Social Institutions Overview

Social Institutions

• Social institutions are the major spheres of social life, or society's subsystems, that are structured around the challenges of collective living.

Human Needs Met by Social Institutions

• Mastery of nature
• Social order and control
• Cultural production
• Socialization

The Institutions

• Classic Five: economy, polity, family, religion, education
• Recently Emergent: science, mass media, health care, military, leisure/sport

Characteristics of Social Institutions

• Social institutions are a society's standardized way of doing things, encompassing communities, cultures and families from the individual to the society level.

State & Polity

• Politics: any action involving the use of power to shape the collective pursuit of collective goals (who gets what, when, and how).

• Government: a group of people who wield power under the polity.

• State: a set of procedures and organizations concerned with creating, administering, and enforcing decisions that bind inhabitants of a polity.

• Political Party: an organization, alliance, or coalition formed to win elective office through legitimate competition with other parties.

Social Power and Authority

• Domination: the exercise of control/influence over others.

  • Illegitimate domination: the ability to carry out one's will despite resistance, using threat or force (power).
  • Legitimate domination: the recognized right to make binding decisions (authority).

• Types of Authority (Weber):

  • Traditional authority: adherence to long-established cultural patterns.
  • Charismatic authority: devotion to the exceptional character of an individual.
  • Rational-legal authority: belief in the legality of written rules and regulations.

• Hegemony: covert, unconscious domination; the capacity of elites to establish systems of meanings as common sense, justifying inequalities.

The State

• The Character of the State:

  • provision of public goods
  • threat or use of force
  • the dilemma

• Types of Modern States:

  • State Socialism: centralized control of productive property in a state bureaucracy.
  • Democracy: government by the consent of the governed. This includes the development of citizenship rights:
    • Civil rights (18th century): rights of the individual in law.
    • Political rights (19th century): right to hold office.
    • Social rights (20th century): right to a minimum standard of living. Democracy also involves an agreement to collectively give up rights to uphold other rights.

• Populism: Describes a political system of significant public/popular support.

• Authoritarian Populism: A type of political system.

• Non-democratic States:

  • Authoritarianism: any political system that denies popular participation in government.
  • Totalitarianism: any political system that denies popular participation in government and extensively regulates the lives of all citizens.

Theories of the State

• Pluralism: a theory describing societal characteristics.

• Elite Theory: a theory defining societal characteristics.

The Decline of the Welfare State

• Two Theories
  • State Overload:
  • Legitimation Crisis:

Political Culture in Canada

• The political right ("conservatives"): individual is more important than the collectivity, the best society results from individual freedoms.

• The political left ("liberals/progressives"): collectivity is more important than the individual, the best society results when individuals function together.

Electoral System: Canada

• Single-Member Plurality System: A voting system.

• Alternative System: Proportional Representation: a voting system in which the votes/seats in parliament reflect popular vote and smaller parties proportionally gain power.

Voting Patterns

• Age and Social Class
• Party Similarity
• Voter Disillusionment:
  • Regional Alienation
  • Voting against (instead of for)
  • Voting Rates: record federal high in 1958 with 79%, record federal low in 2008 with 59%.

This quiz delves into the fundamental spheres of social life known as social institutions. It covers various types of institutions, their characteristics, and the human needs they fulfill through structured social practices. Test your understanding of concepts like polity, family, and education within societal frameworks.