we call organizationSocial the phenomenon that allows for several distinct elements living in community. In addition to the basic social structure, there is the organization of a complex whole (society) divided into distinct parts (individuals). The management of these individual and subjectively different parts is the social organization. Social organization implies political, economic and social models that must ensure full functioning of order within a society.
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what is social organization
First, think about the animal world: among animals there is no law (except the law of nature), that is, there is no civil law. If there is no civil law, there is no civilization. If there is no civilization, nor human rationality, there is also no moral among the animals. Not having all these elements, there is no society but primitive community. There is also no economy, notions of values, distinction, exchanges, etc. In the absence of this set of elements in the animal world, the primitive community in which some species live is governed only by instincts and the law of nature. The human being is different.
The human being has developed language and reasoning. With that, community life (the primitive communities were the families and the clans) allowed the breaking of natural barriers with the development of moral laws, in coexistence laws and exchange between families. To anthropologist Franco-Belgian Claude Lévi-Strauss, the oldest exchange between families that allowed the formation of societies with more than one of them was marriage, as the most archaic societies no longer considered incest as something morally desirable.
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Based on this more complex formation, human beings began to develop new forms of coexistence, which required a gradualorganization to manage society as it grew. In the wake of this social development came politics; the notions of government, state, economy, value, and currency to facilitate commercial exchanges; and all the elements that constitute the current social formation.
Social organization is a complex set of factors that constitute societies in their political, economic and moral facets.
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Forms of social and political organization and the notion of the State
Societies have organized themselves in different ways over the centuries. THE notion of state appeared, still in the Antique, to meet the need for a social organization that encompassed a large number of individuals and underwent several changes over time. Furthermore, before the emergence of the State, there were other smaller social organizations that persist to this day, despite being embraced by the State, which is the larger organization.
In the beginning human beings were grouped by families, having in common the blood ties that united people in favor of protection and nutrition. Families began to grow, forming family unions, which were the clans. Here also begins the interfamilial exchange of members for the institution of marriage, as incest came to be perceived as something negative in this type of constitution.
The union of clans formed the tribes. From the tribes we saw the birth of cities, and with the cities, born to notion of politics and government. With them also came the sense of national and patriotic belonging based on origin and the land where citizens are born. We realized that the feeling of cohesion and organization evolved from the simple blood tie to the feeling of belonging to the same place.
Even with the development of the State, the family did not cease to exist, as it was the first form of socialization of individuals in existence. It is within the family that the primary socialization, which is the teaching of the first moral and social laws that the individual learns through affection. As they grow, the individual comes into contact with the secondary socialization, in which he gets to know other social institutions, such as schools, work and the State. In this form of socialization, affection is no longer enough, giving way to the teaching of civil laws and the norms of the rigid social structure.
When analyzing the forms of socialization and the organizations mentioned, we can see a change in roles throughout history, as each individual must play a paperSocial in the organizational model, and these roles change over time and society. The child, for example, was seen in the Ancient Greece, as a potential citizen who should learn all the education necessary to become a good citizen as an adult.
In Athens this learning was political and philosophical, while in Sparta he was military. already in Middle Ages and on Modern age, the child was seen as a kind of miniature adult, having to be taught and behave like a small adult. Only educational theories, which emerged from the mid-nineteenth and twentieth century, understand the child as a being singular, endowed with needs, rights, duties and wills different from the needs, rights, duties and wills of the adults. It is understood, therefore, that the social organization was changed and, with this, the social role played by the child in society also changed.
The role of women and men and the conception of gender also underwent changes over time and the society analyzed. At societypatriarchal traditionally, the man is the provider of food and protector of the family, while the woman is delegated the role of home care. For millennia, women were excluded from any activity outside the home, including politics. This situation began to change in the 18th century, when women from the lower classes began to work away from home, and the change became more noticeable in the 19th century, when they began to have access to politics.
The social configuration, especially in Western societies, has also changed with this insertion of women in the labor market and in the political, since before the care of the home and children was seen as an exclusive role of the mother, now it must be seen as a role of the mother and of Father.
THE change of family constitution is also noticeable. If before the family was considered the union through an affective bond between a man, a woman and their children, after divorce, sexual freedom and the possibility of marriage homoaffective, the family can be composed of a single mother, a single father, two fathers, two mothers, a couple without children, grandparents who take care of their grandchildren, among other constitutions. possible.
It is also possible to notice a change in the conception of state, since it appeared in Antiquity to the present day. When it emerged, the state was essentially theocratic (a state model that unites politics and a religious belief as inseparable bonds). Even in periods of democracy in ancient Greece or republic in classical rome, the Greco-Roman state was not secular (when there is a separation between government and religion). This model lasted until the beginning of Modernity, having a strong constitution in the Middle Ages, when the Catholic clergy and feudal lords nurtured strong pacts.
The conception of the State as we know it today only emerged in Modernity, when the Old Regime (monarchy based on National States and heir of the feudalism medieval) was questioned, giving rise to a new conception of the State based on democracy and a new notion of economy based on industrial capitalism and free trade.
The role of the state has changed: if before he was justified by deities and the government was a representation of God on Earth, his modern conception brought a new perspective, based on state democracy and the individual capacity to manage a state, for the rulers. This new configuration also resulted in new forms of social organization.
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social organization and culture
THE culture is the motto by which social organization is passed on to individuals. In a patriarchal society, for example, sexist and patriarchal culture is traditionally passed on as a way of learning for new generations. In a democratic society, culture should extol democracy so that new generations can learn to live in democratic environments.
Like the morals, the language, the religion and other cultural elements make up the cultural structure of a given people, these same elements are also responsible for contributing to the social organization of a society. Like culture is not fixed and rigid, changing according to place and time, it can be changed, which results in changing the social organization of societies.
by Francisco Porfirio
Sociology Professor
