Practice question · Select all that apply
Which are social facts in Durkheim’s sense?
Hints
- The test is whether it exists outside any individual and constrains them.
- A private preference, however intense, is not external to the person holding it.
Show the answer
- B. The norm of shaking hands when meeting a client
- C. A country’s stable yearly marriage rate
- D. The persistent gender gap in engineering enrollment
Why
Social facts are external to any individual and coercive on all: rates, norms, and patterned gaps qualify. A private taste, however strong, binds no one else.
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