8.4 The Conditions of Civilisation

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來自 University of Amsterdam 的課程

古典社会学理论

1044 個評分

University of Amsterdam

古典社会学理论

1044 個評分

This Massive Open Online Course (MOOC) will offer the participants an introduction into the most important classical sociological readings between the 18th and 20th century. Highly influential social science scholars, such as Karl Marx, Max Weber and Emile Durkheim, will be discussed during 8 sessions. Combined with small tests, based on the video’s and recommended readings, the participants will be encouraged to dive deeply into the complex texts and get familiar with classical sociological concepts that are still very relevant today.

從本節課中

Session 8: Norbert Elias (1897-1990)

Elias is the last of the Classical Sociologists. Elias' theory focusses on long term trends, with his so called process or figurational sociology. He shows us how the civilisation proces can be explained in terms like Self-Constraint and Figurations.

8.1 The Last of the Great Classic Sociologists5:43

8.2 Introduction to the Civilizing Process6:55

8.3 The Social Constraint Towards Self-Constraint8:26

8.4 The Conditions of Civilisation6:48

8.5 The Importance of Norbert Elias6:13

8.6 A Base for Contemporary Studies7:09

8.7 Figurational Processes6:14

8.8 Classical Sociological Theories: a Focus on Long Term Trends6:11

與講師見面

Bart van Heerikhuizen
Dr.
Faculty of Social and Behavioural Sciences

In the second volume of his book,

the volume that is called State Formation and Civilization.

Elias tries to come up with an explanation of the civilizing process.

He tells us, how many small territories that

occupied the part of Europe, that we call today, France.

Slowly but surely united to form a larger whole.

That Process of State Formation took many centuries before it was completed,

with the Rule of Louis the 14th, the Sun King, at the end of the 17th century.

Following [INAUDIBLE] here, Elias describes this process as a gradual

development of a monopoly over the means of violence by a decentralized state.

And the development of a monopoly over the means of taxation over the same state.

Taxpayers money is needed

to pay the officials that are interested with the means of violence.

And those officials are needed to force the people to pay their taxes.

So, you can say that the two monopolies pre-suppose one another.

And that may explain in part, why it took such a long period of time for

this structure to develop.

Elias writes hundreds of pages to describe the ups and

downs in this Process of State Formation.

Sometimes, one is reminded reading the book of the ups and

downs in the process of the formation of European union in our own days.

Episodes when the former antagonists seem to

melt together under the influence of centripetal forces,

are alternated with periods when the centrifugal forces become stronger.

And they seem to fragment, what began to look like a structure with some stability.

But, in the end of this long and

very torturous process, the outcome is unmistakable.

We witness the appearance of the french nation state as we still know it today.

One of the outcomes of this process is that, the ordinary citizens, and I mean,

everybody except the state officials, who control the means of violence.

The ordinary citizens are discern.

They are forced, from now on,

to resolve their internal conflicts in a peaceful way.

Because the use of violent force by them, is not legally forbidden.

You could say, the citizens are pacified and

they're are pacified in a forceful way.

And again, this external force to stay away from violent solutions becomes,

after some generations, internalized.

People develop a sort of Non-violent when they are confronted with acts of violence.

They are shocked.

They are dismayed.

They feel embarrassed, ashamed.

But maybe, I should add here that, for

modern people, brutal violence is not only a source of shame.

It may sometimes also be a source of fascination and in its simulated forms,

it may even be a source of pleasure, sometimes.

Our contemporary popular culture.

The box office movies.

The computer games.

The most popular video series.

They all testify to that ambivalence, repugnance of violence and

at the same time, a kind of, fascination with violence.

But one thing is certain, and that is, that in everyday life,

people learn to situationally control their inner most aggressive impulses.

They are not allowed anymore to react with violent means.

But there are so many other and more subtle ways to fight your enemies.

Using the discoveries of his former book on the core society of [INAUDIBLE],

Elias now, describes how the courgers succeeded

on outwitting their adversaries under the new conditions.

Those descendents of a waring class.

Those grandsons of a military elite

are now forced to continue their struggles under the strict rules,

of a kind of choreography that was enacted around the king of France.

And it's here at the court of [INAUDIBLE] that

new behavioral standards are developed.

The highest prizes now, are reserved for

those who know, when you have to hide your aggressive feelings, and

when you can outmaneuver your enemy.

It's like a game of chess,

you must foresee the moves of your adversary even before he thought of them.

You must be strategic.

You must be extremely rational.

And most of all, you should master your impulses.

You should only play out your advantage at the moment, when the time is ripe.

So at this court, we can see a social constraint towards self-constraint.

And over a longer period of time,

those internal controls become automatically operating.

Self-steering mechanisms that constrain people from the inside.

Now, the middle class people observe with admiration,

the behavioral innovations at the court.

And they try to imitate those upper class people.

And soon, those codes of conduct trickle down

from the highest classes of society, into the lower ranks.

In this way, the standards that one's very typical of only a small

segment of society, the elite, the top of society are more, and more generalized.

And so, models of civilized behavior are now

circulating through the entire society.

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