Practice question · Multiple choice
Durkheim argued that modern society does not destroy social cohesion but transforms its basis. What follows from this distinction when contrasting his view with Tönnies's account of Gesellschaft?
Hints
- Does organic solidarity represent an absence of solidarity, or a different structure of mutual need?
- How does Durkheim's view of modern law reflect social cohesion rather than mere self-interest?
Show the answer
B. Specialisation creates interdependencies that sustain genuine moral ties
Why
Tönnies viewed Gesellschaft as a shift toward purely instrumental, individualistic relations. Durkheim countered that differentiation in organic solidarity generates a new form of genuine moral cohesion through mutual reliance, rather than a mere loss of social solidarity.
Practise The European Consolidation: Durkheim, Weber and Tönnies
The app has 5 more questions on this lesson, and keeps your place in the course. Sociology I is free to start.
More questions on The European Consolidation: Durkheim, Weber and Tönnies
- Durkheim defined a social fact by three properties. Which of the following are those properties, as set out…
- Complete the account of Tönnies’s pair of concepts.
- Durkheim held that a social fact must be explained by another social fact, while Weber held that sociology…
- Match each of Weber’s three types of legitimate domination to the ground on which obedience rests.
- Arrange the steps of Durkheim’s argument from population growth to a new kind of social bond.
- In which year did Durkheim publish The Rules of Sociological Method?
- Parsons translated Weber’s phrase stahlhartes Gehäuse as "iron cage", and later scholars have proposed "a…
- Estimate how many years separate the publication of Tönnies’s Gemeinschaft und Gesellschaft from Max Weber’s…
- Arrange these classical works by date of publication, earliest first.