Durkheim: Division of Labour and Civilization

Contents

Civilization is itself the necessary consequence of the changes which are produced in the volume and in the density of societies. If science, art, and economic activity develop it is in accordance with a necessity which is imposed upon men. It is because there is, for them, no other way of living in the new conditions in which they have been placed. From the time that the number of individuals among whom social relations are established begins to increase, they can maintain themselves only by greater specialization, harder work, and intensification of their faculties. From this general stimulation, there inevitably results a much higher degree of culture. From this point of view, civilization appears, not as an end which moves people by its attraction for them, not as a good foreseen and desired in advance, of which they seek to assure themselves the largest possible part, but as the effect of a cause, as the necessary resultant of a given state. It is not the pole towards which historic development is moving and to which men seek to get nearer in order to be happier or better, for neither happiness nor morality necessarily increases with the intensity of life. They move because they must move, and what determines the speed of this march is the more or less strong pressure which they exercise upon one another, according to their number

“Pleasure” describes the local, limited, momentary state of a particular function, while “happiness” describes the health of the physical and moral species in its entirety, the extent to which that species has realized its true nature. Thus, the normal savage is just as happy as the normal civilized man, but also by the rapid rise in the suicide rate commensurate with the advance in civilization, a phenomenon in which Durkheim already had a powerful interest.

Joy may be temporary, but happiness is permanent. But in happiness there is always some degree of pleasure. If civilization is used correctly, it can see the happiness in us, because happiness is not in the civilization of man, it can only be prophesied by people, or a smartphone cannot be happy alone, but whoever has it can get some satisfaction or happiness. Use it to contact friends and research a teacher's mission.

DIVISION OF LABOUR AND THE ‘HAPPINESS HYPOTHESIS’

Durkheim’s inquiry into causes rehearsed his earlier analysis of functions; for, just as the earlier discussion began with Durkheim’s rejection of Adam Smith’s argument that the function of the division of labour was the advancement of civilization, so the later discussion began with a negative assessment of that “classic” explanation, attributed to political economy in general, whereby the cause of the division of labour would be “man’s unceasing desire to increase his happiness.”

Durkheim rejects the fact that the function or cause of the division of labor is the advancement of human civilization. This was especially true of a proposal from Adam Smith. He also denies that the cause of the division of labor is man's incessant desire or happiness. Durkheim points out that the intensity of any pleasant stimulus can only usefully increase (that is, contribute to greater pleasure) between two extremes. For example, an increase in monetary wealth must be of a certain magnitude for pleasure to result; conversely, a person who is thoroughly habituated to large increases in wealth estimates the value of such increases accordingly, and is equally denied the pleasure in proportion to the stimulus received. The increase in income experienced by the man of average wealth is therefore more likely to produce a measure of pleasure commensurate with his cause. From the above quote from Robert Alun's analysis of Durkheim, it is therefore evident that

 If the cause of the division of labour were the desire for happiness, therefore, social evolution would surely have come to a stop long ago; for the maximum happiness of which men are capable would have been achieved through a relatively moderate development of social differentiation and its resulting stimuli

According to the quote above, the desire for happiness cannot be the cause of the division of labour. If that were the case, social evolution would have come to an end a long time ago. Because man would have long ago obtained the happiness he desires through a low level of social differentiation. Robert Alun Jones reiterates that this claim that the human capacity for happiness is very limited, a kind of Aristotelian ethics supplemented by Wundt's Grunzuge der physiologisch Psychologie (1874), remained one of Durkheim's most constant and characteristic ideas.

Durkheim also objects to the fact that pleasure (which is at least an element of happiness) loses its intensity with repetition and can only be regained by new stimuli, i.e. more productive work ( and therefore by the division of labor). He contradicts this as follows:

First, such a “law” would apply to all societies, and thus it could provide no account of why the division of labour advances in some societies and not in others. Second, Durkheim denied the assumption on which the argument is based: namely, that repetition alone reduces the intensity of pleasure. So long as our pleasures have a certain variety, he argues, they can be repeated endlessly; only if the pleasure is continuous and uninterrupted does its intensity wane.

Therefore, he rejects the idea that happiness or pleasure is the cause of happiness, as they could be different pleasures and one cannot be bored.

The cause of the division of labor according to Durkheim must be sought in a number of social contexts. Durkheim shows in his thesis how the organized structure (and therefore the division of labor) develops when the segmental structure disappears; therefore either the disappearance of the segmental structure is the cause of the division of labor, or the reverse. Since, as we have seen, the segmental structure presents an insurmountable obstacle to the division of labor, this last hypothesis is manifestly erroneous according to Robert Alun's analysis; the division of labor can appear only insofar as the segmental structure has already begun to disappear. This means that social life is not concentrated in a number of small identical individual segments, but rather that these parts begin to expand beyond their limits, exchanging movements, acting and reacting to each other. (Cr. Robert Alun. 30). Durkheim calls this density dynamic or moral and suggests that it increases in direct proportion to the progression of the division of labor. But what creates this “moral density”? Durkheim points to two causes. First, the real, material distance between members of a society must be reduced both spatially (e.g., the growth of cities) and technologically (e.g., advances in communications and transportation), for such "material density" to multiplies the number of intra-social relationships. Second, this effect is magnified by a society's simple "social volume" (the total number of members). Durkheim thus argues that the division of labor varies in direct proportion to the dynamic or moral density of society, which in turn is an effect of both material density and social volume.

But how, one might ask, does this double cause (material density and social volume) produce its ultimate effect (division of labour)? Indeed, Durkheim agrees that a variety of external circumstances have this differentiating effect; but he denies that this diversity was sufficient to produce (rather than hasten) so dramatic an effect as the division of labor.

For his own explanation, Durkheim turns to Darwin's Origin of Species (1859) and argues that increased material density and social volume cause division of labor, not because they increase exposure to various external circumstances, but because they make the struggle for existence more acute. . This is based on Darwin's understanding of competition. Darwin had argued that as long as resources were plentiful and population sizes were limited, similar organisms could coexist relatively peacefully; but where the population increases and where resources become scarce, conflicts and competitions arise, and these conflicts are all the more active when the organisms resemble each other and have similar needs. Where organisms are different and have different needs, what is useful to one organism becomes worthless to another and conflicts diminish. 

A greater division of labor allows those organs that disappear to stabilize by specializing in other ways to adapt to changing situations and respond to needs. Thus, the conflict and competition resulting from increased social volume and density foster the division of labor just as the latter mitigates the former's negative effects. In the modern city, for example, large and strong condensed populations coexist peacefully as result of professional differentiation: “The soldier aspires to military glory, the priest to moral authority, the power of the statesman, the wealth of the businessman, the scientific fame of the scholar. Each of them can achieve their goal without preventing the others from achieving theirs.

Thus, deducing from the above arguments, nothing in this process, Durkheim adds, implies an increase in happiness, or that the pursuit of happiness can be the goal: rather, "everything happens mechanically" as a result of an inexorable law of social development. Furthermore, Durkheim strongly argues that the division of labor is caused by changes in the size and density of societies.

But this was not yet a complete explanation, as Durkheim recognizes that such specialization is not the only possible solution to the struggle for existence that may ensue. The division of labor is therefore a contingency rather than a necessary consequence of changes in the social environment, and for it to occur in place of its alternatives it is essential that the influence of at least two secondary factors - collective consciousness and heredity - - be significantly reduced. To the extent that collective consciousness becomes less concrete and decisive in this school of thought, it inevitably has less influence on individual thought and behavior. Precise states of consciousness function analogously to instinctive reflexes; More general principles affect behavior only through the intermediate reflections of intelligence. Thus, “deliberate movements do not have the spontaneity of involuntary movements. Because it becomes more rational, the [collective of consciousness] becomes less imperative and therefore places fewer restrictions on the free expression of the individual. But the cause of this growth of rationality is, in turn, the increase in the population of society and the ecological diversity which it implies.

Conclusion

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