended effects’. Power is not a tangible artefact, but a
set of relations between people. Weber defined it as the ability to get what you want even
if others want something different. Early theorizing of power – whether explicit or
implied – examined how privilege was unevenly distributed and how power was thus
possessed by a ruling elite. For Marx, power was located within the economy, with those
who ruled the mode of production having power over those who did not (see Chapter
2). Greek Marxist sociologist Nicos Poulantzas (1978 p. 147) defined power as ‘the
capacity of one class to realise its interests in opposition to another class’.
In his influential book Power: A Radical View, Steven Lukes (1974) theorized
power as having three distinct forms or dimensions. The first form is direct power,
where someone can change another person’s behaviour through instruction or force.
The second form relates to agenda setting and non-decision making, where a person
or group can determine the set of options discussed and block particular outcomes.
The third form is power through ideology, influencing people’s desires and thoughts
without them realizing.
By combining these components, Lukes developed a multidimensional understanding

of power that connected social and political institutions more persuasively than had
previously been achieved. The second edition of Power updated his account, engaging
with more recent theories of power, including that by Michel Foucault, who focused
Discourse:an
on how power exists beyond social structures and people with authority or privilege
institu
tionalized or
in society (Lukes 2004).
societally Foucault ([1976]1991) emphasized that power is not possessed but is diffused
condoned way around us. He said that power was everywhere, and that it was fragmented. Foucault
of speaking defined discourse as an institutionalized or societally condoned way of speaking
that controls that determines how a topic can be discussed. Power operates, in part, by who can
the ways in influence and steer discourses. Foucault developed his theory of power when writing
which a topic about the transformation of societies around the industrial revolutions (see Chapters
can be
2 and 6), and he charted the effects this had on several social institutions, including
discussed
prisons (see Chapter 9).

You have probably heard the saying that ‘history is told by the winners’. This aphorism
is an example of how Foucault thinks of power. Historical knowledge is determined by
those who have the knowledge, social positioning and authority to make these claims.
Can you think of any current examples of dominant ways of thinking about an
issue in society that might be told differently if different people had more influence
on the story?
Critical to Foucault’s understanding of power was that it can be creative – not just
a negative or restrictive force but one that enabled things to happen as well. There are
two ways of thinking about this. First, power makes as well as breaks people: it is not
just ‘bad’ but can be ‘good’. Second, if power can be resisted, the ‘thing’ that is doing
the resisting is also ‘power’. This is the sense in which power is diffuse – it is present
both in the act of resistance as well as in whatever act is being resisted.
In Foucauldian language, power is constitutive. This means that people are not
forced to do things, but end up doing them as they unconsciously adopt as their own
those desires that have been shaped by dominant frameworks. People become self-
regulating subjects as they go about their daily lives.
It is through discipline and being disciplined (i.e., told off or rewarded) that
improvement is achieved. Doctors, teachers and prison guards all claim authority to
‘discipline’ their charges on the basis that they have specialist (disciplinary) training
themselves. People can be policed through physical punishments, but also by various
kinds of reward designed to make us want to ‘get better’ (whether physically, medically
or mentally). We dedicate Chapter 9 to thinking about these issues.
The effects of power and self-regulation

Airlines talk of passengers as ‘self-loading luggage’. Have you ever wondered why you feel so
keen to do things expected of you – to join queues, to fit in, to earn lots of money at the
expense of seeing friends and family?
In his book Distinction, Bourdieu (1984) wrote about the way in which culture enables people
to develop an identity and distinguish themselves from others. Through our taste in certain
activities, we assert our distinction from other groups of people.
Bourdieu argued this occurred in three domains: culture, food and presentation. Consider
the following statements:
■■ ‘She watches these awful daytime soaps. I much prefer going to the opera.’
■■ ‘He drinks beer. I like red wine.’
■■ ‘What are they wearing? You shouldn’t wear running shoes in a venue like this.’
In each example here, taste is being used to distinguish a middle-class person from an (inferior
or stigmatized) working-class norm. Bourdieu argued that this was the point of taste and
culture – to make clear divisions between the classes, and reproduce inequalities between
them.
To understand how these notions of taste connect with the body, we need to
consider Bourdieu’s concept of habitus. Habitus refers to the way a person presents Habitus:how
themselves: their accent, how they walk, how they stand, as well as their cultural the social
tastes. It also relates to the presentation of your home, the car you drive (or if you world is
use public transport) and the activities you engage in. British sociologist Steph incorporated
into the self
Lawler (2014) describes habitus as ‘the ways in which the social is incorporated into
the self’. That is, while these behaviours and practices seem natural to the individual, they have
been shaped and structured by life experiences – much in the way a symbolic interactionist would
argue. Somewhere between habits and habitat, habitus refers to that part of ourselves that feels
second nature to us, but which would seem unnatural to anyone outside our circle.
The value of habitus as an idea is that it enables an understanding of individuals that does not
characterize people as simply cultural dupes to tradition or the latest capitalist advertising. At
the same time, habitus also recognizes the influences of society. In other words, people are able
to make active choices about their lives, but these choices are made against a backdrop of
unconscious norms that have been internalized over many years. These norms will be influenced
by modes of power such as class, race and gender. They will also be influenced by the social
history of the artefact being considered.
CONCLUSION
This chapter has explored sociological theory. What can be seen as an aloof and
abstract idea is, in fact, a vital component of sociology because it is the thing that
explains the social world. Without theory, we just have seemingly unrelated facts. We
have distinguished sociological theory from other scientific theories through its
focus on people and society, highlighting how it differs from social theory in its
emphasis on empirical methods. Some readers will enjoy the abstract writing of high
theory, and we encourage you in this endeavour and hope it inspires you as it did
Maggie O’Neill in our Vox Pop. We focused on sociological theory, and encouraged
you to write as clearly and accessibly as possible – and to take the time needed to do
this. We have discussed two examples of theory in action – understanding people
and leisure – and highlight that theory is applied throughout this book. Finally, even
if theories are more valued if they are interesting rather than right, we encouraged
you to take the time to be as right as possible.
HOW WOULD…?
■■ How would you approach theory?
–– Do you see yourself as a functionalist, interactionist or conflict theorist?
–– Do you prefer inductive or deductive approaches? Why?
–– What about critical theory and poststructuralist approaches?
■■ Think about the study you considered doing in Chapter 1.
–– How would this study connect with these theoretical approaches?
–– Explain why you would use or discard each of them.

Alatas, S.F. and Sinha, V. (2017) Sociological Theory beyond the Canon. London: Palgrave Macmillan.
This engaging and accessible textbook approaches sociological theory beyond the traditional
sociological canon. Writers like Marx and Weber are considered alongside Harriet Martineau, Ibn
Khaldun and Jose Rizal, which offers a fresh and vibrant approach to sociological theory.
Inglis, D. (2012) An Invitation to Social Theory. Cambridge: Polity.
If you have been interested by the more abstract theoretical discussions in our chapter, and want to
engage more fully with social theory, this is an engaging and comprehensive introduction to a range
of theorists, their ideas and their influence in understanding the social world.
Scott, J. (2012) Sociological Theory: Contemporary Debates. Northampton, MA: Edward Elgar.
This textbook examines contemporary issues in sociological theory in an engaging and accessible
manner. It also covers some key theorists we have not had space to discuss, such as Talcott Parsons
and Jürgen Habermas.

Chapter 4
The Method
of Sociology
INTRODUCTION
This chapter will address the method of sociology. Sometimes, this subject is seen as
dry, difficult or boring by sociologists in training; either too mathematical or too
detached from the human actions it studies. Yet, methods enable us to answer questions
about society. Consider how a sociology module on sexuality might be seen as sexually
‘explicit’. It is explicit, but only to the same extent that a module on health must
explicitly be about illness, or one on crime will explicitly discuss breaking the law. You
have to discuss the substance of the issue. A key substance of sociology is method. We
cannot do sociology without method; otherwise, it becomes philosophy at best, opinion
or conjecture at worst. Discussing method in a sociology course, then, is the same as
covering sex in a sexuality lecture – fundamental to the aims of the project. In our
Provocation, we question whether pornography really is bad for you.
THE METHOD OF SOCIOLOGY

A set of rules about methods exists to ensure that sociology is a social science. But, Methods:
while methods are an integral component of sociology, they are often taught in the
isolation, compartmentalized into a module within a degree programme or a separate techniques of
textbook. This tends to marginalize the importance of methods to sociology. Given data
collection
that the improper use of methods can lead to incorrect results and bad sociology,
and analysis
one must always be aware of the methods that have been used and the effect of this
on claims made in sociological research.
This chapter is not a ‘how to’ manual. If you think of methods as a set of tools,
this chapter will not tell you which tool fits which problem; rather, it will explain Methodo
why particular tools are useful in certain situations. Just as it is inappropriate to use a logy:the
sledgehammer to crack a nut, so we need to use the tools of sociology carefully. The principles
aim of this chapter is to ensure that you can approach the subject of methods with that guide
an understanding of the issues around them. how methods
This means that we are not just talking about methods but also about methodology. are used in
It is one thing to know what a method is, it is a completely different issue to know the attempt
to generate
when and how to use it. The reason why one method might be more appropriate
valid results
than another is the realm of methodology. We are also going to discuss how to
77
collect data and analyse it. After all, obtaining useful, accurate and relevant data, and
being able to analyse it in ways appropriate to what we are trying to find out, is the
whole point of having methods.
This chapter is organized into five sections: Before choosing a method; Research
design; Types of method; Data collection; and Data analysis. First, we shall think about
the issues involved in designing a research study, before moving on to research design
and which specific methods to use, how we gather data via these and, after that data is
collected, the various methods of analysis. These stages will come to inform each
other. For instance, you must be thinking about your analysis at the design stage of a
study. Answering your research question requires that the data collected can be analysed
in a way that will answer the question posed, and hence must be the right data to fit the
analysis technique you believe will work best. Such interlinkage is difficult to represent
here: the research process is cyclical, but a chapter in a book is not.
Positioning methods
A systematic approach to collecting data is central to sociological research. Yet the approach
we set out in this chapter is not independent of the context in which the methods were
developed. Just as we spoke of the history of sociology as socially located, so too must we
recognize the context of research methods. Part of the work of postcolonial sociology is for
Western scholars to understand that our methodological frameworks arose within European,
North American, Australian and other Western cultures. This means that the methods we
discuss are indigenous to these countries and continents (Chilisa 2020).
The context and embedded values of Western sociological methods have real impacts. In
her influential book Decolonizing Methodologies: Research and Indigenous Peoples, Linda Tuhiwai
Smith (2012 p. 1) argues that even the word ‘research’ is ‘inextricably linked to European
imperialism and colonialism’ for peoples who have been colonized by Western countries. Not
only does the term call to mind barbarous practices that were labelled as research, but it speaks
more broadly to a Western framework of knowledge that claims superior
Indigenous: knowledge about Indigenous peoples in a context where that knowledge was
a place-based used to claim ownership of their resources and land (see also Said 1978).
human Tuhiwai Smith calls for an approach to methods that is rooted in self-determination,
culture that
decolonization and social justice. This includes empowering Indigenous academics and
has not
migrated researchers to research their own communities, as well as developing methods and
from its frameworks of knowledge that are effective in the social and historical context of these
homeland groups (see Chilisa 2020). Recognizing Western methods as indigenous to the West
helps understand the importance of history, culture and geography in studying social
worlds, and cautions against applying Western findings to non-Western cultures.
This approach has also provoked fertile methodological discussions (e.g. Gobo 2011),
including questioning how different indigenous methods are from existing, particularly
qualitative, methods (Atkinson and Ryen 2016). In this chapter, we focus on Western methods,
as fits our audience and our own positionality as researchers, remembering how these methods
are bounded by geography and history.
The Method of Sociology 79
BEFORE CHOOSING A METHOD

In Chapter 3, we examined how theory is developed, including inductive and deductive
approaches to theory generation. The theory-making process in that discussion did not
include the real sociological work of data collection and analysis. Now, we are going to
take that step back and think about building the evidence base. In other words, we will
take you through the process of conducting an empirical study.
What is a research question?

If sociological methods are to be used to answer a question, we must first be clear
about how to formulate that research question. Fundamentally, a question should
address a problem in need of a solution. This problem may be intellectual – a gap in
our understanding of the world – or it may be more practical, such as a specific
social, political or economic difficulty to be solved or improved. As such, research is
always driven by values in choosing what to study.
Forming a research question is a skill. Some questions have no meaning. To ask
‘what is it like to be a stone?’ falsely implies that stones have some capacity to know
what being a stone is like. Other questions cannot be answered because there is no
way we can get to the evidence. We will probably never know with what accent the Evidence:
Ancient Egyptians spoke. the data
The questions we are interested in are those that we can answer if we had the required to
evidence, and where that evidence is possible to collect. A research question must, in answer a
particular
principle, be a question that can be answered. Rhetorical questions that stimulate the
research
imagination but cannot realistically be answered can have value, but they do not question
count as research questions. So, asking about the accents of Ancient Egyptians might
spark our thinking on class, geography and the evolution of language, but it would
still fail as a sociological research question.
Questions can vary in levels of focus. For example, ‘What is going on in everyday
classroom interactions?’ is very open-ended, whereas ‘Why do some children do
better at school than others?’ is more focused. And ‘Does the gender of the teacher
impact on the relative performance of male and female pupils?’ is even more specific.
The level of focus that your research question needs will depend on what gaps you
encounter in past relevant research. The greater knowledge you have of an issue
already, the more precise your question should be. There is little point, for example,
asking broadly whether class impacts on educational performance when we already
know it does (e.g. Reay 2017). To usefully research this area, you will need to find a
focus not covered in as much detail, whether that be about the topic itself (e.g. class
and education) or a particular demographic (maybe the evidence is not as strong or
complete for a particular group of people). Thus, formulating a research question will
depend on carrying out a review of past research.
Before formulating a question, the researcher should look to see what previous
researchers have done and how they have done it. Doing a literature review is as much
about doing a methods review as it is about simply recording what other people
concluded from their research. We can see what earlier researchers have found out
from reading their books and articles, but while doing so we should also be asking how
these researchers came to their conclusions. When was the research carried out, by
whom, where, using what collection techniques and who with (what was the sample?)?
Nicola Green (2008 pp. 47–9) suggests six dimensions to a ‘good’ research
question, as shown in Table 4.1. Thinking about these dimensions can help evaluate
the quality of a research question.
Table 4.1: Six dimensions of a ‘good’ research question

Interesting To the researcher
Relevant To the wider research community or other interest groups
Feasible Within the constraints the researcher finds themselves

under
Ethical In relation to the choice of topic, the research to be

conducted and the way results are disseminated
Concise Being the most efficient way of addressing the issue at hand
Answerable In actually being able to produce a true answer

Source: Based on Green (2008)
Searching the literature, doing a literature review

Deciding what to research will require an examination of prior research. A literature
search involves systematically searching archives – once on paper and in libraries, but
now usually online using digital archives and databases. Here, you use keywords to
find books and articles on the topic of interest. Such keyword searching will usually
involve cross-referencing – using more than one keyword and selecting only those
books and articles that feature all, or the most significant, of these key terms.
Whatever library, archive or database you use will have its own systems for such
searching, so you will have to learn how to use them. It is tempting to just rely on
Google Scholar, but using a range of databases will yield the richest results.
A literature search requires that you have some initial idea of what to look for, but
as you progress, you may become aware of new terms that will help you to refine
your search for further literature. This is when a literature search starts to become a
literature review. A literature review involves reading the works that the search
identified and identifying their key characteristics. This ‘reviewing’ will enable an
understanding of what has gone before, and allows a researcher to identify what
might be useful to do in the future.
A simple guide to doing a literature review is to ask six basic questions of any
piece of research you find: what, when, where, how, whom and why? What did the
researchers research, when did they do it, where did they do it, how was the data collected,
from whom was the data collected and why was the data collected? By comparing
different pieces of research on these questions, it is possible to identify where

researchers agree (across exact question, time, place, sample, method and purpose),
and where there are differences. It is in the gaps and differences highlighted in such
a review of the literature that a new research question emerges.
Deduction and induction

Just as theory development can be deductive or inductive (see Chapter 3), so too are the styles
of questions you can adopt. If your question can be reformulated into a prediction to be tested,
such as: ‘Boys do better with a male teacher’, this allows for a theory-testing (deductive)
research design. Here, the researcher sets out a theory in advance, and develops a hypothesis,
with data collected in such a way as to ‘test’ whether the hypothesis is valid or not.
If you are not starting with a statement that is to be (dis)proved, or if you do not feel such
‘closure’ is possible or useful, you will want a more exploratory (inductive) design. Here, you will
collect lots of data and build a theory from it. Grounded theory (Glaser and Strauss 1967) involves
constantly analysing your data as you collect it, developing an initial theory early on and
continually ‘testing’ and revising that theory against new data as you collect it. This continues
until the researcher arrives at what they consider to be a robust theory of the phenomenon.
A key question to ask in a literature review is: ‘Where did everyone else go wrong?’
Perhaps they did not. If all prior studies, in all the places and times, using all sorts of
different methods and samples, came to the same conclusion, then it is unlikely you
will find something different. Still, if all those studies were carried out a long time
ago, or in very different locations from yours, you may still want to see if what
everyone else found applies where you are now.
However, if different researchers, using different designs, sampling, collection
and analysis methods, in different places and at different times, generated different
results from each other, you have reason to ask: Why? These differences, once you
have studied them, will help clarify possible reasons for such diversity, and hence
focus your own research question. Having set out with a vague research question, a
study of prior literature should allow you to get a little more focused. Looking at
what has been studied already, and how, should help to answer in more detail: ‘What
needs to be studied and how can you study it?’

At the start of this chapter, we highlighted how Western sociological methods are
indigenous to the West. What experiences do you have – both personal and more
cultural – that might influence how you and your peers understand the social world?
Methods and what it means to be human

Social scientists often seek to understand the internal beliefs of actors, and not just
the external conditions within which people act. In Chapter 3, we discussed whether
an individual’s agency or the power of social structures has the greater influence over
social problems and the dynamics of society. A related issue is whether we should
study people’s beliefs or the context in which they live, known as their ‘conditions’.
Just as we found with structure and agency, beliefs and conditions are not two
discrete categories. People are influenced by their surroundings, but the individual is
not a passive, mechanical product of circumstances; people’s actions also contribute
to creating those surroundings. Actions are also shaped by beliefs. People in very
similar conditions can hold different beliefs and act in different ways. The study of
this interplay is what social research seeks to achieve.
In this chapter, we move from a theoretical discussion around structure and
agency to a methodological discussion of how structure and agency, and beliefs and
conditions, affect how we can study people. In their approach to this key question,
sociologists tend to be divided into two camps.
One school of sociology says: ‘Look, the one thing we, the researchers, know that
we have in common with those we study is our ability to make meaning of events
in our lives. Let’s go from there.’ That is, as humans, we have the unique ability to
think, to have an inner life of the mind. As researchers, we can use that ability to
Verstehen: try to comprehend the inner lives of others. This approach is known as Verstehen,
an approach German for ‘understanding’ or ‘interpretation’ (Weber [1922]1965). In terms of
that tries to Chapter 3’s theoretical debate, it is akin to focusing on agency. The Verstehen
comprehend
approach uses a focus on meaning in two ways. First, the focus of research is on
the meanings
and
meaning – the beliefs and meaningful actions of others. Second, meaning-making is
motivations the way of achieving that focus – reconstructing other people’s meanings through
of human the researcher’s interpretations of them.
action A second school of sociology, more in line with ‘traditional’ scientific methods,
says: ‘Well, that sounds nice, but while we might be able to interpret what drives the
actions of others, it is better to record what people actually do and the conditions in
which they do it, and see if there are externally observable patterns that can then be
used to formulate theories about cause and effect.’ In other words, we cannot be sure
of the intention behind an act, so let’s focus on the act instead. The patterns of such
observable actions – recurrent trends, associations and sequences – are what
Durkheim ([1895]1982) called ‘social facts’ (see Chapter 1). This is more like studying
structures, although structures are not of themselves observable actions, so there is
a real difference between observing conditions and the analysis of structures.
One approach looks for meanings as drivers of action, while the other looks for
patterns of association that predict effects. Those who look for meanings usually
employ methods that highlight how language constructs and structures people’s
experiences, and how meaning is composed through language and social interaction.
Those who look for external causes generally favour methods that are sensitive to
how patterns can be measured, and this usually requires the collection of numerical
data to see how often some things happen in relation to other things. Disputes rage
over how far these two approaches overlap or diverge, but broadly speaking, this can
be described as a divide between qualitative research (focused on meanings) and

quantitative research (focused on numerical relationships).
Most sociologists are more comfortable with and specialize in one approach or
the other, and, to varying degrees, they can become attached to that way of thinking.
However, given that qualitative and quantitative methods have different strengths in
different contexts, the choice of which to use should depend on the problem you are
addressing and your research question.
Causality and correlation

We routinely invoke the idea of ‘causation’ – that one thing causes another. C. Wright
Mills (1940) describes what he calls ‘vocabularies of motive’ – the way people learn
to invoke causes that other people will accept as ‘excuses’. ‘I was too drunk to finish
my essay’ does not tend to work as a reason for requesting a deadline extension, but
if you have had a distressing experience, that well might.
The excuses we find acceptable change over time. Sociologists are not directly in
the business of judging excuses, but the idea that an outcome was caused by prior
events or circumstances, rather than by a ‘free’ choice, implies that we cannot simply
attribute the action to the person concerned. As such, studying causes, and evaluating
the claims behind them, has implications for many political, social and legal questions.
When two things routinely go together, we might think their coincidence is not a
random accident. Perhaps one is making the other happen (more education improves
employment prospects); perhaps both things are the product of a hidden cause
(maybe high family income causes better educational results and increased
employment prospects). To say that two things tend to go together is only to observe
a correlation, a pattern of association. A correlation can be positive (as one thing
increases, so does the other) or negative (as one increases, the other falls), but this
pattern is just a description of events. It does not prove that a causal relationship
exists. To claim a causal link requires not just that a pattern exists, but that the
supposed cause preceded the supposed effect, and that an explanation can be given
for what is going on (sometimes called the ‘mechanism at work’).
BAD SOCIOLOGY
Causation, Everywhere
There is a tendency to see causality in things that are around us. A famous Latin phrase captures
the logical fallacy – the flawed thinking – of when people attribute causality to something without
evidence: post hoc ergo propter hoc. Translated as ‘after it therefore because of it’, and often
referred to as ‘post hoc fallacy’, it highlights our desire to attribute causal relationships simply
because one happened after the other. It is imperative that sociologists do not fall into this trap.
See Provocation 4 for an example of how a correlation can be taken for causation, and how
thinking sociologically can help us examine the validity of this cause–effect paradigm.
General In order to examine for causality, experimental research tries to obtain

izability:the controlled conditions. Controlled conditions and a clear sequence of before and
extent to after allows an experimenter to be confident that a change in outcome was
which findings the result of the change in input they introduced. This is best exemplified
from a sample by the science laboratory, where everything can be controlled, from the
can be said to temperature of the room to the duration of the experiment, to a matter of
be true of the milliseconds.
population
However, experimental conditions may not reflect real-world situations and
the complexity of social life cannot be reproduced in a laboratory. This has led
Validity:how
sociologists to adopt alternative non-experimental methods, such as surveys,
far the data
collected
interviews and ethnographic observations (see below). These methods seek to
captures the address the problems of the experimental method, but each has its own limits
true nature of in terms of generalizability (can what is found in the study group tell us
the things about the whole population?) and validity (does the data truly show what is
being going on?).
measured
PROVOCATION 4
Watching pornography is probably good for you
It is often argued that exposure to sexually explicit content has a harmful effect on
viewers. Radical feminist writing in the 1970s and 1980s developed a critique of
pornography that claimed social problems, such as rape and gender inequality, were
perpetuated through forms of pornography that were equivalent to violence against
women (e.g. Dworkin 1979). Research has since focused on the potential negative
effects of pornography. So overwhelming is this focus on the harms of porn in research
that McCormack and Wignall (2017) describe it as a ‘negative effects paradigm’.
There is a significant amount of research on pornography that argues it has causal
effects, and that these effects are bad for the person viewing it and society as a
whole. For individuals, the theory is that people act out the ‘scripts’ they see in
pornography and that because these scripts are damaging in some way, pornography
has negative effects (Wright 2013). Hence, if porn has become more violent, sex
between consenting adults will become more violent. Or, because porn objectifies
women, women will be more objectified in society. It is also argued that watching
porn that depicts rape will lead to increased acceptance of rape myths and increase
violent sexual fantasies (e.g. McGlynn and Rackley 2007). But is this an issue of
causality or correlation?
Let us assume for now that people who watched porn were found to show increased
sexual objectification of others compared to those who do not watch it, and that they
also repeated rape myths to a greater extent. Is it the case that porn caused this difference,
or is it merely a correlation? Perhaps, instead, people who sexually objectify others are
more likely to watch porn because it is a medium that depicts sexual objectification. The
prior attitudes and desires may have caused the viewing pattern, rather than the viewing
causing the attitudes and desires.
The crux of the argument that porn causes negative effects necessarily rests on
experimental studies that show increased negative attitudes or behaviours after
viewing pornography – in particular, the finding that viewing pornography containing
violence leads some people to engage in violent behaviours in their lives.
Unfortunately, there are systematic methodological flaws in the experimental
studies on porn consumption (McCormack and Wignall 2017). These experimental
studies occur in laboratories to enable controlled conditions, yet the settings are
nothing like how people consume pornography in their own lives (McKee 2007). In
the experimental studies, participants do not get to choose the pornography they
watch; they must watch it for a designated amount of time (often 30-plus minutes);
and they are not allowed to masturbate. These studies thus lack ecological validity;
they do not reflect ‘real-life’ porn consumption. As such, they do not speak to porn
consumption more generally. Negative effects from laboratory studies likely reflect
the context of the consumption and not the content of the pornography.
The only time research has shown that watching porn has damaging effects is for
a small subset of the population who have very problematic relationships with sexual
behaviour already (Malamuth 1984). However, this involves a specific group of men
with a particular set of circumstances – the findings are not generalizable to the
broader population. Longitudinal research supports the argument that sexual
aggressiveness is only correlated with porn consumption, and that porn does not
cause aggressive sexual behaviour (Dawson et al. 2019).
There are also theoretical problems with the causation model. Those espousing
the causal argument have tended to apply a simplified form of sexual script theory.
Sexual script theory has been a valuable tool for understanding how people
experience sex (Simon and Gagnon 1986). The core idea is that people do not
experience bodily (sexual) sensations without connecting these to broader social
meanings of sex and sexuality in the culture and society in which they live. People
adopt a script that helps them process their physical and emotional feelings related
to sex. This is particularly important, given how sex is imbued with great meaning in
society (see Chapter 10). Sexual script theory is quite sophisticated, and sexual
scripts are not passively learned and recited, like an actor learns their lines in a play,
but they are actively interpreted by individuals in complex ways involving agency
(Frith and Kitzinger 2001). People change and even challenge sexual scripts through
their own experiences of sex.
However, sexual script theory in the negative effects paradigm of porn research
assumes a simple causal relationship between the scripts in porn and the person
watching it (Wiederman 2015). The consumer is assumed to accept and adopt the
scripts in the porn they watch, uncritically. As such, the negative effects paradigm
does not explain pornography consumption satisfactorily. Given all this, there is
simply not the evidence to prove a causal relationship between watching pornography
and negative effects in general.
We have shown how it is not fair to say that watching porn causes harm (the
dominant cultural narrative), but can we say it might actually be good for you? A
growing body of research is starting to explore this possibility (see Daskalopoulou
and Zanette 2020; Neville 2018; Wignall 2019). Thinking of pornography as a form
of entertainment rather than a health risk (McKee 2012), this research moves
beyond potential negative effects. It has found that young people consume porn for
a variety of reasons, including: as a leisure activity in its own right; as an erotic
experience; out of boredom; and to explore sexual identity (Smith et al. 2015).
In a study on how non-heterosexual young men consumed porn, McCormack
and Wignall (2017) found no support for ideas of harm or negative effects. Instead,
there were several potential benefits:
1 Some participants appeared to delay their first sexual experience because they
could explore safely through watching porn.
2 Several participants stated that pornography helped them understand their
sexual identity.
3 Participants spoke about the enjoyment and sexual satisfaction they got from
watching porn. It made them feel good, gave them a good orgasm and was, for
most, a pleasurable leisure experience.
Research into the positive effects of pornography is not developed enough to prove
that watching porn has positive effects. Yet the harms of watching porn appear to be
restricted to a small subgroup of men. It might be the case that porn does not have
very much effect at all, other than momentary pleasures. If this is true, it still stands
in sharp contrast with the dominant attitudes in society about porn.
Perhaps it’s time society shifted its view on porn.

Ley, D., Prause, N. and Finn, P. (2014) The emperor has no clothes: A review of the ‘pornography
addiction’ model. Current Sexual Health Reports, 6(2), 94–105.
McCormack, M. and Wignall, L. (2017) Enjoyment, exploration and education: Understanding the
consumption of pornography among young men with non-exclusive sexual orientations.
Sociology, 51(5), 975–91.
Rubin, G. (1993) Misguided, dangerous, and wrong: An analysis of antipornography politics. In A.
Assiter and A. Carol (eds) Bad Girls and Dirty Pictures: The Challenge to Reclaim Feminism
(pp. 18–40). London: Pluto Press.
RESEARCH DESIGN
As the tools of the sociologist’s trade, methods do not just enable research but also Longitudinal
guide and restrict what research is possible. A research question directs the researcher research:
towards constructing a research design, but issues of data collection and data analysis research
may also influence your formulation of the research question. where change
over time is
The first issue to decide is whether to test a theory or develop a new one. If the
the primary
intention is to develop a hypothesis that corroborates or challenges existing theory, focus of
this is a deductive approach. It will likely use quantitative methods. While one could attention
interview people to do this, it would be an inefficient, time-consuming process
compared to sending out a survey or a questionnaire.
Cross-
However, if the intention is to develop a new theory about a social issue, adopting sectional
an inductive approach, where the theory development comes from data analysis, research:
then qualitative research is better suited to the rich data needed. Table 4.2 gives some research
suggestions as to what method best suits different types of research question. design that
A second dimension of research design relates to the focus of study. Are you collects data
looking at: at one point
in time
■■ change over time – longitudinal research
■■ differences within a group at one point in time – cross-sectional research Comparative
■■ differences between locations – comparative methods, where comparisons can methods:
be made between large cross-sectional datasets or between in-depth cases research
■■ indepth exploration of a particular place and time – case study methods. focused on at
least two
locations to
Table 4.2: Research questions and appropriate methods identify
similarities and
Research question focus Example Appropriate method differences
between them
How one or more How does gender impact on a Quantitative
variables impact on an particular educational questionnaire/survey Case study
outcome variable qualification? methods:
in-depth
Why people behave in a What are the motivations for Qualitative interview investigation
particular manner the photos one posts on into individual
Instagram? cases rather
than
What the dynamics of a Why does bullying occur in Ethnography comparing
variables from
particular context are school cultures? multiple cases
Examining why a What social issues were Archival research

particular event occurred relevant to the emergence of
the Black Lives Matter
protests?
If your research question best fits one or other of the above types, your design
and method should follow accordingly.
These designs still employ the methods outlined below, just in a variety of
different manifestations. Longitudinal research might compare quantitative causes
and effects (parental education and a child’s achievement) and use survey data
collection methods, as it is usually interested in causal relationships between prior
states and outcomes. Similarly, a comparative project looking at educational results
in different countries might also use surveys, but the focus is on correlations, even
though causes can sometimes be tentatively suggested. Alternatively, biographical
interviews might be used to explore changing experiences of ageing over time, or
for measuring attitudes to marriage in different countries. Case study research might
draw on interviews, observations, archives and/or questionnaire data (although the
latter is less common), and might even have comparative or longitudinal elements –
at the level of individual lives or whole institutions (see David 2007).
A research question addresses what you seek to study. Research design engages
the question of what sort of approach would be best suited to answer the research
question. These questions include:
■■ What balance should be struck between qualitative and quantitative data, induc-
tion and deduction?
■■ Is the question best answered by looking at patterns over time, in many places, in
one place but through many cases, or by studying just one or a very small number
of particular cases?
Once the question of research design is settled, the actual detail of what methods to
use must be addressed.
TYPES OF METHOD
Having touched on many of the issues related to method within sociology, we now
consider what these methods are and some of the issues related to each of them. We
start by discussing observation, in the traditional sense of observations in the laboratory.
We then examine ways in which sociologists can observe people in their everyday
lives. We also discuss the power of asking questions through interview and survey
methods. These are all ways of collecting primary data – directly from participants
themselves. Next, we examine the possibilities of using archival data and secondary
data. We then look at how methods have evolved, including the use of digital and
mixed methods.
Observation by experiment
If sociology followed the hard sciences, sociologists would undertake experiments
all the time, fixing the conditions in which people act.
Any experimental design requires that the researcher first identify what they
believe to be the cause and what effect they want to test. However, given that lots of
things happen all the time to all sorts of people, it is hard to pin down patterns
unless the researcher takes some control over the situation. As such, in experimental
research, it is essential to create controlled conditions – where there is no ‘outside’
interference with the things we want to study.
The experimental laboratory is designed to give the researcher maximum control
over all the conditions in the participants’ environment for the duration of the
research. Sampling (discussed in more detail under ‘Sampling theory, myths and Sampling:
reality’) is a component of this, as it enables the researcher to avoid bias and the process
distortions that might arise from simply measuring unrepresentative and divergent of selecting
groups. units within a
population
The results of a well-controlled experiment will allow the researcher to be
confident that any difference in outcomes between the groups can only be due to the
differences the researcher introduced, and not ones that already existed in the groups
being studied, or other conditions in which they were studied. Experiments are
therefore useful for showing causes, not just correlations.
However, people do not behave normally when they know they are being studied.
It is also very difficult to recreate complex social situations in laboratories, so the
creation of controlled conditions very often relies on simplifications that do not
reflect real life. This issue was originally labelled the ‘Hawthorne effect’. It referred
to research undertaken at the Hawthorne Works in Illinois, where a study showed
that focusing on workers’ needs would lead to improved productivity (Mayo 1949).
The study was critiqued, however, and it was argued that the real reason for improved
productivity was that the workers were enthused by being the focus of empirical
research (Landsberger 1958).
One solution to these problems is not to try and re-create laboratory conditions
at all, but to go out looking for naturalistic experimental conditions. If two locations are
in all respects the same, except for the one variable you are interested in studying,
you can use those two locations as a pseudo-laboratory to see if the presence and
absence of that thing (the variable of interest) makes a difference. For example, the
introduction of a new school examination in one location would allow comparison
with results in other (comparable) locations where the new exams have not been
introduced.
The major criticism of the experimental method is that the experimental
environment itself has too much of an effect on the participants over and above any
actual effect of the independent variable being tested. As such, most sociological
research is non-experimental. Even so, while experiments are often criticized because
Naturalistic
of the bias they introduce by their impact on participants, ‘researcher effects’ can observation:
bias non-experimental research as well. We discuss some of the ethical issues around the
the role of the researcher in Chapter 5. researcher
observes
Observing people in their own worlds people in
their ‘natural’
Most observational research in sociology is carried out in naturalistic settings, settings
looking at people going about their everyday lives. Such naturalistic observation rather than in
is less complex than setting up a laboratory experiment. Naturalistic observation a lab or
interview
also allows the researcher to experience ‘real life’ in all its complexity, while having
conditions
less biasing effect on those they observe than occurs in experimental conditions.
Nonetheless, exposure to the complexity of ‘real life’ has its drawbacks, as the
researcher cannot be fully aware of all the factors impacting on those they study, and
cannot control, prevent or even fully know these factors when trying to determine
what is influencing what.
Naturalistic observation may be purely detached or participant based. A detached
observer may simply observe, and actively avoid interaction with those they observe
so as not to ‘disturb’ their normal routines. If they were interested in how children
interact in classroom settings, a researcher may sit at the back, or digitally record
interactions without being directly present. However, passive observation may be
insufficient for gaining an understanding of what is really going on when people do
the things they can be seen doing (see Thorne 1993).
Participant Participant observation is a technique where the researcher gets involved in
observation: the routines of those they study, not only to observe their activities more closely,
the but also to combine observation with practical experience (and dialogue). An
researcher anthropologist going to live as part of a hunter-gatherer village and a sociologist
participates
who gets a job in a call centre to study working conditions are both carrying out
in the activity
along with participant observation.
participants Participant observation is the name sociologists coined to refer to what
and simulta anthropologists call ethnography (a term sociologists now also regularly use) – the
neously practice of living within the community you want to study. However, there is a huge
observes variation in degrees of involvement, from engaging in the community for a sustained
them period of time to full immersion in the life of those being studied. Traditionally,
ethnographers observed but did not participate, but various modes of participation
have now become standard.
Controversy exists as to just how far it is possible to know another culture even
by living within it or through participant observations. Additionally, many of the
groups, communities and subcultures that sociologists study are linked to the
researcher’s existing life. Some forms of participant observation involve members of
a particular community studying other members of their own community, such as
teachers researching teaching.
This may make it easier for the researcher to get involved and be accepted, but it
also raises issues of bias, as the researcher may come to share unconscious attitudes
or taken-for-granted behaviours with those they study, and so not perceive these as
‘interesting’ and in need of investigation. The openness of ethnographic observation
may also create information overload, and the researcher needs to be aware of how
they make their choices about what to follow up and what to set aside.
The ethics of sociological research is a key issue (see Chapter 5). Experiments are
unethical if they inflict harm through manipulation of participants, and also if
participants are not being told what is being done to them. Naturalistic observation
avoids the ethical problems of manipulation, as the researcher does not tend to
manipulate those they observe, but they can set up problems around consent and
deception. Gaining access to people’s ‘real’ lives may enhance the quality of the data,
but it also increases the risk of exposing the secrets of those being observed. There
is also concern that sociologists can be voyeuristic tourists – dropping in to glean
data about sensitive topics, affecting the lives of their participants and then leaving,
never to be seen again as they publish their research in academic journals.
Naturalistic observers may choose to tell those they observe exactly what they
are up to. Not to do so is called covert observation. This has been justified by some
as it allows researchers to find the truth about groups who might hide their true
activities if they knew they were being watched. Covert observation is ethically
controversial, and many argue it is simply unacceptable. Some maintain that it
leads to invalid results anyway, as the researcher cannot verify their interpretations
of what they see. If the researcher is covert, they may find it hard to ask the
people they are studying to clarify any issues that arise, so covert research may
limit the scope to actually ask people what they are doing and why. Of course, if
you are researching deviant activities that many others disapprove of and which
might also be illegal, participants might respond dishonestly if asked directly what
they are doing. If this is the case, a researcher might decide they themselves need
to be covert as well, but this scenario raises so many ethical concerns that such
research might not be a good idea for a trainee student (again, see Chapter 5). The
researcher must also protect themselves from harm, in where they go and who
they spend time with.
Asking questions
The advantage of observation-based research is that you can record people’s actual
activity, which may be the very thing you are interested in. What people think and say
may be deceptive, not just to you, but to themselves. However, many things are not
easily observed (such as how people voted), cannot be observed (past actions) or can
best be identified by asking (attitudes and beliefs). For these reasons, it may be better
to ask people about such things, rather than observing them.
Asking questions is a unique research method in the social sciences as it is only
human beings who can answer in words. The capacity of human beings to use
language means their actions are meaning based: people act on intentions that are
shaped by the meanings they hold and are geared towards achieving future outcomes
the individual can conceptualize. People have some capacity to recall past actions, and
they have the ability to communicate these things to others, including researchers.
People spend a lot of time thinking about the past, the present and the future, and
this makes them valuable sources of data.
Interview:
Asking questions can take different forms, and the two most important are a form of data
interviews and questionnaires: collection
where the
■■ Interview: An interviewer asks the interviewee a set of questions, giving the participant is
interviewee time to answer each question before moving on to the next one. asked a set of
This is most typically carried out face to face and with the questions asked and questions by
answered verbally. Depending on the format, follow-up questions may be asked the researcher
and the interviewee may have quite a lot of control over the interview. Answers
are recorded either by a recording device or note-taking. Question
■■ Questionnaire: A questionnaire is a written set of questions (now most often in naire:a
written set of
a digital form). The respondent is asked to write down their answers and return
questions
the questionnaire to the researcher.
While this is the fundamental difference between interviews and questionnaires, many
subtleties exist. Interviews are commonly associated with questions that are more
qualitative, while questionnaires are usually associated with more quantitative data
collection. Speaking in person and filling out a paper form respectively lend themselves
to these different forms of data collection. However, this does not have to be the case,
and the forms of questions and answers vary greatly within and between interviews
and questionnaires. The term ‘survey’ is strongly associated with the conduct of
Survey:the questionnaires. A survey is the systematic collection of the same data from a specified
systematic sample or census. This is most often collected in the form of questionnaires.
collection of Questionnaire response rates are often very low, leading to potential sample bias
the same
(see our later discussion of sampling), as the people who actually return the
data from a
specified
questionnaires may be unrepresentative, usually being the most ‘opinionated’
sample individuals. Telephone interviews can help overcome travel, cost and sampling bias
issues, and online options further develop this potential (David and Millward 2014).
Not all interviews and questionnaires are the same. Interviews range from
‘structured’ to ‘open’ formats. Structure here refers to the wording and sequence of
questions in an interview schedule. A fully structured interview is one where the
wording and sequence of questions remains fixed so all interviewees are asked the
same questions in the same order. This makes responses more comparable, but limits
the scope to explore in detail particular things that each interviewee says. A fully
structured interview is similar to a questionnaire, as the sequence and wording of
questions on a page cannot be altered once given to the respondent.
A semi-structured interview is one where the interviewer retains some level of
flexibility in how they ask and sequence the questions. The sociologist may want to
explore some issues in more depth, link questions to previous answers in a distinctive
way for particular interviewees, and may even decide that some questions can be
merged together or even deleted if they are clearly not relevant. The sociologist is
also free to follow the thread of the interviewees’ answers, reordering the sequence of
questions to follow up interesting points. These techniques can be particularly useful
in inductive research where the sociologist is interested in a particular issue, but wants
to be guided by the person they are interviewing. This form of interviewing requires
preparation and experience to do well, and is far more complex than simply ‘asking
questions’.
A fully unstructured interview might have no prior set of questions, and is more
like a conversation that an ethnographer might strike up in their fieldwork – when
the opportunity arises or when there is a question they want to explore with someone
at that moment.
Both the Chicago and Atlanta Schools of sociology (see Chapter 2) drew
significantly on interviews to collect data, and qualitative research became firmly
recognized as a legitimate method within sociology as a result of their pioneering
work. Feminist sociologists further advocated for more informal forms of interview
that privileged the voice of the participant and took power away from the interviewer
(Oakley 2016), meaning that the interviewer can be guided by the experiences and
perspectives of the participant (Reinharz 1992); particularly important for people
who have been marginalized or oppressed.
Individual or focus groups

The classic interview has one interviewee and one interviewer, but focus groups
involve more than one interviewee to create a more dynamic dialogue. They are more
flexible than questionnaires because the researcher can add and change questions
during data collection. Focus groups – usually 6–12 participants – seek to bring
together experts (a so-called ‘Delphi group’), members of a particular category of
people (where different focus groups would be used to study other types to allow
comparisons) or members of different categories (to study their interactions in
generating responses). Putting similar people together may allow patterns to emerge
through the group’s dialogue with itself. Putting diverse people in the same group
can provoke reactions and hence insights, but might also inhibit interviewees saying
what they might say among those they think are ‘like-minded’.
In focus groups, the interviewer becomes a facilitator for the group to talk among
themselves, not just responding to the interviewer’s questions one by one. Jenny Kitzinger
(1994) notes that interviewing a group does not constitute a focus group if the research
just collects an answer to each question from each person; a focus group needs to generate
dialogue within the group.
VOX POP
Dr Elham Amini
Researching the Experiences of Menopausal Iranian Women
My interest in the sexuality of menopausal women
started with my background as a midwife. My
professional work saw me spending time with many
different women, from different age groups and
social backgrounds. I frequently heard about the
most hidden and private parts of their lives.
Most of the women who were more than 35 years
old thought of the menopause as ‘dysfunction’ or
‘disease’. They also thought it was inevitable and a
biological consequence of the ageing process; but they
felt guilty that they could not be a ‘good wife’ and ‘satisfy
their husbands’. They also carried within themselves a
fear of losing their husbands due to not being able to
‘fulfil’ their ‘marital duties’. My feelings as their midwife
were both of concern for the women and of frustration © Elham Amini
of how the menopause was understood.

When I interviewed menopausal women in Iran, it was no surprise that these interviews were
full of emotional feelings. My participants cried, sobbed, shook with emotion and raised their
voices. Several of the women said I was the first person they had ever talked to in depth about
issues of sexuality. Their feeling of exposure was very strong, which always brought a lump to my
throat. At these times, I showed my empathy by taking their hands, giving them a tissue or glass
of water, and tried hard not to cry in front of them. I thought the participants would feel burdened
by my crying, and I did not want to interrupt their stories. I only cried when I returned home.
After returning to England, I transcribed the interviews into words so I could analyse them.
Listening to these stories for a second time was emotionally difficult again. While this was taxing
for me, it was a chance for me to listen to women’s lived experiences and move understanding
of the menopause, sexuality and gender from the abstract to one based in Iranian women’s
realities.
■■ How does Elham’s story influence your opinion of qualitative research?
■■ Do you think her experiences of emotionality strengthen or hinder the validity of her research?
What are the benefits and disadvantages of this emotional engagement?
Using archival data and/or secondary data

Some of the expense and ethical troubles associated with collecting your own data
can be reduced if the data you need to answer your research question has already
been collected by someone else. Sometimes it is not possible to collect new primary
data. Past events cannot be repeated, but records may exist documenting them.
Observations from the past might have been captured on film or in photographs.
Archives are therefore a very useful source of data. Many archives store materials
that are generated in the course of their keepers’ work and/or life, not for the
particular purposes of research. Newspaper groups archive their newspapers.
Schools archive their pupils’ performance reports. Individuals keep diaries and photo
albums to record their lives and, of course, there is lots of information about our
lives on social media. All this material can be of use to a sociologist.
Historical records have formed the basis for much archival research, where it is
not possible to research historical events directly. Just as there is discussion regarding
the degree to which interviews and questionnaires can get to the truth of people’s
actual behaviour, so it is that archives must be ‘read’ with critical attention to the
distinction between what they say and what they claim to be talking about.
What people wore in old photographs, their posture and group composition tell
us a lot about what those people wanted to say in these images, but that is not the
whole truth. Old photographs can provide glimpses of how people wanted to be
seen and to see themselves, but perhaps less about what they actually looked like, and
less still about what they were really like as people.
Consider the image we have of Victorians in England. The perception is of
dour, serious people. There are few photos of people laughing from this time.
Many might think this is a result of living in what is widely seen today as a stern and
repressed culture. Or perhaps they see this dourness as reflecting a difficult era,
where work was hard, most families knew people who had been in a war and there
was little leisure time. The reality, though, is that the process by which photos were
developed, and the amount of time it took, meant that photographers told people
to stand still and not move. It was very difficult for people to keep a smile for so
long in the same position, and so they simply did not smile (see Figure 4.1).
Figure 4.1: A Victorian couple enjoying themselves

Visual The field of visual methods grapples with this issue. The study of selfies
methods: (Robinson 2007) raises very similar questions about what such images tell us about
methods that society, even in the various acts of revelation and concealment being practised in
enable the making these digital images.
study of Archival data also has an issue with sampling bias. Who leaves behind a trace and
images and whose lives are forgotten or were never recorded in the first place? The diaries of
non-textual 17th-century farmers’ wives will be biased in favour of the better off – not least,
data
those who were literate – just as the volume and popularity of selfies on the internet
reflects today’s ‘digital divide’ – between those with and without access to digital
technologies, faster and more reliable access to the internet, and more knowledge and
confidence in using the technology (David and Millward 2014). When investigating
records, what you are studying is how the world was being represented by dominant
groups, not how everyone saw the world, and certainly not how the world was. Some
archives are more inclusive than others, so it is important to ask how representative
any archive is when assessing what data from that source can tell you.
Evolving methods: digital sociology and mixed methods

The rise of the internet means more people are leaving a trail of self-representation
for researchers to collect. As such, the internet creates huge opportunities for
sociologists to study the here and now by means that were once reserved mainly for
the study of the past. Of course, the digital divide means not everyone is equally
represented.
The rise of what is called the ‘network society’ is not just confined to the internet and
the practices of networked individuals (see Chapter 11). Institutions – governments,
schools, universities, police forces and private companies – make it their business to
collect ever more information about their citizens, pupils, students, users and customers.
Some refer to this as the rise of ‘big data’ (Savage and Burrows 2007).
Supermarkets, states and insurance companies know vast amounts about you,
sometimes exceeding what you know about yourself. Whether this data is available
to social researchers to use is a different matter. The ethical issues involved in such a
‘surveillance society’ (Lyon 2001) are significant, as they are when a social researcher
seeks to use such live archives to study people online. In online research, the
researcher may blend archival research with non-participant observation, as the
archive materials are often records of ongoing activity.
Alternatively, researchers may engage directly with participants of online archiving
communities, such as blog sites, Twitter and e-fanzines, in a form of online ethnography
(David and Millward 2014, section six). The researcher may be just ‘lurking’ in the
margins of online public space, but such observation and asking questions should
be treated with the same ethical consideration as would apply to other interview-,
questionnaire- and observation-based research. Researching public records of past
events raises fewer ethical concerns than online participant observation of active
archives (Snee et al. 2016). These questions took on particular significance with the
emergence of COVID-19, as online methods became a crucial way of collecting data
in a period of social distancing.
Mixed methods means different things to different people, some of which are not Mixed
new. Preparing for an experiment or questionnaire, a researcher might do some methods:
preliminary observations, secondary data analysis or interviews to hone their questions. a research
Such qualitative exploration may then develop into ‘piloting’ the themes that will be design using
developed in the later quantitative work. Alternatively, after a survey, a researcher might more than one
choose to carry out smaller scale interview research to enable a better interpretation of form of data
the statistical results. More recent advocates of mixed methods reject this linear add-on collection.
Sometimes
model for a more integrated interaction between methods. Greene et al. (1989) suggest
called
five forms of mixed methods research, each seeking to combine different data collection ‘multimethod’
strategies in particular ways and to particular ends: Table 4.3 explains these components.
Table 4.3: Mixed methods research formats

Form of mixed methods Explanation
Triangulation Involves parallel research methods designed to test

whether different approaches confirm the same
result
Complementarity Sequential, and one method is used to clarify prior

findings
Developmental Builds on the results of one method to ‘fine-tune’ a

subsequent method
Initiation Allows one method to develop results that

subsequent approaches might challenge, highlighting
alternatives and contradictions
Expansion Explores different aspects of an issue that singular

approaches would miss
John Cresswell (2014) rejects mixed methods as a bolt-on addition to one main
method. He argues that mixed methods ought instead to be the default approach,
reflecting how the ‘true’ interpretation of any issue is complex and often contradictory.
Different methods must be given equal weight because what is discovered by different
methods can never simply be added up into one overall result.
DATA COLLECTION
The following sections discuss the interaction between research design and data
collection, and how data can be analysed. Data collection must always be designed
with a view to how that data will subsequently be analysed; so keep in mind that the
choices being considered under collection should be made in the light of what is
discussed in the subsequent sections.
Populations and samples

In order to answer a research question, we need to decide who (or what) we are
Population: talking about. This is deciding on the population. A population is every member of
all members a category. We often think of countries, towns or villages as having populations, but
of the the sociological meaning of the term refers to the membership of any group. A
category population is not simply ‘everyone’ but rather everyone in the group of interest. If
under
investigation
you are interested in current students in your university or college, then that does not
include all students ever or everywhere, let alone all adults. All the pupils in a school
are the population of pupils at that school. If you are interested in the total population
of a school, you will include teachers and other staff.
Sample:a For most research methods, sociologists need a sample of participants to
subset of a take part in the study. It is sometimes possible to study the whole population if
population it is small; for example, all the clubs in a particular sporting league. Such studies
do not need to worry about sampling. Most of the time, however, the population
is too large for all members to be studied. The importance of defining the
population lies in the fact that research can only be representative if it is clear
who (or what) it is about, and when there is a clear relationship between the
cases being studied (the sample) and the group such results are claimed to be
about (the population).
Opinion poll organizations try to predict election results based on samples, but if
they sample people by telephone they should only claim that their population were
telephone owners, not the general population. Those who have lived in the same
home for many years are more likely to be identified, contacted and included by
opinion poll companies; such sampling represents only the population of stable
residents and so often excludes many. Far fewer young adults have access to a landline
phone compared to older people. Opinion polls that try to select a sample that is
representative of the whole population, in the sense of every adult eligible to vote in
a territory, may also be unrepresentative if the actual population of those who do
vote excludes many less secure citizens.
Sampling theory, myths and reality

The sampling process should start by clearly identifying the relevant population. The
question that then arises is whether all members of that population can be identified
Sampling – that is, whether a sampling frame can be produced. If so, it is possible to select a
frame:the subset of the population in a way that would allow each member of the population
list of every an equal chance of being in that sample.
person or Next, a selection method whereby all members of the population have an
thing in a
equal chance of being selected should be designed. This is called a random sample.
population
that can be If this is not possible, a non-random sample will have to suffice. The problem
sampled with non-random samples is that you cannot generalize to the entire population
from such samples. Table 4.4 provides an overview of the different sampling
methods available.
Table 4.4: Types of sampling

Type of sample Explanation
Random No bias exists in influencing who gets into the sample. It does
not mean spontaneous or unpredictable
Stratified random Selects proportions of different subpopulations in advance,

and those subpopulations are then sampled randomly. Allows
for small populations to be compared with large ones
Quota A non-random sample. Subpopulations are identified in

advance as in stratified random sampling, but these
subpopulations are not sampled randomly. The primary
concern is to fill the quota rather than eliminating bias
Cluster The researcher recruits from a number of locations. This can

be a form of random or non-random sampling, depending on
how participants are recruited from each location
Convenience Select the first (or easiest) people you meet. This is non-
random because where and when you select them has a
biasing effect on who is selected
Snowball Initial participants identify others to participate in the

research. This is non-random, and justified where a
population is hard to access, difficult to identify or hidden
Sample size
The answer to the question ‘how big must my sample be?’ depends on two things.
First, the variation observed in the population. A population that is highly diverse in
relation to the things being studied will require a larger sample. A more similar
population will require a smaller sample. One French person might be all you need to
gain a working knowledge of the French language, but you would need a much larger
sample to study French political attitudes, which are much more diverse.
Second, sample size will depend on the mode of analysis being undertaken, with
more complex forms of analysis requiring greater amounts of data.
Qualitative studies tend not to collect numerical data, and so do not allow for
statistical tests. A small sample of detailed interviews may generate fascinating data,
but the sample size will make the results hard to generalize from. Some qualitative
researchers simply suspend the issue of generalization in favour of small samples
studied in detail, while others argue that theory can be developed from this data,
which can then be tested quantitatively.
The question of sample size for qualitative research is also a challenge. Very little
qualitative research has more than 100 participants because the amount of data from
that many interviews or observations would be overwhelming, and only manageable
by a large team of researchers. Additionally, some qualitative researchers start out
with an intended number of participants that they think will allow them to gather
enough data to answer their research questions but will also be flexible regarding
this. For example, a researcher might hope to gather interview data from 40
participants but stop data collection after 34 interviews. This decision to stop might
be because of theoretical/data saturation – where a researcher feels that the data they
are gathering is not offering any new findings or insights. Deciding when you have
reached this saturation point is difficult and requires researchers to have an extremely
detailed knowledge of their data.
BAD SOCIOLOGY
Bad Sampling Leads to Bad Research
Bad sociology is often the result of poor methods. Bad research can produce misleading
results that can be used to promote false claims about society. For example, a comparison
between children raised by same-sex and different-sex couples (Regnerus 2012) claimed
that research showed that children raised by same-sex couples performed less well in
education and other measures of life success and wellbeing. This was a provocative claim, not
just because it contradicted other research but because of the political effect such a result
could have, given the existence of homophobic attitudes in society.
However, many more of those in the same-sex parenting group were divorced or separated
from a previous heterosexual partner. As such, it could not be demonstrated that the research
was showing any ‘effect’ of same-sex parenting, instead of and distinct from the impact of
parental separation on children. Sociologists have a responsibility to ensure that their methods
are as accurate and rigorous as possible.
Whether divorce harms children is equally controversial. Research has shown that children
of single parents are more likely to be unemployed, in prison or to drop out of school
(McLanahan and Sandefur 1994). However, becoming a single parent is more likely for those
who are poor and discriminated against in society. As such, once you control for class,
employment, ethnicity and parental education, it turns out that disadvantage explains the
harm these children experience far more than family form (Ni Bhrolchain 2001).
Given that sociological research addresses social problems and issues in people’s lives,
great care needs to be taken with method. Whether intentionally or not, methods used poorly
may well lead to incorrect results that can have real, material effects on people’s lives and
perceptions. Research (as noted above) that falsely suggests certain types of people are ‘bad
parents’ will reinforce stigma against them and harm their lives, as well as those of their
children.
What happens when sampling goes wrong?

Sampling is difficult, and can be flawed for several reasons, including implicit biases
and cultural norms. For example, the Nuffield 1980 class study used men’s earnings for
household income as the baseline against which to see whether children’s outcomes in
health, school and employment were predicted by such a background factor. It did not
include women’s income in determining this. The choice of the father’s earnings was
supposed to be ‘better’ than using ‘total household income’, because it was considered
difficult to compare dual-earning households with ‘breadwinner’ households. This idea
has become increasingly redundant as more and more women go out to work, and
as family forms diversify. It is also seen as a failing of the study based on outdated
gender norms (see Delamont 2003 pp. 53–4). We discuss the exclusion of women from
sociology in Chapter 2, and look at gender as a form of social division in Chapter 8.
In the UK, Black and minority ethnic (BME) 18- to 25-year-olds are more likely
to be in higher education than their White peers (Boliver 2016). However, at the
same time, Black men in that age group are more likely to be in prison than in higher
education. To combine BME men and women into one group is therefore potentially
misleading. Likewise, talk of ‘South Asian’ students obscures more than it reveals;
while 18- to 25-year-olds with Indian heritage are more likely to be in higher education
than their White peers, those from Pakistani and Bangladeshi backgrounds are less
likely (see Chapter 8 for discussion of race).
DATA ANALYSIS
Once a sociologist has collected data, it is then their task to analyse it to produce
meaningful results. This process of turning a large amount of data into results
requires systematic analysis to identify valid patterns. Here, we give a simple outline of
what you can do. We begin by looking at textual (qualitative) data analysis and then
at how to analyse numerical (quantitative) data. While analysis takes place after data
collection, data collection should have been carried out with a clear view of the data
analysis that is to be undertaken.
Qualitative data analysis

Qualitative data analysis treats data as text. By text we mean anything that can be
‘read’ for its meaning. Qualitative data analysis searches for patterns of meaning
within text: within and between individual texts – interview transcripts, newspaper
reports, radio broadcasts, songs, diary entries, films or photographs. The conduct of Code:a word
analysis involves three basic steps: coding, content analysis and discourse analysis. Some or short
research only combines the first two steps. Others jump directly to the third. phrase that
characterizes
a larger
Coding amount of
Coding means going through textual data and highlighting each time a particular text in order
to undertake
theme or idea recurs and giving it a label. Each instance of this is a code and each
analysis
time it recurs the sociologist codes it. For example, in an interview transcript, a
participant might repeatedly refer to their pet dog. In this case, the sociologist would
highlight every time this happened, labelling each instance as something like ‘dog’.
Coding may be conducted with a computer software package or using coloured pens.
Once data is coded, it is possible to look for patterns; how often codes arise, where
they do and in what combinations with other codes.
The question is then how to choose the codes to use. There are various levels of
coding, and each performs slightly different kinds of pattern searching. Coding is
deductive if codes were selected in advance of beginning the analysis, and inductive
if codes are selected by engaging with the text – by reading carefully and making
codes for what ‘leaps out’ at the researcher. Deductive coding is more appropriate if
examining relationships that are already known, while inductive coding is more
exploratory.
Qualitative content analysis

Once textual data has been coded, it is possible for the sociologist to search through
the content to look for patterns. Simple (deductive) content analysis can be
quantitative. If the hypothesis was that some newspapers would use terms more
frequently than others, statistical tests can measure this. One could look for how
many times the term ‘fake news’ is used, and see whether this depends on the type
of newspaper (see Chapter 12). Qualitative content analysis is more inductive and
exploratory, and the pattern searching is less concerned with testing prior theories
statistically as it is with looking for such patterns in the first place. Qualitative content
analysis allows the researcher to look for patterns, but most qualitative sociologists
want to go beyond just looking for patterns such as the use and non-use of certain
key terms (content or codes), and want to study what meanings are present and how
they are constructed in such content/codes. This leads us to discourse analysis.
Discourse analysis
The term ‘discourse’ is used here to refer to systems of meaning by which
representations of the world are constructed in language (including visual ‘text’).
These may be media discourses or medical discourses, legal discourses or many other
forms besides. For example, some groups of people are more likely to be reported
in connection with crime than others. Qualitative content analysis can help identify
what elements recur in such stories, what language is repeated, what images are used
and what other links are routinely made. That sort of pattern identification is what
qualitative coding allows us to explore. However, once we have identified that pattern,
it is possible to ask not just what elements are routinely deployed, but how and why
these elements are put together. This is where content analysis shifts into discourse
analysis.
There are at least 13 different types of discourse analysis (see David and Sutton
2011), but some simple commonalities exist. The basic approach is to identify how
particular meanings are constructed, not how often they recur. Through the study of
grammar, metaphor, equation, myth, narrative, thematic construction, omission and
various other linguistic devices, the researcher seeks to identify how particular
constructions in language work to present ‘discursive figures’ – seemingly real
characters, patterns, sequences, events and relationships that tell a version of events
that appears true because they close down alternative versions of reality.
Content analysis can only give us a sense of the objects in play (the vocabulary of
the text). Discourse analysis examines how the grammar used puts these words into
place to create meaning. See David and Sutton (2011 pp. 338–87) for an extended
account of the various terms and vocabularies used to describe forms of qualitative
data analysis.
Clean your data

Qualitative data is seen as less precise and more subjective than quantitative data. This is true in
many senses, but it also downplays how ‘messy’ quantitative data is. Sociologists speak of
‘cleaning’ their quantitative data, which means ensuring that the data is accurate. There are
many forms of data cleaning for numeric data. Your data might not be accurate because:
■■ The data may have been incorrectly input into the data analysis software
■■ There may be incomplete answers
■■ There may be more than one answer
■■ There may be duplicate answers, where the same respondent has answered twice
■■ Different units of measurements are used by different respondents
■■ Responses might be incorrect or irrelevant.
Each of these cases requires the sociologist to carefully check the data and remove errors so
that the statistical analysis remains accurate. But this also brings subjective judgements about
how best to do this.
Quantitative data analysis

Quantitative research collects data as numerical values within specified variables.
Large volumes of such data can be collected and, as with qualitative data analysis, the
issue for the researcher is how to extract patterns from such a mass of data.
Quantitative data analysis looks for patterns of graphical and statistical relations.
Such patterns can take many forms.
Undertaking quantitative analysis can be complex, with mathematical steps
required. We do not provide an instruction manual of how to undertake each form
of analysis, but we discuss the broader issues about which sort of analysis is relevant,
and how to choose the right one. To do this, we must first consider how variables are
recorded numerically.
Levels of measurement
A variable varies in a way that can be recorded numerically. The values of such
variables are numbered, but some variable values are more numerical than others.
There are three basic levels of measurement: nominal, ordinal and interval/ratio (see
Table 4.5). These levels relate to how numerical each measure is.
Nominal and ordinal variables are called categorical data as their values are in the
form of categories, whereas interval/ratio variables have real numbers and not
categories. Scale and ratio are numerical data.
Table 4.5: Types of data and levels of measurement

Level of Definition Example Notes
measurement
Nominal A variable whose Degree subject These numbers are just

values have no studied labels or identifiers
sequence or Country of origin
scale Hair colour
Ordinal A variable whose Olympic medals It is the order that matters.

values have Satisfaction It is not possible to say how
sequence but no surveys much better a gold medal
scale is to a silver one.
Interval A variable whose Clothes sizes The lack of a ‘true zero’

values have Temperature (where 0 means an
sequence and absence/lack of value)
scale, but not a means that ratios are not
true zero meaningful in these scales.
Size 0 is not an absence of
size, and size 6 is not half
the size of size 12
Ratio A variable whose Speed ‘Fully’ numerical data. This

values have Distance is the best kind of data, in
sequence, scale Age the sense that a lot of
and a true zero Height quantitative analysis can be
Weight used on it
The first step in analysis is to examine your individual variables, known as univariate
analysis. This includes producing graphic displays and carrying out basic statistical
measurements. These displays and measures allow you to identify problems and
patterns that might be obscured in later, more sophisticated forms of analysis.
Recall the levels of measurement. For a nominal variable, a pie chart (see Figure 4.2) is
best. You can also calculate the modal value – the most popular value in that variable.
For ordinal data, you can plot a bar chart (see Figure 4.3), and calculate the modal
value and the median value. The median value is the value of the middle case; that is, if
all cases were lined up sequentially (from lowest to highest value) the value of the middle
case would be the median. In an even-numbered sample, the median is the value shared
by the middle two cases, and if these are different, then just split the difference.
If you have interval or ratio data, you can use a histogram (see Figure 4.4) and
calculate the mode, the median and the mean. The mean is the average – the sum of all
the case values added up and divided by the number of cases.
Sex
Male
Female
Figure 4.2: A pie chart showing the nominal sex variable in overall population
3,000
2,000
Count
1,000
0
Strongly agree Agree Neither Diagree Strongly disagree
agree/disagree
People can’t influence govt. policy
Figure 4.3: Ordinal variable of belief in political efficacy

200 Mean = 51.79

Std. Dev. = 16.134
N= 6,113
150
Frequency
100
50
0
20 40 60 80 100
Age at date of interview (wave 11)
Figure 4.4: A histogram for the interval age variable
The mode, median and mean are known as the measures of central tendency. This is
a more formal way of describing the ‘average’ of a set of data, and these measures
are ways of describing a set of data with one value that offers some form of ‘central’
position. Only fully numerical variables can use all three measures (and others).
It is also possible to calculate the range, variance and standard deviation for interval
and ratio variables. These measure how widely the data is distributed. The range is
just the gap between the highest and lowest values.
The variance measures how far either side of the middle value the values in a
dataset actually are. Variance is calculated by working out the mean, and then
calculating the distance from the mean to each value. Because some values will be
above the mean and some below, each such value is squared to make all these
differences positive values. The sum of all those differences will vary depending on
how far the values disperse from the mean.
Taking the square root of the variance removes the exaggerating effect of all
those squarings, but keeps the overall effect of all the positive values, and gives the
standard deviation – a useful measure of how narrow or wide the sample distribution
really is. Computer software does the number crunching these days. However, most
statistical tests for relationships with interval variables use the properties of standard
deviations to work out how far things actually go together.
Groups with the same average are not the same

Univariate analysis is helpful in showing broad trends or highlighting any obvious problems with
data.
Ten people all earning £20 an hour for work will have the same (mean) average wage as a
group of ten people where five earn £40 and five earn nothing. We only know, in this context,
that this difference exists if we also take the range (0 vs. 40).
If we add a third group where two people earn nothing, three people earn £10, three people
earn £30 and two people earn £40, the average and the range is the same as the second group.
It is only by finding the standard deviation that you see the differences between these groups.
For examples with this kind of small sample size, it is easy to see that differences exist by
looking at the raw data. But if you are doing similar analysis with thousands of cases, these tests
are needed to acquire this information.
Bivariate analysis
Once univariate analysis has looked for interesting results related to individual variables,
it is possible to search for interesting relationships between two variables. This is done
through bivariate analysis. Clustered and stacked bar charts graphically display
relationships between two nominal or ordinal variables (see Figure 4.5). And a
scatterplot represents the relationship between two interval variables (see Figure 4.6).
Employed full
2,000
time
Full time: 30 hrs +
Part time: less than
30 hrs
1,500
Count
1,000
500
0
Male Female
Sex
Figure 4.5: A stacked bar chart for two categorical variables

85.00
80.00
75.00
Weight
70.00
65.00
60.00
150.00 155.00 160.00 165.00 170.00

Height
Figure 4.6: Scatterplot for height and weight
While graphic representations can be helpful, it is better to examine statistical

relationships. The most important statistical measures are association, significance and
regression.
Association
Does change in one variable coincide with change in another? With categorical (nominal
or ordinal) data, this association is called cross-tabulation. Between interval/ratio data,
association is called correlation. If you are using two variables of different levels of
measurement, always use the test appropriate for the lower level of measurement
(nominal being the lowest and interval/ratio being the highest). Table 4.6 shows the
statistical tests for association depend on the levels of measurement involved.
Table 4.6: Association tests appropriate for different levels of measurement

Nominal Ordinal Interval/ratio
Cross-tabulation Cross-tabulation Comparison of means
Nominal (Cramer’s V, or if (Cramer’s V) (Eta)
both are binary, Phi)
Cross-tabulation Comparison of means
Ordinal
(Spearman’s rank) (Eta)
Correlation
Interval/ratio
(Pearson’s r)
All the statistical tests generate a result on a scale of 0–1, although variables with
sequence can vary between –1 to +1. Zero means there is no association between
variables, and one shows absolute association:
■■ If all men had short hair and all women had long hair, this would produce an
association value of one.
■■ If the distribution of earnings had no association with age, the result would be
zero.
■■ If the pattern between sex and hair length, or between income and age, was
mixed, the result would be somewhere in between.
Usually, an association of less than 0.2 is considered weak, and above 0.4 as strong,
with a result above 0.6 as very strong. Where both variables have sequence (ordinal,
interval and ratio data), association could be positive or negative (where a minus sign
shows). If ageing associates with worsening health, we would see a negative
association, assuming the health variable was measured from low health (1) to higher
levels of health (a higher number).
Still, you should take such results for what they are, simple measures of association.
The way a variable is coded can lead to confusion, so always be careful when
interpreting results. Other things should tell us how much importance we can place
on such outcomes.
Significance
If you produce a measure of association, that result is a measure of the association
within the sample you have analysed. All results that measure patterns within a sample
are called descriptive statistics. Inferential statistics are claims that what was found in a
sample can be generalized to the wider population from which the sample was
drawn. Assuming you drew a random sample (see above), it is possible to gauge
how likely it is that the result in your sample could have come about by random
fluctuation in the composition of the sample relative to the population.
Fortunately, there are tests to assess this. The bigger the sample and the smaller
the variance in the sample, the lower this risk is. Measures of significance offer an
indication of this risk.
Significance tests produce a p value, which indicates the probability (on a scale
of 0–1) that your result was a sampling accident; the higher the p value, the less
confidence you can have in the generalizability of the association result. The
simplest significance test is called the chi square test and was designed for nominal
data. Other significance tests, such as the t-test and the ANOVA, build on the chi
square test, and they are all based on similar principles of working out a balance
– the bigger the sample and the association result, and the smaller the variance in
each variable, the lower the risk. A p value of less than 0.05 is commonly taken as
acceptable in non-experimental research designs as it means there is less than a 5
per cent chance that the association in your sample came about in a population
where association was zero. Experimental designs usually use a 0.01 (1 per cent)
level of acceptable risk.
Regression
If you found an association between your two variables and that association in your
sample is statistically significant, you can ask yourself a third question. If years of
education associates with higher earnings, how much does an additional year of a
person’s education tend to increase their earnings? Not everyone with more education
earns more. Likewise, if there is a significant association, this does not tell us whether
more education leads to a lot more earning power or just a little more. A strong
association simply means education and earnings tend to rise together. Even if
everyone with more education earned more than everyone with less (a perfect
association), it might still be the case that each additional year of schooling only led
to a small amount of extra money. The association was strong but the ‘effect’ might
still be small. Regression measures the strength of this ‘effect’, not the strength of
the association.
Importantly, it is only worth measuring the size of an effect once it has been
demonstrated that a link exists between two variables that is not there by chance, that
is, that there is a significant association between variables. Only when this is the case
do you then examine the size of the effect – by running a regression test.
Simple linear regression looks for straight lines between two interval or ratio variables
(see Figure 4.7). A measure of association between interval variables looks at how close
cases are to the line of best fit. Linear regression asks what the angle of that line is. By
how much does the effect alter when the cause alters? Logistic regression allows you to
measure effects for categorical variables. The usefulness of regression is that once you
R2 Linear = 0.873
25.0
22.5
Income
20.0
17.5
15.0
10 12 14 16 18 20 22
School
Figure 4.7: A scatterplot for two interval variables – current income and years spent
in formal education, with line of best fit
have started with a simple linear regression, it is possible to add in multiple variables to
measure how a number of inputs predict an outcome. A multivariate regression test might
look at how earnings could be predicted by a combination of sex, ethnicity and years
of education; the result would show how each of these predictors maps earnings
relative to each of the others. Multivariate regression is useful for building models that
delve into several layers of complex interrelationships, and they are used to check
whether apparent predictors are, in fact, just proxies for other factors.
For instance, length/level of education achieved may correlate with earnings, but
is itself predicted by parental earnings. Putting both parental earnings and years of
education into a multivariate regression to predict earnings might show that – once
you control for background – those with similar parental earnings do not earn
different amounts depending on their own years of education. However, if we then
add in gender, we might find that sons of rich parents tend to get well-paid jobs
irrespective of their own education, whereas daughters find that education does
matter in accessing well-paid jobs (Egerton and Savage 1997). Egerton and Savage
conclude that education is more important for daughters than for sons in turning
background advantage into career success.

Are quantitative methods more difficult than qualitative methods? This is often the
fear of sociology students – that the mathematics involved in quantitative methods
makes it harder than qualitative methods. We prefer to think of the difficulty and
effort of each method is located at a different point: the work is frontloaded in
quantitative methods (working out what analysis to do, and then cleaning the data),
whereas the work of qualitative methods occurs later (in the detailed analysis).
CONCLUSION
This chapter has examined the methods of sociology. We have explained why
particular methods are useful in certain situations, and provided the information
needed to understand why that is the case. In doing so, we have examined the
methodology of sociology. Thinking about methods starts before you choose a
method, and requires consideration of the type of method, the collection of data
and how that data is analysed. We also examined some of the issues in methods,
including the question of bias.
In conclusion, methods involve a degree of technical skill, and technical skills can
become mechanical if practised in isolation from the craft of knowing when and
where to apply them. Nevertheless, a sociologist who does not learn the broad range
of available methods is constrained. Methods must be used to answer the questions
a sociologist wants to ask, not to dictate the questions they can ask. Methods need
to be respected, but we must never let ourselves become subservient to method
in isolation. There is no single correct way to research society, but there are many
things to think about and many ways to get it wrong if you do not choose the most
appropriate approach for the question you want an answer to.
HOW WOULD…?
■■ Think about your ideal subject for study, such as we discussed in C
hapters 1 and 3.
How would you design your own research study on this?
–– What might your research question be?
■■ How might you address this using inductive and deductive approaches? Using
Green’s criteria (as shown in Table 4.1), have you developed a ‘good’ research
question?
■■ How have other people studied this issue?
–– Find two studies that have investigated the topic (or one closely related).
What methods did they use? Are they appropriate? Why?
■■ If you could improve these studies in terms of methods, how might you do it?
■■ How might you study this in a different culture?
–– What aspects of the problem are likely to be specific to your culture?
■■ How might your own understandings of the world impact on this?

Chilisa, B. (2020) Indigenous Research Methodologies. London: Sage.
Designed to provide a foundation in indigenous methods for new researchers, goes into detail
about questions of ethics, postcolonial epistemologies, and new methodologies and how these can
be integrated into social science more generally.
David, M. and Sutton, C. (2011) Social Research: An Introduction. London: Sage.
Provides those new to social research with a comprehensive introduction not just to research
methods, but also the theory and logic of qualitative, quantitative and mixed methods.
Pink, S. (2014) Doing Visual Ethnography. London: Sage.
Accessible and engaging introduction to doing research with images, video and the internet.
Provides a foundation for thinking about visual ethnography and introduces the practical and
theoretical issues related to using visual and digital technologies.

Chapter 5
Ethical Sociology
INTRODUCTION
This chapter examines what it means for sociology to be ethical. Ethical practice is vital
to sociological research, and social science more broadly, and so it deserves careful
consideration as a core aspect of sociology. We look at the different dimensions of
ethical research practice, and explore some examples of past research that some people
consider unethical. We highlight that ethics is not just important in conducting research
– although this is where the most harm is likely to occur – but that there are ethical
considerations for the way research is written, and even ethical questions about what
should be researched at all. In our Provocation, we ask whether ethics panels in
universities are damaging novel sociological research.
ETHICS IN SOCIOLOGY
Sociologists must think about ethics in every study they undertake. There are formal
guidelines and codes of ethics in place to help determine if practice is ethical. Ethics:moral
Indeed, for any sociological study undertaken at a university, the proposed research principles and
must be presented to an ethics board or committee and receive permission. But what a code of
do we mean by ethics? Banks (2012 p. 58) defines ethics as follows: conduct that
govern
researchers’
Ethics is about matters of right and wrong conduct, good and bad qualities of behaviours
character and responsibilities attached to relationships. Although the subject
matter of ethics is often said to be human welfare, the bigger picture also
includes the flourishing of animals and the whole ecosystem.
There are great philosophical debates about ethics, but we are not directly concerned
with these abstract arguments about living a moral life. Instead, we are interested in
the ethical practice of sociology and will approach the topic by considering examples,
arguments and theories developed by sociologists.
Contemporary sociology has a commitment to social justice, based on fairness,
equitable distribution of resources and physical and psychological safety (see Chapter 1).
This commitment is closely linked to sociology being ethical. Just as medical doctors
swear the Hippocratic Oath to ‘first, do no harm’, so too sociologists have a duty to
minimize the possibility that our practice may have negative effects on people. In thinking
about sociology being ethical, this instruction not to harm others is a good first rule.
113
Perhaps the most obvious group of people sociologists are required to protect
are the participants in their studies. It would not, for example, be ethical to physically
strike people in the face and then measure how their reactions varied by age, gender
or any other characteristic. The issue of putting participants at harm is a serious
concern in several of the case studies examined later in this chapter. Sociologists
must also minimize harm and the threat of harm to themselves and their co-workers,
as well as other research stakeholders (see Provocation 12), and the general public.
But the interests and protection of these groups do not always align, and ethical
sociology can be a complex endeavour.
Dealing with ethics in sociology usually requires thinking about the impact of
methods within the context of their use. While some studies are inherently unethical,
and others present few or no ethical issues (i.e., studying how many times certain
words occur in newspaper articles, ensuring ethical practice normally requires careful
consideration). In other words, few methods or research designs can be quickly
designated ‘ethical’ or ‘unethical’. Instead, they tend to be located somewhere along
a continuum that is dependent on a range of practices and contextual factors. This
is one reason why universities require all research with human subjects to undergo
analysis from an ethics board.
In this chapter, we are going to draw out some of the key questions that ethical
sociologists must ask of research studies. These include:
■■ Who should be protected in a study? At what expense to the quality of the data?
■■ How much responsibility does a researcher have for any negative effects of
their research?
■■ What harms are sociologists concerned about?
British Sociological Association’s ethical guidelines

Sociological associations provide ethical guidelines and codes of conduct for sociologists. Many of
these guidelines concern the broader role of being a professional sociologist, including maintaining
professional competencies. Some guidelines also directly relate to engaging in ethical research. The
British Sociological Association (BSA 2002), for example, states the following:
Relations with and Responsibilities towards Research Participants

Sociologists, when they carry out research, enter into personal and moral relationships with
those they study, be they individuals, households, social groups or corporate entities.
Although sociologists, like other researchers, are committed to the advancement of knowledge,
that goal does not, of itself, provide an entitlement to override the rights of others.
Members [of the BSA] should be aware that they have some responsibility for the use to which
their data may be put and for how the research is to be disseminated. Discharging that responsibility
may on occasion be difficult, especially in situations of social conflict, competing social interests
or where there is unanticipated misuse of the research by third parties.
These are the overarching points that guide ethical conduct. Given these indicators, how might that
influence your arguments about our opening example of a potential research topic and method?
Ethical Sociology 115
CONCEIVING, CONDUCTING AND DISSEMINATING

ETHICAL RESEARCH
As sociologists, we must consider several factors to ensure that we are acting ethically.
This includes thinking about the impact of the research, on participants, wider
society and oneself. In this section, we discuss the stages that a sociologist goes
through in conducting research, and the ethical considerations that need to occur
along the way. Here, it is important to remember that ethics is not just a one-off
checklist to be satisfied, but an ongoing active process that is considered at each part of
any sociological study.
Ethical considerations in choosing a research topic

The first question of ethics is whether a topic should be researched. We should
always approach this answer with an open mind and a desire to enable research
wherever possible. Knowledge often advances through surprising means, with
unforeseen and unexpected discoveries. Teflon is perhaps the most famous
example of this idea: the non-stick coating for cookware was discovered by
accident during research into possible substances to use in refrigeration.
However, there are also potential studies we know to be unethical. Early
research on gynaecology, for example, was conducted on enslaved African
American women without their consent or the use of anaesthetics, causing great
pain (see Ojanuga 1993). Some of the most notorious experiments were those
the Nazis performed on Jewish people in the concentration camps. These
horrifying experiments sought to examine how human bodies reacted to toxic
chemicals, torture and other extreme conditions. They were unanimously
condemned after the war and a 10-point Nuremberg Code was devised that laid
out key principles for research with human subjects as a mechanism to stop such
studies ever happening again (see NIH n.d.).
Within sociology, one might consider whether questions that sought to prove
a bigoted perspective were worthy of study. The underlying motives might
matter here, including whether the research questions were based on reasonable
empirical evidence or whether they were based on prejudice (see Chapter 4).
We should also consider whether our research is a waste of time. If a study is
never going to be published, maybe being undertaken for the sole purpose of
getting a degree, is it ethical to ask participants to give their time without financial
compensation? This question raises the issue of whether researchers need to
inform their participants about what will become of the research. If participants
are led to believe that their participation will contribute to a study that has some
palpable benefit in the world, but the researcher has no intention of using this
data in any such practical way, that is unethical. However, if the participant
knows that this research is purely theoretical and gives their time anyway, that
would be ethical.
This highlights a crucial point: the same investigation or act can be both
ethical and unethical. What determines its ethical status is what the participant is
told or, in other words, how the sociologist has addressed ethics in their practice.
Ethical considerations in choosing a research method

How we design our research – the methods and analysis we use – will determine
whether our study will help or hinder the participants or society, or have no effect.
A poor research design will often harm the sociologist: by failing their dissertation,
being unable to get their research published or damaging their reputation. Yet when
inaccurate results and flawed conclusions are published, the effects can be worse and
may well harm people beyond the study participants.
In Chapter 4, we discussed the work of sociologist Mark Regnerus (2012) and his
research on the ‘outcomes’ of gay parenting. He used poor research methods in
determining that children from gay households fared less well than children from
heterosexual households. The methodological design was flawed because it used
unequal samples. The children from heterosexual families came from non-divorced
families, whereas the children studied from the gay families came from a background
of divorce.
The issue is an obvious one, particularly to trained sociologists, and the error
unsurprisingly yielded results that supported Regnerus’s prior opposition to same-sex
marriage. Over 200 sociologists, led by Gary Gates of the Williams Institute at the
University of California, Los Angeles, wrote a letter to the journal editors who
published the article critiquing many aspects of the study, focusing on its deeply flawed
methods.
The reason so many people were motivated here was because this issue is deeply
political, and the study was used to sway politicians into denying same-sex couples the
right to adopt. Regnerus also touted the study as proof of why same-sex marriage
should not be legal. He thus used sociology as a tool to limit the rights of sexual
minorities, going against the ethical code of the American Sociological Association.
But what if Regnerus had conducted the study using an appropriate comparison;
Covert by comparing samples of children from straight and gay households that were
research: otherwise alike? Would it have now been ethical to examine whether gay parents
research
provided worse outcomes for children than heterosexual ones?
where
participants
This is certainly more complex, but many people would still say no. This is because
are not told lots of external structural factors affect childhood outcomes; divorce is just one
they are part variable. At the time of Regnerus’s research, gay and lesbian couples did not have the
of a study same legal rights as heterosexual couples. This should also factor into a study on the
issue. Choosing on the basis of one’s own social concerns to examine a group that is
already legally discriminated against is to use the discipline of sociology to encourage
Deceptive
research:
the prevention of equality for same-sex couples. The ethics of this would then depend
research on whether the methodology was sophisticated enough to uncover and compensate
where for these other forms of discrimination: if not, the study is quite possibly unethical.
participants Another research design ethical issue concerns the deception of participants.
are told the Covert research is when participants are not told they or their actions are being
study is about assessed as part of a study (see Chapter 4). In general, this is acceptable if it is in a
something public space, and unacceptable in other contexts. Deceptive research refers to
other than its
where the participants are told they are being studied for one thing, but are actually
real aims
studied for another.
For example, some researchers wanted to know if the processes of group

identification affect how people will react to others involved in another group on
issues of medical intervention. In this case, they told sport fans they were to be
tested on something unrelated to what they were actually testing (Levine et al. 2005).
After filling out a questionnaire, they were told to cross the courtyard for an interview.
On the way, an actor wearing a replica shirt of either the participant’s favoured or
most disliked football team feigned a jogging injury in front of the participant. When
the ‘runner’ was wearing the shirt of the participant’s favoured team, they were more
likely to help than when the runner was wearing the shirt of a rival team. Had the
participant known that this ‘random’ interaction was the heart of the research, they
may not have exhibited such preferential behaviour.
Ethical considerations in conducting research

After choosing a topic to study and determining an appropriate method to conduct
the study, the next ethical concern in the research design regards the emotional and
physical safety of those we study. This first comes through the concept of avoiding
unnecessary harm (emotional harm as well as physical harm). This is easy for most
sociologists: few sociological studies directly involve the possibility of creating bodily
harm, the way studies in drugs, exercise, medicine or nuclear technologies might. Yet
the risk of physical harm is still an issue to consider, particularly in the fields of
medical sociology or sport sociology.
Still, humans are capable of committing violence towards each other. Hence,
alongside the principle of avoiding unnecessary harm, researchers must ask questions
about risk. Ideally, researchers do not take risks (physical, emotional or otherwise) with
their participants, research team or themselves. Consider the following: Is it ethical for
a White academic who conducts research on a group of men who are White
supremacists to ask one of his Black graduate students to join him in interviewing
them? The research design puts people at unnecessary risk and thus should be avoided.
The next issue to consider is emotional harm. This can pertain to emotional or
psychological trauma that could result from completing the study. Such a risk does not
mean that research cannot take place, but that care must be taken to deal with the issue.
Consider, for example, a study on asylum seekers. One might ask participants to
recall painful memories of leaving family behind in their country of origin. This could
quite possibly cause emotional harm in that it may bring forth painful memories; but
that does not necessarily mean the study should not take place, as the outcomes of the
research have the potential to positively influence policy or understanding of the issue.
If, conversely, the research is not intended for publication, and is only a learning exercise Informed
for the researcher, then this might not be deemed ethical. Why should someone have consent:
to revisit painful memories just so someone can gain practice in interviewing? participants
Another important issue here is that the participant should agree to take part in the agree to
research. Unless you have good reason to undertake covert research (most likely, you participate in
are observing in a public place), you have to gain the informed consent of your a study
participants. This means that not only do they agree to participate, but also that they having been
informed of
have been provided with enough information to give that consent with a full
its aims
understanding of what is involved.
Indigenous research and the ethics of consent

Indigenous research and methods emerged because of a Eurocentric worldview in social
sciences where perceptions of Western exceptionalism meant that the local knowledge and
situated experiences of Indigenous peoples were ignored or erased (Alatas and Sinha 2017; see
Chapter 2). The need to decolonize sociology also applies to research ethics. Drawing on
research with Mãori people, West-McGruer (2020 p. 187) argues that traditional ethical
frameworks fail Indigenous peoples by doing nothing to counter pathological framings in much
social research, ‘burdening communities with labels of criminality, welfare dependence or
educational deficiency’. In this context, ethical guidelines have failed to shift a deficit model of
social research on Indigenous peoples to one that recognizes the vibrancy and benefits of
Indigenous peoples.
One of the key failings of Western ethical frameworks is the focus on the individual and their
right to consent. Tauri (2017) highlights how Western notions of informed consent, as
demonstrated by an individual signing a consent form, weakens the collectivist approach to
knowledge that is present in Indigenous peoples, where group leaders are best placed to
determine whether consent should be granted and how best to mitigate risk. In place of
individual informed consent, indigenous research can be better served by communal informed
consent.
As we argue in this chapter, what is vital to ethics in social research is for it to be flexible and
a process, not a form-filling exercise. In this manner, research with Indigenous peoples must
have a flexible approach to ethics in a way that recognizes both Indigenous peoples’ approaches
to consent and knowledge creation and also moves beyond research questions and methods
that view these populations through a pathology or deficit model.
Ethical considerations related to the researcher

Our ethical obligation to consider what and who we study also extends to our own
Positionality: positionality within a group and whether we are the appropriate researcher to study
the this topic. This means that we should examine how our own perspectives influence
researcher the data we collect.
has a position Perhaps the most important way to do this is to reflect on any personal bias: racist
in the
research
people should not research issues of race and ethnicity; misogynists should not
process and research issues about gender inequality. Here, the bias is so great that the results will
this may not be trusted by others. Relatedly, when someone passionately believes in the thing
affect the they are researching, even with progressive aims, the researcher might discount
data potential problems or frame an issue in a way that exaggerates benefits. In both
collected examples, there is a real threat of confirmation bias influencing the results (see
Chapter 9 for discussion of advocacy research).
We should also ask ethical questions about whether our positionality has the
impact of unduly influencing results. This might be because of personal friendships
in a setting, it could refer to previous experience or even political allegiance. Consider
the following example. A 60-year-old professor, who is well known on campus for Preacher
her opposition to excessive drinking, enters a college nightclub to research a group effect:people
of 21-year-old students and their rate of alcohol consumption. Given the academic’s underestimate
intellectual beliefs and her position of authority in relation to her students, it is likely a claim
that the participants will consume less alcohol because of the presence of the because of the
researcher. This could bias her results, making her research less valid. This is presence of
something we call the preacher effect: people act differently around religious (or the researcher
other) authorities.
The same effect might be true in the opposite direction in a different context. If Coach effect:
people
the professor was studying drugs and was rumoured to take drugs herself, perhaps
exaggerate a
students might be likely to overestimate their consumption of drugs. We call this the claim because
coach effect. So, a sociologist who is known to be an avid runner, in studying of the
middle-aged men and their exercise habits, might find that participants overrepresent presence of
the amount of running they do. In both cases, participants may well alter behaviours the researcher
or conceal feelings if they fear being judged.
Given these issues, a researcher must, at a minimum, reflect on their personal Reflexivity:
identity and how that could affect the data they gather, including their potential thinking
influence on participants. This is known as reflexivity – where the researcher critically
critically reflects on their position. about one’s
Finally, in ethnographic work, researchers become thoroughly embedded within positionality
and its effect
the culture or community they study. Sometimes they do this by travelling to other
on data or
communities or countries, and sometimes they conduct ethnography in communities society
they are already a part of, something known as ‘insider ethnography’. The risk with
both forms, but particularly the latter, is that if the researcher gets too close to those Going native:
they study, for too long, they begin to understand and even interpret the world a researcher
through that community’s perspective. This can have value, but it can also lead the adopts the
researcher to be biased in their account of events. This is known as going native. views of their
While this does not hurt those you study, and is really more of a research methods participants
consideration, if this loss of objectivity biases data that is then used to make a policy without
argument, or is otherwise used to influence people’s lives, there may be ethical realizing, and
loses an
considerations.
objective
perspective
Ethical considerations in writing research
Ethical risks extend to how the researcher portrays their participants in writing up Anonymity:
the guarantee
research. In much qualitative and all ethnographic research, the author gives details
given to
of the participants’ lives, views and experiences. This could lead to a range of research
negative effects if made public, from social embarrassment to employment participants
termination or family break-up. Consider conducting research on illegal drug that they will
consumption, for example, or studying how corporate executives break laws to not be
promote financial gain. If the researcher is to present findings on these topics, identifiable in
participants must be protected from harm, otherwise they would lie about their data. any
Thus, all participants in research must be assured anonymity by the researcher. This publications
about the
means that when anyone else reads the research, identifying the participants is
research
impossible.
The first step in doing this is to make participants’ names anonymous by

using pseudonyms. Still, sometimes the description of the participant is enough
to identify them to others familiar in the setting. Ellis (1986) researched fishing
communities and published her findings. In later follow-up research (Ellis 1995),
she found that her participants were angry over the way they had been portrayed
in her book, and they believed others in the small community could identify
them. Sometimes it is necessary to exclude, or even slightly change, data to
ensure anonymity is protected.
It may not be possible or desirable to maintain anonymity in all contexts. If
you are researching a particular organization and it is necessary to include data
about someone in a unique role, it might be the case that they are identifiable to
people in the study but not to the general population. Likewise, with a study of
people in the public eye, it might be advantageous if quotes could be attributed
to specific individuals. In these cases, it is vital that participants consent to not
being anonymous.
Confiden Participant anonymity must also be protected via confidentiality when
tiality:the discussing participants with each other. Much like a therapist cannot share details
requirement of one client’s sessions with other clients, researchers are required to keep other
that participants’ data and stories anonymous (Tolich 2004). In general, this
information
confidentiality is kept unless the researcher feels there is a genuine risk of serious
about a
participant
and immediate harm to the participant or another person – and only then would
cannot be the researcher break confidentiality by telling relevant people.
shared without The British Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC) offers some
their express useful guidance in this regard. It argues that confidentiality should be breached
consent only when a ‘participant or another person identified in the interview is in
significant and immediate danger’ (ESRC 2012 p. 25). It also argues that
confidentiality will be ‘preserved as far as the law permits’, but this is a statement
nebulous enough that sociologists can interpret it in several ways. Hiriscau et al.
(2014 p. 414) argue similarly, stating:
Circumstances under which it may be permitted or required to disclose

confidential information include situations where a legal obligation exists to do
so or where there is an immediate risk of harm that can only be averted or
prevented by disclosing information.
There are ethical questions about defamation, too. What if a sociologist interviews
people, appropriately lays out their participants’ views and then criticizes those views
in their analysis? What if they have actively gathered data, treating their participants
respectfully while doing so, but then used that data to socially damage the participants
in writing about them. What is the ethical approach to doing this? Some of these
concerns are discussed in Provocation 12, where we ask whether sociologists should
‘pick a side’ in their research.

Does the mere fact that the commentator is, or even used to be, a sociologist mean
that they have a moral duty to carefully and intellectually consider what they blog,
tweet or post about? Should they always have to speak as a sociologist when engaging
with the public?
You may have seen academics’ profiles with ‘Tweets are personal opinions’ or
similar disclaimer text added, but does this absolve them of all responsibility? What if
a sociologist uses the same Twitter account to tweet to their students about a class?
Finally, there are ethics concerned over whether to publish data collected in research.
For example, consider a sociologist who collected ethnographic data on a stigmatized
group of people, expecting to shine light upon a misunderstood community. Contrary
to expectations, the data strongly supported the negative stereotypes of the group. Is
it ethical to publish the data? Doing so would be an accurate representation of the
participants’ perspectives, but it would have the effect of further reproducing social
stigma against the group studied. What would you do?
Visit the companion website at www.macmillanihe.com/McCormack-Discovering-

Sociology-2e for a discussion of how Eric Anderson dealt with an ethical issue
that occurred after he had an article from his study accepted for publication.
Researching crime and criminality

Issues of crime and criminality are important concerns for sociologists. In Chapter
9 we think about these issues in the broader context of deviance and transgression,
recognizing that not all crimes are immoral and there can be good reasons to break
bad laws.
Collecting data on crime can be fraught with ethical quandaries, particularly if
this includes direct knowledge of criminal activity (Lowman and Palys 2001). If you
are doing qualitative research on criminal networks, for example, it would be hard to
report crimes to the police because you would not then gain the trust of criminals,
if you gained any access to them at all. Deceiving them and then reporting their
crimes would be highly questionable ethically, and would also put you in danger,
depending on the seriousness of the crimes. Many criminologists argue that because
they are not working for the state, they should reject requests from police officers
and prosecutors for access to data (Wolfgang 1981).
Protecting sources and not reporting any crimes to the police would enable
sociologists to gather rich data that could have benefits to society in the long run. But
can it ever be ethical to participate in crimes that might have real negative effects on
innocent people? Some countries have mandatory reporting and the researcher can put
themselves in legal jeopardy if they have information related to a crime and refuse to
produce it. In other words, the researcher should not participate in or observe serious
crimes unless there is an overwhelming reason to do so, which is unlikely in general.
The British Society of Criminology (BSC 2018) notes three contexts in UK law
in which people, including researchers, have a legal duty to report information: when
a person has information related to terrorism, money laundering and the neglect or
abuse of a child. The guidance is that researchers who have knowledge about these
crimes should disclose them, but otherwise strive to protect confidentiality. The
American and Australian criminology societies are less explicit about when researchers
might break confidentiality, but similar principles are likely to hold.
In general, researchers recognize the importance of keeping data confidential
wherever possible, and so people who research crime must have very clear procedures
in place to minimize ethical issues. Given that prosecutors may try and subpoena
data from researchers, and there is no clear legal protection against this, one key
process is to anticipate problems by being familiar with the law and only holding data
that does not incriminate people. This approach should then be held in conjunction
with the guidance from the ESRC (2012) that researchers should also disclose
confidential information if someone identified in the interview is in significant and
immediate danger.
GOOD SOCIOLOGY
Framework for Ethical Consideration
When thinking about designing a research project, the following steps should help ensure
that the project is ethical.
Choosing a topic to research
■■ Should the topic be studied?
■■ Is it possible that the results of the study could harm a community or group of people?
Choosing a research design
■■ Is the design free from bias and are comparisons appropriate for investigation?
■■ Do participants need to be made aware that they are being studied?
■■ Is the research a waste of the participants’ time?
■■ Will the research design harm anyone in physical or emotional ways?
Procedures
■■ Have the participants given full and informed consent?
■■ Have they been told that they can drop out of the study?
■■ Does the collection of this data harm the participants in any way?
■■ Might they regret their participation later on?
■■ Does this research expose participants to any criminal repercussions?
■■ Is anonymity guaranteed, including assuring that there is no way participants’ identities can
be revealed?
■■ Has your research been approved by an appropriate ethical body?
■■ Do you comply with laws on data processing and handling, such as the EU General Data
Protection Regulation?
Analysing and writing the research
■■ Will the presentation of the data cast social stigma onto any particular community?
■■ Is the analysis fair to the participants’ perceptions of what the research is?
■■ Should this research be published?
VOX POP
Dr Kim Jamie
Member of a University Ethics Committee
Ethics is fundamental to the research students
and staff undertake in universities. Doing ethically
sound research is one of the things that
differentiates rigorous academic research from
journalism and simply asking people a few
questions about their lives.
All research that involves human participants
at universities has to be reviewed by an ethics
committee, and that’s where I come in. Members
of the ethics committee will receive an overview
of a research project, copies of all material
participants will receive and a description of what
will be ‘done’ to participants (e.g. if they’ll be
interviewed or observed or asked to be
photographed). We then review this to make sure
research participants are being treated well, that
they are fully informed about the purpose of the © Kim Jamie
research and they are able to consent to taking part. Sometimes research deals with sensitive
topics and vulnerable participants. In these cases, upsetting participants may be unavoidable or
it may be difficult to obtain consent. This doesn’t necessarily mean, though, that the research
shouldn’t be done. In fact, this type of research is some of the most interesting, with the capacity
to change society’s perspectives.
Ethics committees are also there to look after the wellbeing of researchers. Setting out to do
fieldwork can be dangerous, so ethics committees provide support to minimize the risks to
researchers and help identify possible problems in potentially dangerous research fields.
An ethics review can often be seen as a barrier to research as you have to get ethics approval
before you can begin collecting data. However, I think it should be seen as a way to improve
research design and open up conversations about how to actually do research. I also think
conversations about ethics should be broadened out to issues of positionality (how you as a
researcher are positioned in the field) and reflexivity (how you will deal with this position), which
can be challenging and are vital.
Although reviewing lots of research projects can be very time-consuming, I feel privileged to
be able to read about researchers’ fascinating and diverse research projects.
■■ What are the key ethical issues that Kim looks at in proposals? How might Kim’s expertise as a
sociologist help her in this task?
■■ Many university ethics committees include members of the community or other non-experts.
How useful do you think this is?
EXAMINING ETHICAL DILEMMAS

Ethics is a process. As such, you will encounter many ethical dilemmas. These
dilemmas require careful thought about how to address them. In the rest of this
chapter, we want to learn about ethical practice by engaging with studies that are
known for their ethical dilemmas. In the four research studies that follow, we will
describe the study and some of the debate. In thinking about ethics, we ask you to
consider the four key issues:
1 the topic;
2 the research design;
3 the implementation of the research;
4 how participants were treated in the writing of the research.
At the end of the chapter, we will highlight key issues to consider with each of these
studies, but we will not supply a definitive answer as to whether the research should
have taken place or not; we leave that for you to think about and discuss.
The cases we feature here come from the USA. This is not a deliberate choice but
reflects what we consider to be the best examples for discussion. Not all of the cases
are based in sociology, but all are from the social sciences and adopt methods that
could be used by sociologists.
Case 1: Laud Humphreys and Tearoom Trade

In the 1960s, American sociologist Laud Humphreys wanted to know more about men
who had sex with other men in the public restrooms (toilets) of city parks in the USA.
This was a time when homosexuality was illegal and stigmatized, and so understanding
these practices was a way of investigating a gay subculture. Men seeking an outlet for
their sexual desires resorted to ‘cruising’ – going to secluded public places to have sex
with other men. Restrooms provided shelter and protection from being accidentally
discovered by others passing by, or, indeed, being arrested by police.
These restrooms were known as ‘tearooms’ to those who used them for this
purpose and, unlike in most European countries, the practice was and remains illegal
in the USA. As such, recruiting participants was difficult. Humphreys got creative:
he joined the groups of men by acting as ‘watch queen’, playing lookout to warn
others if anyone was coming. The men involved did not know he was a researcher.
In addition to recording the sexual activities of over 100 men, Humphreys wanted
to find out more about the relationship between their anonymous sex lives and their
public identities. He knew that the men would be unwilling to discuss matters with him
near the restroom; there was a no-talking rule in cruising spots that still exists today. So,
Humphreys recorded their licence plates as they returned to their cars and, through the
Department of Motor Vehicles, found out their addresses (this is no longer possible). A
year later, with a different hairstyle, clothes and car, he knocked on the door of 50 of
these men. He portrayed himself as a social health researcher and elicited information
from them about their marital status, sexual orientation and occupation.
In his subsequent book, Tearoom Trade: Impersonal Sex in Public Places, Humphreys
(1970) found that men who had sex with other men in public restrooms defied
cultural stereotypes. First, they came from diverse social backgrounds. Second, it was
not just gay and bisexual men partaking in tearoom sex with other men, but also men
who identified as heterosexual and were married. Many of the men he studied lived
otherwise conventional lives; they were family men and respected members of their
communities. He found that their sexual activities posed no danger of harassment to
straight males, or anyone else. His study thus provided new evidence about
anonymous male–male sexual encounters in public places, and the lives of men with
samesex sexualities in America at that time.

■■ Identify the important findings of Humphreys’ research.
■■ Identify the ethical issues present in his research.
■■ How might one use the internet to perform this research today?
■■ What if Humphreys performed a similar study today on how people who sexually
molest children operate? If he were to do covert research on this topic, should he
report the perpetrators to the police?
Discussing the ethics of Tearoom Trade

Humphreys’ research into same-sex sex had many benefits, helping dispel myths
about gay people and same-sex sexuality. His research design was a result of laws that
criminalized same-sex sexual activity. One can argue that, given this context,
Humphreys’ approach was the least emotionally harmful way to collect the data, and
possibly the only way to do so. Most social scientists agree that observing people in
public spaces is ethical, regardless of the legality of the behaviours – as long as
people are not identified in the research.
The major flaw with his method is that there was a high risk that his study could
have resulted in imprisonment for his participants, or ruined their lives and reputations
in several other ways. All that needed to happen was for his notes to have been found.
There are many ways this could have happened: he could have lost his notebook, had
it stolen or even been subpoenaed by the police. These were not risks for Humphreys,
but for his participants – who did not even know they were being studied.
This has been the key critique of his method: that there were not sufficient
measures to secure his data (Israel and Hay 2006). The logic is that the research
would have been acceptable had there been better controls in place. He could, for
example, have used a code for identifying information about individuals that only he
knew. The research would still be deceptive, but ethical because the risk to his
participants was minimized.
Humphreys’ work is generally accepted because he was researching an unfairly
stigmatized group – and helping to reduce oppression. Indeed, his research
contributed to the body of evidence that led to the decriminalization of same-sex
sex and the removal of homosexuality as a mental disorder by the American
Psychiatric Association.
Yet this raises a further important question. Humphreys was studying a behaviour
that was then both illegal and stigmatized. We approve of it now in part because the
social change in many countries has been such that we overwhelmingly oppose
homophobia and decry laws that criminalize sexual minorities. But what if Humphreys
had been studying an activity that remains illegal and condemned? That is why we
asked about how these methods could be applied to studying people who abuse
children. Should our views on how we study such people be compatible with how
researchers have studied sexual minorities in exceptionally homophobic cultures? To
what extent should contemporary social norms influence or limit research that might
provide greater knowledge and even, in time, alter those norms?
Case 2: Philip Zimbardo and the prison experiment

Philip Zimbardo, an American psychologist, was interested in how good people can
end up doing bad things. In 1971, as part of research designed to explore this, he
paid 24 male university students to participate in his prison experiment at Stanford
University. Depending on the flip of a coin, the students were randomly assigned to
take the role of either prisoners or prison guards (Haney et al. 1973). A basement on
campus was turned into a makeshift prison to facilitate the experiment. The ‘prisoners’
were first collected by ‘police car’, stripped naked, ‘decontaminated’ and placed in
gowns with no undergarments. Zimbardo says that this was designed to ‘effeminize’
the men, suggesting that they began ‘to walk and to sit differently, and to hold
themselves differently – more like a woman than like a man’. The men’s heads were
shaved, and shackles placed around their feet. As happens in real prisons, their names
were replaced with identification numbers.
The guards were given no instructions, other than to ‘keep order in the prison’. They
were given uniforms, along with whistles and billy clubs (also known as truncheons or
batons). At 2:30 a.m. on the first morning, the guards woke the prisoners for ‘count’,
and forced the prisoners to repeatedly recite their ID numbers. At this stage, the dynamic
was quite playful: there were jokes and banter, as neither the prisoners nor the guards
took their new role too seriously. But this playfulness quickly dissipated, and the guards’
level of control soon escalated, as the men began to inhabit their social roles (see the
discussions of structure and agency throughout Chapter 3).
The experiment, originally designed to last two weeks, was cancelled after just six
days, as the guards began to wield power over their ‘prisoners’ in problematic ways.
First, the guards gave push-ups as punishment, and this escalated to degrading,
homophobic and power-laden guard-to-prisoner discourse. The tactics of humiliating
prisoners and interrupting their sleep provoked a rebellion among the prisoners,
who blocked the door and removed their prisoner hats. The guards then sprayed the
prisoners with a fire extinguisher, stripped them and increased the verbal humiliation.
Although the men adopting these roles had not studied prisons or received any
guidance on how they should behave, Zimbardo (1972) highlighted that these are the
same tactics that real guards utilize to quell resistance.
© Getty Images/Image Source

Prisons are designed to remove people’s individuality and agency
Then, borrowing a tactic used to discourage workers from forming unions, the
guards gave privileges to some prisoners, and not to others. Prisoners who
continued to rebel were starved. The guards then reversed the ‘privilege’, which
further set the groups of prisoners against each other. Soon all prisoners stopped
rebelling. Perhaps most illuminating, on the fifth day, when a new prisoner was
brought into the scenario, he rebelled against the treatment of the prisoners. But
this was no longer a favoured tactic of the longer term prisoners, who viewed him
as an unwanted troublemaker.
When one prisoner broke down, crying and shaking, he was chided by the
guards for not being ‘man enough’. He was asked how he would make it in San
Quentin, a notoriously dangerous American prison. When this prisoner said that
he wanted to quit the experiment, he was told by the other prisoners to suck it up
and stay put. And, when visiting parents complained about the condition of their
sons, the guards chided them.
But Zimbardo did not cancel the experiment. He was given pause to think
about the issue when a colleague observed his study. On his website (www.
prisonexp.org), Zimbardo writes:
I was sitting there all alone, waiting anxiously for the intruders to break
in, when who should happen along but a colleague and former Yale
graduate student roommate, Gordon Bower. Gordon had heard we were
doing an experiment, and he came to see what was going on. I briefly
described what we were up to, and Gordon asked me a very simple
question: ‘Say, what’s the independent variable in this study?’ To my
surprise, I got really angry at him. Here I had a prison break on my
hands. The security of my men and the stability of my prison was at
stake, and now, I had to deal with this bleeding-heart, liberal, academic,
effete dingdong who was concerned about the independent variable! It
wasn’t until much later that I realized how far into my prison role I was
at that point – that I was thinking like a prison superintendent rather
than a research psychologist.
However, this intervention from a colleague did not stop the experiment
immediately. Zimbardo dismissed the concerns using problematic language.
As the study continued, several other young men broke down, crying
uncontrollably. One requested medical assistance, and others asked to speak to
lawyers.
Zimbardo ended the study early because participants’ behaviour was becoming
more dangerous, and because of another colleague’s outrage regarding the issue.
The finding of the research was that the prisoners had adopted their roles so
well they essentially forgot they were only involved in a college experiment.
Although, according to the contracts they had signed, they were free to leave at
will (losing only their pay), they had seemingly lost their agency. They had
developed a form of self-imprisonment.

■■ Identify the important findings of the research.
■■ Identify what ethical issues were present in both the design and execution
of the research.
■■ Could this experiment ever be performed ethically today? If so, how might it be possible?
Discussing the ethics of the prison experiment

Zimbardo’s prison experiment is well known both for its finding – of role adoption – and
the ethical issues it raised. This study is infamous even beyond the world of social psychology
to this day; a 2010 Hollywood film/movie (The Experiment) was based on it. The men (both
prisoners and guards) learned to conform to authority and to act according to their
preconceived perceptions of the roles they were assigned. Even Zimbardo was swept into
overly associating with the role of warden. Clearly, role adoption is a real component of
human nature and Zimbardo theorized about this from his findings. His study also resulted
in changes to the way US prisons are run.
However, Zimbardo’s research is widely viewed to be unethical because the
students were mentally abused, and physically hurt (Fitch 2005). It is important to
consider how far conditions had deteriorated by the end of the study. Zimbardo
writes on his website: ‘First, we had learned through videotapes that the guards were
escalating their abuse of prisoners … Their boredom had driven them to ever more
pornographic and degrading abuse of the prisoners.’
Indeed, the academic who expressed outrage declared: ‘It’s terrible what you are
doing to these boys!’ According to Zimbardo, she had witnessed ‘our prisoners being
marched on a toilet run, bags over their heads, legs chained together, hands on each
other’s shoulders’.
It is unlikely that there was any informed consent about the study. Arguably, there
was no outright deception at play. The students knew in theory what they were
getting into, and were given the right to drop out at any time. They were also paid for
their labour. Perhaps adults should be able to make such choices, and these events
were probably less damaging than regularly participating in ‘acceptable’ activities that
cause physical harm, like boxing.
But how free were the participants to withdraw? They were students at university,
and Zimbardo was a professor. Given the power and authority context of the prison
– and of Zimbardo as their ‘governor’ – did the students really feel able to leave at
any time? This issue may seem a more genuine concern once you have read the next
case study. Similarly, how were they reminded about their option to leave, if at all?
Another issue to consider is the longer term effects on participants. When they
were reunited with Zimbardo years later, the prisoners still harboured deep emotional
pain and anger from the experience. Many had attended counselling because of their
participation; not only prisoners but also the guards, who felt guilt about how they
had acted.
One thing that almost all people will agree upon, however, is that Zimbardo
lacked significant researcher reflexivity and failed to account for his own positionality.
If the research was about the adoption of roles, it is salient that he ought to have
assumed people might indeed adopt their roles to a dangerous or harmful extent –
including himself. It was therefore unethical to place himself into the role of warden.
Had he not, he may have stopped the experiment earlier.
Case 3: Stanley Milgram and his behavioural study of obedience

In the wake of the Second World War, and specifically the horrors of the Holocaust,
social psychologist Stanley Milgram of Yale University set out to determine if
convicted war criminals, Adolf Eichmann and other Nazi officers, could argue with
any justification that they were simply following orders. This would make them
accomplices to these crimes rather than the instigators. His study was designed to see
if a layperson would obey the commands of an authority figure to the point of
violating their moral conscience.
Accordingly, while telling participants they were participating in a learning
experiment, Milgram instructed an actor to pretend he was being electrically shocked.
The actor was concealed from view but clearly audible to the participant. The
participant asked the actor a question and, when they gave an incorrect answer, the
participant was to administer what they thought was an electric shock – provoking a
scream from the actor. The participant would then be instructed to continue with the
experiment. With each wrong answer, the participant was told to systematically
escalate the level of electric shock. Milgram (1973 p. 62) summarized the experiment,
writing:
The legal and philosophic aspects of obedience are of enormous import,

but they say very little about how most people behave in concrete situations.
I set up a simple experiment at Yale University to test how much pain an
ordinary citizen would inflict on another person simply because he was
ordered to by an experimental scientist. Stark authority was pitted against
the subjects’ strongest moral imperatives against hurting others, and, with
the subjects’ ears ringing with the screams of the victims, authority won
more often than not.
As the intensity of shocks increased, so did the actor’s screams, even begging for the
experiment to stop. The actor would even complain about a heart condition. Most
of the participants at some point asked Milgram (the experimental scientist in the
white coat) if they could stop the experiment. Milgram would respond to each
request: The first time, he simply said, ‘Please continue.’ The next attempt to stop
was met with, ‘The experiment requires that you continue.’ Followed by, ‘It’s
absolutely necessary that you continue.’ Finally, the participant was told, ‘You have
no other choice. You must go on.’ If the participant again asked to stop the
experiment, it was halted. Otherwise, it continued until the participant thought they
had administered 450 volts (a potentially fatal shock) three times in a row.
In the original experiment, none of the participants stopped before

administering 300 volts, and 65 per cent went on to the final stage of 450 volts,
three times each. Many continued to administer the shocks even though the actor
had ceased to scream (as if he had died). Since the original experiment, it has been
replicated and altered in numerous ways. In one study, the wall between the actor
and the participant was removed, so that the shocker could see the (acted) pain
the other person was experiencing. Nonetheless, the consistent finding remains
that approximately two-thirds of people will administer the lethal dose of 450
volts (Blass 1999). And, of those who refused to go on, none demanded that the
whole experiment be stopped altogether, and none bothered to check on the
health of the person they thought they were shocking.
Milgram’s experiments clearly complement Zimbardo’s study, but instead of
studying how people adopt roles, it examines how we submit to authority. His study
shows that when people believe they are simply the instrument for carrying out
another person’s wishes – in particular, an authority figure – they no longer hold
themselves responsible for their actions. Once this critical shift of viewpoint has
occurred, people become obedient to the person who has that authority.
The findings led Milgram (1974) to develop his agency theory, arguing that when we
receive commands from authority figures, we lose our sense of responsibility because
it is diffused by others: that we lose our capacity to make our own choices because
of the influence of others. Essentially, we enter an agentic-free state where we
become agents of a higher authority, feeling ‘responsibility to authority’ but ‘no
responsibility for the content of our actions that the authority prescribes’ (Milgram
1974 pp. 145–6).
Many individuals who hold little institutional power or authority assume that they
are supposed to carry out orders without question (Hamilton and Sanders 1999).
They no longer believe they are in control of their own actions, and so become
willing cogs in the group machine, carrying out the authority’s orders without
considering their implications or effects (ibid.). Milgram (1974 p. 6) is quoted as
saying:
This is, perhaps, the most fundamental lesson of our study: ordinary people,
simply doing their jobs, and without any particular hostility on their part, can
become agents in a terrible destructive process. Moreover, even when the
destructive effects of their work become patently clear, and they are asked to
carry out actions incompatible with fundamental standards of morality,
relatively few people have the resources needed to resist authority.
Later variants of the experiment show that the closer a person is to the damage they
inflict, the less likely they are to comply with authority. When participants were told
to place the hand of the ‘learner’ on the electric shock plate, conformity rates
dropped to just 30 per cent. Interestingly, although women showed more distress at
having to administer electric shocks, they complied equally with men. Also, when
other researchers encouraged the participant to apply the shocks, compliance
improved.

■■ Identify the important findings of the research.
■■ Identify what ethical issues were present in the research.
■■ How might this experiment be performed ethically today? Is it possible?
■■ If the participants were forewarned that they might experience extreme psychological
distress in the experiment, would that make it acceptable?
Discussing the ethics of Milgram

Like the Zimbardo prison experiments, the Milgram shocking studies have achieved
iconic status (Haggerty 2004). First, they have significant findings about obedience
to authority. Latane (1981) argues that Milgram’s results can be interpreted through
social impact theory. This theory contends that the influence of an authority figure
on a person is determined by three main factors:
1 the strength (or importance) of the influencer (a professor compared to a stranger

on the street);
2 the number of influencers;
3 the immediacy (or closeness) of the influencer.
As each of these increases, conformity also increases. Social impact theory can
account for a large body of experimental research on conformity, compliance and
obedience (Latane and Bourgeois 2001), all of which offer useful insights into
explanations of multiple social situations, including, for example, the abuse athletes
are subjected to by their coaches.
Milgram’s experiments are a good example to consider the use of deception to
achieve the study aims. The first criterion of the need for deception is clearly met: if
participants knew the study was investigating when they would stand up to authority,
they would be much more likely to do just that. To get the answers, deception was
necessary. But was it justified, when the need for deception is balanced against the
possible damage to participants? While the study did not cause any physical pain, it
quite possibly created significant longterm anxiety for the participants, who had
provided enough electric shocks to kill another human being. Baumrind (1964) made
this point, arguing that the participants were deceived into highly distressing situations.
Most of you reading this may think that you would not do such a thing: that you
would have the agency to say, ‘No. I’m not going to shock him anymore,’ or to realize
that shocking someone for the sake of learning is inhumane in the first place. This
could be a comforting illusion – a method of protecting one’s sense of self – because
65 per cent of those Milgram studied did not exhibit this agency. Those individuals
must now live with the fact that they lacked the resolve to stand up to authority not
to kill another human being.
The study has been adapted in many ways, and one easy response would be to
lessen the effects – not killing a person but disadvantaging them in a much less
damaging way. Slater et al. (2006) have also developed a virtual experiment where
participants are not dealing with real people, although the fictive nature of these
experiments might harm the validity of the results. But, as they argue, few if any
universities would allow the experiments as run by Milgram today – ethical practice
means that alternative plans must be developed.
Beyond the unethical canon

We have started our practical discussion of ethics with these three cases because
they are widely attributed as being key factors in the introduction of mandatory
ethics panels for the social sciences in universities (Librett and Perrone 2010). In
our experience, it would be impossible to replicate these studies today. It seems
likely that these panels have helped reduce the number of unethical studies that
can occur. In the last case, we discuss a recent ethical issue in sociology and explore
its complexity.
Case 4: Alice Goffman and On the Run

Alice Goffman, daughter of the esteemed American sociologist Erving Goffman,
wrote an ethnography of inner-city life and how African American communities
are subject to police activity and high levels of surveillance. Published in 2014, On
the Run: Fugitive Life in an American City details her six-year study of a poor Black
community in west Philadelphia. She embedded herself with those she studied,
moving into an apartment with her participants, studying them and their social
networks. They were aware she was writing her doctorate and then a book and that
they were research participants, so there were no issues of consent. Goffman
chronicled their lives, including their regular interactions with law enforcement.
She promised them anonymity, and kept this promise.
Goffman’s participants were almost constantly subject to arrest for outstanding
warrants related to failure to pay fines,
missing court dates and parole violations.
Fearing arrest, they even had to avoid
important social institutions and venues,
like hospital emergency rooms, driver’s
licence facilities and even their own chil-
dren’s schools. Burdened by prior convic-
tions, they also could not obtain jobs, forc-
ing them into an underground economy of
bartering, drug dealing, loan sharking, steal-
ing and other illegal matters for survival.
Goffman also reported a great deal
of police surveillance. The people in her
study were regularly subject to stop and
search procedures, the searching of their © iStock/Tupungato
homes and a constant state of police monitoring. She also documented police vio-
lence; she ‘watched the police punch, choke, kick, stomp on, or beat young men with
their nightsticks’ (2014 p. 4).
For bringing all this to light, On the Run has been highly praised by both the sociological
community as well as the literary world. However, her work drew criticism, too. First, people
have cast doubt on the accuracy of some of her reports. Several incidents seem implausible,
or highly embellished. One example is of an 11-year-old being arrested for riding as a
passenger in a stolen car – something that is not illegal in Philadelphia, although there is
evidence Black people are regularly stopped by police for things that are not crimes (see
Chapter 9).
However, there may be a larger problem: Goffman appears to indicate that she
participated in a major crime during her fieldwork. In an appendix, she discusses the
murder of one of her closest participants. Placing herself at the scene of his death,
she then writes: ‘the hunt was on to find the man who had killed Chuck’ (2014 p.
261). Her other participants believed they could identify the killer. Armed, they drove
around the city looking to enact their revenge. Goffman (2014 p. 262) took notes on
this and also described driving the car:
We started out around 3:00 a.m., with Mike in the passenger seat, his hand on
his Glock [pistol] as he directed me around the area. We peered into dark
houses and looked at license plates and car models as Mike spoke on the
phone with others who had information about [the suspected killer’s]
whereabouts.
One night, Mike thought he saw his target:
He tucked his gun in his jeans, got out of the car, and hid in the adjacent
alleyway. I waited in the car with the engine running, ready to speed off as soon
as Mike ran back and got inside. (2014 p. 262)
Mike decided that he had the wrong man, and nobody was shot that night.

■■ Identify the important findings of Goffman’s research.
■■ What ethical issues were present in her research?
■■ As a sociologist, would it be acceptable for her to engage in a serious crime?
■■ Had Goffman refused to drive the car, should she also have called the police to tell
them that she had reason to believe the men she was studying were looking to commit
murder?
Discussing the ethics of On the Run

On the Run is one of the most controversial sociology books of recent years. It is
important to recognize how well received Goffman’s book was by many people.
Respected academics reviewed it very positively for the critique it developed of how
police surveillance damaged the lives of African American communities – an issue
that was particularly topical, exemplified by the Black Lives Matter movement (see
Chapter 11) and recent protests following the death of George Floyd while being
restrained by police in Minneapolis in May 2020. Goffman’s call for criminal justice
reform was viewed positively by many experts in the area.
However, the book has also been criticized in relation to ethical concerns. Lubet
(2015) argued that Goffman had admitted to committing conspiracy to murder.
After contacting several law officials, he quotes a former prosecutor from the
Philadelphia District Attorney’s office saying: ‘She’s flat out confessed to conspiring
to commit murder and could be charged and convicted based on this account right
now.’ Lubet also questioned the accuracy of some of the claims in the book, arguing
that some were logistically very improbable.
Reminiscent of Zimbardo, an issue appears to be that Goffman adopted the role
of participant too much – she went native. Goffman wrote (2014 p. 263):
I did not get into the car with Mike because I wanted to learn first-hand about
violence. I got into the car because … I wanted Chuck’s killer to die. …
Looking back, I’m glad that I learned what it feels like to want a man to die
– not simply to understand the desire for vengeance in others, but to feel it in
my bones.
That, Lubet argues, is an alarming confession from an ethnographer.

Goffman provided a revision of this episode that characterized the activity not as
a hunt for revenge but a ritual of mourning for a dead friend. This opens up a related
critique: that the seeming factual errors in On the Run are not the result of ethical
problems, but of a writing style that sacrifices some elements of truth for a more
powerful narrative. This issue of writing style is at the heart of some of the debate
about On the Run. Quoted in a New York Times article about the debate (Lewis-Kraus
2016), sociologist Victor Rios critiqued Goffman for writing too much for a public
audience rather than a sociological one. He is quoted as saying: ‘How much do we
sacrifice to become public intellectuals? … At the end of the day, we have to be
careful about how much pandering we do to the masses.’
Yet perhaps Goffman has a legitimate claim to write a different form of sociology
than that preferred by Rios. Perhaps a journalistic style has the power to draw
attention to systemic racism in the criminal justice system. The balance between total
accuracy and telling a story that is honest to the broader context is an ethical issue
with no easy formula. What do you think the answer should be?
The question is whether total accuracy is more important than developing the
power of an argument. If we opt for total accuracy, how is that squared with the
accepted technique that sociologists should change data somewhat to protect a
participant’s identity? A behaviour could be unethical if related purely to the form of

the sociological argument, but ethical when related to the bigger picture ethical
process. Is that appropriate?
Others have argued that the flaws with On the Run are not the fault of Goffman
but of an ethics process that requires anonymity and confidentiality for participants.
Following the issues raised by Humphreys’ Tearoom Trade, Goffman also had to
destroy her field notes – making it more likely that, over the course of writing a
book, errors might creep in. Keeping track of field notes and pseudonyms is difficult,
and Goffman’s period of data collection lasted six years. Some errors are to be
expected, and some of the strongest critiques have come from non-sociologists who
might not be aware of these practical complexities.
Undoubtedly, On the Run is a provocative book about complex issues. Research
on criminal behaviour is often more difficult to evaluate ethically. A key question
concerns the ethics of reporting crimes to the police. Goffman witnessed many
crimes, and never reported them. This was approved by her ethics committee and is
standard practice in criminological research. But are there limits to this? At what
stage should an individual’s safety trump the data collected? And what should
Goffman do in such a situation?
PROVOCATION 5
University ethics panels are damaging novel sociological research
Following the ethical issues raised by our first three case studies, all universities now
require their researchers to undergo an ethics approval process for every study that
involves human beings. Known as ‘ethics committees’ or panels in the UK and
‘institutional review boards’ in the USA, their function is to protect participants and
researchers and to protect universities from litigation.
There are benefits to a mandatory ethical process. But the existence of these
boards may not be entirely beneficial to sociological research (Lincoln and Tierney
2004; Reed 2010).
Most disciplines involve some ethical dimensions to consider: some have huge
implications for society. Research that seeks to splice genes for the betterment of
the human condition, but could also in theory lead to the creation of designer babies
or super-humans, has profound philosophical questions at its heart. Similarly,
medical research can present lifechanging opportunities as well as dangers – and
participants may well face severe risks from these studies. Ethics committees here
have a great deal to discuss and bear significant responsibility.
While sociology engages with important questions, we cannot think of many
issues that are on a par with even the standard cases of medical research. For the
most part, sociological research is fairly benign. Consider this: in the classic cases we
have discussed in this chapter, nobody died or was gravely injured. Society was not
irreparably damaged. As Haggerty (2004 p. 400) writes: ‘notwithstanding the
iconic status of the early examples, the harms that social science ethics committees
routinely try to mitigate are generally of a considerably lower magnitude’.
Many of the things a sociologist might do that are seriously unethical are likely
covered – and prohibited – by law. In the case of Goffman, the ethics of her situation
are pretty much guided by the law – with the sociological practice that she need not
report minor crimes or those that are specifically related to her research activities.
But why does this matter? If the relatively minor inconvenience of filling out some
paperwork makes a sociologist think twice about ethical practice, isn’t that a good
thing? Well, that is a positive aspect certainly, but it does not include the negative
issues involved with ethical reviews.
While ethical review processes were primarily developed to protect the welfare of
participants and defend universities from litigation, ethics review panels today have
actually evolved to wield significant power over the types of methods and topics
sociologists can pursue (Hammersley 2010). The review process normally includes
assessing proposed interview and survey questions, meaning the panel has the power
to exclude some types of questions and dictate how participants should be recruited.
This all means that ethics committees can and do restrict the autonomy of academics
in designing research and its methods (Jamie 2013). This is because the structure
and makeup of these boards have largely taken control of methodological decisions
away from academics with expertise in the specific research area under investigation,
and shifted it towards bureaucrats whose primary concern is minimizing risk for the
institution (Boden et al. 2009), rather than pushing the boundaries of scholarship.
Haggerty (2004 p. 391) describes this as the ‘creep’ of institutional review
processes, arguing that academics in the social sciences are ‘currently witnessing
the emergence of a host of new fetters on our knowledge production endeavors’
(see also Hammersley 2010). This is of particular concern for topics that committees/
boards often deem ‘sensitive’, including sexuality. Here, the conservatism of
bureaucratic institutions can stifle research. The retelling of the same issues we
covered in this chapter, like Zimbardo and Milgram, has contributed to this creep.
This is because they build up fear in novice ethics committee members, socializing
them into an exaggerated concern about reproducing these worst-case scenarios,
while simultaneously legitimizing the entire ethics review process. Thus, when review
boards, or ethics committees, are in place, sociologists may be limited in the topics
they can study because of squeamish institutional review board members who are
usually not experts in the subject area that the researcher is working in (see Chapter
6 for a discussion of bureaucracy).
There are many ways this can occur. We have direct experience of ethics
committees asking for more revisions in studies on sexuality than in other areas. In
one study on pornography consumption, it was demanded that we have a full plan in
place in case any participants disclosed watching child pornography – this was not
the topic under discussion and child pornography represents a tiny proportion of
porn. You might argue that this is a reasonable request, given the criminality of
watching such material. The problem is that this kind of suggestion is not applied
evenly: if this query is applicable for pornography consumption, a study on driving
should demand that the researcher consider what happens if the driver discloses a
hit-and-run crime in their past; a study on athletes should demand that the
researcher consider what happens if they disclose physical, psychological or sexual
abuse by coaches. Yet these requests tend not to happen. It is an uneven application
of the same guidance.
The question becomes: Do ethics committees allow sociologists to conduct
research into sensitive issues? The sociologist may be researching undercover
crimes or marginalized groups. An ethical review process that is overly concerned
about the threat to the university, and not sufficiently focused on enabling the study
to proceed in an ethical manner, can have a chilling effect on sociological research.
Another reason that ethics review panels have hurt sociological research is that
social science research often needs to adapt methods in situ. Some scholars have
thus argued that there is limited potential for methodological innovation from
research that needs to be pre-approved (Taylor and Coffey 2009). In short,
researchers often do not feel able to respond to events as they unfold because they
are scripted by their prior ethics approval for what they can do. This means that
novel methods are difficult to trial, and the less structured a study is, the less ‘safe’ it
is considered to be (McCormack et al. 2013).
Ethical review boards protect against unethical practice. But they do so at a cost
to methodological innovation and the autonomy of academics to pursue research
that may be deemed sensitive or provocative. Sociologists must ensure that their
research and practice is ethical. Perhaps, though, ethical review boards as they
currently operate are not the best way of ensuring this.

Boden, R., Epstein, D. and Latimer, J. (2009) Accounting for ethos or programmes for conduct?
The brave new world of research ethics committees. The Sociological Review, 57(4), 727–49.
Guillemin, M. and Gillam, L. (2004) Ethics, reflexivity, and ‘ethically important moments’ in
research. Qualitative Inquiry, 10(2), 261–80.
CONCLUSION
This chapter has explored what it means for sociology to be ethical. Laying out a
framework for thinking about ethics within sociological research, we highlight that this
goes far further than being ethical when collecting data: thinking about ethics is
important when identifying the topic right through to disseminating findings – or even,
in some cases, deciding not to publish them at all. We then explored ethical sociology
by discussing studies that have been deemed unethical. Examining the reasons why
individual studies were unethical in some areas enabled us to think more critically about
how we may all be ethical in our own research.
HOW WOULD…?
■■ How would you ensure that your sociology is ethical?
–– Go back to Chapter 4 and think about your answer to the study you
would design in that chapter’s How would …? section.
–– Are there aspects that were unethical? How might you change these?
Could thinking about ethics improve your study?
■■ If you are based in a different discipline, how would your own subject area
think about ethics?
–– Are there key differences?
–– Is the emphasis different?
■■ Do you have concerns about how you can be ethical in your academic
practice in the future? How might you address these?

Israel, M. and Hay, I. (2006) Research Ethics for Social Scientists. London: Sage.
Encourages knowledge of research ethics in practice. Interrogates the practices that have contributed
to the adversarial relationships between researchers and regulators, and hopes to encourage both
parties to develop shared solutions to ethical and regulatory problems.
Calvey, D. (2017) Covert Research: The Art, Politics and Ethics of Undercover Fieldwork. London: Sage.
Drawing on interesting sociological studies to make the case, Calvey argues for covert research,
which remains an interesting source of data as well as a contested methodology.
Ransome, D. (2013) Ethics and Values in Social Research. London: Red Globe Press.
Explores the ethical responsibilities that social scientists have regarding the intellectual and practical
implications of their work. Details how social research connects with professional codes of ethics
and how the values of the researcher matter, particularly in action research.

Chapter 6
Making Modern
Societies
INTRODUCTION
This chapter examines how modern societies came about in the West, what it is like to
live in them and how they have developed. We start by examining the Industrial
Revolution and explore how this has led to a period known as ‘modernity’. The key
characteristics of modernity are discussed, as well as the fact that for all its benefits,
modernity has been experienced as a set of catastrophic events for many people across
the world. We then turn to consider some of the key sociological theories for
understanding modern life, focusing on how these societies think about risk, the
growing importance of therapy to our cultures and the importance of new technologies.
In our Provocation, we ask whether there is too much rationality in the world.
THE INDUSTRIAL REVOLUTION AND MODERNITY

Understanding how modern Western societies came to exist in the form they do
today is a complex task. Ideas of politics and democracy, for example, can be traced
back to the Ancient Greeks. It was during this era when institutions were created to
house such debates and theories. The current university system has its antecedents in
the ‘Academy’ founded by philosopher Plato 24 centuries ago.
Yet our current societies are somewhat of an anomaly in the history of human
civilizations. For much of human life, people lived in small groups as hunter-
gatherers, whose main focus was on finding food to survive. More established
societies developed as groups started to domesticate animals and farm crops and
migrate across land with the changing seasons. It was approximately 6,000 years ago
that traditional societies and civilizations began to emerge – large-scale societies with
populations of hundreds of thousands of people, and even millions in some cases.
Mostly agrarian in form, these civilizations also had sophisticated systems of trade
and they expanded through war and conquest.
Sociologists have been interested in mapping the development of different
societies since the beginning of the discipline, with a focus on a stage model of
societies, which saw each stage progress in complexity and sophistication (e.g. Marx
[1867]1965). We do not have the scope to cover all the ways all societies have changed
140
Making Modern Societies 141
since then, nor can we discuss the great diversity of societies that exist across the
world at any given time. Instead, we look at key moments that have influenced
our contemporary world and the processes of modernization. Modernization Moderni
has several characteristics, including the creation of institutions separate from the zation:the
state, the increasing drive towards rationality away from mysticism, the growth of changes that
bureaucracy and secularization and the separation of public and private spheres. occur as a
society
The Industrial Revolution was a vital period that ushered in Western modernity.
transforms
We have already discussed this in Chapter 2, in the context of the Age of into an urban,
Enlightenment, where ideas of rationality and empiricism became core principles in industrial
how Western societies were organized. This was a profound change from the more society
mystical and diverse ways that characterized societies prior to this time. This was part
of what has been called the great transformation (Polanyi [1957]2002), where Modernity:
social and political upheavals saw a marked shift from agrarian to capitalist modes of a term to
production (Durkheim [1893]1984; Weber [1905]1930). Importantly, this included understand
an acceptance of the political idea (and reality) that societies were embedded within societies that
a market economy, where a self-regulating market would be the distributor of wealth. emerged
after the
The Industrial Revolution lasted many years. Although the technological
Industrial
innovations that enabled it began in the 1700s, it was what historians call the Second Revolution
Industrial Revolution (mid-1800s to the early 1900s) that saw most dramatic change and when
in three key areas: Technological advances enabled revolutionary growth in the capitalism
production of material goods, transforming those economies that adopted them. was
The emergence of efficient, affordable mass transportation, particularly the steam embedded as
engine, meant that people were far less circumscribed by geography and locale. the mode of
Improvements in agriculture and industry meant that societies could accommodate production
more people. Note that we do not write ‘support’ or ‘care for’ more people, as the
notion of any kind of welfare state would not occur for many decades. Nonetheless, Great
trans
there was significant population growth across Europe during this period.
formation:the
The Industrial Revolution is generally heralded as an era of great social progress – social and
even if capitalism is appropriately critiqued for its potential to exploit people, and political
concerns about the dehumanizing effects of rationalization are recognized (Weber changes that
[1905]1930). If we take a more global view, though, it is evident that many of the saw Western
harms of modernization were most acutely felt in countries that did not experience societies shift
its benefits. to capitalist
The most obvious example of the harm to other countries caused by modernization modes of
production
was slavery and the global slave trade. This horrific symptom of and motive for
European colonialism saw explorers from powerful European countries – Great
Colonialism:
Britain, Portugal, France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Germany and Spain – cross the
the process
world in ships and plunder non-Western territories, colonizing and asserting trading by which
and social dominance over them (Smith 1991). Williams (1972) argued that this was explorers and
the result of a capitalist tendency to maximize profit and power, which trumped settlers take
Enlightenment values of human rights, resulting in the degradation of human life that political
made the international slave trade palatable (see Chapter 8). The plundering of food and control of
raw materials from these colonized territories was another key driver of population another
growth in Europe, and it also meant that for much of the population of the world, country and
exploit it
modernity was experienced not as triumph but as conquest, pillage and destruction –
economically
an issue we return to later in this chapter.
Notwithstanding this deeply troubling international component, the Industrial

Revolution was circumscribed by geography. China, for example, had no similar
Industrial Revolution, despite having had more scientific and technological
development in the prior centuries. Economic historian Joel Mokyr (2017) argues
that this can be explained by the way China was governed as an empire: the singular
ruling elite in China prevented technological innovation, viewing such thinking as a
challenge to their authority, privileging instead the rote learning of classical
knowledge.
Mokyr contrasts this with Europe, which, as a continent of independently ruled
countries, was distinguished by fierce national competition – an atmosphere that
drove and promoted technological innovation. While religious authoritarianism
existed, the fragmentation by country meant that people who took radical intellectual
positions had more chance of escaping persecution by fleeing abroad with their
ideas, even though some were undoubtedly still punished (see Chapter 2). This
contrasts sharply with China where, despite uprisings and rebellions, the ruling
dynasty had overwhelming power to quash challenges to its bureaucratic norms.
That the Industrial Revolution occurred in Europe, then, was not predetermined and
could have occurred in China if its culture and politics were different.
The importance of sport

The development of sport may not seem central to changes in 19th-century culture, yet sport
had little social value prior to the Industrial Revolution. Social historian Donald Mrozek (1983
p. xiii) wrote:
at the beginning of the nineteenth century, there was no obvious merit in sport … certainly
no clear social value to it and no sense that it contributed to the improvement of the
individual’s character or the society’s moral or even physical health.
However, by the 1920s, these sentiments had been completely reversed (Miracle and Rees
1994). This was partly attributable to the nature of work in the city. The regularity of work
meant that between the blows of the factory whistle, there was time for men to play. The
concept of leisure, once reserved for the wealthy, spread to the working class (Rigauer 1981).
And while sport was also a middle-class pursuit, this tended to be a casual mode of athletic
exercise, such as tennis and golf (Hobsbawm 1987). For the middle classes, sport served as a
diversion during their plenteous leisure time. This was in marked contrast to the frenetic forms
of sport working-class men passionately engaged in and came to follow.
Sport also helped socialize boys and young men into the values required to be successful in
the new capitalist economy (see Chapter 8 for our Provocation on segregating sport by
gender). It helped teach the qualities of discipline and obedience, and to honour the hard work
that was necessary in the dangerous occupations of factory work and mining (Rigauer 1981).
Workers had to sacrifice both their time and their health to earn the wage they needed to
support their dependent families, and sport was a mechanism to socialize young boys early into
valuing the concept of sacrificing one’s body for the ‘greater good’ – that of the team, the
family and, ultimately, the workplace. As well as producing obedient workers and students, this
also served as ideal psychological preparation for soldiers going off to war, which required
complete obedience to authority and acceptance of the ultimate self-sacrifice – to kill and die
for others.
Most important to the bourgeois ruling class, however, was that workers needed to be
obedient to authority. Sport taught boys this docility. Accordingly, organized competitive sport
was funded by those who maintained control of the reproduction of material goods. For
example, in UK football, the modern club system is based on teams originally associated with
employers (such as particular factories) and the public school system (Magrath 2017).

Modernity and the city

The city is perhaps emblematic of modern societies. The rise of urban and city living
is unique to modernity, and sociologists have documented how the city is a modern
experience. Even so, we would still be shocked by significant differences from the
cities of the early 1900s, not least related to limited technology, poverty and the
absence of social care (Pinker 2018). Writing during the infancy of sociology,
German sociologist Georg Simmel (1858–1918) argued that the city had a palpable
influence on the mind of the individual (Simmel [1903]1976). He contended that
living in the city – which he called the ‘metropolis’ – resulted in people developing ‘a
protective organ’ to guard against the increased sensual stimuli of city dwelling. Many
early cities did not have adequate sewer systems or clean water, leading to poor
hygiene – the sensual stimuli of the city included this grim reality.
With the development of city living, and a context of dirty, noisy and unhygienic
cities, various maladies were documented that were attributed directly to the modern city.
Perhaps one of the most well known of these is ‘neurasthenia’, the symptoms of which
included fatigue, anxiety, headache, neuralgia and depression. New York doctor George
Beard wrote about the illness in 1869, arguing it was the result of society women and
businessmen being overworked and stimulated in the city. He argued that ‘overcivilization’
through inventions such as the printing press and steam power and the sciences were
responsible for these symptoms. Kimmel (2005) highlights how the illness was gendered,
with the prescription for women to be confined to their bed while men were required to
exercise and get fresh (non-city) air. Early feminist sociologist Charlotte Perkins Gilman
(see Chapter 2) was diagnosed with neurasthenia and ordered to rest for months.
Simmel argued that the individual turns to logic and intellect – rationality – to
process the sensory overload of the busy, bustling city. Advancing his critique of
rationalization (see below), Simmel viewed the turn to rationality as a rejection of
artistic impulse and emotional response, and the potential death of culture.
French philosopher and sociologist Henri Lefebvre ([1974]1991, [1970]2003)
developed this critique of the modern city to argue that the way space is regulated
and produced in urban societies serves to reproduce capitalism itself. He maintained
that the ‘look’ of cities – how they are built and how space is managed and even
produced – is not inconsequential but both reflects and affects the social dynamics
of the area. Thus, the urban centres of Ancient Rome were markedly different from
those of contemporary societies. Lefebvre ([1974]1991 p. 26) argued that ‘in addition
to being a means of production … [social space] is also a means of control, and
hence of domination, of power’.
Sociology and the city

The city has played a key role in sociology since its initial stages. This is because early sociologists,
particularly those of the Chicago School (see Chapter 2), turned to the city – and Chicago
specifically – as an accessible and fertile area of study. Robert Park (1915), a leading sociologist in
the Chicago School, studied how Polish immigrants to America habituated to their new culture
while retaining elements of their own identity. Offering a more optimistic view of the city than
Simmel and Lefebvre, Park (1915 p. 608) wrote:
The attraction of the metropolis is due in part … to the fact that in the long run every
individual finds somewhere among the varied manifestations of city life the sort of
environment in which he expands and feels at ease; finds, in short, the moral climate in
which his peculiar nature obtains the stimulations that bring his innate dispositions to full
and free expression.
The research produced by the Chicago School in this early period fundamentally influenced
the development of sociology as a discipline, and part of its success was how it viewed the city
both as a location to study people and as a topic in itself.
UNDERSTANDING MODERNITY
Sociologists have spent a great deal of time thinking about the key characteristics
of modern societies. British sociologist Anthony Giddens has argued that there
are three processes fundamental to modern societies that distinguish them from
premodern ones (Giddens 1990). These are: the standardization of time; the
disembedding of social systems; and the questioning and analysis of social
relations by individuals. We also examine the importance of bureaucracy in
modernity, and the harms that modern societies have inflicted on the world.
The standardization of time

Time is something that most of us take for granted. As you read this book, the time
of day will be measured the same way for your friends, and by using the internet, you
will be able to find out easily what time it is in any part of the world. This has not
been the case for most of human history. While people have always had a working
concept of time, the nature of this has varied significantly.
Giddens (1990) highlights that premodern cultures’ understanding of time was
markedly different from our own because time was variable and imprecise and usually
connected with a place. Prior to the Industrial Revolution, social life and work routines
had generally been organized around a combination of natural markers, such as the
seasons, sunrise and sunset, which were of practical value to agrarian workers, and
religious ones, such as daily services, feast days and so on. Accordingly, time was
never abstract but always placed in a social or geographical context, and communities
in different geographic regions would have different conceptions of time.
The social organization of time also impacts on how we sleep. Historian Roger
Ekirch (2013) showed how in preindustrial Europe, people would regularly have a
break in their sleep, waking up to relax, think about their dreams, have sex or do
other work that needed minimal light. People would go to bed at dusk or shortly
after for their ‘first sleep’, and then have their ‘second sleep’ after their nocturnal
awakening. This form of sleep ended with industrialization, though, as the hard
work of factories meant that extended sleep was necessary.

How does time impact your everyday life?
Could you imagine your life without standardized time?
If you had to stay in your home for several weeks because of the COVID-19
epidemic in 2020, how did this influence your perspective on time?
As work moved to factories, and the mode of production changed, time became
organized not by such events but by how life ran in the city. The organization of the
city meant the mechanical clock became increasingly important – the length of the
working day became a battle between workers and employers rather than being
determined by the sun or the weather. Workers’ time needed to be synchronized, so
that everyone started their shift at the same time each day and batches of goods
could be shipped at the optimum time to get them to their destinations and avoid a
backlog in factories. Work did not start when the sun rose or the fruits ripened, but
when the factory opened according to a time designated in that city by that owner.
This also had the benefit for factory owners that they could better measure the
productivity of their workers (Thompson 1967).
As capitalist life became increasingly consolidated as the organizing principle of

Western societies, time became increasingly separated from the locations in which
people lived, becoming instead an abstract measure independent of place.
The politics of time zones

One of the ways in which time remains organized by location is the notion of time zones. At its
simplest level, when it is 2:40 p.m. in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, it is 8:40 a.m. in Denver, Colorado,
11:40 p.m. in Seoul, South Korea, and 00:40 a.m. in Melbourne, Australia. These differences
might also change depending on the time of the year, as various countries have different
summer and winter times.
The rationale for this is obvious: it reflects geography and the position of a country on earth
as it rotates in position in relation to the sun. But time zones are not systematically and
consistently applied across the world. China, the third-largest country in the world geographically,
for example, only has one time zone, while Australia, a slightly smaller country, has six. Hassid
and Watson (2014) argue that this is not a cultural quirk or an issue of geography but reflects
how state authority is conceived in each country. The organization of time is a form of symbolic
centralization by which a country’s rulers can exert control over the daily lives of its citizens.
Thus, China seeks to maintain central power through having one time zone across its vast space,
while Australia has decentralized its notions of time, loosening the control it has over the
everyday lives of its citizens. Time zones are political.
The disembedding of social systems

Disembed
ded:how The second key characteristic of modernity is that social systems become
social disembedded from their surroundings. In essence, Giddens (1990) argues that
practices that many of the tools we use to navigate our lives have become more abstract and no
were once
longer closely connected to the social context in which they were used.
grounded in
the local Money is perhaps the easiest way to think of this. In premodern societies, people
context are no would directly trade something they had for something they wanted; for example,
longer trading eggs from their hens for potatoes that another farmer had grown. They
restricted by would also use forms of coinage, credit notes and other tokens, and for all premodern
place and time societies, the metals used to make the coin had intrinsic value. Contrast this with the
$50 note, for example, which is practically worthless as paper, and only has value in
Symbolic the form of money. This is the vital distinction that occurred as societies transitioned
token:things to the modern era.
that can be In modern societies, money acts as a symbolic token. Money is not tied to a
used for specific transaction, but has value purely because of the institutional frameworks put
exchange, in place that ascribe value to it, which are invisible and disembedded from our social
such as
relations. Giddens (1990 p. 24) highlights that money only works in the modern era
money
through ‘the intervention of the state, which acts as a guarantor of value. Only the
state (which means here the modern nation-state) is able to transform private debt
transactions into a standard means of payment.’
Giddens names symbolic tokens such as money as one of the ways society was
disembedded. Another form was how expert, authoritative knowledge was
perceived. In premodern societies, people were only considered experts, whether
as a witch doctor, warrior, or some other figure, if others had witnessed their
success. In modernity, however, people trust expertise, through a range of
institutional systems and frameworks. Thus, we fly on airplanes because we accept
that there are a huge range of safety checks and we believe engineers are well
trained. Similarly, we try to eat fruit and vegetables and not drink too much alcohol,
because we trust the guidance of medical experts. Giddens refers to this as
functional specialization. Functional
The trust we have in these systems is an interesting feature of modernity and speciali
can be understood as part of the move towards rationalization (see Chapter 2). In zation:where
his book The Philosophy of Money, Simmel ([1900]1978) argued that the impersonal trust in
experts is
nature of money – particularly when compared with interpersonal actions such as
granted
bartering – promoted rational behaviour in human affairs and supported the trend through
towards rationalization that yielded economic growth among the population. institutional
Giddens (1990) argues that the trust in these systems is a form of faith that is frameworks
based on the reliability of the systems in producing results that were intended. rather than
There is a real question as to whether trust in experts and institutions still exists in direct
the way Giddens describes, and we discuss fake news and issues that occur when experience
such trust breaks down in Chapter 12.
The questioning and analysis of social relations by individuals

The third characteristic of modernity is the questioning and analysis of social
relations by individuals. Giddens calls this the ‘reflexivity of modernity’. This is the
understanding that people think of themselves as people and, in doing so, reflect
on their actions and behaviours. As Giddens (1990 p. 36) writes: ‘There is a
fundamental sense in which reflexivity is a defining characteristic of all human
action. All human beings routinely “keep in touch” with the grounds of what they
do as an integral element of doing it.’ Yet this reflexivity is part of modernity.
Premodern societies placed much greater belief and importance in rituals and
tradition, and did not even conceive of these as traditions, but just as the natural
way of things. It is a characteristic of modernity that we think about our actions,
reflect on why we are reading this book, and simultaneously worry about whether
our degrees will provide us with the qualifications and skills to compete in an ever-
changing workforce (see Chapter 7).
This reflexivity is a vital component of modernity. Perhaps we would not have
sociology without it because we would lack that desire to understand and critique the
social world. It was also the precursor to some more problematic shifts in society,
which we will return to later in this chapter.
From ‘modernity’ to ‘modernities’

Sociology is often sceptical of the singular. Just as
there is not one society but many, so too are there
multiple modernities. This statement can be used
merely to recognize diversity in modern societies
– British modernity is different from modernity in
Australia, just as there are real differences with
European countries (Wittrock 2000). Yet within
this approach remains the idea of growing
convergence between societies, and that across
the globe societies will increasingly look like
European modernity.
This approach has been critiqued as another part
of a Eurocentric worldview (Bhambra 2007), and a
separate modernities approach foregrounds ‘the
possibility of a variety of different and autonomous
interlinked modernities’ (Beck and Grande 2010 p.
413). Here, Western modernity is not the only way
that societies can develop but is a particular © Everett Collection Historical/Alamy Stock Photo
combination of structural features, and other forms Empress Dowager Cixi
of modernity can develop and coexist.
China is an important example of a country that has ‘modernized’, including a more diverse
class and occupational structure alongside more open forms of religious practice, but does not
have some of the key characteristics of modern Western societies, such as property ownership
as found in the West (Domingues 2011). Much of the early modernization of China is attributable
to Cixi, Empress Dowager of China, who effectively controlled the Chinese government for
almost 50 years until her death in 1908. Cixi’s story is a fascinating one of palace intrigue,
murder and politics (see Chang 2014), and, while this account is contested, it is argued that
she revolutionized China despite the gender hierarchies that prevented women from occupying
the most powerful positions in society.
China, whether led by Cixi or otherwise, advanced a modernization process that adopted
various elements evident in the West, including Western forms of learning, increasing but still
limited openness to other countries, and a cautious engagement with science and technology.
Some innovations, such as the railway, met with more resistance and took longer to be adopted.
China’s modernization has seen massive population growth, improved medicine, a popular
press, industrialization and associated economic transformation, while maintaining socialist
characteristics and state control (Hsü 2000).
Bureaucracy
As soon as the word bureaucracy is mentioned, people will often sigh or express Bureaucracy:
dissatisfaction. People tend to hate ‘red tape’ and bureaucracy is often considered a a system of
synonym of excessive rules and wasteful administration that prevents people from organization
doing what they want. ‘Faceless bureaucrats’ can make important decisions based on that
implements
regulations that are seen as arbitrary or pointless, and these decisions can require
the rules or
seemingly endless amounts of paperwork. Such framings of bureaucracy have been laws of the
levelled at the European Union (EU), and it was one of the popular arguments institution
during the referendum in 2016 for Britain to leave the EU.
Yet, it is bureaucracy that enables us to receive our salary, pay taxes fairly and
receive the appropriate medical treatment through organized healthcare systems.
Without the bureaucracy of red tape, there would be far more deaths at work,
beaches would be full of pollution and welfare payments would be impossible to
organize, meaning there would be no safety net for people in need. The ability for
governments to react to national crises is dependent on information about its people
– most often filed through forms and other ‘paperwork’ – to be effective.
This is the great tension at the heart of bureaucracy: with the increasing complexity
of modern societies, and the disembedding of its institutions, expansive bureaucracy
is a necessity, but it also serves to make more work and is deeply unpopular.
Furthermore, while bureaucracy can be used to guard against wrongdoing, providing
rules and regulations that otherwise bad actors have to follow, it can also enable bad
actors to perform atrocities.
Regardless of whether bureaucracy is good, bad or simultaneously both, it is
undoubtedly fundamental to the operation of modern societies. While bureaucracy
has been key to governing for thousands of years, modern societies require new and
massively expanded forms. This is because the rationalization present in modern
societies requires an administrative system to ensure these rational decisions are
implemented – the growth of industry and the emergence of the nation state also
require new and complex administrative systems (Riggs 1997).
The early Western sociologists were particularly interested in bureaucracy
and its role in the newly developing industrial societies. Marx ([1843]1970) was a
critic because he viewed it as a key mechanism by which the working class were
exploited. A Marxist critique of bureaucracy also highlights that it can be used
to split the workforce and undermine the power of collective class movements.
Because bureaucracies are traditionally considered as a hierarchical organization
of administrators, it is possible to pit potential collaborators against each other
as different people apply for the same promotion with its associated increase
in salary. Ironically, however, socialist and communist countries have tended to
have extensive bureaucracies, suggesting Marx’s critique did not fully grasp how
bureaucracy operates in modern societies.
Max Weber’s ([1921]1968) perspective on bureaucracy was more ambivalent,
recognizing the necessity of bureaucracy for organizing social life but also seeing the
potential for its inhumanity. Weber was the first Western sociologist to study bureaucracy,
and he documented its key characteristics. These included hierarchical organization

with a clear chain of command; a fixed domain of activity with a rigid division of
labour; clearly defined rules and regulations, with regularly performed tasks; and expert
officials with a clear career path and job security. Fundamentally, bureaucracy in modern
societies is about being governed by a set of rules that are applied methodically by
people who are working in an official capacity (see Waters and Waters 2015).
Two important components are present here. First, the methodical and objective
application of a set of rules. Bureaucrats are not sovereign rulers who can act on a
whim but must apply the rules of the organization carefully and without coercion or
bias. These decisions are based on formalized rules put down into documents, and
they are always in operation; that is, it is not by chance whether the rules are applied
to your own context. Second, is the notion of governed by. Bureaucracy has a direct
impact on our lives because it makes decisions by which we have to abide. It is a form
of power, described by Weber as ‘rational-legal authority’, because logic and rationality
trump other perspectives when making decisions.
It is important to remember Weber’s recognition of the benefits of bureaucracy,
because his most interesting writing relates to what amounts to a profound sociological
critique. Weber ([1919]1958 p. 139) displayed some nostalgia for earlier societies, writing
that modernization had led to the ‘disenchantment of the world’. This is because of the
rise of instrumental rationality, where logic dictates decision-making rather than religious,
moral or other frameworks. And the logic within Western modern societies was a
capitalist one, privileging profit over social justice. Weber ([1905]1930 p. 54) argued that
rationalization was a compelling force, famously describing it as an ‘iron cage’ that
‘forces the individual … to conform to capitalist rules of action’.
The moral sleeping pill

Renowned sociologist Zygmunt Bauman (1925–2017) offers one of the most trenchant
critiques of modernity, arguing that it made the Holocaust possible. While other sociologists
have argued that the civilizing processes of modernity have resulted in a decrease in violence and
harm (Elias [1939]1994), Bauman argues the opposite. Bauman (1989 p. 87) posits instead
that the processes of modernity enable great moral evil, writing: ‘without modern civilization
and its most central achievements, there would be no Holocaust’. He argues that the framing
of society as a set of problems to be solved, where nature can be controlled and mastered and
social engineering can be an acceptable goal are all aspects that were adopted by the Nazis.
For Bauman, it is the combination of expansive state bureaucracy, modern science and
industry, and the state’s legal ability to commit violence that made the Holocaust possible. He
argues that bureaucracy is particularly important because it enables systematic and large-scale
operations, which can include systematic murder. More than this, though, bureaucracy is
implicated because of its effect on the ability to take moral and compassionate decisions and is
responsible for the ‘management of morality’.
In a bureaucratic system, administrators are purely technocrats, where moral responsibility

has been substituted for technical capability. The objectivity of bureaucracy becomes moral
neutrality, as good and bad are superseded by solving the problem, even if the solution is deeply
unethical or immoral. This connects with Hannah Arendt’s (1963) discussion of ‘the banality of
evil’, where many Nazis were a cog in the machine performing their bureaucratic duties.
Bauman does not argue that the Holocaust was always going to happen in a modern society,
but instead challenges us to think differently about bureaucracy and rationalization and consider
more carefully how the harms of modernity can be countered.
These debates about the morality of bureaucracy, however, can miss some of the
ways in which it functions ineffectively. Sociologist Laurence Peter (1969), for
example, highlights how ineffectiveness is built into bureaucracies with his eponymous
‘Peter principle’ – the notion that people are promoted to their level of incompetence.
The idea is that in bureaucracies, people who are good at their jobs tend to keep on
getting promoted until they are no longer good at their jobs. A person stops changing
jobs, then, not when they find the job they love and excel at but when they are in a
job they are no longer good at and cannot get promoted out of.
In a similar critique, Parkinson ([1957]2002) wrote the adage: ‘work expands so as
to fill the time available for its completion’. Known as ‘Parkinson’s law’, the critique
is that bureaucracies continually grow and, as a result, grow wasteful, with the idea
that the potential efficiencies of bureaucracies are blunted by this tendency towards
inefficiency. This also explains why email – a technology that promised to revolutionize
and simplify work life – resulted in an increase in workload and an intensification of
bureaucracy.
Rehabilitating bureaucracy
Not all sociologists have a critical view of bureaucracy. Those who see it positively
highlight that it is bureaucracy that enables the availability and production of
healthcare, welfare and other social goods. They add that increasingly complex
societies simply require an organized and hierarchical administrative system to
function. While we might bemoan the state of public transport, such networks would
be impossible without bureaucracy. Perhaps the best-known advocate for this
position is sociologist Paul du Gay (2000) and his book In Praise of Bureaucracy.
Drawing on Weber’s recognition of the benefits of bureaucracy, particularly related
to the promotion of impartiality and a commitment to treating people equally
independent of their status or background, du Gay argues that a bureaucratic ethos
is fundamental to modern societies. That is, bureaucracy is not amoral but imbued
with values that connect with impartiality and social justice.
There are other positive aspects built into bureaucracies. Administrators are
trained in their roles, meaning they should be competent, and there is clear supervision.
There is also the ability to appeal decisions and check them against the ‘rule book’ of
that institution. Because of this, bureaucracy can also be democratic if the people are
able to determine the rules and laws; that is, if they live in a democracy.
A key point for the benevolence of bureaucracy is the idea that administration should
be separate from party politics and private morality. Laws should be decided democratically,
and with sustained consideration of ethics and social justice, and it is the role of bureaucracy
to implement these procedures. For du Gay, the implementation of immoral or unjust
policies is the fault of the lawmaking process, not bureaucracy.
Du Gay argues against Bauman’s critique of bureaucracy, contending that it is
one-sided and ignores how justice is part of the ethos of bureaucracy. He argues that
Bauman erroneously attributes responsibility for the Holocaust to bureaucracy rather
than the illegitimate co-option of the National Socialist movement and democratic
processes by the Nazis. The horrors perpetrated through administrative processes
were only possible because the Nazis had stripped the moral ethos from bureaucracy.
For du Gay, the Holocaust was not an effect of bureaucracy but a corruption of it.
PROVOCATION 6
We need less rationality in the world
A central tenet of the Enlightenment, in which contemporary Western societies

have their foundation, is the notion that rational thought should be the basis for
decisions and structures in society. At a time when cries of ‘fake news’ are part of
political discourse, and leading politicians seek to deny scientific facts, we emphasize
our strong commitment to this value, and its centrality to sociology.
Yet what if too great a reliance on rationality is damaging to our society? This is,
after all, a concern that has a long history. English Romantic poets of the 18th
century were troubled by it. John Keats, in his poem Lamia, worried that science
would ‘unweave a rainbow’ and that philosophy would ‘clip an angel’s wings’ –
stripping society of magic and wonder. He probably would not have spoken highly of
sociology had he known about it.
But we are not referring to Romantic literary critiques of rationality, just as we
reject the mendacious claims of ‘post-truth’ politics, where debate and even policy
are framed by appeals to emotion rather than empirical reality (see Chapter 12).
Rather, we want to question the ways in which a narrow version of rationality is
applied to benefit corporations in a globalized society, at the expense of people and
the common good.
To think about this, we need to examine how technology has changed everyday
life across the past century. A key concept here is rationalization – introduced by
Max Weber ([1905]1930) and discussed in Chapter 2. Rationalization refers to how
traditions and rituals were replaced by more calculated, rational behaviours in the
organization of societies. These processes became deeply embedded in modern
capitalist societies from the 20th century.
The rationalization of work gained credibility with the theories of an American

management consultant, Frederick Winslow Taylor. His argument was that the most
efficient method should be used to manufacture goods, and this resulted in breaking
tasks into small, manageable chunks (Taylor 1911). These principles were then
adopted by Henry Ford, the quintessential American industrialist who founded the
Ford Motor Company. The factory assembly line used by Ford made mass production
of cars possible.
Ford also raised the wages of his employees, meaning that he had a satisfied
workforce and that there were enough people who could afford to buy the products
he was manufacturing (Harvey 1989). This was part of a period of modern capitalism,
from the early 20th century to the 1970s, now known as Fordism – characterized by
relatively strong protections for workers and stable labour relations.
Relevant to our argument is the centrality of the factory assembly line and how
manufacturing was rational, followed clear rules and could be transplanted from one
context to another. In other words, all factories producing the same goods were
practically indistinguishable and interchangeable.
Yet globalization and the continued revolution in technology development have
also seen a further rationalization of the organization of work and leisure, as capitalism
itself is globalized. American sociologist George Ritzer has called this process
McDonaldization. Ritzer (2000) based his theory on Weber’s critique of
rationalization and bureaucracy to argue that many of the institutions where we
work or spend our leisure time have undergone processes exemplified by the
McDonald’s fast-food restaurant chain. These processes are:
1 efficiency: minimizing any waste in the system
2 calculability: knowing the cost and delivery time of a product, with a focus on
quantitative aspects
3 predictability: knowing precisely what the product will look like, and that it will
vary only slightly, if at all
4 control through non-human technology: machines replace workers or routinize their
tasks.
In all these ways, one can see the supposed benefits of rationalization and technology.
Tasks are more efficient; we know how long they will take; and people (and resources)
can be freed up from these tasks. These things will happen faster. There are numerous
other benefits, including a greater choice of options and avoiding many of the
problems of non-rational societies. Most of us at some point will have enjoyed an
aspect of this process: whether it be at the eponymous McDonald’s, with more
upmarket brands, or in other aspects of leisure and play (see Ritzer 2010).
But what if, in many cases, these processes of McDonaldization do not serve to
improve our services? What if they ultimately help raise profits for corporations, with little
or no consideration for the experience of the user or the worker? Ritzer argues that this
is precisely what happens. He says that

rather than producing positive results for
people, a central pillar of McDonaldization
is the irrationality of rationality. That is,
through these processes of rationalization,
irrational effects occur. He uses the
example of the queues at McDonald’s
that paradoxically make fast food very
slow, particularly at times like the weekend
when families are together.
Similarly, the processes of McDon
aldi
zation shift the work from the
producer to the user. That is why, in
most fast-food chains, you clear away
© Drical/iStock
your own rubbish and are not provided
with proper cutlery. In the McDonaldized shopping centres, you will buy products
that you put together yourself once home, such as flat-pack furniture. Arguably, the
products are of lower quality, meaning that the ‘cheaper’ price reflects the value of the
product purchased.
The efficiency of rationalization can also lead to great waste. Have you ever
wondered why, in most supermarkets, every carrot looks exactly as you would expect
a carrot to look? It seems natural, but it is not. Supermarkets across the world – at
least, those that follow the McDonaldization model – regularly throw out tonnes of
perfectly edible fresh fruit and vegetables because they do not conform to their
customers’ expectations. Enforcing the required uniformity (the predictability) is
fundamentally inefficient.
Ritzer goes beyond highlighting the irrationalities of McDonaldization to argue
that it is fundamentally unreasonable. Explaining this, Ritzer (1998 p. 56) writes:
Irrationality means that rational systems are unreasonable systems – they

serve to deny the basic humanity, the human reason, of the people who work
within them or are served by them. In other words, rational systems are
dehumanizing systems. Whereas the terms rationality and reason are often
used interchangeably in other contexts, here they are employed to mean
antithetical phenomena.
These forms of dehumanization include the genuine harms of eating such foods
repeatedly, and can foster negative eating habits, particularly in children. Ritzer also
highlights the damage such chains have done to the environment. He is also
concerned with how microwave meals can be antisocial, relegating the importance
of family meals or meals with friends. Perhaps more clearly evidenced, the strict
management of workers and the control of work patterns by machines has palpable
effects on workers’ identity and self-worth (see Chapter 7).
The irrationality of rational systems is present in many institutions. Caroline
Oliver (2020) shows that legally present migrants in the UK are denied access to
healthcare, education and welfare benefits that they are entitled to because complex
regulations, intended to save money in a context of austerity, are misapplied. The
volume and scale of these regulations incorrectly and inhumanely restrict access to
vital services, and this can even cost money as people appeal the system through the
courts. In this context, rationality is irrational on both economic and social justice
rationales.
Ritzer (2003) sees opportunities for McDonaldization to be challenged, primarily
through local cultures being able to influence and contest the way global companies
develop in their areas. For example, a start-up company in California called Imperfect
(www.imperfectfoods.com) sells ‘ugly’ vegetables to consumers at a heavily
discounted price – combatting the irrationality of strict predictability. So, while the
spread of McDonaldization is pervasive, there are ways to challenge and subvert the
dominant system.
In summary, while rationalization was a vital part of the Enlightenment and is a
central tenet of sociology and modern societies, its expansion into many parts of
work and social life can have negative effects. Counterintuitively, these effects can
be irrational because the beneficiaries are not the consumers but those making
profits. For the common good, sometimes we need less rationality.

Harvey, D. (1989) The Condition of Postmodernity. Oxford: Blackwell.
Oliver, C. (2020) Irrational rationalities and governmentality-effected neglect in immigration
practice: Legal migrants’ entitlements to services and benefits in the United Kingdom. British
Journal of Sociology, 71(1), 96–111.
Ritzer, G. (2003) Rethinking globalization: Glocalization/grobalization and something/nothing.
Sociological Theory, 21(3), 193–209.
Modernity as catastrophe
During the reign of Leopold II, King of Belgium from 1865 to 1909, Belgium
controlled what is now the Democratic Republic of Congo but was called then the
Congo Free State. This was a complete misnomer, however, as Leopold’s rule of
Congo was characterized by systematic brutality, torture and many other atrocities.
Indigenous people were enslaved and forced to mine the local resources, particularly
rubber, which were then exported to fund Belgium’s industrial growth. Brutal
punishments were used on enslaved people, including amputating their hands when
they did not meet the difficult quotas for harvesting crops. At least 1 million
Congolese people died during this period, and modern estimates range between 10
and 15 million (Nzongola-Ntalaja 2002).
The great stain on the history of modernity is that this example, while
particularly brutal, is not an exception to Western modernity but a fundamental
component of it. Put simply, the industrialization and economic transformation
of Western societies from the Enlightenment to modernity was funded by the
colonization of non-Western countries, enslaving their peoples and extracting
their resources and wealth (Bhambra 2007). Because of this, for many people in
the world, modernity was experienced not as progress but as catastrophe.
The emergence of capitalism across this period was enmeshed with racism
(Virdee 2019). From the colonization of countries in the 1600s, there is evidence of
race being used to categorize humans into groups to dehumanize them. Virdee (2019
p. 15) also documents how this intersected with class oppression, with ‘slavery and
colonialism abroad [and] enclosure at home’ (see Chapter 2 for discussion of
enclosure). Racism was a ‘structuring force … in the history of capitalist modernity’
(p. 22), and the transformation of the West into the modern society discussed above
was reliant on slave labour beyond the West’s borders (see Chapter 8 for a discussion
of racism and slavery). In this way, capitalism itself is racialized (Virdee 2019).
Much like the erasure of race in the history of sociology discussed in Chapter 2,
the importance of race and slavery in the development of modern societies is
downplayed, when it is not ignored entirely. Blaut (2012) calls this a ‘tunnel history’
of Europe, where a Eurocentric view of the world places Europe at the civilized
centre and views the non-European world as stagnant, uninventive and ahistorical.
In Blaut’s metaphor, the walls of the tunnel are the spatial boundaries of Europe and
what is of interest is within that tunnel. This is how it is possible to ignore the harms
done to much of the rest of the world and the influx of wealth that came from it.
The Eurocentric approach to modernity also frames non-Western societies as
premodern and, even when accepting the harms of colonialism, views this period as
one in which these societies also developed. That is, while harm may have been done,
colonized countries gained technical and cultural benefits. This fails to recognize,
though, how European colonizers purposefully destroyed the culture and historical
artefacts of places they conquered (see Fischer 2004). For example, Alatas (2017b)
discusses the work of Rizal (1961), who highlighted how Spanish colonizers of the
Philippines destroyed and then erased the advances in agriculture and industry of the
Indigenous people who predated modernity. Rizal also critiqued the colonial
discourse of Filipinos as backward and lazy – similar accusations were made in the
context of Brazil (Freyre 1986) and elsewhere (Clayton et al. 2017).
With its empire spanning hundreds of years, Britain is, of course, deeply
implicated in these processes of colonization. While slavery is perhaps most
associated with America during this period (see Chapter 8), Britain was prolific in
the slave trade, but kept most of its enslaved people in settlements in other parts
of the world. It is estimated that Britain transported over 3 million Africans as
slaves, and English cities such as London, Bristol and Liverpool became very
wealthy as a result (Dumas 2016). Slavery did not cause the Industrial Revolution
in Britain, but was important to it, not just because of the wealth it provided but
also because of the information and expertise on how to manufacture the

materials that were expropriated from these countries (Bhambra 2007).
Britain also colonized its nearest neighbour, Ireland. Britain has occupied Ireland
at many times in modern history, and extracted wealth and food from the country as
well as quelling uprisings through violent force. Few British people know that during
the Irish potato famine of 1845–49, Britain continued to export livestock and grain
from Ireland to Britain and much of the rest of the world (Kinealy 1997). As Irish
people starved, their food and resources were still being shipped to the rest of the
world by diktat of the British government. Had there been less ideological and moral
attitudes towards Ireland and the famine, it is likely that fewer than the 1 million
deaths (of a population of 8.5 million) would have occurred (O’Grada 1995). Again,
many people in Ireland experienced as catastrophe the economic and industrial
developments that led to modern societies.
GOOD SOCIOLOGY
Settler Colonialism and Australian Society
The dominant narrative of
Australian history was a triumphal
one, where heroic explorers
conquered the wild frontier and
civilized Australia in the process. Yet
this narrative ignores the damage
done by colonizers to Indigenous
peoples and the displacement of
Indigenous peoples so that new
settler societies could flourish.
As a result of colonization,
© World History Archive/Alamy Stock Photo
the Aboriginal Australians faced
significant exclusion and oppression British colonization of Australia
and did not have full citizenship rights. When British conquerors arrived in
Sydney, they brought with them diseases such as smallpox and syphilis that Settler
colonialism:
killed more than half of the Indigenous peoples in the area. The British also a form of
killed them and, in many cases, treated them like animals, and the Aboriginal colonialism
population was decimated across Australia (Rose 2000). where
An important contribution to understanding this was Australian colonial
anthropologist Patrick Wolfe’s book Settler Colonialism and the Transformation settlers seek
of Anthropology (1999). Here, Wolfe focused on the role of gaining territory to replace the
original
and the specific form of conquest known as settler colonialism, highlighting population
that it was the gaining of territory and the setting up of a new society that was and form a
the primary aim. Thus, while colonizers ‘employed the organizing grammar of new society
race’, their genocide of Aboriginal Australians was primarily to gain access to land, and
territoriality is ‘settler colonialism’s specific, irreducible element’ (Wolfe 2006 p. 387).
Wolfe highlights that the argument that the new Australian settlers were occupying vast
swathes of empty land is simply false. To construct this narrative, the settler had to kill the
Indigenous people, denigrate their kinship networks, and force them from their land. In a
manner like that described by Rizal of the Philippines, the narrative of Australian Aborigines
as primitive nomads was only possible because of the violence done to the Aboriginal
peoples, their culture and land.
Wolfe’s work is important not just in anthropology, but in the social sciences more
generally for understanding how racial categories connect with settler colonialism and how
these are implicated in modern societies. His work has seen a real growth in studies of
settler colonial societies, as part of postcolonial approaches that seek to foreground
Indigenous peoples’ experiences, among other issues.
UNDERSTANDING LATE MODERN SOCIETIES

Risk society: In this chapter, we have examined the structures and characteristics of societies
a framework conceptualized by the term ‘modernity’ – representing Western societies for much
to understand
contem
of the 20th century. Yet, there has been substantial debate about the nature of
porary contemporary society, how it has changed and the key drivers of these changes.
societies that These include arguments that people no longer find value in their lives through class
have to deal and religion, but rather through social connections that occur online, crossing
with global traditional geographic boundaries, and where people are sceptical of traditional
risks that are norms and values. As German sociologist Ulrich Beck (1992 p. 10) argued: ‘Just as
focused modernization dissolved the structure of feudal society in the nineteenth century
around and produced the industrial society, modernization today is dissolving industrial
technology
society and another modernity is coming into being.’
A key contribution to this debate is Beck’s notion of risk society. Beck (1992)
Late modern: identified risk as a new and defining feature of late modern societies. Whereas
a term that premodern societies had to deal with life-threatening risks – from hunger and
recognizes fighting, to natural disasters attributed to local deities – late modern societies have to
contem
deal with risks that are caused by humans and focused around technology, whether
porary
societies are
that be financial crises, climate change or globalized pandemics. Floods and famines
markedly might be managed but they could not be prevented; contemporary risk, because it is
different manufactured by humans, has the potential to be prevented or, at least, ameliorated.
from those in Still, these contemporary problems are intractable and cannot be solved easily, and
the certainly not by individuals.
modernity Alongside this, there was a massive shift in levels of education and a subsequent
era of the rise of an educated and skilled workforce. The transition of the population to
mid-20th
educated – from a tiny majority receiving formal education in 1900 to education
century
between 5 and 16 years of age being legally mandated across Europe by 2000 –
meant that people were now far more able to reflect on their own lives and social
conditions. Here, people become increasingly selective about their lives, including
their relationships, cultural affiliations and career choices (see also Giddens 1990).
As such, we worry about climate change, what jobs will be available in the future,
the state of politics and democracy in many parts of the world, all without being able
to impact these in any meaningful way. These concerns are about issues at the societal
level and require institutional, state and international intervention. And with these
risks, it becomes clear that social life in late modern society is imbued with uncertainty
– the ‘job for life’ once promised in the 20th century has been replaced by ‘transferable
skills’ and the need for workers to have potentially many different careers in their life.
The recent coronavirus global epidemic is a clear example of this. Despite
pandemics being a notable threat of globalization (see Chapter 11), insufficient testing
during the early spring of 2020 meant that governments did not know for weeks the
scale and scope of transmission of COVID-19, with the result that there was huge
variance in estimates of rates of transmission and how deadly the disease was. Even as
some countries were scaling up extraordinary measures of social control, such as harsh
restrictions on movement and the closing of pubs, clubs and public gatherings, other
advanced countries played down the threat. The calculation of risk between countries
varied widely and was at least partly attributable to the fact that societies were operating
at the edge of their knowledge, not understanding the risk involved.
A defining feature of Beck’s conceptualization of the risk society is that it is
distinct from earlier iterations of modernity. Beck (1992) argued that the environmental
effects of industrialization were central to this shift: from global warming and more
general pollution, to nuclear contamination and scares about food such as horsemeat
in processed products.
Modern societies have to think much more about these risks and question their
own structures and processes to try and mitigate them. Beck (1992) argues that
societies then are oriented around how they control for risk, changing as they respond
to perceived dangers. Beck (1992 p. 21) defines risk as:
a systematic way of dealing with hazards and insecurities induced and

introduced by modernization itself. Risks, as opposed to older dangers, are
consequences which relate to the threatening force of modernization and to
its globalization of doubt.
Beck’s theorizing of risk society has been critiqued for downplaying the traditional
categories of sociological analysis, particularly class (see Chapters 2 and 8). The
sociological debates here are complex, but Beck still does recognize the inequalities
associated with risk. Considering class, he notes that ‘wealth accumulates at the top,
risk at the bottom’ (1992 p. 35). The wealthy tend to be able to purchase freedom
from risk, whereas poverty offers little protection from it. This is similar to the
adage, popularized by Harrington (1962), that many modern capitalist societies
have socialism for the rich and capitalism for the poor. This was exemplified in
the financial crisis of 2008, where banks and other corporations received massive
bailouts, while the poor faced a decade of austerity politics to recover these costs.
Risk and the boomerang effect

Beck (1992) highlighted that risk accumulated at the poorer end of society even though it was
mostly generated by the wealthiest in society. He also conceptualized a ‘boomerang effect’ to
understand that risk still impacted on the wealthy, who suffer when pollution seeps into the water
supply or when the value of their expensive coastal properties erodes with the coastline as a result
of climate change. The wealthy cannot evade these risks entirely. Perhaps, though, Beck downplays
the ability of the wealthy to mitigate risk far more easily than the poorer in society.
The rise of therapy culture

Living in a risk society can be difficult. Navigating the choices that determine your life can
be a stressful endeavour. From deciding whether to go to university to which university to
attend; deciding whether to marry a partner, move in with them or be single; whether you
should go to that family gathering or respond to that text from your friend; all these
decisions, when combined, can exert a significant toll on the individual. Perhaps it is for
these reasons that there is a massive growth in the number of people reporting stress,
getting therapy and struggling to cope with the pressures of everyday life.
British sociologist Frank Furedi (2004) documents the mass expansion of the
language of therapy and related terms at the end of the 20th century. Analysing 300
British newspapers, he found that the word ‘self-esteem’ was not mentioned once in
1980, but by the year 2000 it was mentioned 3,328 times. Comparing different words
between the early 1990s and the year 2000 he documented similar trends (Table 6.1).
Table 6.1: Comparing word usage: early 1990s and 2000

The word Usage in early 1990s Usage in 2000
Trauma <500 5,500
Counselling <500 7,000
Syndrome <500 7,000
Stress <1,000 24,000
This is not, then, just a growth in individuals having counselling or therapy, but a
cultural shift in the vocabulary by which the media discusses social problems. Furedi
(2004 p. 22) argues:
A culture becomes therapeutic when this form of thinking expands from

informing the relationship between the individual and therapist to shaping
public perceptions about a variety of issues. At that point it ceases to be a
clinical technique and becomes an instrument for the management of
subjectivity.
The language of therapy becomes an ‘instrument for the management of subjectivity’

– a way to control people. Offers of therapy are provided to people in place of a
substantive change to conditions. For example, people who have been made
redundant are offered the opportunity to meet a counsellor to cope with their job
loss. Universities regularly offer their staff resiliency training and classes to cope with
adversity, rather than making structural changes, such as reversing the casualization
of the academic workforce or dealing with gender and ethnic pay gaps and the
sustained decline in pay and benefits. In these examples and more generally, therapy
culture shifts the problem from society to the individual, something known as
responsibilization. Responsibili
In her book Smile or Die (2010), Barbara Ehenreich critiques the multi-billion zation:the
dollar positive thinking industry, where life coaches, motivational speakers and a process
plethora of self-help books exult the individual to get well and motivate oneself whereby
individuals are
through positive thinking. Ehenreich highlights the scientific flaws in the psychology
held
supporting this approach, and develops a sociological critique whereby the happiness responsible
industry becomes a way of blaming individuals for structural problems – to put on for issues
a ‘happy face’, even as someone is made redundant from a job, or cannot receive that
adequate healthcare to treat a life-threatening illness, as happens in the USA. previously
Furedi (2004 p. 7) connects the trend around self-care and particularly therapy to would have
the emergence of risk society: ‘The objectification of human experience into the been
grammar of risks has the potential of turning every new encounter into a test of attributed to
organizations
emotional resilience.’ The awareness of continually being surrounded by risk carries
or institutions
a sense of powerlessness that becomes internalized as an emotional deficit. Furedi
argues that the cultural embrace of therapy is a response to this, but a deeply flawed
and damaging one.
This cultural positioning of therapy serves as an ‘invitation to infirmity’ (Furedi
2004 p. 112), where people are encouraged and rewarded if they claim a victim
status. This can be seen in reality TV shows, where people who narrate tragic
experiences are rewarded with screen time, even if the representation of their trauma
might not be positive. This approach emphasizes vulnerability and human frailty
with perverse results. For Furedi (2004 p. 114), ‘according to the therapeutic version
of personhood, people are not so much the authors, but the victims of circumstance’.
In a manner that nicely blends both structure and agency (see Chapter 3), this
positioning of people as victims places the onus on individuals to deal with difficult
circumstances and also serves to absolve individuals of their own responsibility for
their actions. This can be seen in the medicalization of various social issues, such as
porn and sex addiction, where there is scant scientific evidence for such a medical
diagnosis (Ley et al. 2014). While there are undoubted cultural pressures to adopt the
victim role (or, at least, the therapy discourse), people also have agency to contest it
but tend to passively adopt it instead. People who are unwell can feel better after
receiving a diagnosis (Nettleton 2006). When the therapist states that the patient is
not to blame, so therapy culture seeks to place the blame on institutions and
organizations.
Therapy culture can only occur in a risk society. Rather than taking risks, which
involves the exertion of agency, therapy culture positions the individual as at risk,
connecting with the manufactured risks that are pervasive in risk societies. Many
of the great concerns of the latter part of the 20th century, particularly around
climate change, are associated with a sense of powerlessness to make change. In a
way that is implicitly critical of Bauman’s approach to modernity and his critique
of bureaucracy, Furedi (2004) argues that therapy culture is further enhanced by a
general critique of Enlightenment thinking and a disposition that sees contemporary
society as one that does harm, and where the best that can be hoped for is prevention
of worst-case scenarios. Therapy culture is a fundamentally conservative answer to
living in risk societies. The move from the individual as a risk taker to being at risk
blunts the capability for human innovation and changing societies.
Furedi’s work is part of a broader sociological critique of the turn to therapy
in modernity (see also Lasch 1979; Rose 1990), situating therapy as part of a
disciplinary technique (see Chapter 3) that stifles protest and political action.
While not rejecting all aspects of these arguments, Australian sociologist Katie
Wright (2011) contends that such accounts downplay the importance of shifts
in gender relations and a growing recognition of the harms that exist within
the private sphere. She argues that a feminist reading of the therapeutic turn
would recognize the positive effects of destabilizing the traditional distinction
between private and public life (see Chapter 8). Furedi’s argument would have
been stronger, then, if he had considered how therapy and giving voice to hidden
pain are important for countering abuse and enabling people who have been the
victims of hidden forms of violence.
Network
society: The impact of new technologies
a society
where social Other theories have emerged to engage with these new structures that are dominant
institutions in society. Writing more recently, and thus engaging with the transformative effect of
are the internet, Spanish sociologist Manuel Castells (2005 p. 3) describes the ‘emergence
structured of a new technological paradigm, based in information and communication
around digital technologies’. He conceptualizes a network society, where key social institutions
networks of and activities are structured around digital information networks (Castells 1996).
information, Because of this focus on the internet and electronic networks, the network society as
primarily the
a concept is inherently tied with processes of globalization (see Chapter 11). He
internet
argues that we have moved from the industrial age to an information age. Castells
contends that these networks have become the basic units of contemporary societies,
Technological and that power now exists beyond nation states and resides instead in these networks.
determinism:
Exclusion from these networks is seen as a key form of marginalization, with power
the
assumption
being located with those who monopolize them.
that It can be easy to think that societies will inevitably grow and change in set ways
technology because of the technologies available to them, known as technological
determines determinism. This approach is evident in Marx’s social theories, which essentially
the argued that human relations and social institutions are ultimately based on a
development society’s economic, and thus also technological, foundation (see Chapter 2). It is
of a society’s something that persists in contemporary thinking, from naming whole civilizations
structure and
after particular technologies (e.g. ‘Iron’, ‘Stone’ and ‘Internet’ Ages) to attributing
culture
direct causality from technology to events and social changes (see Wyatt 2017).
Yet thinking in this way assumes that technology is developed and used outside
social, economic and political forces and that technology causes social change. It can
do this latter component, but such an approach fails to understand how people are
innovators of technology use, and not just designers of technology.
Consider the internet as a new technology that has transformed society (Yar and
Steinmetz 2019). Undoubtedly, technological innovations have caused some of these
changes, because the internet has facilitated digital interactions, but this does not
mean there was any inevitability to how societies adopted the internet and effected
change. As David (2010 p. 20) writes:
Interactions that would not otherwise occur, do occur. Yet the medium itself
does not determine how people will interact. The way that the Internet is used
itself is a performance, the medium is interpreted and applied in ways
determined by social negotiation between the parties to the interaction.
People are great innovators of the internet, just like other technologies. Sites
that were designed for one intention are then used for other reasons (Wignall
2017), and people can ‘hack’ technology for their own ends.
Berlin artist Simon Weckert powerfully illustrated this in his performance and
installation ‘Google Map Hacks’. Weckert (2020) managed to create a traffic jam in
Berlin with just 99 mobile phones and a little red cart. He did not do this by spreading
the phones across the road and causing an obstruction, but by putting them together
in his cart and slowly walking down one of the main roads in Berlin. All 99 phones
were reporting their location and movement back to Google servers, and this data
was interpreted as slow-moving traffic – a traffic jam of 99 cars on one busy road.
As this synched with the map, the green lines on the digital maps across Berlin
turned red and cars were rerouted en masse to avoid this digital jam.

Consider how the internet might be different if Tim Berners-Lee, its creator, had
patented his idea and demanded royalties whenever it was used. How might that have
restricted access and stifled innovation?
The internet also runs according to the system of ‘net neutrality’, where internet
service providers must enable access to all content and applications regardless of the
source and are not allowed to favour or block particular products or sites. If net
neutrality was abandoned, how might the internet change?
Technology is a vital part of societies and has a huge impact on how societies are
organized and develop, evident today with the internet and historically with the
Industrial Revolution that saw the rise of modern societies. Digital technologies are a
key structure in society today (Castells 1996). But technology does not determine
future societies nor does technology narrowly follow the intention of its designer.
Understanding the flaws of technological determinism can also help recognize the
possibility of multiple modernities and how technological innovations can have
created several different forms of modern societies (Hutchby 2001).
VOX POP
Dora Meredith
EU and Global Portfolio Manager for Innovate UK
I work for the UK’s national innovation agency. Since 2007,
we have invested over £1.5 billion in innovation. Innovate UK
supports a wide range of technologies: from robotics for a
safer world, to developing first-of-a-kind approaches for the
manufacturing of medicines, to recyclable batteries to power
electric vehicles. We work with industry, researchers,
investors and the government to drive innovation across the
whole of the UK. I work on policy within Innovate UK, with a
particular focus on international strategy.
I have gained a wide variety of experience in my career
so far, all with the consistent theme of working on effective,
evidence-based policy interventions that improve society.
I chose to work at Innovate UK, as I believe that new
technologies will have a significant impact on future
societies, requiring effective government policy to ensure © Dora Meredith
positive ramifications.
There are many global challenges facing society: from scarcity of food, antimicrobial resistance
and climate change. It is certain that new technologies will impact on these challenges. For example,
we can use precision agriculture technologies to ensure more efficient farming, or further develop
renewable energy technology to counter climate change. It is crucial, however, that such technology
development is contextualized within wider policy, for which social science plays a key role.
It is not enough to be thinking simply about what we think can be done next in terms of
technology – we need to think about the big challenges and be positive about our potential to
address them. Critically, we need to ensure that challenges are addressed in a holistic manner,
considering how technologies will interact with people and change our behaviour. Technologies
are moving rapidly, with many businesses facing disruption within their markets, and implications
on every aspect of our daily lives: from work practices, to the way we talk to each other, to our
security. Social scientists need to respond to this changing world and continue to provide crucial
insight, enabling society to understand implications for the future.
Note: Dora Meredith has made this contribution in a personal capacity. Any reference to
Innovate UK should not be read as the authors’ endorsement of the views presented.
■■ How might Dora’s role help combat climate change?
■■ What areas of research not discussed in this chapter do you think might benefit from funding?
But what about postmodernity?

An important concept in some of these debates is ‘postmodernity’. This and other similar terms,
particularly ‘postmodern’ and ‘postmodernism’, are used quite frequently to signify a new era,
one in which Enlightenment ideals are questioned and grand narratives undermined (e.g.
Baudrillard 1994).
In his book The Postmodern Condition, French philosopher Jean-Francois Lyotard (1984)
argued that the Enlightenment narratives of scientific truth and human progress were based on
shaky foundations: with a pessimistic account of industrial and technological progress leading to
crises of nuclear war, climate change and devastation for many people. Similarly, poststructuralist
theories, influenced by Michel Foucault (see Chapter 9), rejected the notion of absolute truths
entirely, arguing instead for plural interpretations of reality.
We have not offered simple definitions of these terms or used them as orienting concepts
for the chapter because they rely on a great deal of prior knowledge to fully understand the
nuance of the debate. ‘Postmodernism’ refers to aesthetic and cultural movements regarding
the nature of modernity, while ‘postmodernity’ is a set of theories arguing that ‘the trajectory of
social development is taking us away from the institutions of modernity towards a new and
distinct type of social order’ (Giddens 1990 p. 45). Even though many sociologists remain
sceptical of theories of postmodernity, its core ideas and arguments have influenced much
contemporary sociology, and their work is present in our discussion of transgression in Chapter
9 and social change in Chapter 11.
CONCLUSION
This chapter has examined the emergence of the societies we would broadly
recognize as the ones we live in today – industrial, capitalist societies that use
advanced technology in all aspects of daily life. Time, money and expertise are all
abstracted, to the extent that they rely on trust in the institutions that organize social
life. These societies have advanced bureaucracies, are concerned with addressing
risks that they have manufactured, and use the language of therapy to manage the
subjectivities of their citizens. Technology sees new social structures in society, yet
how these technologies operate are not predetermined and can have unintended
effects. While modernization brought many benefits, and diverse societies, we must
also remember that many people experienced catastrophic harm as a result of
colonization of non-Western countries.
HOW WOULD…?
■■ How would you understand your own experience in relation to the t heories
in the second half of this chapter?
–– Consider the arguments about therapy culture. To what extent do
you use the language of stress, trauma and counselling? Do you think
Furedi downplays the benefits from counselling and therapy, particu-
larly when compared with previous silence around issues such as men-
tal health?
–– How valid is the critique of therapy culture? To what extent is d iscussing
victimhood ‘an invitation to infirmity’? Would a sociologist’s views likely
be different if they adopted a functionalist or critical perspective?
–– How has the internet transformed your life? Are you reading this book
on paper or in e-form? Does the medium in which you read impact on
how you study and even think?

Giddens, A. (1990) The Consequences of Modernity. Cambridge: Polity.
Based on a set of lectures given at Stanford University in the late 1980s, it provides an important
theoretical argument about the nature and consequences of modernity. Arguing against the notion
that societies have seen a revolutionary shift, Giddens instead develops themes of security versus
danger and trust versus risk to argue that modernity has benefits and dangers; and that it is essential
to develop political responses to these risks.
Meghji, A. (2020) Decolonizing Sociology. Cambridge: Polity.
This book considers how colonialism has been central to sociology since it became institutionalized
in universities, and how it continues to shape the discipline today. It provides useful suggestions for
how to decolonize sociology moving forward on a global scale.
Furedi, F. (2004) Therapy Culture: Cultivating Vulnerability in an Uncertain Era. London: Routledge.
Offers an engaging and powerful critique of the growth of therapy as a cultural phenomenon,
rather than individual practice. Connects other arguments about risk in society with a critique of the
discourse of therapy in society, arguing that it serves to minimize people’s agency and is an invitation
to victimhood.

Chapter 7
Structures
and Institutions
INTRODUCTION
Societies are highly organized and standardized in many ways. But it is not always clear
how this organization occurs because much of it is implicit and taken for granted.
Sociologists are interested in uncovering this hidden organization of social life and a key
way of doing so is by researching social structures and institutions. This chapter will
begin by defining these terms before examining four important institutions that shape
our behaviour and help to organize our social world: family, education, media and work.
In our Provocation, we question whether Western societies are really meritocratic or
whether the term itself fosters inequality.
THE STRUCTURES OF SOCIETY

Sociologists approach society from two different perspectives One approach is to
examine how and why individuals act, looking at their agency and the meanings
developed in social interaction (a Weberian approach). The other perspective, the
one we focus on in this chapter, interrogates the social structures of society – invisible
frameworks that organize the social world around us and our interactions with each
other (the approach of Marx and Durkheim).
A structural perspective contends that these structures exist outside, and have primacy
over, the individual. Individuals are constrained to act in the limited ways that are available
in society (we discussed the structure–agency debate in Chapter 3). Social structures are
supported, maintained and reproduced through social institutions, which we now discuss.
What is an institution?
When you hear the word ‘institution’, what do you think of ? Perhaps a place or
building, possibly an old hospital for people with mental health problems. When
sociologists discuss institutions, they are most often talking about social institutions,
which sit within the wider structures in society. Social institutions can be defined as
‘systems of established and embedded social rules that structure social interactions’
(Hodgson 2006 p. 18). In other words, they embody the ‘rules of the game’ (North
1990 p. 3), determining how to behave appropriately in a particular society.
167
Formal Some of these rules are upheld by formal institutions, such as the law, and are
institutions: enforced by official agencies such as police, prosecutors and the judiciary. Formal
rules, such as institutions will often have buildings or places associated with them – courthouses
the law, that that relate to the judiciary, prisons that relate to the police, and schools that relate to
are enforced education. The buildings themselves do not make the institution, they just consolidate
by official it. Formal institutions comprise expectations and conventions, while the buildings
agencies are the physical spaces where these expectations are enforced.
Other rules are learned through informal institutions, such as cultural customs
Informal and taboos, where rules are not written and enforced by agencies but are taken for
institutions: granted and important to fitting in. These norms, usually unwritten, are created,
cultural communicated and enforced outside officially sanctioned channels.
customs and Think about driving a car. Driving has many rules and conventions, some of
taboos, which are upheld by formal institutions and others by informal institutions. Adhering
where rules to the speed limit and not driving while drunk are examples of conventions that are
are not
transmitted by the formal institution of law and enforced by agencies like the police.
written and
enforced but
However, raising your hand to thank another driver who waited for you is a convention
are important that is transmitted informally – by word of mouth and observation. These kinds of
for ‘fitting in’ actions are not enshrined in law but you might face social reprimand if you do not
to a culture follow these informal rules.
Both formal and informal institutions can constrain and enable individual
behaviour. The influence of institutions and the conventions they transmit means
that individuals are pressured to act consistently with the dominant norms and
expectations of their society. This is inherently constraining because it places
limitations on people’s behaviours. But, institutions and conventions can also give us
choices and make life easier and safer. Take again the example of driving: traffic
lights force us to stop in particular places where we might not want to, but this also
means that traffic flows more freely and safely.
Organi Organizations are important parts of social institutions, although they can be
zations: conflated. For example, a university is an organization that sits within the larger
physical institution of higher education. There are lots of universities (organizations), but
entities that only one overarching institution of higher education that conducts research and
consolidate
educates adults to a particular standard. Some sociologists will refer to organizations,
the norms and
values and do such as an individual university, as an institution. This is because although the
the work of a organization is part of a larger social institution, the organization itself might have
particular its own particular norms and rules. This makes it an institution itself, while also being
institution an organization within a larger institution.
Organizations and institutions tend to develop particular cultures that are unique
to them, known as institutional or organizational cultures. These cultures can range from
benevolent to exclusionary, which means that they purposefully or unknowingly
exclude certain groups of people. This exclusion can be symbolic, where a group is
made to feel unwelcome, or literal, where certain people cannot be a part of an
organization because of some characteristic, such as age, gender or race. We discuss
issues of social exclusion and division in Chapter 8.
Structures and Institutions 169
Consider the example of high finance. McDowell (2011) draws attention to how
this institutional culture disadvantages women. Explicit forms of exclusion include
overt sexism, such as overlooking women for promotion, and the prevalence of a
masculine culture wherein demeaning or inappropriate actions are excused as
supposedly harmless jokes. Covertly, the organization of work tasks, such as timing
work hours and events that make balancing caring responsibilities and paid work
challenging, has a greater impact on women because more women are in caring
positions than men.
These covert and explicit issues not only impact on those women who already work
in the sector. They can also discourage women from wanting to work in high finance
because of this institutional culture. Thus, the highly masculine culture is self-
perpetuating, and will continue to dominate these workplaces, meaning that women
will continue to be effectively excluded from participating in this highly paid and high-
status profession.
We now turn to look at four key social institutions that shape our behaviour and
our interactions with other people – family, education, media and work. These
institutions are a vital part of social life in the modern era, but they are still culturally
and historically located. That is, although the four institutions we examine are
universal to almost all societies, the way they look and work is dependent on time and
place. The Western concept of family, for example, is notably different now from
200 years ago because we live in a different socioconomic and cultural period.
Similarly, the family in nomadic tribal communities today is quite unlike those in the
Western world. The nature of the institutions we describe below have only recently
emerged in their current forms in Western societies following the Industrial
Revolutions of the 18th and 19th centuries, as discussed in Chapter 6.
FAMILY
The word ‘family’ can evoke many images – one’s own parents or guardians, a friend’s
parents, imagined future children, or maybe a fictional family from TV or a novel.
The dominant Western cultural image of family is what has been called the nuclear Nuclear
family: a married heterosexual couple and their two biological children who live family:a
together in one house. Despite the many different forms that families take in the heterosexual
Western world, this is still the most common representation. couple and
their
The small nuclear family unit has traditionally been assumed to be the most
genetically
emotionally and economically stable model, providing children with a balanced related
upbringing by having two parents of different sexes. Non-nuclear family types have offspring
always existed, and these include same-sex parents, families headed by a single parent,
reconstituted families with stepparents and stepchildren, and families in which children
have been adopted, among many others. We are much more accepting of these diverse
family forms today than in the past. Historically, people whose family circumstances did
not conform to the nuclear family model were highly stigmatized and some, particularly
single mothers, experienced a great deal of ill-treatment (see Keating 2009).
© Photodisc/Getty Images
The traditional idea of the ‘nuclear family’
Sociologists have extensively researched the family, its role in society and the ways
families are changing (see Dempsey and Lindsay 2015). The family is understood as
a key informal social institution supporting the broader social structures of society.
It is an informal institution because it is not an officially sanctioned or organized
body, although, as we will see later, it occupies an ambiguous position, being
simultaneously public and private. The primary role of the family is the socialization
of children, which teaches children the appropriate ways to behave, ensures social
order and thus maintains the broad social structure.
Functionalism and the family

Talcott Parsons (1902–79) is perhaps the best-known sociologist of the family. As
a structural functionalist (see Chapter 3), he was interested in describing how
institutions work to maintain the structure and function of society. For Parsons, the
nuclear family unit evolved to fit the economic and social needs of industrial capitalist
societies (Parsons and Bales 1955). Within this ideal nuclear family, men took on the
‘instrumental’ role of breadwinner and family leadership, while women became
responsible for the emotional wellbeing and domestic work in the family through
their ‘expressive role’. Although many women also worked outside the home, men
tended to have the higher paid jobs while women still bore the responsibility for all
the domestic work. According to Parsons, these gendered roles were complementary
and enabled the nuclear family to fulfil its two main functions – primary socialization
(see box) and the stabilization of adult personalities.
Types of socialization
Socialization is an important concept in the sociology of the family. As we saw in Chapter 1,
socialization is a learning process where people learn the norms and expectations of a particular
society. It is often split into primary and secondary socialization. Primary socialization occurs
early on in life and is usually led by a child’s family. During primary socialization, children learn
from their parents or guardians the attitudes, values and actions that are appropriate in a
particular society. Secondary socialization occurs after this initial learning through the family
unit and involves children learning to behave appropriately around people with whom they do
not have an emotional connection, for example at school. As such, secondary socialization
entails a degree of negotiation and decision making by children as they learn to participate
successfully in society. Socialization is not just limited to childhood, it is a lifelong process in
which we are constantly learning the most appropriate ways to successfully be part of a society.
The gendered division of labour meant that the family had become a sanctuary
for men from the stresses of work, one in which they were looked after by their
wives. Through this care, men’s emotions and personalities stabilized, supposedly
making them better workers and reducing the amount of conflict in society in
general. This understanding is referred to as the warm bath theory because the Warm bath
family unit is like a warm soothing bath that men can relax into after a day at work theory:the
(Parsons and Bales 1955). Notably, the family is not seen as a sanctuary for women. comparison
Instead, women are expected to create and maintain a supportive physical and of the nuclear
family to a
emotional environment within the family, not to benefit from it. Here, the family can
warm bath
be a site of gender inequality (see Chapter 8). that men
For many years, the nuclear family was regarded as the ‘ideal’ family form. Other could relax
types of family were stigmatized and discredited, and this oppression was often into after a
hidden within moral ideals. Homophobia, for example, was frequently phrased in long day
terms of the immorality of homosexuality, with much of this framed as concern that working
same-sex relationships would undermine the nuclear family. outside the
Functionalist perspectives on the family endorsed the nuclear family model, but home
they have been widely critiqued. David Cooper (1971), a Marxist scholar, argued
that the idealized functionalist image of the nuclear family ignores the true purpose
of the socialization of children, which he contends is to indoctrinate them into
their role within the exploitative capitalist system. Furthermore, Parsons’
understanding of the family is outdated, failing to account for the diversity of
family forms that exist today (Scott and Schwartz 2008), particularly mixed-race
couples, same-sex couples, single parents and adoptive parents. It also ignored the
harm caused to these groups of people when such families were heavily stigmatized
and censured.
Perhaps the most pervasive critiques of the functionalist perspective have come
from feminist scholars, who argued that the traditional nuclear family reproduced
patriarchal norms. Part of this was because of a different focus on the family
(Delamont 2003): while functionalist approaches examined the structure and role of
families within society, feminists investigated the relationships and interactions within
families. As we discuss in Chapter 8, second-wave feminist scholars of the 1970s drew
attention to the limitations that traditional gender roles placed on women’s
employment opportunities outside the home and the financial power that this gave
husbands over their wives (Greer 1970). Anne Oakley (1974) highlighted to the
unrecognized value of the domestic work that women in traditional gender roles
performed. Others argued that women who worked outside the home had to
Emotional undertake a ‘triple shift’ of paid labour, unpaid domestic work and emotional
labour:work labour: taking care of the family’s wellbeing, such as the emotional stabilization of
that involves men (Duncombe and Marsden 1995). This can be read as a critique of the warm
emotions bath theory in functionalist approaches. Indeed, for functionalists, the nuclear family
rather than
was thought to reduce conflict in society, but, for feminists, the family itself was
just doing
activities understood as the site of conflict.
Children, families and emotion

Children are often considered to be a central part of families. Family gatherings are
frequently characterized, certainly in cultural representations of them, as having young
children as the centre of attention. However, the notion of children as central to family
is not without its problems. Not everyone has children, not everyone wants to have
children. We have asked some lecture classes how many students want children, and the
great majority raise their hand. When one or two say they actively do not want children,
there is often a gasp from some of the other students – the thought of not raising
children is that shocking to them. Indeed, there is a lot of societal pressure on people,
particularly women, to have children and those without children often find themselves
subject to negative stereotypes and stigma (Park 2002). Given this, the term ‘child-free’
has been suggested for use instead of ‘childless’, as the latter attaches negative
connotations to a life without children (see Gillespie 2000).
It is also important to remember that not everyone can have children even when
they want to, and this can have a significant impact on people’s lives (Hadley 2018). The
focus in families and related institutions, such as education and health, is on people with
children, and those without can feel isolated. Similarly, people who have miscarriages
also report poor experiences of healthcare alongside the grief they feel (Boynton 2016).
VOX POP
Dr Petra Boynton
Social Psychologist and Agony Aunt
When I was pregnant for the second time I didn’t tell anyone at work, fearful that it might count
against me in a competitive university environment. Having not told anyone I was pregnant, how
could I then explain I was miscarrying? I kept this miscarriage secret, fitting in surgical
management for my loss on a ‘working from home’ day. The healthcare I received during this
loss, my second miscarriage, was functional and all my

physical needs were met. Emotionally it was a different story.
Nobody asked about my mental health and there was no
support offered to my partner.
You might think that having an academic career in
reproductive health, lecturing healthcare workers on how to
use evidence in practice, and applying my research with a
media career as an agony aunt (advice columnist) that I would
know exactly how to care for myself. And yet I struggled.
Since nobody in hospital had mentioned therapeutic help, I
assumed I didn’t qualify for any. I hid my grief.
My third pregnancy went to term, and technically as
someone with past losses I should have been offered more
support and greater awareness, but this was not forthcoming
even though I asked for reassurance. I had a traumatic birth
and my son was unwell shortly after he was born, and was
rushed back into hospital. All the evidence tells us to offer a
debriefing after a traumatic birth, followed by close
monitoring from midwives and health visitors, and the option © Petra Boynton
of therapy. None of this happened and since I wasn’t in a
place to check the literature while managing a newborn, I had no idea I was entitled to it.
When I miscarried for a third time, my eldest was three and by now I knew what to expect. I
treated it as an ethnographic study, grilling healthcare workers on the psychological and
sociological aspects of pregnancy loss, discovering most were too busy to find and apply
evidence, although willing to do so if only someone could access and share it. This remains a
problem across healthcare, where overloaded workers lack capacity and supervision to bring
evidence into practice. And for many low and middle-income countries while rates of baby loss
(a loss that includes early miscarriage, ectopic and molar pregnancy, stillbirth and the death of
an infant aged up to twelve months) remain shockingly high, there is little information about how
you manage psychologically.
After my youngest was born, I continued to experience many mixed emotions and anxiety. It
took a long time to connect how I was feeling with the inadequate care I’d received. I didn’t want
anyone else to go through this, so I started writing about what happened to me in both the press and
journals like The Lancet. I obtained public engagement funding to support the Miscarriage Association
to create a multimedia campaign aimed at partners, called Partners Too (www.miscarriageassociation.
org.uk/your-feelings/partners). And then, drawing together my research skills and agony aunt
techniques, I wrote a self-help book called Coping with Pregnancy Loss (2016) to explain in clear
terms what might happen during baby loss both physically and emotionally; what help could be given
and how to manage if it was not provided; ways to help yourself; information for partners; and ideas
for remembering your baby. I worked with an illustrator to ensure the images we included were
representative as diversity is lacking in baby loss advice. This resource is now used by those who have
had a loss and more widely by the healthcare workers who look after them. Charities that promote
the book get a percentage of sales.
Currently I’m working with the charity Hesperian to make an international, free, multi-
language resource for anyone who has experienced pregnancy loss and wants advice on how to
look after themselves or a loved one. Some people remember their babies with activism,
fundraising, or art. I use my privilege of being able to access and understand research to create
easy to follow, practical advice that lets people realize help is out there and they are not alone.
Twitter: @drpetra
Instagram: petraboynton
Reflection
■■ Petra writes about ensuring that the images in her books were diverse and representative.
What forms of diversity do you think she is referring to here?
■■ Petra writes about using her privilege to engage in research to provide practical advice for
people in need. Can you think of other areas that could do with more of this.
The emotions around having children are not restricted to whether to have them,
but when to have children if you do. There are many negative stereotypes about
young parents, particularly mothers (Yardley 2008), but women who have children
later in life are also subject to negative stereotyping (Whitley and Kirmayer 2008).
This, again, involves not just the parents deciding to have children but also wider
society: for example, if people have children too young, it is widely assumed that the
state will have to support them, through benefits and welfare packages (Brown 2015).
No matter the age of parents when their children are born, the experience of
being a parent is also emotionally charged. Children are assumed to be future citizens
and, therefore, how they are raised is deemed public business – even before they are
born. Given this, Longhurst (1999) draws attention to the scrutiny that pregnant
women often find themselves subjected to, particularly receiving unwanted comments
on their behaviours and unwelcome touching of their stomachs. You can also see
this kind of public interest in action if you think about guidance for pregnant women
on what not to eat, drink and do; although the guidance is about what mothers should
(not) do, the intention is the wellbeing of the foetus.
VOX POP
Becoming a young mother: Holly’s story
I found out I was pregnant when I was 16 and I had my son at 17. It wasn’t planned and I wasn’t
prepared for a baby at all, but I decided to keep it. My family were pretty upset when I told them
I was pregnant and my dad didn’t speak to me for about a month. I think they thought I’d ruined
my life, but after my son was born, they fell in love with him.
I took a year away from college and then started doing my qualifications part time because I
got financial help with the nursery fees. I’m starting university this year, so I don’t feel like I’m
doing anything different to my friends

who didn’t have babies young. I just
feel like I’m doing it a few years later
but the whole pregnancy and babies
thing is out of the way for me now.
There can be lots of negative
attitudes about young mums and you
do get comments from people about
it. When you first have your baby,
you’re really worried about being a
rubbish mother and I stayed at home
for months because I was really not
confident. But then you realize that © iStock/Halfpoint
everyone has that, no matter what age you have your babies. Now I just don’t care. My son is fed
and happy and that’s all that matters. If people comment, I just ignore them or tell them to mind
their own business.
Note: ‘Holly’ is a pseudonym, and neither she nor her child are shown in the accompanying
photograph.
Reflection
■■ What do you think about Holly’s story?
■■ Do you agree that there are lots of negative attitudes about young mothers? If so, what are
these? How are they spread?
■■ If both adolescence and waiting ‘too long’ are criticized as a ‘bad’ time to have children, do you
think there is ever a societally acceptable ‘good’ time to have children? If so, why is that time
deemed ‘better’?
Policy debates and the family

Although families are usually seen as private, they are subject to a great deal of public
scrutiny. This does not mean that every family unit will be highly scrutinized, but that
the notion of ‘family’ is subject to a great deal of debate. Take the example of in vitro
fertilization (IVF), which is the technique of fertilizing a woman’s egg outside the body.
The process involves harvesting eggs from a woman’s body, implanting sperm directly
into the egg in a laboratory and then reimplanting the zygote (the cells that form when
an egg is fertilized) into a woman’s womb with the intention of establishing a successful
pregnancy. IVF is used by couples who are unable to conceive naturally either because
of fertility problems or because they are a same-sex couple. IVF has been heavily
debated for several reasons.
First, there are debates about who should pay for IVF (see Chapter 12 for
discussion of social policy). In countries with nationalized healthcare systems, the
crux of this debate is whether having children is a lifestyle choice (so the health
service should not pay to help people have children) or a right (so the health service
should pay). It seems that the policy answer is somewhere in the middle. In the UK,
for example, the National Health Service (NHS) pays for two or three cycles of IVF
(this varies by region) and then couples have to pay for additional attempts themselves
– the success rate of IVF for under 35s is around 32 per cent, although this declines
as women get older. However, given that IVF is expensive, some couples will be
unable to pay and so may look to adoption, which also involves a great deal of policy
debate about personal life.
Second, there are policy questions about who should be able to access those
IVF services that are paid for by national healthcare services. Before 2008, in the
UK, single and lesbian women were unable to have IVF paid for by the NHS.
Today, same-sex couples and single women can use NHS IVF services, although
there are still criteria governing who is eligible: only women under 40 and those
who are still not pregnant after 12 months of unprotected sex or 12 attempts at
artificial insemination (directly inserting sperm into a woman’s womb without
having intercourse) are able to apply for IVF through the NHS; everyone else
has to pay.
There are often additional criteria, such as being a non-smoker and a healthy
weight. Although these are positioned as being for clinical efficiency reasons (because
IVF is less likely to work for unhealthy people), there is also arguably a moral
imperative to this which could be read as an attempt to ensure that only ‘well-
behaved’ people are supported in having children (see Chapter 9 about disciplinary
techniques of control).
Extreme rules around children and families also exist. For 36 years, 1979–2015,
in order to curb overpopulation, China enforced a law mandating that couples were
only allowed to have one baby – known as the ‘one-child policy’. While there were
exceptions, particularly for ethnic minorities and parents whose first child was a girl,
this law meant that the Chinese government enforced coercive birth planning that
caused considerable human suffering (Whyte et al. 2015). This provides a radically
different image of the family, and social policy related to the family, than that in
many Western countries.
Regardless of how the family is framed – whether it focuses on parents,
grandparents or children, or brothers and sisters to aunts and uncles, nephews and
nieces, pets, or close friends who are not blood relations – the family is a place where
people are supposed to care for each other beyond state intervention. It is likely that
a family member will be your next of kin as well as your emergency contact number
on your phone. Even so, families occupy an ambiguous position in society. As an
institution, they are simultaneously isolated and private, but charged with enormous
responsibility for bringing up the next generation of citizens and workers, which
necessitates some degree of public and policy involvement. Of course, the first time
families recede in importance in a child’s life is when they start school and enter the
institution of education.
Religion as an institution
It may seem odd to think about religion as a social institution, concerned as it is with individual
beliefs, questions of morality and perspectives on the afterlife. These most personal questions
develop within cultures and specific histories, and religion is not just an individual thing. It is
practised in communities, socially organized and often has hierarchical structures. Religion has
also become institutionalized in many countries, with some Church of England bishops having
voting rights in the House of Lords, and, despite the formal separation of Church and state,
religion has a significant influence on politics and social life in America.
Religion was a topic of interest to the Western founders of sociology in the modern era. In his
book The Elementary Forms of Religious Life, Durkheim ([1912]2008) examined whether there is
an essential characteristic to religions that separates them from philosophy or other categories.
Focusing on the early religions present in small, traditional societies, he argued that
the key characteristic was a separation between that which was sacred and that Sacred:
which was profane. As part of this distinction, these religions also had totems, extraordinary
objects from the profane world that take on special significance and become viewed things that
inspire awe
as sacred objects.
and
Emphasizing the central role of rituals and regular collective ceremonies to reverence
religion, these totems are sacred because they represent some of the core values
of the community. In Durkheim’s perspective, religious rituals are both a
Profane:
celebration of the society’s values and also an opportunity to foster community things that
and solidarity. As such, for Durkheim, religion plays a central role in early, small- belong to the
scale societies because it is central to community and the organization of everyday everyday
life in such communities. world
Of course, Durkheim’s sociology of religion is not readily applied to the diverse
complex societies and their global religions. Much sociology of religion has focused on issues of
Christianity in the West, although it has also diversified to understand the major religions and their
place in a globalizing and secularizing world. Brian Wilson ([1966]2016 p. 6) defines secularization as
‘the process whereby religious thinking, practices and institutions lose their social significance’, and
can be traced back to the processes of rationalization during the Age of Enlightenment (see Chapters
1 and 6). As well as considering secularization in the West, which has focused on Christianity, there is
a growth of research on other world religions, including Islam (Salvatore 2016), as well as postcolonial
approaches to religion, which consider what a sociology of religion would look like if Western
Christianity had not been the main religious influence (Spickard 2017).
EDUCATION
Education socializes children into the norms, values and expectations of the
society in which they live (Boronski and Hassan 2015). Although upper-class
boys, historically considered to be the future leaders of society, have always been
educated in one way or another, universal and compulsory education was not
established until the 19th century in Western societies. In the UK, the Elementary
Education Act 1880 made schooling compulsory for everyone. In the USA,
education was made compulsory between 1852 and 1917, and in Australia, this
happened between 1830 and 1870. Prior to compulsory education, the teaching
of children had been provided in an ad hoc manner, with schools established by
churches, private philanthropists and industrial organizations. Provision was
variable across different areas and countries.
There was significant resistance to compulsory and universal education because
many people believed that educating the poor would lead to revolution. In the UK,
for example, in an 1807 debate about compulsory education, Conservative Member
of Parliament (MP) Davies Giddy (cited in Chitty 2007 p. 15) commented that
giving education to the labouring classes of the poor … would, in effect, be

found to be prejudicial to their morals and happiness; it would teach them
to despise their lot in life, instead of making them good servants in
agriculture and other laborious employments to which their rank in society
had destined them; instead of teaching them the virtue of subordination, it
would render them factious and refractory.
Giddy was concerned that educating the poor would alert them to the injustice they
suffered and awaken a desire to be more than servants to the upper classes. He was
not necessarily wrong in this prediction; it’s just that most of us would see this as an
argument for education, not against.
A Marxist (see Chapter 2) would argue that Giddy was worried that the poor
False would become aware of their false consciousness and rebel against the upper
conscious classes, potentially overturning the entrenched class structure. We might suspect that
ness: the not only was Giddy concerned about disrupting existing social structures more
state of mind generally but also directly concerned about his own position, given that he was a
where people
wealthy member of the classes oppressing the poor.
are unaware
of the
Despite such opposition, calls for universal education increased and included
inequality of individuals and groups with privileged social status, such as church leaders and
their situation education activists. Voices of opposition were soon in the minority and eventually
because class universal education became the norm across the Western world. Education was
and wealth constructed as a way through which poorer children would be able to improve their
stratification lives and enter into a social class above their parents (Morrish 1970). We return to
are thought this idealized goal below.
to be the
natural order
of social life Theorizing education
Sociologists have analysed education as a social institution from a variety of
perspectives. For Durkheim ([1925]2011), school not only instilled shared common
values that ensured a functional society, such as hard work and respect for authority,
but also taught children the skills needed for highly specialized roles in the labour
market. Whereas in preindustrial societies these roles would have been learned within
the family unit, in industrial societies Durkheim believed that school provided this
socialization.
Parsons also saw school as important for the socialization of children to ensure
the functionality of society. For Parsons, schools instilled the value of achievement,
which cannot be learned within the family because of the fixed nature of a person’s
status within that unit (Parsons and Bales 1955). In other words, you cannot work
hard and achieve your status as a son or daughter in a family – as it is set from birth
and cannot be changed – but you can work hard in school and achieve higher status
in later professional life.
Marxist scholars have also understood education as an agent of socialization but
have highlighted how schools have trained children to become the right type of
workers for capitalism. Bowles and Gintis (1976) argued that there is a ‘correspondence’
between the routines and structures of school life and the routines and structures of
working life; listening to teachers and following their instructions is similar to
listening to bosses and following theirs. Schools, therefore, not only provide students
with the right knowledge and skills to be productive future workers but also train
children in personality, personal appearance, self-presentation and social class
identification.
An important addition to debates in education came from the ‘new sociology of
education’ that emphasized the socially constructed nature of the curriculum, arguing
that what counts as knowledge in schools is the result of power relations that benefit
the state (see Brooks et al. 2013). There was a call for significantly more qualitative
research that could foreground meaning and experience in school, while also
recognizing that such knowledge is constructed through individuals’ interactions and
interpretations (see Chapter 3).
In this model, sociologists have argued that there is a hidden curriculum in
education, which trains children to accept the status quo of how the world is.
Proponents of this perspective argue that as well as overtly teaching students
knowledge about particular subjects, school implicitly teaches children the norms
and expectations of the class system and their place within it. Through school,
children are taught to ‘know their place and to sit still in it’ (Illich 1971 p. 41). This
hidden curriculum is not just taught through the lessons themselves but also
implicitly through other elements of school, such as the teachers’ power, the
architecture of the school, the use of language and the use of school uniform.
Think about this last example in terms of the hidden curriculum. First, school
uniform reproduces a gender status quo. It is, generally, culturally unacceptable for
boys to wear school skirts and might even be against school rules. This reproduces
the idea of a fundamental difference between boys and girls, which is made visible
through their clothes. There is often concern in schools about the length of girls’
skirts, with occasional sensationalist media reports of skirts being measured and girls
being sent home for wearing them too short (Ahlum and Fralley 1976). This
perpetuates the idea that, from an early age, women’s clothing is subject to public
scrutiny and even punishment when it does not match expectations of propriety.
Second, it is often argued that school uniform can make social class differences
invisible as all children are required to dress the same (Craik 2003). But is this really
true? The uniforms are only the same within each school. Consider how uniforms
differ between elite, feepaying schools and the poorer schools that are free to attend
and run by the state. Not only are the uniforms at elite, fee-paying schools far more
expensive, they are often more tightly governed and carry connotations of wealth,
power and status. Some schools require uniforms to be bought from a specific
(expensive) shop; they may also require a sport uniform as well, increasing costs
further. In this context, school uniform reproduces class inequality.
© Christopher Furlong/Staff/Getty Images
And reflect on how it felt when you went from wearing a uniform to not wearing
one. In the UK, uniforms tend to be mandatory between the ages of 5 and 16, but
for ages 17–18 many students can wear their own clothes. This is about more than
just class, it also signifies a shift to adulthood and self-dependence. In these schools,
you are also expected to do more independent work. The logic would suggest that
uniforms also confer the notion of childhood and implies – or encourages – a level
Social of docility in the wearer (as also indicated during the Zimbardo prison experiment
mobility:the we examined in Chapter 5).
change in
social status
that a person
Education and social mobility
achieves over Social mobility refers to the change in social status that a person achieves in a set
the course of
period (Roberts 2011), or the difference between an adult’s income, professional
their life
standing and social class position relative to their parents. For example, a barrister
whose parents were unskilled or low-skilled workers would be classed as being Meritocracy:
socially mobile. a social
Sociologists have largely disputed the claim that education is a vehicle for social system in
mobility. Working-class children tend to do worse in education than their middle- which people
class counterparts but are not less intelligent. Why, then, do working-class children, succeed and
generally, achieve lower grades and have lower attendance at elite universities? Most are rewarded
sociologists agree that this is because we do not live in a meritocracy. Instead, based on
talent and
sociologists have shown that the structures of inequality that exist in society (between
ability alone
genders, socioeconomic classes and ethnicities) are reproduced through the education
system at all levels (Hoskins and Janmaat 2019). Social
Lampert (2012) has compared the education system to social Darwinism, where Darwinism:
inequalities are justified as the ‘natural’ result of a meritocracy. Borrowing from Charles the theory
Darwin’s natural selection theory (famously summarized by English philosopher that individuals
Herbert Spencer as ‘the survival of the fittest’), Lampert argues that the notion of and groups are
meritocracy is used to justify the relative underachievement of some students as purely subject to the
same
the result of their lack of ability or hard work. This justification, he contends, masks
Darwinian laws
other factors and inequalities, such as material deprivation, which impact on student of natural
achievement and leave certain groups of students ‘behind’. Sociologists and selection as
educationalists have demonstrated that children from lower socioeconomic groups get plants and
‘left behind’ in education at a very early age and never catch up (see Jackson and animals, that
Marsden 2012; Reay 2017). is, survival of
the fittest
Radical alternatives to formal education

Radical philosopher Ivan Illich (1971) argued that societies need to move away from compulsory
education altogether, a process he called ‘deschooling’. Illich was a staunch opponent of
industrial capitalism, which he saw as eroding people’s capacity for creativity and self-reliance.
Instead, Illich thought that capitalist society had become increasingly dependent on ‘expert’
knowledge, for example that of doctors and teachers, which primarily served to further
capitalism. He argued that compulsory education indoctrinated children into an uncritical
acceptance of the dominant social structure through messages and ideologies hidden in school
curricula and routines.
Instead of compulsory school education, Illich advocated for the development of peer-to-
peer creative learning models, where children would use technology to connect with others and
learn the material most relevant to them in the most appropriate way. Although Illich’s
deschooling thesis has been widely critiqued for not being well thought-out and not proposing
realistic alternatives (Gintis 1972), the increase in home schooling and ‘alternative’ models in
the West, such as Montessori schools where pupils’ freedom and creativity is encouraged as a
mode of learning, certainly chime with his calls for more creativity and freedom in education.
However, the impact of school closures during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic
demonstrated the importance of schools, not just for learning but also for socialization and
good mental health and to enable parents to continue with their working lives.
PROVOCATION 7
We do not live in a meritocratic society
A meritocracy is a society in which citizens are rewarded by merit. In the USA, this is
known as the ‘American dream’ and it holds that the rewards of society – normally,
becoming rich – can be yours as long as you work hard enough and are good at your job.
The notion of moving from poverty to great wealth exists in stories and folk tales
across cultures and time. This notion of ‘rags to riches’, where someone progresses
from a lowly or poor position in life to one with great power or wealth, is normally
attributed to hard work, natural skills and great talent. But do we really live in a
meritocratic society?
Arguing against the notion of meritocracy, sociologists Sam Friedman and Daniel
Laurison (2019) describe a ‘class ceiling’ to show the impact that class has on people’s
trajectories. They show that a class pay gap exists in the UK, with people from working-
class backgrounds earning, on average, 16 per cent less than those from privileged
backgrounds within higher managerial and professional occupations. The gap persists
even when controlling for occupation, education and experience. We like to think that
success is based on merit, but too frequently things like family background, social
connections, discrimination and luck matter more (McNamee 2018).
Ideas of meritocracy are also focused on education, which is seen as a vehicle of
social mobility and a key mechanism to enable people to achieve what they wish in
the future. Here, the first issue to consider is how success is defined. How educational
success is measured is quite limited, largely assessing competency in retaining a
great amount of information and being able to recite it on command. Exams are,
quite simply, a bad way of measuring an ability to understand or interpret, and yet
they remain the primary way children are assessed in schools. Albert Einstein is
attributed as saying: ‘Everybody is a genius. But if you judge a fish by its ability to
climb a tree, it will live its whole life believing that it is stupid.’ So, the way we measure
success in education – and part of the way we measure ‘merit’ – is deeply flawed
and lacks validity (see Chapter 4).
Second, we must recognize that educational success is impacted by economic
inequality. Success at school is partly the result of hard work – most children will not
succeed if they do not try – but it is also dependent on the context into which you are
born and how rich and educated your parents are. Research has demonstrated a
multitude of ways in which children from lower social classes have less access, on
average, to resources at home compared to middle-class students. Working-class
students have less access to enough nutritious food, educational toys, the internet,
laptops, music lessons and trips to theatres and museums. They certainly have less
additional private tutoring. All these things influence the likelihood of academic success.
So-called ‘meritocratic societies’, like Britain, Australia, Canada and the USA, also
fall short as meritocracies because of how they are stratified by class. The families who
can afford to send their children to private schools buy access to smaller class sizes,
better facilities and, often, influential social networks that can last a lifetime. These are
the reasons why privately educated people get into elite universities at far higher rates
than working-class students (Boliver 2013). Entrenched class inequalities also exist at
the postgraduate level, where people from working-class backgrounds are only 28 per
cent as likely to obtain a postgraduate degree compared with their more privileged
peers (Wakeling and Laurison 2017).
Educational research has also highlighted many ways working-class students suffer
from the way schooling is organized. Working-class children often find it harder to
complete homework, not because of the difficulty of the work but because of their
social context: they frequently have more caring responsibilities or work a part-time
job to help support their family. They have less free time outside school to complete
homework, and their home situations can preclude dedicated time and space to do
homework away from these other responsibilities. The problem with the education
system is that it does not recognize these other demands on working-class students.
The tests that denote educational success benefit those who have had the time and
space to complete homework. It does not give any reward to those who have dealt with
other issues and developed significant skills in these areas. Instead, they get lower
grades because they had less time to revise.
Meritocracies are also problematic intellectually. Sociologists have developed this
argument to suggest that meritocracy is actually a political tool that serves to reproduce
class inequality (see Mijs and Savage 2020). A meritocracy can, for example, be used
to justify inequality. If it is believed that we live in a meritocratic society, then it can be
argued that those who do less well do so because of some deficiency, rather than social
context. Yet research has shown that schools reproduce class values. In his classic
ethnography of working-class boys in schools, Learning to Labour: How Working Class
Kids Get Working Class Jobs, Paul Willis (1977) argued that rather than providing these
‘lads’ with the possibility of going to university, the school actually trained them to
become manual labourers. Willis demonstrated how schooling functioned so that
working-class kids got working-class jobs. At the same time, middle-class students
were being trained to become managers and rule over them.
And so we come to the potential reality of what our society really is. Perhaps it is
not a meritocracy, where skill and merit is rewarded; perhaps, instead, it is a society
that projects the illusion of meritocracy in order to justify and reproduce class
inequality, and keep the workers in their place.

Friedman, S. and Laurison, D. (2019) The Class Ceiling: Why it Pays to be Privileged. Bristol: Policy.
Hoskins, B. and Janmaat, J.G. (2019) Education, Democracy and Inequality: Political Engagement
and Citizenship Education in Europe. London: Palgrave Macmillan.
McNamee, S.J. (2018) The Meritocracy Myth. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield.
MEDIA
The media has the power to shape how we perceive the world and our place within
it. Today, the media is hugely diverse and includes all sorts of tools of communication,
such as TV, music, books, magazines and newspapers. Sociologists have studied
traditional forms of media like these and are increasingly turning their attention to
the internet and social media.
Political economy approaches to the media

Early research into culture and the media came from critical social theorists who saw
the media as an institution that reproduced structures of inequality in society.
Scholars from the Frankfurt School were particularly important in understanding the
role of mass media in society. As discussed in Chapter 3, the Frankfurt School was
named after its original home in Frankfurt, Germany, but these scholars were forced
to relocate to the USA during the 1930s because of the rise of fascism under the
Nazi regime in Germany. As a result, they had witnessed first-hand the importance
of the media in shaping public opinion (Wiggershaus 1994). In the USA, the
Frankfurt School flourished and important scholars, such as Theodor Adorno, Max
Horkheimer, Leo Lowenthal and Jürgen Habermas, produced critical neo-Marxist
accounts of the power of the mass media in entrenching and reproducing capitalism,
which benefited the wealthy and powerful.
One of the most notable ideas to come out of the Frankfurt School was
Horkheimer and Adorno’s ([1947]2002) notion of the culture industry (see Chapter
3). They drew attention to the industrialization of mass-produced culture, arguing
that through this process, culture had become just as standardized and commodified
as any other industry. They argued that this development of a culture industry
embedded capitalism as the dominant economic model and induced people to work
hard, for the benefit of the wealthy and powerful elite.
Members of the Frankfurt School were particularly concerned about the
integration of the working classes into capitalist ideology. In traditional Marxist
thought, the working classes were imagined to be the instigators of revolution, so if
they were also duped by mass communications into working hard and consuming
goods, there would be little hope of a revolution and an end to capitalism.
These understandings of the mass media as a capitalist industry owned by private
Political interests are often referred to as political economy approaches. Based on Marxian
economy:the principles (rather than the more political ideology of Marxist views), political
study of how economy approaches study ‘the social laws of production and distribution’ of goods,
politics and recognizing that production and consumption are continual cycles (Lange 1963 p. 7).
economics
To understand mass media from a political economy perspective means recognizing
intersect
the economic forces behind it.
Central to these political economy approaches is the critique of private ownership
of the media, which has tended to be concentrated in the hands of a small number
of international media magnates. The most famous magnate is probably Rupert
Murdoch, who owns several global media outlets, including Fox News. Those who
subscribe to a political economy perspective argue that this private ownership

deliberately excludes particular ideas and people from the mainstream media (Golding
and Murdock 1997). The voices that are represented in the media, then, are those
unlikely to criticize the inequality of power and wealth in contemporary society (we
discuss this in more detail in Chapter 12).
Herman and Chomsky (2002 p. xii) theorized the importance of ownership of
the media with their ‘propaganda model’. They argue that
the media serve, and propagandize on behalf of, the powerful societal interests
that control and finance them. The representatives of these interests have
important agendas and principles they want to advance and they are well
positioned to shape and constrain media policy.
Countries where the media is state-owned also use the media to control the
population. In China, for example, until the 1980s, all TV, radio stations,
newspapers and magazines were owned by the government. This meant that the
government controlled how it was represented and could ensure that no
dissenters were allowed to reach a mass audience through the media. Although
the media is increasingly privately owned in China, the government still retains a
strong influence, particularly in censoring parts of the internet for fear of dissent
and Western influence. There are around 3,000 websites currently inaccessible in
China (including Google and Facebook), although maintaining this so-called
‘Great Firewall of China’ is increasingly challenging as the population becomes
more computer savvy.
Representation in the media

The mass media represents social life, people and events. Representation has
traditionally meant the depiction of an event or a group of people through selected
words, images and videos that are implied to capture the ‘full story’. That is,
representations ‘stand in’ for actual events and enable us to know about what is
happening in the world without actually being there and experiencing it. This clearly
gives great power to the media. Events are represented to us by them, and that
retelling is a moment of considerable influence.
If we take a political economy approach, these representations might further
the priorities of an individual or organization by showing events and people in
one particular way. Sociologists have critiqued media representations of, among
others, women and ethnic minorities. Feminist scholars have drawn attention to
the ways in which women are regularly cast in roles and positions conforming to
stereotypes of them as sexual objects or belonging to the domestic sphere
(Byerly and Ross 2006).
Consider this 1981 image of a familiar couple: Prince Charles, heir to the
throne of Great Britain, and the soon-to-be Princess Diana. This couple had
huge fame in the 1980s, and there is little obvious to critique about this image.
One might note that the stance of Charles is more authoritative (hand placed on
Diana’s shoulder), whereas hers is more pliant (resting on her own arm). If you
search for pictures of them together, you will see many more in basically the
same fashion. This representation even extended to the official postage stamps
issued of the couple (see right-hand image).
© Tim Graham/Getty Images © iStock/Andylid

Charles and Diana represented as different heights
But here’s the thing: Princess Diana and Prince Charles were the same height. But in
staged photos like this, Charles is always notably taller than Diana. It happens so
frequently that it cannot be coincidence. Given that research tells us that height
confers authority (Etcoff 1999), it suddenly makes much more sense: Charles is
given authority by re-presenting his stature in a way that reproduces gender inequalities
(see Cohen 2017).
The associations of height and power are reproduced in other aspects of
mainstream media. Kit Harington, the actor who played Jon Snow in the phenomenally
successful Game of Thrones TV series, wore heels on set because his height (1.73
m/5ft 8in) was deemed unsuitable for his role. Similarly, Tom Cruise is regularly
made to look taller than his female co-stars in films where he plays an action hero.
Both actors have been seen in photos with their spouses in ways that misrepresent
the height difference between them.
Sociologists have also drawn attention to media representations of ethnic minority
groups that reinforce stereotypes about different cultures. These representations
have shown people from diverse ethnic backgrounds in a very limited set of social
roles. Park et al. (2006) draw attention to the racial stereotyping of Blacks and Asians
in the 1998 film Rush Hour, arguing that such stereotypical representations of ethnic
groups naturalizes, rather than challenges, racial differences.
GOOD SOCIOLOGY
Stuart Hall and Representation
Cultural studies is an interdisciplinary field that looks at contemporary culture, its historical
foundations, defining traits and conflicts. The field developed in the UK in the mid-20th
century and probably the best-known cluster of scholars worked at the Centre for
Contemporary Cultural Studies at the University of Birmingham. Cultural studies scholars
understand culture as fluid and changeable, shifting with wider economic, political and
structural changes in society. They also tend to be interested in the ways in which
contemporary culture intersects with different power structures like race, class, gender and
sexuality (see Chapter 8). Stuart Hall (1932–2014) was one of the best-known cultural
studies scholars.
Hall (1997) argued in favour of a view that acknowledges the active role of representation
in how we understand the world. He questioned whether events and people ever have one
objectively ‘true’ version against which media representations and distortions can be
measured. Events do, of course, happen, but Hall argued that these events have different
meanings for different people depending on who they are, where they are from, where they
live and their life experiences and so on.
Hall argued that to have meanings, events need to be represented in some way. By this,
he does not mean the simple description of an event through text and images after it has
happened, but that representation is fundamentally part of the event itself; that the event
is partly constituted as it is happening by how it is represented. Events are classified and
described using a shared language; these classifications and words are then used to help us
understand the events. In other words, to attribute language to something is to represent
what it is, which then allows us to use our prior experience to attribute meaning to it.
Think of the various balls used to play different sports. We attribute meaning to different
types of balls (what sport they are used for and what the rules of that sport are) based on
the language used to classify them (whether they are golf balls, footballs or tennis balls) and
our previous experiences (we have seen football, golf or tennis being played before, so we
know what they are).
Analysis of this type of representation in the media has, then, focused on language and
the process of giving meaning to events, objects and people. Given that the mass media is
one of the most powerful ways in which meanings are circulated, meanings cannot easily be
separated from questions of power – the question becomes who has the power to define
objects, events and people, as well as whose meanings are being privileged when things are
represented in the media. For Hall, arguing from a neo-Marxist perspective, the powerful
seek to fix meanings to support their own agendas and fixing an interpretation as the
dominant one is an exercise of power that influences our experiences and perspectives.
Consider our discussion of the height of Prince Charles and Princess Diana. The
positioning of Charles as taller than Diana despite being the same height can be considered
a ‘fixing’ of the interpretation of men as taller than women in general.

We have drawn attention to some ways in which the media is not representative. Can
you identify other areas where the media could be fairer or more inclusive?
How are issues of power connected to this? Is it important that all sections of society
are represented in the media? What exceptions to representation might be valid?
Social media
Traditional forms of media are owned by a small number of very rich and powerful
Social media: people. But new forms of social media have emerged to challenge this paradigm.
websites and Although social media companies like Facebook, Twitter and Instagram are also
apps that owned by very powerful and supremely rich people, their content is produced by
allow users to their users. These users come from diverse backgrounds and will not necessarily
create and
share the agendas of the company owners. This model of open, collaborative user-
share content
or connect generated content, where users produce as well as consume the internet, was known
with other as ‘Web 2.0’ (see Beer and Burrows 2007), although this name is seldom used now
people that this internet model has increasingly become the norm.
According to the World Bank (2020), the great majority of people in the West are
regular internet users. This includes 93 per cent of people in the UK, 88 per cent in
the USA and 87 per cent in Australia. In other developed nations, internet use is
similarly high, with regular internet use at 99 per cent in Iceland, 91 per cent in Japan
and 93 per cent in Canada. In developing countries, the story is quite different, with
only 3 per cent, 6 per cent and 3 per cent of people in Burundi, Chad and Eritrea
respectively using the internet regularly.
This ubiquity of the internet in the West has changed everyday life there and
revolutionized the ways we communicate with other people. Manuel Castells (2005)
argues that we now live in a networked global society where our social networks of
friends and contacts are not just limited to those people physically close around us
but can also include people in other countries, living in very different cultures, who
we may never actually meet face to face (see Chapter 6).
Perhaps the most visible aspect of such a globally networked society is the
increased use of social media and social networking sites. Although social media has
often been seen to challenge the monopoly of large media companies and their
biased representations, Rheingold (2000) predicted that the internet could easily
become dominated by conglomerates as, therefore, just another form of mass media.
He also argued that the internet would allow corporations to monitor and, ultimately,
sell to the population much more easily. His prediction about corporations monitoring
users has indeed come true (see our discussion of ‘self-tracking’ in Chapter 10), as
has the dominance of big business. For example, Facebook bought Instagram in
2012 and WhatsApp in 2014, meaning that Facebook owns the four most downloaded
apps of the 2010s (Shead 2019).
Think about when you go online and are confronted by adverts for all sorts of
things from beauty products to video games. The range of goods and services you
are offered is not a random selection but targeted specifically at you, based on what
you have searched for previously, what websites you use and what your interests
appear to be (see Bakshy et al. 2015). Although the internet was billed as a form of
media somewhat free from capitalist forces, it has become increasingly commercialized
(Weis 2010). It seems that even new forms of social media cannot escape some of
the institutional and capitalist powers more often associated with traditional media.
Sociologically speaking, this increased use of social media presents interesting
questions about what it means to be ‘in touch’ or ‘friends’ with someone (Turkle
2011). Consider those people who you went to school with when you were younger
and who are your friends on Facebook. You probably know a lot about these people
– whether they are in a relationship, which university they study at and where they
went on holiday last summer. But you might not have spoken to them (either in
person or online) for a few years, and you might know little about their thoughts,
feelings and perspectives on the world. So, are they really friends? As we go on to
discuss in Chapter 10, the answer to this question is complex because social media
and friendship mean different things for people at different times.
Lambert (2013) suggested that social media involves particular forms of intimacy
– intense and publicly displayed emotions – which have now spilled over into ‘real
life’ and are changing how we communicate offline. Perhaps people’s perceptions of
the value or otherwise of friendship via social media will change as a result of
COVID-19 and how technology enabled people to interact and communicate with
friends and family they were not allowed to visit in person.
Another question for sociologists is about the presentation of the self online.
Goffman (1956) suggested that we all have social ‘masks’, which we use to present
ourselves in the most desirable way. Although Goffman was talking about
interactions in the offline world, his perspective is relevant when we think about
social media. When you post a picture on social media, you are saying something
about yourself with that picture; you are presenting yourself in a particular way.
Hogan (2010) argued that social media users work hard to curate their images,
status updates and friends’ lists to present themselves in the most appealing way
for their friends or followers. Others have questioned whether these carefully
curated presentations of the self are damaging, as they can perpetuate stereotypes
about beauty and set unattainable goals (Lambert 2013).
The effects of social media broadly fall into two categories. On the one hand,
positive understandings of social media (and the internet more generally) have
advocated it as a platform for the development of new relationships that transcend
traditional boundaries, such as national borders and subcultural divides. These
positive perspectives draw attention to the empowering and emancipatory power of
the internet and social media for people who may not have a voice in society (e.g.
Baym 2015; Wignall 2017).
Others have drawn attention to social media’s potential to enact political change.
Eltantawy and Wiest (2011) cite the example of the 2011 Egyptian uprising, which led
to the resignation of the dictatorial leader, Hosni Mubarak. Given that free speech in
Egypt was increasingly difficult in the years leading up to the uprising, meeting other
disaffected people and organizing protests was incredibly challenging. Social media
provided a method by which large groups of people were able to organize quickly and
plan protests, which eventually ended in positive political change.
However, social media has also been argued to be damaging in contemporary
society. The most prominent aspect of this negative understanding is the use of
social media as a platform for hate speech and bullying, which tends to be particularly
directed at women and marginalized groups. Other scholars argue that the prominence
of social media has led to people being connected online but disconnected from
meaningful relationships (Turkle 2011). There are also concerns about the spread of
disinformation, from lies about politicians to incorrect guidance on how to minimize
the likelihood of catching or transmitting viruses, as witnessed in the COVID-19
pandemic in 2020. One way of understanding this is through the term ‘fake news’,
which we discuss in detail in Chapter 12.
Technological change and fear of technology

If we told you about a new technology that resulted in reduced social contact and physical
activity, provoked fantastical thoughts and could even lead to participation in extremist groups,
would you be at all concerned? Would your view change if you found out the technology had
been available for hundreds of years?
If we had used the name of the technology – books – you would likely not have been
concerned at all. Yet, in the 19th and early 20th centuries, books were feared by social elites
because of their potential to communicate revolutionary ideas to the public. With the printing
press and the mass production of books, suddenly the literate general public could discover new
ideas that ran contrary to the orthodoxy of the time and so books were seen as a threat to public
morality (Furedi 2016).
New technologies are frequently the subject of cultural concern that they cause harm or
damage the ‘social fabric’. Contemporary worries include whether social media means we have
poorer relationships with our friends, alongside fears about internet porn and ‘sexting’. There
may be genuine cause for concern in these areas. But it is also worth noting that very similar
concerns have been raised for centuries about new forms of media as they emerge.
Barker and Petley (1997 p. 7) remind us that popular songs were seen as dangerous in the
1500s because they presented criminals as heroes:
For more than 150 years, moral campaigners have been making wild claims about the
effects of media which they don’t like. When in the 1830s Thomas Bowdler claimed that
the plays of Shakespeare would corrupt young girls’ minds, he was doing something no
different from [British] Conservative MPs today claiming that Casualty [a popular UK TV
drama] could encourage inner-city violence.
We need to be wary, then, of critiques that warn about these new technologies fostering moral
or social decay. The technologies may be new, but these cautionary tales are very, very old.
WORK
Working eight hours per day, five days per week, for the 251 working days a year, we
spend up to 22.9 per cent of our year at work. This does not include time spent
travelling to and from work, any overtime we do, the weekend time that we spend
putting together work for a big deadline on Monday, or the time we spend thinking
about work when we are not actually there. It also does not take into account the
breakdown of the boundary between work and personal life that has happened as
new technologies like laptops and smartphones have enabled us to take our work
with us wherever we go (Fleming 2014). Many of us spend much longer than 22.9
per cent of our time doing, or thinking about, our work; particularly as a result of
COVID-19, where many people had to work from home and also spent time
worrying about the security and physical safety of their jobs.
This begs the question as to why we spend, at a conservative estimate, a quarter of
our adult lives working. There are two ways to answer this question: one is to look at
people’s motivations and the other is to consider social structures. Personal explanations
focus on issues such as gaining a sense of personal identity, striving for ‘something
better’, developing specific skills, connecting to a social network and, of course, earning
money. Structural explanations suggest that the nature of work is interwoven with the
structure of society – the structure of society dictates the model of work and,
simultaneously, work supports the overarching structure of society. If we lived in
agrarian or nomadic cultures, our perception of work would be radically different. To
examine these issues in more detail, we need a better understanding of ‘work’.
What is work?
We tend to think of work as an exchange of our time and some form of labour for
money. For most of us, this type of work will take place outside the home and under
the direction of another person. Part of our work as authors of this book includes
sitting at computers at a university and at home, where we also have to apportion our
time between teaching, publishing original research and undertaking administrative
duties among other activities.
But this model of work is relatively recent and specific to industrial capitalism.
Prior to the Industrial Revolution in Western countries, work tended to be undertaken
in family groups and focused on survival rather than generating surplus capital
(Edgell 2012). Indeed, this is still true in large parts of the world today.
This modern understanding of work does not capture unpaid labour, such as
childcare and domestic chores. These tasks are assumed to be less valuable and not
recognized as ‘real’ work, partly because they have no explicit monetary value, although
you can, of course, pay other people to do this work for you. These unrecognized tasks
have tended to be disproportionately undertaken by women, which has led to a strain
on many women’s lives. Despite families becoming more egalitarian, with an increasingly
common approach to domestic work where men and women more fairly share the
burden, Bianchi et al. (2012) find that it is still women who undertake most unpaid
labour. There has also been some evidence that when men do take on more equal
amounts of childcare, they tend to have a larger share of the fun or enjoyable aspects.
There are two main consequences of this. First, it means that significant portions
of the work that women do are not recognized as work because it is unpaid. This
invisible labour includes cooking and cleaning, making and remembering
appointments, arranging children’s playdates, knowing about allergies, remembering
household goods that need replenishing and so on. While individually these tasks are
not necessarily something we would consider to be work, taken together this sort of
labour entails a significant investment of time and emotion, little of which tends to
be recognized and none of which is economically recompensed.
Second, people who work in these areas as a waged occupation, such as cleaners,
carers, cooks, early-year professionals, tend to be paid less money than people who
work in occupations of equal value. Occupations that are paid less tend to be
predominantly undertaken by women and people from minority ethnic backgrounds,
further reproducing inequality in society.
So, we can see that defining work is complex because the definition is both social
and political – how work is defined determines how that work is rewarded, and
which groups benefit and which do not.
COVID-19 and the value of work

The COVID-19 pandemic raised important questions about the value and importance of different
types of work. Some sectors of work were labelled as ‘key’ or ‘essential’ and people working in these
areas were required to continue going to work as they had always done, albeit with some adjustments
like social distancing measures. People working outside these essential jobs were asked to work
from home, and some countries provided ‘furlough’, a paid leave of absence from their work.
This opened up some key sociological questions about what kinds of work are tangibly and
immediately valuable in modern capitalism. For example, while supermarket workers were
essential to help keep everyone fed, top-flight footballers stopped working and life went on
without too much disruption. That’s not to say that footballers are expendable or should not
return to work; life would be pretty boring without sportspeople, actors or musicians to entertain
us. But the question is: What types of work, and workers, do we need rather than want?
This kind of thinking about who is needed also demonstrated how different kinds of work are
valued by society, in terms of pay and status. Many of the workers who were labelled as ‘essential’
worked in low-paid and low-status jobs. Consider care home staff. Given their role in caring for
some of the most vulnerable members of society, care workers were seen as key workers doing
emotionally and physically difficult work at a time of great risk. However, care work does not
occupy a high status and pay and conditions for carers are often poor.
What this shows is that the importance of work is often out of step with how workers are
treated by employers and viewed by society. This issue, though, is not new for sociologists.
Research has looked at low-paid, low-status work that is deemed vital for society. One way that
this has been understood is using the idea of ‘dirty work’, which refers to work that is somehow
tainted and most people do not want to do. Think, for example, of refuse collectors, who
encounter soiled nappies/diapers, rotting food and other nasties that we put in our rubbish bins.
This work is absolutely essential for everyday life to function properly but refuse workers are not
particularly well paid and are certainly not afforded a high status (see Hamilton et al. 2019).
Why do we work?
Sociologist C. Wright Mills (1973 p. 219) argued that ‘for most employees, work has
a generally unpleasant quality’. Drawing on a Marxist argument, he suggested that
workers in contemporary society are alienated from the content of their work as they
have limited control over it. Mills (1973 p. 228) suggested that, for most workers,
work is simply a ‘sacrifice of time, necessary to build a life outside of it’ and argued
that, where workers are satisfied with their work, it is not so much the actual doing of
the work that is the source of this satisfaction but the power, status and money that
work provides. Why, then, do we bother working at all?
There are several sociological explanations. As discussed in Chapter 2, Max Weber
argued that work took on a moralistic meaning in the late 17th century – what he
called the ‘Protestant work ethic’ – where working hard in your ‘calling’ (the
obligations imposed on an individual by their position in the world) and being
disciplined were thought to be ways to become ‘chosen’ by God. We can see this
moralistic framing of work still evident today: being a hard worker is still imbued
with positive connotations.
Other scholars have suggested that work provides a framework for constructing
a positive identity (Ashforth and Mael 1989). Even when work is stigmatized in some
way, workers reframe, refocus and revalue their work in order to present themselves
and their work in a positive light (Ashforth and Kreiner 1999). Roberts (2013, 2018)
has shown this is the case with young working-class men in the service sector – men Service
who have taken on jobs that were once deemed solely for women, and adapted them sector:a
or their perception of them to fit their conceptions of masculinity. In addition to sector of the
this, sociologists have highlighted the positive social connections, friendships and economy
focused on
intimate relationships that work can facilitate (Kakabadse and Kakabadse 2004).
providing a
Unemployment is also seen to have negative effects on identity (Kelvin 1981). service rather
The value or otherwise of work may become an increasingly pressing question. than goods
The growing automation of technology we are witnessing, from driverless cars to
(artificially) intelligent robots, means that we may be approaching a time when there
simply is not enough work to share between people. Indeed, work is changing in a
number of ways, which means that how we currently understand and value it as a
society is a pressing sociological issue.
The changing nature of work

In Western societies, work has changed significantly over the past century or so (see
Chapter 6). One significant change has been the increase in the number of women
working, the socalled ‘feminization’ of the workforce. Standing (1999) demonstrated
that this was a global trend, with 71.4 per cent of developing countries and 72.9 per
cent of developed countries showing an increase in the number of women working
from 1975 onwards. Research shows that women are more likely to be well represented
in the workforce in less religious countries and where paid maternity leave schemes
exist, as well as in more economically developed countries (Beamusca et al. 2015). In
the West, women who worked outside the home in the early 20th century tended to
be from lower socioeconomic classes, were concentrated in domestic and other
service work and rarely occupied high-status positions in organizations. Today,

women from across the social class spectrum work in a multitude of sectors and
there are many women in high-status positions.
However, women are still underrepresented in the most prestigious work
sectors (law, medicine, engineering and science) and at the highest levels of
organizations (in the boardroom). In addition, there is still a significant gender
pay gap, with men frequently earning more than women for the same job. This is
despite second-wave feminists drawing attention to the gender pay gap back in
the 1970s and several laws that are meant to ensure that women and men are paid
equally. Although increased female participation in the labour market is
understood by feminist scholars as liberating women and giving them financial
independence, inequalities persist.
The nature of work has also changed significantly. At the turn of the 20th century,
much of the Western world was heavily reliant on manufacturing as a source of
income, but today the service sector is by far the largest employer. By service sector,
we refer to jobs that are based in the production of services (for business and
customers) rather than based on the production of goods. This is sometimes also
called affective labour (Hardt 1999). Working in shops, cafes, call centres, transport,
hairdressing and sales are all examples of service sector jobs. Working in the service
sector requires a very different set of skills from the manufacturing sector – it
prioritizes what are often referred to as ‘soft skills’, such as good communication,
looking presentable and emotional labour (Hochschild 1983). These are all skills
women are traditionally assumed to have a ‘natural’ aptitude for; thus, the increased
availability of jobs requiring these skills goes some way to explaining the feminization
of the workforce. In the Eastern world and developing countries, the nature of work
has also changed significantly, becoming increasingly characterized by manufacturing
rather than agriculture.
Recently, entrepreneurialism has also become a much more salient feature of
Western labour markets. The US Bureau of Labor Statistics (2016) found that 10.1
per cent of the US population was self-employed in 2015. These rates significantly
increased after the economic downturn of 2008 and have remained relatively steady.
Uncertainty about a country’s economic health and its labour market are key drivers
of an increase in self-employment, but sociologists have also looked at more
ideological reasons behind increased entrepreneurialism. Richard Sennett (1998)
argued that the uncertainty of modern labour markets means that people are unable
to form positive connections with, or fulfil their identities through, work because
they have to change jobs so frequently. Instead, they look to self-employment to
express their ‘authentic’ selves. In this way, self-employment can be understood as a
way of resisting the capitalist ‘rat race’.
However, this notion of entrepreneurialism and personal fulfilment can be
romanticized. Self-employment entails a high degree of precariousness and
uncertainty, even if such uncertainty has been ‘rebranded’ through notions of
‘freedom’ and ‘flexibility’ to appear much less problematic. This ‘flexibility’ may be
appealing for young, mobile entrepreneurs but is much more challenging for those
with caring responsibilities and a mortgage to pay.
The future of work is another serious concern for sociologists. Primarily, this
concern has focused on automation and increased precariousness. Workers have Automation:
been concerned about the implications of automation since the early 19th century. the
The Luddites were English textile workers who smashed the new cotton mill introduction
of automatic
machinery out of fear that their traditional way of life would be destroyed and they
equipment
would lose their jobs to new machinery that was quicker and cheaper than manual – robots,
workers (Thompson 1963). People are still concerned about automation and the machines and
effect on jobs, and, sporadically, articles appear in the media informing us that our computers –
jobs will in the future be done by robots. Braverman’s (1974) classic work on in a manu
deskilling, however, argued that workers’ anger and concerns about automation facturing or
should not be directed at the technologies themselves (as the Luddites did) but at the other work
class and power structures of modern capitalism, which focus on companies attaining environment
a monopoly over a particular area of production, no matter the cost.
Related to this, sociologists have also drawn attention to the risk of increased
precariousness in future labour markets. As machines and computers are increasingly
able to undertake work, human workers will be needed less regularly. This means that
permanent, long-term contracts will be rarer and people will increasingly engage in
irregular work, often called the ‘gig economy’. The gig economy has become
increasingly entrenched with the rise of digital technologies, where individuals can
earn money from assets they own or use apps to sell their labour, through companies
such as Uber and Deliveroo.
Guy Standing (2016) has been highly critical of this move towards precarious and
irregular labour and argued that a new social class is emerging – the ‘precariat’ (an
amalgamation of the words ‘precarious’ and ‘proletariat’). He argued that the precariat
is characterized by chronic underemployment – people work fewer hours than they
want and so do not earn enough to make a decent living – and insecurity. While forms
of flexible working can be beneficial for people in certain life situations, particularly
young people fitting in work around education, the normalization of this type of work
is thought to be indicative of just how deep the roots of modern capitalism go.
Autonomist Marxists have theorized the changing nature of work as part of the
increased society of control that they argue we now live in (see Chapter 9). This examines the
everyday workplace resistance techniques of the working classes, such as being absent,
coming in late and not working as hard as they could, and the changes that such resistance
can bring about in the capitalist system outside traditional organizations like political
parties and trade unions. Writing in this tradition, Deleuze (1992) argued that the
boundaries between work and personal life are blurred, with the result that while it
appears that we have more freedom we are also subject to more control. For example,
many jobs allow work from home but, at the same time, employers now also expect
workers to take phone calls or answer emails outside core working hours. For autonomist
Marxists, this tension between freedom and control in work is also evident in forms of
workplace surveillance: whereas workers previously would have been physically watched
by a manager while they were at work, we are now subject to surveillance through complex
matrixes of information, such as how long we spend online and what websites we visit.
This information is available not only to our employers but can also be shared with
authorities and even used by and sold to companies to market products to us.

In 2017, the billionaire business-
man Bill Gates called for a tax on
robots. What is your response to
this idea?
It might initially sound surreal,
but given what we know about
automation, alongside Marxist
theories of the economy, perhaps
it has merit. A tax on robots
would shift the cost of automation
from the worker (who would face
losing their job to it) to the
businesses (who would pay this © Getty Images/Marin Thomas
tax on it). If these tax revenues
were then reserved to support people displaced from work by robots, it might help offset
the potential impact of automation.
Considering this, has your view of the idea changed?
Employability
At school, college and university, you will be encouraged to think about your own
relationship with work in terms of what you want to do after you finish your education.
Your university or college will have services and opportunities that are designed to put
you in the best possible position for securing employment when you leave education.
Employability: These focus on increasing your employability: that is, how attractive you are to potential
how attractive future employers. Over the past two decades, schools and universities have focused
individuals are much more on supporting students’ employability. The intention is to make sure that
to employers students are work-ready, that they have the skills and experiences employers are looking
and, by
extension,
for, when they leave education, through activities like careers fairs, guest speakers and
how easy it key skills modules – and you will find that every university has a careers centre.
will be to get a This increase in support that schools and universities give to students’ employability
job is known in the UK as the employability agenda but is not limited to UK universities.
Part of the reason for the introduction of the employability agenda in universities
was the increase in student numbers, the widening of university to previously
underrepresented groups and the subsequent upskilling and professionalization that
accompanied these changes. With so many people being educated to degree level,
there was a concern that having a degree was no longer ‘enough’ – students needed
additional skills and experiences that would be valued by employers.
The employability agenda can also be seen to be rooted in neoliberal ideas about
personal responsibility, whereby being successful in a particular sector of social life
lies with an individual, irrespective of the wider landscape of that particular sector.
As such, having or not having a job is framed as being down to the success or failure
of the individual (their own ‘employability’, or lack of) rather than the wider state of
the labour market, such as whether there are actually jobs available or not.
While the employability agenda supports students to gain useful experiences and
coaches them to present their experiences in particular ways, it fails to recognize
inequality of opportunity. Being employable means, in part, having extracurricular
experiences, such as senior memberships of societies, internships and study abroad
opportunities. Some of these experiences are, however, more easily secured through
personal networks, meaning that students whose networks do not include influential
people are disadvantaged. Broadly speaking, students from lower socioeconomic
groups and minority ethnic students are less likely than their White, middle-class
counterparts to have access to people who can facilitate extracurricular activities
such as these. These inequalities have been theorized as part of a symbolic economy
of class, with these networks contributing to a set of ‘capitals’ that impact on
opportunities and experiences (Bourdieu 1984; see Chapter 8).
Moreover, the employability agenda assumes that all students will succeed in
extracurricular activities like internships and memberships of societies. However,
these activities rely on a set of skills, knowledge and codes most often part of a
White, middle-class habitus (Bourdieu 1984; Sennett and Cobb 1972). Consider the
following: imagine you are undertaking an internship and are invited out for dinner
with senior partners in the firm. As you sit at the table, you notice that there are
several sets of cutlery and three types of wine glasses. Then, the person next to you
begins to talk about a recent opera they went to see and the person opposite starts
to talk about an exotic holiday they are planning. If this situation and the conversations
do not reflect your prior experiences, the chances are you will have a rather
uncomfortable time, be less able to bond with your colleagues and ultimately less
likely to ‘succeed’ at your internship. This is not because you are incapable but
because your habitus does not match.
The benefits of employability

Although we have encouraged you to take a critical approach to the employability agenda, it is
still something you will need to engage with and it is never too early to start. You do not
necessarily need to know what you want to do as a career but you should start to think about
what kinds of skills employers might be looking for and how you match up against these. When
doing this, you should not be afraid to admit if you are lacking skills in certain areas. Where you
do see room for improvement, look for ways to improve: join a student society, try to get some
voluntary or work experience, enrol on a course.
If you are reading this at university, you should also make sure you do two things. First, start writing
a CV and regularly update it as you acquire new skills or experiences. Second, book an appointment
with your college or university careers service to discuss your skills, CV and career plans.
THINKING SOCIOLOGICALLY ABOUT STRUCTURES

AND INSTITUTIONS
Social institutions are culturally and historically contingent and are the result of
social norms and tangible organizations that enforce these rules. Today’s Western
social institutions are relatively recent, emerging in their current forms during the
Industrial Revolution. We have examined four of the key social institutions in society
– family, education, media and work – and have explored the ways in which these
institutions have been analysed and understood by sociologists. We could have
looked at many other institutions – from sport and leisure to medicine and health –
and the way we have approached them can be applied to other areas.
In each of the four cases, studying the implicit and taken-for-granted norms of
institutions yields important and surprising results. For example, when focusing on
education, examining the institution of education confounds some of our
expectations about meritocracy and the success of education as an institution –
education does not necessarily reward the most innately able or the hardest working.
Indeed, success is determined in no small part by how well suited a person is to the
forms of assessment that are used. Similarly, the sociology of the media tells us that
how we enjoy our leisure time and the culture we like may have more negative effects
than we realize. Are we cultural dupes who waste our time when we could be actively
campaigning for positive social change? The study of structures and institutions is a
vital part of sociology precisely because it challenges our preconceived ideas of
society, helps root out injustice and inequality, and has the potential to effect
progressive social change in the future.
CONCLUSION
This chapter has shown that society is highly organized through invisible social
structures. These structures both constrain and enable our individual behaviours and
are supported by social institutions, some of which are formal and others informal.
These institutions socialize us into particular behaviours and roles in society, which
allow us to maintain the existing social structures. We have explored the ways in
which sociologists have critiqued institutions and the social structures they support,
focusing on education, the family, the media and work. Some of the more radical
sociological thinkers have even suggested we move away from social institutions
altogether, assuming that this would eventually lead to the collapse of some of the
more problematic structures that are built on inequality.
HOW WOULD…?
■■ How would a qualitative sociologist study representations in the media from an
empirical perspective?
–– Think back to Chapter 4. What key methods might be used to practically
examine the more abstract ideas of cultural theorists like Stuart Hall? What
areas would you look at?
–– Say you wanted to study the elites in the media who control how ethnic mi-
norities are represented on TV. What issues might you examine, and what
do you think you might find in undertaking this study?
■■ What types of work are ‘essential’ for capitalism?
–– How are these types of work constructed and thought of in society?
–– Should some key workers be paid more, given that their work is so important?
–– How should society show appreciation for those who continued to work in
risky contexts during the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic? Should this be the
same for doctors, nurses, cleaners and supermarket workers, all of whom
were classed as key workers?

Brooks, R. (2018) Education and Society: Places, Policies, Processes. London: Red Globe Press.
Provides a wide-ranging discussion of the key debates within the sociology of education. It provides
an international perspective to address core questions about the purpose of education, who is in
control of institutionalized education, and the impacts of education on diverse groups.
Dempsey, D. and Lindsay, J. (2015) Families, Relationships and Intimate Life. Oxford: Oxford University
Press.
Situates the sociology of the family in historical and cultural contexts, including understanding
intersections of race, sexuality, class and gender. Key issues of childhood, parenting, intimacy and
violence are all considered and how they relate to the family as a social institution.
Grint, K. and Nixon, D. (2015) The Sociology of Work (4th edn). Cambridge: Polity.
Established textbook providing a holistic examination of work that is accessible and engages with the
key debates in the field. Providing a historical and theoretical account of work, it also draws out key
issues related to class, gender and race, as well as thinking about technological change and globalization.
Hodkinson, P. (2016) Media, Culture and Society: An Introduction (2nd edn). London: Sage.
Examines the issues and debates around understanding the media in society. As well as introducing
the elements of the media, it also offers ways to understand the power the media exerts and who
controls it. Finally, it examines how the media intersects with race, ethnicity, gender and sexuality to
develop an overarching account of media in society.

Chapter 8
Social Divisions
INTRODUCTION
Many sociologists are interested in examining inequality in society and how some
people gain privilege at the expense of others. One of the primary ways this is studied
is by examining social divisions, where these stratifications are the results of social
structures and human interaction. Crucially, these divisions are not fixed and can be
changed for the better. In this chapter, we examine social divisions that are based on
class, race, gender and sexuality that are present across Western societies. We discuss
theories that seek to understand inequality and oppression in these areas, and how
people have sought to contest them. In our Provocation, we ask why segregation is
acceptable in sport.
SOCIETIES DIVIDED
We are not all treated equally. In society, we are set against each other as individuals
and as groups. Sadly, societies too often are divided and one social group will
frequently find itself discriminated against by another or even by the society as a
whole. There are a great many ways we oppose each other and, despite rarely being
at literal war with one another, we are nonetheless engaged in conflict. Consciously
or not, you are part of that conflict.
Division often occurs because of structural and cultural reasons. Consider the
experience of a friend of the second author who taught at a mostly Black high school
in Southern California in the late 1990s. The school was just eight miles from one of
the finest beaches in Southern California, but most of his pupils had never seen it or any
other beach. There were structural reasons for this: most of these students did not
have easy access to a car to get there and there was no easy route via public transport.
Simultaneously, cultural reasons discouraged them: these young people spoke about
feeling out of place in White neighbourhoods, and this particular beach was inhabited
almost entirely by White people. As we shall discuss later, such feelings of being out of
place are the result of cultural norms and social inequalities that are structural and
deeply entrenched (Bhopal 2018). Elijah Anderson (2015) called this ‘the White space’,
and Black Americans felt such places to be informally ‘off limits’.
200
Social Divisions 201
Social divisions take many forms, and we are interested in those where
inequality is structured in the organization of society. This form of social
division is often called social stratification. The other core fact with these Social
divisions is that they are the result of social processes. Skin colour, for example, stratification:
is a biological characteristic, but the values ascribed to that skin colour, and how the structured
and uneven
certain groups of people experience considerable oppression because of skin
division of
colour, are the result of society. groups of
people in
society
© C_Fernandes/iStock
Which social divisions does this image convey to you?
Sometimes, these divisions are literally built into cities through architecture and
urban planning (see the picture above). This is also the case with disability. The social
model of disability highlights that while people with disabilities have impairments
that impact on their lives, it is the social organization of society that has the greatest
negative impact on disabled people (Oliver 1983). It is not difficulty in walking that
excludes people with this impairment from participating in society, but the lack of
wheelchair ramps and other mechanisms that make buildings and public space more
accessible (Kitchin 1998). Take a look at the maps of city centre public transport
systems and find out about how much or how little is wheelchair accessible: the
London underground network is particularly revealing in this regard.
Societies do not have to exist this way. Rather, inequality is the result of how
societies are organized; if that organization is changed, things can become fairer. So
the study of social divisions is not just about cataloguing and understanding inequality
and oppression, but thinking about social justice and how society can become fairer
and more equitable.
Class, race, gender and sexuality

When discussing social divisions, issues of class, gender and race are central to these
debates in contemporary sociology. There are several reasons why these categories
have emerged as core to sociology, but one key factor is that they are dominant ways
in which many societies are divided, and around which political movements have
developed. The importance of sexuality is increasingly recognized as both a social
identity and a structuring force in society, although it remains marginalized in
contemporary sociology compared to the other three divisions. Gender, race and
sexuality are helpful to consider sociologically, because they are all things that are
seen as personal characteristics more often than they are understood as vectors
through which societies are structured and divided.
Stratifications of class and race manifest differently by country and context. In
India, for example, the caste system is a social hierarchy that combines elements of
class, race and religion in a manner distinct from the UK and the USA. In Australia, the
history of British colonization and the oppression of Aboriginal peoples requires an
understanding beyond US theories of race, even though similar racist arguments were
used to legitimize horrific oppression. As discussed in Chapter 6, this is best understood
not through racism but territoriality and a logic of elimination (Wolfe 2006).
Class is perhaps the most established of these areas, certainly in British sociology
(Savage 2000). Both Marx and Weber developed influential theories of class division, and
how inequality was structured through these divides established class as an important
characteristic. Ken Roberts (2011) highlighted that unlike race and gender, which were
held to be biological characteristics for the early parts of the 20th century, class has long
been recognized as a social construction and thus the domain of sociology. Mike Savage
(2000) also noted that the study of class became dominant in Britain in the 1960s because
it allowed British sociologists to distinguish themselves from American sociologists who
had developed functionalist approaches to class (see Chapter 3). It also enabled
connections with more established disciplines such as economics.
In America, it is race that is the primary marker of division. While W.E.B. Du
Bois (1899) developed sociological analysis of race as a social construct, it took
longer for it to be established as a legitimate object of sociological study – not least
because of the structural exclusion of Du Bois from sociology’s history (see Chapter
2). Yet racism has been a central feature of American social life, from institutionalized
slavery to the Jim Crow laws that kept African Americans segregated from White
Americans, and an approach to interpreting and enforcing the law that unfairly
polices people of colour to this day (Goffman 2015; see Chapter 9). In this chapter,
we discuss key components of the sociology of race. This is not limited to American
sociology, as racism occurs across the globe, but we do draw on particularly influential
American sociologists and schools of thought in this chapter.
Our third area of focus is gender. As discussed in Chapter 2, women made
significant contributions to early sociology and their contributions were then erased
(Deegan 1990). This was in the context of oppression against women, who were
denied the right to vote or own land. Laws also stated that it was the duty of wives
to have sex with their husbands, and so it was not legally possible for a husband to
rape a wife – meaning that women did not have control over their bodies during this
time. Just as with class and race, gender was a core political issue across much of the
20th century – from women’s suffrage (the right to vote) to laws around equal pay
and accessing abortion legally.
We finish the chapter by considering sexuality. The regulation of sexuality is a
powerful force across many societies, yet it has often escaped attention as a social
division because it was subsumed within other issues or not deemed worthy of study.
Prior to the early work on sexual deviance in the mid-twentieth century (e.g. Gagnon
and Simon 1967), same-sex sexuality was widely censured and illegal in many
countries, and sociology did little to contest this framing. Early feminist accounts of
women’s sexuality also focused on issues of gender, arguing that sexuality was a
component of gender and not a separate issue (MacKinnon 1982). It was only with
the combination of feminist debates about sexuality (see Rubin 1984) alongside civil
rights protests from lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans people (Weeks 2007) that sexuality
began to be understood as a key form of social division in the West.
CLASS
The social elements of class
We introduced the core ideas of Karl Marx’s critique of capitalism in Chapter 3. One
criticism of Marx’s position on class and the economy was the significance he attributed
to universal economic rules at the expense of the role of society. One of the early
attempts to understand the social aspects of class in British society was the work of
Charles Booth, a social reformer and researcher. His book Life and Labour of the People in
London (1889) collected survey data on people who lived and worked in London in the
late 1800s and discussed their occupation and the realities of their lives. He developed
poverty maps of various areas in London, and his research was influential in developing
early forms of welfare for London’s poor – particularly the young and elderly.
Moving on from the focus on economic problems, in his influential book The
Making of the English Working Class, E.P. Thompson (1963) explored the everyday
cultures of working-class people in the late 18th and early 19th centuries in England.
Documenting the songs, customs, social activities, rituals and more, Thompson
(1963 p. 12) brought focus to the experiences of working-class people to combat
what he called ‘the enormous condescension of posterity’. While some of the
working-class movements may now be seen as misguided in their political actions,
such as the Luddite textile workers who destroyed new machines that threatened
their jobs and way of life, Thompson (1963 p. 12) makes the important point:
they lived through these times of acute social disturbance, and we did not.
Their aspirations were valid in terms of their own experience; and, if they
were casualties of history, they remain, condemned in their own lives, as
casualties. Our only criterion of judgment should not be whether or not a
man’s actions are justified in the light of subsequent evolution.
When considering the broader history of the working class, or other groups,
retrospectively, it is incomplete without considering the experiences of these groups as
the events happened.
Thompson (1963 p. 9) also discussed the active ways class was created through
social interaction: ‘I do not see class as a “structure”, nor even as a “category”, but
as something which in fact happens … in human relationships.’ He highlighted how
the working class developed a collective consciousness through working values that
included collectivism, mutuality and religious conviction. In this way, class is not a
‘thing’, as traditionally held in Marxist work, but a process and a ‘happening’, a
relationship of groups of people forming a social and political movement, collectively.
Poverty and inequality

Poverty comes in several forms, and there is a difference between absolute and relative poverty.
Relative poverty means that those who are in poverty today have a different standard of living
to those in poverty in Victorian times. Practically all citizens in the West have access to clean
water, free education, food that will not poison you and a certain standard of healthcare. The
mass production of goods has also reduced the prices of luxury items, meaning that many poor
people have smartphones or other forms of technology.
Most Western citizens do not live in absolute poverty. Few Westerners would elect to swap
their position to live in a very poor part of the world, for purely financial reasons, and we suspect
that even fewer would seek to live like the working class of 200 years ago (Pinker 2018).
Yet sociologists highlight the importance of inequality in wealth, and why relative poverty
matters. In their influential book The Spirit Level: Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do
Better, Kate Pickett and Richard Wilkinson (2009) demonstrate that more equal societies tend
to do better and that inequality in society erodes trust, increases anxiety and illness, and
encourages excessive consumption. Using statistical analysis to compare large datasets across
many countries, they showed that all the social problems that are more common at the lower
end of the social ladder are also more common in more unequal societies. So, while relative
poverty means that poor people are not generally living in the horrific conditions that Marx and
others described, the inequality still present in many Western societies means that relative
poverty continues to be a pressing social issue.
It is important to recognize the social effects of class beyond determining where

one lives and what one can afford. Richard Sennett and Jonathan Cobb (1972) wrote
about the ‘hidden injuries of class’, underlining how working-class people were
marginalized. With resonances of Du Bois’ concept of double consciousness
(Chapter 2), Sennett and Cobb (1972 pp. 33–4) wrote:
This fear of being summoned before some hidden bar of judgment and
being found inadequate infects the lives of people who are coping perfectly
well from day to day: it is a matter of hidden weight, a hidden anxiety, in the
quality of experience, a matter of feeling inadequately in control where an
observer making calculations would conclude the workingman had adequate
control.
This experience runs from stereotyping about accents to the knowledge that many
institutions, such as schools, are organized around the norms of the middle class.
Diane Reay (2017), for example, discusses the experience of a high-achieving,
working-class boy in an inner-city school and the social complexities and psychological
stressors of maintaining a White working-class masculinity simultaneously with an
educationally successful identity.
While it is vital to recognize the economic components and basis of much of
what constitutes social class, we also have to engage with the ways in which class is
social and influences everyday life. In order to understand this further, we turn again
to the work of Pierre Bourdieu.
Pierre Bourdieu and capitals

This social component of class adds a great deal of complexity to understanding
how to theorize it. One key reason for this is because class is not fixed. Consider
someone who has parents with manual labour jobs, attended a comprehensive (state)
school, and grew up in a working-class area. His hobbies were working on his
motorbike and playing football with friends, and he spoke with a regional accent.
There were very few books in his house. At age 17, he would be accurately categorized
as working class.
And yet how would we understand this person if he was accepted to the
University of Oxford to study English Literature? Would he still be working class?
Probably so, particularly as his experience at Oxford would be very different from
those with middle- and upper-class backgrounds. But what if he went on to study
for a PhD, and then became a lecturer at Oxford? What if he became a professor
and renowned as a leading world authority who regularly appeared on the BBC?
Finally, what if he was made a lord in the British Houses of Parliament? By the
time our working-class young man has become a world-leading professor of
English literature and a member of the House of Lords, few would consider him
working or middle class. Even if he was not part of the aristocracy, most would see
him as socially elite and upper class.
The interesting question here is not that he has changed class, nor is it to try and
label his current class position, but to understand the process of class change.
Traditional class models do not account for this – asking about income, job type and
other socioeconomic questions over the course of this person’s life might show a
gradual shift in class position (not least, as income changed), but that would not
capture the experiences or complexity of this transition (see below for further
discussion of social mobility).
Read the eVox Pop from Matthew Ripley at www.macmillanihe.com/

McCormack-Discovering-Sociology-2e for a personal account and insight
into this kind of social class transformation.
One of the key modern theorists to explore the complexities of this transition is
French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu (1930–2002). Bourdieu recognized that class is
more than just about money. As with Weber, he argued that class can, instead, be
understood as a set of ‘capitals’ (Bourdieu 1984) – economic, cultural, social and
symbolic forms. Alongside money and wealth, we all have non-financial assets that
can promote social mobility, including education, accent and style of dress. If you
own art or play a classical musical instrument, you have different experiences than
Cultural someone who does not. Bourdieu classified these things as cultural capital. Many
capital: middle-class people speak of growing up around books, of living with parents who
non-financial owned books and encouraged them to read; many working-class people speak of
assets that growing up watching the television instead. In this context, books are forms of
can promote
cultural capital.
social
mobility
Social capital refers to the cultural resources a person has accrued via their
networks and group membership – the social capital of someone whose main
friendship groups are part of a gang is markedly different from someone whose
Social friends sing together in a local church choir. Bourdieu defines social capital as ‘the
capital:the sum of the resources, actual or virtual, that accrue to an individual or a group by
cultural
resources a
virtue of possessing a durable network of more or less institutionalized relationships
person has of mutual acquaintance and recognition’ (Bourdieu and Wacquant 1992 p. 119).
based on Thus, social capital can be the shared childcare support that a group of parents offer
their one another; similarly, it is the sharing of food and resources that workingclass
networks and communities develop (Ehenreich 2001). It is also why many well-known journalists
group and actors have parents who were also famous in their profession – it is not a
membership hereditary skill but who you know (O’Brien et al. 2016).
These capitals (or forms of privilege) are not the only forms that exist. Who you
know is also very important. Think of YouTube celebrities: these people might not
make significant amounts of money directly from their vlogs, yet they will still have
benefits from their status. This includes access to events, meeting other celebrities
and the possibility of new employment opportunities in more traditional media.
Symbolic Bourdieu calls this symbolic capital. This can be used to explain differences in
capital:one’s experience between similar groups of people.
prestige in a These capitals come together to form a symbolic economy of class that enables
social group, consideration of these different aspects of a person’s life beyond the economic. This
such as
is important because these forms of capital can be quite closely entwined. Sometimes
reputation
and celebrity these forms of capital can be hard to differentiate – not least in deciding whether
something is a cultural or social capital. This is partly because of the complexity of
the issue, but also because these capitals become interchangeable over time.
Consider the earlier example of the working-class boy who became a lord and
worldrenowned professor of English literature. Undoubtedly, his class position
changed. His income will certainly have increased and place him within the upper-
class salary range. His attendance at Oxford and his position in the House of Lords
will enhance both his symbolic and social capital. The University of Oxford is a
prestigious institution, and so he will gain prestige from that (symbolic capital). It
also opens networks and connections that he would not have otherwise (social
capital). These forms of capital are intricately interrelated.
Thus Bourdieu’s theorizing helps us understand how class inequality can take
multiple forms. While economic position, not least in terms of salary and inherited
wealth, matters greatly, Bourdieu’s symbolic economy of class and other similar theories
recognize the social and cultural aspects of class inequality (Atkinson et al. 2012).
Sociological thinking about class today

Bourdieu’s theorizing of capitals and a symbolic economy of class enabled
consideration of different aspects of a person’s life beyond the economic. His ideas
and concepts still have great relevance today and are even undergoing something of
a renaissance. One particularly newsworthy study was the BBC’s Great British Class
Survey. Launched in 2011, more than 161,000 people took part, making it the biggest
survey of class ever in the UK.
The survey emerged as a result of two key issues in theorizing social class. First,
concerns were growing about how the old conceptualization of class – as having working,
middle and upper classes – no longer captured how British society was stratified. Not
least, how the concept of ‘upper class’ made little sense as it spoke to aristocracy (lords
and ladies, dukes and duchesses and so on) and did not describe the super-rich who had
not inherited long-established family money, land or status. The second issue was that
while research was starting to recognize that class was far more diverse than employment
inequalities (e.g. Crompton 2008), it lacked largescale quantitative datasets that could help
understand the macro-level issues associated with diverse class groups.
The survey’s sociologists published their findings in the journal Sociology in 2013
(Savage et al. 2013). They argued that while
a large ‘rump’ of the established middle (or ‘service’) class, and the traditional
working class exists, there are five other classes which fit less easily into this
conventional sociological framing, and which reveal the extent of social
polarisation and class fragmentation in contemporary Britain. (p. 221)
Perhaps most importantly, the authors highlight the role of the most privileged in
society – those with savings of more than £100,000, and with lots of social and
cultural capital. They call this group the ‘elite’ and argue that its ‘sheer economic
advantage sets it apart from other classes’ (Savage et al. 2013 p. 245). People in this
group tend to have had very privileged upbringings as well.
The authors also argue for recognition of a ‘precariat’ class – about 15 per cent
of the population who lack any significant amount of economic, cultural or social
capital (see Chapter 2 for discussion of the precariat). Often having household
incomes of around £8,000 a year, they are likely to rent and live in old industrial
areas. Key to the class is insecurity in terms of their jobs, their ability to pay rent and
even put food on the table. The authors also expanded the ways of thinking about
the middle and working classes, but these additions were not as significant as the
focus on the elite and the precariat. Indeed, Savage (2015) argues that one of the
survey’s most important contributions was to shift class analysis away from working-
and middle-class groups to focusing on the elites.
The Great British Class Survey certainly popularized discussions of class, and
resulted in many conversations in the media. It also generated a large amount of
sociological debate. Mills (2014), for example, critiques the survey on methodological
and analytical grounds, arguing that the new formulation is too inductive (see
Chapter 4) and not built using class theory. Dorling (2014) praises the survey
and its associated publications for grappling with how class is changing in
contemporary Britain and internationally, but raises concerns – not least that
the survey asked for friends’ occupations (e.g. social and cultural capital) but
not one’s own.

You can fill out the survey, which is still available to complete online at www.bbc.co.
uk/news/magazine-22000973. What did you make of it? How accurately do you
think class is captured by the seven categories described in the Great British Class
Survey?
Social class in Australia

Based on the Great British Class Survey, Australian academics Jill Sheppard and Nicholas
Biddle (2015) surveyed 1,200 Australians about their social class. The authors argue for five
classes that included two ‘affluent classes’ that are similar to the elites mentioned in the Great
British Class Survey. They highlight that political allegiances tend to cross class lines and that
Australian sociology has tended to consider distribution of wealth or income and intergenerational
mobility, rather than focus on class as a social structure that entrenches inequality, as is more
popular in much European literature (Sheppard and Biddle 2017).
Class has been considered at various points in Australian sociology (Bennett et al. 1999;
Connell and Irving 1992). Sheppard and Biddle (2017) highlight that increasing evidence of
socioeconomic stratification in Australia means that class is increasingly useful to understand
social trends. They also document that Australians are very much aware of their class
membership, and class is meaningfully part of many Australian’s social identity. As Sheppard
and Biddle (2017 p. 513) write: ‘To the extent that Australians may perceive their society as
being relatively “classless”, at the individual-level they display a finely-honed sense of their own
relative class position.’ Because of this, they call for more consideration of class as an issue in
Australian politics and sociological debates, rather than reliance of the language of mobility,
cohesion and other similar terms.
You can take the Australian ‘Working class or affluent’ questionnaire online, at www.abc.net.
au/news/2015-10-28/social-class-survey-where-you-fit-in-australia/6869864?nw=0.
RACIAL DIVISIONS
Race is a major form of social division in society, although
this is not inevitable. The Ancient Greeks, for example, did
not care about race but divided people according to whether
they spoke Greek. In many medieval societies, religion was
the key way to categorize and differentiate between people.
Race was far less important in these contexts.
There are numerous broad (macro-level) social changes
that resulted in race gaining importance, and one of the
central, and most troubling, was its use as a concept to
legitimize slavery. While slavery has been a horrific social
problem across many different civilizations and eras, it
expanded massively in Europe and America in the 16th and
17th centuries as Europeans built better ships and started to
explore beyond the European land mass (Rawley and
Behrendt 2005). Technological changes meant cheap labour
was needed to expand farming and industry – with
competition between bordering countries that were regularly
at war with each other. One of the solutions to this was
slavery. European settlers in America also introduced slavery
to build the country’s new cities and infrastructure. The
prosperity and wealth of America and European countries
today is the result of slavery (see Chapter 6). © MPI/Getty Images
We look upon slavery today as a truly horrendous scar An enslaved man showing his scars
on Western history. Yet there were many people living at
the time who did not see slavery as a problem. There are a lot of reasons for this, but
fundamental to them was the belief that ‘slaves’ were not equal to non-slaves – that
enslaved people were not fully human. ‘Race’ was used to justify the gross inequality
in treatment and status between different groups – to explain why people with one
skin colour were ‘less than’ people of another skin colour. In other words, racism or
racist ideologies were the way that people justified the horrors of slavery.
It is because of this troubled history that many people do not like to use the term
‘race’. However, there are different norms cross-culturally related to the use of the term.
Some argue that it is an entirely damaging construct that should never be used; some
suggest using quotation marks to recognize the damaged history of the construct
(‘race’); others discuss critical theories of race; while others use the term and distinguish
Ethnicity:
between race as a shared lineage and a presumed shared physical characteristic, with a socially
ethnicity relating to cultural characteristics instead (Kivisto and Croll 2012). created
Ethnicity is another important term when discussing these issues. People of a system of
particular ethnicity will often have similar skin colour, but skin colour is not close to classifying
being equivalent to ethnicity. Many of you will have filled out forms, particularly people on the
related to jobs or educational institutions, which ask you to choose your ethnicity. In basis of
the UK, options will often include White British, White Irish, Asian British and cultural or
Black British, among many others. The point is that these ethnicities are distinguished nationality
differences
by a range of factors, and they do not necessarily pertain to skin colour.
Slavery and the USA

America’s founding fathers adopted a constitution that legitimized slavery in 1776, although
slavery had been part of American culture since 1625. Over the years, the ‘land of the free’
became a very rich nation through slave labour. Abraham Lincoln finally administered the
emancipation proclamation freeing enslaved people in 1863, but this was done at least as much
out of political necessity as social justice: three years into a bitter Civil War, Lincoln needed
more soldiers to fight in his war, while simultaneously weakening the slavery-powered economy
of the rebel South. The agreement that was reached included a commitment that each enslaved
person would be given 40 acres of land and a mule. However, unlike for survivors of later
government-induced atrocities, the promise of reparations was never honoured. There remains
a strong case for paying reparations (Coates 2014).
Without access to the means of production – without owning capital, land, factories or resources
– newly freed Black slaves survived by working for the owners of industry or their previous owners
as tenant farmers. They had more freedom in theory, but the Jim Crow laws still discriminated
against African Americans, and covert racism made life very difficult. Their lack of resources and
racism in the population left them vulnerable to overt and institutional discrimination.
African Americans became ghettoized, living in squalor, paying rent on buildings owned by
White people, and working in White people’s homes, farms and factories. In 1968, Martin
Luther King Jr referred to this in a speech in Washington, DC:
In 1863 the Negro was told that he was free as a result of The Emancipation Proclamation
being signed by Abraham Lincoln. But he was not given any land to make that freedom
meaningful … And the irony of it all is that at the same time that the nation failed to do
anything for the Black man, it was giving away millions of acres of land in the West and the
Midwest … [to] white peasants from Europe … Not only did it give [whites] land, but it built
land-grant colleges to teach them how to farm. It provided low interest rates so that they
could mechanise their farms … And these are some of the very people who tell Negroes that
they must lift themselves by their own bootstraps.
Scholars have also demonstrated that the use of prisons changed markedly at the end of the slave
trade (Davis 2003). While the 13th Amendment of the US Constitution ostensibly abolished
slavery, it did not apply to prisoners. After the end of slavery, prisons shifted focus from trying to
reform criminals to adopting the strategies and punishments once used by slave owners.
In the USA today, there still exists a great deal of cultural and economic inequality. One key
area this occurs relates to the criminal justice system, and policing in particular (Tonry 2011;
Websdale 2001). Black Americans suffer police brutality more than White people, and are
targeted for stop and searches and pulled over for traffic infringements more than White
people (Lundman and Kaufman 2003). Black Americans continue to be overrepresented in
the US prison system today, with harsher sentences regularly given to non-White convicts.
Alexander (2020) argues that the mass incarceration of Black American men in the prison
system is, metaphorically, the new Jim Crow laws (see Chapter 2). While Black Americans
ostensibly have full legal equality, they are not treated equally under the law and experience
discrimination in a range of contexts.
Sociological theories of race and racism

The sociological study of race started with the work of W.E.B. Du Bois and his
Atlanta School (see Chapter 2). Du Bois undertook important empirical work and
developed an overarching argument that race is a social construction and that the
inequalities of race are the result of social structures, not biology. As Delgado and
Stefancic (2012 pp. 9–10) argue:
Race and races are products of social thought and relations. Not objective,
inherent, or fixed, they correspond to no biological or genetic reality … People
with common origins share certain physical traits, of course, such as skin
color, physique, and hair texture. But these constitute only an extremely small
portion of their genetic endowment, are dwarfed by that which we have in
common, and have little or nothing to do with distinctly human, higher-order
traits, such as personality, intelligence, and moral behavior.
This does not mean that there is literally no role for biology. As highlighted in the
quote, things like physique and skin colour similarities do exist, but they do not
account for the important, damaging differences explained far better by racist
behaviours, norms and structures.
VOX POP
Professor Kalwant Bhopal
Professor of Education and Social Justice
As an academic working on exploring inequalities to
do with race, gender and class, I am often defined as
someone ‘who has an axe to grind’. This is particularly
the case in relation to issues to do with race. Many
people find the subject of race and racism
uncomfortable; and this includes many academics
working in higher education. They don’t like
discussing it, and they don’t like to be confronted by
uncomfortable truths.
Universities often promote themselves as liberal
and inclusive institutions; but quite often if you
scratch the surface, you find that your race, class
and gender impact massively on how you are
positioned in universities. I am deeply passionate
about issues to do with equality, particularly race –
as an Asian woman, I experienced racism in the
playground and remember being called a ‘Paki’ and
© Martin Myers
told that I smelled of curry.
I have continued to experience racism all my life. For several years I was racially bullied by a
female, White, middle-class colleague in a university where I worked; other White, middle-class
colleagues seemed not to quite notice it was happening. In a liberal and inclusive organization, you
expect people to notice.
Racism is something that upsets me terribly and hurts me. It is something I think we should
all be aware of and something we should always be fighting against. This attitude led me to focus
on trying to use my research on minority ethnic groups to fight for issues of social justice and
equity – to create a society that values everyone and not just the few.
I use my research on education to argue that education is a right and not a privilege – every individual,
regardless of their ethnicity, gender or social class background is entitled to a quality education. So, we
must first continue to acknowledge that racism exists and is a feature for some of everyday life. A failure
to acknowledge racism results in a failure to address it and act upon it. Second, we must ensure that as
educators we continue to challenge those inequalities that favour the privileged and fight for a society
that values social justice and equity for all.
■■ How do Kalwant’s experiences of prejudice within higher education connect with theories of
gender and race discussed in this chapter?
■■ In what ways are Kalwant’s experiences structural and when are they interactional? How might these
be linked?
■■ Reflect on your own experiences growing up. How have you encountered privilege or prejudice in
your life?
–– Has your gender had an influence on your experiences? In what ways?
–– How do you think your life would have been different if you were not the gender you are?
What about your race and class?
–– Thinking about your own experiences, what concepts or theories discussed above are
most helpful in understanding your context?
One of the key ways of understanding issues of race and ethnicity has been
Critical race through critical race theory (CRT). CRT began as a theoretical movement within
theory: a set US law schools in the mid-1980s. Its core argument is that society needs to be
of critical understood and analysed primarily through a race lens (Bell 1992). Central to this
theories that argument is the idea that society is structured to privilege White people at the expense
analyse society
of people of colour. While CRT was developed in a North American context, many
primarily in
terms of race of its ideas are applicable across the world.
Discussing CRT in the context of law, Roy Brooks (1994 p. 85) provided an
overview of its core aims, arguing:
It focuses on the various ways in which the received tradition in law adversely
affects people of color not as individuals but as a group. Thus, CRT attempts
to analyze law and legal traditions through the history, contemporary
experiences, and racial sensibilities of racial minorities in this country. The
question always lurking in the background of CRT is this: What would the
legal landscape look like today if people of color were the decision-makers?
Delgado and Stefancic (2012) argue that five propositions define CRT:
1 Racism is ordinary. Rather than seeing racism as shocking or an aberration to

normal society, CRT holds that racism is a regular, expected occurrence in society.
Some sociologists also refer to this as systemic racism (Feagin 2006).
2 White privilege and power serve important purposes for the dominant group, and
they gain from it.
3 Race is a social construction. It is the product of human interaction and thus
changes over time.
4 The dominant society racializes different minority groups (see box below).
5 People of colour have a presumed competence to speak about race and racism.
Within CRT, this includes African Americans telling their stories of oppression
under the law as a way to address racism. As Delgado and Stefancic point out, this
presumption is theoretically problematic as it assumes an inherent ability based on
race, the kind of assumption criticized or rejected in other areas of CRT.
Delgado and Stefancic (2012) argue that the shifts in racialization are closely Racialization:
related to the shifting needs of society, not least the labour market. African the attribution
of particular
American Black men, for example, were portrayed as being physically inferior to values or
White men during slavery, yet are now stereotyped as being strong and dangerous stereotypes to
(Hoberman 1997). racial groups
An important further component of the study of race is to recognize that White

people are heavily implicated in these discussions (Garner 2007). That is, whiteness itself
has significant influence on social life. Dyer (1997) highlights that this includes the fact that
White people are imbued with the power to determine culturally what counts as racist.
It may be clear that CRT is not a singular theory, as we discussed in Chapter 3, but is a
collection of theories, or even a theoretical framework by which to approach social issues.
CRT has made important contributions to knowledge about the issues of race
and racism in society. However, it has also been critiqued for its primary focus on
race at the expense of other modes of oppression (Collins 2000). Most notably, it
was argued that CRT relegates gender as a mode of subordination and assumes race
is always the most important form of discrimination faced. This may be true for Black
Black men, but it is less likely to be accurate for Black women. This critique, by feminist
thought:a
scholars such as bell hooks, Patricia Hill Collins and Kimberlé Crenshaw, has become
body of
known as Black feminist thought, which can be characterized as arguing for writing that
recognition of issues of class, gender and sexuality alongside race. argues for
For example, bell hooks (1981 p. 185) powerfully critiqued the Black rights recognition
movement historically, writing. of issues of
class, gender
the dominant white patriarchy and black male patriarchy conveyed to black and sexuality
alongside
women the message that to cast a vote in favour of social equality of the
race
sexes, i.e. women’s liberation, was to cast a vote against black liberation.
Intersection Kimberlé Crenshaw (1991) made an important contribution to this debate with her
ality:the concept of intersectionality. Critiquing the sole focus of race in CRT, she argued
inter that debates about which mode of power is most important are pointless. She called
connected for recognition that different forms of power, such as race, gender and class, intersect
nature of to form complex, multifaceted oppressions. The experiences of a White heterosexual
social man are different from a Black heterosexual man; but both men’s experiences will be
categories, different from those of a lesbian woman of any race.
particularly
Patricia Hill Collins (2000) developed this further, arguing that oppressions of
how they
relate to race, class, gender and sexuality not only intersect but are mutually constituting,
oppression meaning that they reenforce each other. She also included a discussion of the role of
sexuality, which had been missing from much of the debate on these issues.
An example of intersecting oppressions

Many Black people experience racism as the primary oppression in their lives. Similarly, many
gay people experience homophobia as the primary oppression in their lives. But what if you are
gay and Black? It is not just the oppressions added together – new oppressions form as well. For
example, racism in gay communities has meant that gay Black men are often excluded from
these cultures, and consequently they have less protection from homophobia (Green 2007).
Now consider how class intersects with this. A man who is gay, Black and very rich will suffer far
less than a poor gay, Black man. Wealth will serve as a form of protection, while poverty will
exacerbate the oppressions. Certainly, being middle class and gay is a very different experience
than being gay, Black and poor.
Some of these issues are explored in the 2016 Oscar-winning film Moonlight, which
presented three stages in the life of Chiron, a Black, gay youth growing up in Miami.
The intersection of race and gender is exemplified by Sojourner Truth (1797–

1883), who was born into slavery in New York State. After gaining her freedom in
1827, she became a wellknown anti-slavery speaker and in 1851 at a Women’s
Convention in Akron, Ohio, she gave her famous speech, ‘Ain’t I a Woman?’, in
which she emphasized that her life as a Black woman was impacted by racism, but
also that the framing of women as passive and vulnerable was incompatible with the
dominant ways in which womanhood was constructed at the time.

Discovering-Sociology-2e for extracts from Sojourner Truth’s Akron speech,
plus further commentary.
In his book on the Black British middle-class, Ali Meghji (2019) develops a CRT
account of class in Britain, arguing against the notion that it is ‘beyond race’ (see also
Arday 2019; Joseph-Salisbury 2019). Rather than racism being primarily about
individual acts of violence and bigotry, he documents the structural and systematic
ways in which the British middle-class is racialized as White. With the context that
the Black middle-class are economically poorer than the White middle-class, Meghji
focuses on the consumption practices (see Chapter 3) of the Black middle-class to
document three identity modes:
1 Strategic assimilation: Black people ‘switch’ identities when around White middle-
class people to establish ‘legitimate’ membership of the middle-class.
2 Ethnoracial autonomous: Black people resist White norms and emphasize pride in
being Black.
3 Class-minded: Black people adopt the practices and discourses of ‘post-racism’ and
see their blackness as incidental and not a core part of their identity.
This approach to race and ethnicity can be understood through Joe Feagin’s (2013 p. x)
concept of the white racial frame. He describes it as a worldview that has White racial
frame:a
long legitimated, rationalized, and shaped racial oppression and inequality … worldview
that
[it] includes a broad and persisting set of racial stereotypes, prejudices,
interprets the
ideologies, interlinked interpretations and narratives, and visual images … social world
[that] imbeds inclinations to discriminate. through
White
Feagin uses the example of a study of Black airline pilots who report being asked to privilege and
call for a taxi (cab) for members of the public. So dominant is the idea of Black rationalizes
Americans as serving in lesser roles in society, people mistake the pilot’s uniform for racial
inequality
that of the taxi rank concierge.
These practices persist in schools as well. In a study of California high schools,
Rafalow (2020) shows how teachers interpret technology skill among students
differently based on their ethnicity. When students use technology in ways they have
learned outside the classroom, often disrupting learning, teachers tended to praise
White students for innovation but frame Asian American students as ‘hackers’ and
Latinx students as troublemakers. It was only the White students who saw their
disruptive practice nurtured into educational capital – a racialized form of the
Matthew effect (see Provocation below).
In line with CRT and Black feminist thought, Feagin (2013) argues that sustained
collective action is needed to challenge systemic and entrenched contemporary racism
and make society more equal. This includes exposing and challenging concerted efforts
to prevent people of colour from voting, as well as a criminal justice system that
punishes and incarcerates non-White people far more than White people.
Our discussion of race has focused on issues within the USA. This is not to
deny the role that race and racism plays in countries across the world. Paul Gilroy
(1987), for example, argues that anti-Black racism has been a component of much
of British history and is linked with a blurry idea of a ‘national culture’ that is
predominantly White. Drawing on scholarship from Du Bois, among others (see
Chapter 2), Gilroy argues, as per CRT, that racism is not an aberration, but has
been connected with justifying colonialism and the wars of conquest that are part
of British history. This is true of many institutions, not least schooling (Bhopal
2016, 2018). The Vox Pop above from Professor Kalwant Bhopal, who has
undertaken important research on race and racism in the UK, tells of her
experiences of inequality and prejudice in the UK. Likewise, in her recent book,
journalist Reni Eddo-Lodge (2018) draws attention to institutionalized racism in
the UK and critiques how the people who are allowed to discuss race in British
society tend to have little experience of racism.
Inequality across the globe

Orientalism:
Racism is not just a problem within countries, but also an issue that affects nations a set of social
and continents. One of the key distinctions is between the Global North and the processes by
Global South. For example, Edward Said (1978) conceptualized orientalism as which the
Global North
the processes by which the Global North framed Arab peoples (from the ‘Orient’)
frame Arab
as being uncivilized, backward and dangerous. Said’s book Orientalism can be seen peoples
as the foundation for a branch of social studies known as ‘postcolonialism’, which according to
seeks to understand how the West controls how other regions such as the Global a range of
South are understood and the influence it has in contemporary global politics damaging
(see, for example, Spivak 1988). stereotypes
Decolonizing sociology and thinking more broadly about race

In our discussion of race, we have focused on the impact of racism, racial
oppression and the history of slavery. In Chapter 6, we discussed the racialization
of capitalism and how modernity was experienced as a catastrophe in many parts
of the world. These issues are vital to consider, particularly as racism is often
downplayed in contemporary societies, yet part of the push to decolonizing
sociology (e.g. Rodríguez et al. 2010) includes a call to move beyond a deficit model
of race and ethnicity where we only focus on racism and racial oppression. We
have focused on these social issues because of the nature of this chapter, but
research on race and ethnicity includes documenting the cultural vibrancy and
diversity of ethnic groups; it is vital that sociology considers race and ethnicity
beyond issues of harm and oppression.
GENDER
In addition to class and race, gender is another key division in society. Issues of
gender equality share much in common with racial and class inequality, but there
is also a crucial difference. Whereas class and race groups tend to be segregated
through broader social structures – like the racist laws that literally segregate non-
White people, or the economic realities and social structures that reinforce class
divides – people are not segregated by gender from birth: heterosexual families are
necessarily of mixed genders. Almost everyone has a mother. Thus, to oppress

women is to oppress a member of one’s own family: one’s mother, wife, sister or
daughter.
One of the key concepts used to examine gender inequality has been
patriarchy (Lerner 1986; Walby 1990). This concept has examined how men are Patriarchy:
stratified to have more power than women, both culturally and legally. In her a concept to
book The Creation of Patriarchy, Gerda Lerner (1986) contends that the concept understand
has its roots in family systems organized around the idea of the primacy of the systematic
father. Families are institutions in which wealth, prestige and power are passed gender
on from one generation to the next (see Chapter 7 for discussion of the family inequality in
as an institution). In a patriarchal culture, those goods are passed on society
disproportionately to male offspring. Most power today is located within politics,
religion, corporations, government and education – institutions outside the
household and heavily dominated by men.
Patriarchy is a concept that has proven difficult to define, with much debate
about its utility (Rubin 2012). It can be seen to reify static notions of gender, and has
suffered from ongoing debate about its precise meaning. Thus we find the term
‘gender inequality’ to be more useful than patriarchy to examine the role of gender
as a mode of power in society.
Gender scholars are concerned with understanding how and why the social
dynamics of men and women have come to exist as they currently do. Sociologists
have helped discredit older biological theories that posited ‘natural’ differences to
debates about gender norms and cultural politics. This is not to say that biology has
no influence but, similar to CRT, to argue that the attribution of values, privilege,
stigma and power on gender lines is primarily social.
One of the first key moves away from a biological focus on the differences
between men and women was scholarship that examined sex roles. As Kimmel (2004
p. 95) comments: ‘sex role theorists explore the ways in which individuals come to be
gendered, and the ways in which they negotiate their ways towards some sense of
internal consistency and coherence’. Sex role theory was an important milestone in
gender scholarship because it provided an initial understanding of the role of the
social in gender.
As discussed in Chapter 7, early functionalist research in sex role theory thought
that socialization was necessary for a stable and orderly society (Parsons and Bales
1955). In this view, gender norms existed for a reason, such as women having an
important role caring for the family – gender inequalities were seen as natural and
right. While feminists used sex role theory to challenge gender norms and argue for
expanded roles for women in society, the theory did not sufficiently account for
issues of historical context, social conflict and power in society (Stacey and Thorne
1985). The notion of particular roles for men and women seemed to presuppose
gender differences rather than examine the production of these differences. This is
problematic, as it is through ideas of difference that inequalities are rationalized.
Thus, while sex role theory was an important component of gender scholarship, it
has been superseded by more contemporary theories.
Sex and gender terminology

Should we say ‘sex’ or ‘gender’? You may have noticed that sex role theory was used to discuss
gender relations. What is going on? The history of the terms used is complex and has generated
much debate. Nowadays:
■■ Sex is generally used to describe a medical or biological classification at birth: this has tradi-
tionally been ‘male’ or ‘female, but also includes ‘intersex’.
■■ Gender refers to behaviours associated with a person’s sex (‘masculine’ or ‘feminine’) and
also to an identity – how you feel as a man or a woman.
■■ Transgender is used as an umbrella term to refer to people whose gender identity does not
match their assigned sex. There is a growing movement to use the term ‘cisgender’ to refer
to people whose gender identity aligns with the sex they were assigned at birth.
Sociologically, we also use gender as an analytic lens or framework to understand social inequality
between men and women.
Gender at the individual and cultural level

A holistic understanding of gender must include focus at the individual and cultural
levels. This involves considering how gender is enacted in social interaction (West
and Zimmerman 1987), and also examining the ways gender is structured by
institutions and society.
In our daily lives, we classify people to a sex (normally a binary of male or female)
almost instantaneously. Yet, the way science actually defines sex – through genitalia,
chromosomes and hormones – is rarely obvious or even known to us. Nonetheless,
we readily categorize a person as a man or woman. How is that? West and Zimmerman
(1987) introduced the concept of a sex category to explain this. Think about how you
judge a person’s sex. You will pay attention to secondary sex characteristics, such as
facial features, hip size, musculature and other similar things. And you will also notice
things that they have some influence over: their voice (pitch, volume and so on),
hairstyle and clothing choices. These are the behaviours and codes that people use to
identify a person’s sex – their sex category.
West and Zimmerman argue that ‘doing gender’ is the process of behaving in a
way that aligns a person’s sex category with the sex they wish to be perceived as. This
means that gender is not an attribute ascribed at birth or determined by one’s body,
but a social performance and an accomplishment achieved in social interaction.
While the notion of doing gender has been widely adopted in the sociology of
gender, Deutsch (2007) cautions against its overuse for fear that it can undermine
the goal of reducing gender inequality and even support the notion that gender is a
system of inequality impervious to change.
At the macro level, Joan Acker (1990 p. 146) highlights how gender is a central
way in which society is organized. She argues that organizations are gendered, where
‘advantage and disadvantage, exploitation and control, action and emotion, meaning
and identity, are patterned through and in terms of a distinction between male and
female, masculine and feminine’. Lorber (1994) stresses that these differences are
vital, because without difference it is much harder to justify inequality (as per our
discussion of race above).
PROVOCATION 8
What’s wrong with segregation in sport?
While visiting a university in the American South, a professor of sociology noted that
the campus was quite diverse in terms of ethnicity and race. He noted that there was a
good mixture of people with different ethnicities socializing together. Walking past the
playing fields, he saw several soccer teams competing. Asking who the teams were, he
was told that the university teams were playing against a visiting school. However, unlike
in the wider campus areas, the playing teams were entirely segregated.
Shocked by this segregation, the professor asked one of the coaches why the
teams were split this way. He was told it was for two key reasons. First, the players
preferred it that way; and second, most of the players on one team were better than
the players on the other. The coach argued that segregation thus best served the
players on both teams.
The sociologist was incensed. ‘Segregation is a sign of oppression,’ he said. ‘I’m
appalled that you should reproduce decades if not centuries of inequality in how you
organize your teams. How can you do this?’
The coach was confused. ‘What do you mean?’ he asked. ‘I don’t segregate. Look,
I have Black and White players on the same team!’
‘Yes,’ the sociologist replied, ‘but you have those teams segregated by sex.’
*****
While we have made great improvements in promoting equality in some areas of
society, we remain a sexist and gender segregated society. The sociologist was
dismayed by the fact that the teams were split into a men’s team and a women’s
team because of the immediate and long-term consequences of segregating
children and young adults by sex.
*****
After this initial exchange, the sociologist asked the coach why we, as a society,
endorse organized, competitive team sports. ‘They promote health and fitness,’ the
coach responded.
Perplexed, the sociologist said: ‘Yes, but we can gain health and fitness through
any exercise. Why do we promote competitive team sport?’
The coach answered quickly: ‘Sport is useful for teaching students motivation
and dedication. It teaches them teamwork.’
Still dissatisfied, the sociologist asked: ‘But learning dedication is not unique to
team sports. That can be done with running or cycling. Why do we value team sports
in particular? Do they offer students anything that an individual sport does not?’
‘Yes,’ the coach replied. ‘They teach us to learn to work as a team, and that’s vital
for the world of work.’
The sociologist nodded, saying: ‘And that’s exactly why segregation by gender is
a problem. Segregated sport helps perpetuate gender inequality at work.’
*****
There are many ways this argument can develop, not least depending on the points
that the person defending gender segregation in sport raises. But the sociologist
accepted the coach’s contention that sport enabled teamwork – a widely held
cultural belief. What follows is an exploration of the key arguments for gender
integration in sport.
One of the most frequent arguments for segregating men and women tends to
be about biological capacities and ‘natural’ levels of strength, size and speed. For
example, most people would agree that a 136-kg (300-lb) man should not be
tackling a 68-kg (150-lb) woman; but fewer people agree that a 136-kg (300-lb)
man should not tackle a 68-kg (150-lb) man. The point is that it is dangerous for a
136-kg (300-lb) man to tackle any 68-kg (150-lb) person – gender is not the
issue, weight is. But even when we divide teams or competitors into categories by
weight, as appropriate for safety, we still also tend to divide by sex.
Some people might argue that most men are better at sport than most women, and
that segregated spaces facilitate their own abilities. Assuming for now that this is true, it
is to privilege winning over the supposed purpose of sport. But if we value sport for
character building and teamwork, segregating men and women harms this endeavour.
Perhaps your own perspective is that sport is really about achieving feats of
human excellence, not team building and leadership skills. In this case, segregation
is wrong because it limits the best women by not permitting them to play with the
best available players (many of whom are men). Just imagine how good the best
women could be if they consistently played with the best players. Robert Merton
(1968b) called this the ‘Matthew effect’, after the parable of the talents in the
Gospel of Matthew (the first book of the New Testament of the Bible), where people
who show early skill are rewarded disproportionately compared to others of a near-
similar skill level. In this case, gender segregation ensures that men keep their
advantage in sport. The skills gap could shrink and possibly disappear if sports were
gender integrated.
But let’s focus on the primary reason for sport in educational settings: the idea
that it develops the ability to work as a team. If this is the rationale, then it should
be the duty of sport to ensure that children learn the skills necessary to work with
everyone in the real-world workplace – not just men. Segregating children in sport
suggests, at some level, that men and women should be treated differently at work.
There is significant
evidence that this effect is
real. When boys are socialized
into sport for its perceived
‘character-building’ benefits,
they also construct a language
specific to sport that they
then take with them into the
workplace. Boys and men
learn to bond, relate to each
other, work and solve
problems via sport, all without
© monkeybusinessimages/iStock
the presence of girls or
women.
Because sport is gender segregated, women are excluded from the domain in
which this language and way of relating is learned. Women therefore have a harder
time acquiring the cultural codes and behavioural conducts deemed necessary to
impress gatekeepers in work and other social institutions that are dominated by
men. This is something gatekeepers (those who do the hiring) code as ‘skills’. At job
interviews for young adults with little work experience, the easiest answer to
questions about ‘leadership’ or ‘team building’ is to give an anecdote about sporting
participation. Because of gender segregation in sport, this is easier for men to
answer. The skills, experiences and behaviours learned through sport – part of what
Bourdieu called ‘habitus’ – also mean that a male interviewer and interviewee can
more easily relate to each other. This later translates to men’s advantage in
advancement in corporate life.
There are also negative effects for boys. The gender segregation of sport means
that young men are not introduced to the athletic abilities or the lived experiences
of women. Instead, young men are socialized into an ethos in which women are
devalued as athletes or leaders and primarily viewed as sexual objects. Without the
possibility of socializing with women in sport, men fail to learn of women’s athletic
abilities and leadership skills. With this organization of leisure time, they rarely have
the opportunity to become friends with women.
Part of the difficulty in recognizing the problem of gender segregation in sport is
that it has become so normalized in everyday life. If you were to walk by a sports field
and see two football teams segregated by race (an all-Black team playing another all-
Black team on the left field, and an all-White team playing an all-White team on the
right field), you would most likely think that you were witnessing racist segregation.
But seeing an all-female team playing an all-female team on the left field, and an all-
male team playing an all-male team on another field is not perceived as gender
segregation. The same difference would certainly apply if this segregation was codified
in rules, institutionalized in sporting leagues, and supported by media and educators.
And that’s why we argue segregation by gender is wrong, and team sports should
be gender integrated.

Joseph, L.J. and Anderson, E. (2016) The influence of gender segregation and teamsport
experience on occupational discrimination in sport-based employment. Journal of Gender
Studies, 25(5), 586–98.
McDonagh, E. and Pappano, L. (2007) Playing with the Boys: Why Separate is Not Equal in Sports.
Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Feminism
Just as the civil rights movement challenged racist oppression in the USA, so too
have people fought for equal rights for women. While each culture has its own
Feminism: history of political action in this regard, it is generally known as feminism. Feminism
the has roots that existed long before the label. Historians sometimes label people who
intellectual advocated for women’s equality, or at least protested certain aspects of women’s
and political oppression, as ‘protofeminists’.
movement
It is often said that feminism is as simple as believing that women deserve equal
that seeks
rights for rights with men. While admirable in sentiment, the reality is more complex: not just
women and because different groups of people advance different political strategies about how
challenges best to achieve equality, but also because differing views exist about what even
gender constitutes equality. So, one group of feminists passionately believe that pornography
inequality and sex work are forms of oppression against women (Dworkin 1985), while others
reject such claims (Rubin 1993). Indeed, the aims of feminism have changed across
time and have been categorized into three distinct waves. The three-wave model of
feminism’s development is associated with particular times in (Anglo-American)
women’s fight for gender equality.
First-wave feminism
First-wave feminism occurred between the late 1800s and the mid-1930s. Emerging
from ideals of the Enlightenment, it was focused on women gaining the right to vote
and the right to own land, and women collaborated internationally to achieve these
aims. The emancipation movement in particular emerged to fight for the vote. This
right is referred to as ‘women’s suffrage’ – hence the name of the suffragettes who
emerged as a political force during this period.
The suffragettes fought for women’s rights in ways that contrasted with the
dominant notion of women as compliant and passive. They threw themselves in
front of horses at high-profile racing events (English suffragette Emily Davison
died as a result of this), entered into physical altercations with police officers and
generally demonstrated that the idea that women were not able to partake in
political debate was plainly false.
The two world wars that dominated global politics in the first half of the 20th
century had important influences on the first wave of feminism. While the suffragettes
were campaigning prior to the start of the First World War in 1914, the war meant
that great numbers of men went off to fight and women took their place in factories
and industries where society had previously prohibited them from working. Over 1
million British women joined the workforce during the four years of war. While
many women returned home after peace was declared, significant numbers remained
in the workforce and the Sex Disqualification (Removal) Act 1919 made it illegal to
exclude women from a job because of their gender.
More significant and prolonged change for women occurred after the Second
World War (from 1945). During the conflict, women had directly contributed to the
war effort in very important ways, in the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force, among other
organizations and roles. Women worked as spies, in the navy and army, and again
demonstrated the falsity of dominant images of passive femininity in society.
© Topical Press Agency/Stringer/Getty Images

Women being arrested in Chicago, US, for wearing ‘indecent’ swimwear in 1922
The feminism of the 1960s has its antecedents in first-wave feminism that
fought for fundamental rights and the historical events that transformed working
practices.
Second-wave feminism
Second-wave feminism has strong connections with the civil rights movement – the
social movement in the USA that sought to end racial segregation and discrimination
in the 1950s and 1960s. The tactics and hopes that this struggle inspired likely
encouraged other groups to adopt similar tactics. Second-wave feminism is probably
what many people think of as ‘feminism’: political action that sought to contest legal
inequality.
It was also in the 1960s that feminism adopted intellectual arguments from within
academia and applied them more generally. For example, French philosopher Simone
de Beauvoir wrote an influential book, The Second Sex (1949). This included the now-
famous phrase: ‘One is not born, but rather becomes, a woman.’ Here, she was
arguing for the social nature of gender: that being a woman is dependent on social
attitudes and views of femaleness that constrict the possibilities afforded to women.
Her ideas fermented into political action and meant that feminism had a strong
intellectual foundation alongside its political action.
Influential non-academic books were written during this second wave. For
example, Australian feminist Germaine Greer (1970) argued in The Female Eunuch
that the traditional ‘nuclear family’ (see Chapter 7) served to repress women’s sexuality
and effectively rendered them eunuchs. A combination of scholarly research
alongside polemical writing, Greer presented problems with the way society discussed
female sexuality in bold, bawdy terms. Similarly, Betty Friedan (1959), an American
feminist, wrote The Feminine Mystique, which examined the negative experiences of
women in American society at the time.
Second-wave feminism also drew wider cultural attention to the social problems
of rape, domestic violence and other social injustices and crimes that disproportionately
affect women (Dobash and Dobash 1998; Kelly 1988). Known collectively as
‘violence against women’, the 1993 United Nations Declaration on the Elimination
of Violence Against Women described it as ‘a manifestation of historically unequal
power relations between men and women, which have led to domination over and
discrimination against women by men and to the prevention of the full advancement
of women’ (UNGA 1993 p. 2).
Feminists during this period engaged in political actions, from trying to implement
new laws to developing new forms of intellectual critique. This latter trend included
examining how a narrow and stereotypical representation of women in the media
had negative social effects. Second-wave feminism achieved multiple social gains, at
least in the West. Women’s rights to reproductive health, to attend schools, to work,
to live independently of men, to have a sex life, play sport, drive and many more
opportunities and rights have come from the collaboration between and synthesis of
academics and activists.
Another feature of second-wave feminism, however, was the emergence of
substantial and strident debate between feminists. Whereas most women, and certainly
all feminists, agreed that women should be legally entitled to vote and own property,
debates about the regulation of pornography and sex work are far more contentious.
The ‘porn wars’ of the 1980s were particularly acrimonious and saw significant
divides within the feminist movement (Rubin 1993).
Most of these debates centred on issues of sex and sexual desire. However, they
also included issues of race and other issues of diversity. Second-wave feminism was
also critiqued for mostly reflecting the views and perspectives of White women,
straight women, and women of the middle and upper classes. This led to what some
today recognize as third-wave feminism.
Third-wave feminism
As a new generation of women academics, writers and activists entered the feminist
movement, third-wave feminism marked a growing dissatisfaction with how second-
wave feminism had polarized in the 1980s. Growing from the successes of the
second wave, focus shifted in the 1990s to other forms of discrimination that had
not been addressed in such depth and included a diversification of approaches to
understanding gender inequality. Key issues here were the recognition of
intersectionality and the experiences of non-White and working-class women.
Third-wave feminism thus both attempts to expand feminism to a more diverse
set of women’s identities – to include the voices of those traditionally excluded (e.g.
Bassel and Emejulu 2017) – and to focus more on cultural issues of sexual inequality.
Debates about the aims and terminology of feminism persist, as do the debates
about sex work, and the porn wars are back with a vengeance as some argue that
pornography inherently damages women (see Provocation 4). Feminist sociologist
Alison Phipps (2020) argues that the contemporary mainstream feminist movement
is dominated by White privileged women who are both victims of sexual violence
but also perpetrators of race and class supremacy. Phipps contends that the problem
with contemporary mainstream feminism is that it focuses on White women’s
experiences of sexual violence in a way that exacerbates racism and classism; she
calls this a form of ‘political whiteness’ that fails to understand the intersectionality
of oppression.
One component of feminism has shifted from a focus on political action to more
intellectual pursuits and queer transgressions. Renowned feminist philosopher
Martha Nussbaum wrote in The New Republic (1999):
Many young feminists, whatever their concrete affiliations with this or that
French thinker, have been influenced by the extremely French idea that the
intellectual does politics by speaking seditiously, and that this is a significant
type of political action. Many have also derived from the writings of Michel
Foucault (rightly or wrongly) the fatalistic idea that we are prisoners of an all-
enveloping structure of power, and that real-life reform movements usually
end up serving power in new and insidious ways. Such feminists therefore find
comfort in the idea that the subversive use of words is still available to feminist
intellectuals.
It is thus important to understand that third-wave feminism is not united, and it has
not erased the factionalism of feminism from the second wave.
Of course, feminists have always faced opposition that looks to devalue their
cause and stall social progress for women. Much of this has been done by stigmatizing
the notion of identifying as feminist. Feminists have long been stereotyped as
unattractive, humourless, man-hating single women; modern feminism is stereotyped
as being obsessed by political correctness. This is not to say that feminists have given
up the fight for quality education, reproductive rights and improved living conditions
for women and children, but that the quest for gender equality has faced many
challenges. The future of feminism is much debated, including whether it has entered
a fourth wave, and how best to organize for change and combat inequality in a 21st-
century political context (Walby 2011).
Men and masculinities

An important subfield of the sociology of gender is the study of men and masculinities.
It holds men as the core focus of analysis, explicitly recognizing them as gendered
beings. This scholarship has developed understanding of how men benefit from
patriarchy, but it also discusses the ways in which men lose out from their gender.
One of the core problems with masculinities is that they are often defined in
opposition to a highly stigmatized femininity. As Kimmel (2004 p. 97) argued: ‘the
antifemininity component of masculinity is perhaps the single dominant and
universal characteristic’. Men have also had to be macho and tough. In the UK,
Máirtín Mac an Ghaill (1994) discussed the three Fs of masculinity: football, fighting
and fucking. Pollack (1999) showed that from the time they are very young, boys had
to act like little men, including the idea that ‘boys don’t cry’, even though expressing
emotions is an important component of being human and suppressing them can be
detrimental to mental health and wellbeing.
This machismo was accompanied by a pervasive homophobia. As a result, men went
to great lengths to avoid being perceived by others as gay. The most effective way of
doing this was to deploy homophobia. Accordingly, masculinity became not just a show
of physical strength and emotional stoicism, but also an expression of anti-gay attitudes.
Australian sociologist Raewyn Connell (1995) introduced the notion of ‘hegemonic
masculinity’ to theorize how privilege and damage were distributed between men.
Importantly, she argued two core ideas: that masculine hierarchies existed between men;
and that dynamics of masculinities perpetuate gender inequality. In terms of hierarchies
between men, Connell argued that there were four archetypes into which groups of
men fit. There is one masculinity that is the dominant, hegemonic one in society: this is
the masculinity that men aspire to, although it may be different in different cultural
contexts. Within each context, however, only ever one type of masculinity maintained
this dominance. In the latter half of the twentieth century, it tended to be macho,
sporty, violent and homophobic – and was labelled orthodox masculinity (Anderson 2005).
Connell (1995) identified three other groups of men and their masculinities:
1 Complicit: those who benefited from patriarchy but did not conform to the
hegemonic ideal (of orthodox masculinity).
2 Marginalized: described working-class men and people of colour who might gain
some benefits from masculinity, but these are outweighed by the issues they
encounter because of their class and race.
3 Subordinated: referred to gay men and other sexual minorities, who were excluded
from masculine contention because of their sexuality: so homophobic was the
1980s that gay men were not considered masculine because of their sexuality
(Plummer 1999).
Many of the men in these groups, particularly those with complicit masculinities,
believed in the right to rule of those at the top, and they desired to embody orthodox
masculinity themselves – hence the hegemony of the system.
Connell also argued that these stratifications of masculinities served to reinforce
gender inequality between men and women. We have no doubt that many men who
embodied orthodox masculinities also reproduced gender inequality, but there is
scant evidence that the hierarchies of masculinity are the core issue in how gender
inequality is perpetuated. As discussed above, patriarchy is a complex social problem
that has multiple roots and cannot be simplified to the conscious actions of men or
the hierarchies of masculinities (New 2001; Walby 1997).
The description of the most popular form of masculinity described by research in
the 1980s does not accurately describe millennial men today. ‘Metrosexuality’ emerged
in the 1990s as a way for men to care about clothes and style without being socially
perceived as gay. This desire to look good has now moved from a transgressive notion
to a valued characteristic of modern men. The British boy band One Direction best
exemplified this change. These young men’s gentle tactility and open displays of
emotion were part of their appeal. Homophobia couldn’t be further from their lips, as
they thanked their army of gay fans and performed at gay venues (McCormack 2012).
This change has been explained through Anderson’s (2009) inclusive masculinity
theory, which connected softening masculinities with decreasing homophobia in the
West across the past 30 years (Clements and Field 2014; Smith et al. 2014). As
homophobia was the policing agent of masculinity in the 1980s, the decrease of
homophobia has meant that men can be more in touch with their feelings and more
expressive about them publicly than they could before (see Anderson and McCormack
2018). Perhaps the best example of this change is to think about men cuddling and
sharing beds together. Anderson and McCormack (2015) interviewed 30 young
sportsmen at a British university about how they related to their friends, finding that
29 of them had shared a bed with a close male friend, and 27 had spooned together
– sustained cuddling in bed between two straight men. And most times, their other
friends knew about this.
The relatively new sociology of masculinities, mapped out mostly by feminist
scholars, has emerged as a new paradigm for examining men – one that no longer
takes masculinity uncritically as a norm for male experience. Masculinities are now
defined collectively in culture, and it is recognized that they are sustained by core and
peripheral institutions. Masculinities today are being examined socially, historically
and critically for their problems as well as their benefits (see also Caribi and Armengol
2014; Gorman-Murray and Hopkins 2016; Roberts 2018).
SEXUALITY
The word ‘sexuality’ has many meanings. It can refer to sexual identity, such as
whether one identifies as straight, gay or bisexual; it can refer to desire – from the sex
you are attracted to, to the type of bodies and specific sex acts you like. It is also used
to discuss ideas of love, intimacy and diverse forms of relationships. How these
desires and practices are experienced are inherently social and influenced by cultural
norms, as we discuss in detail in Chapter 10. Yet sexuality is also a mode of power,
and different sexualities – in terms of identities, desires, practices and relationships
– are not all equally valued.
While sociology has a long history of research into sexuality, it has often been
considered a marginal component of society – an issue of ‘deviance’ not particularly
important to the running of society (Irvine 2003). Indeed, as gender scholarship
emerged in the 1960s and 1970s, sexuality was subsumed within gender – that is,
sexual desire and sexual violence were seen as aspects of gender inequality (Rubin
1984). Thus, important ways that sexuality is understood in society – from sex work
and the consumption of pornography through to abortion and sexual violence –
were all understood through the prism of existing gender theories. This was
inadequate, not least because such approaches tended to erase the perspectives and
experiences of gay, lesbian and bisexual people.
In the latter part of the twentieth century, theories of sexuality developed
primarily from sexual minority scholars who adopted interdisciplinary approaches to
understand sexuality in society. One vital component of this movement was to
understand how heterosexuality was systematically privileged in societies.
Hetero Conceptualized as heterosexism, heterosexuality is esteemed above other sexual
sexism:the identities and relationship types in social practices, customs and law. In a now classic
structural and essay, Adrienne Rich (1980) argued that heterosexuality was not a natural characteristic,
systematic but an institution imposed on people that gave power and social benefits to
privileging of
heterosexual men and erased the existence of lesbian women.
hetero
sexuality over There are many examples of heterosexuality being privileged. In law, this has
other sexual included only heterosexual couples being able to marry and adopt; an older age of
identities consent for same-sex sexual activity; and forbidding gay people from serving in the
armed forces (Herek 1990). In culture, heterosexuality is privileged in media
representations where romantic films and other mainstream media are overwhelmingly
Charmed about heterosexual people, and where sexual minorities are excluded or presented in
circle:a
a stereotyped fashion. Likewise, schools institutionalize heterosexism by only
concept
developed by
discussing heterosexuality in curricula and discouraging, or even banning, staff and
Rubin to students from coming out (Epstein and Johnson 1998). Interactionally, straight
visualize people gain from their sexuality through the marginalization and bullying of sexual
which sexual minorities, as well as never having the psychological impact of being a sexual minority
acts are (Meyer 2003).
esteemed In a famous essay called Thinking Sex, Gayle Rubin (1984) introduced the notion
and which are of a sex hierarchy, where a charmed circle of behaviours deemed good, normal and
stigmatized in
natural was contrasted with those framed as bad, abnormal and unnatural (see also
society
Douglas [1966]2003). People tend to think in binaries about sex, with each positive
component (such as monogamy) contrasted with the stigmatized opposite (such as

promiscuity).
Rubin’s contribution to understanding sex in society is so valuable because she
provides a method to think about how a sex hierarchy operates. She highlighted that
sex was always treated with suspicion, writing that: ‘Sex is presumed guilty until
proven innocent.’ Sex is acceptable if it occurs within certain social institutions or
norms – such as within marriage, for reproduction and between people who love
each other.
Writing in the 1980s, Rubin powerfully underlined how society placed value on
different sexual acts in a moral and political way. Rubin (1984 p. 281) offered another
way of understanding the sex hierarchy, as a pyramid:
Modern Western societies appraise sex acts according to a hierarchical system

of sexual value. Marital, reproductive heterosexuals are alone at the top of the
erotic pyramid. Clamouring below are unmarried monogamous heterosexuals
in couples, followed by most other heterosexuals. Solitary sex floats
ambiguously … Stable, long-term lesbian and gay male couples are verging on
respectability, but bar dykes and promiscuous gay men are hovering just above
the groups at the very bottom of the pyramid. The most despised sexual
castes currently include transsexuals, transvestites, fetishists, sadomasochists,
sex workers such as prostitutes and porn models, and the lowliest of all, those
whose eroticism transgresses generational boundaries.
While some components of this have changed – gay men have improved their social
position, and porn models perhaps face less condemnation – other acts and behaviours
remain marginalized. The notion of an erotic pyramid is still distinctly relevant.
Flagging your sexuality

If asked to think of a symbol of LGBT
people or cultures, we predict that the
great majority of readers would name the
rainbow flag. The rainbow flag has become
almost synonymous with the LGBT
movement, so that almost all LGBT
venues and events will have rainbow flags
alongside the rainbow colours attached to
posters, clothes and anywhere else
possible. This may seem natural, but the
association of particular flags with the
LGBT movement has a social history and
the meanings attached to the flag is
contested. Original eight-colour LGBT rainbow flag
Before the gay liberation movement

of the 1970s, the main symbol of gay
people (and what was then called the
‘homophile movement’) was the pink
triangle, a symbol of the murder of sexual
minorities by Nazis during the Holocaust
(Plant 1988). This was a powerful emblem
that drew attention to the atrocities
experienced by sexual minorities. By the
1970s, as liberationist politics was making
social and legal gains and Harvey Milk
became the first openly gay elected ‘Progress’ Pride Flag by Daniel Quasar, Copyright © 2018. All rights reserved.
politician in the USA, there was a push
for a more positive representation of LGBT people. Gilbert Baker created the rainbow flag, but his
original version had an eighth colour – pink. This was only removed because pink was a very difficult
colour for flag makers to produce at the time.
The adapted rainbow flag that is famous today quickly became very popular, and this association
was further consolidated with the tragic assassination of Harvey Milk in 1978, with LGBT people in
San Francisco and across America buying the rainbow flag as a sign of solidarity.
The rainbow flag has spawned an array of other designs and speaks to differences and inequalities
within LGBT communities. The bisexual flag is made up of pink, purple and blue and is used by
bisexual people to highlight bisexual identities and the presence of biphobia within lesbian and gay
communities. There are similar adaptations for trans people, pansexuals, asexuals and others. Other
flags include the addition of brown and black stripes to recognize ethnic diversity within LGBT
communities, and there are flags for different sexual subcultures and kinks, including flags for leather,
rubber, puppies and bears.
One flag that is gaining popularity is graphic designer Daniel Quasar’s progress pride flag.
Superimposed on the rainbow flag is a five-coloured chevron to symbolize the inclusion of trans
people and people of colour.
The growth in flags has resulted in much debate within LGBT communities about social exclusion
and the extent to which they reproduce racism and gender inequality. Flags not only serve as a social
and political identity for LGBT people, but as a way to develop conversations about inequalities
within these communities.
Sexual prejudice
Sexuality has been mobilized as a source of power through the oppression of sexual
minorities. A key component of this has been the stigmatization of same-sex desire
and sexual practice. Sexual minorities suffered a great deal of discrimination and
oppression, including the criminalization of same-sex sexual acts across much of the
20th century (Greenberg 1988). Gays and lesbians were forced to socialize within
closeted subcultures for protection and safety, invisible to the dominant culture. Civil
rights activism around sexuality made gains for sexual minorities in the 1960s and
1970s, as the broader liberalization of attitudes towards sex also positively influenced
people’s perspectives of consensual same-sex sexual activity (D’Emilio 1983).
Sexual minority cultures were often segregated by sex. Early versions of this were
the ‘molly houses’ in England, pubs or taverns where men would play with traditional
gender roles (often by dressing camply, or as women) and find sexual partners
(Norton 1992). Lesbian subcultures also existed in major cities, often with women
impersonating men and these cultures varied greatly by city and continent (Rupp
2001). These also included kinky sexual practices, such as interest in leather and
fisting (Kamel 1980; Rubin 1991).
It was in the 1980s that gay communities were hit by the terrible HIV/AIDs
epidemic, an unknown condition with no effective treatment at the time. People with
HIV did not have access to medical interventions to prevent the onset of AIDS and
as a result died from AIDS-related illnesses. A great deal of stigma was levelled at
people with HIV or AIDS, such as false rumours that HIV could be caught by a
handshake or sneezing. So great was the prejudice related to HIV/AIDS that some
undertakers refused to bury those who had died from illnesses related to the disease
(Weinberg et al. 1994). Through media panic and homophobic political discourses,
HIV/AIDS was labelled as ‘the gay disease’, and the prejudice and stigma applied to
people with HIV/AIDS was conflated with the stigma levelled at gay and bisexual
men (Hammack et al. 2018).
The combination of prejudice about HIV/AIDS and homophobia was supported
by a rightwing politics that waged a culture war against homosexuality. Fears about
homosexuality and HIV/AIDS were used by conservative politicians, particularly in
the USA and the UK, to foster social concerns about sexuality, social change and the
perceived threat to so-called ‘traditional family values’. Homophobia peaked in the
1980s in part because politicians harnessed ignorance and prejudice about same-sex
desire and HIV/AIDS for their own gain. This combined with the politicization of
religion, with evangelical churches in the USA adopting homophobic positions to
increase donations during a time when church attendance had begun to decline
(Anderson and McCormack 2016).
‘Homophobia’ has been the term used by academics and activists to understand
the nature and effects of prejudice and discrimination against sexual minorities,
although it only gained traction in the late 1970s. Herek (2004 p. 8) argued that the
term helped change the framing of anti-gay prejudice by ‘locating the “problem” of
homosexuality not in homosexual people, but in heterosexuals who were intolerant
of gay men and lesbians’. While terms such as ‘biphobia’ are used to discuss sexual
prejudice against bisexuals specifically, homophobia is still used as a term to refer to
prejudice against gay people and same-sex desire more generally, which would include
bisexuals and other sexual minorities (Anderson and McCormack 2016).
It is important to consider the prejudice levelled at bisexuals. Klein (1993) suggests
that bisexuals are stigmatized as being neurotic, unable to love, sex crazed and less
capable of monogamy than those attracted to one sex. Bisexuals are also accused of
attention seeking, and not being brave enough to fully come out (Eliason 1997).
Furthermore, bisexuals suffer from negative stereotypes about their identities from
other sexual minorities, being thought as confused about their sexual orientation, or
seen as being within a transitional phase (Diamond 2008).
Homophobia is undergoing a period of sustained decline in the West, with
attitudes and laws improving across the USA and most of Europe (Weeks 2007).
However, homophobic laws and the oppression of sexual minorities are still
occurring and even increasing in Eastern Europe, the Middle East and parts of
Africa and Russia (Smith et al. 2014; Velasco 2020). These trends are particularly
concerning, and highlight the contextual nature of homophobia and how it is a
political mechanism used to control people within a society. Sexuality is likely to be a
core way societies are divided in the future, and its study needs to be incorporated
into sociology in a manner similar to class, race and gender.
CONCLUSION
This chapter has examined the ways in which societies are divided. We have focused
on class, race, gender and sexuality as key ways inequality exists in society – where
one group of people gain benefits and privilege at the expense of another group. In
each of these cases, the differences and distinctions are not the result of biological
or inherent differences, but how society is structured. We have drawn out key theories
for each of the divisions, and encourage you to look for similarities between them.
The breadth and depth of social divisions means that there is much more we could
have covered – both for class, race and gender but also in terms of other divisions.
Societies are divided by religion, age, attractiveness, ability and many more factors.
Sadly, we have to keep reminding ourselves of the Black feminist poet Maya Angelou’s
declamatory refrain in her poem ‘Human Family’: ‘We are more alike, my friends,
than we are unalike.’
HOW WOULD…?
■■ How would Black feminists like Patricia Hill Collins and Kimberlé Crenshaw
critique second-wave feminism that focused on gender?
–– Have you noticed class, race or gender being modes of power in your own
life? Have you benefited or suffered because of them?
–– To what extent have you thought about them before?
■■ How would you approach studying social divisions in your own community?
–– What theoretical framework fits best?
–– How would each of the theories apply to your own context or country?

Atkinson, W. (2015) Class. Cambridge: Polity.
An introduction to the theories of class that discusses the key theoretical traditions in research on
social class, and debates some of the major controversies that have shaped the field and examines
contemporary class inequalities.
Ghaziani, A. (2017) Sex Cultures. Cambridge: Polity.
An accessible introduction to understanding sex in society that views these discussions through a
cultural lens. With a chapter on politics and protest, it understands the moral nature of much
regulation and prejudice around sexuality and develops an argument about how to study sex and
sexuality in society.
McIntosh, P. (1989) White privilege: Unpacking the invisible knapsack. Peace and Freedom Magazine,
July/August, 10–12.
A piece of sociology that highlighted the powerful ways in which White people maintain privilege
in society. Draws attention to a number of ways in which privilege is taken for granted, and how it
requires a conscious ‘unpacking’ of privilege to effect change.

Chapter 9
Transgressions
INTRODUCTION
This chapter explores sociological understandings of when people break the rules. It
starts by examining the relationship between transgression, crime, deviance and society.
Understanding transgression requires an understanding of not just who breaks rules,
but who makes them. We then examine the different sociological approaches to
transgression, crime and deviance; from positivist, functionalist and strain theories of
what ‘causes’ transgression through to subcultural, interactionist and moral panic
approaches that consider meaning, power and stereotypes. Third, this chapter explores
the demographics of criminality and victimization by considering how class, gender and
race/ethnicity link to the likelihood of transgression, punishment and victimhood.
Finally, we consider consumption and transgression, focusing on illegal substances. In
our Provocation, we consider how best to understand the criminalization of the exchange
of sexual acts for money.
RULES, LAWS AND TRANSGRESSING THEM

Social institutions are organized through rules (see Chapter 7). When a social institution
is so powerful that individuals can be forced to follow them, the rules of that institution
become laws. However, even when these laws are enforced by government and the state,
people can opt not to follow them, breaking the law in the process. This is what makes
Trans transgression so interesting. Unlike the laws of nature, which we have no option but to
gression: follow, humans can and do choose to break the rules and laws set out by societies.
breaking rules Societal rules vary in importance. For example, chess has rules; if you break
that others them, others may not want to play with you anymore but there are unlikely to be
believe
should
further consequences. However, some games have been so formalized as to require
regulate laws to regulate their rules, such as drug taking and match fixing in sport. Contrastingly,
actionc it is not illegal to copy an essay, but academic institutions have their own rules and
you may be expelled for plagiarism if you fall foul of them.
As discussed in Chapter 1, we also have norms that regulate our behaviour in set
ways. We suspend disbelief in the cinema so that we do not call the police when
someone is seemingly murdered on screen. Drawing attention to that ‘crime’ would
result in you being reprimanded or told to leave because the context tells us the laws
of society are not being broken.
234
Transgressions 235
The fact that we can choose to break rules is the justification given in modern Deviance:
societies for punishment: much of Western morality stems from the notion that anything that
people can choose right from wrong and that breaking rules is a form of deviance. is socially
But are people truly free? Should we aim to understand and ‘correct’ rather than classed as
‘punish’ or does that take away the moral responsibility from individuals? outside the
realm of
normality

During the COVID-19 pandemic, societies around the world imposed strict rules
constraining individual freedoms in the name of protecting wider society. During
these lockdowns, members of governments worldwide were caught breaking or
appearing to break the rules. Many lost their jobs, but some did not. Was such
behaviour worse than if we had done the same, or were elites scapegoated because
they were in the public eye?
How far should the strong be constrained in order to protect the weak?
Life is unfair. Some people can easily achieve a desired outcome that someone
with less opportunities and money would struggle to achieve – class structures mean
that the benefits of society are not distributed evenly (see Chapter 8). Breaking a rule
might be a way of acquiring something that, because of your class-limited resources,
you cannot have by following the rules. Enforcing rules when resources are unevenly
distributed will reproduce inequalities, but not enforcing rules might cause chaos
that is worse for everyone.
Some people claim that ‘natural law’ can be drawn from the way human beings
are, and that such a natural law can be used to decide what laws ought to be in all
societies. Such people can then argue that it is acceptable, necessary even, to disobey
laws they consider to be unnatural and therefore harmful to universal human dignity.
The proponents of natural law, from Ancient Greek philosophers Plato and Aristotle
to modern thinkers like John Rawls and sociologist Jürgen Habermas, contend that
human nature sets up certain universal human needs that society should accord with,
and which a person would be justified in seeking even if the law of their particular
society forbade it. However, problems arise because the proponents of ‘natural law’
cannot agree on what those universal human needs are.
Different societies have different laws. Assisting someone to kill themselves is a
crime in some places and not in others. Social media companies in the USA can sell
data provided by users, as consent is assumed in the act of posting that content, but in
the EU selling such data without specific consent is a crime. Some people point to
norms in other societies to claim moral superiority for their own society, or for the
other society, or to suggest that morals are simply relative. Whether different societies
are better, worse, or merely different is a complex philosophical question.
Separating law from morality

People often think that laws exist for good reason and that if something is illegal it is also immoral
– known as the ‘normativity of the law’ (Spaak 2012). This is one reason why when once-criminalized
behaviours, such as same-sex sexual activity, are legalized, the behaviours become increasingly
accepted in society. Law and morality influence each other but they are not the same thing.
Consider the changing attitudes towards how we dress. In various countries, women can be
arrested for wearing clothes that do not cover the body. Iran, for example, has had a ‘morality
police’ since the 1979 Islamic Revolution, which enforces laws on women wearing the hijab and
discourages cosmetics. In the West, in the early part of the 20th century, women were also
arrested for wearing swimming costumes deemed too revealing (see Chapter 8). Yet, in France,
in 2016, a number of municipalities banned ‘burkinis’ (a full body- and head-covering swimsuit),
and it has been unlawful to wear a face-covering hijab in public since 2011 because both are said
to be not revealing enough.
Another area in which morality and law are related but distinct is with personal relationships.
It is not illegal to lie per se, nor is it illegal to cheat on sexual partners. Yet, for many people, lying
to friends and cheating on partners are considered worse than lying and cheating in relation to
authorities and institutions, which are illegal.
In a society where individual freedom is highly valued, individuals are encouraged to strive to
do what is best for them. Selfishness is encouraged as the best way to motivate success. It is not
a crime to lie, show off, seek pleasure, be unfaithful, or promiscuous. Some argue that the law
has become amoral, just regulating a game of winning and losing to no higher moral purpose.
Others argue that the law is simply remodelled to reflect a new morality; one that asserts that
the only true good is individual freedom.
Criminalization, decriminalization and legalization

Laws are not static but consistently change. Things are made into a crime
Criminali (criminalization), made legal (legalization) or determined no longer to be prosecuted
zation:the as crimes (decriminalization). Decriminalization is not the same as legalization, as
act of making giving leeway not to prosecute does not mean such acts cannot be prosecuted as criminal
a form of
or civil offences, only that authorities are not compelled to do so.
deviance into
a crime
Sexuality is a clear example of how laws change. The age of consent for a person
to have heterosexual sex legally was 13 in Great Britain until 1885, after which time
it became 16 for heterosexual sex. Same-sex sexual activity was illegal in the UK until
Legalization: 1967, where the age of consent was set to 21. It was only equalized in 2001. Today,
removing a the age of consent in different countries varies from 14 to 21. These differences
legal
connect with cultural norms of sex, sexuality, childhood and religion (Waites 2005).
prohibition
Similarly, abortion, contraception and relationship forms have different legal status
in different places and at different times.
Transgressions 237
Laws regarding criticism of religion (called ‘blasphemy laws’) vary in particular Decriminali
countries. In the UK, blasphemy laws have been weakened, but ‘hate speech’ zation:limiting
legislation means that criticizing people for their religion is increasingly criminalized. the legal
Drug laws also vary and have changed dramatically. Heroin, cocaine, cannabis prohibition on
and other drugs were only criminalized in Europe and the USA after 1918, as was a form of
alcohol, albeit temporarily, in the USA via prohibition. Today, many countries are deviant
relaxing laws against cannabis. behaviour
Modern Western societies give emphasis to individuals having the right to
make their own choices. The question of what should be allowed in law is
increasingly resolved at the level of whether the participants are consenting
adults. As consent has become the primary measure of whether an interaction is
acceptable, the question of what ‘consent’ really means has gained significance.
When entering into a contract, the question arises whether the person was coerced
or misled into signing. There are debates about what, if any, coercion or deception
are acceptable. These matters become more complex still when one considers
whether poverty, or any other manifestation of disadvantage, is a form of
coercion that reduces the ability to refuse an offer made even if the conditions
are very undesirable.
All societies have laws that regulate whether and how you can sell your body. In
the UK, the law declares that a person cannot sell any part of their body that cannot
be detached ‘naturally’. Thus, you can sell your hair but not your organs; men can sell
their sperm but women cannot directly sell ‘their’ eggs.
Assisted suicide, ‘consenting’ cannibalism and various forms of selling sex for
money are all heavily regulated by law. This is because societies often seek to protect
their members from harm, and sometimes even claim the right and need to protect
members from themselves. A significant question becomes whether these legal
interventions best protect the citizens subject to them (see Provocation 9).
Children and some adults (those with limited mental capacity or who are
restricted within institutions) are said not to have the ability to give informed
consent and society therefore decides what is best for them. A condition of being
considered an adult in modern society is accepting responsibility for one’s actions.
If a person is not considered capable of being responsible for their actions, society
removes their right to make choices and makes their decisions for them. However,
these conditions do not always align. A child aged 10 is considered to be able to
accept responsibility for their actions in a British court of law, yet society still
removes their right to make choices, such as voting rights and the ability to consent
to a range of activities.
Nobody has full mental comprehension of all the possible consequences of their
actions, and nobody is fully free of the power relations that operate in institutions
and markets. Even if we assume that most adults are and should be ‘at liberty’ to
make their own choices, we are also aware that real choices are always constrained,
and that some choices are harmful. As such, the concept of consent is both essential
to regulating modern societies and highly problematic.
Global networks, national laws and the internet

Global travel, migration, trade and the internet increasingly cross national borders. It is often
unclear where or whether a crime has occurred, or whose law enforcement agencies should
act. Digital content hosted in one country can be viewed globally, making prosecution
harder. Using the postal service in combination with the internet, it is possible to buy illegal
materials and have them delivered to a proxy address (Bancroft and Reid 2016). Similarly, it
is possible to access free streaming services even in countries where those services are
banned.
Digital technologies bring added complexity to this. Crimes can be committed against
computers (hacking), using computers (fraud, stalking and piracy), or within computers (hate
speech, trolling and obscene content). Digital networks extend criminal reach, reduce costs
and make detection harder. National laws and local police are struggling to adapt. Is the internet
therefore criminogenic?
Crimino
Authorities claim that the internet is a playground for cyberterrorists, child
genic:any
social or pornographers, fraudsters, hackers, trolls, stalkers and pirates. Yet networks allow
technical more coordinated global policing. Digital transgressions are easier to track and
arrangement record than face-to-face interactions, and you cannot actually crash an
that increases aeroplane or blow up a nuclear power station via the internet. Surveillance and
the incidence encryption play cat and mouse as authorities and citizens always have. Technology
of crime
does not determine how we use it (Yar and Steinmetz 2019).
THINKING SOCIOLOGICALLY ABOUT TRANSGRESSION

A joke poses the question: ‘How many sociologists does it take to change a light bulb?’
The answer is ‘None! It’s not the light bulb that needs changing. It’s the system.’
Much early research on crime and transgression did not consider the system but
instead focused on individuals. Where some biologists explain crime and rule breaking in
general by bad genes, some psychologists believe that individual brains have developed
faults, in particular the failure in early life to learn how to inhibit impulses for immediate
gratification (Mischel 2014; Raine 2013). Policy researchers focus on how best to reduce
offending by making rule breakers fit back into society. A sociological approach to
transgression is vital because it questions flawed biologically deterministic explanations
and considers the structural and institutional issues that affect rule breaking. Thinking
sociologically about transgression means questioning naturalization.
Sociologists ask not only why some people do not conform, but also why society
accepts only certain kinds of difference and not others, and how it might also fail to
make it possible for everyone to fit in, even if they wanted to. Because ‘transgression’
means crossing the lines created by society, the sociology of transgression must think
about how such lines were drawn in the first place, why some choose to cross them and
not others, and why some who cross the line are punished when others are not. It is
not enough just to ask what is wrong with rule breakers, or what can be done to make
the systems of enforcement of rules stronger. We should question the rules as well.
Transgressions 239
Jurisprudence, sociology of crime or criminology?

There are many approaches to the study of crime and, by extension, transgression. In legal
scholarship, ‘jurisprudence’ is the study of what the law is and what it should be. Jurisprudence
has tended to be viewed as a branch of philosophy, seeking rational explanation of how the law
should be understood and enacted, drawing on philosophies of morality and ethics. There has
also been a tradition of ‘sociological jurisprudence’, which seeks to understand how the law
relates to the society of which it is a part. Where the philosophy of law has tended to seek
universal logical truths, the sociology of law asks whether the law needs to reflect particular
ways of living rather than assuming one universally correct way of life.
Beyond asking whether the law should reflect the society it regulates, the sociology of crime and
deviance asks why some things are prohibited and others not, why certain groups are more heavily
regulated than others and why certain groups may be more or less likely to commit certain
transgressions. Questions of how crime can be reduced and criminals rehabilitated are also asked.
Geographers have also sought to map spatial patterns of where crime is most likely to happen,
while computer scientists study how digital networks may enable crime or better help catch criminals.
Some people argue that all these different approaches form a separate discipline called ‘criminology’.
We disagree. Approaches to human rule breaking must always examine the question of who created
the rules and why people choose to break them. These are always sociological questions. What is
deviant and when a transgression is defined as a crime cannot be reduced to the individual or
technical measurement alone. The brain and technology have some part to play, but without a
sociological understanding, the study of such parts will never give the whole picture.
Monkey fighting: biological and psychological approaches to deviance

Male chimpanzees are more aggressive than female chimpanzees. Chimpanzees are
more aggressive than bonobos. Chimps and bonobos are close relatives and both are
the closest relatives that humans have in nature. We share 99 per cent of our DNA
with these two related species. Some biologists think that the study of primates can
help explain human behaviour, in particular the far greater tendency of males to use
violence, including sexual violence (Daly and Wilson 1989). However, chimps and
bonobos are very different; with chimps living in patriarchal hierarchies where
dominant males regulate other males and all females using violence, while bonobos
live in female-led groups where dominant females regulate other females and all
males using grooming and sex. Chimps engage in a lot of fighting. Bonobos have a
lot of sex. Human social life can be like either, so it is not true that one biological
nature determines us.
Consider this. Step-parents (particularly stepfathers) are one hundred times more
likely to murder stepchildren than are biological parents (Daly and Wilson 1998).
Some claim this shows a strong biological cause of crime. However, there is no
difference between the levels of child abuse and murder between biological parents
and adoptive parents (David 2002a). As such, it is not the biology that makes a
difference here, but rather the social relationship between adult and child. Society
values adoptive parents as more ‘real’ than step-parents.
-
Similarly, claims that the Maori people in New Zealand have a ‘warrior gene’
producing higher levels of violence erroneously reduces actions to biology (see
Perbal 2013). Short people have no ‘drowning gene’ and White people have no ‘skin
Affordances: cancer gene’. Circumstances determine how genetic aff ordances are played out.
properties of Controversial psychologist Hans Eysenck ([1964]2013) suggested that the
an object or psychological differences in personality explained the likelihood of crime and
environment
deviance, but even he admitted that the same biological personality type might
that allow but
do not
produce a businessman or a bank robber depending on that individual’s upbringing.
determine Some psychologists and biologists argue that rape is a reproductive strategy that
possible men are programmed to use to increase their number of offspring; however, given that
actions or such offspring would then probably be raised by stepfathers who the same authors
outcomes think are more likely to kill such offspring, the authors then conclude that men might
also be programmed to avoid such a risky strategy. The theory does not add up.
Policy/administrative approaches: uncritical criminology

Governments want solutions to problems as they define them. If a government is
under pressure to stop people freely downloading music, or looking at ‘obscene’
content, what they want are ‘technical’ solutions rather than critical research that
might question whether or not such things should be prohibited in the first place
(Cairney 2016).
Administrative criminologists carry out research to test whether certain
programmes are successful at making people ‘better’, curing them of whatever it
might be that society (or those in charge) has decided needs to be stamped out.
Consider the following questions:
■■ Do certain offender rehabilitation programmes reduce the likelihood of reoffending?

■■ Can a particular publicity campaign successfully reduce a prohibited or socially
disapproved activity?
■■ Does the administration of a particular medical substitute/medicine reduce
harmful illegal alternatives?
These questions may best be answered using rigorous research designs (see Chapter 4). If
you want to know if a new rehabilitation programme ‘works’, you have to conduct a study
that compares the new method with existing alternatives, but ensure that the people taking
the new route are not simply those who are the most enthusiastic. If you advertise for a
new scheme, maybe those who come forward are simply those most keen to ‘change’. If
the results show that this group changed more that those who did not take part, that may
simply tell you about those people rather than the programme itself.
Politicians regularly call for tough prison sentences, particularly for people who
commit violent crimes. But it is debatable whether prison is effective in changing
behaviour or preventing crime. Similarly, various schemes that occur in prisons are
of questionable value. Those advocating such schemes are paid to administer them
Transgressions 241
and will claim they are doing good. This is known as ‘advocacy research’, and the
good intentions of advocates who believe in what they are doing can corrupt the
quality of the results (Gilbert 1997). Administrative criminologists therefore need to
take a rigorous approach to comparing identical samples to test the claims being
made by those ‘selling’ new schemes for solving old problems.
BAD SOCIOLOGY
Broken Windows
Some areas see more crime than others.
Some neighbourhoods have a reputation
for being dangerous. It has been suggested
that some buildings, particularly residential
tower blocks, reduce the potential for the
development of community and hence in-
crease the scope for deviant behaviour to
rise unchecked.
Based on Travis Hirschi’s self-control
theory of criminal behaviour, ‘broken
windows theory’ claims that when people mattartz/Unsplash
see decay, they think nobody cares about
that place, increasing the sense that people can get away with crime in that area (Wilson
and Kelling 1982). This broken windows theory has led to policies of tidying up certain
faҫades to create the impression that a place is less rundown than it is. The theory also
suggests that targeting the little manifestations of disorder will create an atmosphere of
control that will reduce the tendency towards more serious crimes. This has been used to
justify excessive street policing and stop and search policies that create the impression of
zero tolerance.
Defenders of the theory argue that abandoning certain geographical areas to petty
crime and street disorder creates ‘ghettos’ where anything goes and whose residents are
made even more vulnerable to crime because they have been abandoned. Tough policing is
better than letting things get out of control. Yet it is questionable that the policing of minor
infringements can create the sense of social cohesion that has been lost by the structural
breakdown of social order – such as where employment, transport, health, education and
housing opportunities have been reduced.
Substantive critiques of broken windows theory question its validity. First, zero tolerance
approaches appear indelibly associated with the targeting of minorities, particularly people
of colour and working-class men. It also reifies classed notions of disorder, where inner-city
disorder is seen as a prelude to crime but not when the same behaviours occur in boardrooms
(Sheldon n.d.).
Broken windows theory also conflates correlation and causation (see Chapter 4). If poverty
means that smashed windows are not repaired, it is the poverty not the broken glass that fuels
crime. The broken windows approach masks the broader structural issues related to city
regeneration and gentrification that further perpetuate wealth inequality (Harcourt 2013).
Indeed, the broken windows approach is sceptical of social reasons for crime more generally,
ignoring how social inequality affects crime.
Rich people often live in towers, and these tend to be well maintained, attractive and
signal success. Poor people also often live in towers, but poverty and stigma mean they
are poorly maintained and become associated with social problems. The fire at Grenfell
Tower in London on 14 June 2017 resulted in the death of 72 people. The failure of
owners, regulators and state officials caused the deaths. The cladding on the building
looked good, but was cheap, faulty and flammable. Making things look good on the
surface, while not dealing with the structural issues underneath was lethal. Cheap
window dressing kills.
Routine activity theory is a theory of crime most aligned to the administrative

approach (Cohen and Felson 1979). The theory assumes that victims and motivated
criminals simply exist, and the only thing that varies is whether an effective guardian is
in place to prevent the latter successfully targeting the former. The only issue to be
addressed is effective prevention.
However, testing what works in the most rigorous fashion avoids the question of
whether we want to ‘make people better’ in the first place. When someone does not
fit in, the answer is not necessarily to cure the behaviour but to consider the conditions
that make the behaviour seem out of place.
STRUCTURE, CULTURE AND CRIME

Durkheim, Lombroso and the positivist criminalists
Medieval jurists saw much of what happened in nature and society to be part of
the struggle between god and the devil. Animals were often put on trial and
executed. A tree or a cart that caused someone’s death might also be forfeited or
destroyed if it were deemed an instrument of evil spirits (Evans 1906). When a
person committed a crime, they were often seen as being possessed by the devil or
controlled by ‘sin’.
Modern societies placed a new emphasis on ‘free will’. A person was to be
punished if they freely chose to do what society said was wrong; not simply
destroyed as an instrument of the devil. It was against both premodern ideas of
evil spirits and early modern ideas of freely choosing wickedness that late 19th-
Transgressions 243
century criminalists offered ‘scientific’ explanations of crime. These criminalists Criminalist:

suggested that crime could be explained by causal mechanisms operating beyond an early term
free will. Such social science sought to explain human action by externally to describe
observable causal processes similar to those proposed by physical scientists when what are now
called
they explained weather, volcanos and disease. From a physiological perspective,
‘crimino
Italian positivist criminologist Cesare Lombroso argued that largely inherited, logists’
physical abnormalities in the ‘criminal brain’ explained why some ‘types’ of people
are incapable of restraining selfishness. While Lombroso’s specific theories about
race, crime and degeneracy have been discredited (Driver 1968), new forms of
criminal psychology continue to arise, claiming to explain crime in terms of
physical brain abnormalities.
In contrast to Lombroso, Emile Durkheim examined mental states and
consequent actions as products of social structures. Durkheim’s theory of suicide
([1897]2006) showed how the level of integration and regulation that social
structures exerted on individuals controlled their actions, even determining
whether or not they would kill themselves (see Chapter 1). Thus, early sociology
started to address deviance and criminality from a social perspective, rejecting the
notion that deviance was inherent in the individual and arguing instead that it was
located within social structures.
Durkheim even suggested that crime could perform social functions. Punishing
rule breakers allows society to publicly reaffirm its rules. In such thinking, everything
fits the ‘system’, even rebelling against the system; or, deviance may offer new
adaptations that allow society to change and improve its overall functionality. For
Durkheim, even a society of angels would have deviance, as their standards would be
so high, even they would not be able to live up to them. The better we become, the
worse things seem to be.
Such functionalism is often criticized for being too neat and tidy. It begins to
sound a little bit too much like conspiracy theory, where everything is said to be part
of the system.
Robert Merton’s alternative functionalism, strain and anomie

American sociologist Robert Merton (1910–2003) proposed a revised version of functionalism for
what he called ‘the middle range’ (Merton 1938). He was sceptical about theories that claimed to
show how everything fitted together. Certain values may be socialized in everyone, such as the desire
for material wealth. This ‘aspiration’ might function to motivate people to work hard. However, lacking
certain resources, some individuals might turn to crime as a way of achieving what society encourages
them to gain, but only by means society disapproves of. This situation creates what Merton called
‘strain’, and his strain theory is widely known.
People are pulled in different directions by contradictory functional goals and institutional
means. Merton was writing during the 1930s when the Great Depression meant that many
people could not reconcile their actual circumstances with the ‘American dream’.
Strain Merton created a two-by-two grid. One axis relates to institutional means
theory:belief and the other is society’s goals. Along each axis it is possible to accept or reject.
that crime is This creates four types:
caused by
tension 1 Conformists: Those who accept society’s goals and the institutional means.
between 2 Ritualists: Those who accept the means but reject the goals.
general 3 Retreatists: Those who reject both the means and the goals.
socialization
4 Innovators: Those who accept the goals, but reject the means.
and material
conditions Apart from the conformist, all the others may come to adopt certain kinds of deviant
that do not behaviour. However, a fifth box, the ‘rebel’, creates new means and new goals and is
allow some to
achieve what
the most deviant of all.
society Culture goals Institutionalized means
expects of I. Conformity + +
them II. Innovation + –
III. Ritualism – +
IV. Retreatism – –
V. Rebellion ± ±
Merton also highlighted the tension in functionalism between explaining crime in terms of
the strain between society’s approved goals and disapproved ways of achieving those goals (in
the material conditions that made accepted behaviours ineffective for many), and the idea of
‘anomie’, where crime flows from the lack of institutional regulations. Where, for Durkheim,
anomie arises from an increasing division of labour that removes shared goals, for Merton,
anomie arises when the division of labour fragments and removes approved pathways to shared
goals for many people.
Durkheim identified social integration as positive association and reward, where regulation
was a more negative form of association that punishes those who transgress. Merton is critical
of functionalists like Talcott Parsons who believed that regulation and integration would, for the
most part, work, and work in harmony. Merton, while linked to the functionalist tradition, was
not so sure things would work out harmoniously all the time. As a personal example, consider
this. Harriet Zuckerman, Merton’s wife, identified ‘the Matthew effect’ in science before her
husband. Robert Merton then wrote an article about it. He is famous for discussing it. Feminist
researchers have called this ‘the Matilda effect’. If someone powerful ‘steals’ an idea, they are
rewarded. If a less powerful person takes something, they are more likely to get into trouble.
Urban ecologies and subcultures of crime

Despite Durkheim’s attempts at incorporating crime and deviance into functionalist
perspectives, social transgressions challenge the idea that societies are functional wholes.
The Chicago School of sociology, introduced in Chapter 2, started from a more grounded
position, trying to understand the relationship between order and disorder in newly growing
cities. What was apparent to such researchers was the diversity of communities within these
cities. Dissimilar to the homogeneous societies espoused by classical sociological theories,
Transgressions 245
Polish people, Russians, Jewish people, Italians, Black Americans from the southern states,
Germans and those of British and Irish heritage brought different religions, languages
and ways of life into individual cities.
The diversity and different rules of these cultures that had not been socialized together
might appear to an outsider to be a lack of social order, or anomie as Durkheim might see
it. Looking more closely using ethnographic methods, Chicago School sociologists found
alternative cultures in operation. This was not just deviance or transgression in relation to
one set of rules, but involved conformity to alternative rules as well. If other rules also
existed, not conforming to the dominant institutional arrangements, laws and values that
functionalist sociologists espoused was only part of the story.
Known as urban ecology, the Chicago approach sought to understand these Urban
alternative ways of life, which have come to be referred to as ‘subcultures’ (see ecology:
Chapter 1). Whether such alternative ways of life are best explained in terms of explains
Merton’s theory of alternative adaptations within mainstream values, or as more human action
in terms of
fundamentally different ways of living remains a source of dispute.
people’s
The Chicago School combined elements of symbolic interactionism and social
qualitative attention to the meaning of human action with an evolutionary conception environment,
of ecological areas and group competition. Park’s (1950) conception of the race neighbour
relations cycle assumed that new groups would move from conflict, through hood or area
competition to accommodation and finally to assimilation. This notion of assimilation
has been much questioned since, given that competition and conflict were far more
apparent than accommodation let alone assimilation.
Clifford Shaw’s (1929) study of delinquency areas used pin maps to identify
where crimes occurred, where those arrested lived and other variables of interest.
Shaw identified street crimes, such as drug dealing, racketeering, illegal street-level
gambling and crimes relating to bootleg alcohol, as concentrated in areas of transition;
areas where older populations were being replaced by newer and poorer groups and
where old social regulations were breaking down. Tension existed within the Chicago
School in how to understand this. Was crime the result of a breakdown in regulations
and the subsequent ecological competition for resources in the absence of rules, or
was it, in part, the result of alternative rules and values held by different groups
within the same or adjacent neighbourhoods?
The study of Chicago drug dealing and street gangs today is still divided between
those who argue that such gangs are simply alternative business models in conditions
of racialized social exclusion (Jankowski 1991) and those who argue that life
expectancy and material life chances (economic benefits) show that gang crime does
not pay for most members, and that membership can only be explained in terms of
alternative value systems or subcultures (Venkatesh 2008).
SYMBOLIC INTERACTIONISM, LABELLING

AND THE NEW DEVIANCY
The urban sociology of the Chicago School produced the symbolic interactionist
approach (see Chapter 2), focusing on how people make sense of the world and
organize their actions in relation to one another. The second generation of symbolic
interactionists became increasingly interested in how crime was produced through
the interactions between those who are thought to be committing crime and the
Labelling agents charged with regulating crime, with labelling theory a key concept. If certain
theory:the groups are assumed to be more criminal and are policed more heavily, this may lead
idea that to a self-fulfilling prophecy. Being labelled as ‘criminal’ and being processed through
interaction the criminal justice system may reduce alternative avenues of employment and
with
increase a person’s identification of themselves as being outside the law.
authorities
reinforces or Howard Becker’s (1963) book Outsiders contends that almost everyone breaks rules,
even creates and the key sociological question is who the authorities identify and label as ‘deviant’.
identity Outsiders focuses on two groups that were defined by the wider society as ‘trouble’ – jazz
musicians and marijuana users. Becker studied the process of becoming a marijuana user,
the learning of how to smoke and how you are supposed to respond to its effects. He then
addressed how the authorities treated smokers as extreme cases of deviance. ‘Reefer
madness’, the false idea that smoking cannabis caused extreme violence and lawlessness,
led the police, courts and lawmakers to equate marijuana users with rapists and murderers.
Linking marijuana smokers with violence and other crimes like robbery labelled them in a
way that marked them as outsiders far more than did their actual smoking.
Labelling theory focuses attention on how interaction with the authorities amplifies
a person’s deviant status and so is likely to increase rather than reduce deviance. As
almost everyone commits some level of deviance but does not go on to lead ‘a life of
crime’, Becker (1963 p. 9) makes the radical assertion that: ‘The deviant is one to whom
the label has successfully been applied; deviant behaviour is behaviour that has been so
labelled.’ This is not to say that deviance does not exist prior to labelling, but that labelling
is at least as important in explaining how a deviant career or lifestyle unfolds.
Jock Young’s (1971) study The Drugtakers examined the impact of the policing of
Deviance
hippy marijuana smokers in London’s Notting Hill. Once an area was labelled as deviant,
ampli the spiral of increased surveillance and hence increased incidents of being stopped,
fication:the arrested, prosecuted and sentenced for drugs offences further marginalized marijuana
process by users, reduced the likelihood of their gaining employment, and increased the likelihood
which of further involvement within the criminal economy and further police action.
attempts to The deviance amplification spiral for White hippies was one thing. The way this
control spiral impacted on non-White participants in the community of marijuana users was far
deviance
more intense. The policing of young African Caribbean men in particular acted to
increases it
further marginalize and label groups and individuals who were already excluded. Alcohol
was legal, marijuana was not. This created a baseline condition where particular cultural
practices were already unlawful. Policing certain communities more heavily that others
then further criminalized that community. Crimes committed were more readily
identified and punished, while the scope to participate in lawful careers was diminished.
Anger and resentment at being discriminated against could then be reframed as evidence
of being dangerous and violent, requiring even tougher policing.
Aaron Cicourel (1968) documented how similar processes occurred within the
policing of youth crime, where certain groups are funnelled through the criminal
justice system all the way to custodial sentence. The process went as follows. Some
actions are observed. Of these, some are reported. Some reports are investigated.
Some investigations lead to arrests. Some arrests lead to formal prosecutions. Some
prosecutions lead to convictions. Some convictions lead to custodial sentences. At every
Transgressions 247
stage in this process, decisions are made based on assumptions about certain kinds
of young people, ratcheting up the punishment for minority groups. Poorer, less well-
educated, non-White kids are more likely to be processed all the way through the system.
Cicourel described the system as acting like a ratchet, because it always moved in one
direction in unfair and discriminatory ways. This issue continues today, with significant
racial inequality in criminal justice systems (see Cunneen 2019; Lammy 2017).
What is policing?
The words ‘police’ and ‘policing’ recur over sixty times in this chapter, and mainly refer to formal
state law enforcement officers, whose job is to enforce the criminal law. But we all police our
own conduct and sometimes other people’s, and all sorts of organizations and groups engage in
enforcing rules.
The emergence of modern police forces is relatively recent. Police forces can be private,
local, national or international, with a spectrum of organization from more military structures
to more community-based civilian structures. The balance between crime detection and crime
prevention, uniformed and plain clothed, varies.
There are many profound questions about policing. Does upholding public order mean
protecting the powerful against the powerless, or protecting everyone equally? How far are
police forces representative of the communities they serve? What happens when the police
perpetrate violence on communities rather than serving them? How does the culture of a
police force impact on the conduct of policing? How does formal policing relate to other forms
of policing that go on in society, from institutional rules to interpersonal norms?
These questions permeate this chapter because the policing of rules and laws is closely
associated to the transgression of them.
The anti-psychiatry movement

Psychiatry is now an established branch of medicine that deals with the brain and
mental illness, but its emergence as a specialist field is relatively recent. Medicine is
thousands of years old, whereas psychiatry only came to prominence in the 19th
century, alongside psychology and sociology.
In relation to transgression, early psychiatry set about claiming jurisdiction over
a range of people who received treatment that was truly horrific, particularly some
criminalized people and those deemed possessed by devils. Punishment was to be
replaced by medical treatment (Hacking 1999), itself to be administered in asylums
and hospitals. Psychiatry saved many patients from far worse conditions and it aspired
to make people better using the latest available science. However, confinement inside
a mental hospital could itself become a form of imprisonment. What sought to be
an alternative increasingly came to resemble what it set out to replace: the prison.
Being processed by the institutions of correction extends far beyond the prison.
The school, the psychiatric hospital and elite sports have all been studied for the way
Institutional
they process ‘inmates’, in what Erving Goffman referred to as institutional careers.
career:a Goffman’s (1961) Asylums documents the routine expectations of staff within
patterned psychiatric institutions that shaped the careers of inmates. Refusal to accept the
sequence of stages in the career towards accepting your condition was itself labelled as evidence
stages along of why you needed to be institutionalized in the first place.
which a The power of this process, and of labelling, has been shown to overpower
person is other processes within these institutions. In a classic, albeit contested, study,
expected and
psychologist David Rosenhan (1973) asked a class of students to report that they
pressured to
conform to
were hearing voices at the admissions offices of psychiatric hospitals across the
when USA. They were instructed to use words such as ‘empty’, ‘hollow’ and ‘thud’.
consigned Once admitted for psychiatric observations, the students had been told to start
within an acting normally. All their normal behaviours were labelled as evidence of being
institution insane, including taking notes, claiming they were just doing a research project
and getting worried after not being released (on average it took 19 days to get
released). Rosenhan argued that it was difficult to distinguish the sane from
the insane in psychiatric hospitals, and that various practices within them were
‘counter-therapeutic’. Author Jon Ronson’s more recent book, The Psychopath Test
(2012), shows that these concerns continue to this day and that determinations
of psychopathy are social and subjective.
Michel Foucault’s early work Madness and Civilization ([1960]2001) was part of
Anti- what has been called anti-psychiatry. Foucault claimed that people who society
psychiatry: labelled as ‘mad’ were simply refusing to conform to a society obsessed with being
the critique rational. In the Middle Ages in Europe, religious principles were said to govern life,
of or ought to, and those who refused to conform were seen as heretics or servants of
institutional
the devil and often put to death. This worldview went into decline and was replaced
labelling and
incarceration
by modern faith in science and reason.
of the In the new Age of Enlightenment, people who did not conform were said to be
supposedly irrational. Such people were a threat to reason and order and were confined, in
‘insane’ Foucault’s view, as much to protect society from their challenge to rationality as to
save them. Few of those who were confined to mental hospitals were cured, so the
idea that this was going to make them better is questionable. In his early work,
Foucault still believed that the ‘mad’ person showed a spark of human uniqueness
that just did not fit in with convention. However, Foucault came to believe that even
resistance itself was instilled in people by disciplinary institutions such as schools,
hospitals, prisons, military barracks and mental asylums. He felt that we could never
find our true, free self. At best, we might make ourselves like a work of art – a
creation, not a discovery of our true inner self.
The anti-psychiatry movement successfully closed most mental hospitals.
Whether this resulted in better care in the community is debated. Many people
became homeless or ended up in prison. In some cases, medication was used to
replace institutional care. In mental hospitals, the term ‘medical cosh’ was used to
describe when drugs rendered someone unconscious, making them manageable (a
‘cosh’ being a heavy stick used as a weapon). Today, the use of drugs to manage
mental health symptoms is excessive. Prozac, Ritalin, Valium, antipsychotics, sleeping
Transgressions 249
pills and opioids are prescribed en masse. People are ‘normalized’ by taking these
drugs – a medical cosh stabilizing millions of people on a daily basis (Schwartz 2014;
Wurtzel 1994). Beyond the asylum, we have found new ways of creating what Foucault
called ‘docile bodies’.
New circuits of control, from credit scores, academic grades, digital ‘likes’ and
profile hits, monitor our every moment. Whereas 300 years ago hardly anyone owned
a mirror, now we monitor ourselves constantly to ensure that we are conforming – at
the gym, posting a selfie, or just checking our profile. Most of us police ourselves.
The disciplinary society of closed institutional spaces that anti-psychiatry opposed
has been replaced by a pervasive digital surveillance and self-regulation that amounts
to a ‘society of control’ (Deleuze 1992).
What is the society of control?

For Foucault, Goffman and others, the supreme example of power was the ‘total institution’, a
contained space where a particular discipline managed the lives of those within it, through total
control and total surveillance. Prisons, convents/monasteries, army barracks and mental
asylums aimed to generate such total control and claimed to be best able to make people better
as a result. A ‘disciplinary society’ was one governed by the principles of human science
disciplines regulating total institutions, such as psychiatry, penology, medicine, pedagogy and
administrative criminology.
Foucault ([1976]1991) observed that in premodern society, the ‘criminal’ was either
violently killed or cast into a dungeon out of sight. The principle of the modern prison is
different. Foucault cites Jeremy Bentham’s ‘panopticon’, an all-seeing prison, as the model
not only for modern prisons but for society as a whole. Where the sovereign ruler would once
have destroyed or hidden the body of anyone who transgressed their power, modern
disciplinary power seeks to remake the deviant by keeping them under constant surveillance.
Disciplinary institutions, with the prison as the prime example, apply discipline to inmates,
and are organized around the expertise of ‘disciplines’, such as penology, psychology, sociology
and criminology.
The expansion of such disciplines beyond the walls of institutions was what Foucault called
the wider project of ‘governmentality’, where everyday lives are subject to constant monitoring
and regulation by experts. Large urban populations are a challenge to govern. Foucault claims
that statistics means ‘state science’ – the study of populations to control them. The prison
becomes the model for the school, factory, university and hospital. But if the model prison does
not work, what of all the rest?
With every aspect of our lives now monitored by digital networks, it is only necessary to monitor
and control our credit status and consumption habits to place each of us in a state of control.
Zuboff (2015) suggests that the ‘big brother’ of the disciplinary state has been replaced by the ‘big
other’ that is surveillance capitalism. This is what Deleuze (1992) called ‘the society of control’.
What do prisons do and

are there better ways to
make people better?
Modern prisons claim to
make people better. However,
few people believe that
prisons reform criminals into
law-abiding citizens. Rates
of reoffending, known as
Recidivism: recidivism, are very high.
when a Those sent to prison very
person often go back to prison ©1shostak/iStock
released from shortly after release. Whether
prison What is the role of prisons in society?
reoffends or
this is because going to prison
at least when increases criminality or those who receive custodial sentences are already the more
they are serious criminals is an important question.
caught People admitted to hospital after visiting their doctor are more likely to die than
those sent home with pills, but that does not mean the hospital killed them. Although
hospital-induced complications can kill, most often these patients were just more ill
in the first place. Even so, prisons rarely ‘cure’ criminalized people in the way hospitals
can medically cure patients. If prisons cannot rehabilitate, perhaps they can only
deter, punish and contain crime; however, over the long term, there is only limited
evidence even for this.
Some argue that prisons should be reformed to focus on rehabilitation, with
more education and training. However, poorly designed prisoner rehabilitation
schemes, without randomized controlled trials and robust outcome evaluations,
increase reoffending rates (Mews et al. 2017; Shaw 2019). This is because learning
approved scripts about change from sympathetic but poorly trained tutors increases
the chances of early release without any transformation in attitudes or behaviours.
Others argue that prisons should deter crime by being more punitive, as
rehabilitation might only be to reward criminality. Societies where jobs, houses and
training are generally in short supply tend to be most hostile to giving criminalized
people training in prison or help with employment and housing in exchange for such
training while in prison. Societies that have less unemployment, more affordable
housing and good training for all have smaller prison populations in the first place,
and much lower reconviction rates. A decent society is the best cure for crime.
The notion that ‘getting tough’ deters crime assumes that people who break the
law calculate the likely cost–benefit ratio of doing so. Maybe the clever ones do, but
the clever ones rarely get caught. Those who are caught and convicted rarely display
high levels of education and foresight, so are least likely to have been deterred by a
poor cost–benefit ratio. Those people who are sent to prison tend to have far lower
levels of education but far higher levels of mental health problems than the general
population. Better education and better mental health services might then be more
effective than prison at preventing crime.
Transgressions 251
Once convicted, a punitive regime might harden convicted people further, making
them more dangerous on release. Locking people up might keep everyone else safe
in the short term, but may only be storing up trouble for the future. ‘Throwing away
the key’ might seem like the right approach until the bill for ever longer sentences
and rocketing prison populations arrives.
Greater use of non-custodial sentences that seek to integrate people back into
society may be the solution, but the desire to punish runs deep in a society where
many who believe they follow the rules feel society is not working for them. As
Durkheim suggested, a divided society wants someone to punish. Given the choice,
most people would bring back the death penalty. Public executions were not banned
because they were unpopular; rather, they were so popular that crowds at such events
often got out of control.
Those given non-custodial sentences are less likely to reoffend. This might be
because they were less dangerous offenders in the first place, but non-custodial
sentences, in particular the use of restorative sentencing, where the offender is
required to meet their victim or the wider community they harmed to agree a way to
redress the harm done, are more constructive in relation to both the victim and
integrating the offender back into society.
Multiple moral panics and the ‘new’ deviancy

Moral panic theory in the UK emerged from an extension of labelling, deviance Moral panic:
amplification and symbolic interactionism, and came to be combined with deeper disproportio
critiques of power in society. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, this new approach nate reactions
came to be called the ‘new deviancy theory’. Jock Young (1971) looked at the way to particular
deviant acts/
drug use in London was represented as part of a supposed wider threat to traditional
actors by
British society. Stanley Cohen ([1972]2011) examined media, police and political moral
reactions to mods and rockers fighting on bank holiday weekends at various southern entrepreneurs
English seaside towns in the early 1960s. Exaggeration amplified events, encouraged seeking to
more trouble and was used to justify tough new laws. introduce new
Cohen is normally attributed with coining the term ‘moral panic’, and his focus and/or
was on how particular concerns are exaggerated and used by people in power to tougher
control others. Cohen ([1972]2011 p. 9) famously wrote that a moral panic occurs regulations
when a ‘condition, episode, person or group of persons emerges to become defined
as a threat to societal values and interests’. New moral panics regarding mass
migration today seek to create new ‘folk devils’ to blame for society’s problems.
Extending the work of Young and Cohen, Stuart Hall and colleagues
([1978]2013) applied moral panic to the concept of ‘mugging’. In the 1970s, it was
believed that vandalism was on the rise in the UK. However, this appeared to be
the case because the police only recorded damage over the value of £15, and
inflation in the 1970s was very high. A broken window in a telephone box in 1970
cost less than £15 to replace, but a few years later cost more. Lumping eight
different street crimes into the new category of ‘mugging’ in the early 1970s meant
criminal statistics appeared to show a huge spike in such events, leading to calls for
tougher policing.
Hall et al. showed that street crimes committed by young Black men gained far
more media attention than if the offender had been White. Their book focuses on a
particular crime where four Black teenage boys killed an elderly White man and stole
72 pence. Media coverage portrayed this crime as indicative of young Black teenage
boys in general, and of a general decline in morals due to immigration. Again,
newspapers called for tougher policing.
The British new deviancy approach was concerned with how powerful groups
labelled and blamed outsiders in order to stay in power. For example, Cohen’s study
of mods and rockers found that while journalists, politicians and judges exaggerated
the threat of teenagers fighting on the beaches, the local residents he interviewed did
not panic, viewing the reporting as over the top.
In the USA, Erich Goode and Nachman Ben-Yahuda (1994) became the most
prominent researchers in the field of moral panic research. Their core examples of
moral panic were the Salem witch trials and lynch mobs, where ordinary citizens
labelled and incited one another. Here, their interest was in mob rule scapegoating
minorities. In the case of the Salem witch trials of 1692, it was local people who
engaged in a spiral of accusations that saw 200 people accused, 30 tried and led to
the killing of 15 women, 4 men and 2 dogs before higher authorities could intervene
and calm the situation. As such, the moral panic research tradition is split between
those who think moral panics are made up by authorities to justify and extend their
power, and those who believe that the irrationality of ordinary people is always in
danger of exploding if the power of higher authorities is not sufficiently forceful to
stop it.
Panic buying or moral panic?

Elements of moral panic are evident in the response to the COVID-19 pandemic. In the UK,
USA and Australia, media reports of panic buying showed empty shops and supermarkets and
there was a narrative that selfish people were buying large amounts of produce they did not
need, and vulnerable people were suffering. However, in the UK, evidence showed that
people’s weekly shopping only went up by £16 during that period. This was not panic buying
but a small and rational increase in purchasing to prepare for self-isolation. The empty shelves
were because of this happening on a large scale. The framing of panic buying could actually
have fostered a moral panic (Reicher et al. 2020).
DEMOGRAPHICS OF CRIME
‘Demography’ refers to the measurement of population characteristics such as age, sex,
race/ethnicity and class. In relation to crime, the key demographic issues are whether
some groups commit more crimes and/or are more likely to be victims. The next three
sections address class, gender and race/ethnicity as significant demographics, although
whole chapters could be given to these and other demographics that impact on crime.
Transgressions 253
Class and crime

The overwhelming assumption in Western cultures is that crime and poverty are
closely related: whether this is a view that the working classes are more prone to
criminality or that poverty is a cause of crime, the association is indelibly fixed.
There are many reasons why poverty may cause crime. The classic stereotype of
a person stealing a loaf of bread to ward off starvation comes to mind, as in the
book, musical and 2012 film Les Misérables. No doubt many acts of desperation like
this have and do occur, so poverty may certainly be a cause of crime. Today, the
crime of shoplifting may involve such basic necessities as bread, but more often
involves stealing consumer goods, like small electrical items, clothes and cosmetics.
In a society where people are judged according to their consumption choices (Veblen
[1899]1992), ‘relative poverty’ means not being able to take part in normal social
activities, so shoplifting such items may still be the result of poverty.
However, shoplifting and petty theft are often a way to fund drug use. Poverty
and other forms of social exclusion may lead a person to drink or drug dependency.
Certainly, many affluent people drink and use drugs, but tend not to have to steal to
fund their addictions, nor are they labelled as having a problem. In this case, poverty
explains why people might resort to crime. Poverty may also sometimes lead to drug
and alcohol use in the first place. Poverty may also cause a person to become involved
in other criminal activities such as drug dealing.
However, this association between poverty and crime is flawed from the start. Poverty White-collar
is not the main cause of crime. Steven Box (1983) famously observed that the most crime:crimes
fundamental causes of crime were greed and opportunity. These things are most achieved
characteristic of elites. Illegal industrial practices, pollution and substandard goods kill more through
people than interpersonal violence. Corporate tax evasion dwarfs benefit fraud. Sutherland insider
(1949) developed the concept of white-collar crime to highlight how elites are socialized information
to believe that the rules do not apply to them, that they are entitled to more than everyone or authority,
not physical
else, and, as insiders, they know the best ways to bribe, defraud and cheat the system they
force
created. The costs of white-collar crime are far larger than burglary and physical robbery.
At the national level, state engagement in war, state-sponsored terrorism and
internal repression dwarf interpersonal violence. Permanent membership of the Terrorism:
United Nations (UN) Security Council is reserved for the five biggest nuclear weapon politically
states. Such weapons of mass destruction cannot distinguish military personnel from motivated
civilians and so, legally, constitute terrorism. The UN declared possession of nuclear violence or
weapons a crime against humanity, but only applies the rules to weaker states. Poor threat of
violence,
countries resort to land mines to defend their territories: the UN actively bans these.
either against
The reason why the dominant association of poverty and crime is wrong is because non-
it only considers some forms of crime. combatant
One person’s terrorist is another person’s freedom fighter. For some, politically motivated civilians or
violence should be judged according to whether we agree with the goal being sought. For against state
others, the use of violence to achieve political goals is never justified, whether by states or agents by
others. Whether violence or any other crime can ever be justified, even if society is unfair, is parties and
disputed. As such, law and crime are always political. States use violence to maintain order, methods
outside the
yet disorder is not necessarily worse. Does a violent order justify resistance, or would ‘taking
‘laws of war’
the law into our own hands’ make things even worse?
Who makes the law, who breaks the law?

The expression ‘all property is theft’ is wrongly attributed to Marx. He only quoted this phrase to
disagree with the French anarchist Proudhon. Property, Marx argued, was not theft, because the
property-owning class writes the laws (see Chapter 2). When a society is governed by a religious
hierarchy, laws ban blasphemy. Where society is ruled by men, rape is not a crime within marriage.
After the 2008 financial crisis, significant criminal misconduct was uncovered, yet no senior bankers
went to prison. Banks were bailed out and large amounts of government money were spent by the
banks’ legal teams ‘cooperating’ with the authorities. In return for paying large fines, no senior managers
were imprisoned. The cost is then passed on to customers or taken from further government bailouts.
Large accountancy firms lobby, fund and offer lucrative positions to government officials, in exchange
for ‘helping’ to draft tax laws. These large accountancy firms can then navigate these laws profitably to
enable clients to minimize their tax bills (Crouch 2015). The courts and legal profession are drawn
predominantly from the ruling elite. The police are primarily directed to defending the status quo, not
‘busting’ rogue landlords, tax dodgers and multinational corporations engaged in exploitation, fraud,
political corruption, poor standards and environmental destruction.
Gender and crime

Women appear much less likely to commit crime than men and men massively outnumber
women in prison everywhere. Seven per cent of the UK and US prison population is
female, and this figure is 8 per cent for Australia. Pakistan and Taiwan have double this
percentage of women in prison. Men are convicted of many more crimes; men are more
likely than women to be convicted of the most serious crimes that carry custodial sentences;
Double and the duration of time served in prison by men tends to be longer. Men are more likely
deviance:
to be sent to prison and spend longer there (Silvestri and Crowther-Dowey 2018).
women who
commit
Violent crimes and large-scale theft are predominantly carried out by men, even
crime break if some women just do not get caught. Nevertheless, gender difference in prison
the law but populations has slightly reduced over recent decades. Perhaps women are committing
also break more crime because of relaxed gender norms, welfare cuts, low wages or family
gender norms breakdown. Perhaps the criminal justice system is more willing to incarcerate women
regarding today. The theory of double deviance suggests that a man who commits crime is
approved deviating from the law, but a woman who commits crime is deviating both from
female
social rules and the rules associated with femininity. We suspect men more, but once
behaviour
suspected, women invoke more horror (Carlen 1985; Seal 2010).

What are the sociological reasons for this double deviance? Think back to Chapter 8
and the discussion of gender as both social and structural.
Does the same reaction hold true when women are the victims of crime? Domestic
violence was once taken much less seriously than it is now and reported incidents
have risen over time. Is this because things are getting worse, or the opposite?
Transgressions 255
Most victims of sexual violence know the perpetrator. However, not all victims
live with their attacker. Sexual and domestic violence are often linked but are not
the same thing – domestic violence also includes violent, degrading or controlling
behaviour that is not sexual. Domestic violence is legally defined as being done by
an adult to another adult partner, but violence in the home also occurs against
children and, less frequently, abuse directed by children towards their parents
(Holt 2013). Women are substantially more likely to experience domestic and
sexual violence than men (Westmarland 2015), although statistics suggest that
most women have not experienced it. Perpetrators of domestic and sexual
violence are predominantly men, although most men are not perpetrators. And,
although less common and less often lethal, men can be victims of violence by
women; and same-sex relationships can also manifest violence that challenges
simplistic notions of women as victims and men as perpetrators (Donovan and
Hester 2015).
The case of Reynhard Sinaga, a gay man who was convicted of 159 sexual
offences, including the rape of 136 young men in Manchester, England, is notable
here because his victims were heterosexual men: he found drunk heterosexual men
outside clubs near his flat and offered them a place to stay for the night, where he
then drugged and raped them. Many of his victims only found out they had been
raped when the police contacted them. A high-profile serial rapist was a gay man
whose victims were heterosexual men.
Feminist research has also highlighted the importance of subtler forms of abuse
beyond physical or sexual violence: coercive control includes intimidation, isolation Coercive
and the control of a women’s economic and social life (Stark 2007). The legal control:a
requirement to prove guilt is a challenge in relation to actions conducted in private pattern of
controlling
space without witnesses. Laws change, but stigma remains. Women may fear being
behaviours
judged negatively if they make allegations. A man may feel pathetic if he reports he beyond
was victimized by a member of ‘the weaker sex’. Victims in same-sex relationships physical
can encounter the view that ‘it’s a fair fight’. abuse, akin to
The relationship between conviction rates for these forms of criminal activity hostage taking
and their prevalence is complex. When recorded incidents of sexual and/or and intimate
domestic violence go up, this may be because victims feel better able to come terrorism
forward due to legal, institutional and cultural changes. Thus, campaigns against
sexual and domestic violence may increase levels of such crimes being recorded,
not because they make the problem worse but because they empower victims to
come forward.
Campaigns designed to validate victim claims challenge the principle that the
accused is innocent until proven guilty. This presumption, of innocent until proven
guilty, is the cornerstone of liberty, but when some are freer than others, perhaps it
is proper to require the law to believe the victim and thereby assume the accused is
guilty unless they can prove otherwise. Yet, the presumption of guilt until proven
innocent is the defining characteristic of totalitarianism. Can liberty and equality be
balanced within ‘justice’?
Regulating reproduction
Friedrich Engels ([1884]2010) proposed that marriage has its origins with the rise of private
property and inheritance. His argument was as follows. Women know they are the mother of
their children. If a man wants to pass on property to ‘his’ offspring, he needs to be sure those
children he thinks are his are his. Therefore, men sought to control women. The institution of
marriage, Engels suggests, made women’s wombs into men’s property. Within patriarchy (see
Chapter 8), children were legally defined as their father’s property and rape was a violation of a
father/husband’s property rights in his wife’s fertility and his daughters’ virginity.
Moral codes, norms and laws against sex outside marriage arose from fear of unwanted
babies – both as the ruin of daughters and as a burden on the rest of society. ‘Respectable’
parents genuinely feared the consequences for such ‘fallen’ daughters. Parents, the law and
religious bodies feared for the bodies, morals and souls arising from unregulated sex, and sought
to prevent it by all means possible. Laws to regulate sexually transmitted diseases were also used
to regulate women and others who might deviate from the patriarchal family form.
There is a longstanding association between pleasure and corruption. The cost of raising
children and the inability to fully control the relationship between heterosexual sex and having
babies saw sex being regulated within marriage. Sex for pleasure was condemned as sinful.
Regulating reproduction also saw the intense regulation of non-reproduction. Law and morality
were often wedded on such questions, and homosexuality, masturbation, infidelity and even
contraception within marriage have been condemned and banned in many places over time,
and in some places still today.
The rise of contraception in the 20th century has been a revolutionary force, not only in
relation to women’s control over their fertility. As sex has come to be detached from the
necessity of having babies and the cost of child-rearing, the hostility that was once directed at
anyone who was having non-reproductive sexual pleasure has dramatically reduced. Even so,
so-called ‘honour-based violence’ within some families continues to police women’s bodies.
Another seeming contradiction is the gendered difference in fear of crime. On

average, women fear crime more but experience it less than men. Is this a paradox or
does fear cause caution and hence reduce risk? Around 400 women in the UK are
murdered annually, most often by a male (ex-)partner. Women rarely kill men. The
situation is similar across the world (Fitz-Gibbon 2014). Nonetheless, men are twice
as likely to be murdered, almost always by another man, and very rarely a partner.
Similarly, men are twice as likely to be the victim of non-sexual violence. Nonetheless,
Fear paradox: victimization surveys report that women are more fearful of violent crime. The fear
the inverse paradox is that women are more afraid of crimes they are less likely to experience.
relationship The concept of the ‘continuum of sexual violence’ suggests that women
between fear
may experience any criminal encounter as either a potential rape situation, or a
of crime and
likelihood of
trigger for fearful associations with past events (Kelly 1988). An extension of
being a victim this theory suggests that women encounter less crime precisely because fear
leads to defensive actions to reduce risk (Vera-Gray 2016). While women’s
Transgressions 257
defensive work reduces victimization in many situations, avoiding public spaces

and staying in makes women more vulnerable to domestic abuse. Fear traps
many women. Fearlessness gets many men killed.
Do we even know what we’re talking about?

Many crimes go unreported and such crimes are referred to as ‘the dark figure of crime’, similar
to an iceberg, where the recorded crime is only ‘the tip’ and what lies beneath the water may be
far greater but we just don’t know. In relation to the crimes of the powerful and crimes against
the weak, society is or has been wilful in not wanting to know the true scale of such crimes. On
the other hand, crimes against the powerful by the socially excluded get far more attention. As
such, recorded crime figures, and criminal convictions are likely to be fundamentally misleading
in understanding the true nature and extent of criminal activity.
Race, ethnicity and criminalization

Policing has always sought to protect the status quo. As those with the most power
have the greatest influence in writing the law, it is no accident that the police, in
upholding the law, tend to protect the interests of those in power. This also means
that the police have tended to focus on the crimes of the less powerful. In targeting
those who most visibly deviate from the status quo, the police are very often
found to focus on poor minorities even more than they do on poorer people in
general. The more affluent are generally underpoliced and overprotected.
Given that the crimes associated with poverty and exclusion, such as petty
theft and street violence, are policed more rigorously than crimes associated with
wealth and power, such as fraud, bribery, corruption and health and safety
violations, the least advantaged minority ethnic communities will be most heavily
targeted. Yet more targeting means more arrests, and so Black and minority ethnic
communities become labelled as ‘deviant’ and then subject to even more policing.
If more arrests cause more convictions, criminal statistics reflecting such biases
will then suggest to the uncritical observer that those communities really are more
criminal.
Interactions between ethnic minorities and the police in many countries have led
to conflict and even riots (see Chapter 11). After a series of riots in England in 1981,
in Bristol, Manchester, London, Birmingham and Liverpool, the government
instituted an inquiry looking specifically into south London’s Brixton riot (Scarman
1981). Lord Scarman identified social and economic disadvantage as conditions, but
also highlighted the disproportionate stop and search of young Black men in that
area as the trigger for the riot. He discussed the term ‘institutional racism’ to describe
the policies and practices of discrimination that exist even without deliberate
intention to be racist. However, Scarman rejected the notion that the police were
institutionally racist, and attributed problems to a ‘few bad apples’.
If criminal statistics show that certain areas appear to have more crime and
certain types of person are more likely to be convicted of such crimes, police may
focus their time and resources on those areas and people. However, focusing on
those places and people may be what is causing such criminal statistics in the first
place. Those who live in leafy suburbs may be defrauding the government of billions
in taxes, but the police rarely chase them. Scarman accepted that the indiscriminate
use of stop and search powers without the need for specific evidence in predominantly
Black areas had triggered the riots in 1981. He just did not want to call this ‘institutional
racism’.
The murder of Stephen Lawrence, a Black British teenager, by a group of White
men in 1993 led to a Metropolitan Police investigation that many considered to be
deeply flawed because police officers failed to follow basic leads and even arrest
suspects. In 1997, a new government took office and instituted the Macpherson
Inquiry. In 1999, Sir William Macpherson’s conclusions were that the police had been
‘institutionally racist’. The conduct of their investigations had been inadequate and
Lawrence’s ethnicity had contributed to the police failing to give the case the necessary
attention.
Since the Scarman and Macpherson Reports, attempts have been made to improve
community police relations in areas where trust has been very low and where
residents have negative experiences of the police as overfocusing on them. The
development of an inclusive police force, and community policing, is essential to
this, but this is not always successful. Stop and search powers were substantially
reduced, but so were police budgets. If Scarman recommended a reduction in stop
and search, Macpherson recommended better policing, not simply a reduction in
policing.
Representation also matters regarding policing. In 2019, around 15 per cent
of the UK population were non-White. Only 6.9 per cent of police officers
were non-White. This is an increase from 3.9 per cent in 2007, but the police
are still not as diverse as the communities they serve. The Metropolitan Police
in London is 15 per cent non-White, but 55 per cent of the population of the
city is non-White. The figures for senior police officers are even less repre
sentative. Again, numbers have improved but remain low, with only 5.2 per cent
of sergeants, 4.9 per cent of inspectors, 4 per cent of those above inspector rank
and only 3.6 per cent of chief constables being non-White (GOV.UK 2019). Statistics
for the legal profession (solicitors, barristers, magistrates and judges) show similar
underrepresentation.
Critical race theorists highlight that when any profession is not representative,
those who are underrepresented will be disadvantaged. ‘Insider crimes’, such as
fraud, corruption and professional misconduct, receive far less police attention
than crimes stereotypically associated with minority communities, around
migration status, recreational drugs and street crime. We discuss the effects of
policing and riots in Chapter 11, when we consider the Black Lives Matter social
movement.
Transgressions 259
PROVOCATION 9
Is the criminalization of selling sex class warfare?
One enduring debate in social policy and criminal law is how society should treat
prostitution. The debate tends to focus on whether buying and selling sex should be
illegal, and whether criminalization is counterproductive. Perhaps, though, the
criminalization of selling sex is a form of class war.
To think about this, we must first discuss salaries and pay, and how these relate to
class. It is commonly thought that pay is related to merit, but this is only distantly
true. The more training one has, or the richer the company, the more one might get
paid, although this is only true if you occupy a sufficiently esteemed position (see
Chapter 7 for discussion of meritocracy). The COVID-19 outbreak highlighted that
many key workers’ in vital services were often only paid the minimum wage.
This is because a person’s wage is quite closely linked to class position. Your
background is a good predictor of the type of job you will have and how much you
will earn in the future (Bloodworth 2016). Children who come from rich families
have social and cultural capital and financial safety nets to rely on; those who do not
come from money have less access to this important economy of class, and thus
have significantly lower chances of earning high salaries compared to those from
wealthy families. These inequalities are entrenched in education systems across the
world and are integral to how they are reproduced (Alon 2009; Reay 2017).
There is, however, one trade that relies on the use of the body for work that does
not require one-in-a-million talent, like a professional sportsperson; if done with
legal protection and access to health services, it causes little or no harm to the body,
and, unlike soldiering or policing, does not have a high mortality rate. It requires no
formal training, is older than most occupations and continues to be in demand. It is
the selling of sex – an act that is illegal in many countries.
Some countries, like Norway, permit the selling of sex, but criminalize the
purchase of it –a rhetorical device that seeks de facto criminalization without using
the terminology (Baratosy and Wendt 2017). So, in Norway, as in many countries,
the exchange of sex for money is illegal. And even in the countries where selling sex
is legal (like the UK), there is a great stigma around it. Perhaps the criminalization of
the exchange of money for sex is the result of sexual stigma and social control and
does not stand up to scrutiny.
One of the core arguments is that criminalizing sex work is a way to protect
sex workers. But sociological research shows that this simply does not work
(Baratosy and Wendt 2017). Countries where sex work is criminalized find
harmful results for sex workers (Ahmed et al. 2011). Criminalization deters the
more law-abiding clients, while not discouraging those who are violent and
abusive. It also encourages criminal elements to take control, putting sex workers
at great risk (Chapkis 1997).
In the UK, where selling sex is legal, a number of rules actively prevent selling sex
safely; sex workers are safest when they work together and have at least one person
serving as a chaperone, but British law currently makes this illegal (Collins and Judge
2008; Kinnell 2013). If the safety of sex workers was truly the law’s primary concern,
it would have policies that enabled sex workers to work together, rather than
compelling them to work alone (Ellison 2017).
Compare this to a context where sex work was legal and regulated like other
businesses, and sex workers had statutory protections. As Martha Nussbaum (1998)
and Gayle Rubin (1993) have both argued, the social policy interventions that would
best protect sex workers are those that improve work conditions and enable
unionization – not blanket criminalization.
Given that sexual stigma is a component of the desire for criminalization, why do we
argue that criminalizing sex work is a form of class war? Prostitution is one service that
poor people can provide without specialist schooling or training. It gives young people
the opportunity to make a living and even fund their higher education (Masvawure
2010; Sagar et al. 2016). Criminalizing and stigmatizing sex work limits poor people’s
opportunities to raise themselves out of poverty. In this context, criminalizing and
stigmatizing sex work can be considered class warfare. This is not to ignore or deny that
some sex workers are engaged in ‘survival sex’, where they are compelled to sell their
bodies to feed themselves or their families. But social policy interventions that give
legal protections to sex workers would help this group too, much more than blanket
criminalization does (Armstrong 2018; Sagar and Jones 2018).
Feminist philosopher Martha Nussbaum (1998) asks why the selling of sex is different
from other bodily services. We can pay for pornography or erotic dance. We can pay for
massage, personal training and psychotherapy. We can consent to having our bodies
tested on for medical science, earning money in the process. We can pay someone to
clean our homes, where the cleaner must enter a stranger’s house alone, not without
risk. We can pay to be entertained by men punching each other violently in a boxing ring.
Many forms of employment are inherently risky, but they are not criminalized. Sex, for
some reason, is different.
Consider some of the other options for people with few qualifications or social
contacts: they can work picking fruit, stacking shelves in a supermarket or drive a
taxi, which are low-paid jobs with little job security; they can join the army, where
many men suffer posttraumatic stress disorder, alcohol abuse and depression – men
who are also likely to be from socially disadvantaged backgrounds (MacManus et al.
2013); they could work in manual labour, where, in the UK alone, more than 3,000
men a year die from asbestos-related illnesses (Barber et al. 2016). Sex work has
the potential to be a safe form of work that can yield a reasonable wage, or a part-
time job that can be used as supplementary income.
Given that the criminalization of the exchange of sex for money does not reduce
harm for sex workers and that a moral argument is rarely used against selling sex
Transgressions 261
outside religious areas, we argue that the fundamental issue is one of class. It is about
regulating working-class people’s bodies and reducing the options they have to make
money and support themselves and their families in capitalist societies. As Laura
Graham (2017 p. 201) argues:
By framing sex work as an issue of crime, with sex workers being both the
perpetrators of crime and the potential victims of exploitative crime, the state is
able to legitimise its actions against sex workers, while ignoring the harm done to
sex workers by the state.

Nussbaum, M. (1998) ‘Whether from reason or prejudice’: Taking money for bodily services.
Journal of Legal Studies, 27(2), 693–723.
Weitzer, R. (2018) Resistance to sex work stigma. Sexualities, 21(5/6), 717–29.
Youth culture and crime

When young people reject the values of their parents, is this a problem? Studies of subcultures
and moral panics have focused on the outrage of older generations, against teenage mothers,
crack babies and muggers, among other issues. Young people are routinely said to be ‘out of
control’. Crime statistics show young men everywhere are more likely than women and older
people to commit violent acts. However, war, industrial pollution, corruption and corporate
crime kill far more people and are mostly managed by older men. Protest movement activists
challenging these crimes of the powerful are typically young, exemplified by Malala Yousafzai
and Greta Thunberg.
In Western countries since the 1950s, musical forms emerging from within Black
communities in the USA became the foundation for wider youth cultures. The double
consciousness experienced by Black Americans, of being told to ‘fit in’ but not given the
opportunities to do so and being punished as adults but regarded as children, created music
that expressed pain, anger and hope. This music has been adopted by young people in general,
who also feel a double consciousness of being told to fit in but are often excluded. Such music
expresses rebellion and the desire for freedom, but has been exploited by corporations. From
Elvis’s gyrating hips to grime and hip hop today, popular music has been accused of corrupting
morals and inciting crime. Can music really cause crime? Music of Black origin has been the
‘soundtrack’ of multiple civil rights movements. Sometimes, young people being out of control
has meant freedom, and sometimes helped extend freedom. Some people find freedom to be
troubling. Too much freedom can be a bad thing. Too little freedom is worse. Disrupting tradition
can be good.
CONSUMPTION AND TRANSGRESSION

Drugs
When a person chooses to sell drugs to another person who chooses to buy them, is
there a ‘victim’? The question of consumption-related crimes extends across a range
of areas of activity where society seeks to prohibit what individuals choose to
consume. As Gayle Rubin (1984 p. 291) highlights regarding criminalized sexual
behaviours, many of the prohibited acts are ‘freely chosen, and avidly sought’.
Criminalization may be based on the principle of protecting society or the individual
from themselves. In either case, such protection, by which society seeks to control
personal consumption, leads to tensions.
Some drugs are legal in most countries, such as alcohol and tobacco. Medical
drugs are also legal, but it may be illegal to sell, buy or use them without a medical
prescription. It is increasingly possible to bypass national laws to buy medicines
online without a prescription. Some argue that this allows freedom of choice, but
others claim that it puts people at risk of harm due to uninformed self-medication.
But sugar and fats can be harmful in large amounts and remain legal. Many
governments have introduced sugar taxes to tackle obesity, and levy very high duties
on tobacco and alcohol; yet these governments are also currently relaxing laws
prohibiting cannabis sales.
Feminist research has highlighted the gendered nature of drug consumption.
Feminist sociologist Elizabeth Ettorre (see Vox Pop, Chapter 2) highlighted how
early drugs research examined substance misuse and harm in a way that stigmatized
users, focusing on gender differences and threats to pregnancy. She argued that this
elides the diverse and complex ways that women experience drug use as pleasurable
and how it can impact positively on their sense of autonomy and wellbeing (see also
du Rose 2017). How people consume drugs, and the effects of this consumption, is
dependent on many issues, not least gender, class, disability and race, and simplistic
models of drug consumption normally fail to account for this.
Ross Coomber (1997) interviewed drug dealers in London. The police were funding
his research to understand how drug dealers saw their clients because it is sometimes
argued that legalizing drugs reduces their potential harm by taking drugs out of the
hands of criminals. What Coomber found, however, was that the dealers who were not
caught by the police were very careful to ensure the health of their customers. The idea
that criminal drug dealers mix illicit drugs with dangerous substances seemed to be a
myth. Why would dealers want to kill the people who pay them?
The history of drugs, including alcohol, shows how society views risk and threats
to the social order. Drugs associated with outsiders are treated more harshly than
those associated with ‘traditional’ lifestyles. Concern over the use of the stimulant
ecstasy in the 1990s focused on cases of teenagers whose deaths were linked to
taking the drug. More people die each year as a result of complications relating to
bee stings, but bees don’t have the same negative moral connotation as drug dealers.
What a society sees as the biggest risk is what it sees as the biggest risk for social
order.
Transgressions 263
Criminalizing consumption
Democratic politicians seek to gather votes in order to be elected. Older people
across Europe, America and Australia are more likely to vote. So, politicians often
believe that there are more votes to be gained by being tough on drugs that are more
popular with younger people and seen as more alien by older people. Drugs policy is
often torn between evidence suggesting harm reduction and political populism in
favour of taking a tough prohibitionist stance. Many drugs are illegal to consume
even when there is far greater evidence of harm related to alcohol and cigarettes.
Nonetheless, in recent years, several countries have, in law or practice, reduced the
policing of cannabis possession and, in many places, its sale as well.
In democracies, most people agree with most laws, and there is little debate regarding
whether acts like murder, robbery and rape should be illegal. However, there are many
cases where criminalization has failed to reduce the behaviour being targeted and has
even been counterproductive, particularly related to behaviours that do not have an
immediate or visible victim. The most famous example of failure was prohibition in the
USA in the 1920s. While alcohol can have negative effects, both to the consumer and
society with public drunkenness, it is mostly consumed by people who do so of their
own free will, eagerly, because they enjoy it. When the sale and consumption of alcohol
was banned in the USA, it reduced alcohol consumption initially, although it came
nowhere close to stopping it. However, alcohol consumption steadily increased during
the period of prohibition and also resulted in the emergence of criminal networks
selling alcohol. These criminal networks were often run by mafia-style groups and
resulted in much violence. Laws banning the production and sale of alcohol did not
stop alcohol being sold and consumed, but it did stop tax revenues, created a black
market and resulted in public expenditure in policing the laws (Okrent 2010).
Later, US President Richard Nixon initiated what became known as ‘the war on
drugs’ at the end of the 1960s. This was a proactive policy using military force to
destroy supplies abroad, border forces to disrupt transportation and greater police
powers at home to regulate distribution and consumption. The idea was that a policing
war on drugs would reduce supply and therefore reduce harm, but evidence suggests
that the policy increases harm through more violence, the introduction of criminal
networks and the black market and riskier products to the final users.

Legalizing drugs would increase tax revenues, like that raised from tobacco, alcohol
and legalized gambling, but would that then mean that everyone was ‘living off immoral
earnings’, condoning addiction and legitimizing the commodification of even the
most intimate aspects of human bodily interaction?
One of the problems of complete legalization or criminalization is that it tends to

erase the nuance and complexity related to the activity of concern. Few people, for
example, argue that all drugs should be legally available, particularly because many illicit
drugs are likely to cause serious harm. Yet there is growing recognition that the
criminalization of drugs, as in most current legislation, is counterproductive – and a
much more sophisticated framework by which drugs are criminalized is needed.
With drugs and alcohol, there is a serious, evidence-based argument that such
drugs can cause harm – and the failure of drugs legislation is when the selection of
drugs that are criminalized moves away from the evidence (see Stevens and Measham
2014). Indeed, one of the great problems of the war on drugs is that it has been
implemented in a racist and classist fashion, with the drugs that people of colour and
working-class people consume criminalized – with far harsher sentences than the
drugs of rich White people – whether it be the association of opium with Chinese
immigration in Australia (Manderson 1999) or the focus on crack rather than powder
cocaine in the USA (Palamar et al. 2015).
VOX POP
Professor Fiona Measham
Professor of Criminology and Director of The Loop
My interest in nightlife preceded my
research career by many years. I grew
up in Birmingham, and started going to
pubs and clubs from the age of 13. I was
working in a Birmingham nightclub at 15
and by 16 I was hitchhiking down to
London at weekends to see gigs at the
Marquee Club on Wardour Street.
My academic research on nightlife
began with a master’s degree where I
conducted a symbolic interactionist
participation observation study of the
sexual harassment of barmaids in
Birmingham pubs. The motivation was
simple: I needed to do research on
something that I could get paid to do,
and most of my paid work had been in
pubs and clubs. My MA supervisor © Fiona Measham
Carol Smart – the pre-eminent feminist criminologist – seemed genuinely excited by my
exploration of this world that she had no experience of. My interest in the intersections of social
Transgressions 265
class, gender, leisure and intoxication was forged in those supervisions that were at turns
challenging, fun and often descended into giggles about the world of the pub.
Then, in the 1990s, I spent 10 years at the University of Manchester as senior researcher on
two research projects that led to the books Illegal Leisure (Parker et al. 1998) and Dancing on
Drugs (Measham et al. 2000), both about changing trends in young people’s recreational drug
use in contemporary Britain. I moved to Manchester at the height of the Madchester scene,
went to clubs like the Hacienda, Sankeys and Paradise Factory, and interviewed young people
taking this new drug called ecstasy. I was both working and playing in the vortex of the UK rave
scene. My academic interest was in studying the zeitgeist – doing some of the earliest UK
academic research on raves, dance clubs and dance drugs; binge drinking and café bars;
ketamine; and new psychoactive substances.
After more than two decades of writing research calling for more harm reduction, and over
10 years as a drugs adviser sitting on a number of scientific committees, including the Advisory
Council on the Misuse of Drugs, it felt like the time to do something more. I decided that
grassroots collective action was needed to instigate change. In 2013, along with a friend who is
a DJ and promoter, I set up a not-for-profit social enterprise called The Loop (www.wearetheloop.
org). I had good relations with stakeholders, including the police, public health, and festival and
nightlife management. The Loop started testing behind the scenes and, in 2016, we introduced
drug checking/safety testing into the UK. The support from the press, police, general public and
bereaved parents has been amazing.
Running a charity on top of my day job has been challenging. The Loop is mostly staffed by
hundreds of volunteers who are dedicated professionals delivering what is a complex, demanding
and innovative service in pressurized festival conditions, under the scrutiny of the international
press and in what is still a legally and politically highly sensitive environment. The idea with The
Loop is that it collects data for research, the research feeds into evidence-based service design,
and the service is an action research project and evidence-making intervention that can help to
influence policy. It sits at the intersection of research, policy change and impact; a vital
combination of academic research and political advocacy that can challenge the harms of
current policy and practice, including the marginalization and criminalization of certain social
groups.
■■ Is the work of The Loop operating within a context of criminalization, decriminalization or
legalization?
■■ To what extent is it acceptable to let rules go unpunished if it reduces harm?
■■ What exceptions might there be to this?
■■ If ignoring a rule leads to a reduction in harm, does that point to a problem with the rule?
Why does criminalization often fail to stop consumption?

Criminalization and prohibition are even more problematic when it comes to questions
of personal morality and autonomy, not least the question of abortion, sex work and
same-sex sexual activity. Our Provocation questions why sex work is criminalized, and
the criminalization of same-sex sexual activity is increasingly recognized as morally
wrong and a human rights abuse. Abortion is perhaps more complex, as it seemingly
pits the rights of the woman to have control over her body against the future rights of
the foetus, particularly when the foetus has a chance to survive outside the womb. This
debate is often framed as ‘pro-choice’ (the woman has the right to choose an abortion)
versus ‘pro-life’ (the potential life should be protected), with the pro-life side favouring
the criminalization of abortion (Smith 2005).
One of the remarkable aspects of the debate about the criminalization of
abortion is how little attention is paid to the effects of such legislation. That is, if one
accepts that it is better to avoid having an abortion if possible, then the reduction
of rates of abortion should be the primary aim of public policy. However, research
comprehensively shows that criminalizing abortion does not reduce rates of
abortion (see Finer and Fine 2013). Rather than criminalizing the act, the most
successful methods of reducing rates or abortion are by providing comprehensive
sex education and ensuring that contraception is readily available (Haddad 2009).
There are many relevant factors here, including psychological and philosophical
components, and a key sociological concern is the difference between individual and
cultural responsibility. The act of criminalization focuses on the individual and places
the responsibility on the pregnant woman (to not have an abortion). Yet abortion is not
a purely individual choice (Smith 2005). People choose to have abortions for several
reasons: these include not being able to afford a(nother) child and fear of reprisal, from
family members among others. By criminalizing the mother if she has an abortion,
society absolves itself of responsibility to provide a social and economic context where
women do not feel obliged to have an abortion for economic or social reasons.
Andrea Smith (2005) powerfully demonstrates how the false binary of pro-life
and pro-choice erases the vital role that society and social welfare plays in reducing
rates of abortion. Criminalization, and the related threat of prison, does not
eliminate underlying causes and so is ineffective in reducing the number of
abortions. Blanket criminalization of acts that many people want to engage in fails
to account for the reality of how and why people engage in these acts. Ill-informed
policies are destined to fail.
CONCLUSION
Transgression is multidimensional. Not all deviance is criminalized or should be, and
what is declared illegal differs over time and between places. What should be against
the law is contested and is itself a sociological question. We should study not only why
people transgress, but also why some do not, and who gets to decide the rules and
interpret them. The relationship between crime and power is also complex. Crime
causes harm and people need protection from lawbreakers, but often the powerless are
themselves criminalized while being victims of those in power. The law can be used to
oppress, but it can be a source of protection from oppression. We might not want to
live in a world without rules, but that does not justify all rules as simply better than
none. Some people believe that it is legitimate to break the rules if they believe them to
be wrong. That raises very difficult questions, and while sociologists cannot easily
answer them, sociology is a good place from which to begin.
Transgressions 267
HOW WOULD…?
■■ Is transgression best explained in terms of a lack of socialization or
alternative socialization?
■■ How would a functionalist sociologist ‘explain’ the continued existence of
crime?
–– Would a Marxist sociologist predict that the rich would be more likely
to break the rules than the poor, or vice versa?
■■ Can it ever be right to break the law, and if so, can it ever be right for one
society to impose its rules on another society because the latter has the
‘wrong’ laws?

Box, S. (1983) Power, Crime and Mystification. Abingdon: Routledge.
Box starts from the assumption that crime is caused by greed and opportunity and then goes on to
demonstrate that it is the powerful, not the poor and marginalized, who commit the most harmful
crimes, and are the least likely ever to be caught and seriously punished. Unsafe workplaces, illegal
pollution, state repression and war kill many times more people than are killed in interpersonal
violence, and that is just the tip of the iceberg of the crimes of the powerful.
Cohen, S. ([1972]2011) Folk Devils and Moral Panics. Abingdon: Routledge.
Cohen’s classic study of how moral entrepreneurs exaggerated a supposed threat to public order as
a fundamental threat to society, and then recruited elites (politicians, journalists and judges) to use
the supposed threat to justify introducing even greater powers for themselves.
Foucault, M. ([1976]1991) Discipline and Punish: The Birth of a Prison. Harmondsworth: Penguin.
Foucault explores how academic disciplines claim to make people better but also engage in forms
of social control. The modern ‘panopticon’ replaced death and dungeons with routine monitoring
and rational calculation. Not an accessible book, but a key text that theorizes punishment in the
modern era.

Chapter 10
Personal Life
INTRODUCTION
This chapter focuses on issues that relate to our personal lives. Sometimes our daily
routines and practices can be seen as divorced from the bigger issues of society, yet
sociology helps us understand how they are connected to and impact on each other. We
examine these issues by focusing on key aspects of personal life. We investigate how
our bodies have been understood sociologically: from how the body has been used to
reproduce gender norms to the ways tattoos are used to inscribe meaning onto our
bodies. We then look at relationships, from friends to lovers, and think about diverse
relationship types in contemporary society. Finally, we turn to sex and think about how
this most personal of activities is connected to broader social norms – even how sex is
defined. In our Provocation, we ask whether cheating is an inherent part of monogamy,
rather than proof of its failure.
THE PERSONAL
Sociology often focuses on how societies are structured and how they change (see
Chapters 6, 7 and 11). Yet sociologists are also concerned with the most intimate parts of
our individual lives – from whom we love to the rituals around death and dying. These
personal aspects of life can seem disconnected from the big questions that sociology is
often focused on, like globalization or social inequality, but they are deeply entwined with
the social organization of society. Sociology helps us understand how and why.
Chapter 1 began with a discussion on disgust related to spit and how students
attending lectures choose where to sit (Provocation 1). This example shows how
broad sociological issues, like the role of disgust in society, are reflected in everyday
life. One reason that a sociology of personal life matters is that it can serve as a hook
to understanding other issues. Just as listening to your favourite artist on Spotify
might encourage you to see them live, or hearing one song could result in you
downloading their album, so connecting with sociology at a personal level can help
open the vista of what sociology can offer more generally.
It would, however, be wrong to argue that the sociology of personal life is just an
easy way into, or the trailer for, macro-level sociology. We also discussed in Chapter
1 how Durkheim connected rates of suicide with the social organization of societies.
This is another example of personal life interacting with broader social trends, but one
that is clearly more serious. When someone contemplates suicide, they do so because
268
Personal Life 269
of very personal feelings and experiences, but, as Durkheim demonstrated, rates of

suicide can also tell us much about the organization of a society.
In this chapter, we examine identity, society and the personal in more detail. We
review how sociology has understood some of the most personal aspects of social
life by thinking about the body, and the changing value and meaning attached to
tattoos across time; we then explore relationships, sex and monogamy, in order to
develop a sociological understanding of personal life.
From the personal to personal life

If we embrace C. Wright Mills’ (1959) notion of the ‘sociological imagination’,
focusing on the personal is a powerful way to develop that method of thinking that
enables us to move beyond commonsense understandings of the world. In his book,
Mills urged us to think about our own individual biographies in understanding how
society operates. He recognized the importance of personal experiences, not least
for the social justice argument that such an approach increases the likelihood that
sociology will have a positive impact on people’s lives.
One term sociologists use to describe the social nature of the personal is
relational. This recognizes that behaviours and practices always occur in the context Relational:
of how they relate to other people, because these behaviours and interactions occur the notion
with and between other people. Our very identities are dependent on how others see that two or
more things
us (see our discussion of ‘me’ and ‘I’ in Chapter 2).
occur in
Thinking about the personal enables recognition of the way institutions, culture relation to
and social policy impact on individuals. Examining, for example, how couples kiss each other,
and embrace outdoors – the infamous ‘public displays of affection’ (PDAs) – can rather than
inform us about differences between how heterosexual and same-sex couples feel indepen
safe and able to express themselves in public venues. Even though there has been a dently
decrease in homophobic attitudes in recent decades, you are still more likely to see
heterosexual couples engaging in PDAs than same-sex couples. This is not because
gay couples love each other less. Rather, it is the result of historical homophobia
being entrenched in culture and policy, so that something as simple and ordinary as
a kiss on the cheek is more challenging for same-sex couples (Doan et al. 2014).
The sociology of the personal can provide information about the interrelationship
between broader social norms and individuals. For example, understanding the
reasons why people engage in binge drinking (the personal) can lead to nuanced
interventions designed to improve public health (the macro) without relying on
prohibitionist social policies, which tend to fail (Measham and Brain 2005). These
policy changes can then filter down to positively impact on the personal by reducing
binge drinking or ensuring that it happens in safer ways.
The study of personal and social interactions has not traditionally occurred under
the name of ‘personal life’. Rather, it will have been framed as ‘sociology of the family’
or other similar terms. British sociologist Carol Smart (2007) argues that the study of
personal life is an important conceptual development, because it enables studies of the
family and the organization of intimate life that move beyond understandings that
privilege biological relations or living together and recognize the significant social
change that has occurred in these areas. This subject has now expanded to touch on
topics as diverse as pets, public spaces and consumer culture (May 2011).
Consider how sociological understanding of families has changed over the past
50 years. In the 1950s and 1960s, the traditional ‘nuclear family’ of a married, White
heterosexual couple with two children (the statistical norm) dominated in many
Western countries. At the time, sociology sought to connect the family with the
‘normal’ operation of society. Talcott Parsons’ functionalist perspective (see Chapter
7) argued that there were prescribed roles and rules that needed to be followed
within the family, such as the father as breadwinner and mother as carer, to effectively
socialize children into functional and productive citizens of this society. He suggested
that deviation from this nuclear family structure and from these prescribed gender
roles would be problematic for the individual child and for society as a whole.
Over the past 50 years, sociological perspectives on the family have radically changed,
with the recognition of a more diverse set of relationships that include dual-heritage
couples, same-sex marriages, non-married couples and many other formats. The reality
of family life has been transformed, including attitudes to different family forms, and
sociological perspectives have also changed greatly. We would be shocked if a
contemporary sociologist shared Parsons’ understanding of what comprised a ‘normal’
family. Much of this intellectual change was down to the increasing value being placed
on understanding how the family works, not just as an institution, but also how it is
experienced and lived at a personal level (see Chapter 7 for discussion of this).
Thus, a sociology of personal life examines the issues of intimacy and importance
within individuals’ lives, connecting these with broader social trends without losing focus
on the contextual issues that influence and constrain our everyday practices.
SOCIOLOGY AND THE BODY

The body is a central component of personal life. It is, after all, the vessel through
which life is experienced and lived. Our bodies are deeply personal to us and are
‘with us’ throughout our entire lifetime, although they inevitably change in various
ways. We worry about our health. We care about how we look. Some of us spend a
great deal of time and money at the gym, on cosmetic surgery, putting on makeup or
choosing the right outfit. Our bodies, and how we think of them, are intimately
connected with these processes.
Surprisingly, perhaps, there is a long history of not considering the body in
sociology and intellectual thought more generally. This is best exemplified by French
philosopher René Descartes’ (1596–1650) famous phrase cogito ergo sum – ‘I think,
therefore I am.’ In perhaps the best-known idea in Western philosophy, Descartes
argued that the one thing we can know for certain is that we think and that, by
extension, if we think we must also have to exist. He then argued that if thinking is
the only way we know we exist, thinking becomes our fundamental and essential
feature. From that starting point, Descartes questioned whether we could be sure
other people and the physical world existed. He felt that the most important thing
that made humans special was their minds, not their senses or their sensations (or
emotions). He did not value the latter two, dismissing them as things we humans
share with animals. The mind, capable of knowing its own existence, is what makes
humans different from animals and, for Descartes, capable of possessing souls.
Personal Life 271
This leads to what is known as Cartesian dualism. Here, the body is relegated Cartesian
to a fleshy, finite substance that decays and dies. The body is understood as somewhat dualism:the
incidental, while the mind is equated with the soul that transcends human life and conceptual
reaches a ‘higher plane’. The body was sometimes considered in early sociology, but separation of
the body and
it was very rarely an explicit focus of study (Shilling 1993). And when sociology
the mind
touched on the subject, it was often quite abstract, using ‘identity’, ‘the self ’ and
other vague terms when referring to the bodily experiences of pain, emotion, injury,
sickness, desire and so on. These intangible sociological terms do not exactly reflect
the intensity with which the feelings are experienced.
Some research did engage more fully with the issue of the body. Erving Goffman
(1963), for example, looked at how bodily practices were important in social
interactions. In his book Stigma, he discussed how physical abnormalities could result
in a person being excluded from acceptable society. More generally, his interactionist
approach incorporated bodily displays and interactions in this regard. Even so, the
body remained a peripheral concern and not the focus of sociological thought.
In large part, sociology ignored the body because it was assumed to be purely a
concern for biologists. Durkheim ([1912]2008) defined human beings as homo duplex,
being biological bodies but also social animals. He then defined sociology as the
study of the latter, not the former. This omission was particularly bad for women,
whose biological differences from men were taken as a convenient catch-all to
‘explain’ all manner of social differences. This included employment, child-rearing, Embodi
education and the right to vote (or its absence). Sociology followed society in ment:the
process by
presuming that the different bodies of men and women explained a range of gender
which
inequalities and, as such, these were not studied sociologically (see Chapter 2 for meaning and
discussion of sociology and women in history). values are
In recent years, however, sociologists have developed sophisticated theories of placed onto
the body and there is a great deal of contemporary research on the body (see people’s
Adelman and Ruggi 2016). A core concept is embodiment, which recognizes that bodies
the body is both a physical object and something that is processed and understood
socially. Waskul and Vannini (2012 p. 3) define embodiment as ‘the process by which
the object-body is actively experienced, produced, sustained and/or transformed as Reflexive
a subject-body’. In other words, the way we interact in society and the values we process:the
place on our bodies are understood through embodiment. cyclical
British sociologist Nick Crossley (2005) argues that people think about their process
bodies, integrating them as part of their identity. As part of this reflexive process – whereby
individuals
where individuals think about their actions and thus influence their behaviours –
think about
people seek to modify their bodies as a way of constructing their broader identities. their actions
Crossley discusses ‘reflexive body techniques’ (RBTs) to understand the connection and thus
between body modifications, embodiment and social identities. Crossley (2005 p. 9) influence
defines RBTs as ‘those body techniques whose primary purpose is to work back their
upon the body, so as to modify, maintain or thematise it in some way’. This includes behaviours,
styling hair, tattoos (see below) and permanent plastic surgery, and from what and which in turn
how we eat to where and how we exercise. RBTs offer a sophisticated way of thinking influences
their
about our bodies and how they interact with society, including how issues like class,
thoughts
ethnicity and gender can affect embodiment.
The body and disability

An important contribution to sociology has been the social model of disability, which has shifted
attention from physical and mental impairments to considering how the organization of society
makes public spaces and many businesses inaccessible to people with such impairments (see
Chapter 7). Like other issues relating to people and their bodies, it moved the focus from
biomedical models of illness to social discourses of citizenship and inclusion, galvanizing politics
around disability (Oliver 1990).
However, there is also concern that the social model of disability can downplay the importance
of the body as it relates to disability, with questions about how best to incorporate the importance
of bodily impairment while still emphasizing the social processes of exclusion (Hughes and
Paterson 1997).
One response to this has been to focus on ableist privilege (Campbell 2009), which
enables discussion of the body as it relates to ability and disability without solely focusing
on disabled people. A recent study has demonstrated how disabled young
Ableism:
discri people experience everyday ableism, which included being ‘routinely started
mination in at, questioned, assisted and challenged by strangers’ (Calder-Dawe et al. 2020
favour of p. 132). Here, ableism is particularly prevalent through a medicalized
able-bodied understanding of disability that sees disability through a prism of visible physical
people impairment.
Women and the body

Social understandings of the body have been a crucial factor in gender inequality.
The fundamental difference between men’s and women’s bodies centred on issues of
reproduction. In preindustrial societies, home and work were not separated and so
childrearing and work went together. But the Industrial Revolution separated work
and home (see Chapters 3 and 7), meaning that childcare and work could not occur
simultaneously (Cancian 1987). Women were held responsible for raising children, to
the extent that laws were passed preventing them from working outside the home so
that they could raise the next generation of workers.
This socially structured division of labour was claimed to be ‘natural’. Men went
to work, voted and got an education. Women did not. In 1900, the average woman
in England had 10 pregnancies in a lifetime, although far fewer resulted in actual
births and even fewer children survived into adulthood. Women were largely bound
to a ‘private’ realm of reproduction, which was said to be ‘natural’ and thus outside
the realm of sociological study. Male doctors, judges, lawmakers and even sociologists
all agreed that women could not exceed the supposed limitations of their bodies.
Charles Darwin pronounced that if a woman went to university, her breasts would
dry up and her womb would start moving about, causing her to become hysterical
(David 2005).
While contraception did exist, it was unreliable and often in male hands (condoms).
Contraception was also subject to moral and legal restriction. It was not, for example,
Personal Life 273
easily available to unmarried women. Furthermore,

marriage legally required that a woman make her body
available to her husband to produce offspring. This was
also interpreted to mean that a husband could not be
accused of raping his wife because she had lawfully
consented to give her body over to his use through the act
of marriage. This was the prevailing common law
interpretation of marriage that informed jurisprudence in
England for over 250 years, until the British House of
Lords explicitly ruled otherwise in 1991.
Throughout much of this time, an almost exclusively
male sociology no more studied the existence of such
gender roles and inequalities than they thought to study
why humans cannot breathe under water. The gendered
body was ‘the’ body, just as gills were what made fish
different from humans.
To summarize a long and complex history, the
contraceptive pill became available to women in the USA
in 1960, while in the UK it became available on the NHS
for married women in 1961 and for others in 1967. It was
the result of much political campaigning. This oral © Richard Baker/Getty Images
contraceptive put relatively secure birth control into An example of sexualized advertising
women’s hands, which had a significant impact on women’s
lives and also sociological thought. Research on the family had studied how the
division of labour between the mother as carer and father as provider was organized
socially (Parsons and Bales 1955). However, the availability of the contraceptive pill
threw the assumptions behind this study radically into question. Suddenly, the body
was clearly subject to social control and could no longer be said to be ‘the natural’
cause of social differences. A whole social structure that assumed women’s position
in society was the result of their biology was suddenly, and fundamentally, discredited.
Feminist researchers in the 1960s and 1970s were the first to challenge a century
of male sociology’s neglect of the body, in studies on work, medicine, marriage,
sexual relationships and reproduction. There was also a later growth in mainstream
research on the body in the 1980s (Shilling 1993).
The rise of consumer culture meant that the body was increasingly a subject of
Consumer
capitalist interest, as people spent money on themselves as part of ‘body projects’. self:the
The sexual revolution that was initiated by the contraceptive pill combined with notion that
higher postwar wages to create a consumer culture devoted to youth, lifestyle choices people’s
and adornment. The notion of the consumer self, where people’s identities were identities are
consolidated through buying particular brands or items, meant that the body was constructed
increasingly relevant. Here, people demonstrated their consumer power on and and
through their bodies – in the clothes and accessories they wore or cosmetic surgery consolidated
through
they had done.
purchasing
Consumer culture became more overtly sexual and bodies – and particular parts of goods
bodies – became more visible. Called striptease culture by Brian McNair (2002), bodies in
sexy and sexual poses were increasingly used to sell goods and services that often had
little or no romantic or sexual connotation. While women’s bodies were the most
sexualized in the 20th century, more recently men’s bodies too have increasingly become
the focus of desire – known as ‘objectification’. As the body became more visible, it
came into focus for sociologists studying consumption practices.
This desire to look good is partly based on the recognition of how valued
attractiveness is in society – good-looking people gain privilege because of their
looks. Asch (1946) called this discrimination ‘primary effect’. He found that the first
information received about a person was more important than information gained
later: how a person looks is often the first information another person receives.
Research has shown that good-looking people are thought to be more kind, sociable,
sensitive and healthy, and are even thought to have better job prospects than
unattractive people (Dion et al. 1972; Feingold 1992).
The rise and success of feminism brought the body to greater attention.
Feminist research first highlighted that bodies matter by the very fact that women
suffered discrimination because of their sex (the biology of their bodies) and
because their bodies were deemed weaker than men’s. Feminist research also
documented how women’s bodies had been the property of men; that women’s
sexual agency was denied; and that gender research had historically tried to prove
women’s bodies inferior to men’s. Feminists did not just discuss the role of the
body, they argued that it was a central battleground in the legitimation of gender
inequality.
A key site of this inequality was, and still is, the workplace. Women continue to
suffer a ‘motherhood penalty’. Here, women who have taken time off work to have
children are disadvantaged in terms of pay, promotions and their perceived competence
and commitment (Correl et al. 2007). The reproductive function of women’s bodies
remains central to their inequality in the workplace. This is not a biological effect of
women’s bodies: being pregnant does not stop women working, nor are men physically
incapable of childcare. Rather, it is how society organizes things before and after
childbirth that continues to limit women’s careers relative to men’s.
More broadly, research also examines the presence of bodies at work through
Body work: the term body work (Gimlin 2007; Wolkowitz 2006). We take our bodies to work
also known as every day, whether we are serving burgers in McDonald’s, labouring on a building
‘body labour’, site or caring for terminally ill patients. We also use our bodies at work in very
it refers to different ways. In doing so, our bodies are physically affected by the work we do
the work
individuals
(we get tired eyes and sore feet, alongside more serious health concerns) and they
exert on their are regulated by the industries we work in (we might have to have vaccinations or
own bodies as wear uniforms). As such, sociology must recognize the importance of the body in
well as paid our daily lives.
work that is This body work has become more important as, in the West, we care more about
performed on our bodies. Our body image is increasingly part of how we care about our identity,
other in ways that are radically different even from a century ago. This may be one reason
people’s why there is an increasing interest in fitness in contemporary societies. While we
bodies
undoubtedly have a better understanding now of medicine and how physical exercise
contributes positively to life expectancy, it is also notable that people engage in
Personal Life 275
exercise for reasons other than physical fitness and health. One key word here is
‘fitness’ as it relates to sexual attractiveness. Adrienne Evans and Sarah Riley (2015)
highlight how ‘sexiness’ has become a consumer product, where the body is used to
fashion not just a look but a social identity. People are culturally expected to buy
products and engage in activities that hone a ‘sexy’ body, while simultaneously
celebrating their actions as individual choices. Although Evans and Riley focus on
these impacts on women, the expectations for these bodies and performances
increasingly apply to men too (Hall 2014).
Technology also has an impact on how we consider the body. At the level of the
individual, digital technologies enable us to keep track of ourselves and our fitness.
Pedometers on our phones mean we can monitor whether we are meeting expectations
of 10,000 steps a day, and apps allow us to track our calories, protein intake and
whether we are meeting our personal health targets – part of a collection of practices
that contribute to what has been called the quantified self . In her book The Quantified Quantified
Self, Australian sociologist Deborah Lupton (2016) documents not just how these self:the
self-tracking processes can be co-opted by individuals as forms of selfhood and cultural
embodiment, but also how people are increasingly being coerced into monitoring phenomenon
of using
parts of their lives. Self-tracking can help with conditions like diabetes, but they are
technology to
also increasingly used by businesses to harvest digital data on a large scale, and this track data
can be done in an exploitative manner. about oneself
Intersections of the body with technology also have broader questions about
what it means to be human. Conception via in vitro fertilization (see Chapter 7)
raised questions about the morality of creating what were called ‘designer babies’
by screening embryos in order to implant those with (or without) particular
characteristics. These sorts of debates are now reappearing, with recent
developments in technology making the creation of synthetic cells, organs and
even DNA a realistic possibility. As medical technology becomes more advanced,
and an ageing population experiences their ageing bodies, there is ever more need
for a sociology of the body.
Women and the body in Iran

Research on women and the body remains focused on the West. Elham Amini (2017)
contributes to sociological research on women and the body internationally by exploring how
menopausal Iranian women understand their gender and sexuality through important moments
in their lives, including their first period (menarche) and the menopause. Amini showed how
participants’ bodies were key sites in understanding their identities, as well as sites for finding
agency in negotiating patriarchal norms of Iranian culture. It was through bodily processes that
participants identified themselves as entering ‘womanhood’ and, similarly, the onset of the
menopause was seen as a significant and permanent sign of ageing (see also Amini and
McCormack 2019). By focusing on the role of the body, Amini highlighted key issues of gender
and sexuality for Iranian women. (See Chapter 4 for Dr Amini’s Vox Pop.)
Tattoos
Tattoos have a long history, going back at least to the Stone Age, with evidence that
the Ancient Egyptian pharaohs had them. In these ancient times, tattoos were literal
signs of status or achievement. Closely related to religion and tribal affiliation, tattoos
would act in a similar way to medals, denoting the achievement of the person
tattooed. They have also been used in slavery, as symbols of ownership, across
different eras and civilizations.
In non-Western contexts, tattoos were traditionally used as rites of passage. In
Ma-ori culture, ta-moko markings on the face and body were used to document the
passage from childhood to adulthood. These were done by chiselling grooves into
the skin rather than inking.
In the West, however, during the 18th and 19th centuries, tattoos became stigmatized
as the preserve of the lower socioeconomic classes and gained an air of disrespectability
(Sanders 2008). This was partly because of criminal associations, as gang members
would mark their affiliations with tattoos. Tattoos were also associated with other groups
of people who were marginalized in society. Circus workers, in particular, were known
for their tattoos, as well as sailors, who would decorate their bodies with tattoos from the
countries they had visited. In both contexts, the tattoo was associated with wild, raucous
men (and sometimes women) who did not have respectable lives or stable jobs.
Pierrat and Guillon (2013) use a collection of photos from 1890 to 1930 to show
how tattoos were used by prisoners and convicts to contest their marginalized
position in society. Their tattoos expressed feelings including patriotism, revenge,
lust and love. During this time, tattoos were almost
exclusively associated with the criminal underworld
and remained stigmatized.
Using tattoos as a form of defiance spread across
Western cultures in the aftermath of the Second World
War (Barron 2013). People were aware of the social
meanings of such ‘inkings’, and they were interpreted
by the wider populace as belonging to people who were
criminals, or associated with criminality, and who used
tattoos as a way to express this fact.
However, in the early 1970s, the practice of
tattooing began to be less associated just with criminality
and deviant subcultures. Benson (2000) speaks of a
tattoo renaissance in which they became a carefully
chosen form of self-expression. While tattoos have
always been used to communicate meaning – whether
it be a medal of achievement or group membership of
a gang or particular subculture – the meanings
diversified, as did the people who had them. As
DeMello (2000 p. 143) writes: ‘Tattooing began, for the
Reproduced with permission from Pierrat and Guillon (2013) first time, to be connected with emerging issues like
From the Ancient era to today, numerous self-actualization, social and personal transformation,
meanings have been associated with tattoos ecological awareness and spiritual growth.’
Personal Life 277
In this context, tattoos have become part of a body project in which people use
tattoos to recognize significant moments in their lives, commemorate important
people, associate themselves with a particular trend, or merely to look good. Gone
are fears about what the tattoo will look like when the person is old, and tattoos are
widely treated in similar ways to hair, makeup and clothes – as ways to look good and
stylish in contemporary culture. Even so, there is still evidence to suggest that
employers may look unfavourably on people with visible tattoos (Elzweig and
Peeples 2011; Miller et al. 2009).
VOX POP
Steven Hogg
Scientist aged 27, from Liverpool,
England
I began getting tattooed at 15. Over the past
twelve years since then, I’ve amassed a
considerable collection of tattoos. My inkings
are diverse, ranging from a pair of socks on my
ankle to two grenade-holding squirrels on my
forearm. Generally, I decide on a more
surrealistic design for my tattoos and sketch
the vast majority of them myself. The stranger
the image, the likelier that I’ll have it perma
nently drawn on my body. Who wants a generic
tribal tattoo or a butterfly when you can imagine
and create unique pieces?
The recurring themes throughout my
© Steven Hogg
tattoos are around animals and nature, but
incorporating them in an artistic and surreal manner. My tattoos aren’t to mark a specific event
in my life, or have one meaning, but they symbolize different aspects of who I am and what I
believe. I showcase them along with art I enjoy on Instagram, at @stehogg5.
■■ Does reading about Steven’s motivations for his tattoos change how you view them?
■■ How does Steven’s narrative of his tattoos correspond with the empirical research on the topic?
■■ In what ways might Steven’s tattoos be a form of body project?
PERSONAL RELATIONSHIPS
Given the relational nature of being human, it is unsurprising that relationships with
other people play such a vital part in all our lives. While diverse in scope, we categorize
these relationships into three broad groups: family, friends and lovers.
The role of the family was discussed at length in Chapter 7. Traditionally viewed
as a cornerstone of society, families have changed significantly. They have become
smaller in size because of the availability and acceptability of contraception, while
increased mobility means that members of families live further apart from each
other than they used to. While family is a vital part of personal life, we focus on
friends and lovers in this chapter.
Friends
Friendships hold an important part in our lives. Pahl (2000 p. 148) describes friendship
as a ‘social glue’, adding that what is important with friendship is ‘the trust, security,
feelings of self-esteem and feelings of being loved for one’s own sake that flow from
[friends]’.
Friends also help us develop and consolidate an identity. Indeed, friends are the
first step of independence from families or carers. It is through friends that we start
to define ourselves – through our interests, the clothes we wear and our musical
tastes. Parents who are worried about the friend who is a ‘bad influence’ are often
just reacting to the growing independence of their child. Children will tend to adopt
the accent of their friends rather than their parents (if there is a difference), which
indicates that friendship can be just as important as family in shaping a person. Of
course, your parents have a lot to do with where you grow up and which school you
attend – both of which massively influence your friendship circles.
Friendships are not purely the result of personal preference. While we think we
select our friends, who we develop friendships with is subject to several factors. As
Allan (1996 p. 100) writes:
Friendships are not just freely chosen. They are developed and sustained
within the wider framework of people’s lives. The choices people make, in
other words, are constrained by aspects of social organization over which they
have relatively little control.
One example of this is that we tend to have friends who are like us – known as
homophily (Lazarsfield and Merton 1954). That is why, although this may not be
desirable from a social justice perspective, friendships tend to be between people of
the same ethnicity, gender, class and sexuality. They also tend to be between people
of the same social status. Of course, friendships exist between different groups, but
the dominant experience is ‘within-group’ friendships.
Research has documented how friendships differ between class groups. Allan
(1996) discusses how middle-class friendships develop by inviting people into
different locations, until finally friendships are fully consolidated by entry into each
other’s houses. Working-class friendships are more restricted to particular settings,
such as a sporting club or a particular leisure site.
Gender also significantly influences the development of friendships, with significant
differences between male and female friendship groups. Pahl (2000 p. 116) highlights
some of the key generalizations about gender differences in friendships:
Personal Life 279
Men were held to be emotionally reticent – fearful perhaps of homoerotic

overtones, while women were held to be more articulate and emotionally
accomplished … Men were less likely to expect to find close friends at work:
the occupational communities had gone and increasing competition meant
that colleagues at work became potential rivals … Survey evidence
demonstrated that [women’s] regular contact with family and friends declined
from the mid-1980s to the mid-1990s. This was attributed partly to the
pressures consequent upon the successful juggling of family and work
responsibilities.
Friendships also have a close correlation with mental health. Female friendship
networks enabled women to talk about their problems and actively find solutions to
solve them. Men, however, were prevented from discussing their concerns because
this was not how male friendships were enacted.
These gender differences also emerge in childhood. When we think of boys’
friendships, we tend to think of rough and tumble physical energy. But research
conducted over the past three decades warns that rough and tumble play often leads
to aggression and violence, and that shallow friendships have resulted in boys being
emotionally stunted. Another pernicious element of boys’ friendships has been
virulent sexism about and towards women, and homophobia towards other men.
These damaging behaviours have tended to emerge in late adolescence. Way
(2011 p. 91) documents how working-class, ethnic minority young boys have deep,
meaningful friendships, where they speak about ‘“circles of love,” “spilling your
heart out to somebody,” … and “feeling lost” without their male best friends’. Way
also shows that as these boys get older, these friendships dissipate and older teenage
boys feel socially isolated and long for the friendships of their youth. Friendships
between boys are changing, however. ‘Bromances’ are increasingly common
(McCormack 2012; Robinson et al. 2018), and are similar to what people commonly
view girls’ friendships to consist of. Here, girls’ friendships have been framed as
oppositional to boys – intimate and tactile, whereas boys are physically and emotionally
distant, and lacking the fights and rough and tumble of male friendships.
While there may be some truth to this, girls’ friendships are more complex than
this stereotype. In an ethnography of British schoolgirls’ friendships, called The
Company She Keeps, Val Hey (1997) explores the underlying tensions and emotions of
girls’ friendships in the 1990s. While less overtly homophobic than boys’ friendships
of that era, Hey highlights the compulsory heterosexuality of these friendships,
which girls would both reproduce and challenge (see Rich 1980; and Chapter 8). A
different set of norms and expectations meant that girls experienced schooling and
growing up very differently to boys.
Despite friendships being structured by forms of social difference, diversity in
friendship groups can be important and beneficial. In their book on friendship and
diversity in school settings, Vincent et al. (2018) show how schools are an important
site for social mixing across difference when ideas of sharing and mutuality are
emphasized by the schools. Schools can help facilitate diverse friendship groups
because of a shared sense of community for all school members, particularly when
they serve diverse metropolitan communities. Even so, with homophily continuing
to exert its pull, they show that class differences seemed harder to cross than ethnic
ones.
We also know a great deal about how friendships develop over time. Important
in any friendship is the idea of disclosure. If you tell your friend something personal,
you expect them to tell you a similarly intimate detail about their own lives. This
reciprocal self-disclosure makes us feel good and is a form of sharing that bonds us
together. A key component of this, though, is the idea that friends share similar
amounts. If you tell your friend about your greatest fears, but they only discuss their
food preferences, you would question the quality of the friendship. Sharing too
much is also considered a social faux pas. Disclosing intimate experiences or details
with a casual acquaintance would be a cause of embarrassment and stigma attaches
to someone who does that frequently.
Another key component of friendship is the idea that friends are supportive. A
friend is someone you can rely on to offer help when required: to feed the cat while
you are on holiday; or to lend you money or food in a time of need. Having a friend
is, in part, being able to call on someone for a favour.
Supporting this notion, friendship is also based on interaction. We all have
people who were once good friends who we no longer speak to or see. There does
not have to have been a falling out for this to happen, just for the friend to no
longer be part of our social lives. As social interactions decrease, so too in general
does the value of the friendship. While we might hope that friendships will always
exist over an extended period of time, the sociological fact is that they need
maintenance through social interaction – a night out, a Zoom call, texts, a
Facebook message – to ensure they continue. Social networking sites have made
it easier to stay close to friends who do not live nearby, but even that demands
active effort to communicate.
Finally, friends are also there to offer positivity. Friends who are too negative or
do not provide support in an encouraging, uplifting way tend not to remain friends
for long.
Lovers
Romeo and Juliet: the most enduring example of young love, which has been echoed
throughout fiction and films ever since. From Titanic (1997) to almost every Disney
film, the idea of ‘star-crossed’, heterosexual lovers is emblematic of romantic
relationships. Yet, by discussing ‘lovers’, we have chosen a curiously vague term to
describe the range of relationship types that sum up romantic relationships. After all,
a lover can be a one-night stand who does not even stay the night, or it can be a
husband or wife you have lived with for 60 years.
We focus on sex later in this chapter, so turn here to examine longer term romantic
relationships, and investigate how they were traditionally based in marriage but have
extended to other forms in the recent past.
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© Maurizio Lapira/AFP/Getty Images

Tourists leave their own declarations of romantic love messages outside the
entrance to the real Juliet Capulet’s house in Verona, Italy
Marriage and cohabitation

Marriage has changed significantly over the past 50 years (Cherlin 2004). Premarital
sex is now considered normal, infidelity is widely acknowledged as occurring and
divorce is an accepted possible end to a relationship – and almost half of marriages
end in divorce. Many of these changes can be attributed to a gradual but sustained
movement away from religiosity in Western countries, an enhanced sense of self-
liberty and the political victories of feminism (Twenge et al. 2015). The rate of
divorce also increased with increasing life expectancy, as some couples decided they
did not want to spend their longer later years together.
The rate of social change related to marriage and cohabitation is evidenced by
the changing values attached to surnames. In the 1950s, women automatically
took the surname of their husband. Indeed, cohabitating couples at the time
would have the woman adopt the husband’s name even though they were not
married to avoid the stigma attached to living together ‘out of wedlock’. Compare
this situation to today where, alongside the growing numbers of people rejecting
marriage, many women do not adopt their husband’s name but either keep their
own, or both partners assume a new, double-barrelled surname. Double-barrelled
names have a long history – previously the result of aristocratic marriages where
both families had important ancestors. The change in the reasons for double-
barrelled surnames is interesting evidence for the broader social change.
These changes have been characterized by Anthony Giddens as the move towards
a pure relationship. The central idea here is of a shift in the meaning and experiences
of marriage. Marriages were once based on issues including class and economic
transaction (where women had a ‘dowry’), and the woman was subservient to the
man. However, Giddens argues that romantic relationships have become based on
notions of equality and negotiation – and relationships only last as long as they offer
fulfilment and satisfaction to both partners.
As Giddens (1992 p. 58) writes, the pure relationship
refers to a situation where a social relation is entered into for its own sake, for
what can be derived by each person from a sustained association with another;
and which is continued only in so far as it is thought by both parties to deliver
enough satisfaction for each individual to stay within it.
Plastic Giddens maintains that the pure relationship is connected with a plastic sexuality
sexuality: that has emerged, where sexual behaviour has moved away from a focus on
where sexual procreation to one where pleasure is privileged. True love (which Giddens calls
desires and ‘confluent’) is when a pure relationship exists alongside a form of sexual pleasure
acts are
shaped by
that sees both partners happy and fulfilled, both sexually and emotionally.
individual Giddens argues that this trend is the result of broader social changes in society –
erotic needs particularly that of ‘individualization’, which is the theoretical argument about
rather than the move from locating value in institutions to finding worth in one’s self (see
reproductive Chapter 6). Rather than be defined by religion, class group or profession, a person
or economic locates value in themselves and the choices they make in their lives. This is known as
ones the individualization thesis. The pure relationship has become increasingly
important in a context where people locate their value in their relationships and
friendships rather than institutions such as the Church or their class background.
Individualiza The individualization thesis contends that the act of making choices about one’s
tion thesis: life is where self-worth is found. While this includes work, sense of style and other
the notion
cultural choices, the primary way this is done is through one’s personal relationships.
that the act of
making Giddens argues that the changes are big. Social and sexual life has been transformed
choices about – indeed, his book is called The Transformation of Intimacy.
one’s life is Giddens’ theory has also been critiqued. Some scholars contend that he did not
where pay enough attention to differences based on class, age and gender (Jamieson 1999):
self-worth is the pure relationship might exist to some extent for some people, but they argue it is
found not the reality for all.
What is beyond doubt is that experiences of marriages and relationships are
changing, as evidenced by the decline in the number of marriages and the related rise
of cohabitation. In most Western countries, the marriage rate has been falling since
the early 1970s (Smart 2011). One clear reason for this is the age when people first
get married, which has risen over the decades. Smart (2011) compared data from the
USA, the UK and Australia, showing that between the 1970s and the late 2000s, this
age (for men and women combined) increased by approximately six years, from early
Personal Life 283
20s to late 20s or early 30s. While this is attributable in part to social changes related
to work and university, it is also an effect of people increasingly feeling able to live
together without marriage.
Another trend across many parts of the world is the ability for same-sex partners
to get married – particularly through the campaign for ‘equal marriage’. This is
evidence of how marriage has changed over time; indeed, marriage between people
of different ethnicities was illegal in the USA until 1967. Despite these changes,
marriage is still privileged in policy, with substantial legal and policy benefits not
afforded to cohabiting couples in virtually all parts of the world.
Living apart together

While Giddens’ notion of the pure relationship captures the changes in marriage and
cohabiting relationships that have occurred over the past 40 years, this form of
relationship is just one of several possibilities. There are non-monogamous
relationships of various forms – including open relationships, where a couple have
sex with other people, and polyamorous relationships, where more than two people
are in a multi-person relationship. In addition to that diversity, think about these
situations:
Mario and Sarah became partners at high school, when they were 16. They love each other
and if they had stayed in the same town they would have moved in together. However, they
both wanted to pursue a university education, and while Mario’s university was close to
home, Sarah’s was the other side of the country. Rather than break up, they decided to stay
together and see each other in the university holidays.
Jack, 42, and Javed, 36, have been partners for two years. While Jack has been openly gay
since he was 18, Javed is bisexual and only ended a relationship with the mother of his two
children three years ago. The break-up was amicable and while Jack and Javed live close to
each other, everyone decided Javed should live in his family home until his two children (aged
14 and 17) left home.
Susan and Trevor met online 10 years ago. They immediately felt a connection and
communicated online for several months. They lived in different countries but after entering
a relationship online, and having sex via webcam, they decided to meet in person. After
several meetings, they decided to get married but remain living in different countries. They
speak daily via their computers.
In each of these contexts, the couple are together, but live apart. This has been
conceptualized in the phrase ‘living apart together’ (LAT), and it can take many
forms. An important characteristic of LAT couples is that they have two separate
homes. This is different from earlier forms of cohabitation, where there was one
main home and one member would live away from this for particular times, for work
or other reasons.
There are several reasons why LAT relationships have emerged. There is a
greater expectation that people might have to travel or relocate for their job, and
there is simultaneously less of an expectation that a partner will also move if this
happens. This is particularly true for heterosexual couples where women

increasingly have their own careers and are not able, or willing, to ‘follow’ their
partner when they move for work.
The option of living apart has also become more palatable as the rise in technology
means it is far easier to communicate over long distances – first via email and now
using a range of technologies that mean couples can video call each other via their
computers, laptops or smartphones.
The increasing acceptance of diverse forms of family life means that unusual
forms of relationship receive far less stigma than they might once have done.
Furthermore, the rise in divorce rates means that more people are single at middle
and older ages and when they enter new relationships have more ‘baggage’ to
accommodate than newlyweds in their early 20s.
LAT relationships have several benefits (Levin 2004). People can avoid having to
choose between a partner or caring for an elderly relative or their own children. This
type of relationship also enables couples to concentrate on careers or not change
jobs, and may well ameliorate tensions that can arise from ‘settling down’ together
too quickly. Indeed, the very notion of ‘settling down’ has been disrupted in recent
years, occurring later in life, if at all.
While technology has enabled LAT relationships to take place more easily than
ever before, there are concerns about how smartphones and the internet more
generally can interfere with relationships. McCormack and Ogilvie (2020) examined
how smartphones impact on relationships. This research found that couples used
smartphones to keep in touch – not just to organize the logistics of daily life, but also
for the emotional work of caring and comforting each other. Participants spoke of
the importance of texts and phone calls – short communications to check how the
day was going or remind their partners that they were loved. It was also a central part
of leisure time, arranging trips and dinners out, or spicing up sex lives with flirtatious
messages or erotic pictures and videos.
But the pervasive use of technology in relationships also came at a cost. For some
participants in the study, smartphones undermined their trust in the fidelity of their
partners. While the majority valued technology in their lives, they still expressed
frustration at the tensions it caused in their relationships. Some people were unhappy
about the amount of time their partners spent on smartphone apps, as well as money
spent on ‘freemium’ games (games that are free to play, but have options to purchase
items within the game). There were concerns that smartphones were prioritized over
face-to-face communication in the home, as well as encroaching onto sexual activity
and bedroom routines. Some participants even spoke of their partners interrupting
sex to answer a phone call.
Importantly, many couples had developed strategies to deal with these issues.
This included organizing times when smartphones were banned from use, particularly
at dinner or before sleeping. Others spoke about changing their own behaviour, such
as deleting apps they felt took up too much of their time. Even so, these strategies
only worked in particular contexts, and tensions remained with how technology
intersected with their social lives.
Technology was used by couples who lived together as well as those in LAT
relationships. It is possible that those in LAT relationships find fewer stresses result
Personal Life 285
from technology, as its use in keeping couples together while apart is much more
significant than the tensions it may cause during the (smaller) amount of time they
are physically together.
Monogamy as a social construction

Although we briefly acknowledged other relationship forms at the start of the last
section, a key assumption of our discussion of romantic relationships thus far has
been the idea that they are monogamous. Indeed, monogamy is an enduring
component of romantic relationships in most of the Western world. Monogamy is
such a well-known term that we rarely examine what it actually means – monogamy
is being ‘faithful’ to (that is, not cheating on) your partner.
Alas, even monogamy is not that simple – and what precisely ‘cheating’ consists
of is far more intricate than commonly conceived. To highlight this, think of yourself
in a monogamous romantic relationship, whether it be past, present or in the future.
Which of the following actions by your partner would you consider cheating?
■■ Penetrative sex with another person

■■ Received oral sex from another person
■■ Watched pornography
■■ Had cybersex with a sex worker
■■ Masturbated thinking of you
■■ Kissed another person
■■ Gave oral sex to another person
■■ Masturbated thinking of an ex-partner.
We suspect that almost everyone would not consider their partner masturbating while
thinking of them as cheating, and that penetrative sex with another person would be
considered a violation of monogamy.
Between those two examples is where it gets interesting. Is kissing another person
a form of cheating? Does it depend how long the kiss is for? What about whether
your partner was drunk? Or if the person was a friend or stranger? Does it matter
whether they enjoyed it?
In answering these questions, the first point is to recognize that different readers will
have different answers regarding what counts as cheating. Ask your friends what they
would consider cheating – how do they differ from you and why? We also recognize
that not everyone is equally familiar or comfortable discussing sexual activity. That, in
part, speaks to cultural and social norms, and it will influence how easy it is to think of
relationship types outside monogamy. But sociology pushes us to question norms (see
Garfinkel’s breaching experiments, Chapter 1), and we encourage you to at least think
of these questions even if you have not done so before.
We have focused here on sexual monogamy. Many relationships also have emotional
monogamy, where the other person is your primary partner and the person you love
‘the most’ (whatever that means). Many sexually open relationships maintain
emotional monogamy. There is still an interesting distinction here, though. In
emotional monogamy, you are still allowed to have friends – to not do so would
normally be considered abuse. Yet in sexual monogamy, you are not allowed, in
general, a casual sexual partner.
It is also quite likely that your friendship group might have similar perspectives on
this issue – particularly if you have discussed these questions before and given that
we socialize with people who share our views. There will likely be bigger differences
between you and people with different experiences than you. There is a greater
chance of different beliefs, for example, between someone with low sexual desire
and strong religious beliefs who lives in the countryside and another person who is
always sexually aroused, lives in the city and likes to go clubbing at weekends.
The other key point is that answers to these questions have varied significantly
historically. Masturbation was once seen as a form of infidelity by the Victorians, an
attitude that was both driven by and helped inflame their moral panic against it. Watching
porn has also been seen to be against monogamous norms, but now the internet has, for
many people, made viewing porn more of a commonplace experience. Some couples
view having threesomes together as a mechanism to add diversity to their sex lives while
keeping an emotional connection with their partner (Scoats 2019).
Thus, we can say that monogamy is a social institution, and that how monogamy is
defined changes over time and is influenced by social norms related to attitudes about
masturbation and women’s rights. And here’s the thing: research into monogamy has
demonstrated how it has changed. Most importantly, the central tenet of contemporary
monogamy – sexual fidelity – is a relatively recent addition to the definition.

How might your own perspectives on sex and relationships change if you think of
monogamy as a social institution? Are there other aspects of sexuality that can be
thought of in this way?
Historically, family relationships have not been monogamous. Research shows

that, particularly in the non-Western world, the majority of cultures are polygamous –
that is, relationships are between more than two people (Anderson 2012). Monogamy
in this context refers to a coupled relationship, where just two people are in a
relationship, rather than three or more.
However, monogamy came to be particularly valued in the West. Entering the
modern era, as characterized by a revolution in democracy and the advancement of
industry and capitalism, there was a significant move to the cities from rural areas. It
is this shift to urban living that ushered in the privileging of monogamy, in terms of
coupled relationships (Cancian 1987). Whereas rural (or agrarian) living was difficult,
with poor healthcare and high infant mortality rates, things improved in cities over
time, although the very poorest still lived in squalor and in worse conditions than
rural workers. Furthermore, as people living in cities moved to salaried wages (rather
than living off the crops they had grown), higher numbers of children negatively
impacted on the wealth of the family, whereas, previously, larger families were of
Personal Life 287
benefit, offering a greater workforce for farming. Polygamous relationships moved

from having positive effects to damaging life chances. Monogamy and marriage also
became more formally recognized in the organization of city life as a way to keep
track of issues such as tax and where one lived.
In terms of monogamy relating to sexual exclusivity, we also know that this has
not always been the case. In Ancient Greek and Roman times, same-sex sex was
common even among married men, who were not considered to be cheating on their
wives. Monogamy as a practice of sexual restriction has a long and complex history
in the West but became dominant in the late 1800s, when puritan sexual norms were
to the fore. Anderson (2012) argues that the reason why sexual fidelity became a key
component of monogamy, and not polygamy, came through the widespread adoption
of the French principles of liberty, equality and fraternity. These are ideas that
provide the framework for Western nations; ideas that came in with Locke, Hume,
Paine and Jefferson. They were adopted with the notion that every man is ‘guaranteed
the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness’. Thus, one reason marital
monogamy is esteemed over polygamy was the egalitarian/fraternal notion that all
men (but not women) were created equal, and therefore all men deserved a wife. If
one man owned many wives, he would effectively be denying other men their right
to own a wife. Accordingly, monogamy, as a mandated law, seems to have arisen
alongside industry, democracy and political doctrines of equality. Most feminists also
reject polygamy, which is largely viewed as fostering and reinforcing patriarchy when
it has occurred (Willey 2006).
Since sexual fidelity became a valued part of monogamy, the definitions and
experiences of it have continued to change. In the 1950s, men would date multiple
women (mostly without sex, and certainly without socially approved sex), before
choosing to ‘go steady’ with one. After ‘going steady’ for a while, the man would propose
and, if all was successful, they would get married. After marriage, the couple were free
to engage in sexual intercourse, with the expectation that this would lead to children.
Sexual monogamy was then expected, both socially and religiously, for life.
Today, premarital sex is far more widely accepted (Twenge et al. 2015). Yet despite
trends in sexuality in the West moving towards more liberal perspectives where people
should be able to do what they want – including gay rights, divorce and kinky sexual
behaviours – monogamy has retained its cultural dominance. The cultural, hegemonic
dominance of monogamy in contemporary Western societies has been called monogamism
(Anderson 2012). As discussed in Chapter 3, hegemony is a form of power where the
dominant position is maintained because people buy into the dominant belief, even at
their own expense. The basic premise of hegemony is that people will accept and even
support their own subordination if the conditions are right. Monogamism in
contemporary society is evidenced by the fact that a sexually exclusive relationship is
deemed the only culturally valued relationship choice available. Questioning monogamy
can result in having your own morality questioned. Sexually open relationships are
viewed as likely to fail, or as not constituting a ‘proper’ relationship.
So, the assumption of monogamy discussed at the beginning of this section is not
a valueneutral accident, but part of the process by which monogamy is esteemed –
sitting atop Rubin’s pyramid of sexual hierarchy (see Chapter 8) – as other relationship
types are critiqued and condemned.
PROVOCATION 10
Do people cheat because they love their partners?
The prevailing cultural narrative about cheating is clear and powerful: it is a betrayal,
a breaking of implicit or explicit vows, and a sign that the cheater does not love their
partner. As such, a great deal of social pressure exists for the individual cheated on
to end a relationship. This is one reason why cheating is the primary cause of divorce
in married couples.
But is cheating always a sign that one has lost love for their partner? In this
Provocation, we argue that, at least for undergraduates and young adults, cheating
may actually be a sign of long-term relationship commitment. In order to make this
argument, it is first necessary to think about how cheating is positioned in society in
relation to monogamy, which is the personal and social expectation that two people
in a relationship will only have sex with each other. The dominant view in most
societies is that monogamous relationships are the only moral or even healthy form
of sexual relationships, disavowing and stigmatizing those in open or polyamorous
relationships.
Most people also believe that if you love your partner, you will find your sex life with
them fulfilling throughout the course of your life. In other words, they believe that love
makes for frequent
and great sex, for
ever. Some people
are so heavily in
vested in the belief
that monogamy is a
sign of love, they
cannot accept that
a person can desire
sex with someone
else and still love
their partner; nor
can they accept
that a relationship
can thrive without © AntonioGuillem/iStock
sex. The problem is, the research shows this is wrong.
Perhaps one of the longest and most consistent sexological findings we have is
this: the longer a couple is together, the less frequent and erotic their sex will be.
This contradicts what undergraduates normally think about sex. Young people often
think that the relationship has died when the sex dies. But the opposite is true: the
more love, intimacy and history a couple has together, the less sex they have
together. The relationship becomes one that is based on emotional intimacy, not
Personal Life 289
sex. Grandparents are not less in love than undergraduates because they have less
sex with their partners.
The decrease in sex the longer a couple stay together is not the result of
decreased sexual drive or horniness. People still desire sex with others even when
they are in a long-term relationship. Our argument is that cheating on a partner
in this context can be a sign of love, rather than betrayal. Consider this. There are
many reasons why some couples stay together, even if they no longer love each
other. They might do so for the sake of their children, or because it is their only
realistic option financially. They may stay with a partner out of family or cultural
pressure. But, for most undergraduates, these situations do not apply.
Undergraduates are free to break up without causing serious financial or familial
harm, and few have children to care for. In fact, there is even some peer
encouragement to be single during one’s youth.
So, if a person cheats on their partner, must it mean that they do not love
their partner? After all, they are young; they do not have kids or a mortgage
together; and relative to others, their relationship is not socially expected to
continue. In other words, there is no external pressure to stay together.
Undergraduates have the freedom to break up simply because they no longer
want to be in a relationship. Given this, let’s examine the options that an
undergraduate might have after entering into a relationship, having some great
sex, and then finding the sexual thrill, the passion and eroticism of spontaneous
and novel sex wearing off. Eventually, the couple has to put effort into having
good sex, and that very effort makes it feel as if they are trying too hard, and that
makes the sex less good. Spontaneity, romance and sexual novelty can only be
lived once. We are using the example of a heterosexual couple where the man is
sexually unfulfilled, although the example would work equally well if either or
both genders were swapped.
At this point, there are four options for the unhappy undergraduate:
1 Split up with his partner, despite loving her, and thus grow depressed at missing
her and fearing that he will never be able to have a long-term partner knowing
that the same cycle will repeat.
2 Ask his partner if they can be in some form of open relationship, which, given the
power of norms around monogamy, he can presume would terminate or at least
severely compromise the relationship, unless he has good reason to believe
otherwise.
3 Only have sex with his partner, and remain sexually unsatisfied within monogamy.
Men in this situation usually turn to pornography to at least partially fulfil some
of their extradyadic desires.
4 Cheat on his partner to meet his sexual desires, and hope that she does not find
out.
Given that this undergraduate does not want to lose his partner, he rules the first
option out. Given that he fears that asking for an open relationship will lead his partner
to break up with him, he rules the second option out. He could, of course, choose to
stay with his partner, and deny his sexual desires for other people. That certainly shows
that he loves his partner, because he is willing to sacrifice a real source of pleasure.
However, like many people, in this case our undergraduate finds himself giving in to
sexual temptation of sex outside the relationship. He has certainly failed to signal his
commitment to the relationship according to dominant norms, but can – as we
propose – that cheating also signal commitment in a paradoxical way?
Here is how it can. Because this undergraduate is under no financial, familial or
even social pressure to stay with his college partner, he could freely break up with
that partner to pursue sex with others. The problem is he loves his partner but wants
casual sex with someone else – because he is human with biological urges. Thus, he
chooses to stay with the one he loves and cheat on her to satisfy his sexual urges.
The cheating thus serves as an ironic proclamation of love, because he wanted the
relationship with his partner to continue even as he had sex with someone else.
Knowing that research shows that up to 86 per cent of undergraduate men have
cheated on their university girlfriends, the key sociological questions to consider are:
1 How much social harm is created by relationship termination because of cheating

for sexual purposes?
2 What harm is caused by socially compelling people into monogamy?
3 Can open sexual relationships be a more honest and fulfilling way of doing love?
In conclusion, cheating can be a sign of love because of the cultural power of

monogamy. If monogamy was freely chosen as an individual’s preferred option from
several equally valued alternatives (open relationship, swinging, polyamory), cheating
might deserve the stigma it currently holds. But in a culture where monogamy is, for
the vast majority, imposed, perhaps cheating is a rational choice and a private
declaration of love.

Anderson, E. (2012) The Monogamy Gap: Men, Love and the Reality of Cheating. New York: Oxford
University Press.
Barker, M.J. (2012) Rewriting the Rules: An Integrative Guide to Love, Sex and Relationships. London:
Routledge.
Scoats, R. (2019) Understanding Threesomes: Gender, Sex, and Consensual Non-Monogamy.
London: Routledge.
Personal Life 291
Considering sex
Examining monogamy as an institution and the dominant way of organizing romantic
relationships also highlights that we need to look more closely at sex. For some
people, talking about sex is easy. Teenagers are often seen to be always having sex, or
at least always thinking about it, and there is often a cultural expectation to appear
knowledgeable about sex. But not everyone feels comfortable discussing sex, and
this will vary depending on a range of factors, including religious and family
background, as well as cultural context.
Even so, sex is central to our lives. Even people who do not have sexual desires
– asexuals – still live in a society that is infused with sexual stories and images. Sex is
not just commonly held to be a vital part of romantic relationships, it can preoccupy
our thoughts and is a key way to sell products and ideas. Sex is also vital to some of
the big sociological issues, such as population studies and demographics – who is
having sex with whom, and whether it leads to childbirth, are significant issues for
countries at the macro level.
However, there is a basic question that is quite difficult to answer. What counts as
sex? If you ask your friends this question, their answer will normally presuppose that
sex is a behaviour that occurs with another person. Many people will assume that
person will be of a different sex, but it can of course be with someone of the same
sex. People answering this question then normally add that it includes penetration –
where the penis enters the vagina. Interestingly, they will often say that penile-anal
sexual activity is sex for gay men, but not for heterosexual couples.
Sociological research has investigated this issue. Sanders and Reinisch (1999)
found that people held ‘widely divergent opinions about what behaviours do and do
not constitute having “had sex”’. More recently, Peck et al. (2016) found that 97.4 per
cent of participants felt that penile-vaginal intercourse qualified as sex, while 85.4
per cent thought this was true of penile-anal intercourse. Approximately 60 per cent
of participants felt that oral-vaginal or oral-penile intercourse was sex. Other forms
of sexual contact – such as kissing, breast-fondling and other forms of touch or
foreplay – are considered to be sex by only a small proportion of people (under 5 per
cent for each). Is there anything wrong with this?
We first need to recognize that discussing what counts as sex is actually determining
a definition of sex. And the key component in most definitions of sex is penetration. The
focus on penetration keeps sex located in the reproductive realm. In patriarchal societies,
it has always been important for the father of a child (especially an heir) to know that
he was the biological father – that he ‘has paternity’ (see Chapter 9). Moral codes were
created to regulate women’s sexuality, curbing their rights over their own bodies. These
codes bound sex firmly to reproduction and either denied outright the concept of sex
for (female) pleasure or, at best, limited it to strictly being possible within the bounds of
marriage (more leeway being implicitly given to men’s ‘coarser natures’).
Despite sex becoming more recreational rather than concerned with procreation
(Giddens 1992), penetrative heterosex maintains that link with pregnancy and
children. As such, another negative effect of believing that only one kind of
penetration counts as ‘real’ sex is a heightened risk of unwanted pregnancies and
higher risks of transmitting sexually transmitted infections.
There is also a sizeable group of people who maintain that while oral intercourse
counts as sex, it would not count as a way of losing one’s virginity (Peck et al. 2016).
Given that virginity is basically defined as ‘not having had sex’, this shows that there is a
hierarchy even among those sexual acts that are widely considered to comprise sex. This
speaks to the hegemonic dominance that penetration and the importance of the penis
have in cultural understandings of sex – described as a phallocentric view of sex.
It is also instructive that people define sex through particular acts rather than
experiences. While survey questions tend to structure people into answering in terms
of acts, the responses are similar to our experiences of students’ answers and beget the
question: Why focus on acts when you could focus on pleasure instead? Indeed, the
focus on penetration rather than pleasure cannot be disentangled from the problematic
issues of gender in definitions of sex. However implicitly, sex defined by penetration is
overwhelmingly experienced as men fucking women (or other men).
How different would sex be if we defined it through the experience of pleasure,
and maybe orgasm, rather than instrumentally through particular behaviours? Would
cybersex count as sex in one definition but not the other? How would the organization
of personal life change if sex was focused more on mutual pleasure? We suggest it
would have benefits for heterosexuals as well as sexual minorities.
Changing views of sexual pleasure

What is considered sexual or erotic changes over time and depends on culture. In Victorian
England, a woman displaying her ankle was considered overtly sexual – a pre20thcentury form
of twerking. Similarly, when Elvis Presley shook his hips while dancing in the USA in the 1950s,
many in the dominant culture thought this was sexually obscene. Today in the West, however,
such dancing is regularly shown on TV and in the music industry. While these physical expressions
have likely always occurred, the way society views them and condemns or endorses them has
significantly changed.
Hierarchies of sex
There is an old joke that is helpful in thinking about the norms associated with sex:
A husband and wife are having sex. During their love-making, the husband looks down at
his wife and says, ‘My dear, is everything ok?’
She answers, ‘Yes, why do you ask?’
‘Well,’ he responds, ‘You moved.’
We are not interested in the joke on its comedic merits, evaluating whether it is funny,
but to examine and understand why it is considered a joke at all. We suggest there are
two ways of interpreting this as a joke, and the interpretation is dependent on the
listener’s own perspective and social context.
Personal Life 293

Did you find this joke funny? Why is that the case? What do you think the joke is
about?
Once you have thought about this or discussed it with your peers, read on.
Originally, the joke may have been merely observational, a sexist comment on
women’s passive role in sex that ignored any social context for why this was so. We
encountered this joke reading Margaret Atwood’s renowned 1986 feminist novel
The Handmaid’s Tale, now a successful TV series. She used an austere version of it
in her book, shorn of words such as ‘dear’. The book is written in the style of a
diary kept secretly under a totalitarian and patriarchal regime, and the words after
‘You moved’ are ‘Just don’t move.’ Here, the ‘joke’ is undoubtedly a commentary
on the damage of misogynistic cultures where men are active in sex and women
don’t move. Yet when we use this joke in lectures, to highlight this issue, some of
our students, both men and women, will laugh at it. This is not because they share
those views, but, rather, they are laughing at them for being archaic. The joke
highlights how female sexual passivity has been a normative discourse in many
societies – often known as ‘the missionary position’.
The idea of the sexual passivity of women is a denial of women’s sexual agency
and greatly limits the ways in which women and men can experience sexual
pleasure. Unfortunately, it is not the only way in which sexual activities are
restricted through cultural norms that place moral values on sex. As we discussed
in Chapter 8, a ‘charmed circle’ of sexual acts exists, with some receiving legal
benefits and privilege. For example, monogamous sex is rewarded through
marriage, which has only recently been available to same-sex couples and is still
not open to them in many countries (see Diez 2015).
Sexual attitudes are also dependent on social norms and cultural context.
One key trend in this regard is the increasing acceptance of non-marital sex
(Twenge et al. 2015). The contraceptive pill meant that the baby boomers began
the ‘sexual revolution’ with far reduced risks of pregnancy. For people at the
time, sexual liberation meant ‘free love’ outside patriarchal controls. The 1960s
and 1970s saw an increasing acceptance of casual sex and a ‘free love’ culture,
which was a rejection of earlier generations’ conservative attitudes to sex in the
West. Known as the ‘swinging sixties’ this so-called ‘permissive society’ refers to
the declining intervention by law and other social mechanisms of regulation
into the private lives of individuals (see Chapter 9). Laws were relaxed regarding
pornography, access to contraception and abortion. The grounds for divorce
were also relaxed. Sex became a matter of choice and personal freedom, not a
matter for judges, politicians and priests. Sex for pleasure was no longer either
shameful or wrong.
Moral panics about sex

A sexual component of everyday life for many people is the act of self-pleasuring
– known as ‘masturbation’, but referred to by a whole host of other terms. ‘Wanking’,
‘fapping’, ‘bashing the bishop’ are all common terms that jokingly refer to what
Christianity called ‘onanism’ and cast as a sin because it was deemed a waste of
‘God’s seed’. While these terms are predominantly for male masturbation – perhaps
a result of the great joy teenage boys appear to take in discussing it – there are
increasing numbers of expressions to recognize that women masturbate as well.
The joking about masturbation that is a part of teenage life speaks to how it is
not something that is an acceptable part of everyday conversation. Similarly, the fact
that ‘wanker’ is used as an insult in Britain demonstrates that masturbation is not a
value-neutral behaviour. The insult includes the idea that masturbation is a failure to
secure sex with another person, as well as historically seen as a moral failure.
That masturbation is treated as a joke, as slightly taboo, is not surprising. What is
less well known, however, is that masturbation was once seen as extremely dangerous
and even a national threat. During the Victorian era, masturbation was understood
as an epidemic sweeping Britain and America, and an emergency that needed
immediate medical intervention (Hunt 1998). Interventions were devised to stop
such ‘self-abuse’ – chastity devices including cages around a man’s penis or a woman’s
vagina, as well as machines employed by doctors that effectively masturbated women
in attempt to remove their desire to masturbate (we would most likely consider this
rape today).
There are several other strange aspects of the concerns about masturbation.
Some foods were thought to increase the likelihood of wanking, so cereal was
invented to guard against this; the use of daily baths or (cold) showers might reduce
masturbatory risk; and sport became a socially valued activity in part to entertain
boys who would otherwise think of playing with themselves. It was thought that
boys would become so tired from sports during the day, they would collapse on their
beds and go straight into a deep ‘angelic’ sleep, without the time or energy to think
of such vices.
This concern about sex might sound funny today, but it was deeply serious 100
years ago, and had grave consequences. Not only did it make people feel bad about
a natural source of pleasure, many of the interventions were inhumane and led to a
great deal of suffering. Furthermore, this Victorian puritanism casts a long shadow,
and many widespread concerns about sex today can be traced back to these old
social fears, at least in the UK and North America.
There was great focus on the ‘solitary vice’ of masturbation. But the way in
which society policed and stigmatized it was not unique but rather an enduring
component of sex in society – and it can be explained by the concept of moral
panic (David et al. 2011; see Chapter 9). Cohen ([1972]2011) focused on the social
fear of crime and gangs, while Gayle Rubin highlights how sex is particularly
vulnerable to being subjected to moral panics. Masturbation was an early example,
and the homophobia associated with the HIV/AIDS epidemic also can be
Personal Life 295
explained by the moral panic concept. A particularly pertinent contemporary

example is provided by the widespread high-profile concerns related to
pornography (see Provocation 4).
Consider the following: Joe and Sarah are a couple. Joe is aged 19 and Sarah is
aged 16. They both live in England, where the age of consent is 16 years. It is thus
completely legal for Joe and Sarah to have sex. However, if Joe were to send Sarah a
sexually explicit image (if he were to ‘sext’ her), Joe would be breaking the law and
would face criminal conviction, including being sent to jail and put on a sex offender
register.
Sexting has even seen charges of child pornography applied because the law
was not able to deal with this (Best and Bogle 2014). One argument is that laws
change slowly, and this is particularly true in relation to technology where there
is such rapid transformation. But, given our knowledge about moral panics related
to sex, a better answer is that this is the result of bad laws put in place to address
particular public concerns without duly considering the full policy implications.
However, Best and Bogle (2014 p. 141) argue that fears over sexting are a reaction
to more general fears about ‘kids becoming too sexual too soon’. They highlight
how media concern is often exaggerated and hysterical, arguing that ‘contemporary
legends and exaggerated fears don’t help. Rather, these stories give a distorted
view of youth and make it more difficult for parents or others who work with
young people’.
In their study of university men’s sexting behaviours in Melbourne, Australia,
Roberts and Ravn (2020) show how sociological theory can help guard against moral
panics when it comes to thinking about sexual practice. By carefully applying social
practice theory to men’s sexting – thinking about sexting as a routinized and everyday
behaviour – they demonstrate how men emphasize consent, mutuality and respect in
their sexting practices. Roberts and Ravn’s participants saw sexting as different from
flirting and harassment, and abided by a set of norms governing acceptable sexting.
Contrary to dominant fears about sexting as a new technology for sexual harassment,
Roberts and Ravn show how young men approach these practices in their daily lives
(see also Roberts et al. 2020).
CONCLUSION
Sociology has the potential to explain and contextualize our personal lives.
Experiences and behaviours that we may believe are natural or unique often fit
broader social trends or societal norms. How we think about our bodies and the
nature of our sex lives are two ways in which society has significant influence.
Similarly, sociology can tell us a great deal about the relationships we have, from
friends to lovers. Perhaps the great value of a sociology of personal life is that it
connects broader social trends and the organization of society with the most intimate
and private aspects of our lives – having great relevance to us all and illuminating the
ways in which society impacts on us.
HOW WOULD…?
■■ Think about your body as you read this book and as you sit in lectures and
seminars. How does your physical self impact on how you think and learn?
–– Do you read in small chunks and take a break because it helps you
concentrate? Do you find lecturers who don’t have any breaks or vid
eos in their lectures harder to engage with? What techniques do you
use to help you concentrate?
–– How would the concept of embodiment help you think about these
practices?
■■ Consider Crossley’s notion of reflexive body techniques. Are there ways
in which this applies to your own identity?
–– Would you consider getting a tattoo? How do your personal opinions
and social context impact on your thoughts here?
■■ What distinguishes friends from romantic partners? How does
the role of sex shift in romantic relationship over time? Does this mean
friendships become more like relationships later in life?

May, V. and Nordqvist, P. (eds) (2019) Sociology of Personal Life (2nd edn). London: Red Globe Press.
A treasure trove of engaging chapters about various aspects of personal life, from families and
coupled relationships to consumer culture and the role of personal life in public spaces. It is written
in an accessible style and focuses on core issues of family life in contemporary Western societies.
Pahl, R. (2000) On Friendship. Cambridge: Polity.
A key text on friendship and the importance of friends in society, recognizing friends as a form of
community that can offer support and help throughout one’s life. Drawing on a range of approaches,
the book situates friendship within the social world.
Rubin, G. (2012) Deviations: A Gayle Rubin Reader. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.
This reader provides access to a range of work by cultural anthropologist Gayle Rubin. Her chapter
‘Thinking sex’ is a seminal text in arguing for a critical, social science analysis of sex beyond gender
and feminist theories. Some other great chapters include her critique of anti-porn feminism, her
discussion of gay and lesbian politics, and her ethnography of a kinky sexual community.

Chapter 11
Social
Transformations
INTRODUCTION
This chapter examines how societies change. It discusses how the term ‘crisis’ is used to
draw attention to immediate social challenges, but also how it is used for political
purposes. We then examine social movements as a key mechanism by which societies
change, distinguishing them from other group activities. The importance of identity
politics is then discussed, recognizing its success for many oppressed groups but also
the controversies that surround it. We then consider no platforming as a form of political
action. The chapter continues by examining the rise of populism, and how the UK’s
Brexit vote and Donald Trump’s election as US president can be understood sociologically.
We conclude by exploring globalization and environmentalism, before discussing the
distribution of resources in a context of post-scarcity. In our Provocation, we ask
whether charities perpetuate inequality.
CHANGE AND CRISIS IN SOCIETIES

Considering change
Societies exist because of people and their social interactions. Human agency means
that change will always be a central component of any society. Given this, any
consideration of people and societies must think carefully about how societies adapt
and change.
Contemporary sociology is mostly interested in issues related to social change, Social
including: population growth and demographic changes; economic development; change:the
social and cultural shifts, such as religion and language; and changes to social reshaping of
structures, including family and personal relationships (Weinstein 2010). social
relations and
In Chapter 6, our exploration of modern societies examined the impact of the
processes
social change at the turn of the 19th and 20th centuries. The sociological concepts over time
we discussed in that chapter – including industrialization, rationalization, bureaucracy
and risk society – all sought to understand how the specific transformations of that
period came to define the societies in which we live. This is a macrosociological
approach, considering change at the broadest levels. But change also occurs within
297
societies at the meso and micro level, and sociology considers the mechanisms by
which such change occurs.
One early sociological concept that is still useful in understanding social change
Cultural lag: is William Ogburn’s (1922) cultural lag. Ogburn argued that technological innovation
the gap tended to be the result of the right environment rather than solitary genius, an
between argument also developed decades later by Robert Merton (1963). Ogburn’s evidence
technological for this included documenting many occasions where the same invention or
and
technological breakthrough occurred simultaneously yet independently, known as
organizational
change and ‘multiple discovery’. Akin to the famous phrase, used by Isaac Newton, among
how this is others, of ‘standing on the shoulders of giants’, invention and innovation only occur
manifest in because of building on prior knowledge and, by extension, the ideas and environment
cultural that are available to the thinker at the time.
practices Situating invention and technological change within social and historical contexts,
Ogburn (1922) then highlighted how different aspects of society change at different
rates and that social institutions often lag behind technological developments and
material conditions. This is cultural lag, and it can have profound consequences.
Cultural lag applies today regarding the use of illegal drugs in medical research,
where there is real potential for scientific discoveries but laws regulating illicit drug
use prevent this from occurring (Rucker et al. 2018).
Contemporary sociologists recognize the inherent volatility of change: it is not
biological or mechanical but can be altered in unexpected ways. As we discussed in
Chapter 6, deterministic views of technology (and other aspects of society) do not
adequately explain or account for innovation and complexity in the social world.
Change in societies can be seen as good or bad, and this is dependent on objective
conditions and people’s perspectives. Traditionalists are more likely to see change as
threatening, but since the Enlightenment, notions of change are often associated
with ideas of progress and development (see Chapter 6). The perspective that change
is inherently good or progressive is as one-sided a view as the concern that all change
is bad. Understanding this reality also involves recognizing that change comes from
a complex interplay of people’s attitudes and social structures and institutions, with
these changing at different speeds and with different effects.
In this chapter, we consider how sociologists have thought about social change,
with a focus on social movements and their role in transforming societies. We begin
by considering how crises have the potential to alter societies in profound ways.
Considering crisis
Societies often go through periods of intense difficulty or danger that are often
referred to as ‘crises’. Alongside the individual crises a person might face, such as the
loss of a job, the death of a loved one or the questioning of faith, societies face
social problems that can have profoundly negative effects on the health and wellbeing
of a population, and even its survival.
An example of crisis includes the Cuban missile crisis of 1962, in which the
former Soviet Union sought to place nuclear missiles only 110 miles from the
US coastline in the nearby country of Cuba. While a diplomatic response
Social Transformations 299
eventually resolved this particularly tense moment in the Cold War, there was a
genuine fear that the crisis could ultimately result in nuclear war between the
two countries (White 1996).
Such events can lead to transformational change. For example, the National
Health Service (NHS) was founded in Britain in the aftermath of the Second World
War. Following the huge war effort across society and the toll in life that was paid
particularly by the working classes, the prevailing view was that the atrocity of war
should result in a more equal and fair society (Blakemore and Warwick-Booth 2013).
The crisis of the war therefore acted a catalyst to bring about fundamental social
change. Of course, such change does not always have to be positive.
In premodern times, crises tended to be either the result of war or stem from
environmental factors – the harms brought by flooding, drought, pestilence and
other so-called ‘acts of god’. Environmental crises persist in the contemporary
world, but the main crisis is not the damage that natural catastrophes can cause us,
but the damage that we are causing to the environment.
The set of crises, and concern about crises, has expanded in contemporary
societies: from fears about trends related to gender and sexuality to technology and
automation, and the potential job losses that might result from significant expansion
of robots and artificial intelligence. The nature of these potential crises has also
shifted, with pestilence moving from a problem that can annihilate individual tribes
to now being considered as global pandemics that can affect people worldwide. The
extraordinary political and socioeconomic effects of the COVID-19 pandemic also
demonstrated what a true pandemic crisis looked like.
As war, climate change and epidemics highlight, many crises occur in societies.
However, the term ‘crisis’ is often used inappropriately to describe issues that are not
crises in any meaningful way, either because the threat is not serious or it is very
unlikely to happen. We do not call the potential for an asteroid to destroy life on
earth a crisis – not because the potential harm is fake, but because the likelihood of
it happening is very small. As soon as there becomes a likely chance this could
happen, the language of crisis would likely be quickly adopted.
The concept of crisis can be applied to events incorrectly or a potential threat can
be accidentally exaggerated, but the term can also be misused intentionally. That is,
the term ‘crisis’ can be used by actors in bad faith to advance their own cause. If it
causes fear or apprehension in the populace, the term is useful in raising fear to sell
products, promote political ideas, or distract from other issues.
This brings us to the notion that there is a political economy of crisis. That is,
when considering when and how crisis is used as a term, we should consider political
and economic reasons why the term is used alongside evidence about the issue under
consideration. A legitimate crisis may not be recognized as such because it is politically
untenable for those in power to do so – maybe because they receive too much money
from vested interests, the costs of addressing the change are simply too great, or that
doing so would be unpopular and would come at a cost in the next election.
Democratic elections can result in short-term thinking, where politicians place
greater value on short-term benefits rather than addressing the mitigation of long-
term harms.
Similarly, people in power might characterize an issue as a crisis, even as a

complete fabrication, if they think it will help them get what they want – whether
it be a politician maintaining power, a business making more profit, or a group
motivated by prejudice. One of the great difficulties for society addressing problems
is that we exist in a marketplace of claims and counterclaims about potential crises,
and societies only have a limited capacity to adjudicate completing claims and then
address what they consider to be the most pressing crises (Best 2017). This has its
own problems, with the growth of talk about crisis leading to a potential devaluing
of the term and its utility. As sociologist Robert Holton (1987 p. 503) argued: ‘the
possibility arises that we are losing the capacity to discriminate between social
pathology or breakdown, on the one side, and social normality and social order on
the other’. By using the word crisis too much, perhaps the word is less effective when
addressing real issues.
Crisis or distraction?
In February 2018, following a high school
mass shooting where 17 people were
murdered, members of the Florida
House of Representatives were set to
vote on a ban on assault weapons and
large-capacity magazines that hold many
bullets. However, the Republican-led
House refused to consider the ban. But,
on the same day, the House also passed
Bill HR157, which declared pornography
to be a ‘public health crisis’. As discussed
in the Provocation 4, there is scant michelmond/Alamy Stock Photo
evidence that porn causes harm let alone
warrants the label ‘crisis’, while statistics show that guns kill tens of thousands of people in the
USA each year. The introduction of the Bill calling porn a public health crisis can be seen as a
clear attempt to divert attention from the refusal to put in place legislation to reduce the
number of gun deaths.
A crisis of response to coronavirus

The COVID-19 pandemic that began in November 2019 was an undoubted crisis
across the world and resulted in huge restrictions being placed on people’s freedom
of movement and creating a global recession. It also drew attention to social
inequalities, such as the low pay of many ‘key workers’ and the higher death rates of
poor people and ethnic minorities. It will take a long time for sociologists to
understand the impact of this, but the emergence of the COVID-19 pandemic
speaks to a broader crisis of many institutions in the Western world.
Sociological and critical thinking can point to key failures in how the early stages
of the pandemic were dealt with. The one we focus on here relates to readiness and
having social institutions with the capacity to deal with unexpected crises. Many
Western societies had undertaken several steps that had weakened their ability to
respond to such threats. In the UK, for example, ‘efficiency savings’ in the NHS have
seen the total number of NHS beds in England reduce from almost 300,000 to less
than 150,000 in 30 years, while the number of patients treated increased significantly
(Ewbank et al. 2020). The rate of bed occupancy in 2018/19 was regularly over 95
per cent, meaning that it did not have the capacity to deal with the coronavirus crisis.
Preventive measures are often seen as expendable in a broader context of austerity
where cost-cutting and efficiency savings are demanded of state institutions. This
has led to a ‘hollowing out’ of the state, where once-strong institutions do not have
the capacity or expertise to deal with unexpected events (Rhodes 1994). This is also
one reason why the UK found it difficult to quickly expand the rate of testing: the
loss of local organizational structures around controlling communicable disease, in
the name of savings, meant that the infrastructure was no longer present to do this
(Pollock and Roderick 2020).
Because the benefits of preventive measures are only evidenced through the
absence of bad things, they can become a target of cuts. Writing about a US Supreme
Court decision that saw voters’ rights legislation undermined, Supreme Court Justice
Ruth Bader Ginsburg criticized the decision as akin to ‘throwing away your umbrella
in a rainstorm because you are not getting wet’ (cited in Katz 2015). As the COVID-19
pandemic showed, efficiencies and a cost-cutting agenda can have the same effect.
Gender and crisis

The notion of crisis has been applied to men for more than a century. Framings of
‘men in crisis’ or ‘the crisis of masculinity’ are used to understand the shifting
dynamics of workplaces, where men have been losing their ‘breadwinner’ role, to
contemporary concerns about the Me Too movement and so-called ‘toxic
masculinities’. So, whether boys are in crisis because of the feminization of education
(Farrell and Gray 2018) or their inability to express emotion (Way 2011) in part
depends on your socialized attitudes towards gender more generally (see Chapter 8).
Sometimes, people describe masculinity as being in crisis because men are too
masculine, too aggressive and violent, and other times men are described as being in
crisis because their old-school macho ways are no longer valued. Men and their
masculinities are certainly in flux and it is notable that society so readily applies the label
of ‘crisis’ to these changes. A sociological approach to understanding this issue requires
considering the terms ‘men’ and ‘masculinities’ in their social and historical context.
Men were seen to be in crisis in the Victorian era, as industrialization and the move
to city living took hold (see Chapter 6). The gender roles that emerged during this period
resulted in a perceived crisis for masculinity. Boys were being structured away from
spending time with their fathers; they lacked male role models and it was feared that they
would then grow up feminine and unable to be good soldiers or factory workers (Filene
1975), and that they would be sexual deviants (Freud [1905]1962).
A bibliography of men in crisis

1966 M. Brenton The American Male: A Penetrating Look at the Masculinity Crisis (Coward-
McCann)
1970 K. Bednarik The Male in Crisis (Knopf)
1995 L. Payne Crisis in Masculinity (Baker Books)
1997 R.J. Corber Homosexuality in Cold War America: Resistance and the Crisis of Masculinity
(Duke University Press)
2000 S. Robinson Marked Men: White Masculinity in Crisis (Columbia University Press)
2010 A. Clare On Men: Masculinity in Crisis (Random House)
2013 A. De Sondy The Crisis of Islamic Masculinities (Bloomsbury)
2018 W. Farrell and J. Gray The Boy Crisis (BenBella Books)
Structural changes to the economy were also the cause of the crisis narrative
of masculinity a century later, in the 1990s, when deindustrialization in the West
challenged men’s breadwinner role. Again, the fear was that men were being feminized.
But, rather than crisis, younger men adapted to these changes in terms of valuing
new forms of work (Roberts 2018) and benefited from becoming more emotionally
open and less prone to homophobia and violence (Anderson and McCormack 2018).
There are social, political, religious, economic and technological factors that
influence the dynamics of men and masculinities. Consider just one aspect of
technology. Readers of this textbook will have grown up with digital communications
and social networking sites, and many of you will be reading it as an e-book rather
than in hardback or paperback. Increasing numbers of men play video games rather
than organized physical sports. It is possible to explore risk, danger and violence by
playing games online rather than on the streets or on playing fields. There will be
diverse consequences of this and related changes, but we should consider these
under the language of social change, not crisis.
In terms of the political economy of crisis, note how no one ever describes
women as being in crisis or calls attention to a crisis of femininity. Women have
experienced rapid social change, probably far greater than men, with transformations
in their rights and experiences, even as gender inequality persists. Yet the term ‘crisis’
was not applied to women even for the period of time when women could neither
vote nor own property – other framings and terminology are used to understand
these trends. Some scholars considered the term ‘gender crisis’, but this was still in
response to men’s social conditions (Roberts 2016). Part of this is the result of
middle-class men’s privileged position in academia and journalism, and their
preoccupation with understanding the shifts and challenges related to masculinity
(Bederman 1995), but it is perhaps primarily that crisis tends to be applied when
considering threats and the potential to lose something. Men are held in crisis because
of threats to their privilege, real or perceived. The dominance of narratives about
masculinity in crisis tells us far more about what people have to say about masculinity
than it does about the condition of masculinity itself.

Sociology shows that the labelling of something as a ‘crisis’ is not solely dependent on
the urgency and danger of a social problem, but other political and economic reasons.
Can you identify a recent example of a social problem that should have been labelled
a ‘crisis’ but was not? Why might this be the case?
How and why some social problems gain recognition while others do not is an
issue we return to in Chapter 12.
CHANGE THROUGH SOCIAL MOVEMENTS

A social movement is a form of collective action by a group of people who seek to Social
influence society (Blumer 1951). In the early part of the 20th century, social movement:
movements tended to consolidate around religion and class. However, sociologists organized
have identified a change, particularly after the Second World War, which they have collective
social action
termed collectively as new social movements (Scott 1990). While many movements
with political
remained based in religion and class issues, they also extended further and are based aims to
on ideology and values. Such movements include campaigns about animal rights, the challenge a
environment, peace, and issues related to online privacy and the internet. problem or
Contemporary social movements tend to occur when there is dissatisfaction with improve a
a current social issue, whether it be anger against an existing condition and hope situation
for a new way of living, such as the civil rights movement, feminism and gay rights,
or against a social trend that is seen as damaging and should be stopped, such as New social
the environmental movement. They are historically new forms of collective action movements:
that have emerged alongside structural changes to society, such as the shift to a the growth in
postindustrial society (Bernstein 2005). The term new social movements tends to and change
relate to issues of identity and identity politics (see below), and so does not capture of social
all social movements since the 1960s. movements
Social movement theories place significant importance on individual agency (see since the
1960s,
Chapter 3). The collective agency of individuals coming together has changed
mostly
cultural norms on a range of issues. This includes the understanding and treatment focused on
of sexual and gender minorities, the gradual challenging and changing of racist identity and
attitudes and institutional racism, and even the repeal of repressive laws, such as the identity
prohibition of marijuana in some parts of the world. Social movements are not politics
always progressive and can result in reactionary and repressive behaviours or laws as
well – including movements that attempt to marginalize others based on socially
defined categories such as race and gender (Mudde 2019).
One way of distinguishing social movements is between those that seek reform
versus those that want revolution. This distinction can be seen in how different
wings of the Democratic Party in the US approach healthcare and increasing access
to it. In 2010, President Barack Obama introduced what has since been called
‘Obamacare’, which saw substantial expansion of the number of people who could
gain health insurance and thus affordable healthcare; yet it was still a reform approach
that sought to appeal to centrist and even rightwing voters. Compare this with Bernie
Sanders, the leftwing senator who ran to be the Democratic nominee for president
in 2016 and 2020. He campaigned for Medicare for All, which, by US standards, is a
radical transformation – a revolution – in healthcare provision. This example is also
instructive because it highlights the importance of culture: what would be a revolution
for the USA is, broadly, what already exists in the UK.
A short description of the lifecycle of a social movement

Social movements have several stages, although an individual social movement may get stuck
in one or take a great deal of time to progress through all of them. A complete social movement
process works something like this:
■■ No one does something and no one talks about doing something
■■ No one does something, but someone talks about doing something
■■ No one does something, but many people talk about doing something
■■ Some people do something
■■ Many people do something
■■ Everyone does something, and everyone talks about doing it
■■ Everyone does something, but no one talks about doing it.
Despite this diversity, there are some key characteristics of these new social
movements (Lichterman 1996; Turner et al. 1998):
1 They are a collective endeavour. They are not the domain of individuals, but of people
working together.
2 They are related to social change. They may seek a new future or a return to a prior era,
but social movements are always related to perceived changes in society, with
people working together to effect such a change.
3 They have organization and motivation. The people working together to effect change
will normally have a sense of solidarity and an identity related to the movement.
Thus, a group of people gathered together to watch a parade lacks the organization
and motivation of social movements.
4 They are sustained periods of collective action. Regardless of how organized a group is,
if it only exists for a matter of weeks, it is unlikely to be considered a social
movement.
5 They tend to occur outside traditional institutional settings. They are normally pushing for
social change, largely because their members do not have access to, or faith in, the
state or institutional processes that would be able to make such change.
Claims of demonstrable harm normally help a social movement progress faster, too.
Hence, America was embroiled in political speech about abortion (which uses
religion and science on both sides) before it was embroiled with gay rights, but same-
sex marriage debates have come and gone because there is no demonstrable harm to
permitting same-sex unions. Arguments were made to prevent these unions, but they
lacked credibility because of an absence of evidence of palpable harm beyond
individuals’ feelings. The same cannot be said for abortion, however; some see
demonstrable harm to an unborn child, and others see demonstrable harm to a
woman’s right to choose whether to have that child.
The Occupy movement

The Occupy movement is an international sociopolitical movement that emerged in the late
2000s to argue against social and economic inequality (Gamson and Sifry 2013). Spurred by
the global financial crisis of the period, it has been described as a ‘global justice movement’
(Steger and James 2013 p. 38), because of the way it sparked protests and marches across
hundreds of cities in many countries. The Occupy movement can be understood as a protest
against many of the problems of a 21st-century capitalism that had rejected the job security
and decent pay of what has been called ‘Fordism’ (see Chapter 6). As one 2011 declaration
stated:
As one people, united, we acknowledge the reality: that the future of the human race
requires the cooperation of its members; that our system must protect our rights, and upon
corruption of that system, it is up to the individuals to protect their own rights, and those of
their neighbors; that a democratic government derives its just power from the people, but
corporations do not seek consent to extract wealth from the people and the Earth; and that
no true democracy is attainable when the process is determined by economic power. (cited
in Rosow and George 2014 p. 153)
Perhaps the most famous protest of the Occupy movement was Occupy Wall Street in 2011.
Protestors congregated in and effectively took over Zuccotti Park in New York City, staying for
more than a month before being evicted on 15 November. After this, protestors occupied
banks, university campuses and corporate headquarters to challenge what they saw as gross
social and economic inequality perpetuated by leading social institutions (see Chapter 8).
The Occupy movement powerfully used user-generated social media, such as Twitter and
YouTube, to organize and publicize their activities, making it a very contemporary social
movement. Sociologists are still considering the effects of this style of protest, both in terms of
the issues it was contesting and as a social movement (see Gamson and Sifry 2013).
Collective action as a vehicle for social change

Not all of you will consider yourselves to be an active member of a social movement.
Readers who are lesbian, gay or bisexual might consider themselves part of the gay
rights movement, but not all sexual minority people do (Savin-Williams 2005).
Likewise, not all women associate themselves with feminism. Membership of a social
movement is for people who are particularly motivated regarding an issue – and
motivated enough to commit time and resources to challenging what they see as
inequality or injustice.
However, there are other, more general forms of collective action that do not
reach the status of social movement. One example of this is the petitions that people
sign, not least on websites such as change.org. These have become so popular that
some governments have incorporated them into official political proceedings: for
example, both the British and American governments recognize such petitions to the
extent that, if enough people sign, there will be an official response or even a formal
debate among politicians. While some petitions will be related to ongoing social
movements, others will reflect more short-term or isolated incidents that capture the
public’s imagination.
Crowds: Likewise, crowds are a key form of collective action that do not qualify as a social
groups of movement, but are important to consider (Borch 2012). Crowds range from casual
people gatherings of people who happen to be in the same place, such as waiting to cross a
congregated busy road, to ‘expressive crowds’, which gather to express a particular sentiment,
together,
such as at a political rally (Goode 1992). More conventional crowds are for people
normally in
response to a
attending a concert or lecture, although this may increasingly blur with large-scale
particular political gatherings, such as those for President Donald Trump.
event Crowds often congregate spontaneously, in response to a disaster or issue that
captures the imagination. Images of crowds mourning outside Buckingham Palace
in London after the death of Princess Diana in 1997 captured an outpouring of
grief that was not expected or planned. These are different to crowds that occur at
organized events, such as large sporting events, but in both, members of the crowd
tend to have shared interests or emotions. Durkheim ([1912]2008) described the
elation that can be felt in crowds as collective effervescence, and he discussed how
communal gatherings can intensify religious experiences.
Early sociological research on collective behaviour and crowds focused on social
unrest. Blumer (1969) understood the protest activities of groups of people as being
motivated by dissatisfaction with contemporary society and a desire to see social
Riot:where a change. One form of this behaviour is the riot. Many people have negative views of
group of riots, and they can often have deleterious effects. Perhaps the archetypal image of
people this kind of riot is that of the sport hooligan.
exhibit unruly However, just because crowds and riots are often spontaneous does not mean that
behaviour
there are no underlying processes related to them. In their study of football (soccer)
that damages
people or hooliganism, Dunning et al. (1988) argue that a social and historical approach is needed
property to understand it. They contend that hooliganism has had a place in British football since
its inception and must be understood partly as a way that young working-class men
publicly express an aggressive form of macho masculinity. Furthermore, football
hooliganism often included fights between opposing fans that were arranged in advance.
This would explain why a decrease in football hooliganism has emerged at the same time
as softer masculinities flourished in competitive football (Magrath 2017).
While riots are often viewed negatively and as a form of social deviance (see
Chapter 9), they are also a mechanism by which significant resistance to dominant
social norms is expressed (Gamson and Sifry 2013). For this reason, they are also
known as ‘revolts’ or ‘uprisings’, to demonstrate the political intent behind them.
Research has also shown that rioters are often representative and typical of the
people in the communities in which the riots occurred. This countered the dominant
view that rioters were mere hooligans but rather citizens protesting social inequalities
(McPhail 1971). Just because many riots and protests are not part of social movements
does not mean that they are completely separate.
Consider, for example, the riots and protests that followed the death in 2014 of
Michael Brown, an unarmed 18-year-old Black American man who was shot by a
police officer. During the disturbances in Ferguson, Missouri (known as the ‘Ferguson
riots’), residents in the area formed crowds in protest at the shooting, which turned
violent after clashes with the police; many have argued that the police exacerbated
rather than calmed the process. These riots can be seen as part of the broader Black
Lives Matter movement that has drawn attention to racial prejudice in US law
enforcement. As such, it is possible to view the Ferguson riots as a factor that started
a new social movement about racial justice; not least because the participants did not
feel represented by, or able to effect change through, conventional channels.
© Michael B Thomas/Stringer
A scene from the Ferguson riots in 2014. Events in Ferguson have played a significant
role in the broader Black Lives Matter political protest
These riots and protests around police violence against Black Americans
intensified in 2020, following the death of George Floyd after a White police officer
knelt on his neck for almost nine minutes. Particularly shocking about this death was
the video of the incident, which showed how the White police officer refused to
remove his knee, despite Floyd repeatedly saying: ‘I can’t breathe.’ Connecting also
with broader protest movements and grassroots agency in response to the stoking of
racial tensions during Donald Trump’s presidency (Fisher 2019), the protests lasted
and spread across the USA and internationally. These protests have also been notable
for how they are far more racially diverse than traditional protests against street
violence (Harmon and Tavernise 2020).
The protests and widespread outrage at the deaths of young Black people by the
police have also drawn further attention to evidence of systemic racism in police
forces (see Chapter 8). Regarding social protests, analysis of more than 15,000
protest events in the USA between 1960 and 1990 shows that African American
protests are more likely to draw a police presence than White protests and that, once
in attendance, the police are more likely to take action at African American protests
(Davenport et al. 2011). There is racial inequality even in how protests are policed.
Collective action on concussion

A contemporary social movement in the West relates to the harms caused by
collisions in team sports, such as rugby, American football and Australian football.
Most people are familiar with the immediate consequences that occur from
concussions, such as headache, dizziness and blurred vision. More recently, sport
and medical scientists are learning that having even one concussion can have lifelong
consequences, such as depression and suicidality, anxiety, impulse control and
violence. The growing understanding of the long-term risks of concussion has
begun to change how it is viewed in sport.
Whereas those immersed in sport used to describe concussion as a ‘knock on the
head’, today concussion is recognized as a traumatic brain injury. Whereas before,
athletes were encouraged to play on, today they are encouraged to be immediately
removed from play if a concussion is suspected; and to return to play only with a doctor’s
consent. Strategies designed to reduce the damage of concussion, such as wearing
helmets, are also coming under scrutiny: because the damage of concussion comes from
the brain hitting the inside of the skull, helmets offer little protection in sport.
Scientists have also discovered that neurodegenerative diseases are attributed to
athletes in sports where the head is jolted, shocked or bumped repeatedly. Known
collectively as dementia, one of these forms exists only among people receiving
regular subconcussive hits to the head, such as repeatedly heading a football or being
tackled; this form of dementia is called ‘chronic traumatic encephalopathy’ (CTE).
Research shows that, for example, those who played American football for 4.5 years
have greatly increased chances of dementia. Researchers even find evidence of the
disease among teenagers. The earlier one starts playing these sports, the worse it is:
children’s brains are more susceptible to damage than adults.
These rapidly emerging findings cast serious doubt on the claims that sports
involving repeated hits, jars, or other impacts to the head are healthy. Cultural
awareness of the issues is growing, as is its coverage in the sports media, and even
Hollywood. In 2015, Will Smith starred in the film Concussion, about the scientist who
named the disease and the National Football League’s attempts to silence him.
Consequently, there are growing movements across the West to prevent children
from receiving repeated impacts to the head.
In terms of understanding this as a social movement, we can consider the framing
of the claims being made. At one level, this is a debate between two sets of academics.
One set, including one of the authors of this book, base their arguments on the
harms done to the brains of children and thus call for the abolition of various
practices and wholesale changes to sports in order to prevent these impacts to
children’s brains. Others emphasize the social and physical benefits of concussive
sport, and seek to minimize the harm by introducing various protective measures,
such as helmets, although the effectiveness of these is questioned. The debate, then,
is essentially about competing harms: which health condition is worse; whether the
benefits for many outweigh the harms for a few; and the extent to which people
knowingly consent to the risks of sport.
This social movement appears to have hit a tipping point. Increasingly, sports
organizations, states and countries are banning sporting activities that cause brain
damage to children. American football is a useful case to consider:
■ The sports media, which once heralded athletes who took big hits and got back
into the game, has changed its discourse to instead herald athletes for flagging up
that a teammate may be concussed (Cassilo and Sanderson 2016).
■ Lawsuits are on the rise related to concussion: the NFL (National Football
League) has been sued for nearly a billion dollars, and so has the American chil-
dren’s league, Pop Warner. Irrespective of the success of the lawsuits, the proba-
bility of expensive suits continuing has knock-on effects, not least increasing the
costs of insurance.
■ Several high-profile football players have committed suicide, by shooting them-
selves in the stomach (to preserve the brain for medical research): others, includ-
ing sporting legends, have said they would never let their own children play. In
2020, Netflix released a documentary about Aaron Hernandez, a former NFL
superstar and convicted murderer. He killed himself at 27 and his autopsied brain
showed severe CTE.
■ There are decreasing participation rates in American high school football and, for
the first time, more kids played flag than tackle football in 2019.
The movement to prevent children from receiving impacts to the head has spread to
other sports. Most Western countries have banned children from heading the ball in
some form. For example, in 2015, the USA banned children age 10 and under from
heading the ball in soccer (limiting heading in practice for children between 10 and
13), and in 2020, the UK banned children up to age 12 from heading the ball in
football practice. Participation rates in these types of sports are also on the decline
(Anderson and White 2017). Evidence exists that combat sports are increasingly
preventing children from being struck in the head, too. As more evidence emerges
of the harms of minor impacts to the brain, we suspect that parents who enrol their
children in these forms of sport will be viewed as abusive, and thus participation
rates will plummet.
PROVOCATION 11
Do charities perpetuate social inequality?
Charities play an important role in societies across the world. We tend to think positively
of them, as evidence that people care and have a social conscience. Charitable giving and
work are associated with altruism and supporting people in need (Dean 2020). But what
if rather than fulfilling this social role, charities actually perpetuate inequality?
Charities do not exist in a vacuum, with their intentions and values floating free of
other institutions. For all the good that charities do, they operate within existing social
structures and, as such, are potentially implicated in existing inequalities. Charities have
always had a questionable relationship with inequality. Smith (2007) highlights how early
charity work in the USA focused on helping individuals in poverty without also addressing
the structural conditions that resulted in the social situation, such as campaigning against
low wages. They were helping others, but not addressing the root problems.
This charity system was consolidated in the early 1900s as hugely wealthy
industrialists, such as Henry Ford and John D. Rockefeller, funded many causes. These
philanthropists were referred to as ‘robber barons’ (Josephson 1934) because of their
ruthless business practices, and their philanthropy was not purely altruistic but involved
economic self-interest. Charitable donations received (and still receive) huge tax
breaks, meaning that when wealthy people donate millions of pounds to charity, they
are also denying the state income it would otherwise receive through taxation. Thus,
philanthropists get to pick and choose what they give money to, rather than letting the
state and, by extension, democracy decide. Such charitable giving also serves as
excellent public relations, with many philanthropists having buildings or wings of art
galleries, hospitals and universities named after them.
With the new social movements and identity politics of the 1960s, new radical
movements were arguing for transformational change related to class and race, among
other issues. However, Smith (2007) argues that charity and the not-for-profit
system blunted the edge of these movements, as wealthy benefactors used strategic
donations to particular organizations to direct advocacy towards policy and legal
reform rather than radical social action. A similar focus on getting African Americans
into higher education in the 1960s essentially co-opted them into existing systems
rather than pursuing the more radical politics of the time.
This focus has persisted, as charities become increasingly professionalized and
develop closer links with government bodies. Charities have shifted from voluntary
organizations that relied on altruism and goodwill to effectively operating like businesses
in a crowded marketplace, where they must compete for funding and public recognition
(Dean 2020; Eikenberry 2009). Here, charities enter partnerships with businesses
and corporations even if doing so goes against their ethos or values. Called ‘non-
profitization’ (Beam 2018), this has included the professionalization of processes and
staff and the growth of well-paid jobs for charity leaders.
Charities also work increasingly closely with governments, providing public goods
and services that were once provided by the state. This hollowing out of the state
(Rhodes 1994) means that governments have less capacity to do these things, and, as
a result, charities become the ‘shadow state’ (Gilmore 2007). Here, by filling the gap
left by governments, charities can be seen as endorsing the current system rather
than challenging it. As Poppendieck (1998) argues, it ‘creates a culture of charity that
normalizes destitution and legitimates personal generosity as a response to major
social and economic dislocation’.
We can name many charities doing excellent work around researching cures for
diseases and illnesses and providing care for people suffering with them. We do not
critique these charities. Rather, we ask why state governments are happy for vital work
to be contracted out to charities, rather than doing it themselves? This dissonance has
been understood conceptually by the term ‘industrial complex’ (see Munshi and Willse
2007). This term was originally used by US President Dwight Eisenhower to warn of
the dangers of the close relationships between the state military and a large-scale,
profit-based arms industry. Calling this the ‘military industrial complex’, questions of
profit and financial gain become increasingly influential in decisions of war, meaning
that foreign policy becomes distorted by unelected businesspeople who exert great
power and there is a financial motivation to be perpetually at war.
Applied to charities and not-for-profit organizations, the ‘nonprofit industrial
complex’ conceptualizes a system where potential threats to the social order via social
movements and advocacy are incorporated into the state apparatus, enabling the
state to concentrate on sustaining profit in market economies and maintaining large-
scale prisons and the military (Smith 2007).
Consider this. Can you name an established charity that has dissolved because it
has found a solution to the problem it was addressing? Examples of this are few and far
between, particularly if you move beyond small charities and local issues. Arguments
to explain this can include that charities are addressing intractable issues, such as
curing cancer or reducing poverty, so a solution is not easy to come by. Similarly, many
charities are not designed to solve a problem but to help people in need. If they are
providing support, do they need to challenge the root cause of the problem?
These answers are precisely part of the reason why charities are critiqued by social
movement scholars, who argue that it is this structural design of the charity sector
that blunts their radical potential, so that they make marginal improvements while
reinforcing existing systems rather than radically challenging inequality (Rodriguez
2007). Perhaps rather than challenging inequality, charities are one mechanism by
which inequalities are seen as palatable by the general population.

Dean, J. (2020) The Good Glow: Charity and the Symbolic Power of Doing Good. Bristol: Policy Press.
Incite! Women of Color against Violence (eds) (2007) The Revolution Will Not Be Funded: Beyond the
Non-Profit Industrial Complex. Duke, NC: Duke University Press.
Beam, M. (2018) Gay, Inc.: The Nonprofitization of Queer Politics. Minneapolis, MN: University of
Minnesota Press.
The politics of identity

One of the other key shifts in new social movements is the centrality of identity.
Civil rights activism around race, gender and sexuality were key examples of social
movements based on the notion of injustice perpetrated against people because of
the social categories to which they belong. Alongside names such as the ‘civil rights
movement’, ‘feminism’ and ‘gay liberation’, these movements are collectively called
Identity identity politics. A key element of identity politics is that the movement foregrounds
politics: an issue or social oppression that has previously been ignored or sidelined due to a
political lack of political or cultural power from members who identify with such categories.
movements This foregrounding of previous oppressions is a real strength of identity politics.
that are
We have highlighted throughout this book various social problems and forms of
based on
forms of
oppression that have previously been ignored in society and sociological research,
identity such as racism, domestic violence and homophobia. As Lemert (2001) argues,
rather than identity politics has necessarily privileged identity over traditional issues of economic
broad-based inequality, because these groups’ exclusions from components of economic and
party politics social life have not been considered by traditional class movements. The reason why
people become invested in at least some of these movements is so that they can have
the full rights offered to the majority of citizens.
Identity politics, as with new social movements more generally, is not solely
concerned with achieving the core values of equality and citizenship, but also
expanding rights and freedoms. This can be seen in the waves of feminism discussed
in Chapter 8, where advocacy moved from equality under the law to equal pay to
issues of representation.
Identity politics has come under sustained attack. Some argue that the focus on
identity privileges personal feelings over broader political issues, trivializing traditional
issues such as economic inequality (Elshtain 1995; Gitlin 1995). This has been a
sustained concern in leftwing politics, where issues of class are seen to be marginalized
either because of the supremacy of capitalism or economic wellbeing among many
of its proponents. Yet these claims tend to be asserted rather than demonstrated, and
many forms of identity politics also engage with class and structural issues (Bernstein
2005). Others claim that identity politics is a form of culture, where identity is
weaponized so that narrow interests dominate the broader political debate (Murray
2019). It is also seen as selfish, special pleading or threatening to individual freedoms
(Alcoff and Mohanty 2006).
Some of these critiques can be dismissed as conservative reactions to progressive
change. But, as Alcoff and Mohanty (2006) argue, identity politics has also been
critiqued by former supporters who have become concerned about some elements
of the politics or theory of the movement. There are, for example, inconsistencies
in arguing that gender differences are socially constructed and that women have a
special understanding of feminist issues based on their gender; a similar critique is
also levelled at critical race theories and sexualities scholarship. This critique is
interesting. There can be a tendency for people to claim knowledge or truth about
issues because of some identity category that fails to recognize difference, diversity
and competing values within that group – not least based on other forms of identity,
such as the critique of mainstream feminism being focused on White, middle-class
issues (Phipps 2020). However, the claims to knowledge based on identity and
experience are not without merit. Rather, the development of knowledge and truth
through identity politics occurs precisely through collective organization and sincere
engagement with people’s experiences and is known as ‘standpoint epistemology’
(Collins 2000; Smith 1987).
The tendency for identity politics to downplay difference and diversity is one of
its core tensions as a political movement. For claims to be made about a particular
social condition, there must be a level of agreement within the group: when this is
about a denial of basic human rights, such agreement is relatively easy to come by.
This is reflected in shifts within political identity movements. Ghaziani et al. (2016)
chart shifting cycles in LGBT social movements and show that the politics of these
movements oscillates between emphasizing similarities to heterosexual mainstream
culture and celebrating differences. These differences are evident in recent debates
about same-sex couples having the right to marry, with some seeing this as an
important step to equality and full citizenship while others critique it as assimilation
into a conservative, heterosexual social institution.
Another concern with identity politics is how the process of political action around
identity can be co-opted by groups not aligned with issues of social justice. That is, while
identity politics emerged from groups contesting demonstrable social injustice, based
around a denial of humanity according to characteristics such as ethnicity, gender and
sexuality, similar claims can be made by groups people who feel that an aspect of their
own identity is not being fully valued (Fukuyama 2018). If identity politics is partly
organized through a demand for recognition, any group can make such claims and the
question then becomes one of evaluating competing claims (see Chapter 12) rather than
addressing injustice. Thus, recent years have seen far-right groups adopt the language of
identity politics in their own political advancement.
One particularly worrying example of this is the growth of neo-Nazi groups that
have adopted the language of identity politics for White people in violent ways: the
Unite the Right rally in Richmond, Virginia in 2017 saw one anti-racist counter-
protestor murdered and another 19 injured. This has seen claims made that straight
White men are the most oppressed group. Moran (2020) argues that while this trend
is not new, as such contestation of the term was already evident in the 1990s, the
issue is now far worse. One reason for this is the growth of populism in recent years,
and the mainstreaming of the radical right, discussed below.
No platforming as political action

While we do not find the language of ‘culture wars’ particularly useful in understanding
contemporary social movements and political advocacy, it is regularly invoked as a
cause for concern and an issue to address. Within this, the strategy of no platforming
has come under scrutiny. No platforming is where political effort is exerted by
groups to try and block a speaker from being given a platform to speak on a topic
because the speaker is deemed morally reprehensible to particular communities
(Moran 2020). Platforms, in this context, can include appearances in the media, talks
at festivals and any form of public appearance.
Special attention is often given to universities. This is because no platforming

goes against the spirt of intellectual debate, with the idea that the best way to expose
and challenge bad ideas is to debate them and demonstrate how they are wrong.
Emblematic of this perspective was the debate about evolution at Oxford University
in 1860, which is known for the arguments between scientist Thomas Henry Huxley
and theologian Bishop Samuel Wilberforce. The scientists advocating the Darwinian
perspective are widely acknowledged to have won the debate and it is seen as a key
moment in the acceptance of evolution; even though ideas of evolution caused
offence and many people thought they were harmful. A key tenet of academic
freedom is being able to argue unpopular positions.
In his defence of freedom of speech as a foundation of liberal societies, John
Stuart Mill ([1859]2010) limited exceptions to this to speech that risked public order
or bodily security. It did not include speech that was seen as emotionally hurtful or a
form of microaggression. It is precisely this question of what constitutes harm that
has shifted in contemporary politics of no platforming (Fenton and Smith 2019;
Waiton 2019). Furedi (2004 p. 112) critiqued therapy culture for providing an
‘invitation to infirmity’ and emphasizing human frailty rather than resilience (see
Chapter 6). In this context, educational institutions are to be ‘safe spaces’, where
people are protected so they can learn appropriately. Speech that may offend students
or challenge cherished notions can question this frame. Feminist academic and social
critic Camille Paglia (2018) argues that is notably different to the ideas of the 1960s
cultural revolution, where freedom of speech and expression were paramount,
regardless of how shocking or offensive the content.
A serious issue here is that what is deemed to cause offence or harm is, to an
extent, normative. Put simply, there was a time, not that long ago, when homosexuality
was illegal and punishable by imprisonment because it was seen as either a sickness
or an abomination. The no platforming logic struggles to explain why it would have
been wrong to no platform gay rights campaigners at that time. As Fenton and Smith
(2019 p. 78) argue in the context of social work education: ‘So, what constitutes
knowledge and what is or isn’t allowed to be said should not merely reflect the “held-
fast” views of activist or establishment groups.’ Doing so is a socially conservative
position that can have significant impact on progressive social change.
Of course, not everyone is permitted to speak at universities or other public
venues. Whether through concerted effort, or through rules about who is eligible to
speak, denying people a platform is an effective and appropriate way of stopping
particular views gaining currency. Some extremist speakers are banned from British
universities, for example, without claims of ‘no platforming’ gaining traction. In an
increasingly complex world, truthful explanations can seem less convincing than
conspiracy theories or arguments that foster inequality or oppression. There are laws
in most Western countries that limit free speech to a certain extent. In other words,
there can be legitimate reasons to limit debate and, potentially, stop people from
speaking. Yet whether no platforming is appropriate is questionable, as it arguably
goes against the core ideas of universities, and may even be counterproductive:
attempts to suppress information can lead to them gaining more attention, known as
the ‘Streisand effect’, after the American singer sought to stop photographs of her
residence being published, which resulted in even more publicity than before.
VOX POP
Vanity von Glow
Drag Performer
My performance at 2018’s Day For Freedom, anomalous
among a line-up of speakers associated with fringe
rightwing politics, was intended to emphasize my right to
be heard as a truly liminal voice, and not to cede the
celebration of free speech to one end of the political
spectrum. It was also to reiterate that societies which
uphold free speech as a value enable those without
institutional power (such as the early pre-Stonewall
LGBT community) to organize support networks and
disseminate information.
Despite these efforts on my part, and before footage of
my performance in which I make the above case was even
posted, a quick-response team of online critics decided I
could only have appeared at the event to support far-right
politics. I have no history of canoodling with unsavoury
characters such as fellow speaker Tommy Robinson and so
was frustrated at these aspersions. I have always been a
committed supporter of many leftwing ideals, and an ardent
progressive living a wild bohemian and embracing lifestyle © Vanity von Glow
enriched by a diverse network of brilliant creatives from all
backgrounds. However, my feeling that ‘cancel culture’ presented a dangerous threat to free expression
meant I was not wholly surprised to myself fall prey to an online mob.
Vehement, furious voices on Twitter triggered a frenzy in which venues across the UK were
harassed and petitioned via phone calls and in person to cancel my shows and deplatform me as
an entertainer. My musicians who I employ found themselves without work, venues found
themselves in the midst of a fray they did not ask for, and I lost a summer’s worth of work.
A surprising outcome of the attention garnered around this controversy was my being invited
to discuss the affair on national television, broadcast radio, and at live speaking engagements
over the past two years. Indeed, the aftermath saw me launch a successful live talk show event
in London, ‘The Vanity Project’, in which I interview journalists, comedians and other figures
about the issues of the day – the culture wars, politics and more. An irony of some overzealous
attempts to take down people you disagree with is it often creates more interest and ‘buzz’
around them. In my own case I recovered from a substantial financial hit in the short term, and
since I have not turned out to be a secret far-right rapscallion have enjoyed a return to a busy
life as a performing artist.
As an entertainer I seek to live honestly, communicate freely, and show with my work that
people have more in common than they realize – all while having a laugh. It’s about bringing
people together. My temporary deplatforming, presented by its proponents as valorous, sought
to prevent that. To be misunderstood is challenging; going forward I work hard to be clear in my
intentions, for where there is misunderstanding there is great fear. To me, deplatforming is an
act of fear dressed up as an act of courage and a liberal society can and should do better.
■■ Does Vanity’s experience change your perspective on no platforming?
–– Was no platforming effective in Vanity’s case?
–– Does Vanity’s reason for performing at the event influence your perspective?
■■ Does Vanity’s positionality as a leftwing ‘wild bohemian’ drag performer matter in this debate?
■■ To what extent is no platforming a necessary part of identity politics?
The rise of populism

A form of politics that is ostensibly focused on understanding the issues and politics
Populism:a of ‘the people’ is known as populism, normally where the interests of ‘the people’
political are pitted against various elites, whether that be the government, the wealthy or
approach multinational corporations. Populism was initially framed as a threat to the rule of
that law because it referred to political movements that challenged the governors of a
champions
state or country and positioned the movement as better than the existing political
the common
person and system (Allcock 1971). This threat to the governing system, and thus in many cases
places them to democracy, remained central to much sociology of populism.
in opposition This sociological definition can initially be confusing because if democracies are
to existing supposed to provide common people with political power, why should populist
elites policies and movements be dangerous or damaging? Healthcare is a prime example
of a policy that is beneficial to and desired by the majority of people but can be
resisted by elites: is such a populist policy really dangerous?
The answer is that populism is not merely another social movement that seeks
to make positive social change, but has other defining characteristics. Mudde and
Rovira Kaltwasser (2017) contend that populism is an ideology with three core ideas:
1 it is based on an appeal to ‘the people’

2 it denounces ‘the elite’
3 it is framed as an expression of the general will.
These core ideas are interconnected. The elite are not merely criticized for failing
to act on an issue or address a social problem; rather, they are characterized as a
fundamental reason why the damage to ordinary people is occurring in the first
place. Populist movements try to pit ordinary people against elites. There are many
examples of this in contemporary politics. Building on the tradition of the Tea
Party movement in the USA, Donald Trump regularly framed the media as
purveyors of ‘fake news’ (which we discuss in Chapter 12). Similarly, the labelling
of British judges as ‘enemies of the people’ by the Daily Mail, a rightwing tabloid
newspaper, was a classic example of a populist framing of elites versus ordinary
people.
The importance of pitting ordinary people against elites is one reason why many
populist movements do not cohere to one formal ideology. Popular opinion can
matter more than ideological purity. Thus, a populist might adopt a leftwing economic
platform with rightwing cultural views, or vice versa.
Populism also tends to occur outside the dominant political system, at least
initially. Populist politicians will often attack established or mainstream parties, and
challenge elite values more generally. Thus, Donald Trump was not a Republican
politician before running for president, but a TV celebrity and wealthy businessman.
Likewise, Nigel Farage, the founding member of the UK Independence Party, a
fringe, far-right political party, was the figurehead of the Brexit vote in the UK,
although it was supported by many Conservative MPs.
Populists also seek radical change. Panizza (2005 p. 9) describes populism as ‘the
language of politics when there can be no politics as usual … involving the radical
redrawing of social borders along lines other than those that had previously structured
society’. Given the broader stirring up of dissatisfaction in the populace, and the
tendency to authoritarianism in many populists, a profound concern of populism as
a movement is precisely the potential threat to democracy that it carries.
Alongside these real issues, Berezin (2019 p. 351) contends that populism has
also become shorthand ‘for political parties, politicians, and ideas that academic,
journalists, and public intellectuals find unacceptable’. If these groups are part of
elites, then, it could be argued that the populist is likely to be critiqued because of
the challenge posed to these people’s privilege. This is a thread also developed by
Mudde and Rovira Kaltwasser (2017 p. 79), who caution against any automatic
association between populism and social effects. This is not to disavow the palpable
harms that many populist movements have resulted in, but to recognize that it is
not an inevitable result:
Depending on its electoral power and the context in which it arises, populism
can work as either a threat to or a corrective for democracy. This means that
populism per se is neither good nor bad for the democratic system. Just as
other ideologies, such as liberalism, nationalism, or socialism, can have a
positive and negative impact on democracy, so can populism.
Mudde and Rovira Kaltwasser (2017) highlight that populism can give voice to
marginalized groups, help integrate them into the political system and make the
political system more responsive to these groups, in the process making the system
more accountable. Yet, at the same time, populism can see minority rights diminish,
erode the institutions that protect fundamental rights and damage the ability of
politicians to make pragmatic decisions.
Hugo Chavez and leftwing populism

Perhaps the most famous leftwing populist in power in recent years was Hugo Chavez, former
president of Venezuela. A former soldier, Chavez channelled the nation’s wealth from oil
revenues into social programmes that tried to relieve poverty and promote food security. He
did this while also being a vocal critic of capitalist economic models. Venezuela, and Chavez’s
leadership, has been hailed as a success of the populist left, but also as a case of economic
disaster, as oil production collapsed in 2013.
Alongside the economic decline, Chavez also characterized the political establishment as
the enemy of the people, and he subsequently dissolved the opposition-controlled legislature
as he rewrote the constitution, imprisoned political opponents and increased censorship powers.
Roberts (2012) suggests that Chavez’s leadership contained elements of authoritarianism
alongside continued democracy, bringing meaningful benefits for many Venezuelans while still
having deeply problematic aspects.
Sociological analysis of Trump and Brexit

While populism was often centred on Latin America, Russia, Eastern Europe and
Africa in the latter half of the 20th century, it is the rise of populism in Western
Europe and the USA that is particularly commented on in the early 21st century. The
election of Donald Trump as president of the USA and Britain voting to leave the
EU (known as ‘Brexit’) are emblematic of this shift, although Viktor Orbán, prime
minister of Hungary, is perhaps closer to what traditional forms of populism can
look like.
Offering the nuanced perspective on populism quoted above, sociologist Cas
Mudde (2019 p. 1) is concerned about ‘the mainstreaming and normalization of the
far right in general, and the populist radical right in particular’. He highlights that at
the time of his writing (May 2019), Brazil, India and the USA had far-right leaders
and constitute three of the five most populous countries in the world. He distinguishes
between the radical right, which accepts the essence of democracy, from the extreme
right, which rejects democracy altogether – epitomized in the 20th century by Adolf
Hitler and Benito Mussolini. In defining the radical right, Mudde contends that while
accepting of democracy, they reject key planks of liberal Western democracies, such
as the rule of law, the separation of powers and minority rights.
Developing some of these arguments in their book Reactionary Democracy, Mondon
and Winter (2020) argue that the mainstreaming of far-right populism is not because
of popular demand but is the result of elites manipulating the working class to push
reactionary ideas. They argue that the notion of ‘public opinion’ is constructed by
elite groups within the media, politics and academia, and it is this framing of
contemporary populism that has helped the mainstream radical right.
One way in which this framing is evident is how the working classes are reported
in media accounts of recent Western populist movements. Brexit, for example, was
often reported as a working-class backlash against metropolitan elites, yet the main
block for leaving the EU was affluent middle-class voters in the south of England
(Dorling 2016). In the dominant framing of a working-class backlash, it is argued
that issues of class and socioeconomic disadvantage have been sidelined in favour of
politics around identity and, particularly, ethnicity. Simultaneously, the majority of
non-White, working-class people voted to remain in the EU, but narratives of a
working-class leave vote falsely racialize the working class as White; something
Bhambra (2016) calls methodological whiteness. Methodo
logical
whiteness:
SOCIETIES BEYOND MODERNITY a way of
The globalization of the world understanding
societies that
Today, we live in a global world. The internet connects most of us to friends and fails to
family in different continents, some of whom we may have never met in person. We recognize how
can order products and foods from practically any country, and have them arrive in race structures
those societies
a matter of days. And just as we can access things, opinions and information from
other countries, so too our own products and influence can spread near-
instantaneously across the world (Wallerstein 1979, 2004).
It is perhaps not surprising that such technological developments have spurred
seismic social change, although few individual technological innovations have had
such global influence as the internet. While the telephone was invented in the 19th
century, its influence was greatest in the mid-20th century, but its impact in
transforming social life does not come close to that of the internet. The internet has
been the fastest-growing communication tool ever developed – whereas 140 million
people used it in 1998, as of 2020, it is used by an estimated 4.5 billion people across
the world (Kemp 2020).
However, different countries were becoming increasingly interlinked even before
the phenomenal growth of the internet. The term globalization is used to Globalization:
conceptualize this change, and has been defined as ‘all those processes by which the the process by
people of the world are incorporated into a single, global society’ (Albrow 1990 p. 9). which
While Albrow’s definition of globalization is helpful in highlighting the broad issues countries have
become
that globalization covers, its breadth also means it lacks specificity – it is all-
increasingly
encompassing. Goran Therborn (2000 p. 154) argues for a more precise definition, inter
stating that globalization refers to ‘tendencies to a world-wide reach, impact, or connected,
connectedness of social phenomena or to a world-encompassing awareness among with individual
social actors’. In Table 11.1, we explore what each of these components means to experiences
gain a better understanding of the issue. and social
Manfred Steger (2017) argues that globalization is not a single process or a solitary phenomena
concept but an umbrella term for a great many issues that are unfurling simultaneously. traversing
traditional
Steger identifies some key characteristics of globalization:
economic,
geographic and
1 Globalization involves the creation of social networks and the growth of social
connections that traverse traditional boundaries of geography, politics, economy boundaries
and culture.
Table 11.1: Explaining Therborn’s definition of globalization

Definition Meaning
component
Worldwide reach … Issues are not restricted to local phenomena but will be
of social happening at the local level in many contexts across the
phenomena world
Worldwide impact Social phenomena, such as the environment, technology or

pandemics, are not restricted to one country but
experienced internationally
Connectedness Seemingly different issues are connected. Consider the

vote for Brexit and the election of Donald Trump as parts
of a rightwing populism that are connected by new forms of
online media (and Russian influence)
World- Many of us do not think only about our own cultures or

encompassing even societies, we also think about the world and global
awareness among issues, such as climate change
social actors
2 These social networks and relationships are expanded and stretched across the
world; for example, global financial banks operating across countries, or near-
identical shopping centres in countries with distinct cultures.
3 An acceleration and intensification of social activities, primarily through the
internet and online social networks.
4 The processes of globalization are experienced at a subjective level and individuals
increasingly think in global terms.
Robertson (1992) famously argued that globalization represented the ‘compression

of the world’, as technological change and new economic and cultural practices
mean that once-great distances are compressed by technology. Yet, highlighting
the complexities of globalization, such a term can seem jarring. For many people,
their own worlds have not compressed but have opened up in ways their parents
or grandparents would never have imagined possible. Cheap air flights mean that
people can cross the globe and make multiple visits to countries that would have once
been, at best, a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity; and if flights essentially stop, as they
did during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, technology keeps connections
between these worlds possible. Globalization is simultaneously, then, a compressing
and an opening up of the world.
Of particular relevance to this chapter, globalization has transformed the
structures of the modern world. Perhaps most importantly, the global nature of
trade and finance means that the traditional notion of the nation state that had
control of its borders, economy and laws has been significantly undermined. The
shift in power from nation states to these companies is exemplified by media reports
of international corporations, like Amazon and Starbucks, avoiding tax in particular
countries (Barford and Holt 2013). Similarly, as the benefits of global cooperation in
combating major issues are recognized, some countries have ceded power to control
some of their laws to, for example, the EU. Globalization is one of the key trends
that has seen societies fundamentally shift from those of modernity – characterized
by the dominance of industrial cities, technological innovation and the primacy of
democratic principles – to a more dynamic and precarious context (Kalleberg 2018).
Social movements have also emerged to challenge the dominance of globalization,
often called ‘anti-globalization movements’. Significant protests often accompany
trade negotiations, particularly around concerns that multinational corporations
can exploit workers, evade paying taxes and harm the environment. There are both
leftwing and rightwing strains of anti-globalization – with the rightwing approach
identifying threats to national sovereignty and identity and the leftwing approach
more concerned with economic inequality.
Anti-globalization movements are not, though, purely reactive demonstrations
that criticize existing power structures; they also campaign for new, collective
approaches to a global world. For example, Hardt and Negri (2001) argue that the
political order of globalization is, in reality, a new form of empire that must be
challenged for its unfair and unequal practices that dominate marginalized and
poorer groups; yet they contend that this has been matched by a decentralized and
global protest movement that campaigns for an environmentally friendly and socially
just democracy. In a recent update in their thinking, however, Hardt and Negri (2019)
argue that while the global order is in crisis, it has not significantly impacted on the
continuing dominance of this order.
The importance of the environment

Cheap air fares are one symbol of our globalized world – showing how we are
increasingly physically connected as well as digitally. However, air flights are also
symbolic of another issue – pollution and the contribution that humans make to the
degradation of the environment. Indeed, global warming (or climate change) is
perhaps the most pressing threat facing us today – even bringing about the potential
extinction of human life on earth. As we discussed in Chapter 3, the reality of climate
change is not itself a sociological issue, but how we deal with the threat it poses, as
well as examining who is likely to be most harmed, are important sociological
endeavours.
When we discuss climate change, one of the key components is global warming. So-
called ‘greenhouse gases’, including carbon dioxide, are trapped in the earth’s atmosphere
and produce a warming effect as they block some of the sun’s heat from escaping into
space. The problem emerged, however, when human activity, particularly related to the
burning of fossil fuels, resulted in too much greenhouse gas in the atmosphere, meaning
that the overall temperature of the earth began to increase.
© Piyaset/iStock
Sociology has a key part to play in understanding the threat that climate change
poses to human life
Sociology contributes to understanding climate change by theorizing how

globalization and the growth of capitalism has impacted this warming. A conference
funded by the US National Science Foundation and the American Sociological
Association used sociological perspectives to address the social causes of climate
change, its social impacts and how societies can adapt to mitigate the effects (Nagel
et al. 2010). As part of this event, York (2010 p. 149) wrote:
Contemporary global climate change (GCC) is fundamentally a social problem

in two senses. First, it is primarily driven by social forces. Second, it potentially
has dramatic consequences for societies. The social nature of GCC is
sufficiently complex – including economic, demographic, cultural, and
psychological aspects – that it requires the full sweep of social scientific
analysis to gain a comprehensive understanding of it. Thus, due to the clear
social aspects of both the causes and consequences of GCC and due to the
traditionally broad scope of sociological inquiry, it is of the utmost importance
that sociologists are active in discussions about GCC.
The event organizers argued that sociology had enabled a greater consideration of
the political economy of climate change; that is, how political and economic power
are paramount to how climate change is treated at the international level. Another
component is to recognize that social policy interventions that have the effect of
reducing carbon emissions are needed at an international level.
Ulrich Beck (1992) drew sociologists’ attention to the risks associated with
industrial society’s relationship with nature. As we produce more goods, we also
produce ever more harms. A climate catastrophe would hurt everyone, but the
current distribution of resources is deeply unfair: those getting the least goods are
also those getting the most of the harms. The poorest countries are also likely to be
some of the worst affected by climate disasters (see Chapter 6).
Similarly, our understanding of water is liable to change as global climate change
affects weather patterns. Anthropologist Veronica Strang (2004) argues that
international conflicts over water are intensifying, and this trend is likely to continue
in the foreseeable future. She draws on ethnographic research, cultural mapping and
local archives to examine the way water is managed socially and politically in the UK,
arguing that the broader political changes will be felt in local contexts across the
globe. She reports that water consumption continues to increase in industrial
countries at the same time as international conflicts about resources intensify. Strang
draws attention to the cultural components of these issues and how cultural beliefs
about the value of water inflect the debates.
While there is increasing recognition of the dire threat of global warming and
other environmental challenges, people are surprisingly reticent to make significant
change to their behaviours to stop the threat (Gifford 2011). One of the problems
is that the danger of global warming is not felt by most people, so the threat is
downplayed. Several psychological barriers limit the potential of individual action on
climate change. National agreements are thus particularly important to tackle climate
change, although international initiatives will struggle to gain universal agreement.
Unsurprisingly, then, while the 2015 Paris Agreement raised significant hope for
positive action to combat climate change (125 countries, including key countries
such as the USA and China, had signed the document by 2017), this was undermined
when the USA withdrew from the Paris Agreement in 2017, thereby highlighting the
instability of many international treaties in a period of populist and anti-globalization
politics.
During the lockdown period of the COVID-19 pandemic, there were clear
environmental benefits, as much of the world vastly reduced its activity and there
was a huge reduction in air travel and other polluting activities. Data showed that car
and air travel significantly reduced, often to less than a quarter of the prior amounts,
and air quality in major cities greatly improved. Reports of animals, including
endangered species, reclaiming land dominated by humans were powerful examples
of the human impact on shared ecosystems. However, the economic costs of
lockdown were huge and highlight the difficulties in making such changes to address
climate change.
COVID-19 also highlighted how the climate crisis is not limited to climate change.
Deforestation, intensive farming and the exploitation of wild species has significantly
increased the risk of pandemics that arise from diseases in animals infecting humans.
Leading environmental researchers have made this clear:
Our actions have significantly impacted more than three quarters of the
Earth’s land surface, destroyed more than 85% of wetlands and dedicated
more than a third of all land and almost 75% of available freshwater to crops
and livestock production. Add to this the unregulated trade in wild animals
and the explosive growth of global air travel and it becomes clear how a virus
that once circulated harmlessly among a species of bats in Southeast Asia has
now infected almost 3 million people, brought untold human suffering and
halted economies and societies around the world. This is the human hand in
pandemic emergence. (Settele et al. 2020)
Human action has increased the likelihood of pandemics, and so social change will
also be needed to reduce the risk moving forward.
This plundering of natural resources is also carried out by transnational companies,
undermining the material wealth, cultural artefacts and human rights of communities
where the resources exist. Legal frameworks guiding how these resources should be
managed focus on economic and, to a lesser extent, environmental concerns, but do
not pay due attention to fundamental questions of human rights. Because the legal
ownership of natural resources tends to reside in the nation state, local communities
are pitted against transnational companies to the latter’s advantage. However, there is
growing recognition of the collective rights of communities, particularly Indigenous
peoples, and international human rights law is one way that further environmental
damage can be challenged (Gilbert 2018).
The sociology of the environment

Sociological investigation of the environment is an important subdiscipline of sociology
(Sutton 2007). While we focus on climate change in our section on the environment,
sociology has examined in detail the differences between nature and the environment.
How we think about the countryside, for example, is deeply connected to the organization
of the city.
Consider the trend of highly paid city workers buying holiday homes in picturesque parts of
their country a few hours’ drive from where they work. For these rich city dwellers, the country
is an idyll they can escape to, as well as a symbol of their wealth. However, people in the
countryside see this trend as an attack on their community. Fewer houses are lived in all year
round, meaning that these part-timers do not easily mesh with, or spend money in and on, the
wider community, while the influx of wealthy newcomers drives up property prices beyond the
reach of most locals. Thus, two groups of people have very different experiences of the same
environment (see McIntyre et al. 2006).
Capitalism, globalization and technology

Economics is often called ‘the dismal science’. This is because it often starts from the
assumption that human life is a cruel competition where moral niceties cannot
overcome the supposed brutal necessity of the struggle over scarce resources. Yet
one of the basic insights of sociology is that the supposedly free market, within Free market:
which people compete with one another without regulation, still requires a prior level a system
of trust in money, credit and rights. As such, society – the structure that enables where goods
institutions, including banks, laws and systems of trust – is a precondition of market and services
economics (Durkheim [1893]1984). are
However, those actors who society protects with its laws and systems of property exchanged
and money still use the advantages society offers them to reinforce their economic for money,
ostensibly
power. Marx and Weber both identified the significance of political and cultural
with no
systems in maintaining economic inequalities. Today’s global network capitalism is governmental
the culmination of this long history of interplay by which economic, political and support
cultural spheres have been created and transformed by power and by the resistance structures
to it (Castells 1996).
Consider the following situation. In the 1960s, people had to buy hard, physical
vinyl copies of The Beatles’ records to listen to their latest hits, and had to purchase
physical copies of books to read the latest bestseller. Today, music can be streamed
across the internet, and books can be read on electronic devices. The vital issue is
that every copy of a book and song produced in the 1960s cost money, and took a
finite amount of time. Yet digital technologies have made it possible to make copies
of things that would have once required large amounts of ‘capital’ to produce and
distribute.
The question is: What will happen to global network capitalism if the networks
that sustain it start to enable the mass production of free copies of things capitalists
make a profit from selling? In other words, how is capitalism going to survive if it is
no longer making money by producing all the goods?
One important argument here is that globalization has actually been a process
of free markets undermining particular countries’ economies. If corporations can
outsource jobs to developing countries at a fraction of the wage costs, this raises
unemployment in developed societies and increases the bargaining position of
such transnational firms in negotiations with governments. They can also offshore
activities to ensure they do not pay any tax either, further reducing the conditions of
citizens. Colin Crouch (2004) has called this process post-democracy.
However, this version of global network capitalism is only one aspect of the
issue. Global network capitalism is not just about deregulation and the dismantling
of societies to create an unimpeded global ‘free’ market. Replacing the General
Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, which commenced in 1948, the World Trade
Organization (WTO) was created in 1995 to structure a new order based on the
global regulation of property rights. The first act of the WTO was the Agreement on
TradeRelated Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights (TRIPS), a treaty that required
all WTO members to sign into domestic legislation a raft of laws harmonizing and
extending the intellectual property rights of mainly transnational corporations.
These regulations have continued to be increased ever since (David and Halbert
2015). Global networks are very good ways to increase markets, sales and profits,
but this can only be achieved if intellectual property holders can regulate networks
to retain their ownership of what is produced and circulated through them. Despite
legal treaties, this has not been maintained.
Only a year after the TRIPS Agreement, the World Intellectual Property
Organization (WIPO) Copyright Treaty (1996) first recognized the challenge to
intellectual property posed by consumers of digital recording devices, who were
now able to share copies of works that were being sold in digital formats (CDs and
DVDs). Only a couple of years later, the profit stream that had flowed from the CD’s
digitization of recorded music in the 1980s went into reverse with the rise of the file-
sharing software Napster (David 2010). While Napster was rapidly prosecuted and
successfully taken down for ‘contributory infringement’, its closure heralded the rise
of a new generation of fully peer-to-peer services that did not use a central server
to mediate files, and which could not therefore be prosecuted for ‘fencing stolen
goods’ (that is, contributory infringement) as Napster had. The cat-and-mouse
struggle between rights holders and freesharers has continued ever since, with the
development of torrent services, streaming services and cloud-based systems, each
of which distributed the process of sharing in a new way that abolished whatever
bottleneck rights holders sought to close down through prosecution.
One consequence of the rise of sharing networks has been the advent of illegal
pirate services. Another outcome has been the rise of new legal forms of free
access – such as Spotify – that fund free access through advertising. In each case, the
rise of global networks has challenged traditional forms of capitalism by suspending
‘scarcity’, the precondition of price, and the justification of intellectual property
rights within capitalist societies.
It is not just in the music industry that scarcity has been suspended by sharing
networks. The ability to make digital copies whose marginal cost (the cost of making
the next copy) has fallen to zero has reached ever-wider domains of what was once
seen as the economy. Yet the end of scarcity will challenge some of the core tenets
of accepted wisdom in economic theory and practice. Film, television, computer
software and publishing have all witnessed their own versions of this struggle
between sharing and scarcity-based models of production and distribution, and in
each case the rationale for price and property is disproved when sharing is shown to
be more efficient in production, more effective in distribution and generating higher
incentives for creative innovation (David 2017).
This may sound very gloomy, but there are advantages as well. Musicians are
better paid when their music is circulated freely, generating publicity, while leaving
fans with more money, which has meant ticket sales and prices have increased.
Sports fans frozen out by escalating subscription rates to digital sports channels can
challenge hypercommercialization. Authors find wider audiences. Researchers can
access more research. It is also true that the sharing revolution is spreading beyond
purely informational goods. Generic pharmaceuticals mean that medicine better
reaches the neediest, while research is made better and faster by free circulation
from behind patent-protected barriers. And 3D printers will open the post-scarcity
sharing revolution even further (Rifkin 2014).
Global network capitalism requires both deregulation and new forms of regulation
to profit from the global circulation of ideas and things. Capitalism has not had
everything its own way. Global networks have many, diverse possible actions and
outcomes from events (what Castells calls affordances), facilitating intense conflict
© Juancho Torres/Anadolu Agency/Getty Images

This boy in Colombia receives his new prosthetic hand, created by 3D printing
in the world today. Just as capitalists have sought to reduce the value of labour by
deregulating labour markets, so sharers have sought to undo the price of informational
goods by deregulating intellectual property rights through global network sharing
systems.
A parallel conflict is also raging among those who would use robots to replace
people at work and so reduce the dependence of business owners on human workers
(Cameron 2017). At the same time, workers and citizens are looking for new ways to
harness the potential of machines to reduce the burden of work and help people. In
an ageing society, robots may be part of the solution, whether that is helping humans
or replacing them.
CONCLUSION
This chapter has developed our sociological understanding about how societies
change, primarily by considering the role of social movements in their diversity.
Political action is a key question in contemporary times, particularly with the rise of
populism and the success of radical-right politics in many questions. While these
issues can often be considered at a macro level, and may seem divorced from our
own experiences, we examined the role of identity politics and no platforming that
are present in universities as well. We concluded by discussing the problems that
globalization brings to the principles of capitalism, while noting that sociologists will
be of vital importance in understanding these socioeconomic and political issues in
the future.
HOW WOULD…?
■ Think of a social movement you or someone you know has been involved
in.
– Why would you categorize it as a social movement? Is it a new social
movement? Why?
■ The globalization of the world has had a profound effect on all our lives.
How has globalization changed as a result of the impact of COVID-19?
– To what extent are these changes temporary, and how might they be
more long-lasting?
– What theories might explain these changes? Is sociology currently en-
gaged with understanding these trends?

Weinstein, J. (2010) Social Change. New York: Rowman & Littlefield.
This book is a useful introduction to social change, and provides an overview of key theories and
concepts. It has many recent examples to consider, including the impact of the economic crash of
2008 and the importance of globalization. It is also international, paying close attention to changes
in China and India.
Kauffman, L.A. (2017) Direct Action: Protest and the Reinvention of American Radicalism. London: Verso.
This book provides an insider’s account of recent protest movements and the potential to effect
change in the USA. It discusses protests on the American left since the 1960s and examines
movements discussed in this chapter such as Occupy Wall Street and Black Lives Matter.
Mudd, C. (2019) The Far Right Today. Cambridge: Polity.
This accessible book provides an important and engaging overview of the rise of the far right in
contemporary politics. It contextualizes the far right in history and ideology and discusses many of
the fundamental questions that the far right pose for contemporary democracies.

Chapter 12
Sociology Discovered
INTRODUCTION
Now you are equipped with a firm grasp of what sociology is and how it is used to
understand the social world, we can turn to think about its public impact. Recognizing
that people adopt sociological ideas and use them to understand diverse societies, we
discuss the role of sociology in social policy before examining the politics of evidence
and what a sociology of social problems looks like. We then discuss how recent social
trends in the media influence how we engage with sociological concepts and theories.
This includes the presence of fake news, and even fake sociology. In our Provocation, we
ask, in sociology, whose side are you on? We finish by thinking about what a good
sociology student looks like.
THE VALUE OF SOCIOLOGY

This book has introduced you to sociology. We have explained what sociology is,
how it is practised and discussed some of its key empirical findings. In the later
chapters, we applied sociology to a range of important topics to better understand
society. Part of our job in writing this book is to ensure that you get a firm grounding
in the key sociologists and their theories, to make you aware of some of sociology’s
central debates, and to give you an overview of the discipline that was not biased by
our own preferences and perceptions.
Given that sociology is about understanding the social world, we have also sought
to equip you with the intellectual tools to deal with the issues you will encounter in
your lives. In short, we hope to have sparked within you a sociological imagination.
The greater your sociological imagination, the more able you are to critically analyse
society at both micro and macro levels. Some of these issues will be felt on a personal
level, like navigating friendships and romances and dealing with the tensions that
arise within them. Others will be political, like a heightened understanding of the
relationship between politics, poverty, opportunity and diversity. These are issues we
have discussed throughout the book.
We also hope to have helped enable you to contribute to the central debates not
only of our time, but of times to come. As we discussed in Chapter 11, the risks of
the world related to the environment, globalization and the future of capitalism are
simultaneously big, macro issues that nonetheless will be experienced by everyone in
their daily life. Likewise, we cannot predict what social movements around oppressed
329
people will come next, but understanding how past minority groups have fought for
social and legal equality will help you promote other social groups in doing the same.
We believe that sociology can help find the best resolution for dealing with the
issues you will encounter, whether at home or at work. A grounding in existing
sociological research can help when the issues you face relate directly to these topics;
when it does not, we hope to have also engrained a desire and ability to locate, read,
understand and critically reflect on the available evidence. While your answer is not
guaranteed to be correct, sociology provides a systematic process for coming to an
answer that is more than a guess and better than an opinion.
Some of you may have been undertaking a sociology module on a different
degree course, in subjects as diverse as business, psychology, medicine and
criminology. If this is the case for you, we hope that you will apply the core tenets of
sociology to thinking about your own discipline. Whether this is the key skills of
method, theory and critical analysis, or more subject-specific ideas, a sociological
imagination can and should inform your discipline (see Chapter 1).
We have drawn on Provocations throughout the book to engage with emotive
issues. They are there precisely to provoke you into thinking differently about issues to
which you may have an emotional response and perhaps have not critically thought
about before. This will not have been the case for every Provocation, and the
response will be different among readers, mostly based on personal experience.
When you have been more familiar with the arguments, we hope these Provocations
are helpful in modelling ways to engage in sociological debate rather than rely on
emotional reactions.
The Vox Pops provide a different function. Sociology can sometimes be abstract
or difficult to engage with. Hearing the perspectives of real people relating to
sociological issues can help contextualize broader debates. We hope that hearing the
voices of people with a range of backgrounds, and from several countries, has helped
you engage with sociology.
We have also spoken about the importance of theory and method to sociology.
Some students are captivated by theory. Just as Professor Maggie O’Neill wrote about
having her worldview transformed by critical social theory (see Chapter 3), so too do
many students after reading a particular theorist or how a certain issue is theorized.
However, not everyone immediately values the theoretical component of sociology.
Many sociologists write their theories in complex ways that are not easy to understand
or apply to the real world. And even when the theory is brilliantly written, it is not
everyone’s favourite component. If that is you, be expansive in your theory reading and
find a theorist you enjoy at some level: this includes reading widely and not being put
off by theory in general, even if you find some theorists boring or too difficult.
Exploring a range of theories and theorists can be a useful endeavour. It might
help to think of theory as a gym for the mind: just as you get more results from the
gym the more you put in, so too with theory. Sometimes, the greater your effort to
understand theory and think theoretically, the more you will get back. We encourage
you to put that effort in, even if in a selective manner, as theory is vital to sociology.
Theory is what binds facts together, connecting them and providing an explanation
for them. Without theory, there is no sociology.
Sociology Discovered 331
The same can be said of methods: understanding the utility behind various
research methods, as well as when and how to use them, can be complicated (see
Chapter 4). For example, an interview may seem straightforward, yet many skills are
required to interview someone successfully. These range from interpersonal and
listening skills to memory and timekeeping; they require the interviewer to ask the
right questions and remain in control of the conversation, while also being flexible
enough to be directed by the replies and interests of the interviewee.
It is helpful to think of research methods as tools in a toolbox. Just as with
tools, you must know how to use each one. You can use different tools to get
similar results, but the tools you use will affect the outcome. If you are trying to
remove a nail, you might use a pair of pliers and have the same result as if you use
the back end of a hammer. But if you use a saw to cut the nail off at the wall, you
will be left with something different. With sociology, if you interview people
privately about a sensitive topic, you will get different answers than if you use a
group interview. This tools analogy is useful in another way: to remind us that, as
sociologists, we control our methods rather than being controlled by them. That
is, the sociologist needs to reflect on the question they want answered and then
use the best tool to understand it. Pick the best method for the task, do not rely
on the method you like the most.
Our online ‘Methods Applied’ resource considers a range of methods applied to
the topics and issues we have discussed throughout the book. Evaluating how other
people have used methods in their research is a great way to improve your own
understanding of methods.
It is our hope that you develop a sociological imagination, use the tools of theory
and method to interrogate the society you live in, and make choices in your life that
will benefit you and those around you, as well as being for the greater good.
SOCIOLOGY IN THE WORLD

Given that sociology is about understanding societies and social interaction, it is
always, inherently, part of the world. Discussing applied sociology, or sociology in
the world, can seem tautological. Yet this language can be useful to think about the
influence of sociology and the impact it can have. Thus, in the sections that follow,
we discuss how sociology can influence individuals and societies, and some of the
ways this can happen.
The impact of sociology on the individual Single

hermeneutic:
In Chapter 1, we laid out what we considered to be defining characteristics of where
sociology. Not only is it a discipline distinct from psychology, philosophy and other knowledge is
social sciences, it is fundamentally different from the natural sciences. In the natural in one
sciences, scientists investigate aspects of the world that are oblivious to such study. direction. The
This is primarily because the objects of study do not have any possibility of object of
‘knowing’. Rocks do not know that the geologist cares. Giddens (1987) describes study does
not change as
this as a single hermeneutic, where hermeneutic means seeking understanding or
a result
interpretation.
However, sociologists deal with people who do care that they are being studied.
Whether it is with an international study that makes the news across the world or a
student dissertation, the people in the study and the broader population who know
about it will, to varying degrees, be interested in the study. Giddens calls this the double
Double hermeneutic. The double hermeneutic is ‘the interweaving of the concepts of the
hermeneutic: social scientist and everyday life, as social scientific ideas are appropriated by laypeople
the idea that and become part of the new social universe that the researcher studies’ (Tucker 1998
people’s p. 3). As such, sociology can generate change through this method of changing people’s
knowledge of
perspectives of the world. The technical phrases and terms used by sociologists can
sociology
alters how
become part of the wider public vocabulary, and this familiarity and (self-)awareness
they can alter how they are used and, indeed, how they actually manifest in society.
understand Tucker (1998) uses the example of role theory to illustrate this: the notion of a
the world, ‘role’ was developed in interactional sociology across the 20th century, and has
thus changing become a popular term. Most obviously, this is about role models, but we also speak
the world of gender roles and other similar terms. The public may not always accept these
ideas or the meanings sociologists ascribe to them, but in becoming aware of the
concepts, they have had to think in some way about the issues behind them.
Sociology has other ways of impacting on the individual, particularly the
sociologist. Referring in Chapter 1 to C. Wright Mills’ concept of the ‘sociological
imagination’, we highlighted the ways in which sociology was about thinking
differently. Thus, sociology changes the individual because the way they conceive the
world is altered – a critical awakening that makes a person more aware of the ways
in which society structures individuals’ own experiences.
This is also why we have highlighted Indigenous and postcolonial sociology
throughout this book: it is important that we recognize Eurocentrism and Western
bias in sociology and society. Our critical awakening should include an expanded
vision of a truly global world.
PROVOCATION 12
Whose side are we on?
Howard Becker’s (1967) ‘Whose side are we on?’ is perhaps the most well-known
journal article in the discipline of sociology. Becker noted that while the powerful
have many ways to express their interpretation of things and promote their interests,
this is less true for the ‘underdogs’. Becker argued that sociology should understand
and give a voice to the experience and beliefs of these underdogs. In other words,
sociology should be partisan and serve as an advocate for those in need.
Consider the examples discussed in Chapter 8 – where sociology has helped
identify problems of racism, misogyny and classism, among other issues. Surely
sociology is better when it is challenging oppression rather than remaining neutral or
even supporting it? The trouble is that this approach can lead to the problem of
‘going native’ – of becoming biased in favour of a group after spending too much
time with them. Some have taken Becker

to be saying that ‘going native’ is
inevitable but not a problem; others take
the view that in giving voice to a group,
Becker is not suggesting that the
sociologist should lose their ability to
provide a true account (David 2002b).
We therefore ask: Is it the job of the
sociologist to describe how things are, or © Macmillan Mexico/Dave Cockburn
to interpret the voices of those who are otherwise unheard? Can sociologists ever
be neutral in who they research, the questions they choose to ask, or the results
they produce?
In Chapter 5, we discussed the ethics of publishing research that might harm the
group being studied, asking whether it is appropriate to suppress publication,
particularly if the group is an oppressed minority. How might this discussion be
advanced, considering Becker’s questions about whose side we are on?
Using examples of clear oppression can make it harder to think about the role of
sociology more broadly: sociology should not condone racism. Hopefully, there is an
internal logic to sociology that would condemn racist thinking, which tends to be
based on emotive arguments that do not withstand logical scrutiny (see Chapter 8),
but even if not, there are humanitarian reasons and arguments of social justice that
would make that case. Given this, we turn to an example that is less clear-cut for
sociologists, to consider the issue of being partisan.
In a research project looking at the local environmental movement in Kent in the
early 1990s, Matthew David (2002b) set out to map the network of alliances and
enmities among the environmentalists and interested parties concerning a potential
property development in this beautiful area (often referred to as the ‘Garden of
England’). He soon found himself studying 187 different groups, all of whom claimed
to be part of the local environmental movement, but who had very different
conceptions of who else was inside and outside that network. In this fractured
context, what did it mean for Matthew to attend a meeting held by one particular
group instead of another – was he taking a side by so doing?
This question unexpectedly became all too relevant. Having attended a meeting
organized to question the development of an ‘ecotourist’ holiday village in ancient
woodland, Matthew’s name was copied down by representatives of the developers,
and passed to his then employers. Purely by attending this meeting, it was suggested
that he was actively seeking to harm the local economy and block what they were
promoting as an environmentally friendly development project. Subsequently,
Matthew was labelled as ‘hostile’ by the company, and as a result they would not give
him an interview. However, being blacklisted by the company made it easier for
Matthew to gain access to interview opponents of the scheme, because he was now
seen as being sympathetic to their interpretation of events (David 2002b).
By attending the meeting, had Matthew compromised his ability to carry out
‘valid’ research, or did being caught up in the politics of the situation give him a more
‘valid’ insight? What should he have done to get the best data to inform his
arguments? What do you consider to be the best data in this instance, and why?
In later work, the same researcher was asked to assess the effectiveness of a
scheme to provide online training in areas of rural social exclusion via local telecentres
and telecottages (a community-based facility to assist learning). The research was
funded by the agency that was organizing the programme, to evaluate its quality and
effectiveness. Matthew carried out interviews with the software developers who had
written the training packages, the staff in the telecentres and telecottages, and the
users of the facilities. He also chose to interview a number of local employers,
employees and unemployed people living in the areas covered by the scheme. This
led to the identification of very different conceptions of what counted as
‘effectiveness’ and what helped or inhibited it.
The software developers identified the basic problem as a ‘lack of knowledge’,
which could be solved by means of their training packages, whereas telecentre staff
and residents highlighted the residents’ ‘knowledge of lack’ – an awareness of the
material conditions of their lives that could not be resolved by any amount of training
alone. The problem for Matthew was to evaluate whose position was right.
If Matthew was to evaluate the ‘success’ of the scheme, should he only base this
evaluation on what the scheme set out to achieve, which was to make knowledge
available? Alternatively, was it his job to evaluate the scheme according to the
definition of success offered by those whom the scheme targeted? If the funders of the
research dictate the definition of ‘useful’, does this require that the researcher
follows their definition of ‘success’? In this instance, Matthew came under
considerable pressure not to publish results that highlighted the criticisms of the
scheme made by telecentre staff and local residents. After the publication of these
criticisms, the software provider was shown in a poor light, and subsequently had
some of their funding withdrawn.
How should the researcher have acted in this context? Should a researcher take
into consideration such a possible outcome when deciding what to publish and how?
Whose experiences should be privileged in doing this?

Becker, H. (1967) Whose side are we on? Social Problems, 14(3), 239–47.
David, M. (2002) Problems of participation: The limits of action research. International Journal of
Social Research Methodology, 5(1), 11–17.
Gouldner, A. (1968) The sociologist as partisan: Sociology and the welfare state. American
Sociologist, 3(2), 103–16.
SOCIOLOGY AND SOCIAL POLICY

One of the key ways in which sociology can have an impact in society is by influencing
social policy. This is because sociology can provide an understanding of how Social policy:
societies operate, meaning that social problems can be addressed from an empirically how societies
informed context. Paul Spicker (2014) highlights that social policy tends to be most address
concerned about people who lack wellbeing, whether as a result of education, health, issues of
individual
environment or other social problems. The goal is to improve the situation through
wellbeing,
social policy, where there are clear goals and, through a process of implementation, social welfare
achievable and measurable results. and social
Early forms of social policy tended to deal with extreme forms of absolute justice
poverty. In the UK, for example, the 1834 Poor Law was introduced to deal with the
social issues of the time: one of the key ways was moving from giving money to poor
people to providing institutions, such as the workhouse (Fraser 2009). As might
seem familiar with current debates around social policy in the UK, Australia and
North America, key concerns were: to reduce the cost of the social provision; to
encourage people to support themselves; and to take beggars off the streets. The
laws were seen by many as draconian, with workhouses particularly maligned. Many
of the conditions in these workhouses would not be considered acceptable today;
families were separated, the food was poor quality, with silence expected at meals,
and people were expected to carry out hard manual labour for ten hours a day. There
was no education, people were not allowed to go outside, and there was just one
hour of recreation a day. They were more like prisons than provisions of support:
prisons where the only crime was being poor.
Workhouses failed as a social policy because they did not serve to improve the
circumstances or life experiences of the people in need. A key term in
understanding this failure is welfare. ‘Welfare’ is a term used to describe the range
of services that protect vulnerable or needy people, including children, the ill and
the elderly (McClelland and Smyth 2014; Spicker 2014). Somewhat confusingly, in
the USA, welfare has a much narrower definition, referring to financial aid to
people in poverty.
Taking the broader definition of protecting vulnerable and needy people, there
are a range of arguments for welfare. Spicker (2017) highlights some diverse, core
arguments for the need for welfare within social policy (see Table 12.1).
Table 12.1: Arguments for welfare
Argument Rationale
Humanitarian Human beings have inherent value, thus societies have a duty to
provide a basic standard of living
Religious The world’s major religions have moral instructions to be

charitable or offer social solidarity, and much of this includes
helping the poor and needy
Mutual A recognition that supporting the poor and needy can be good
self-interest for society: see the discussion of The Spirit Level in Chapter 8
Democratic Welfare develops alongside democracy, because both require

collective participation
Practical Much like mutual self-interest, welfare has practical benefits for
society
Source: Based on Spicker (2017)
Social policy does not just address those in urgent need. Social policy in any
country must address, for example, the education of its citizenry, the administration
of tax and spend policies, and the regulation of leisure activities. It is concerned with
promoting the welfare of citizens, and concentrates on areas of need, such as poverty,
health and housing, as well as specific groups, such as children, people with disabilities
and older people.
During the COVID-19 pandemic, social policy was a key mechanism to reduce
health risks and save lives. While much news reporting was on behavioural psychology
and medical interventions related to reducing transmission, social policy has a central
role not least because the people most affected by COVID-19 are older people and
ethnic minorities. Social policy interventions that protect the most vulnerable are
critical in mitigating the damage of such disasters. This is true at the national level,
but also internationally, as governments and international organizations try to deal
with issues that cross national borders (see Chapter 11).
Education policy, assessment and perverse consequences

Education is a central component of social policy in most nations, not least because of its
importance for the global economy. Recognizing the influence of globalization (see Chapter
11), sociologists of education Bob Lingard and Sam Sellar (2013) highlight that this has resulted
in a convergence in social policy related to education across the world. While discourses of
values, citizenship and democracy persist (Hoskins 2008), the trend has been towards
experienced educators having less of a role in educational policy than the increasingly influential
bureaucrats and economists who seek to use educational policy to foster economic growth.
Lingard and Sellar contend that various international organizations are driving this trend, not
least the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).
They draw on an extensive case study of the OECD’s Programme for International Student
Assessment (PISA) to argue that schooling is now truly transnational in the way that student
assessment is measured between countries. More and more countries have opted into the
PISA programme, alongside education companies like Pearson. PISA has come to be seen as a
global benchmark of how a country’s education system is performing. However, there is a
perverse consequence to this. PISA results have become increasingly important to national
rankings of schools, meaning that
PISA performance was promoted as an end in itself, collapsing distinctions between test
performance and the performance of the education system it is designed to measure.
(Lingard and Sellar 2013 p. 34)
Performing well on the measure can be more important than performing well for the students.
This problem with rankings can be seen in universities at a number of levels. In the UK, the
annual National Student Survey asks graduating students to rate their experiences at university
on several measures. But this survey has become so important to the national rankings of
universities, which themselves feed into international rankings, that there is arguably more
incentive for universities to prioritize measures that keep students happy and improve their
National Student Survey results, rather than focus on educational quality.
Research has also demonstrated that student evaluation of teaching ratings is not related to
student learning (Uttl et al. 2017). In many countries, academics are often assessed on their
teaching by student surveys, and these evaluations are frequently involved in promotion
decisions as well as monitoring performance. Yet these are known to be poor measures: in
sociology, optional modules tend to score more highly than mandatory ones, and methods
modules often score poorly. More significantly, and across subjects, students tend to score
men more highly than women (MacNell et al. 2015), and attractive people more highly than
less attractive people (Felton et al. 2007).
Think about your own experiences of teaching. Are there any teachers you liked more because
they were attractive? Or because of some issue that was not about teaching? When you fill out
evaluations of someone’s teaching, will you reflect on any potential biases you may have?
The politics of evidence

Social policy is a fascinating area, a discipline in itself, and we do not have the scope
to provide a full history of it here (see Fraser 2009). We turn instead to a contemporary
trend of what is known as evidence-based policy, as distinct from policy that was Evidence-
based in ideological positions or professional or practical experience. Particularly based policy:
evident in British social policy, evidence-based policy making has become a paradigm a paradigm in
which policy
in which research, not least sociological research, is valuable because it can provide
is based on
strategies for improving social problems and influence social policy that is supposedly research,
free from dogma or ideology (Sanderson 2011). While yielding many benefits, its supposedly
practice is necessarily complex (Cairney 2016) and sometimes flawed. free from
There are multiple ways in which evidence-based policy is practised. There is an dogma or
idealistic model where academic research identifies a problem that is then addressed ideology
by policy makers. There is a similar version where social policy makers identify an
issue and fund research to come up with a solution, which may well be positive, but
it can also mean that research is quite narrowly focused through specific set
government interests and thus lessens the chance for innovation.
A broader problem, however, is about how this evidence-based paradigm can be
misused. Appadurai (2001) highlights how the production of evidence to support
government initiatives means that the state frequently has control over the funding
of such research. Likewise, advocacy groups such as charities or think tanks may well
distort evidence to fit a particular policy agenda. This is also true of academic
researchers, particularly when funding is involved. The distortion of evidence can
include ignoring important information, misrepresenting or fabricating evidence, or
overgeneralizing from an argument (Strassheim and Kettunen 2014). This has been
called policy-based evidence, where such evidence is produced with the intention of
supporting the desired policy. And while we have focused on the British context,
there are concerns that this misuse of evidence is occurring across the world
(Appadurai 2001; Boden and Epstein 2006).
In an Australian context, Marston and Watts (2003) argue that evidence-based policy
can be a mechanism by which the policy makers gain power over determining what
constitutes a social problem. They caution against any mechanistic process in which
only narrow forms of ostensibly objective evidence are included, and seek a democratic
and pluralistic form of engagement in order to make social policy. They argue that
researchers and policy makers should remain sensitive to the context of the social
problem, and adapt methods and theory appropriately to understand the issue involved.
The good news is that a strong understanding of sociology equips you with the
skills to differentiate the good research from the bad research and determine what is
evidence-based policy and what is policy-based ‘evidence’.
A sociology of social problems

This textbook has covered a lot of social problems, from racism and homophobia to
globalization and climate change. As we discussed in Chapter 3, conflict theories are
particularly focused on social problems and how to mitigate harmful issues in society.
But the issue of policy-based evidence and the corruption of evidence-based policy
draws attention to an issue with social problems: Who decides what problems matter?
We examined this in Chapter 9 where we discussed how a sociology of crime must
look at the structures of society and not just the individual criminals. Yet there is a
whole area of sociology devoted to understanding social problems, critically analysing
how certain issues are deemed social problems while others are not (Schneider 1985).
This approach considers social problems as social processes and studies those
processes, rather than the core focus being on the potential harms of the problem.
A key tenet of social problems theory is that what issues are deemed to be problems
is inherently social, because bad conditions must be brought to people’s attention to
be classed as a social problem (Schneider 1985).
The standard approach to social problems sees conditions that are harmful to
society, such as crime and poverty, and seeks to develop statistical evidence about
these issues. There are two key issues with this. First, some harmful conditions are
not always identified as social problems. Homophobia was not seen as an issue for
much of the 20th century, just as domestic violence was downplayed. Second, there
are some conditions that some people identify as harmful but others do not. Some
people view atheism and secular society as a problem for society, while others argue
that organized religion does harm. Who is right?
A sociology of social problems does not seek to answer the question of who is
right, but rather to understand how arguments are made about these problems. It is
not the objective conditions that matter so much as the subjective perspectives of groups of
people. In other words, conditions are not viewed as problems because of objective
standards but because people think they are social problems. Collecting data about
the harms of secularism versus religion is less important than understanding people’s
responses to, and perceptions of, harmful conditions. Spector and Kitsuse (1977 p.
75) define social problems as ‘the activities of individuals or groups making assertions
of grievance and claims with respect to putative conditions’. This approach is thus
interested in claims about social issues and the social process of claims-making, Claims-
made by claims makers. making:
It is this process of claims-making that is relevant for our discussion of evidence- asserting that
based policy and policy-based evidence. This is because there are countless different a condition
should be
claims being made continually about social problems, not just whether an issue is a perceived as
social problem, but debates about the nuances related to specific social problems. As a social
such, there is a marketplace of claims and claims makers. problem
Audiences hear claims about many social problems. Many of these will be valid
claims about real social injustices that require attention. We have highlighted several
Claims
issues like this throughout this textbook. But what matters, in understanding social
makers:
problems as a social process, is the implications this marketplace has on claims individuals or
makers. If claims makers want their issue to be recognized as a social problem, they groups
must gain and keep the attention of the audience. Furthermore, established claims seeking to
need to be continually refined in order not to lose traction with the public. convince
This is one area reason why policy-based evidence emerged: claims makers construct others that a
evidence to make their case and persuade the public. Charities are one set of claims condition is
makers that have become increasingly vocal in doing this. Clapton and Cree (2017) troubling and
that
show how charities have used press releases as a way to influence news stories and gain
something
a reputation for the charity involved – making claims not just about the social problem should be
at hand but how the charity is able to resolve it. Similarly, McCormack (2020) examines done
reports produced by charities and framed as objective research that gain media attention
and influence discussion of social problems, which are forms of advocacy research
that focus more on making claims about the issue and promoting the charity rather
than producing objective research (see Chapter 9).
There are a set of conceptual tools that are used to understand social problems
as a social process, including moral panic theory (see Chapter 9), policy analysis and
systematically analysing the claims made, whether it be in reports, press statements,
lectures, or other public venues. Key areas to investigate are claims-making, how
these claims are reported in the media and how policy making is affected (Best 2017).
Table 12.2 provides examples of how issues might be studied within a social
problems approach. While some argue that the objective conditions are irrelevant to
understanding the social process (Spector and Kitsuse 1977), we contend that this
approach is at its strongest when it combines analysis of the subjective processes
alongside the material conditions related to the claims. These are important issues to
consider as claims-making is an ever-present component of the contemporary world.
How you engage with claims is a key issue not just for you personally, but for the
effective functioning of society.
Table 12.2: How to study issues using a social problems approach
Social problems Possible research Possible method

process questions
Claims-making Are the claims accurate? An empirical study testing the

claims
How are the claims Critical review of ‘documents’

made? where the claims are made
Media coverage What are the media Discourse analysis of newspaper

discourses? articles over a period of time
Where is it covered? Quantitative analysis of when

words are used
Policy analysis What policies are made? Textual analysis of policies
Are the policies An empirical study testing the

effective? effects of the policy
VOX POP
Dr Steven Roberts
Associate Professor of Sociology, Monash University
Like many other researchers, I firmly feel that sociology has a
very important role in exposing, and subsequently challenging,
hidden or disguised power dynamics. I don’t think it possible,
and for me it’s not desirable, for sociologists to be neutral or
‘value free’. We have a responsibility to amplify and elevate the
voices and experiences of marginalized and oppressed groups.
This is something that I see as central in my research with
working-class people, and young people more generally, where
negative stereotypes often prevail in society. Social research
has an ethical responsibility to produce accurate accounts and
faithfully represent the words of our research participants, and
I think it is doubly important to adhere to this when thinking and
writing about social groups with relatively less power.
There are some tensions with this line of thinking,
though, which I experience in my research with men and
masculinities. Men have, justly, been seen as a group that
hold unequal amounts of power and influence, and a group that inflict hugely damaging
symbolic and physical violence on people of all genders. We must hold abuses of power to
account, and we should always approach accounts made by those with power with a degree of
scepticism – especially if these accounts seek to play down or erase any prospects of use or
abuse of power.
Yet, it’s still very important to commit to achieving a balance of generosity and critique
when researching men. Without doing so, we risk caricaturing and stereotyping men in non-
productive and even damaging ways. This is especially problematic when we consider the case
of working-class men or men of colour, because they occupy social categories of power
(being a man) that intersect with marginalized social positions (of class and ethnicity). Yet,
very often they are reduced to being first and foremost anti-feminine, homophobic and
misogynistic – with middle-class, well-educated men often problematically positioned as
inherently ‘less bad’ on these measures.
Before being a university academic, I worked in frontline retail jobs for many years. I started
university in my mid-20s, and read lots of sociological accounts about how men did not enjoy
such work, finding it to be a ‘woman’s job’ and thus ‘degrading’. Men managed this degradation,
sociology told me, by reasserting their masculinity and finding ways to dominate others. I was
surprised by this and found it to be at odds with my own experience. Was I an outlier, or was
the literature outdated?
I loved studying sociology even with this question, worked hard, and gained funding to do a
PhD on working-class men’s experiences in retail work. Among the young men I interviewed,
I found very limited reassertion of masculinity and virtually no rejection of the so-called
‘feminine work’ of being kind and deferential to customers. My job, in writing my PhD thesis
and subsequent academic publications (Roberts 2013, 2018), was to balance these men’s
privileges of gender with their more marginalized class position and to faithfully yet critically
represent their experiences in the sociological literature.
■■ How does Steve’s experiences of work influence his practices as a sociologist?
■■ How might social problems literature be applied to how one understands groups as being
privileged or marginalized?
THE CONSUMPTION OF SOCIOLOGY

Once we step outside academic institutions, there are limited ways in which the
public knowingly encounter and engage with sociology and its ideas. Unlike the
highly successful lay books on psychology and economics, sociology has struggled to
have a strong ‘crossover’ presence in selling books for, and to, the general public.
Malcolm Gladwell stands out as an effective popularizer of sociology, now with a
successful podcast too (see Structured further reading at the end of the chapter).
Sociology is rarely taught at schools. The main way sociology is consumed by non-
sociologists is through the media. So we need to think about the media and the
threats to how good sociology is disseminated beyond sociologists.
Thinking about the media and bias

Free press: One of the founding principles of many Western democracies is the notion of a free
the idea that press. Also referred to as the ‘freedom of the press’, this allows people to circulate ideas
people are in writing without being censored by government. This is part of the concept of
allowed to ‘freedom of speech’, where individuals have the right to speak their minds within broad
circulate
ideas in
limits. A free press is strongly associated with democratic countries, and countries where
writing the press is restricted are generally deemed to be authoritarian to some extent.
without being China is one country where the news media is heavily regulated by the state.
censored by Freedom House, an independent watchdog organization funded by the US
government government that promotes freedom and democracy, highlights how journalists in
China are regularly imprisoned and forced to air televised confessions. The internet
is heavily regulated and censored, and ideas that are seen as a threat to the nation,
including competing economic policies, different religions and information about
sexual minorities, are blocked (see Dunham 2016).
Within Western societies, the freedom of the press is not absolute. There is some
diversity across different countries, but there is general acceptance that the press
should not be able to knowingly spread untruths about people or incite violence. In
the USA, the news media can be explicitly partisan in its reporting, but in the UK,
there are strict rules governing what, and how, television media can report.
The news media has evolved throughout the modern era. Cushion (2010) traces
changes in how news has been generated and reported for mass consumption. It was
originally communicated through oral transmission – people telling each other their
© Getty Images
The news media is the main channel through which lay audiences have engaged with
sociology
news and whatever other information they had heard, upon meeting. This had many
problems, not least the inaccuracies that come from recalling facts from memory,
and limitations regarding how far the news could spread.
With the invention of the newspaper, news entered the written format era. Here,
there was a shift from news being created during conversations to news being
released and consumed periodically – when the newspapers were published.
Newspapers (and other written forms of news) reduced problems of memory but
entrenched new forms of bias. This bias occurs in two forms: the interpretation of
news; and selectivity in what news is reported. Newspapers that are more liberal or
leftwing will tend to espouse different theories of the world than those that are more
rightwing; for example, a socialist critique of capitalism versus a free market one.
The second bias occurs when deciding which issues to report: choosing to look the
other way when a member of one political party is accused of sexual harassment, for
example, but not when it is a member of another party is a form of bias.
With the arrival of radio and then television, broadcast news emerged, but
maintained the same forms of bias as print news – there were liberal news stations
and conservative ones. Still, up until the 1990s, people consumed the news once or
twice a day: reading the newspaper in the morning, or watching or listening to thirty
minutes of nightly news in the evening. If a reported story turned out to be untrue,
a retraction would be made in the press, and there would normally be consequences
for the journalist.
This all changed with the invention of cable television (Cushion 2010; Cushion
and Lewis 2010). In 1980, the first-ever 24-hour news channel launched in the USA:
Central News Network (CNN). The station gained popularity during the US invasion
of Iraq in 1991, and other 24-hour news stations emerged shortly after. Also known
as ‘rolling news’ coverage, this has become a norm for leading broadcasters. Given
the limited funding for news channels, it is not possible to provide high-quality
coverage all the time (Juntunen 2010). On some stations, there are a lot of repeated
broadcasts played on a loop that are only updated as events evolve or new ones take
precedence. But the other trend was for journalistic standards on these channels to
drop and previously unnewsworthy topics to be suddenly deemed newsworthy in
order to fill the non-stop demand for content.
This trend was exacerbated with the shift to online news. Mitchelstein and
Boczkowski (2009) highlight that the internet has increasingly become a key source
for news. It used to be that a respected newspaper, like The New York Times, worked
on a story, paid people to factcheck that story, and ran it through an editorial board
before publishing it. The general public then read the paper in the morning, and
could be relatively sure that the story was fundamentally accurate. Today, however,
The New York Times writes a story in the traditional manner, and a journalist picks up
on bits of that story, which they then try and publish online. Many people then read
this on social networking sites and phone apps. In other words, they get their news
second-hand. They may then read another internet article whose report is based not
on the original news, but on the report of the news – a third-hand account. With
each rewritten version, detail is lost, the initial facts are hidden or neglected and more
opportunity for intentional and unintentional bias occurs.
Another bias relates to financial profit. In many countries, the news media has
become guided by market principles (of profit) rather than democratic ones. If the
news is guided by profit rather than serving democracy, news producers seek the
cheapest version of the news that maximizes profit rather than the version that
maximizes the social good (McManus 1992). This means that decisions are made not
just about the quality of news, but about chasing profit. While most newspapers will
not remove all checks and balances – because getting sued or becoming known for
poor news could affect sales and thus profit – the aim is not the best-quality news
with the money available, but the cheapest (or most ‘economical’) reporting that
satisfies a particular minimum standard.
The influence of money is more perverse and pervasive even than this. This
market-driven model leads news media to report the news that meets the audience
demand – in other words, audience opinions, instead of journalistic integrity or the
public interest, come to dictate what is deemed to be newsworthy (Uscinski 2014).
In Chapter 3, we spoke of climate change as an example of theory; it is also an
example of bad news that we dislike. Perhaps it makes the headlines less than it
should because the audience prefers to be uninformed about the scale and nature of
the looming catastrophe.
The online consumption of news appears only to have exacerbated this problem.
The way in which news spreads on Twitter as soon as events happen puts additional
pressure on traditional forms of news media to report faster.

Think about whether you have contributed to this cycle. Do you consume your news
primarily through Facebook, Twitter or some other free social media platform? How
many times have you clicked on a link because the headline supported what you
already think? Conversely, how many times have you investigated a link because it
contradicted your values, to get an alternative view?
If you follow the link more frequently – or only – when it supports your position,
perhaps you are part of the news problem. What do you think might be the next step
in this cycle, if we accept the premise that certain websites only report the news their
audience wants to hear?
Fake news
Even when a news source is biased, the media has traditionally based its stories on
reporting events that actually happened, or quotes that were actually said, even if it then
manipulates the context, emphasis and presentation to suit its agenda. Following the US
presidential election in 2016, however, there was growing concern about the spread and
effects of fake news. Analysing web-browsing data, the archives of fact-checking Fake news:
websites and an online survey, Allcott and Gentzkow (2017) found that fake news was false stories
widely spread during the election, and that it heavily favoured Donald Trump (see also that are
Faris et al. 2017). Over half of those who recalled seeing fake news stories indicated on intentionally
the survey that they believed them. Allcott and Gentzkow highlighted that fake news is spread to
of increasing importance because it is much easier to enter the media industry in the age misinform
of the internet, and then disseminate false stories through social media.
Thus, a key difference between the 2016 presidential election and previous ones
is that internet technologies transformed the circulation of news. Rather than
traditional news outlets having control over what information is given – and, in
general, conforming to rules related to accuracy and truth about when and when not
to publish a story – internet articles were written by activists and political operatives
to fabricate events and (fake) news reports that supported a political narrative
designed to undermine a political opponent (Allcott and Gentzkow 2017). Given the
outcome of that election, it seems that fake news had some success.
Collectively, the sheer volume of news we are exposed to from traditional, new and
fake sources may encourage us to pay attention to less of the detail; as Allcott and
Gentzkow (2017) suggest, to trust the headlines without researching the news outlet, or
cross-verifying the story with other sources. With so much news populating our feeds,
the opportunity is there for fake news to appear undetected and seem to be true. Indeed,
given our preference for theories that are interesting (see Chapter 3) and that confirm
our biases (see above), the allure of fake news is even more apparent.
The internet has perhaps been the most democratizing invention for the
distribution of thought and knowledge. But it has also facilitated the spread of fake
news. This was a real issue in the 2016 US presidential election. For example, the
‘Pizzagate’ fake news story claimed that the New York City Police Department had
found evidence of the existence of a paedophile ring, operating out of a pizzeria and
linked to prominent members of the Democratic Party. There was no evidence for
the story because it was entirely false. Yet a man went to a pizzeria with a gun to
investigate the conspiracy (Siddiqui and Svrluga 2016).
There have since been calls for social media outlets, like Facebook and Twitter, to
monitor and weed out fake news stories, as well as provide high-profile retractions
and clarifications when news is discovered to be fake.
There have been some recent moves to counter fake news by social media outlets.
Twitter now puts warning messages on tweets that are classified as sharing misleading
information on particular topics, such as COVID-19, while Facebook has run media
literacy campaigns about fake news. Even so, to promote entirely fake news, all a
person needs to do is create a rumour, or a fake news story, and post it on their
Facebook account. This is made possible by fake news websites, dedicated to the
promulgation of fake news.
Thus Facebook, Twitter and other social media platforms have rapidly moved
from a place where people used to post pictures, maintain existing friendships and
make new friends to platforms for identity politics, politicking and debate. It has
given power to everyone’s political voice, including those who wish to be dishonest.
This is a new way of creating and consuming news.
The changing nature of news and what it means for sociology

Alongside the opportunity to intentionally spread fake news, the internet does, of
course, offer a range of possibilities for spreading real news and knowledge, including
knowledge of sociologists and other academics. Supporting the notion that
sociological research is interesting to a wider audience, the discipline of sociology
has become an area where journalists can find news stories relatively easily. Both in
traditional news sources and places like YouTube, on podcasts and e-zines, there has
been an explosion in the coverage of sociology. Journalists scan journal issues and
academic listservs where sociologists (and academics more broadly) discuss and
disseminate their research.
This can be a fantastic opportunity, and having one’s research discussed is an
important part of sociology and, by reaching the general public, a potentially
important component of Giddens’ double hermeneutic. There is, however, an
important caveat: once research is debated beyond the scope of the published
study, the sociologist loses control of the way in which it is discussed and the
arguments about what claims are made. Whereas traditional forms of media had
fact-checkers and rigorous systems of editing both within the institution and
through legal regulations, new media has fewer, if any, checks in this regard, and is
also more likely to post more salacious headlines to increase traffic to its websites,
especially given the vast and ever-growing number of online news sources vying
for our attention.
These issues connect with how new media is funded. Whereas old-style
newspapers, in general, had standards and quality safeguards in place so that people
would trust them and become repeat customers, new media (in most cases) does not
have a purchase cost and is instead paid for by advertisers. To be successful under
this business model, it is therefore more important to increase the number of visits
to a website (‘clicks’) rather than provide good-quality news. This is conceptualized
© Zyabich/iStock
Clickbait websites and headlines seek internet traffic over the truth.
by the popular, derogatory term ‘clickbait’ – where headlines and articles are designed
to motivate someone to visit the page rather than educate or inform the reader. As
such, these new media websites have a fundamentally different aim to sociology: one
is a business model, driven to make a profit above all else, while the other privileges
knowledge and understanding.
In addition to this, the news-gathering resources of many journalists have
declined. With increased freelancing and fewer secure jobs at large newspapers,
alongside much greater time pressures on journalists to file copy, many journalists
have less time to properly research their articles. So they turn to other resources, such
as reports and press releases by charities and other advocacy groups. These reports
and statements are designed to appeal to journalists and written in a way to match
their needs for information to report as news (Clapton and Cree 2017; McCormack
2020), something Fenton (2009) called ‘news cloning’. It is easier for journalists to
report the advocacy research of charities rather than the more rigorous research by
academics, which is often behind a paywall and harder to understand.
GOOD SOCIOLOGY
Assessing Sociology in the Media
The majority of people who are not academics come to their sociological knowledge through
media accounts of published (or yet to be published) sociological research. Most people will
believe the results – or even just take in the headline – of that media account, regardless of
how well the sociology is reported. We hope that you will, instead, be a discerning consumer
of sociological. Below is a process for judging whether sociology news reports are high
quality or not:
1 On first learning of an academic study of interest, identify its author. It should be in the
media article. If not, you are likely not reading the original media report – search for the
study, either using a search engine or following the links in the article, so that you have
the name of the author and the study. Be more sceptical of reports that do not directly
link to the study.
2 Open Google Scholar, or another academic search engine, and type in the name of the
study. This will help you locate the study. You can now click on the abstract, where it is
likely that you will already find discrepancies with what you read in the news. You will be
far better informed from just reading the abstract, which is always free, than from news
accounts of that research.
3 If you want to know more about the study, you must access the article. If the article is
‘open access’, you can simply click on it and read it, but you should also be wary about
the quality of its scholarship (as we will discuss in the next few pages).
4 If the article is ‘closed access’, you have several choices. The first is that you pay the publisher
to read the article. Clearly, this is what the publisher is hoping for. The second is to access the
article through a university library. If you are not a university student, or your library does not
subscribe to that journal, you can often locate earlier versions of the published work by searching
the internet. Sometimes there will be a university repository, or an academic’s own webpage,
where you can access an earlier version of the article. The final route is to email the author
directly: this might take a while, but our experience is that academics are normally willing to
share their research. The trick here is to keep the email short, something like: ‘Hello [Name], I
saw you’ve published some work on X and Y. My institution doesn’t have access to it, so I’m
hoping that you might be able to send me a copy?’ Most of the time this works.
5 You might also find that the report is based on the work of a charity or other advocacy
group. In this case, there are likely to be potential issues with it. You should scrutinize
the methods used and be wary of headline statistics. Make sure you check sample sizes
and ensure that grand claims are not being extrapolated from small or non-random
samples. If the reports are not publicly available, you should be much more sceptical of
the quality of the findings, to the extent of discounting them. Finally, look for any
conflicts of interest with the charities involved and consider whether this might have
influenced the findings.
In summary, whether you are reading for your own enjoyment, composing an essay,
completing a dissertation or even writing your own research, it is great to use media reports
of sociology to inspire your thinking, but make sure you always go to the original source as
well.
But what about fake sociology?

As we have discussed, the fundamentally different aims of sociology and the media
mean that reading sociology from news sources is a risky endeavour. The best way to
understand a sociological argument is to read the original study in the academic
journal. The next problem, however, is that you now have to be able to tell real
journals from fake ones.
Traditionally, established, serious academic journals are run by a publishing house,
a university or a learned society. These journals, because they have institutional
credibility and a good reputation, are funded by university libraries across the world
paying to have access to them: normally, this is through a print subscription (physical
copies are sent to each university library) and nowadays this will usually include
online access as well as (or instead of) hard copy. These journals ensure that all the
submitted research goes through peer review – where other academics read the
research and judge whether it meets certain intellectual and academic standards –
and only if approved is it then fit to be published. There is another final quality check
– an editor (also a renowned academic), who makes the final decision about whether
to publish. The most prestigious journals will reject many good articles because they
choose to publish what they see as the best research. The author does not have to
pay anything – their job is to make sure the article is good enough.
This process made it easy for people to know that the research had reached a
certain level of acceptability, that is, that it genuinely contributed to knowledge in
some form. It relied on the trust in institutions. And journalists, academics and the
public at large would then know that if an article had been accepted for publication
in, say, Sociology, the flagship journal of the British Sociological Association, or the
American Journal of Sociology, it was guaranteed to be a serious piece of research.
There is, however, a new model of open access that complicates this approach.
The ideal of open-access research is that it removes the paywalls around research –
meaning that anyone can read it. And in a context where much academic research is
publicly funded, there is a logic to the often-heard argument that the public should
be able to read for free the research that their tax has helped fund. These journals are
often online-only, which makes the loss of paywall income sustainable, as the cost of
producing each issue is therefore much reduced. The majority of these journals
expect the author to pay for their article to be published.
For genuine open-access journals, this can work well. People with research grants
to fund their studies can use some of that money to pay the costs of publishing in a
reputable open-access journal, which can run into thousands of pounds/dollars for
the more prestigious titles. The general public can then read all this research. This is
good, because as sociologists, we want people to know about sociology. In genuine
open-access journals, the vital principles of peer review and intellectual rigour are
maintained, and the cost model is completely separated from the academic decision
about whether to publish.
But there are also problems with this new way of delivering sociological research.
The key problem is that fake – or rather, predatory – open-access journals have
appeared. Here, the predatory journal publishes any research, regardless of quality
and solely based on whether the author can pay. There is either no peer review, or the
peer review is laughably basic and positive. With many of these publications, they
name an editor who either does not exist, or is a real academic but has not consented
to be affiliated with the journal.
To highlight this problem, scholars recently created a fictitious academic and
applied, on her behalf, to 360 journals for an editor position (Sorokowski et al. 2017).
This fictional person’s qualifications were dismal for the role of an editor; in fact, on
her made-up CV, it was clear that she had never even published a journal article and
had no editorial experience. Yet, fully one-third of the online journals thought to be
predatory accepted her as an editor without any relevant background or any invitation
to interview. By comparison, she received no offers from the control group of
journals that met certain standards of quality. Worryingly, even among journals
sampled from the Directory of Open Access Journals, an organization dedicated to
promoting quality open-access publications while maintaining ethical standards, 8 of
120 accepted the fictional character.
Given the lack of trustworthiness of thousands of predatory open-access
journals alongside the existence of respected open-access journals, it is important to
be able to distinguish between them, particularly for journalists and members of the
public who are not familiar with these rules of sociological publishing. While some
journals seem obviously fake or predatory, not all of them are as transparent as the
fraudulent email telling you that a long-lost relative has died and bequeathed you a
fortune, if you could just supply your bank details to receive the payment. Some
trade on the name of prestigious academics, who are completely unaware of this.
Some use titles similar to existing reputable journals. As a fictitious example, a
predatory journal might try and fool people by sounding like the prestigious British
Journal of Sociology by calling itself the Journal of British Sociology.
In general, though, there are a number of clues that indicate if an article has been
published in a non-legitimate journal:
■■ There is no editorial board, or the board is very small, and/or consists merely of
names without any university affiliations.
■■ The website itself does not look as professional as those of established publish-
ing houses like Sage, Taylor & Francis and Springer Nature.
■■ Other articles in the journal look to be of very poor quality.
■■ It is not listed in the Directory of Open Access Journals.
■■ It is also worth paying attention to national differences. Countries in the Global
South, for example, often have serious journals that may not have all of the above
features.
Being a good sociology student

All of us are students of sociology. That is, we are continually learning how to do
sociology, how to understand society and how to contribute to knowledge of the
social world. To be a good student of sociology is to approach social issues with an
open mind – not to be closed off to using different methods or theories besides the
ones you prefer. As we discussed in Chapter 3, human beings have agency and this
means that societies can and do change. Whether it be major changes such as the
creation of new technologies, or resistance to laws or norms through social
movements, the sociologist’s work is never done, as the building blocks of society –
people – will continue to interact and thus change society in unexpected ways.
While we are all students of sociology, there is also advice that we can give you,
as actual sociology students, about how best to study the subject. The fundamental
issue is how you approach sociology, which should be with an open mind and ready to
have your existing opinions challenged. This does not mean you pliantly accept what
you are told or read – decolonizing sociology movements are one example where
students have instigated important change within sociology. Rather, you should
defend your views and argue your case, but still be open to the notion that you could
be partially or wholly wrong.
This approach involves giving up the notion that being wrong is bad. Being wrong
is fantastic and important – it is how we learn. Realistically, if you have decided you
are never wrong, you are shut off from the world and will never challenge yourself.
The economist John Maynard Keynes is reported to have said: ‘When the facts
change, I change my mind.’ This is a helpful statement, but it misses a related set of
issues. It is not just the facts that matter, but how you approach these facts, how you
use them, and whether you are treating the facts honestly and dispassionately.
Accepting being wrong can be an odd, uncomfortable feeling, and is a hard skill
to develop. This is another reason for our Provocations: as we discussed in the
Preface, cognitive dissonance is an important pedagogical tool. When your emotions
are telling you one thing but your intellect is telling you another, this is a prime
opportunity to learn.
GOOD SOCIOLOGY
Sociology and a Pedagogy of Uncertainty
Using cognitive dissonance in sociology, and studying difficult topics more generally,
requires an element of risk: people may be upset or hurt by a topic or the way that topic is
discussed. We do not advocate purposefully being shocking without carefully thinking about
the consequences and how to manage them. But sitting back and disengaging, distancing
yourself from the topic at hand, is the quickest, surest way to minimize the chance of
learning.
Educationalist Lee Shulman (2005 p. 22) emphasizes that engagement and uncertainty
are vital components of learning, and that they can induce feelings of anxiety:
That anxiety derives from the risk involved in putting forward ideas and defending
them, from knowing that one must be prepared for class, from the fear of making a
fool of oneself. The anxiety is either adaptive or paralyzing. … One must have
something at stake. No emotional investment, no intellectual or formational yield.
Thus, learning in sociology requires active participation, accepting that you might be wrong,
and revelling in that possibility.
We are not psychologists and do not have a clear set of guidelines about learning to value
being wrong. We know it is not necessarily easy to do, and will depend on how you have been
socialized and the values you have been taught. This learning process can include reminding
yourself that being wrong can be good; it can be reflecting on prior mistakes and thinking
about how to improve on them – and then developing a strategy to do so.
We recommend reading Shulman’s (2005) text on the pedagogies of uncertainty, trying
to embrace the cognitive dissonance of learning (see Preface) and reading further around
the subject – Kathryn Schulz (2010) has written an entertaining book on this.
To be able to have the discussions and challenge yourself, you also need to read.
Read widely, engage with the set texts you have been given and think about their
arguments. Engage with sociological writing in the media (with the caveats mentioned
earlier), listen to podcasts, talk about these readings and debate them with your
friends. Be reflexive with your reading. The structure of a university degree will
almost certainly mean that you are supposed to read things you find boring or
difficult. Persevere with those readings, as there will normally be a good reason why
they have been set, but do try and recognize your feelings and structure your reading
accordingly. Readings you are interested in will be easy to get through, whether you
are at a desk or on the bus, tired or wide awake. Readings you have to complete but
do not like will feel that much longer. Plan your time accordingly. Maybe you can read
the harder texts first thing with a fresh cup of coffee. Or perhaps you can try the
Pomodoro time management technique, where you break up the reading into 25
minute chunks and reward yourself in the break. Leave your phone in a different
room, and perhaps printing off the article to read hard copy will be less distracting
than reading online.
Writing can also be a powerful way of thinking through your ideas. Committing
words to the page is a real test of how well you know something. As such, do not
save writing for exams and essays, but think about keeping a journal or blogging,
whether these thoughts are kept private or eventually published for anyone to read.
Writing is a cyclical process; understanding is needed to write and the process of
writing – of choosing the right words to express what you mean – hones and
improves that understanding.
Social loafing, or why don’t students like groupwork?

A key tension between lecturers and students is the setting of groupwork for assessments.
Lecturers continue to set groupwork, but students often really dislike it. There are clear benefits
to working in groups:
■■ it is a key skill that you will almost certainly have to do in future employment;
■■ peer learning is a valuable way of developing understanding;
■■ it can help foster friendships and collegiality, which have social benefits.
So why do students hate it so much? The answer is also obvious: there is always that one group
member who does not work as hard as the rest. If you have not experienced this, maybe you are
that student. This behaviour has been called ‘social loafing’ (Latane 1981; Latane et al. 1979) and
is akin to the idea of hiding in a crowd. Why put yourself on the line when others can take the
strain?
In general, most groups get along alright – it is only a minority that have a person who does
little or no work. But this is because of the size of the group: assessed groupwork is normally
done in small groups and it is useful for lecturers, because it is not a switch from no groups to
lots of groups, but one big group (the whole class) to smaller groups. This matters because
people work less hard in big groups. This was demonstrated by an old, unpublished psychology
study (cited in Latane et al. 1979), where German workers were asked to pull as hard as possible
on a rope both alone and in groups, and the exertion was measured via a strain gauge. The total
exertion of individual group members combined was always significantly more than the exertion
of those individuals pulling together as a group. Importantly, individual effort decreases as
groups got larger: each member put in less effort when they could rely on others and hide from
responsibility more easily.
This relationship is precisely why groupwork can be effective. Lecturers know that, in any
large lecture, there will be a sizeable minority of students who are loafing, daydreaming,
searching for pictures of cats online, or doing a sudoku at the back of the room. Small group
activities are a way of reducing the amount of loafing by reducing the size of the group. You
might do a bit less work yourself, but some members will be doing more.
You will encounter groupwork in your studies and there are several ways you can make this
work effectively:
■■ Exchange contact details so you can keep in touch outside lectures;
■■ Give each person specific tasks for which they are responsible;
■■ Have clear deadlines for when you will meet and discuss work;
■■ Ask each other if there are any factors that help or hinder your learning and how they can
be addressed.
We also encourage you, a good sociology student, to learn to reference. It is very

easy for academics to forget how confusing and arbitrary referencing seems to those
new to it. Yet as people who read student work, including marking essays, being able
to reference in a clear and consistent way is a vital means of showing academic
rigour and demonstrating that arguments are based on academic research, and not
newspaper articles or television documentaries. Your university library will have
guidance on how to reference: if you do not have access to this, the American
Sociological Association has a useful reference style guide (see ASA n.d.). But beware!
Different institutions have different guidance: always check the required format
before submitting your work.
You might find that your lecturers do not understand why you find referencing
difficult. Psychological research shows that experts are poor at predicting how
novices will perform – the better a person is at something, the easier they think it will
be for someone with no experience to perform it (Hinds 1999). Your lecturers are
experts at referencing correctly and so will tend to think it is easier for you to do than
it is. Good referencing requires practice.
Taking sociology into the world

Sociology is an academic discipline, but it is unusual in how it is inherently applied to
social life. While sociological theories can appear abstract or inaccessible, they are all,
by definition, about the world in which we live. So it is important that you think
about how sociology will influence your life now and in the future. Sociology
influences the world not just through social policy or debates in the media, but
through sociology graduates – people with skilled training and an ethical ethos who
use their sociological imagination and analytical skills in a myriad of careers and
other undertakings. In a world of fake news and ideological debates, a sociological
approach has the potential to transcend some of these problems and develop
connections and mutual understanding across disparate groups. As we discussed in
Chapter 3, the big picture is connected to the micro components of our own lives
– by taking sociology into the world, we may help move a step closer to a more
benevolent future.
CONCLUSION
Understanding sociology means that you have the intellectual tools to critically
interrogate the social world. In a context where fake news is proliferating and policy
can guide what evidence is collected, these skills are vital. But, finally, our main hope
is that you enjoy sociology. The world is such a diverse and fascinating place, and
understanding how the people in it act and interact is a fundamental component of
knowing what it means to be human. We hope this introduction to sociology has
enthused you and infused a sociological imagination that will stay with you throughout
your life.
HOW WOULD…?
Over the course of this book, we have discussed the ideas of many sociologists.
We have provided a history of sociology, placing it in its historical and social
context. We have discussed a range of theoretical positions, examined different
methodological approaches, and applied sociology to different topics. Now it’s
over to you. How would you improve sociology?
■■ Reflecting on the chapters, what components of sociology do you like?
–– Do you have a preferred theoretical position? (see Chapter 3)
–– Do you prefer social or sociological theory?
–– Are you a functionalist, conflict theorist or interactionist?
–– What parts of sociological method do you like (Chapter 4)?
–– Do you prefer a deductive or inductive approach?
–– Do you think qualitative or quantitative methods have more value?
■■ How would you explain the importance of sociology to a friend or relative?
–– Has it changed how you think about the world? Would that help others?
■■ And finally, how would you reference this book?

We encourage you to read this seminal article about sociology and critically reflect on what you
consider sociology to be.
Crow, G. (2005) The Art of Sociological Argument. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
This book examines how sociological arguments are presented and constructed and, in doing so,
describes several key sociologists’ arguments and theories. By reflecting on the style of important
sociologists’ writing, Crow highlights the diverse possibilities for sociology. Strongly empirical and
foundational sociologists are present, as well as more abstract writers like Michel Foucault and
feminist sociologist Ann Oakley. It is an accessible and engaging book that presents sociology in a
different way.
Gladwell, M. (2016/2017) Revisionist History. Podcast available at http://revisionisthistory.com.
It is vital that you read widely to be a good sociologist. But reading is not the only form of media
where good sociology is present. Malcolm Gladwell has a great podcast that discusses moments in
history whose importance has not been fully realized and which shed light on broader social issues.
His three-part podcast on educational inequality is particularly powerful; listening to his podcasts is
a great way to engage in sociology.

Glossary
Ableism: discrimination in favour of able-bodied people
Affordances: properties of an object or environment that allow but do not determine
possible actions or outcomes
Age of Enlightenment: a period where rationality and logic became the way in which societies were
organized
Agrarian society: a society whose economy is based on producing and maintaining crops and
farmland
Anomie: a condition felt by people in societies where there is an absence of norms or
values
Anonymity: the guarantee given to research participants that they will not be identifiable
in any publications about the research
Anti-psychiatry: the critique of institutional labelling and incarceration of the supposedly
‘insane’
Automation: the introduction of automatic equipment – robots, machines and computers
– in a manufacturing or other work environment
Black feminist thought: a body of writing that argues for recognition of issues of class, gender and
sexuality alongside race
Body work: also known as ‘body labour’, it refers to the work individuals exert on their own
bodies as well as paid work that is performed on other people’s bodies
Bourgeoisie: the class in a capitalist society who own the means of production and most of
that society’s wealth
Bureaucracy: a system of organization that implements the rules or laws of the institution
Capitalism: a society whose trade and industry are owned by private citizens or
corporations who seek to maximize profit through competition
Cartesian dualism: the conceptual separation of the body and the mind
Case study methods: in-depth investigation into individual cases rather than comparing variables
from multiple cases
Charmed circle: a concept developed by Rubin to visualize which sexual acts are esteemed
and which are stigmatized
Claims makers: individuals or groups seeking to convince others that a condition is troubling
and that something should be done
Claims-making: asserting that a condition should be perceived as a social problem
Class: a way society is divided based on social and economic status
Coach effect: people exaggerate a claim because of the presence of the researcher
Code: a word or short phrase that characterizes a larger amount of text in order to
undertake analysis
Coercive control: a pattern of controlling behaviours beyond physical abuse akin to hostage
taking and intimate terrorism
Colonialism: the process by which explorers and settlers take political control of another
country and exploit it economically
Commodification: the process of treating something as a commodity
Communism: a theory of society in which all property is owned by the community
Comparative methods: research focused on at least two locations to identify similarities and
differences between them. Comparison can be made between large
crosssectional data sets or between in-depth cases
356
Glossary 357
Concepts: abstract ways of defining particular issues

Confidentiality: the requirement that information about a participant that cannot be shared
without their express consent
Confirmation bias: where a person focuses on the evidence that supports their argument and
discounts other evidence
Conflict theories: theories that are critical of society and seek to contest oppressive social
norms
Conspicuous consumption: the visible spending of money on goods that do not have a functional use
Consumer self: the notion that people’s identities are constructed and consolidated through
purchasing goods
Covert research: research where participants are not told they are part of a study
Criminalist: an early term to describe what are now called ‘criminologists’
Criminalization: the act of making a form of deviance into a crime
Criminogenic: any social or technical arrangement that increases the incidence of crime
Critical race theory (CRT): a set of critical theories that analyse society primarily through a race lens
Critical theory: an influential set of theories that critique the social world from a philosophical
perspective
Cross-sectional research: research design that collects data at one point in time, and so is best suited to
correlations, but from which causes can sometimes be tentatively suggested
Crowds: groups of people congregated together, normally in response to a particular
event
Cultural capital: non-financial assets that can promote social mobility
Cultural lag: the gap between technological and organizational change and how this is
manifest in cultural practices
Culture: people’s common goals and their ways of thinking and acting
Culture industry: the notion that culture is the commodification of activities that reproduces
power inequality by rendering the masses passive
Data: ‘information’ that can be analysed
Deceptive research: research where participants are told the study is about something other than
its real aims
Decriminalization: limiting the legal prohibition on a form of deviant behaviour
Deductive theory: a theory that is developed from a set of hypotheses that are then tested
Deviance: anything that is socially classed as outside the realm of normality
Deviance amplification: the process by which attempts to control deviance increases it
Discourse: an institutionalized or societally condoned way of speaking that controls the
ways in which a topic can be discussed
Disembedded: how social practices that were once grounded in the local context are no
longer restricted by place and time
Double consciousness: the notion of having two conflicting identities, in this case because of racism
in society
Double deviance: women who commit crime break the law but also break gender norms
regarding approved female behaviour
Double hermeneutic: the idea that people’s knowledge of sociology alters how they understand the
world, thus changing the world
Embodiment: the process by which meaning and values are placed onto people’s bodies
Emotional labour: work that involves emotions rather than just doing activities
Empiricism: the idea that knowledge is derived from our senses
Employability: how attractive individuals are to employers and, by extension, how easy it will
be to get a job
Ethics: moral principles and a code of conduct that govern researchers’ behaviours
358 Glossary
Ethnicity: a socially created system of classifying people on the basis of cultural or

nationality differences
Eurocentrism: a worldview centred on Western civilizations that views them as exceptional
Evidence: the data required to answer a particular research question
Evidence-based policy: a paradigm in which policy is based on research, supposedly free from dogma
or ideology
Fake news: false stories that are intentionally spread to misinform
False consciousness: the state of mind where people are unaware of the inequality of their situation
because class and wealth stratification are thought to be the natural order of
social life
Fear paradox: the inverse relationship between fear of crime and likelihood of being a victim
Feminism: the intellectual and political movement that seeks rights for women and
challenges gender inequality
Formal institutions: rules, such as the law, that are enforced by official agencies
Free market: a system where goods and services are exchanged for money, ostensibly with
no governmental control
Free press: the idea that people are allowed to circulate ideas in writing without being
censored by government
Functionalism: the theoretical perspective that all aspects of society serve a function
necessary for the survival of that society
Functional specialization: where trust in experts is granted through institutional frameworks rather than
direct experience
Generalizability: the extent to which findings from a sample can be said to be true of the
population
Globalization: the process by which countries have become increasingly interconnected,
with individual experiences and social phenomena traversing traditional
economic, geographic and social boundaries
Going native: a researcher adopts the views of their participants without realizing, and loses
an objective perspective
Great transformation: the social and political changes that saw Western societies shift to capitalist
modes of production
Habitus: how the social world is incorporated into the self
Heterosexism: the structural and systematic privileging of heterosexuality over other sexual
identities
Historical materialism: the belief that the social world can be explained through material conditions
Human agency: the capacity of individuals to act independently and make their own choices
Hypothesis: a specific statement or prediction that can be tested empirically
Identity: the sense of self or how one gives meaning to self in a group
Identity politics: political movements that are based on forms of identity rather than broad-
based party politics
Indigenous: a place-based human culture that has not migrated from its homeland
Individualization thesis: the notion that the act of making choices about one’s life is where self-worth
is found
Inductive theory: a theory that emerges from analysis of data
Industrialization: the process by which the economy changes from a reliance on agriculture to
manufacturing and the production of goods
Industrial Revolution: the societal transition where technological change saw the economy
transformed from an agricultural one to one based on manufacturing goods
Informal institutions: cultural customs and taboos, where rules are not written and enforced but are
important for ‘fitting in’ to a culture
Glossary 359
Informed consent: participants agree to participate in a study having been informed of its aims
Institutional career: a patterned sequence of stages along which a person is expected and
pressured to conform to when consigned within an institution
Intersectionality: the interconnected nature of social categories, particularly how they relate to
oppression
Interview: a form of data collection where the participant is asked a set of questions by
the researcher
Labelling theory: the idea that interaction with authorities reinforces or even creates identity
Late modern: a term that recognizes contemporary societies are markedly different from
those in the modernity era of the mid-20th century
Legalization: removing a legal prohibition
Leisure class: elites in industrial societies who display their superiority by conspicuous
wastefulness
Longitudinal research: research where change over time is the primary focus of attention, and which
is usually interested in causal relationships between prior states and outcomes
Mechanical solidarity: social cohesion that comes in premodern societies where all individuals are
similar
Meritocracy: a social system in which people succeed and are rewarded based on talent and
ability alone
Methodological whiteness: a way of understanding societies that fails to recognize how race structures
those societies
Methodology: the principles that guide how methods are used in the attempt to generate
valid results. The reason why one method might be more appropriate than
another is the realm of methodology
Methods: the techniques of data collection and analysis
Mixed methods: a research design using more than one form of data collection. How far the
methods are integrated is a source of much discussion. Sometimes called
‘multimethod’
Mode of production: how people’s needs for shelter, food and protection are met in any given
society
Modernity: a term to understand societies that emerged after the Industrial Revolution
and when capitalism was embedded as the mode of production
Modernization: the changes that occur as a society transforms into an urban, industrial
society
Moral panic: disproportionate reactions to particular deviant acts/actors by moral
entrepreneurs seeking to introduce new and/or tougher regulations
Naturalistic observation: the researcher observes people in their ‘natural’ settings rather than in a lab or
interview conditions
Network society: a society where social institutions are structured around digital networks of
information, primarily the internet
New social movements: the growth in and change of social movements since the 1960s, mostly
focused on identity and identity politics
Norms: social expectations that guide behaviour
Nuclear family: a heterosexual couple and their genetically related offspring
Organic solidarity: social cohesion that comes from diverse groups of people relying on others to
perform their societal role
Organizations: physical places that consolidate the norms and values and do the work of a
particular institution
Orientalism: a set of social processes by which the Global North frame Arab peoples
according to a range of damaging stereotypes
360 Glossary
Paradigm: an established theory or way of thinking that acts as a framework in sociology

Participant observation: the researcher participates in the activity along with participants and
simultaneously observes them
Patriarchy: a concept to understand systematic gender inequality in a society run by and
for men and male interests
Plastic sexuality: where sexual desires and acts are shaped by individual erotic needs rather
than reproductive or economic ones
Political economy: the study of how politics and economics intersect
Population: all members of the category under investigation
Populism: a political approach that champions the common person and places them in
opposition to existing elites
Positionality: the researcher has a position in the research process and this may affect the
data collected
Positivism: the scientific search for fixed laws that govern social and natural worlds
Postcolonial sociology: a sociological approach that actively recognizes the influence of Western
colonialism on contemporary societies
Poststructuralism: a set of theories that critique structuralist notions and also contest the core
tenets of Enlightenment beliefs about science and empirical research
Power: a contested term, fundamentally about the ability to produce intended
effects
Preacher effect: people underestimate a claim because of the presence of the researcher
Profane: things that belong to the everyday world
Proletariat: the group of workers in a capitalist society who were exploited by the
bourgeoisie
Public sociology: a style of sociology that seeks to inform and engage with the public
Quantified self: the cultural phenomenon of using technology to track data about oneself
Questionnaire: a written set of questions
Racialization: the attribution of particular values or stereotypes to racial groups
Rationalization: the replacement of traditions, emotions and superstition as motivations for
action by rational, calculated decision-making
Recidivism: when a person released from prison reoffends or at least when they are caught
Reflexive process: the cyclical process whereby individuals think about their actions and thus
influence their behaviours, which in turn influences their thoughts
Reflexivity: thinking critically about one’s positionality and effect on data or society
Relational: the notion that two or more things occur in relation to each other, rather than
independently
Responsibilization: the process whereby individuals are held responsible for issues that previously
would have been attributed to organizations or institutions
Riot: where a group of people exhibit unruly behaviour that damages people or
property
Risk society: a framework to understand contemporary societies that have to deal with
global risks that are focused around technology
Sacred: extraordinary things that inspire awe and reverence
Sample: a subset of a population
Sampling: the process of selecting units within a population
Sampling frame: the list of every person or thing in a population that can be sampled
Service sector: a sector of the economy focused on providing a service rather than goods
Settler colonialism: a form of colonialism where colonial settlers seek to replace the original
population and form a new society
Glossary 361
Single hermeneutic: where knowledge is in one direction. The object of study does not change as
a result
Social beings: the understanding that human beings’ actions and beliefs are dependent on
their social conditions
Social capital: the cultural resources a person has based on their networks and group
membership
Social change: the reshaping of social relations and processes over time
Social Darwinism: the theory that individuals and groups are subject to the same Darwinian laws
of natural selection as plants and animals, that is, survival of the fittest
Social facts: norms and values that do not have objective reality but exist beyond a single
individual and exert influence in society
Socialization: the process by which a person learns the accepted ways of thinking and
behaving in a particular society
Social media: websites and apps that allow users to create and share content or connect
with other people
Social mobility: the change in social status that a person achieves over the course of their life
Social movement: organized collective social action with political aims to challenge a problem or
improve a situation
Social policy: how societies address issues of individual wellbeing, social welfare and social
justice
Social stratification: the structured and uneven division of groups of people in society
Social structures: the ways society is organized that constrain how an individual can act
Social theory: intellectual critiques of society that are connected with sociological theory
but more located within philosophy
Society: a collection of people who share common culture and land or territory
Sociological canon: classical works of sociology that are seen as foundational to the discipline
Sociological imagination: the awareness of the relationship between personal experiences and broader
society
Sociological theory: abstract propositions about society that can be tested and have empirical
support
Status: the social aspects of class, such as lifestyle and leisure activities
Stigma: a social attribute, behaviour or reputation that is discrediting in some way
Strain theory: belief that crime is caused by tension between general socialization and
material conditions that do not allow some to achieve what society expects of
them
Stratification: Weber’s way of understanding social class, consisting of three elements:
economic class, status and power
Structuralism: a set of theories that contend that society runs according to a set of laws and
social structures
Structuration: structure and action are necessarily related to each other and cannot be
disentangled
Subculture: a group of people who share common interests that vary from the dominant
culture
Sui generis: a term Durkheim used to say that society is unique and cannot be reduced to
the sum of its parts
Survey: the systematic collection of the same data from a specified sample
Symbolic capital: one’s prestige in a social group, such as reputation and celebrity
Symbolic interactionism: a theoretical framework for how people communicate with each other to
understand the meaning of actions, focusing on the symbols and signs of
their communication
362 Glossary
Symbolic token: things that can be used for exchange, such as money
Sympathetic knowledge: an approach to learning about other people in order to care or advocate for
them
Technological determinism: the assumption that technology determines the development of a society’s
structure and culture
Terrorism: politically motivated violence or threat of violence, either against non-
combatant civilians or against state agents by parties and methods outside
the ‘laws of war’
Theory: a proposition or a number of propositions that explain why or how something
is happening
Tradition: a belief or ritual passed down within a group, with meaning imbued to the act
Transgression: breaking rules that others believe should regulate action
Urban ecology: explains human action in terms of people’s social environment, neighbourhood
or area
Validity: how far the data collected captures the true nature of the things being
measured. This is how validity is often understood, but the term ‘external
validity’ is used differently and refers to generalizability (see above)
Variable: any construct or thing that varies and can be measured
Verstehen: an approach in sociology that tries to comprehend the meanings and
motivations of human action
Visual methods: methods that enable the study of images and non-textual data
Warm bath theory: the comparison of the nuclear family to a warm bath that men could relax into
after a long day working outside the home
White-collar crime: crimes achieved through insider information or authority, not physical force
White racial frame: a worldview that interprets the social world through White privilege and
rationalizes racial inequality
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Index
Page numbers in bold indicate tables and in italic indicate figures.
A AIDS, 231, 294 class, 208

ableism, 272 Alatas, S.F., 156 evidence-based policy, 338
Aboriginal Australians, Albrow, M., 319 marriage, 282–283
157–158 Alcoff, L.M., 312 prison population, 254
absolute poverty, 204 Allan, Graham, 278 time zones, 146
abstraction of theories, Allan, Kenneth, 64 Australian Class Survey, 208
54–55, 54 Allcott, Hunt, 345 Australian society, settler
academic journals, 348 alternative facts, 57, 344–345 colonialism and, 157–158
Acker, Joan, 218 American Journal of Sociology, average, 105, 106
Addams, Jane 38–39, 43 38, 41
administrative criminologists, American Psychiatric B
240, 241 Association, 126 bad sociology, 55–56, 67–68,
Adorno, Theodor, 64 American Sociological 83, 100, 241–242
advocacy research, 241 Association, 116, 322, Baker, Gilbert, 230
affordances, 240 353 Banks, Sarah, 113
African Americans, 202 Amini, Elham, 93–94, 275 bar charts, 105, 105
Black Lives Matter Anderson, Eric, xvi, 227, stacked, 107, 107
movement, 135 286, 287 Bauman, Zygmunt, 150–151
civil rights movement, 224 Angelou, Maya, 232 Baumrind, Diana, 132
contributions to early anomie, 13 BBC
sociology, 43–46 anonymity, 119 Great British Class Survey,
double consciousness, 44 anthropology, 5–6 207–208
Jim Crow laws, 44, 202, 210 anti-globalization Beauvoir, Simone de, 224
prisons, 210 movements, 321 Beck, Ulrich, 158–160, 323
racialization of, 213 anti-psychiatry movement, Becker, Howard, 62, 246,
On the Run case study, 247–249 332
133–136 archival data, 94–96. see also Benson, Susan, 276
slavery, 209–210 literature reviews Bentham, Jeremy, 4, 249
Age of Enlightenment, 25, Arendt, Hannah, 151 Ben-Yahuda, Nachman, 252
32, 66, 222 Asch, Solomon, 274 Berezin, M., 317
agency, human, 13, 69, association, 108–109, 108 Berners-Lee, Tim, 163
82–83 astronomy, 25 Best, Joel, 295
agency theory, 131 Atlanta School of sociology, Bhopal, Kalwant, 211–212,
agrarian society, 26 43–46, 211 216
Agreement on Trade-Related Atwood, Margaret, 293 bias, 17
Aspects of Intellectual Australia coach effect, 119
Property Rights (TRIPS), Aboriginal peoples, confirmation bias, 19, 57
325, 326 157–158 ethnography, 119
391
392 Index
experiments, 89 British new deviancy children. see also education;

media and, 342–344 approach, 252 family
participant observation, 90 British Sociological socialization, 9, 39, 70,
preacher effect, 119 Association 217, 270
questionnaires, 92 ethical guidelines, 114 China, media, 342
researcher positionality Broken windows theory, Churchill, Winston, 26
and, 119 241–242 Cicourel, Aaron, 246–247
sampling bias, 92, 96 bromances, 279 city
big data, 96 Brooks, Roy, 212 accessibility, 201
biphobia, 230, 232 Brown, Michael, 307 modernity and, 143–144
bisexual, 17, 125, 203, 228, bureaucracy, 137, 149–151 sociology and, 144
230–232, 283, 305 Butler, Judith, 68 civic engagement, 52, 53
bivariate analysis, 107–111, civil rights movement, 224
107, 108, 108, 110 C Cixi, Emperor, 148
Black feminist thought, 213, cable television, 343 claims makers, 339
215 Calvin, John, 37 claims-making, 339
Black Lives Matter capitalism, 26, 324–327 Clapton, G., 339
movement, 135 Marx on, 28–30 class, 29–32, 36, 202–208
Blaut, J.M., 156 Protestant ethic and, 37 capitals and, 206–207
Blumer, Herbert, 38, 306 religion and, 37 changing one’s, 205–207
Boczkowski, Pablo J., 343 unemployment and, 30–32 contemporary thinking,
bodies, 270–277 Weber on, 36–37 207–208
body work, 274 capitals friendships and, 278
Cartesian dualism, 271 cultural, 206–208 Great British Class Survey,
childcare, 272 social, 206–208 207–208
consumer self, 273 symbolic, 206, 207 intersectionality, 214, 225
contraception, 272, 293 Cartesian dualism, 271 precariat, 31–32, 207
embodiment, 271 case study methods, 87, 88 social effects of, 204
legal regulation of, 271 Castells, Manuel, 162 symbolic economy of,
objectification, 273–274 catastrophe, 155–157 206–207
Reflexive Body categorical data, 104, 104 class and crime, 253
Techniques (RBTs), Catholic church, 13, 24–25 climate change, 50–51
271 causality, 83–86 closed questions, 92
tattoos, 276–277 Central News Network cluster sampling, 99
technology and, 275 (CNN), 343 coach effect, 119
women and, 272–275 charities, 310–311 Cobb, Jonathan, 204
Bogle, Kathleen A., 295 charmed circle, 293 codes of conduct, 114
Boliver, Vikki, 101 Chavez, Hugo, 318 coding, 101–102
Boomerang effect, 160 cheating, in relationships, coercive control, 255
Booth, Charles, 203 285–290 cognitive dissonance, xx, 351
Bourdieu, Pierre, 75, 205– chi square test, 109 cohabitation, 281–283
207 Chicago School of Cohen, Stanley, 6, 251, 294
bourgeoisie, 28–29 sociology, 38–39, 41, collective effervescence, 306
Box, Steven, 253 244–245 Collins, Patricia Hill, 62, 213,
Brexit referendum, 318 childcare, 272, 274 214
Index 393
colonialism, 141 panic buying, 252 D

commodification, 65 political and Darwin, Charles, 272
communism, 29 socioeconomic Darwinian perspective, 314
comparative methods, 87 effects, 299 data, 3
Comte, Auguste, 3, 32–33 social media, 189, 190, collection, 97–101, 99
concentration camps, 115 345 saturation, 100
concepts, 51 social policy, 336 data analysis, 101–111
concussion, 308 transmission, 159 association, 108–109, 108
confidentiality, 120 and value of work, 192 bivariate analysis, 107–111,
confirmation bias, 19, 57 craniometry, 67 107, 108, 108, 110
conflict theories, 61, 62 Cree, Viv, 339 coding, 101–102
Connell, Raewyn, 47, 226– Crenshaw, Kimberlé, 214 content analysis, 101, 102
227 Cresswell, John, 97 discourse analysis, 102–
consent, informed, 117 crime 103
conspiracy theories, 58 class and, 253 levels of measurement,
consumer self, 273 gender and, 254–257 104–108, 104, 105–
contact theory, 71 statistics, 261 108, 108
contemporary global climate youth culture and, 261 qualitative, 101–103
change (GCC), 322 criminal statistics, 258 quantitative, 103–111
contemporary social criminalists, 243 regression, 110–111, 110
movements, 303, 308 criminalization, 236–237, significance, 109
contemporary sociology, 257–262, 265 univariate analysis, 104–
297 criminalizing consumption, 107, 105, 106
content analysis, 101, 102 263–264 variance, 106
‘continuum of sexual criminogenic, 238 databases, 80
violence’, 256 criminology, 239 David, Matthew, xviii, 163,
contraception, 272, 293 crisis, 298–300 334
convenience sampling, 99 men and crisis, 301–302 Davis, Murray, 57–58
Coomber, Ross, 262 critical inquiry, 16–17, 24–25 Davison, Emily, 222–223
Copernicus, Nicolaus, 25 critical race theory (CRT), de Beauvoir, Simone, 40
coronavirus, 300–301 212–215 deceptive research, 116–117,
correlation, 83–86 critical theory, 63–65 133
statistical, 108, 108 Crossley, Nick, 271 decriminalization, 236–237
covert norms, 9 cross-sectional research, 87 deductive coding, 102
covert research, 91, 117 cross-tabulation, 108, 108 deductive research questions,
COVID-19 pandemic, xix, Crouch, Colin, 325 81
xx, 8, 11, 73, 96, 235, crowds, 306 deductive theory, 60
259, 320 Cuban missile crisis, 298 Deegan, Mary Jo, 45
crisis of response to, 300, cultural anthropology, 5 defamation, 120
301 cultural capital, 206–208 Delamont, Sara, 40
the environment, 323–324 cultural lag, 298 Deleuze, Gilles, 249
impact on education, 181 culture, 8–13 Delgado, Richard, 211, 213
impact on work, 191 culture industry, 64, 65 Delphi group, 93
norms of online learning, culture wars, 313 DeMello, Margo, 276
10 Cushion, Stephen, 342 democracy, 27, 32
394 Index
Democratic Party, US, 345 Dunning, Eric, 306 ethnography, 119

demographics of crime, 252 Durkheim, Emile, 3, 13, 17, framework for ethical
class and crime, 253 33–35, 61, 62, 82, consideration, 122–123
gender and crime, 254–257 243–244, 251, 268, 269, going native, 119, 332
youth culture and crime, 271, 306 guidelines and codes of
261 Dyer, Richard, 213 conduct, 114
Descartes, René, 270 Indigenous, 118
descriptive statistics, 109 E informed consent, 117
deviance, 38, 235 Economic and Social Milgram experiment case
deviance amplification, 246 Research Council, 120 study, 130–133
Diagnostic and Statistical economics, 6 misuse of evidence, 337
Manual of Mental education, 336–337 naturalistic observation,
Disorders (DSM), 67–68 assessment, 336 89–91
digital research, 96 policy, 336–337 online research, 96
digital technologies, 163, 238 school rankings, 336 On the Run case study,
disciplinary institutions, 249 university rankings, 337 133–136
discourse analysis, 102–103 Egerton, Muriel, 111 physical harm, 117
discourses, 67–68, 74 Ehenreich, Barbara, 161 positionality of researcher,
Disembedding of social Einstein, Albert, 69 118
systems, 146–147 Eisenhower, Dwight, 311 preacher effect, 119
‘The dismal science’, 324 Ekirch, Roger, 145 prison experiment case
distraction, 300 electric shock experiment study, 126–130
diversity, history of case study, 130–133 protecting participants,
sociology and, 7–48 Ellis, Carolyn, 120 90–91, 113, 116–117,
division of labour, gendered, embodiment, 271 119
272, 273 emotional harm, 117 publishing research, 121,
divorce, 100, 116, 281, 284, empiricism, 25, 33, 35 332–334
287, 293 enclosure, 27, 156 research design, 116–117
‘docile bodies’, 248 Engels, Frederich, 29, 256 research questions, 115
domestic violence, 255 Enlightenment, Age of, 25, risk, 117
Dorling, Danny, 208 32, 66, 222 taking sides, 332–334
double consciousness, 44 environment, importance of, Tearoom Trade case study,
double deviance, 254 321–324 125–126
double hermeneutic, 332, 346 environmental crises, 299 writing up research,
double-barrelled surnames, ethics, 3–4, 18, 113–139 119–121
281–282 anonymity, 120 ethics review panels, 123–
drag, 315–316 coach effect, 119 124, 133, 137–138
Drake, Deborah, 53 confidentiality, 120 ethnic minorities. see also
drugs, 262–266 covert research, 91, 116 African Americans
laws, 237 deceptive research, education and inequality,
policy, 263 116–117, 133 101
The Drugtakers (Young), 246 defined, 113–114 racialization of, 213
Du Bois, William E.B., 3, emotional harm, 117 ethnicity, 209, 257–258. see
43–46, 62, 202, 211 ethical review process, also race and racial
Du Gay, Paul, 151–152 123–124, 133, 137–138 inequality
Index 395
ethnography, 84, 90 pornography, 84 marriage, 273, 281–283

ethics, 119 Fenton, J., 314 men and masculinities,
going native, 119 first-wave feminism, 222– 226–228
insider, 119 223 motherhood penalty, 274
online, 96 Floyd, George, 307, 308 patriarchy, 217, 291
Ettorre, Betsy, 42–43, 262 focus groups, 93 segregation in sport,
Eurocentrism, 148 Ford, Henry, 153, 310 219–222
European modernity, 148 Fordism, 6, 305 sex and, 291–293
evidence, 79–80 Foucault, Michel, 3, 64, 66, sex categories, 218
policy-based, 338 74, 165, 225, 248, 249 sex role theory, 218
evidence-based policy, Frankfurt School, 63–65 sexuality and, 228–232
337–338 free market, 325 suicide, 13
experiments, 84, 88–89 free press, 342 women’s suffrage, 274
expressive crowds, 306 French Revolution, 32 work, 219–222, 272,
Eysenck, Hans, 240 Freud, Sigmund, 57 274–275
Friedan, Betty, 224 General Agreement on
F friendships, 278–280 Tariffs and Trade, 325
Facebook, 280, 345 functional specialization, 147 generalizability, 84
‘faceless bureaucrats’, 149 functionalism, 61, 62, 217, generalization of theories,
fake news, 57, 344–345 270 55
fake sociology, 348–350 Furedi, Frank, 160–162, 314 Gentzkow, Matthew, 344–
falsifiability, 51–52 345
family, 270, 277, 278 G Ghaziani, Amin, 313
functionalist perspective, Galilei, Galileo, 25 Giddens, Anthony, 70,
217, 270 Gates, Gary, 116 144–147, 282, 332
in vitro fertilization (IVF), gay, 3, 11, 17, 18, 70, 116, Gilman, Charlotte Perkins,
275 125, 126, 203, 214, 41, 45, 143
nuclear family model, 270 226–232, 255, 269, 291, Gilroy, Paul, 215
patriarchy and, 217 303, 305, 312, 314 Ginsburg, Ruth Bader, 301
same-sex parenting, 100, gender Gladwell, Malcolm 53, 57
116 and crime, 254–257 global justice movement, 305
single parents, 100 and crisis, 301–302 global network capitalism,
socialization of children, gender and gender inequality, 325, 326
9, 70, 217, 270 202, 216–228 global networks, 238
Farage, Nigel, 317 black feminist thought, Global South, 47
Feagin, Joe, 215 213, 215 orientalism, 216
fear paradox, 256 bodies, 272–275 global warming, 50–51
feminism, 222–226 contraception, 272, 293 globalization, 319–327
first-wave, 222–223 feminism, 222–226 Goffman, Alice, 133–137
second-wave, 224–225 friendships, 278–279 Goffman, Erving, 11, 62,
third-wave, 225–226 gendered division of 248, 249, 271
feminist sociology, 40 labour, 272, 273 going native, 119, 332
black feminist thought, in history of sociology, Goode, Eric, 252
213, 215 39–42, 45 Google Scholar, 80
bodies, 273–275 intersectionality, 214, 225 grand theory, 54
396 Index
Granovetter, Mark, 58–59 histograms, 105, 106 House of Lords, UK, 273
graphical representations historical materialism, 28 human agency, 13, 69–70,
bar charts, 105, 105 historical sociology, 37 82–83, 297
histograms, 105, 106 history of sociology, 23–48 Humphreys, Laud, 125–126
pie charts, 104, 105 Atlanta School, 43–46, Huxley, Thomas Henry, 314
scatterplots, 107, 108, 110 211 hypotheses, 51, 81
stacked bar charts, 107, centrality of critical hypothetico-deductive
107 thought, 24–25 theory, 60
Great British Class Survey, Chicago School, 38–39,
207–208 41 I
great depression, 243 critique of construction identity, 38
great transformation, 141 of, 39–47 bodies and, 271–273
Green, Nicola, 80 exclusionary practice in, consumer self, 273
Greene, Jennifer, 97 44–47 double consciousness, 44
greenhouse gases, 321 foundational thinkers, politics, 312–313
Greer, Germaine, 224 27–37 sexual, 228
grounded theory, 81 gender and, 39–42, 45 taste and, 75
Guillon, Eric, 276 influences on immigration, 38
contemporary implicit norms, 10
H sociology, 47–49 In Praise of Bureaucracy (Du
Habermas, Jurgen, 235 race and, 43–46 Gay), 151
habitus, 75, 221 social context, 23–27, 47 in vitro fertilization (IVF), 275
Haggerty, Kevin, 137 Hitchens, Christopher, 17 incest taboo, 15
Hall, Stuart, 3, 251 HIV/AIDS, 231, 294 Indigenous ethics, 118
Hardt, M., 321 Holsinger, Bruce, 42 Indigenous peoples, 47
Harrington, M., 159 Holton, Robert, 300 Aboriginal Australians,
Harrison, Jane, 40 homophily, 278 157–158
Harvey, Joel, 53 homophobia, 11, 17, 231 Maori, 276
Hassid, J., 146 changing attitudes, 232 individualism, 37
Hawthorne effect, 89 HIV/AIDS and, 231, 294 individualization thesis, 282
health and illness, 7–8, 19 intersectionality and, 214 inductive coding, 102
healthcare services, 274, 275 masculinity and, 226, 227 inductive research questions,
Healy, Kieran, 55–56 public displays of 81
hegemony, 12 affection and, 269 inductive theory, 60
heliocentrism, 25 homosexuality indulgences, 24, 37
Herek, Gregory M., 232 discourses on, 67–68 Industrial Revolution, 26, 163
Hey, Valerie, 279 HIV/AIDS and, 231, 294 and modernity, 140–144
Higher Education intersectionality and, 214 industrialization, 26
norms and university stigma and, 11, 231, 294 inequality, 200–203
culture, 9–11 structuration and, 70 habitus, 75, 221
student evaluation Tearoom Trade case study, intersectionality, 214, 225
surveys, 337 125–126 power and, 73–75
university rankings, 337 honour-based violence, 256 relative poverty, 204
Hiriscau, Ioana E., 120 hooks, bell, 213 social stratification, 36, 41,
Hirschi, Travis, 241 Horkheimer, Max 62, 64 200–201
Index 397
inferential statistics, 109 L macro theories, 58–60

informed consent, 117 labelling theory, 245–252 Madness and Civilization
Inglis, David, 64 Ladd, Everett C., 52 (Foucault), 248
‘insider crimes’, 258 late modern societies, malestream, 40
insider ethnography, 119 158–164 Maori culture, 276
institutional career, 248 law and morality, 256 Marcuse, Herbert, 54
institutions Lawler, Steph, 75 marriage, 273, 281–283
agency and, 70–71, 82–83 lawsuits, 309 same-sex, 116, 283
functionalism, 61 Lefebvre, Henri, 144 Marston, Greg, 338
internet, 238 Leftwing populism, 318 Martineau, Harriet, 3, 40
China, 342 legal frameworks, 324 Marx, Karl, 27–33, 36, 65,
fake news, 344–345 legalization, 236–237 149, 202–204, 254, 325
network society, 96 Lemert, C., 312 Marxism, 29
online news, 343, 344, Lerner, Gerda, 217 conflict theories, 61, 62
346–347 lesbian, 17, 18, 42–43, 116, masculinities, 226–228
online research, 96 176, 203, 214, 228, masturbation, 285, 286,
social media, 52, 280, 345 230–232, 305 294–295
intersectionality, 214, 225 LGBT. see sexual minorities Matthew effect, 220, 244
interval variables, 104, 104, life expectancy, 7–8 Mead, George Herbert, 38,
105, 106, 107, 108, 108, lifecycle of social movement, 39
108 304 mean, 105–107
interviews, 84, 91–92 Lincoln, Abraham, 210 Measham, Fiona, 264–265
Iran linear regression, 110, 110, measurement, levels of,
Islamic Revolution, 236 111 104–108, 104, 105–108,
menopausal women, Lingard, Bob, 336–337 108
93–94, 275 literature reviews, 80–81 measures of central
IVF. see in vitro fertilization living apart together (LAT) tendency, 106
relationships, 283–285 media, 342–350
J logistic regression, 110 assessing sociology in,
Jamie, Kim, xvii, 123–124 Lombroso, Cesare, 243 347–348
jargon, 67 longitudinal research, 87 bias and, 342–344
Jim Crow laws, US, 44, 202, Lorber, Judith, 219 fake news, 57, 344–345
210 Lubet, Steven, 135 fake sociology, 348–350
jurisprudence, 239 Lupton, Deborah, 275 freedom of the press,
Luther, Martin, 24–25, 37 342–343
K Lyotard, Jean Francois, 165 online news, 343, 344,
Kamara, Sierra, 20–21 346–347
Keats, John, 152 M open-access journals,
Keynes, John Maynard, 350 Mac an Ghaill, Máirtín, xv, 348–350
keyword searching, 80–81 226 social media, 52, 280, 345
Kimmel, Michael, 143, 217, McCormack, Mark, xv, sociological research in,
226 84–86, 227, 339 346–350
King, Martin Luther, Jr., 210 McDonaldization, 153–154 median, 105, 106
Kitsuse, John, 339 McKee, Alan, 85, 86 medical sociology, 8, 19–20
Kitzinger, Jenny, 93 McNair, Brian, 273 medieval jurists, 242
398 Index
men Mohanty, S.P., 312 gender inequality and, 41

bromances, 279 Mokyr, Joel, 142 and habitus, 75
friendships, 278–279 Mondon, Auriel, 318 sampling and, 101
masculinities, 226–228 monogamy, 284–285, 285–290 sex, 291–295
menopause, 93–94, 275 moral codes, 256 socialization, 8, 70, 217
Meredith, Dora, 164 moral panic theory, 251–252 university culture and,
Merton, Robert, 220, 243– moral panics, 294–295 9–11
244, 298 morality, 236 nuance traps, 55, 56
methodological whiteness, Morris, Aldon, 44, 46–47 nuclear family model, 270
319 Mudde, Cas, 316–318 Nuffield 1980 class study,
methodology, 77–78 ‘mugging’, 251–252 101
‘metropolis’, 143 multiple discovery, 298 Nuremberg Code, 115
metrosexuality, 227 multi-variate regression, 111 Nussbaum, Martha, 68, 225,
micro theories, 53–54, 54, Mussolini, Benito, 318 260
58–60
Milgram, Stanley, 130–133 N O
Mill, John Stuart, 314 Napster, 326 Obama, Barrack, 303
Mills, C. Wright, 14–16, national agreements, 323 obedience experiment case
55–56, 83, 269, 332 National Health Service study, 130–133
Mills, Colin, 208 (NHS), 299 objectivity, 17, 19, 35
Mitchelstein, Eugenia, 343 national laws, 238 observation-based research,
mixed methods, 97, 97 National Student Survey, 84, 88–91
mode, 104–106 UK, 337 Occupy movement, 305
modern societies, 242 natural law, 235 Ockham’s razor, 56, 69–70
modern Western societies, naturalistic observation, Ogburn, William, 298
140, 237 89–91 Oliver, Caroline, 155
modernity Nazis, 115, 130 On the Run case study,
bureaucracy, 149–151 negative effects paradigm, 133–136
as catastrophe, 155–157 84–86 One Direction, 227
disembedding of social Negri, A., 321 O’Neill, Maggie, 65
systems, 146–147 network society, 96, 162 online ethnography, 96
Industrial Revolution, 26 new deviancy theory, 251– online news, 343, 344,
Industrial Revolution and, 252 346–347
140–144 new social movements, 303, online research, 96
late modern societies, 304 open-access journals, 348–
158–164 new technologies, 162–164 350
to modernities, 148 New York Times, The, 343 open-ended questions, 92
rehabilitating bureaucracy, Newton, Isaac, 298 opinion polls, 98
151–152 Nixon, Richard, 263 Orbán, Viktor, 318
social relations by nominal variables, 104, 104, ordinal variables, 104, 104,
individuals, 147 105, 107, 108, 108 105, 105, 107, 108, 108
standardization of time, non-random sampling, 98, Organization for Economic
145–146 99 Co-operation and
modernization, 141 norms, 8–16, 269 Development (OECD),
modes of production, 28, 30 covert, 10 336
Index 399
orientalism, 216 plastic sexuality, 282 prisons, 210

Outsiders (Becker), 246 Plummer, Ken, 38 probability, 109
policing, 247, 257 professional associations, 18,
P policy researchers, 238 48, 114
p value, 109 policy, social, 335–338, profit, 28–29
Paglia, Camille, 314 335–336 Programme for International
Pahl, Ray, 278 policy/administrative Student Assessment
Panizza, F., 317 approaches, 240–242 (PISA), 336–337
paradigms, 54 policy-based evidence, 338 prohibition, 265
parenting Polish-American community, proletariat, 28–29
in vitro fertilization (IVF), 38 Protestant work ethic, 37
275 political economy, 64, protestantism, 13, 37
same-sex, 100, 116 184–185, 299, 302, 322 pseudonyms, 120
single parents, 100 politics of identity, 312–313 psychiatry, 247
Paris Agreement, 323 politics of time zones, 146 psychology, 5–6, 57
Park, R.E., 245 Pollack, William, 226 The Psychopath Test (Ronson),
Parkinson, C.N., 151 polygamous relationships, 248
‘Parkinson’s law’, 151 286–287 public displays of affection,
Parsons, Talcott, 62, 68, 270 Poor Law (1834), UK, 269
participant observation, 90 335–338, 335–336 public sociology, 19–20
participants, protecting, Poppendieck, J., 311 pure relationships, 282
90–91, 114–117, 119 Popper, Karl, 68 Putnam, Robert 49–50, 50,
anonymity, 119 populations, 98 52–53, 53
confidentiality, 120 populism, 316–317
deception, 116–117, 132 pornography, 84–86, 224, Q
emotional harm, 117 225, 285, 286, 295 qualitative data analysis,
informed consent, 117 negative effects paradigm, 101–103
patriarchy, 217, 291 84, 85 coding, 101–102
Peck, Brittnie, 291 positionality, 118 content analysis, 101, 102
peer review, 348, 349 positivism, 33, 35, 64 discourse analysis, 102–
permissive society, 293 postcolonial societies, 47 103
personal life, 268–270 postmodernity, 165 qualitative research, 38, 83
friendships, 278–280 The Postmodern Condition sample size, 99–100
individualization thesis, (Lyotard), 165 quantified self, 275
282 poststructuralism, 66–68 quantitative data analysis,
Peter, Laurence, 151 poverty, 253 103–111
philosophy, 3–5, 54 absolute and relative, 204 association, 108–109, 108
The Philosophy of Money Powdermaker, Hortense, 40 bivariate analysis, 107–
(Simmel), 147 power, 12, 36, 73–75 111, 107, 108, 108,
photographs, 94–96 power naps, 10 110
pie charts, 104, 105 preacher effect, 119 levels of measurement,
Pierrat, Jerome, 276 precariat class, 31–32, 207 104–108, 104, 105–
PISA. see Programme for premodern societies, 146, 147 108, 108
International Student prison experiment case regression, 110–111, 110
Assessment study, 126–130 significance, 109
400 Index
univariate analysis, 104– Ravn, Signe, 295 Roberts, Steven, 340–341

107, 105, 106 Rawls, John, 235 Robertson, R., 320
quantitative research, 83, 87, Reactionary Democracy Rockefeller, John D., 310
103 (Mondon and Winter), role theory, 332
questionnaires, 87, 91–92 318 Roman Games, 63
quota sampling, 99 Reay, Diane, 205 romantic relationships,
recidivism, 249 280–290
R referencing, 353 cheating, 285–290
race and racial inequality, Reflexive Body Techniques divorce, 100, 116, 281,
202–203, 209–216, (RBTs), 271 284, 287, 293
257–258 reflexive process, 271 living apart together
black feminist thought, reflexivity, 119, 271 (LAT), 283–285
213, 215 Regnerus, Mark, 116 marriage and
civil rights movement, 224 regression, 110–111, 110 cohabitation, 273,
critical race theory (CRT), rehabilitating bureaucracy, 281–283
212–215 151–152 monogamy, 285–290
education, 101 Reinisch, June Machover, polygamy, 285–287
in history of sociology, 291 public displays of
43–46 relational, 269 affection, 269
intersectionality, 214, 225 relationships, personal pure relationships, 282
orientalism, 216 friendships, 278–280 same-sex marriage, 116,
race as social relationships, personal 283
construction, 43–44, friendships, 278–280 technology and, 284–285
202, 213 relative poverty, 204 Ronson, Jon, 248
racialization, 213 religion, 32 Rosenhan, David, 248
racism within science, 67 capitalism and, 37 routine activity theory, 242
slavery, 209–210 challenges to, 24–25 Rovira Kaltwasser, C., 316,
sociological theories of, homophobia and, 231, 317
43–44, 211–215 294 Rubin, Gayle, 62, 260, 262,
systemic racism, 213, 215 rationalization of, 36 287, 294
United Kingdom, 215– suicide and, 13, 17 Russell, Bertrand, 73
216 welfare and, 335–336
United States, 44–46, research design, 87–88, 87 S
202–203, 209–210, ethical considerations, Said, Edward, 216
212, 215 116–117 same-sex marriage, 116, 283
use of term, 209 research questions, 79–80, same-sex parenting, 100, 116
white racial frame, 215 80, 87, 88 sample size, 99–100
racism, 156 ethical considerations, 115 sampling, 89, 98–100, 99
random sampling, 98, 99 responsibilization, 161 bias, 92, 96
range, 106, 107 Rios, Victor, 135 frames, 98
rape, 273 Riot, 306 Sanders, Bernie, 304
ratio variables, 104, 104, 105, Risk society, 158 Sanders, Stephanie A., 291
106, 106, 108, 108 Ritzer, George, 153, 155 Savage, Mike, 111, 202, 207
rationalization, 36–37 Rizal, Jose, 156 scatterplots, 107, 108, 110
‘rational-legal authority’, 150 Roberts, Ken, 202, 318 schools, rankings, 336
Index 401
Schulz, Kathryn, 351 sexual minorities, 3, 71, 126, slums, 27

science of society, 32–35 229, 230, 292, 305, 342 Smart, Carol, 269, 282–283
scientific method, 25 discourses on, 67–68 smartphones, 284–285
scientific revolution, 26–27 HIV/AIDS and, 231, 294 Smile or Die (Ehenreich), 161
secondary data, 94–96 homophobia, 11, 17, 214, Smith, Adam, 6, 266, 310
second-wave feminism, 226, 227, 231, 232, Smith, Clarissa, 86
224–225 269, 294 Smith, M., 314
self, 39 identity, 19, 86, 202, 218, Smith, Will, 308
consumer self, 273 219, 228, 275, 312, 313 snowball sampling, 99
double consciousness, 44 intersectionality and, 214 social anthropology, 5–6
self-disclosure, 280 LGBT, 229–230 social beings, 28
selfies, 96 masculinity and, 227, 228 social capital, 206–208
selfishness, 236 public displays of social change, 297
self-regulation, 75 affection, 269 collective action as vehicle
Sellar, Sam, 336–337 same-sex marriage, 116, 283 for, 305–308
semi-structured interviews, same-sex parenting, 100, social divisions, 200–203
92 116 habitus, 75, 221
Sennett, Richard, 204 stigma, 11, 231, 294 intersectionality, 214, 225
Settler colonialism and structuration, 70 power and, 73–75
Australian society, Tearoom Trade case study, relative poverty, 204
157–158 125–126 social stratification, 36, 41,
sex, 291–295 sexual prejudice, 231–232 200–201
changing attitudes to, 293 sexual script theory, 85 social facts, 34–35, 82
charmed circle, 293 sexual violence, 255 social impact theory, 132
defining, 291–292 sexuality, 228–232, 236 social inequality, 310–311
gender and, 291–293 discourses on, 67–68 social institutions, 234
hierarchies of, 292–293 flags, 230–231 agency and, 70, 82–83
masturbation, 285, 286, intersectionality, 214 functionalism, 61
294–295 menopause and, 93–94, 275 social media, 52, 280, 345
moral panics about, plastic, 282 social model of health, 7–8
294–295 stigma and, 11, 231, 294 social movement
plastic sexuality, 282 structuration and, 70 lifecycle of, 304
pornography, 84–86, 224, sexually transmitted diseases, theories, 303
225, 285, 286, 295 256, 291 social movements, 303–319,
sexual fidelity, 285–290 Shaw, C., 245 321
sexual script theory, 85 Shulman, Lee, 351 social policy, 335–338,
sex categories, 218 significance, 109 335–336
Sex Disqualification Simmel, Georg, 6, 37, 143, social problems process,
(Removal) Act (1919), 144, 147 338–339, 340
UK, 223 simple linear regression, 110, social psychology, 6
sex role theory, 218 110, 111 social relations, by
sex work, 224, 225 single hermeneutic, 331 individuals, 147
sexting, 295 single parents, 100 social sciences, 5–8
sexual fidelity, 285–290 Slater, Mel, 133 social stratification, 36, 41,
sexual liberation, 293 slavery, 209–210 200–201
402 Index
social structures societies beyond deceptive research,

agency and, 13, 70, 82–83 modernity 116–117, 133
functionalism, 61 capitalism, globalization defined, 77–78
structuralism, 66 and technology, digital research, 96
suicide and, 13, 268–269 324–327 experiments, 84, 88–89
social support networks, environment, focus groups, 93
58–60, 59 importance of, interviews, 84, 91–92
social systems, disembedding 321–324 literature reviews, 80–81
of, 146–147 globalization of the longitudinal research, 87
social theory, 54, 64–65 world, 319–321 methodology, 77–78
social theory of society, 27–30 social work, 7, 41 naturalistic observation,
social transformations, socialization, 8, 39, 70, 217, 89–91
25–26 270 observation-based
Age of Enlightenment, societal rules, 234 research, 84, 88–91
66, 222 society(ies), 8–13 online research, 96
change, consideration of, beyond modernity, participant observation,
297–298 319–327 90
change social movements, change and crisis in, questionnaires, 87, 91–92
303–319 297–302 research design, 87–88,
collective action, as a science of, 32–35 87, 116–117
vehicle for social social theory of, 27–30 research questions, 79–80,
change, 305–308 as sui generis, 34 80, 87, 88, 115
collective action on ‘society of control’, 249 sampling, 89, 98–100, 99
concussion, 308– sociological associations, 18, secondary data, 94–96
309 48, 114 types, 88–97
non platforming as sociological canon, 24 Verstehen approach, 82
political action, sociological imagination, visual methods, 96
313–314 14–16, 18–19, 269, 329, sociological theory, 17,
politics of identity, 332 50–76, 330
312–313 sociological methods, 17, 33, abstraction, 54–55, 54
populism, rise of, 77–112, 97, 331. see also agency and structure,
316–317 data analysis; ethics 69–71
Trump and Brexit, archival data, 94–96 approaches to, 61–63, 62
sociological analysis beliefs and conditions, components of good
of, 318–319 82–83 theory, 52–53, 53
crisis case study methods, 87, concepts, 51
consideration of, 88 conflict theories, 61, 62
298–300 causality and correlation, connecting micro and
crisis of response to 83–86 macro, 58–60
coronavirus, comparative methods, 87 critical theory, 63–65
300–301 covert research, 91, 117 deductive theory, 60
gender and crisis, cross-sectional research, defined, 50–51
301–302 87 development of, 60–61
network society, 96 data collection, 97–101, falsifiability, 51–52
99 Frankfurt School, 63–65
Index 403
functionalism, 61, 62, 217, sport, 6, 12 student evaluation surveys,

270 gender segregation in, 337
generalization, 55 219–222 subcultures, 12
inductive theory, 60 importance of, 142–143 subcultures of crime, urban
interest versus truth, 56–58 media, 309 ecologies and, 244–245
levels of, 53–54, 54 stacked bar charts, 107, 107 subjectivity, 19
micro theories, 53–54, 54, standard deviation, 106 suffrage, women’s, 222
58–60 standardization of time, suffragettes, 222
nuance traps, 55, 56 145–146 sui generis, 34
poststructural critique, Standing, Guy, 32 suicide, 13, 17, 268–269, 271
66–68 Standpoint epistemology, surnames, 281–282
of race and racism, 43–44, 313 surveillance society, 96
211–215 statistical measures surveys, 92. see also
Roman Games, 63 association, 108–109, 108 questionnaires
strength of weak ties, of central tendency, 106 Sutherland, E., 253
58–60, 59 mean, 105–107 swinging sixties, 293
symbolic interactionism, median, 105, 106 symbolic capital, 206, 207
38–39, 62, 63 mode, 104–106 symbolic economy of class,
writing, 67–69 range, 106, 107 206–207
sociologists, 140 regression, 110–111, 110 symbolic interactionism,
sociology, 322 significance, 109 38–39, 62, 63, 245–252
advice for being a good standard deviation, 106 symbolic token, 146–147
student of, 350–353 variance, 106 systemic racism, 213, 215
as critical inquiry, 16–17 status, 36
defining, 3–8 Stefancic, Jean, 211, 213 T
as a discipline, 18, 34–35 Steger, Manfred, 319–320 taboos, 15
fake, 348–350 stigma, 11, 70, 231, 271, tattoos, 276–277
impact on individuals, 294 Taylor, Frederick Winslow,
331–332 strain theory, 243, 244 153
in the media, 346–350 Strang, Veronica, 323 Taylorism, 6
as a mode of thought, stratification, 36 Tearoom Trade case study,
14–16 stratified random sampling, 125–126
as personal, 18–19 99 technological determinism,
problems, 338–339, 340 ‘Streisand effect’, 314 162
social policy and, 335– strength of weak ties, 58–60, technology, 26, 324–327
338, 335–336 59 bodies and, 275
task of, 20 striptease culture, 273 network society, 96
use of, 19–20 structuralism, 66 romantic relationships
value of, 329–331 structuration, 70 and, 284–285
sociology of crime, 239 structured interviews, 92 social change and, 26–27
sociology of the structures of society terrorism, 253
environment, 324 agency and, 13, 70, 82–83 testability of theories, 52–53.
southern theory, 47 functionalism, 61 see also falsifiability
Spector, M., 339 structuralism, 66 textual data analysis, 101–
Spicker, Paul, 335, 336 suicide and, 13, 268–269 103
404 Index
Thatcher, Margaret, 8 ethnicity, 209 race and racial inequality,

therapy culture, rise of, evidence-based policy, 44–46, 202–203,
160–162 337–338 209–210, 212, 215
Therborn, Goran, 319, 320 feminism, 222–223 slavery, 209–210
third-wave feminism, 225– Great British Class Survey, Tearoom Trade case study,
226 207–208 125–126
Thomas, William Isaac, 38, HIV/AIDS and univariate analysis, 104–107,
44 homophobia, 231, 105, 106
Thompson, Edward P., 294 universities
203–204 legal regulation of bodies, norms and university
Thunberg, Goran, 261 272 culture, 9–11
trade, 26 marriage, 273, 282–283 rankings, 337
trade unions, 31–32 media, 342 student evaluation
tradition, 12 National Student Survey, surveys, 337
transgressions 337 unstructured interviews, 92
consumption and, 262– Poor Law (1834), 335–338 urban ecologies, and
266 race and racial inequality, subcultures of crime,
demographics of crime, 211–212, 215–216 244–245
252–258 university rankings, 337 utilitarianism, 3–4
rules and laws, 234–237 workhouses, 335
sociological about, 238– United Nations (UN) V
242 Security Council, 253 validity, 84
structure, culture and United States (US) Vannini, Philip, 271
crime, 242–245 Black Lives Matter variables
symbolic interactionism, movement, 135 interval, 104, 104, 105,
labelling and new civil rights movement, 224 106, 107, 108, 108,
deviancy, 245–252 fake news, 57, 344–345 108
transportation, 26 HIV/AIDS and nominal, 104, 104, 105,
Trump, Donald, 306, 308, homophobia, 231, 294 107, 108, 108
316–318, 345 Jim Crow laws, 44, 202, ordinal, 104, 104, 105,
Truth, Sojourner, 214 210 105, 107, 108, 108
Tucker, Kenneth H., 332 marriage, 282–283 ratio, 104, 104, 105, 106,
Twain, Mark, 57, 69 media, 342 106, 108, 108
Twitter, 345 Milgram experiment case variance, 106
Tyson, Neil deGrasse, 5 study, 130–133 Veblen, Thorsten, 37
National Science Verstehen approach, 82
U Foundation, 322 Victorian era, 301
unemployment, 30–32 On the Run case study, Virdee, Satnam, 156
unions, 31–32 133–136 visual methods, 96
United Kingdom Polish-American von Glow, Vanity, 315–316
Brexit referendum, 318 community, 38
class, 202, 203, 207–208 prison experiment case W
education, 101 study, 126–130 Waskul, Dennis, 271
enclosure, 27 prisons, 210 Watson, B.C., 146
Index 405
Watts, Rob, 338 contributions to early World Trade Organization

Way, Niobe, 279 sociology, 39–42, 45 (WTO), 325
weak ties, strength of, 58–60, feminism, 222–226 Wright, Kate, 162
59 friendships, 278, 279 writing
Webb, Beatrice, 40 Iran, 70, 93–94, 275 ethical considerations,
Weber, Max, 3, 6, 35–37, menopause, 93–94, 275 119–121
149–150, 152, 202, 325 motherhood penalty, 274 good and bad, 67–69
Weckert, Simon, 163 sex, 291–293 referencing, 353
welfare, 335, 335–336 suffrage, 222 as a sociology student,
West, Candace, 218 surnames, 281–282 353
Western cultures, 253 work, 272, 274–275
Western modern societies, 150 work Y
Western modernity, 141, 148 body work, 274 Young, Jock, 246, 251
Western societies, 301 gender and, 219–222, 272, Yousafzai, Malala, 261
white racial frame, 215 274–275 youth culture and crime, 261
white-collar crime, 253 motherhood penalty, 274 YouTube, 206
Wignall, Liam, 84–86, 85, 86 precarious, 31–32
William of Ockham, 69 Protestant work ethic, 37 Z
Winter, Aaron, 318 unemployment, 30–32 Zimbardo, Philip, 126–130
Wollstonecraft, Mary, 40 workhouses, 335 Zimmerman, Don, 218
women World Intellectual Property Znaniecki, Florian, 38, 44
bodies, 272–275 Organization (WIPO) Zuboff, S., 249
contraception, 272, 293 Copyright Treaty, 326 Zuckerman, Harriet, 244

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Second edition

Mark McCormack, Eric Anderson,

‘This revised version of Discovering Sociology continues to offer an innovative approach to

In praise of the previous edition:

MARK M c CORMACK, ERIC ANDERSON,

Publisher: Peter Hooper

2. A BRIEF HISTORY OF SOCIOLOGY 23

4. THE METHOD OF SOCIOLOGY 77

5. ETHICAL SOCIOLOGY 113

6. MAKING MODERN SOCIETIES  140

7. STRUCTURES AND INSTITUTIONS 167

How would…? 199

8. SOCIAL DIVISIONS 200

10. PERSONAL LIFE 268

11. SOCIAL TRANSFORMATIONS 297

Societies beyond modernity 319

12. SOCIOLOGY DISCOVERED 329

What’s wrong with segregation in sport? 219

Visit the book’s companion website (www.macmillanihe.com/McCormack-Discovering-

Key terms: key terms

Tables and figures

Micro-level Theories that explain small-scale phenomena or Little

Designed to spark debate, these controversial or counter-intuitive arguments will

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STRUCTURED FURTHER READING

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INVOKING COGNITIVE DISSONANCE

OUTLINE OF THE BOOK

In Chapter 1, What is Sociology?, we discuss what it means to think sociologically. Introducing

‘Ah, it’s gross,’ the

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Further distinguishing sociology

In science, when human behavior enters the equation, things go nonlinear.

Ibn Khaldun and sociology beyond the West

Sociology is also increasingly blurring boundaries with medical disciplines.

Norms and university culture

Emile Durkheim and the study of suicide

Sociology as a mode of thought

sociologists seek to reproduce existing social structures of inequality. Thus, for

Sociology as critical inquiry

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The use of sociology

the mask of essentialism through a universal curriculum.

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THE ORIGINS OF SOCIOLOGY

astronomy (as opposed to astrology, which was influential

Sociology in a changing society

Industrial religious orthodoxies, such as that made by Galileo, accelerated as significant

FOUNDATIONAL SOCIOLOGICAL THINKERS

could critique inequalities in the social

Different ways of sharing profit from business

Unemployment is a feature of capitalist countries across the world. Politicians regularly

Provoked? Read further:

Auguste Comte and a science of society

Distinguishing empiricism and positivism

Emile Durkheim and becoming a discipline

Durkheim is one of the central figures in the development of sociology as a

Max Weber and becoming a dialogue

these actions. Max Weber

Weber and class

2. A BRIEF HISTORY OF SOCIOLOGY 23

4. THE METHOD OF SOCIOLOGY 77

5. ETHICAL SOCIOLOGY 113

6. MAKING MODERN SOCIETIES 140

7. STRUCTURES AND INSTITUTIONS 167

How would…? 199

8. SOCIAL DIVISIONS 200

10. PERSONAL LIFE 268

11. SOCIAL TRANSFORMATIONS 297

Societies beyond modernity 319

12. SOCIOLOGY DISCOVERED 329

What’s wrong with segregation in sport? 219

Structura The poststructural critique