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Summary The Social Structure of Western Socieites
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Summary of all articles used in this course. The Social Structure of Western Societies. Tilburg University. Master Sociology.
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Micro foundations & Macrosocial behaviorJ.S. Coleman
Given that much of social theory is concerned not with individual behavior but with the
functioning of social systems of behavior, and given that the most common and most natural
observations are of individuals, a central intellectual problem in the discipline is the
movement from the individual level, where observations are made, to the systemic level,
where the problem of interest lies. This is called the “micro-to-macro problem”.
Conclusion
1. The central importance of a proper model of micro-to-macro transition for using
micro-level data to study the macro-level or system-level relations that constitute a
major portion of social theory
2. There is widespread failure to develop appropriate models for micro-to-macro
transition in a wide range of phenomena, from assortative marriage by age to
occupational mobility.
3. The neoclassical economic theory of perfect market exchange systems constitutes a
model for the micro-to-macro transition, although the model is appropriate only for an
idealized social system with complete communication.
4. Using the conceptual framework of a market but with certain modifications other
micro-to-macro transitions may be successfully made- as, for example, in marriage
markets, labor markets, and other matching markets.
5. Micro-to-macro transitions in certain areas, such as escape panics and placement of
trust, may be built on a model of individual rational behavior but without markets or
exchange.
6. There is a specific kind of data needed for making the proper micro-to-macro
transition.
7. Comparable micro-to-macro problems can be found for another area- that is, collective
decisions rule- although in this case the defect lies in the institution itself rather than in
the social scientist’s model of transition.
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, Family and social change
A. Janssens
Chapter 3, The population structure and the quality of the data
The population register combines census listings with vital registration in a particular
convenient way. It presents information on demographic events in an already linked format on
the entire population and it facilitates the computation of a wide range of demographic rates.
The population register enables the historian to follow the evolution of the family and the
household on a day-to-day basis throughout the entire period of 1849-1920.
How accurate and complete were the Tilburg population registers?
Weaknesses of the population registers:
lack of accuracy in the registration of occupations (only household was registered.)
vague categories; the entry ‘’merchant’’ could refer to a very rich and successful
businessman but at the same time a marginal trader barely able to keep his family out
of poor relief.
internal migration is heavily under recorded in the registers prior to 1880 but only as
far as movements of households between addresses apparent in a few sudden
appearances between registers.
registers were fairly accurate in reporting demographic events such as births, deaths
and marriages but were less accurate in reporting migration. Reporting the out-
migration of individuals were easily to let slide, resulting in delays in registration, and
leading sometimes to the failure to record at all.
Chapter 5, Family life and the social structure
This chapter is concerned with the study of the relationship between the family and the social
structure of an industrializing society. Through examination of class position in relation to the
structural evolution of the household a better understanding may be gained of the
relationships between the macro-processes of social change and the micro-processes affecting
the family.
Conclusion
The results do not support the supposed association of extended family structures with the
margins of industrial society nor do thet support the supposed structural fit between the
nuclear family and industrial society during the initial stages of the proves of industrialization.
there were no indications that families which had been extended at some point during the first
twenty years of their cycle in any way impeded the social advancement of the family head or
the sons.
As far as intragenerational mobility is concerned, nuclear families in the first cohort showed
themselves to be more upwardly mobile than the extended families sin this group, while the
situation was reversed in the succeeding cohort. Middle class extended family households in
both cohorts were very successful indeed in terms of social mobility. The social success of the
extended family structure increased as the process of industrialization transformed traditional
economic and social structures.
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