Notes Class 11 Chapter 4 Sociology Maharashtra Board

Social Institutions

Introduction

• Sociology’s Focus: Sociology examines the mutual relationship between individuals and society. Founding scholars like Comte, Durkheim, Marx, and Weber emphasized humanity’s social nature.
• Society and Individual: Individuals and society are inseparable. Society is formed through interactions, and individuals internalize societal elements like roles, statuses, values, and norms.
• Social Institutions: These are key concepts in sociology, representing organized systems that coordinate individual behavior to meet societal needs. Examples include family, marriage, education, economy, religion, state, law, and mass media.
• Purpose: Social institutions ensure social well-being by regulating behavior and fulfilling needs like reproduction, socialization, production, and order.

4.1 Social Institutions: Definitions and Characteristics

4.1.1 Definitions

1. Horton and Hunt: A social institution is an organized system of relationships with common rules and procedures, meeting basic societal needs.
2. E.S. Bogardus: A social institution is a societal structure organized to meet people’s needs through well-established procedures.
3. H.E. Barnes: Social institutions are structures and mechanisms through which society organizes and executes activities to fulfill human needs.

4.1.2 Characteristics

1. Stable Patterns: Social institutions are systems of well-defined, consistent behavioral patterns.
2. Collective Activities: They rely on the coordinated actions of individuals.
3. Normative Structure: Institutions have a network of rules and regulations.
4. Regulation of Behavior: They facilitate and control individual actions through stable patterns and norms.
5. Primary Needs: Institutions exist to satisfy essential human needs (e.g., survival, socialization).

Sociological Perspectives

• Functionalist Perspective:
  • Views institutions as structures performing specific roles to facilitate social life.
  • Institutions fulfill society’s needs in distinct domains (e.g., family for socialization, economy for production).
  • They are interdependent, adapting to changing needs and performing multiple functions.
• Conflict Perspective (Marxist):
  • Argues that society is unequal, with privileges skewed toward the affluent.
  • Institutions maintain social divisions and inequalities, often serving the interests of dominant groups.

4.2 Family

Introduction

• Significance: Family is the most important primary social institution, considered the cornerstone of society.
• Universality: Generally seen as universal, though recent perspectives question its inevitability.
• Roles: Provides economic support, emotional care, socialization, and parenting. However, it can also be a source of conflict or violence.
• Changes: Family forms and functions are evolving, with diverse structures emerging.

4.2.1 Definitions

1. Mac Iver: Family is a group defined by a sex relationship enduring enough to provide for children’s protection and upbringing.
2. Burgess and Locke: Family is a group united by marriage, blood, or adoption, living together, interacting in roles (e.g., husband-wife, parent-child), and creating a common culture.
3. Webster Dictionary: Family is a group related by blood or marriage.

• Summary: Family is a key institution for raising children, built on bonds of blood, marriage, or adoption.

Case Study: The Kibbutz

• Context: The kibbutz in Israel challenges the universality of family.
• Features: Based on communal living, shared property, and collective child-rearing. Couples engage in monogamous relations but don’t share residence or economic roles typical of nuclear families.
• Significance: Shows alternative family models exist, though not the norm in Israel.

4.2.2 Functions of Family

Socialization:

• Family is the primary unit for socializing children, shaping their personalities according to societal norms and values (Talcott Parsons).
• Parents and children learn mutually through this process.

Regulation of Sexual Activity:

• Provides a socially approved space for sexual expression and gratification (Murdock).
• Regulates sexual behavior through norms like the incest taboo, maintaining kinship organization.

Emotional Security:

• Offers physical protection, emotional support, and material help.
• Acts as a “haven in the heartless world,” stabilizing adult personalities (Parsons).

Economic Stability:

• Though less significant today, families share resources and maintain property, providing economic security.

Social Identity:

• Ascribes social identity (e.g., race, caste, class) at birth, transmitting social standing across generations.

4.2.3 Forms of Family

Based on Structure:

1. Joint Family:
   • Two or more generations living together, sharing a kitchen.
   • Common in rural India, also called an extended family.
2. Nuclear Family:
   • Consists of parents and children (two generations).
   • Prevalent in urban areas.

Based on Authority:

1. Matriarchal Family:
   • Authority lies with women (e.g., mother or female elders).
2. Patriarchal Family:
   • Authority rests with men (e.g., father or male elders).

4.2.4 Twenty-First Century Families

Changes:

• Families adapt to modern pressures like divorce, delayed marriage, and dual-earner households.
• Women’s education and employment have shifted roles, impacting childcare and family dynamics.

Emerging Forms:

1. Single-Parent Family:
   • Often headed by mothers due to divorce, separation, death, or choice.
   • Can pose challenges for children due to material or social disadvantages.
2. Cohabitation:
   • Unmarried couples living together, common in Europe and urban India.
   • Includes same-sex couples; may not lead to marriage.
3. Step-Parenting:
   • Reconstituted families from divorce or remarriage, including children from previous and new unions.
   • Increasing due to rising divorce and remarriage rates.

Gender Equality: Families are moving toward more equitable roles, though traditional norms persist in some regions.

Regional Variations: Changes are more pronounced in Western countries, but new patterns are emerging in India.

4.3 Marriage

Introduction

• Definition: Marriage is a social institution forming family relations, sanctioned by society for sexual relations and procreation.
• Universality: Considered a universal practice, though forms vary across societies.

4.3.1 Definitions

Horton and Hunt: Marriage is the approved pattern for two or more persons to establish a family.

Robert Lowie: Marriage is a relatively permanent bond between permissible mates.

Webster Dictionary: Marriage is a legally recognized union of two people, historically between a man and woman, now including same-sex unions.

Key Points:

• Marriage satisfies sexual needs socially.
• Its primary purpose is procreation.
• Traditionally heterosexual, but now includes homosexual marriages (e.g., gay/lesbian unions).

4.3.2 Forms of Marriage

Based on Number of Partners:

1. Monogamy:
   • One spouse at a time (one husband, one wife).
   • Most common and legally supported in many societies.
2. Polygamy:
   • Marriage to multiple partners simultaneously.
   • Polyandry: One woman with multiple husbands, often in harsh economic conditions.
   • Polygyny: One man with multiple wives, used to control resources or kin ties.

Based on Rules of Mate Selection:

1. Endogamy:
   • Marriage within a defined group (e.g., caste, tribe).
2. Exogamy:
   • Marriage outside one’s group (e.g., gotra).

Based on Social Status:

1. Hypergamy:
   • Marrying “up” (e.g., a woman marrying into a higher social group).
2. Hypogamy:
   • Marrying “down” (e.g., a man marrying into a higher-status group).

Mate Selection:

• Some societies allow free choice, while others (e.g., India) involve family decisions with restrictions on permissible partners.

Modern Trends

• Homosexual Marriages:
  • Gaining recognition since Denmark’s 1989 legalization.
  • Offer legal benefits like inheritance and healthcare rights.
• India’s Context:
  • Section 377 of the Indian Penal Code criminalized homosexuality until its partial decriminalization in 2018, allowing consensual adult gay sex in private (Supreme Court verdict, September 6, 2018).

Family, Kinship, and Marriage

Kinship: Connections through marriage (affines) or blood (consanguinal kin).

Family Types:

• Family of Orientation: Family of birth.
• Family of Procreation: Family formed through marriage.

Role: Marriage and family create primary bonds, connecting individuals and wider kin networks.

4.4 Economy and Work

Introduction

• Economy: A social institution organizing production, distribution, and consumption of goods and services to meet material needs.
• Interdependence: Economy interacts with family, religion, and politics, with global interconnectedness increasing today.
• Work: Adults spend significant time earning a living, requiring efficient production and distribution systems.

4.4.1 Changing Economies

Human economies evolved through three stages:

Agricultural Revolution:

• Shift from hunting-gathering to farming with ploughs and animals.
• Increased food production, enabling settlements, trade, and specialized tasks (e.g., tool-making, crafts).

Industrial Revolution (Mid-18th Century):

• Key Changes:
  • New Energy: Steam engines (1765, James Watt) replaced human/animal power.
  • Factories: Centralized workplaces separated from homes.
  • Mass Production: Factories turned raw materials into goods (e.g., timber to furniture).
  • Division of Labor: Workers performed repetitive tasks, reducing skill needs.
• Impacts:
  • Raised living standards but created economic inequalities.
  • Labor reforms (late 19th century) addressed child labor, wages, and conditions.

Information Revolution (Mid-20th Century):

• Driven by computers and IT, expanding service sectors (e.g., banking, media).
• Key Changes:
  • Ideas over Products: Focus on services and intellectual work.
  • Literacy Skills: Demand for communication and tech skills.
  • Decentralized Work: Technology enables work from anywhere (e.g., virtual offices).
• Example Professions: Programmers, writers, consultants, service providers.

4.4.2 Changing Nature of Work

• Decline in Agriculture: Mechanized farming in developed nations; India still has significant agricultural employment.
• Service Sector Growth: Rapid expansion in India and globally.
• Economic Interdependence: Global exchange of capital, labor, and technology.
• Global Commodity Chain:
  • Production spans countries (e.g., Barbie doll: designed in the USA, materials from Saudi Arabia, assembled in China).
  • Transnational corporations (e.g., Coca-Cola, Kodak) drive flexible, global production.

4.5 Education

Introduction

Definition: Education actualizes individual potential through learning knowledge and skills for meaningful living.

Evolution:

• In primitive societies, education was informal, part of socialization by family/community.
• Industrialization increased demand for literate workers, leading to formal education systems.

Goals:

• Create and share knowledge.
• Develop skills to improve society.

4.5.1 Types of Education

Formal Education:

• Planned, structured learning with a specific curriculum (e.g., schools, universities).
• Limited to a defined period, designed to meet societal needs.

Informal Education:

• Unstructured learning through daily experiences (e.g., family, travel, media).
• No fixed curriculum or agency; continuous and incidental.

Non-Formal Education:

• Systematic but outside formal systems, serving specific groups.
• Flexible curriculum and evaluation (e.g., adult literacy programs, vocational training).

4.5.2 Importance of Education

Sociological Views (Durkheim, Parsons):

1. Unifies Society: Schools teach common values, integrating diverse individuals.
2. Self-Discipline: Students learn social rules for societal harmony.
3. Specialized Skills: Prepares individuals for modern economies (e.g., technical training).
4. Meritocracy: Promotes achievement through universal standards (exams, rules).

Outcome: Education equips individuals for societal roles while fostering social cohesion.

4.5.3 Education and Social Division

Conflict Perspective:

• Education reproduces inequalities, mirroring workplace hierarchies (Bowles and Gintis).
• Schools favor higher classes, perpetuating economic domination (Bourdieu).
• Curriculum and tasks vary by social background, limiting opportunities for lower classes.

Gender Disparities:

• Despite progress, girls face barriers (e.g., higher dropout rates, preference for boys’ education).
• Gendered subject choices (e.g., “soft” subjects for girls) persist.

Meritocracy Myth (Stephen McNamee):

• Non-merit factors like inheritance, social capital, and discrimination undermine merit-based outcomes.

Summary

• Social Institutions: Stable systems meeting societal needs through coordinated behavior.
• Family: Primary unit for socialization, emotional security, and identity; evolving into diverse forms (e.g., single-parent, cohabitation).
• Marriage: Forms family relations; exists in forms like monogamy, polygamy, endogamy, and exogamy; includes modern homosexual unions.
• Economy: Organizes production and consumption; evolved through agricultural, industrial, and information revolutions; globally interdependent.
• Education: Develops knowledge and skills; formal, informal, and non-formal types; fosters unity and skills but can reproduce inequalities.

Key Concepts

• Social Institutions: Systems regulating behavior (e.g., family, economy).
• Family Functions: Socialization, sexual regulation, emotional/economic security, social identity.
• Marriage Forms: Monogamy, polygamy (polyandry, polygyny), endogamy, exogamy.
• Economic Stages: Agricultural, industrial, and information revolutions.
• Education Types: Formal, informal, non-formal.
• Sociological Perspectives: Functionalist (integration) vs. conflict (inequality).