Dear SW 122 Students:
Please print and study the following notes. Thanks.
Justin Nicolas
Notes on Philippine Realities and Social Welfare
Seven Perspectives
By Justin V. Nicolas
1st Semester SY 2010-2011
Department of Social Work
U. P. CSWCD
SOCIOLOGICAL PERSPECTIVES ON SOCIAL PROBLEMS
Social problem – an alleged situation that is incompatible with the values of a significant number of people who agree that action is needed to alter the situation
Elements used in the discussion of social problems
Definition. Each perspective includes its own more specialized Definition of Social Problems
Causes. Each perspective includes its own causal imagery—that is, its own set of ideas about what types of factors produce social problems and how they do so.
Conditions. Each perspective also has something to say, implicitly or explicitly, about the conditions under which social problems emerge and develop. These are not the immediate causes of social problems. Rather, they are the more general background features out of which the causes of social problems develop.
Consequence. All seven perspectives view social problems as harmful. They differ, however, in terms of how the harmful effects of social problems are described.
Solutions. Each perspective includes its own implications about how we can solve social problems. The perspectives emerged at different points in the development of sociology. Thus, some are more explicitly concerned with social reform than others. Nonetheless, all seven perspectives have some implications for the solution of social problems, and the characteristics of each perspective determine whether the solutions focuses on expectations, violations, or reactions.
THE SEVEN PERSPECTIVES
I. SOCIAL PATHOLOGY
A. Definition. Desirable social conditions and arrangements are seen as healthy, while persons or situations that diverge from moral expectations are regarded as “sick”, therefore is bad. Thus, from the social pathology perspective, a social problem is a violation of moral expectations.
B. Causes. The ultimate cause of social problems is a failure in socialization. Society, through its socializing agents, has the responsibility of transmitting moral norms to each generation. Sometimes, however, the socialization effort is ineffective. An early classification of deviants from the social pathology perspective portrayed them as defective, dependent or delinquent. Defective cannot be taught; dependents are handicapped in receiving instruction; and delinquents reject the teachings. For later pathologists, social problems are a result of wrong values being learned. In this perspective’s “tender” mood, the people who contribute to the social problem are viewed as “sick”; in it “tough” mood, they are viewed as “criminal.” Behind both moods, however, is the notion that the person or situation is, at heart, “immoral.”
C. Conditions. The early social pathologists considered some people to be inherently defective. And, for the most part, the “defective”, dependent, and delinquent classes tended to perpetuate themselves through inbreeding. Later, however, social pathologists began to see the social environment as the important condition contributing to social pathology. Indeed, Smith himself wrote, “social diseases so prevalent as to create a social problem is rarely found without a bad environment of some sort or other, and so the social student is compelled to study the causes of social disease.” Whereas earlier pathologists tended to focus on the immoral properties of individuals, the recent pathologists have tended to focus on the immoral individuals, the recent pathologists have tended to focus on the immoral properties of societies and to see problems as developing from societal forces such as technology and population density.
D. Consequences. In th3e early pathology view, social disturbances increase the cost of maintaining a legitimate social order. The early pathologists did believe, however, that ultimately the healthiest would survive. The more recent pathologists, in contrast, are morally indignant about the defects of society and are less optimistic in their prognosis. The most indignant see societal pathology as total spreading, and likely to dehumanize the entire population.
E. Solutions. Both the early and the recent versions of the social pathology perspective suggest what form solutions to social problems might take. The early sociologists who dwelt on the troubles caused by “genetically” defective individuals, for example, turned to the eugenics movement as a solution. Other sociologists thought the solution to social problems lay in educating the troublemakers in middle-class morality. The recent variant, which tends to regard the society than its nonconforming members as “sick”, has its roots in the Rousseauean view of human nature. Individuals are good; their institutions, on the other hand, are bad. Yet, even the modern social pathologists see the remedy to “sick” institutions as a change in people’s values. Thus, according to this perspective, the only real solution to the social problem is moral education.
II. SOCIAL DISORGANIZATION
People who work with this perspective view society as a social system--- a complex, dynamic whole whose parts are coordinated. When events change one part of the system, there is a corresponding need for adjustment in other parts. “Social disorganization” refers to lack of adjustment, or poor adjustment, between the parts. The major elements of the social disorganization perspective are as follows:
A. Definition. Social disorganization is conceived of as a failure of rules. The major types of disorganization are normlessness, culture conflict, and breakdown. With normlessness, no rules exist on how to act. With culture conflict, at least two opposing sets of rules exist on how to act. In each situations, persons who act in terms of one set of expectations may in so doing violate another set of expectations. Breakdown is a variation on this same theme. Here rules exist, but conformity to them either fails to produce the promised rewards or yields punishments instead.
B. Causes. The root cause of social disorganization is , broadly speaking social change. As changes occur, the parts of the social system get out of tune with one another.
C. Conditions. The parts of a social system are never perfectly in tune. Nevertheless, there is usually a dynamic equilibrium. Any condition that upsets the equilibrium may precipitate social disorganization. Such conditions include technical, demographic, or cultural changes that generate social change (i.e. change in social relationships).
D. Consequences. The social disorganization perspective predicts outcomes for the system and for persons in it. For persons, social disorganization produces stress, which in turn produces “personal disorganization”---for example, mental illness, alcoholism. For the system, social disorganization may have three types of consequences. First, there can be change in the system (i.e. some response or adaptation may bring the various parts of the system back into equilibrium). Second, the system can continue to operate in a steady state (i.e., the disorganization may remain but the system continues to function anyway). Third, the system may break down (i.e. the disorganization may be so disruptive that it destroys the system.)
E. Solutions. Attempts to reduce social disorganization can be put into effect once the proper diagnosis has been made. Thus, parts of the system that are out of phase can be brought back into equilibrium---for example, technical changes can be slowed down.
III. VALUE CONFLICT
Value conflict, as a perspective, is considerably sharper in focus than the social pathology perspective, yet less complex than the social disorganization perspective. Its essential characteristics are as follows:
A. Definition. Social problems are social conditions tha are incompatible with the values of some group whose members succeed in publicizing a call for action.
B. Causes. The root causes of social problems are conflicts of values or interests. Various groups, because they have different interests, find themselves in opposition. One opposition crystallizes into conflict, a social problem is born.
C. Conditions. Background conditions affecting the appearance, frequency, duration, and outcome of social problems are competition and contact among groups. When two or more groups are in competition and in particular types of contact with one another, a conflict cannot be avoided. A number of kinds of social problems have risen under these conditions. And once the problem has arisen, the competing groups can also be in conflict over how to resolve the problem.
Numerous writers have pointed out that social problems consist of an objective condition and a subjective condition. The objective condition is contact and competition; the subjective definition reflects different ways of defining and evaluating contact, competition and distribution of goods and rights. The social problem, then, emerges out of the volatile mixture of objective condition and subjective definition.
D. Consequences. Conflicts can be abrasive and costly. Sometimes they result in the sacrifice of higher values on behalf of the lesser-ranked values. More often, they result in abortive stalemates or in loss by the weaker party in conflict. They also produce a tradition of “bad feeling” between the groups. In addition, however, as more liberal observers point out, conflicts can have the positive effect of helping groups clarify their values.
E. Solutions. The value conflict perspective suggests three ways in which social problems arising out of clashing interests and values may be resolved: consensus, trading, and naked power. If the parties can resolve the conflict on behalf of a set of higher values shared by both parties, then consensus wins the day. If the parties can bargain, then a trade of values---all in the spirit of democratic process---can take place. If neither consensus nor trading works, then the group with the most power gains control.
IV. DEVIANT BEHAVIOR
The key characteristics of the deviant behavior perspective are as follows:
A. Definition. Social problems reflect violations of normative expectations. Behavior or situations that depart from norms are deviant.
B. Causes. The cause of deviant behavior lies in inappropriate socialization—for example, when the learning of deviant ways is not outweighed by the learning of nondeviant ways. The socialization is viewed as taking place within the context of primary group relations.
C. Conditions. Restricted opportunities for learning so-called conventional ways, increased opportunities for learning deviant ways, restricted opportunities for achieving legitimate goals, a feeling of stress, and access to a deviant mode of relief are all important background conditions for the evolution of deviant patterns of behavior.
D. Consequences. The deviant behavior perspective postulates a variety of consequences. Many kinds of deviant behavior are costly to society. One outcome, for example, is the firm establishment of illegal social worlds. In addition, however, some observable deviant behavior is useful, if only because it established negative role models showing the kinds of behavior that will be punished.
E. Solutions. The principal solution of deviant behavior is resocialization, and the best way to resocialize is to increase meaningful primary group contact with legitimate patterns of behavior. At he same time, the opportunity structure must be opened in order to alleviate the strains that motivate people to behave in unacceptable ways. As legitimate opportunities increase, socially problematic behavior should decrease.
V. LABELING
Central to the labeling perspective is the notion that social problems and deviance exist in the eye of the beholder. The perspective seeks to study the process of and responses to social differentiation. The principal elements in the labeling perspective are as follows:
A. Definition. A social problem or social deviant is defined by social reactions to an alleged violation of rules or expectations. This perspective focuses on the conditions under which behaviors or situations come to be defined as problematic or deviant.
B. Causes. The cause of a social problem is ultimately the attention it receives from the public or from social control agents, for social reactions cannot occur until the alleged behavior or situation is recognized.
C. Conditions. When a person or situation is labeled problematic or deviant, the labeler is usually in a position to gain by affixing such a label. The labeler must have a negative label to apply and the power to make it stick. Very often, the labeling is done by someone whose job it is to apply labels (for example, social control agents, journalists), and assigning labels is often a mark of success in such jobs. Occasionally, people may label themselves, and in doing so they may gain some advantages (for example, people have reported that they are homosexual in order to be discharged from the military).
D. Consequences. The definition of a person or situation as socially problematic or deviant may lead to a reordering of human relations in a way that promotes further “deviance.” For example, after a person has been labeled “deviant,” most people expect him or her to continue violating norms of conventional behavior. This may limit the labeled person’s life changes and lead him or her to elaborate the deviant role; for example, an ex-convict may be unable to obtain employment in a conventional job and may thus return to crime in order to make a living. This elaboration of deviant roles because of other people’s reactions is called “secondary deviance”.
E. Solutions. The labeling perspective suggests two solutions: definitions can be changed, and the profit can be taken out of labeling. Changing definitions would mean becoming more tolerant, so that people stop labeling certain people and situations as problematic. Taking the profit out of labeling would presumably mean a consequent decrease both in people’s labeling of themselves and others as deviant, and in the problems that result from such labeling.
VI. CRITICAL PERSPECTIVE
Holism, a key assumption of the critical perspective, requires that analysis examine the whole social system, rather than any of its specific parts. Social problems are interrelated with a number of events, changes, and pressures operating on all social institutions. The main elements of the critical perspective are as follows:
A. Definition. A social problem is a situation that develops out of the exploitation of the working class.
B. Causes. In the broadest sense, the form of social organization that capitalist society produces causes a wide range of specific social problems. With regard to the social problem of crime, it is the system of class domination that creates and sustains it. For example, capitalists sustain poverty and make and enforce rules in their own interests.
C. Conditions. Important conditions of social problems are the extent and severity of class domination and conflict, working-class consciousness, and fluctuations in the business cycle. When domination and conflict are less visible or of less strength, if large segments of the working class are unaware of their common interests, and if there is an upturn in the business cycle, awareness of social problems will lag considerably behind their actual occurrence.
D. Consequences. Though capitalist societies go through cyclic periods, social problems are proportional to advances in the stages of the development of capitalism. Thus, writers using critical perspective predict, fro example, that crime rates will rise with advances in the development of capitalism.
E. Solutions. Only political activism can resolve the consequences of the capitalist system. Either through reform or revolution, the working-class movement must struggle to achieve a classless society, thereby eliminating the host of social problems that are endemic in a social system based on social inequality.
VII. SOCIAL CONSTRUCTIONISM
To some degree, from the widened labeling perspective, Spector and Kitsuse argue that social problems are what people think they are. Objective conditions that may or may not exist and may in some ways give rise to the conception that a social problem exists are of no interest to them. Adopting a radically subjective position, they focus all attention of the problem-defining process, in who goes about defining a situation as a problem, what kind of a definition they formulate, how they present their arguments to others, how others respond to their complaints, and what the upshot of the interaction is between those who complain and those who respond.
A. Definition. The process itself whereby people define a condition, alleged or actual, as a social problem
B. Causes. The problem-defining activities people engage in as they seek a redress of grievances.
C. Conditions. The process involving interaction between complainants, as initiators, and old or new agencies, as responders to their demands for redress.
D. Consequences. There are, hypothetically, four stages on the natural history of social problems *(Please see Randall and Short), when examined from the point of view of social constructionism. But since these stages are hypothetical and contingent on such matters as clarity o definition, management and strategy of gaining and maintaining attention, the relative power of complainants, and the agencies from which they seek redress, only empirical research can offer tentative answers to the questions of consequences
E. Solutions. The constructionist perspective is silent on the question of solutions, deeming this matter to be settled by research on the life course of the defining process.
* A Power Resource Model of Social Problem Development (by Randall and Short according to Spector and Kitsuse)
Stage One: Social Problem Definition and Issue Creation
Stage Two: Official Recognition of the Problem
Stage Three: Group Dissatisfaction with Established Procedures
Stage Four: Rejection of Established Procedures
Reference:
Rubington E. and M.S. Weinberg. The Study of Social Problems: Seven Perspectives 5th ed. New York: Oxford University Press, 1995
