Week 8 - Anomie Theory (Strain Theory)

Question 1

What is the Anomie theory?

Answer 1

When disruption occurs

breakdown of social norms

When those norms no longer control societal members

Question 2

What is the prodcut of Anomie?

Answer 2

• Social components that work together become isolated
• Complex industrial society
• Evolution of society causes imbalance

Question 3

Who is Emile Durkheim & what did he believe

Answer 3

He is a French philosopher and one of the first sociologist

Family becoming less important than the state (the main goal was to make money, not about if your family was happy)

Individuals as a product of society

Saw society as evolving

Saw social statistics as real “facts”

Question 4

What is Durkheim view of social history?

Answer 4

Through industrial development, society evolved from a simple form , (mechanical) to a complex (organic) form

Using land for what it provides

Working as a collective society as opposed to an individualistic society

Question 5

What changes disrupt society’s balance

Answer 5

• Upsets the balance of unity
• Organic societies have a continual state of Anomie (The community is always stuck in a state of not having what they need for a happy and fulfilling life)

Question 6

What did Durkheim’s books focus on Anomie?

Answer 6

Focus on social conditions (rules lose value)

Anomie is represented by high rates of suicide, crime and deviance

Question 7

What is the social heritage of Merton’s Theory

Answer 7

Great depression
- Depicted presence of anomie in society

UCR
- Enough crime statistics collected to compare crime rates among groups; lower-class had higher crime rates

Question 8

What is the intellectual heritage of Anomie Theory?

Answer 8

• Sorokin & Simpson’s translations of Durkheim’s work
• Chicago School vs East Coast sociology
• Parson’s grand theory (structural functionalist ideas, suggested rates of crime in society need to be explained, not individual crime)

Question 9

What is Merton’s Anomie Theory

Answer 9

• Uses rates of crime, and suicide and attempts to explain them (never meant to focus on the individual criminality)
• Societal-level events explain how changes affect groups (classes) of people
• A theory of deviance

Question 10

What are the foundations of the Anomie Theory?

Answer 10

It focused on embedded social structure and cultural differences in society.

social disconnection between goals and means of society

Question 11

What are the definitions of goals and means?

Answer 11

Goals: What one should strive for (money)

Means: Ways of attaining goals (approved and not)

Question 12

Anomie and the American Dream

Answer 12

Society tells us what to achieve but not everyone has access to socially approved means

The social class pyramid keeps the poor at bottom

Question 13

What are Merton’s modes of adaption?

Answer 13

Deviance is created in a way people adapt to inability to reach goals or to lack access to means

There are 5 modes of adaption and all of them are forms of deviance

1. Conformity
2. innovation
3. Ritualism
4. Retreatism
5. Rebellion

Question 14

Conformity

Answer 14

Accepts all goals and means; the most common adaptation

True conformity is NOT a mode of adaption and will result when both the goals and means are available (wealthy)

Question 15

Innovation

Answer 15

Criminals believe in their goals but participate in different means to achieve that goals for example academic misconduct.

Most crime is this type

Question 16

Ritualism

Answer 16

Follows the same path as a society, but does not have the same end goal as a society

For example bureaucrat

Question 17

Retreatism

Answer 17

People who just give up and retreat from society, do not actively participate in society, for example, homeless people, drug addicts, and alcoholics

Was seen as the most uncommon but now more common

Question 18

Rebellion

Answer 18

Replaces original goals and means

Hippie

Question 19

What is absolute deprivation?

Answer 19

People are in absolute poverty

Keeping up with the Jones

Question 20

How are Durkheim and Merton’s theories of anomie different?

Answer 20

Merton - Focused on the ability of the social system to exercise the control of social norms

Durkehims - Focused on social conditions in a society where rules lost their value

Question 21

What is the classification of anomie theory?

Answer 21

• Positivist
• Consensuses
• Structural
• Macro theory
• Functionalist theory (desirable to explain a social event)