Unit 4 2.1 miss
joannes
Explain forms of social control
What is social control?
Social control involves persuading or compelling people to conform to society's norms, laws and
expectations. Society has various means of achieving control over its members behaviour,
which we can group into two main forms:
● Internal forms of social control
● External forms of social control
Internal forms of social control
There are controls over our behaviour that come from within ourselves- from our personalities/
our values. These lead us to conform to the rules of society and the groups that we belong to
because we feel inwardly that it is the right thing to do.
Moral conscience/ superego (freud)
According to the psychoanalytic theory we conform to society's expectations and obey its rules
because our superego tells us to do so. Along with the ID and the ego, the superego forms part
of our personality. Our superego tells us what is right and wrong and inflicts guilty feelings on us
if we fail to do as it urges.
Our superego develops through early socialisation within the family, as a sort of internalised
‘nagging parent’ telling us how we ought to behave. Its function is to restrain the selfish, ‘animal’
urges of the ID. if we acted on these urges, they would often lead us into anti-social & criminal
behaviour.the superego allows us to exercise self control and behave in socially acceptable
ways.
Tradition & culture
The culture to which we belong to also becomes part of us through socialisation. We come to
accept its values, norms & traditions as a part of our identity. E.g, believers follow the religious
traditions that they have been raised in, such as the muslim tradition of ramadan or the jewish
tradition of sharing the shabbat (sabbath) evening meal. Conforming to such traditions is an
important way of affirming one's identity and being accepted as a member of a particular
community.
Internalisation of social rules & morality
Both our superego and the traditions we follow become a part of our inner self/ personality. Yet
both of them start as things outside of us- either as our parents rules & values in the case of the
superego or as those of our culture or social group in the case of tradition.
Socialisation in both cases, we internalise these rules through the process of socialisation
whether from our parents or from wider social groups/institutions e.g religion, school etc. in this
way, society's rules and moral code become our own personal rules and moral code. As a result
we conform willingly to social norms.
, ‘Rational ideology’ a term used to describe the fact that we internalise social rules and use
them to tell us what is right & wrong. This enables us to keep within the law.
External forms of social control
Society does this through agencies of social control.
Agencies of social control
These are organisations/ institutions that impose rules on us in an effort to make us behave in
certain ways. They include the family, peer group and education system. For example, parents
may send a naughty children to bed, friends may shun someone who tells lies, and teachers
may give a disruptive child detention.
All of these are negative sanctions(punishments), but agencies of social control can give
positive sanctions (rewards) to those who conform. E.g a hardworking student may earn praise,
gold stars etc. from the teacher. Both positive & negative sanctions help to impose social
control. Links to skinner's operant learning theory of behavior reinforcement- punishments deter
undesired behaviour and rewards encourage acceptable behaviour.
Formal social control
Informal social control
Based on written rules
and laws Based on unwritten laws &
Usually associated with processes such as the
the way the state approval/disapproval of
regulates & controls others.
people’s actions and
behaviour.
E.g police, judges, traffic wardens, E.g teachers, parents, friends.
Probation officers.
Edward Ross has described a number of means that have been used by social groups
throughout human history to keep individuals under control. The important among them are
public opinion, law, custom, religion, morality, personality, folkways and mores.
Edward Hayes distinguished between control by sanctions and control by suggestion and
imitation. According to him, education is the most effective means of control and the family is
the most significant agency.
Luther L Bernard distinguished between unconscious and conscious means of control. The
most important among the unconscious means of control are custom, tradition and convention.
The conscious means of control are those which have been consciously developed and
employed by leaders of all types.
