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Emile Durkheim ( 1858 - 1917 )

GENERAL APPROACH

The main thrust of Durkheim's overall doctrine is his insistence that the study of society must eschew reductionism and consider social phenomena "sui generis". Rejecting biologic or psychologistic interpretations, Durkheim focused attention on the social-structural determinants of mankind's social problems.

 Durkheim presented a definitive critique of reductionist explanation of social behaviour. Social phenomena are "social facts" and these are the subject matter of sociology. They have, according to Durkheim, distinctive social characteristics and determinants, which are not amenable to explanations on the biological or psychological level. They are external to any particular individual considered as a biological entity. They endure over time while particular individuals die and are replaced by others. Moreover, they are not only external to the individual, but they are "endowed with coercive power, by ... which they impose themselves upon him, independent of his individual will. Constraints, whether in the form of laws or customs, come into play whenever social demands are being violated. These sanctions are imposed on individuals and channel and direct their desires and propensities. A social fact can hence be defined as "every way of acting, fixed or not, capable of exercising on the individual and external constraint."