Discuss what Emile Durkheim meant by the concepts of social facts and anomie

Question

What will be an ideal response?

Answer 1

French sociologist Emile Durkheim stressed that people are the products

of their social environment and that behavior cannot be fully understood in

terms of individual biological and psychological traits. Durkheim set forth

the idea that societies are built on social facts. Social facts are patterned

ways of acting, thinking, and feeling that exist outside any one individual

but that exert social control over each person. He believed that social

facts must be explained by other social facts—by reference to the social

structure rather than to individual attributes. Durkheim's recurring

question was: How do societies manage to hold together? He concluded

that preindustrial societies were held together by strong traditions and by

members' shared moral beliefs and values. As societies industrialized,

more specialized economic activity became the basis of the social bond

because people became interdependent on one another. Durkheim

observed that rapid social change and a more specialized division of

labor produce strains in society.

These strains lead to a breakdown in traditional organization, values, and authority and to a

dramatic increase in anomie—a condition in which social control becomes ineffective as a

result of the loss of shared values and of a sense of purpose in society.