Group processes and patterns of solidarity: a study of aspects of modern and primitive societies

Abstract

The present study places on the one hand mathematics, matter and matters of fact, and on the other, art, religion and politics, in a fundamental distinction between the 'technical' and 'non-technical'. But the categories are defined and elaborated sociologically, and in this are found to be a means not only of descrtbtng the contrast between 'primitive' and 'modern' societies, or of 'society' in its entirety across space and time, but also the special status of 'modern society' within whose context alone such comprehensive considerations are
possible. This special status is connected with an unprecedented 'dualism', of sacred and secular, which generates on the one hand social groups or particulars, and on the other, societies with universalistic tendencies. Although such social particulars cover every form of as­sociation on the basis of special interest, most illustrations in the study are taken from the groups - 't.m. ', 'Encounter' and 'Spiritualist' - which the writer directly observed.
But the 'Encounter' and 'Spiritualist' groups are, in addition, considered to exhibit modern and primitive features respectively, and are contrasted on this basis. Thus spirit belief and communication can be seen to represent a common element between primitive and modern societies and individuals. Except that spiritualism in modern society is humanistic (is in opposition to materialism) while spiritualism in primitive society is inevitable (and the humanties not recognised for what they are). In like manner the humanities are not recogntsed for what they are by writers such as Winch, Wittgenstein, Polanyi, Oakeshott, and those who espouse extreme forms of the sociology of knowledge. But equally invalid on the present categories are attempts, by Durkheim, Marx and Levi-Strauss, to make a science of society or of history or of culture. Part One of the study deals with these conceptual issues, of the distinction between technical and non-technical and their social correlatives, while Part Two centres on the problem of social integratton and synthesis in modern society: the separation of the technical from the non-technical leads to the individuation of persons, groups and societies, as reflected in democracy and anthropology.

Citation

(1984). Group processes and patterns of solidarity: a study of aspects of modern and primitive societies