Social Theory:
SOCL/ANTH 302
Georg Simmel
Georg Simmel 1858-1918
Born: Berlin, Germany
Family:
 Business-oriented
 Prosperous
 Jewish
How is society possible?
Sociologists
should focus on
people in relationships
Society--Patterned
interactions
among members of a group
Everyday Life
Began with the elements of
everyday life—
playing games
keeping secrets
being a stranger
forming friendships
Macro or Micro
Resisted
reducing social behavior to
individual personality
Social
relationships not fully explained
by larger collective patterns such as
“the economy.”
Interaction order
Everyday
interaction creates levels
of reality
“Interaction
Never
order”
totally fixed
Always problematic
Capable of change
Task of Sociology
Society
= A web of patterned
Interactions
Sociology’s
Study
Task
forms of interactions
Sociation
Society= Name for individuals
connected by interactions
Major
field of study: Sociation
Patterns
& Forms in which people
associate and interact
Formal Sociology
(Social Forms)
Forms
of Interaction
For
example:
Study of warfare and Study of marriage
Qualitatively different subjects
Essentially
similar interactive
forms in martial conflict and in marital
conflict
Formal Sociology
(Social Forms)
Behavior
displayed at Court of Louis
XIV
At Offices of American corporations
Study
forms of subordination and
superordination

Common patterns
Forms of Social Interaction
Social Processes
Conflict
and Cooperation
Subordination
and Superordination
Centralization
and Decentralization
Georg Simmel: Social Types
Simmel constructed a gallery of social types to
complement his inventory of social forms:
The
Stranger
The Mediator
The Poor
The Adventurer
The Man in the Middle
The Renegade
Georg Simmel: Social Types
The type is created through
relations with others who:
Assign him a particular position
Expect him to behave in specific
ways.
Social Types: “The stranger”
 Is
not just a wanderer
 “who comes today and goes tomorrow,”
 having no specific structural position.
 He
is a “person who comes today & stays
tomorrow…
 He is fixed within a particular spatial group…
 but his position…is determined…by the fact that
 he does not belong to it from the beginning,”
 and that he may leave again.
 The
stranger is “an element of the group itself”
 While not being fully part of it.
“
“The Stranger”
 He
therefore is assigned a role that no other
members of the group can play.
 By virtue of his partial involvement in group
affairs he can attain an objectivity that other
members cannot reach…
 Moreover, being distant and near at the same
time, the stranger will often be called upon as
a confidante…
 the stranger may be a better judge between
conflicting parties than full members of the
group since he is not tied to either of the
contenders…
Social Types: The Poor
Once
poor accept assistance
Removed
from preconditions of
previous status
Poverty
as special status
Assign people to “poor” category
They
are declassified
Private
issue
trouble becomes a public
The Poor
The
poor come to be viewed not by
what they do
But what is done to them
Society
creates social type of the poor
Assigns them a peculiar status that is
marked only by negative attributes
By what the status-holders do not have
Georg Simmel: Social Types
The
stranger and the poor, and
Simmel’s other types
Assigned
their positions by specific
interactive relations
Societal
 Must
creations
act assigned roles
Georg Simmel:
Dialectical Method
Sociation
involves:
 Harmony
and conflict
 Attraction and repulsion
 Love and hatred
Human
relations characterized by
ambivalence
Intimate
relations not only positive but
also negative sentiments
Georg Simmel:
Dialectical Method
Conflict
Strengthen
existing bonds
Establish new ones
Creative rather than destructive force
Georg Simmel:
Significance of Numbers
One
of most abstract characteristics of
a group:
Number
of participants
Georg Simmel:
Significance of Numbers
Dyad versus Triad
 Dyadic
relationship differs qualitatively from
other types of groups
1.Two participants confronted by only one
other
2. Dyad depends on each element
 Elements=people,
groups, countries
Georg Simmel:
The Significance of Numbers for Social Life
Dyad
-> Triad
 One
more element added brings major
qualitative change
 In
triad, as in all associations involving more
than two persons
 Each
participant confront possibility of
being outvoted by majority
Georg Simmel:
The Significance of Numbers for Social Life
 Triad
is simplest structure in which group
achieves domination over component
members
 Social framework for constraining individual
participants for collective purposes…
 Triad=Characteristics
 Freedom
of all social life:
and constraint
 Autonomy
and heteronomy
Georg Simmel:
The Significance of Numbers for Social Life
Third
member enters dyad,
 Processes
become possible that
previously could not take place
A third member may:
Mediate
Rejoice
Divide and Rule
The Philosophy of Money
Economic
exchange is form of social
interaction
When
monetary transactions replaced
barter
Changes
in forms of interactions
between social actors
The Philosophy of Money
Money
is subject to:
Precise division and manipulation
Permits exact measurement of
equivalents
Impersonal
in ways that objects of
barter, like crafts and shells, can never
be
The Philosophy of Money
Promotes
rational calculation in human
interactions
Increases
rationalization in modern
society
Replaces
personal ties with impersonal
relations
 Limited
to specific purpose
The Philosophy of Money
Abstract
calculation invades areas
of social life such as:
Kinship relations
Esthetic (artistic) appreciation
Previously
domain of qualitative
rather than quantitative appraisals
Contributions to Sociology
Micro
sociologist--Small-group
research
Form
rather than content of social
interaction
Study
of these interactions as primary
task of sociology
Contributions to Sociology
Began
inquiries from micro (individual)
 Observing
smallest social interactions
To
see how institutions (macro)
emerged from them
Differs
from other classic writers-Simmel returns to the individual