scholarly journals ‘Counterfinality’ in sociological theory: Reconceptualization of the concept

2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (4) ◽  
pp. 697-710
Author(s):  
I. A. Latypov
Keyword(s):  
Social Action ◽  
Sociological Theory ◽  
Unintended Consequences ◽  
Sociological Research ◽  
Sociological Analysis ◽  
Sociological Study ◽  
Distinctive Features ◽  
Intentional Actions ◽  
Main Ideas ◽  
Classic Papers

Counterfinality is defined as unintended consequences of the uncoordinated actions of rationally acting individuals. Even before the concept was introduced by Sartre and developed by Elster, counterfinality was considered by many scholars. Some defined counterfinality as a type of social paradoxes and dilemmas, others - as an outcome of social interaction. Description and analysis of such social contradictions and paradoxes can be found in the works of Hobbes, Mandeville, Smith, Marx and Hegel. In the 20th century, sociologists also considered the issue of unintended consequences. Many classic papers of Merton contributed to the sociological analysis of the unintended consequences of intentional actions. Subsequent works focused on their classifications, and the phenomenon of counterfinality was highlighted in almost every classification. The term counterfinality was introduced by Sartre as an appendage of history, an unforeseen consequence of many interactions. The sociological study of counterfinality was initiated by Elster. He analyzes counterfinality not within the functionalist paradigm, but in the methodological individualism perspective, and for him, counterfinality acts as a basis for social change. The authors analysis of the main ideas of Sartre, Elster and other authors on counterfinality reveals its distinctive features in general and in the sociological analysis of social action in particular. The author argues that today the counterfinality theory consists mainly of responses and criticism of the ideas of Sartre and Elster, and that further sociological research should focus on conditions, features and consequences of counterfinality, and on its empirical indicators.

What are unintended and adverse consequences?

Kybernetes ◽  
2019 ◽  
Vol 48 (2) ◽  
pp. 226-237 ◽  
Author(s):  
Josué Antonio Nescolarde-Selva ◽  
Hugh Gash ◽  
Jose-Luis Usó-Domenech
Keyword(s):  
Social Change ◽  
Social Action ◽  
Social Reproduction ◽  
Sociological Theory ◽  
Life Forms ◽  
Unintended Consequences ◽  
Content Type ◽  
History Of ◽  
Methodological Status ◽  
Constituent Elements

Purpose The purpose of this study is to examine the unintended consequences of actions as one of the central and constituent elements of sociological theory and long debated in the history of sociology. This question has been treated under varying sociological terminologies, including, providence, social forces, social paradoxes, heterogeneity of ends, immanent causality and the principle of emergency. Design/methodology/approach This paper is concerned with “adverse effects”. The thematic contexts of “unintended consequences of social action” the authors wish to focus attention on are specific types of consequences which may merit the adjective “adverse”. Findings The analysis of the intentions of our actions and their unwanted or foreseen consequences allows us to understand how societies work. Many historical facts are probably “unintentional.” But, most continuous or changing life forms must be interpreted as a mixture of intentional (social reproduction) and unintentional consequences (social change). Originality/value This paper focuses on four points of view: the object of sociology, the problems of order and social change, the methodological status of the discipline and the nature of social explanation, and mathematical theory. Four classifications of unintended consequences are formulated from the works of Boudon, Baert and Ramos, as well as the authors.

Understanding Social Change

2005 ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Social Action ◽  
Unintended Consequences ◽  
British Society ◽  
Gender Inequalities ◽  
Sociological Research ◽  
Social Changes ◽  
Social Reforms ◽  
Proper Understanding ◽  
The Social ◽  
Rapid Changes

These chapters not only describe the major changes in British society in recent years, but seek to understand and explain what is happening in British society. One of the themes running through this book is that, while there have been rapid changes in overall levels, there have been slower changes in relativities, and this analytical distinction is absolutely fundamental to a proper understanding of contemporary society. The book also considers the wide variety of mechanisms that underlie these changes, in particular processes of social interaction. The complex and often ill-understood nature of these mechanisms may be a major reason why so much social reform has proved ineffective. The verdict on social reforms in education, gender inequalities and ethnic inequalities is rather negative; and sociologists have long been concerned about the unintended consequences of social action, and in the policy field these are frequent. By highlighting the complexities of the causal mechanisms, sociological research can make a major contribution to policy and public debate. While these chapters do not claim that sociology will provide all the answers, they demonstrate that it has made real progress in understanding the social changes that Britain has experienced in recent decades.

scholarly journals Three Aspects of the Phenomenon of Science: In Search for Unity among Sociologists

2018 ◽  
Vol 20 (9) ◽  
pp. 35-55
Author(s):  
N. G. Popova ◽  
E. V. Biricheva ◽  
T. A. Beavitt
Keyword(s):  
Common Ground ◽  
Sociology Of Science ◽  
Practical Significance ◽  
Scientific Development ◽  
Sociological Research ◽  
Human Society ◽  
Sociological Analysis ◽  
Sociological Study ◽  
Diverse Field ◽  
Object Of Study

Introduction. In today’s globalising world, science acquires a crucial importance: integrating humanity within the framework of solving global problems, it becomes one of the leading factors in social development, facilitating work and diversifying leisure time, as well as serving as an instrument of transformations in the political sphere. Undoubtedly, the social aspects of contemporary science are capturing the attention of a huge number of researchers. However, it is not clear that all areas of the sociology of science treat the object of their study in the same way.Aim. A lack of reflection on the unity or otherwise in the understanding of the essence of science in the various fields of sociological research makes it difficult to compare different theories of the institutional, cultural, social and communicative contexts of scientific development. An urgent methodological task therefore consists in developing an understanding of the various definitions of the concept of “science” used in the framework of contemporary sociological analysis of this phenomenon.Results and scientific novelty. In this paper, two dominant sociological views on science – as an experimental-mathematical approach to cognising the world and as a system of representations in general – are compared. We conclude that while researchers studying institutional aspects of science tend to interpret it in terms of the “heritage” of post-Enlightenment European rationalism, constructionist and communicatively-oriented researchers tend to approach science as the system of knowledge and cognition that is formed in any human society, having its own specific sociocultural features in each respective case. While each of these two approaches undoubtedly has its own methodological potential, in order to provide such a diverse field of studies with a common ground, it would be necessary to balance them with a third aspect. We argue that this balancing role, since both common for all mankind and unique for every culture, could be played by Heidegger’s conceptualisation of science as “the theory of the real”.Practical significance. In order to avoid a pluralism of incompatible theories, it is important to continually pose the question “what is the object of study when conducting a sociological study of various scientific phenomena?” – as well as to understand the “limits of applicability” of the particular interpretation of science on which basis sociological analysis proceeds.

Fires as a socio-environmental threat in the minds of students from southern Russia

2020 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 49-63
Author(s):  
Vera V. Diakova ◽  
Ekaterina V. Kargopolova ◽  
Nadezhda V. Dulina
Keyword(s):  
Fire Safety ◽  
Safety System ◽  
Point Of View ◽  
Sociological Research ◽  
Russian Society ◽  
Sociological Analysis ◽  
Sociological Study ◽  
Resource Saving ◽  
Ecological Consciousness ◽  
Environmental Threat

The issues of understanding environmental pollution factors, their prevention and reduction of harmful consequences are relevant both for public discussions and for scientific analysis. This article focuses on the significant experience of scientific research of environmental problems, as there is a tendency to form the ecological consciousness of the world community. The main purpose of this article is to analyze fires as an environmental threat through sociological analysis. The authors explain the relevance of this issue of preventing and minimizing the consequences of fires, as well as improving the fire safety system, both from the point of view of Russia’ contemporary development and through the prism of the necessity for a sociological understanding of these processes and phenomena. The authors highlight the main directions of a sociological research of this phenomenon: formation and development of ecological consciousness; a systemic sociological analysis of specific situations; fire safety sociology through the prism of macro- (as a resource-saving system of society) and microsociology (the level of social groups, applied aspects of implementation and improvement of fire safety. The authors refer to the results of a specific sociological study (initiated by the Russian society of sociologists) conducted among students of Russian higher education institutions. Their responses are analyzed and compared with the all-Russian indicators, including the official statistics on the causes of fires, damage and destruction of forest areas, results of content analysis of the news feed, and official information about the area of forest areas. In conclusion, the authors highlight the importance of further studies of the anthropogenic factor in the framework of this environmental threat and the role of man in the fire safety system. This may help in understanding the process of formation and development of environmental consciousness.

Sociology, theories of

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jeffrey C. Alexander
Keyword(s):  
Social Action ◽  
Social Life ◽  
Sociological Theory ◽  
Empirical Processes ◽  
Sociological Research ◽  
Fundamental Properties ◽  
History Of ◽  
1960S And 1970S ◽  
Post War ◽  
The 1960S

Throughout the history of sociology, three types of theorizing have co-existed, sometimes uneasily. ‘Theories of’ provide abstract models of empirical processes; they function both as guides for sociological research and as sources for covering laws whose falsification or validation is intended to provide the basis for a cumulative science. ‘Presuppositional studies’ abstract away from particular empirical processes, seeking instead to articulate the fundamental properties of social action and order; meta-methodological warrants for the scientific investigation of societies; and normative foundations for moral evaluations of contemporary social life. ‘Hermeneutical theory’ addresses these basic sociological questions more indirectly, by interpreting the meanings and intentions of classical texts. The relation between these three forms of theorizing varies historically. In the post-war period, under the institutional and intellectual influence of US sociologists like Parsons and Merton, presuppositional and hermeneutical issues seemed to be settled; ‘theories of’ proliferated and prospects seemed bright for a cumulative, theoretically-organized science of society. Subsequent social and intellectual developments undermined this brief period of relative consensus. In the midst of the crises of the 1960s and 1970s, presuppositional and hermeneutical studies gained much greater importance, and became increasingly disarticulated from empirical ‘theories of’. Confronting the prospect of growing fragmentation, in the late 1970s and early 1980s there appeared a series of ambitious, synthetical works that sought to reground the discipline by providing coherent examples of how the different forms of sociological theory could once again be intertwined. While widely read inside and outside the discipline, these efforts failed in their foundational ambitions. As a result of this failure, over the last decade sociological theory has had diminishing influence both inside the discipline and without. Inside social science, economic and anthropological theories have been much more influential. In the broader intellectual arena, the most important presuppositional and hermeneutical debates have occurred in philosophy and literary studies. Sociological theorists are now participating in these extra-disciplinary debates even as they have returned to the task of developing ‘theories of’ particular institutional domains. The future of specifically sociological theory depends on reviving coherent relationships between these different theoretical domains.

THE PROBLEM OF SUICIDE IN THE SOCIOLOGICAL THEORY OF E. DURKHEIM

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Дмитрий Вячеславович Босов ◽  
Анастасия Владиславовна Яковлева
Keyword(s):  
Sociological Theory ◽  
Functional Results ◽  
Sociological Study ◽  
Starting Point ◽  
Main Ideas

Цель статьи: рассмотреть проблематику суицида в социологической теории Э. Дюркгейма. Методы: компаративистский, исторический, системный, структурно-функциональный. Результаты: выявлены основные идеи социологии суицида Э. Дюркгейма проявления. Выводы: Социологическое изучение суицида Э. Дюркгеймом стало отправной точкой для последующих теорий и концепции изучения суицида в социологии. Purpose of the article: to consider the problem of suicide in the sociological theory of E. Durkheim. Methods: comparative, historical, systemic, structural and functional. Results: the main ideas of the sociology of E. Durkheim's suicide manifestations were revealed. Conclusions: Sociological study of suicide by E. Durkheim became the starting point for subsequent theories and concepts of the study of suicide in sociology.

scholarly journals Do the Differences in Ideas about Social Action Influence Sociological Analysis? A Review Article

2021 ◽  
pp. 193-199
Keyword(s):  
Social Action ◽  
Max Weber ◽  
Review Article ◽  
Sociological Analysis ◽  
Sociological Study ◽  
Important Concept ◽  
Central Focus ◽  
Key Issues ◽  
Research Questions

This article reviews different thoughts of modern sociologists about social action to examine how the differences in the meaning of social action influence sociological analysis. This article also discusses the implication of these differences in the meaning of social action to sociological analysis. Four articles and two books of selected modern sociologists have been reviewed to explore the research questions of this article. This article finds that modern sociologists take social action as an important concept in sociological analysis. Classical sociologists, such as Max Weber, also suggest taking social action as a central focus in sociological study. This article observes that whether action is exerted based on structure or the actor’s self-interpreting power is one of the key issues in the ideas of modern sociologists.

scholarly journals Social mood of the residents of Moscow city at the beginning of the novel coronavirus pandemic (covid-19): possibilities of medical and sociological analysis

2020 ◽  
Vol 19 (1) ◽  
pp. 78-88
Author(s):  
Andrey V. Reshetnikov ◽  
N. V Prisyazhnaya ◽  
Sergey V. Pavlov ◽  
Nadezhda Y. Vyatkina
Keyword(s):  
Large Scale ◽  
Social Space ◽  
Structural Characteristics ◽  
Social Situation ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Economic Consequences ◽  
Sociological Research ◽  
Sociological Analysis ◽  
Sociological Study ◽  
Coronavirus Infection

A new coronavirus infection, which affected most countries in the world, besides the direct risk to the health and socio-economic well-being (stability) of the population, determined the large-scale coverage of states and societies with associated risks, including the observed transformation of social space, the increase in the phenomena of voluntary social isolation and encapsulation of part among the population, and the revision of the value of social ties. In temporal terms, the density of the observed changes in the social sentiments of society and the socio-structural characteristics of this period need both retrospective reflection and sociological analysis, as foresight analysis appears to be applicable to the current social situation. This study presents the results of a medical and sociological study (questionnaire survey), implemented during the beginning of the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic in Russia on a sample of residents of Moscow. According to the study, despite the high level of awareness of Muscovites about the immediate risk and consequences of the coronavirus infection on their health, the respondents are mainly concerned about the socio-economic consequences of the pandemic. At the same time, the ideas of the respondents about the post-pandemic world include a large-scale economic decline, a violation of the functionality of the health system, and an increase in social conflicts and social disunity in the society. The main difficulties of medical and sociological research (respondent recruitment and data collection) were determined by epidemiological conditions. The study toolkit was developed considering the main trends in the spread of infection in the country and the observed social sentiment of Russians, but the high dynamics of changes did not allow to cover a wider range of issues that became relevant for Muscovites in the self-isolation period (AprilMay), which determined the understanding of the need for a second wave of research (planned for autumn 2020).

Book Reviews: Essays on the History of British Sociological Research, Three Sociological Traditions, Macro Sociological Theory: Perspectives on Sociological Theory Vol. I, Micro Sociological Theory: Perspectives on Sociological Theory Vol. II, Powers and Liberties: The Causes and Consequences of the Rise of the West, Is Democracy Possible?, Talcott Parsons and the Capitalist Nation-State, G.H. Mead. A Contemporary Re-Examination of His Thought, Language, Structure and Reproduction. An Introduction to the Sociology of Basil Bernstein, Measuring Culture: A Paradigm for the Analysis of Social Organisation, Food in the Social Order, Classes, Annals of the Labouring Poor, Beyond Employment: Household, Gender and Subsistence, Women's Working Lives: Patterns and Strategies, On Women, Sexuality and Love, A Woman's Place, An Oral History of Working-Class Women 1890–1940, The Autobiography of the Working Class: An Annotated, Critical Bibliography. Volume 1: 1790–1900, The Sociology of Law, Legal Systems and Social Systems, The Politics of the Police, European Immigration Policy: A Comparative Study, The Elementary Forms of the New Religious Life, The Need for Religious Certainty: A Sociological Study of Conventional Religion, No Pope of Rome: Militant Protestantism in Modern Scotland, American Journal of Islamic Studies, Volume 1, No 1, 1984, Ancient Judaism, The Armenian Quarter of Jerusalem, Islamic Sociology, Categories of Medieval Culture, Science for Social Scientists, The Intellectual and Social Organization of the Sciences, Framing Science: The Making of a BBC Documentary

1986 ◽  
Vol 34 (3) ◽  
pp. 657-729
Author(s):  
John Eldridge ◽  
Duncan Mitchell ◽  
Derek Layder ◽  
C.E. Ashworth ◽  
Paul Hirst ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Working Class ◽  
Social Order ◽  
Sociological Theory ◽  
Social Systems ◽  
Sociological Research ◽  
Sociological Study ◽  
Ancient Judaism ◽  
History Of ◽  
Working Class Women ◽  
European Immigration

scholarly journals Social Functions of Clothes: Dress as an Object of Sociological Study

2015 ◽  
pp. 97-103
Author(s):  
Irina V. Trotsuk ◽  
Anastasia V. Morozova
Keyword(s):  
Conceptual Models ◽  
Historical Context ◽  
Sociological Research ◽  
Specific Task ◽  
Sociological Analysis ◽  
Sociological Study ◽  
Social Functions ◽  
Interdisciplinary Approaches ◽  
Semiotic Approach

Addresses the key interdisciplinary approaches to the study of clothes as well as basic conceptual models of the sociological analysis of dress. The authors believe that in any sociological research, it is not reasonable to use just one approach and argue that a combination of diverse approaches optimised for a specific task matches better. Nevertheless, the semiotic approach offers the most interesting and effective tools for the interpretation of clothes’ functions and codes in a changing cultural and historical context.

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