SOCI 3340 Lecture Notes - Lecture 3: Political Sociology, Alexis De Tocqueville, Feudalism
26 Nov 2017
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Cleavages: different groups in conflict with each other: political ex. Trade unions within industries or social institutions, political left and right interms of political values: economic worker/owner, working class/professional, religious (catholics/protestant, urban/rural, social, environment, wo(cid:373)e(cid:374)"s (cid:396)ights, racial conflict. Cross-cutting cleavages: individuals at different sides on different cleavages. The central problem proper balance between conflict and consensus. The basis of political sociology theorists: marx, tocqueville, weber, michels. Marx saw conflict and consensus as alternatives and not as divergent tendencies that could be balanced. His conception of the political system he projected was not institutionalized democracy but anarchy. His conception of the harmonious future society included the end of division of labour, for elimination of differentiation of roles in the economic spheres of life would eliminate the major source of social conflict. Ma(cid:396)(cid:454)"s theory has no place for democracy under communism. It has two mutually exclusive social types: a society of conflict, and a society of harmony.
