THE CONCEPT OF

SOCIETY AS AN
OBJECTIVE REALITY
GROUP 1
 LEARNING OBJECTIVES:
the end of this lesson, the students are expected to:
•explain how society and its institutions shape individuals;
•demonstrate curiosity about the basic social institutions and be able to explain their
respective roles in socialization;
•compare different social forms of social organization according to their manifest and
latent functions;
•explain the logic of reproduction of social institutions; and discuss the relative
independence of society and its institutions from the individual's consciousness.
 ESSENTIAL QUESTIONS FOR
CONSIDERATION
•How does a society maintain order so that it will persist for a long period of time?
•What are the roles of social institutions in reproducing social life?
•Why do social scientists argue that society is an objective fact sui generis?
 PRE-LESSON ASSESSMENT ACTIVITIES

• Try this experiment: Ride a jeep or a bus. Do you pay even if the driver does
not notice you have not paid your fare? How does it feel when you
deliberately do not pay your fare? Why do think people pay their fare even if
they can pretend to have paid already? How do people react toward a person
who does not pay his or her fare? What values in our society influence the
way we deal with these situations? What institutions do you think are
responsible for making us feel the way we do?
 BUILDING VOCABULARIES
•Adaptation •Repressive State Apparatus
•Goal attainment •Social System
•Ideological State Apparatus •Social Reproduction
•Integration •Society
•Latency •Sociological Realism
•Methodological Individualism •Structuralism
 PEOPLE TO REMEMBER
•Louis Althusser
•Peter L. Berger
•Emile Durkheim
•Talcott Parsons
 THE CONCEPT OF SOCIETY AS AN
OBJECTIVE REALITY
•The term "society" came from the Latin word societas, which in turn was
derived from the noun socius ("comrade, friend, ally") used to describe a bond
or interaction between parties that are friendly, or at least civil.•The term
"society" is used to describe a level of organization of groups that is relatively
self-contained.
•In this definition, society may also refer to the persistent interactions among
members of a particular group like kinship group and other institutions.
•A common opinion among ordinary people is the belief that society does
not exist except for the individuals who compose it. In the early 19th
century, when sociology as a science was still in its infancy, many social
scientists subscribe to methodological individualism. This view states that
collective concepts such as groups, associations, and societies do not exist,
but only individual members. A typical class in a school, in this view, does
not exist at all as a collective group, but only the teachers and the students.
The army as a collective group does not exist except for the soldiers
composing it.
 EMILE DURKHEIM

Emile Durkheim (1858-1917)- was considered the

founding father of French sociology, argued strongly
against this position. His theory, called sociological
realism, states that society is reality sui generis and cannot
be reduced to individual aggregates or parts.

Born on APRIL 15, 1858EPINAL, FRANCE

Died on NOV. 15, 1917PARIS, FRANCE
 DURKHEIM ON THE OBJECTIVE
EXISTENCE OF SOCIETY
•In the case of purely moral maxims; the public conscience exercises a check on every act
which offends it by means of the surveillance it exercises over the conduct of citizens, and the
appropriate penalties at its disposal. In many cases the constraint is less violent, but
nevertheless it always exists. If I do not submit to the conventions of society, if in my dress I
do not conform to the customs observed in my country and in my class, the ridicule I provoke,
the social isolation in which I am kept, produce, although in an attenuated form, the same
effects as a punishment in the strict sense of the word.

(Source: Durkheim, Emile. 1895. The rules of sociological method. 8th ed. Trans. Sarah A.
Solovay and John M. Mueller. Ed. George E. G. Catlin, 2-3. New York: The Free Press.)
Durkheim's argument for the existence of society is demonstrated
further in his classic work Suicide (1897). In this book, Durkheim
avoided the use of psychological and individualistic explanation for
the study of suicide. He rather looked into the statistics of suicide
rates and provided a sociological explanation for the persistence of
suicide. Durkheim showed that the external constraints of society
worked through control mechanism that either prevented people
from committing suicide or made them prone to suicide. If a group
or society has a strong social solidarity or sense of belongingness, the
individual is most likely to attach herself or himself to society.
THE ARGUMENT OF DURKHEIM THAT SOCIETY IS AN
OBJECTIVE REALITY IS ECHOED IN CONTEMPORARY
SOCIOLOGY
By: PETER L. BERGER (1973):
• •The objectivity of society extends to all its constituent elements.
Institutions, roles, and identities exist as objectively real phenomena in the
social world, though they and this world are at the same time nothing but
human productions.
• •Peter Berger's remarks could be extended to all other social institutions.
 SOCIAL REPRODUCTION OR HOW
SOCIETIES PERSIST
• •If one defines society as "organization of groups that is relatively self-
contained," then the next question is how societies manage to exist and
persist across time and space. The problem of explaining how societies
manage to exist over a long period of time is called reproduction by the
French philosopher and sociologist, Louis Althusser.
 LOUIS ALTHUSSER

•Louis Althusser (1918-1990) was a French philosopher and

sociologist.
•Key concepts: Ideological State Apparatuses (ISAs) and
Repressive State Apparatuses (RSAs).

Born on October 16, 1918Birmandreis, Algeria

Died on October 22, 1990La Verrière, France
 DEFINITION OF ISAs AND RSAs:
•SAs function by ideology.
•RSAs function by violence.
•Examples: Army, Police (ideology and violence).
•Both ISAs and RSAs use a combination of ideology and repression.
PRIMARY FUNCTION OF ISAs:
•Function massively and predominantly by ideology.
•Secondary function by repression (symbolic and attenuated).

Examples: Schools, Churches, Family, Cultural IS Apparatus.9

EXAMPLES OF ISAs FUNCTIONS:

•Schools: Punishment, expulsion, selection.
•Churches: Discipline of shepherds and flocks.
•Cultural IS Apparatus: Censorship.
 EXAMPLESOF ISAs FUNCTION:
•ISAs and RSAs function differently but both employ ideology and repression.
•No purely ideological or purely repressive apparatus.
•Understanding the interplay between ideology andrepression in societal institutions
is crucial for analyzingpower dynamics.

REFERENCES:
•Althusser, Louis. (1971). Lenin, Philosophy and Other Essays.Trans. Ben
Brewster. New York, NY: Monthly Review Press.
 TALCOTT PARSONS

•Talcott Parsons (1902-1979) was an American

sociologistof the classical traditionbest known for
his social action theory and structural
functionalism.

Born on December 13, 1902Colorado Springs, Colorado, US

Died on May 8, 1979Munich, Germany
DISPLINARY METHODS IN SOCIETY: ISAs vs RSAs
•Overview of disciplinary methods in society
•- Introduction to ideological state apparatuses (ISAs) and repressive state apparatuses
(RSAs).

DEFINITION OF ISAs AND RSAs:

•SAs function by ideology.
•RSAs function by violence.

•Examples: Army, Police (ideology and violence).

•Both ISAs and RSAs use a combination of ideology and
repression.
 STRUCTURAL FUNCTIONALISM
PERSPECTIVE:
•Functional prerequisites identified by Talcott Parsons.
•ISAs and RSAs contribute to social stability and continuity.
•ISAs promote social integration and latent pattern maintenance.
•RSAs enforce compliance with societal rules through repression.

CRITICAL SOCIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVE:

•Louis Althusser’s view on ISAs and RSAs.
•RSAs function primarily through violence and coercion.
• ISAs perpetuate power structures and reinforce inequalities through ideologies and
values.
 COMPLEX INTERPLAY:
•Effectiveness of disciplinary methods depends on context and power dynamics.
• Both ISAs and RSAs play roles in shaping individual behavior and maintaining social order.
•Disciplinary methods may vary in overt oppression and subtlety, but serve complementary functions.
•Disciplinary methods in society involve a combination of ideological and coercive mechanisms Structural
functionalist and critical sociological perspectives offer insights into the complexities of disciplinary
mechanis.
•Understanding the interplay between ISAs and RSAs enhances comprehension of societal power
dynamics.
 SUMMARY
• Society is an objective reality, which means that it is relatively independent of
how people conceive it. However, unlike physical objects, such as chairs and
tables, society is dependent also on people’s social interactions. Society has to be
reproduced across time and space if it is to persist. Two general theories explain
the process of social reproduction, namely, the structural functionalist approach
of Talcott Parsons and the conflict theory represented by French sociologist
Louis Althusser.
 REFERENCES AND SUGGESTED
READINGS
• Althusser, Louis. 1971. Lenin, philosophy and other essays. London: Monthly
Review Press. Berger, Peter L. 1963. Invitation to sociology. New York:
Vintage.
• Bhaskar, Roy. 1989. The possibility of naturalism. 2nd ed. London:
MacMillan. Durkheim, Emile. 1982. The rules of sociological method. Trans.
W. D. Halls. New York: Free Press.
• Holmwood, John. 2006. The Cambridge dictionary of sociology. Ed. Bryan
Turner. New York: Cambridge University Press.
THANK YOU
FOR
LISTENING
 MEMBERS OF GROUP 1
• ERICH MAY D. FERNANDEZ
• MIRADAEL I SULLANO
• CRISHNA DENIELLE F. FERNANDEZ
• MALIK IAN F. LERON
• OSAMA A. JACKARIA
• ZULFIKHAR BADAL JR.
 ACTIVITY #1

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