Olena Blaguta

Question 9

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Besides sociology, there are other sciences of humanity, society, communities, people, their relationship and coexistence as in the past so and in the modern world too. Therefore, you should determine how sociology differs from them, why now it has a priority position among Social Sciences, and how it fits into the general system of scientific knowledge. The famous American sociologist Sorokin believes that sociology differs from other Social Sciences in three main characteristics.

1. Its main feature is that it is generalized (from Lat. Generalis - general) science. History, in contrast, is individualized (from Fr. Individuel - personal, peculiar for only one) Science for focusing on the study of unique and unforgettable events (such as Christianity as a religion in the life of Ukraine; Abraham Lincoln as a president in U.S. history; review of I or the Second World War, etc.). Sociology also explores properties common to all religions of the world, all countries, all nations, all the wars; for establishing institution of presidency for itself and others.

2. But there are other generalized social sciences such as economics, political science, law. How sociology differs from them? The fact is that each of those sciences deals only with one area of ​​socio-cultural space: the economy with the economic relations, exploring the economic structure; political science -with political relations, analyzing the state and other political institutions; legal science - the legal relationship,explaning the system of rules and norms of behavior established by the state. Specificity of sociology and its fundamental difference from other generalized Social Sciences is that it: - Examines all social processes, whether they are: economic, political, legal, artistic, religious, philosophical, ethical, etc.; - Analyzes the society in the unity of all its parties, industries and sectors, all social and cultural space as well (in spreading globalization) as humanity in general; - Furthermore, Sociology examines the relationship between the phenomena related to the subject of various studies of Social Sciences. For example, it may be clarifying the relationship between production cycles (the subject of study of Economics) and cycles of development of crime (the subject of legal Sciences), while each of them separately does not. Sociologists can also be interested in wheather economic crisis affect on the growth of crime, and economic prosperity - for their reduction.

3. Sociology differs from others Social Sciences also in the way of human vision. For example, in economics the central actor is a person as being primarily economic, which is involved in the production process, in political sciences - a man as a political creature that has some ideological belief manifests, show its activity in political actions, etc., in jurisprudence - man as a creature that has a legal or illegal space and makes the offense; religious studies- religious man in his or her relationship with God. Sociology considers a person not on the one hand or any of its properties, but the man as being social, being inseparable, which is both human and economic, and political, and religious and moral, and rational and partly irrational, which interacts in all these aspects, manifestations and diversities, as it usually is in everyday life. For example, you can take one of the thorniest problems of mankind - the problem of suicide ( from Lat. Sui - a + caedere - kill). French sociologist E. Durkheim, analyzing this problem back in 1898, notes that various sciences study it. History provides information on specific historical persons who voluntarily died (Socrates drank the cup of hemlock poison-, Seneca cut his wrists in the bathtub with warm water). Biology, medicine and psychiatry are looking for the causes of suicides in poor health disorders or mental conditions, geography - the climatic conditions of this or that part of the territory (eg, hot wind, mixed with sand), the economy - in economic factors such as poverty, bankruptcy, depression. That is, all these sciences try to explain the phenomenon of suicide by means of separate, unrelated factors. They pay no attention to a particular society or culture in general, ignore the social organization and cultural phenomena. According to the same Durkheim, the solution of suicide is a holistic consideration of the society and its culture. In a society where: - All social relations are well balanced and interconnected with a high degree of "social cohesion" of people, where a person feels herself an important part of society or community, not forgotten and not alone; - Cultural values ​​are constant and undisputed, shared by all citizens - in such a society the percentage of suicides are usually quite low. Conversely, a society with low "cohesion", whose members are poorly connected with each other and with communities, feel themselves insecure, unwanted and neglected, a society where cultural values ​​and norms are destroyed or relative, often changing, not recognized by all its members – such a society is a powerful generator and persuasive factor in committing suicide, regardless of climate or economic conditions and state of mental and physical health. This "morbid" state of society E. Durkheim calls "anomie" (from Fr. Anomie and Greek. A-nomos - lawlessness) - is a condition characterized by the collapse of traditional values ​​and norms of society and disorientation of a person and society , lack of clear moral regulation of individuals behavior. Although the work of E. Durkheim was written on the edge of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, sociologists recognize the validity of argument of this sociologist for modern societies, including Ukrainian, in which there are all signs of anomie, and where the percentage of suicides among causes of death are high. Thus, unlike other sciences, sociology is generalized science that explores humanity, society, communities and people as social beings, in their unity and interconnection of all spheres of social life. Sociology is now actively working with other branches of scientific knowledge, based on the achievement of statistics, demography, psychology, philosophy, culture, economic and political sciences and disciplines. Today sociology increasingly cooperates its activity and performs "exchange of meanings" also with natural and technological sciences, forming a special branch of knowledge at the frontier of sciences. In particular, an explanation of modern societies some social scientists looking through theoretical positions of synergetics and study societies, depending on their type, as a simple social (conventional) complex social (industrial) and complex socio-cultural (postindustrial) systems. There is also a kind of "sociologization" of sciences, there are such areas as biosociology, sociology of epidemics myocardial sociology, sociology of crime, sociology of masculinity (from Lat. Masculinus - male), sociology of space, humor sociology, sociology of international relations and more.