Origin 0 Development of Sociology

Origin & Development of Sociology
Sociology is the scientific study of social behavior, human life, and social group. It focuses on
social relationship, how those relationships influence people’s behavior, and how societies
develop, and change based on those relationships.
The term sociology was coined by French philosopher Auguste Comte in 1838, for this reason he
is known as the “Father of Sociology.” Comte felt that science could be used to study the social
world. To find the origin of sociology the idea of applying the scientific method to the social world,
known as positivism, was apparently first proposed by Auguste Comte.
Sociology was born in Europe. The process started in late 18th century and ended in the middle
of 19th century. French revolution brings many positive changes in the society which has
enormous positive consequences. But the negative effects of those positive changes were
important for the birth of Sociology.
Auguste Comte: Auguste Comte said there must be laws that underlie the society. Therefore, we
should discover these principles by applying scientific method to social world. He advocated
origins of sociology for building new societies on twin foundations of science and industry rather
than on religion and landowner-serf relationship. This will be a new science and Comte named it
as Sociology (1838) – the study of society.
Herbert Spenser: Herbert Spenser said that societies evolve from lower to higher forms. In this
way he applied the ideas of Darwin to the development of human society, and hence this
approach may be called as Social Darwinism. By following the basic principle of Social Darwinism
Spenser advocated that ‘let the fittest survive’. There should be no reform because it will help in
the survival of lower order individuals.
Karl Marx: According to Karl Marx the key to human history is Class Conflict. Not really a
sociologist but wrote widely about history, philosophy, economics, political science. Because of
his insights into the relationship between the social classes, he is claimed to be an early
sociologist. He introduced one of the major perspectives in sociology – conflict perspective.
Emile Durkheim: Emile Durkheim’s primary goal was of getting sociology recognized as a
separate academic discipline. His systematic study comparing suicide rates among several
countries revealed an underlying social factor. People were more likely to commit suicide if their
ties to others in their communities were weak. He identified the key role of social integration in
social life.
Max Weber: Max Weber used cross-cultural and historical materials to determine how
extensively social groups affect people’s orientations to life.
Sociologists believe that our social surroundings influence thought and action. For example, the
rise of the social sciences developed in response to social changes. In the sixteenth and
seventeenth centuries, Europeans were exploring the world and voyagers returned from Asia,
the Americas, Africa, and the South Seas with amazing stories of other societies and civilizations.
In the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, Western Europe was rocked by technical, economic,
and social changes that forever changed the social order. James Watt invented the steam engine
in 1769, and in 1865 Joseph Lister discovered that an antiseptic barrier could be placed between
a wound and germs in the atmosphere to inhibit infection. This trend was part of a more general
growth in rationalism.
The industrial revolution began in Britain in the late eighteenth century. Mechanical industry
was growing, and thousands of people were migrating to cities to work in the new factories.
People once rooted in the land and social communities where they farmed found themselves
crowded into cities. The traditional authority of the church, the village, and the family were being
undermined by impersonal factory and city life.
Capitalism also grew in Western Europe in the nineteenth century. This meant that relatively
few people owned the means of production—such as factories—while many others had to sell
their labor to those owners. At the same time, relatively impersonal financial markets began to
expand.
Finally, there was enormous population growth worldwide in this period, due to longer life
expectancy and major decreases in child death rates. These massive social changes lent new
urgency to the development of the social sciences, as early sociological thinkers struggled with
the vast implications of economic, social, and political revolutions. All the major figures in the
early years of sociology thought about the “great transformation” from simple, preliterate
societies to massive, complex, industrial societies.

Origin 0 Development of Sociology

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Origin & Development of Sociology

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