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GEORG SIMMEL (1858-1918):
THE FORMS OF SOCIAL LIFE
 

A. Society and Sociology

Sociology is the study of society, but what is society, and is it real? The central point is that society nor individual are real alone, neither one is thinkable without the other. Simmel wants to overcome the problems of both methodological individualism, stressing the primacy of the individual, and holism or sociologism, emphasizing the social. Nothing is real in the sense that it would refer to a single object, e.g. the individual is not an object of cognition but of experience, its intellectual knowledge is a synthesis, an abstraction. These abstractions are all real although they approach an object from different distances, related to, and justified by, their purposes. Sociology, as a method, focuses on people inasmuch as they form groups and are determined by their interactions.

Society, then, can be defined as a number of individuals connected by interaction. These interactions can become crystallized as permanent fields. These relationships, or forms of sociation, are crucial because they demonstrate that society is not a substance but an event, and because forms of sociation overcome the individual/social dualism (individuals engage with one another and thus constitute the social). Through sociation, particular phenomena are produced. These phenomena are of two kinds: 1) the simultaneous influence of interacting individuals, and 2) the succession of generations.

In sum, society is defined as a) a number of individuals connected by interaction, and b) the sum of these interactions, or the forms of relationship by virtue of which individuals are transformed into society in the first sense (Simmel is unclear about this, but tends more towards the latter definition).
 

B. Society and Individual: General, Formal, and Philosophical Sociology

Simmel distinguishes general, formal and philosophical sociology. Sociology is a point of view, and these various kinds of sociology indicate different viewpoints.

1. General Sociology

the study of the whole of historical life insofar as it is societally formed

The facts of social life can be studied in terms of their historical materiality, their contents, i.e. in terms of their development within and by social groups over time. Historical developments can be perceived in different terms, but they all present a particular frame of analysis from the objective, individual (subjective), and/or social point of view. The social viewpoint is obviously the one that concerns sociology, though the link with the other ones is unavoidable. Here appear the problems of social evolution (e.g. Durkheim: from organic to mechanical solidarity), group power, or the value relations between collectivity and individuality.

2. Formal or Pure Sociology

the study of the societal forms themselves

Formal or pure sociology abstracts the mere element of sociation from social life, it isolates the form from its different manifestations in historical contents (which were traced through general sociology, e.g. the form of the division of labor in 19th century capitalism). Form and content are relatively autonomous: the forms of life must be distinct from their content since groups with different content (referring to the relatively variable "what" of social life) may exhibit similar or even identical forms, and the form (referring to the relatively stable "how" of social action) of groups can differ though their contents are the same. Behind every social formation there are forces at work which should be isolated from the content of their manifestation, and their analysis points to the value of abstract, pure or formal sociology. (Thus, the wide variety of topics discussed by Simmel [fashion, law, space, women, poverty, secrecy, the city, art, etcetera] is not surprising).

3. Philosophical Sociology

the study of the epistemology and metaphysics of society

Philosophical sociology concerns two areas of research: a) the fundamental concepts and presuppositions of research, i.e. the epistemology of the special social sciences engaged in the study of any one particular manifestation of social life, and b) the concepts and presuppositions of knowledge, the metaphysics of the matters discussed in the special social sciences. These are not empirical questions of research or thought, but they always underlie them. Note that Simmel here often confused ontology and intellectual history.

! A Note on Sociation

Sociation is the crucial subject matter of Simmel’s (formal) sociology. This concept indicates: - that everything in social life is related, interacts with everything else (Wechselwirkung); - this order of interaction is dynamic, and society is experienced to be in flux and transitory; - concepts should be relational (e.g. form con only be elucidated with reference to content). Society, in previous sociologies (e.g. Spencer) is a totality assumed to have a particular pattern of evolution. This is not so; society is constituted by the totality of forms of interaction that make people societal; sociation refers to the forms around which people crystallize their interests. Simmel’s object of sociology became society as sociation (words he came to use interchangeably).

Note the contrast with Durkheim: Durkheim conceived society as a system of active forces operating upon individuals; for Simmel, society is seen as formal interactions between individuals. In interaction, people occupy a role, their individuality is constituted, and together it forms a structure. In addition, people are aware of this process (the consciousness of sociation).

Forms of sociation can be divided in a) social processes: the relatively stable and simple configurations of social interaction (e.g. the secret society); b) social types: the typical characteristics of the persons engaged in interaction (e.g. the stranger); and c) developmental patterns: the complex and diachronic forms of interaction (taken from Levine).

C. Examples of General, Formal, and Philosophical Sociology

1. Example of General Sociology: The Social and the Individual Level

The individual and the group level are different with regard to one fact: this is the possibility of separating in the individual the qualities by which he forms the group, and the qualities constitute his private nature, individuality. The force of tradition (the old) is explained by the fact that it is most deeply rooted in the individual as group member, the appeal of the new is explained by the same valuation, namely it is more valued by the individual as individual. Therefore, both similarities and differences between individuals are significant. However, in modern times, the values of individuality and the new are rated higher. The mass combines therefore not all individuals but only those parts of them which coincide between all it members.

Consequently, mass behavior is a kind of lowest common denominator: at the level of intellect, the mass shows only one, simple idea, the individual is allowed more creativity in thought. Therefore, what holds the mass together must be what is shared by all, even the poorest (stupidest) of its members. At the level of emotions, however, the social is stronger than the individual (e.g. mass excitement, mass hysteria, and mass enthusiasm). Note that the mass is not the average but tends towards the lowest value (counter-forces prevent it from reaching the bottom), and that higher placed people cannot always descend to lower levels.

2. Example of Formal Sociology: Sociability

Formal or pure sociology, as said before, focuses on the societal forms. The content or material of sociation refers to individual’s interests and drives which mediate effects upon others. These materials are not social but when they are transformed into forms of interaction, they are a factor of sociation. Sociation is the form in which individuals interact to satisfy their interests. Then the original interest that brought the forms into existence can be transformed into a new reality (e.g. laws are created because of certain interests, but once created, it is no longer a means to an ends but determines itself how social life should be shaped, a sort of dialectical reification). So then, first, the materials determine the forms of social life, and, then, the forms determine the materials (dialectics).

The same process happens in society, and the result is that forms gain their own life, freed from contents, existing for its own sake, and this is sociability, i.e. the satisfactory feeling of being sociated regardless of the material motivations, it is the play-form of sociation (note that in German sociability refers to both association and coziness).

Some characteristics of sociability: - tact, as a regulatory principle, limits all motives other than the sociation itself since these would militate against interaction (e.g. status); - discretion prevents individuals from crossing the sociability thresholds, that is either only holding on to objective purposes or to one’s subjective aspects; - the democratic nature of sociability, as sociability’s drive, is played to suggest total equality; - sociability is artificial because its symmetry and balance are stylized expressions; this is manifested in games, where society is played, in coquetry, whereby the woman moves between yes and no while the man appreciates this movement in itself; in sociable conversations, i.e. fascinating, non-instrumental talk, in sociable ethics, the ways in which individual and collective are merged; - the superficiality of sociability, finally, exemplifies the fact that it plays social life and yet remains related to it.

3. Example of Philosophical Sociology:
Individual and Society in 18th and 19th Century Views of Life

The basic problem of any society is the conflict between social forces and the individual, because, first, the social is inherent to every individual and, second, social and individual elements may collide in the individual. The conflict between society, striving to fully integrate the individual, and the individual, resisting this drive, is insoluble. This problem should not be conceived as an egoism-altruism dichotomy (Durkheim): the perfection of the individual constitutes an objective value irrespective of its (in)significance for other individuals, even for the individual him/herself. This objective human value may even collide with society as a whole: the (deeper) human values have a merely accidental relation to the (actual) social values. Likewise, personal values are autonomous from their social entanglements: the attitude of personal life can differ from the success of individual action, in other words, existence is qualitatively different from its particular effects. This double struggle of the individual with society, not to transcend it in a more general nor more individual fashion, is the basis of the philosophies of individual freedom.

In the 18th Century, the philosophy of individualism is well captured in the slogan of the French Revolution: "liberty, equality and fraternity". The unacceptable social forms of the Ancien Regime (18th century dictatorship) lead to the ideal of individual liberty as the "natural" state of (wo)man. But, of course, this would lead to exploitation by the privileged, so that freedom would lead to inequality (unless economic equality is achieved by means of socializing the means of production, as is proposed in socialism). Therefore, a third element is brought in: fraternity, which should balance freedom and equality. In 18th century philosophy, freedom is seen as natural or law-like so that any particular individual (and his/her liberty) is captured within the more general pattern of humanity "as such": the antinomy between freedom and equality is in the individual seen as general humanity (cf. Kant: what the ego conceives is real; cf. Rousseau: be yourself to be more than yourself). The "pure" (wo)man is manifested (more or less) in every individual. Therefore, "act in such a way that the principles guiding your actions can be valid for everybody" (Kant’s categorical imperative).

In the 19th Century, the abstract conception of individualism in the 18th Century could not be maintained, and split up in two ways: a) equality without freedom versus b) freedom without equality. (a) In socialism, equality comes first, but for this to be achieved without completely destroying freedom (of the entrepreneur for instance), the equality of the proletariat must be seen as freedom. In practice this cannot be maintained: inequalities will always remain (e.g. because there are more people qualified to take up important positions than there are positions). Socialism is doomed to fail. (b) Individualism comes first, now also to distinguish the individual from all other individuals, either to realize that s/he is like all others (we’re all the same), or to bear an extreme solitude (I am not you), the latter can even be thought of as the ultimate, moral goal of (wo)man as the strive for complete uniqueness. Together with the individualism of the 18th Century (free personality), this individualism (of differentiated personality) manifested itself in the economic principles of, respectively, free competition and the division of labor.
 

D. Quantitative Aspects of the Group

1. On the Significance of Numbers for Social Life

Groups are quantitatively determined in two ways: some developments can only take place below or above a particular number of elements, and some developments are imposed upon the group by its quantitative modifications.

Small groups: only in small groups does socialism stand a chance (otherwise, differentiations are inevitable). Sects too require the cohesiveness of small groups, and aristocracies need the "surveyability" of all elements in small groups (the transition to larger groups means the extinction of small groups, cf. state formation).

Large groups: they are always guided by simple ideas accessible to everybody, though in reality they operate with great complexity. Small groups are more radical in the sense that they require unreserved devotion of every member; larger groups can allow some heterogeneity of elements without the danger of breaking up. Also, as a correlate to the face-to-face cohesiveness of small groups, large groups resort to offices, laws, representations and symbols. For instance, compare custom and law: custom is the undifferentiated "normative as such" and evolves into both morality and law. Morality is what develops in the ego (the individuality of the ideal "I ought to" which is part of the "I am"); law is its correlate in society (the "we ought to" to which the individual is subjected). Custom stands in between both; a breach of custom mobilizes the small group, while legal violations provoke the whole society. However, the law of society does not have to be as all-encompassing as custom, because the large group only requires the law as far as it forms a unity, which is a matter of degree.

2. The Quantitative Determination of Group Divisions and of Certain Groups

Moving beyond the small-large group division, some observations can be made. In numerical equal subdivisions, the number operates as a classificatory principle within a whole. The subdivisions are composed of related or supplementary elements. The numerical division here constitutes the principle of classification. Numbers can also be used to characterize a group within a larger group (e.g. the top ten). The number is the symbol for group division, and its members are defined solely on the basis of that number. This division by numbers only becomes increasingly important in large groups, where the individual becomes less important than the whole. The example of the party further shows the relevance of the number. A party is only a party depending on the relationships between host and guests, between guests, and how these relations are interpreted. Note that the more people come together, the less they can share any sophisticated things, they instead share at a lower level (food and drink). Generally, the more people come together, the more it will lead to something intrinsically different (quantity shifts lead to qualitative changes). Groups have their own responsibilities which an individual member could not bear. Numbers also matter for the extended family, and so on.

3. The Isolated Individual and the Dyad

More definite conclusions can be reached from looking at the simple structures, i.e. one, two or three people. First, isolation is not just the individual in solitude, but it implies the rejection of society (often in a group). It exist in the individual but it expresses a relation with the group. Freedom, therefore, is not being alone; freedom is drawn with respect to a group, as a matter of degree, and often dependent on a person’s power. Second, the dyad is the simplest form of sociation, between two people upon which it is entirely dependent. The dyad is trivial and intimate. The marriage is a desire for fusion and, once a child is born, the illusion of that fusion. A third person coming in destroys the dyad, and it becomes a triad. Then superordination and subordination completely change.

4. The Triad

Triads consist of three people or three parties (consisting of more than three people). The role of the third is crucial, because the third can mediate (verbally or by gesture) between the other two since he stand above the conflicting interests or is equally concerned with both interests. The third can also arbitrate, i.e. make a final decision. Note that Simmel feels that "if one wants to understand the real web of human society..., the most important thing is to sharpen one’s eye for such beginnings and transitions". The third can also be a tertius gaudens, i.e. someone who profits from the other two’s interactions, e.g. checking them out. An example is a buyer and two or more producers. of course, as soon as the other two merge (form a trust), the third looses its advantage. The third can also create conflicts between the two others and prohibit them from uniting and so becoming stronger (the divide and rule principle).
 

E. Superordination and Subordination

Introduction
These are the key ideas of Simmel’s analysis of superordination and subordination:

1) Domination is a form of interaction. Even in the most extreme forms of subordination, there is some personal freedom. These are therefore societal forms.

2) Authority denotes authoritative behavior that can become objective or supra-individual, as well as the fact that the supra-individual power may vest a person with authority. Prestige is individual and has no supra-individual objectivity.

3) The leader and the led are intertwined in sociation by means of reciprocity; they do not exclude each other, on the contrary, they imply one another.

4) Interaction is important for the idea of law. There can be no reciprocity between ruler and ruled when the ruler is chosen on the basis of a mutual contract between the ruled. In this case there is no reciprocity. There must be confrontation to have interaction, and therefore "the tyranny of a group over its own members is worse than that of a prince over his subjects" (relate to informalism in social control, cf. there is no third with which a reciprocal relationship is established).

1. Subordination under an Individual

Superordination can be exerted by an individual, a group, or an objective, social or ideal, force. Subordination of a group under an individual results in a unification, a close bonding of the group (around or against the leader). Examples: sects have a strong cohesion based on their relationship to god. The leader, which can be a plurality of leaders, is the cause of cohesion.

When groups have a common enemy, their cohesion is even stronger (see Lewis Coser). Often group dynamics show both the need for, and the antagonism toward, leadership: obedience and opposition are two sides of one human attitude. However, subordination under one leader can also lead to group conflicts. This is a threshold phenomenon: antagonisms between groups stabilizes their relationships up to a certain point (e.g. dominated groups have a tendency to come together, and this can intensify group conflicts). Group conflicts, however, are more easily removed when these groups have a common leader, a higher power which they share.

Levelling of the group, i.e. the abolition or non-existence of differences between its members, maintains the power of the leader (the despot rules by virtue of equality). Individual members of a group put only a little part of their personality in the group (by virtue of their decomposition of personality), and how smaller this input, how easier it is for the ruler to rule. Gradation can also lead to unification, namely when the group members are organized like a pyramid, with the ruler on top.. Gradation occurs bottom up or top down. An overturn of power actually often preserves the structures of superordination (e.g. French revolution).

2. Subordination under a Plurality

The relationships between a plurality of leaders and their subordinates are uneven depending on the structures of their relations. Individual needs are usually not taken into account, while an appeal to objective conditions (e.g. law) is often effective under a plurality of leaders. Masses are lower in intellect, they are susceptible to irrational, spontaneous actions.

The subordination under a plurality may be total, and the individual is confronted by different demands (the tension is insoluble). The subordination under a plurality is relative when the individual can switch from one to the other. The plurality of superordinates can also be stratified, so that a middle power stands between the upper power and the subordinates (hostile to both).

A special case of subordination is the outvoting of a minority. As a member of a community, the individual who joins in the vote submits to the subordination to the majority, as a consequence of social membership. Outvoting does not threaten the whole when there is this sense of supra-individuality, but when it is missing, unanimity becomes imperative for the continuation of the whole. Simmel notes that the subjection to majority can be irrational in the sense that the majority can be wrong (it is a subjection based on dogma). Note how there is dissent (the will of the minority) but it does not weaken the group; outvoting reflects the dualism between a person’s group membership and his personal individuality.

3. Subordination under a Principle

This is the dominant modern principle of subordination: people subject to an objective law, not to leaders. It is depersonified subordination. Subordination by principle can also take the form of a concrete object (e.g. the land). These relationships translate in the individual’s consciousness: the group wants what the individual wants (socialization), but the power of obligation stems from the super-personal validity, an objective reality (reification). Actually, society stand between individual and objectivity, society is general. The objectivity arises out of society, its generality. In the end, justice, for instance, appears as an objective relationship, it transcend the individual as well as the social. Actually, the power of the superordinate can also become objective, e.g. the will of the King becomes law, and then he must himself subject to that objectivity. Both superordinates and subordinates stand under an objective force (e.g. the force of the contract).

4. Superordination, Subordination, Domination and Freedom

There can be groups which have no subordinates, and the group itself is superordinate (e.g. vis-a-vis a former enemy, there is no interaction yet there is superordination). There is actually a fundamental will to substitute superordination for freedom, this is done either by wanting to destroy the sociological form of superordination, or by seeking benefits within that form, i.e. lower start climbing up to the higher (the latter instance seems more common to Simmel, and goes completely against Marx).

Freedom and domination are dialectically related; differences among men are natural (against socialism and anarchism). For Simmel, superordination and subordination should be reciprocal over time; people are dependent on eachother vis-a-vis an objectified from of domination (e.g. the prince acquires a general character; the position in a division of labor is objective, and it is separated from the person). Coercion is important because of its form; it keeps people together (formal functionality of coercion), it is an irreplaceable support. The structures of superordination, to Simmel, seem mostly just because more people are qualified to take up the highest positions, hence the best take them. The pyramidal structure of classification is a solution to the discrepancy between qualifications and the limitations on the satisfying of those qualifications (compare to Durkheim who says that norms limit people’s passions, while Simmel says it’s the forms that do this).
 

F. The Secret and the Secret Society

1. Knowledge, Truth and Falsehood

Knowledge in significant in interaction, first, because one has to know who one deal with. This knowledge is a standpoint depending on the interaction, the positions we’re in, and this knowledge in turn affects the relationship. In our knowledge of reality, we can make errors. the knowledge of objects differs from that of people because people can choose to lie, i.e. conceal the truth about them. People select the relevant fragments of their thoughts to be revealed. These are not lies: a lie is a purposeful deception. Large, modern societies are fundamentally based on the truthfulness of its actors, but a certain amount of lying is not entirely negative. This indicates the relevance of trust or confidence: not everything can be known, so it must be assumed that they will do this or that.

Different groups can be distinguished based on the reciprocity of knowledge between their members. In interest groups, this reciprocal knowledge is not important, because, and as long as, members perform towards the interest that binds them. Several social forms can be classified according to the amount of knowledge involved; e.g. acquaintance: merely the other’s existence is acknowledged; discretion: respect for the other’s secret; friendship and love: a strive for total intimacy (but usually one focuses on one or the other aspect of the person); marriage: modern marriages are directed by love and sex, but there is an amount of discretion involved otherwise there would be nothing left to discover.

2. Secrecy and the Secret Society

The secret, as the hiding of realities, is one of man’s greatest achievements, it creates a second world and thus enlarges social life. People are fascinated by secrecy (I know something you don’t know) as well as by betrayal (I will tell you something you don’t know). Note that in modern society, more is known of general affairs and hardly anything of personal things. Note on adornment that it is twofold, namely giving another person joy and a wish to be enjoyed, a wish for the joy to flow back (it is typically a property of women; men have weapons).

The secret society (i.e. the group’s existence is a secret, or the membership in a known group is a secret) has the purpose of protection through confidence. The group can conceal itself, i.e. its existence is a secret, because it is just formed or because it is threatened in its existence. The confidence among its members is essential, they must preserve the secret, but this situation is unstable. Silence is a necessary technique to keep a secret, while written communication is opposed to all secrecy (e.g. letters).

Secrecy can be the purpose of a social formation (e.g. the secret society), and sociation prevents people from disclosing the secret since it counterbalances the isolation which results from keeping a secret. Secret societies are hierarchical (division of labor), because they are built (they do not grow) purposely in this fashion. Therefore, secret societies have specific rituals, which must be carried out and which must be guarded as a secret; it claims the individual, makes him member of the secret society. Secret societies also have a degree of freedom which is missing in society at large; the secret society compensates for this lack of freedom in general society. Compared to sociation in general, secret societies are separate, formal, and conscious; they have complicated systems of signs which secure inner cohesion and seclusion from the outside; its members feel superior, and are initiated to materially and formally establish their seclusion from society; they are egoistic in terms of the secret society and hostile towards the general society; secret societies have very strong bonds, they exclude inner conflicts, and they are centralized (blind obedience to the leaders); the members are de-individualized, equal, anonymous, and because they essentially refuse the unifying attempt of government in society at large, they appear as dangerous.
 

G. Some Cultural Studies of Modernity

1. Faithfulness and Gratitude

Faithfulness is a mode of conduct, a psychic state of the individual, and it is necessary for the existence of society. It ensures that relationships are maintained beyond the purposes that originated them. Faithfulness is not directed towards a person, it is directed at the relationship; it stabilizes the fluctuations in relationships and mediates tensions (it secures the interactions’ formal stability). This makes gratitude and faithfulness sociological matters: they sustain sociation. Specifically, gratitude ensures the reciprocity of relations, a means of inner coercion by absence of external coercion.

2. Masses and The Stranger

Masses are negative, they prohibit because it unifies them more easily. The observance of norms is not that important, but the violation of a norm can be an impetus for exclusion from the group.

A stranger is not part of a group, and can therefore be more objective, because of the peculiar distance and nearness vis-a-vis the group. The stranger stays unique, no matter how much they interact with the group, they never interact in the group.

4. The Metropolis and Mental Life

The city affects people’s psychic lives because of the intensification of nervous stimulations, it calls for punctuality, calculability and exactness. This dominance of the intellect is related to the money economy, since both are unresponsive to the individuality of persons. Objective culture at the same time calls for a personal subjectivity, cf. the blase attitude. All qualities are reduced to quantities, all relations are characterized by distrust and indifference. But it also allows for freedom, since the ability to control each and every person is weakened; the objective spirit takes over from the subjective spirit. People are overwhelmed by objective culture, but at the same time this makes them want to be unique, it stimulates their need to seek individuality. Not the general human attitude secures the individual’s freedom (see above, 18th century), but the individual’s uniqueness and independence.

Literature:

(1900) The Philosophy of Money
(1908) Soziologie
(1917) Individual and Society

See also: Mathieu Deflem. 2003. The Sociology of the Sociology of Money: Simmel and the Contemporary Battle of the Classics. Journal of Classical Sociology 3(1).

 

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