The Future of Modernization

In Society the Basics Modernity is described as a key form of social change that can be defined as “social patterns resulting from industrialization” (Macionis, 2006 pp 455).  This term is used to categorize the social patterns that have developed since the industrial revolution. Modernization is defined as “the process of social change begun by industrialization” (Macionis, 2006 pp 455).

    How does modernization manifest itself in US society? According to Peter Berger (1977), he identified four key concepts of how modernization manifests itself. These four concepts are: The decline of small, traditional communities, the expansion of personal choice, increasing social diversity, and orientation toward the future and a growing awareness of time (Society the basics, 2006 pp 455-456). Table 16:1 below gives a specific overview of the changes over the past century in the US.


Macionis, J.J., Table 16-1., Society: the Basics Eight Edition 2006 Prentice-Hall Copyright 2006 Pearson
    Education, INC


    Is modernization likely to continue in the US?  It seems that modernization is not likely to continue in the US. As we move into the information age postmodernity defined as “social patterns characteristic of postindustrial societies” (Macionis, 2006 pp 467) has the following key concepts: In important aspects, modernity has failed, the bright light of “progress” is fading, Science no longer holds the answers, cultural debates are intensifying, and social institutions are changing. Modernization does not seem to have the staying power necessary to continue in the US. In the end it creates more problems than it solves.

    Is modernization a worldwide trend? Since modernization is a result of the industrial revolution then it cannot be a worldwide trend. Many of the world’s countries have not reached their own industrial revolution and according to Society: the Basics it is highly unlikely that they will develop modernization as outlined in the following excerpt:
Not everyone thinks that modernization is really an option. According to dependency theory, a second approach to global stratification presented in Chapter 9, today’s poor societies struggle to modernize, even if they want to. From this point of view, the major barrier to economic development is not traditionalism but global domination by rich capitalist societies. In effect, dependency theory asserts that rich nations achieved their modernization at the expense of poor ones, which provided them with valuable natural resources and human labor. Even today, the world’s poorest countries remain locked in a disadvantageous economic relationship with rich nations, dependent on wealthy countries to buy their raw materials and in return provide them with whatever manufactured products they can afford. According to this view, continuing ties with rich societies will only perpetuate current patterns of global inequality. (Macionis, 2006 pp 470)

    What are the consequences of modernization?  The consequences of modernization would seem to be the loss of purpose and confusion of how to live one’s life. People today are lost with no clear sense of morals of what is right or wrong. Moral decay is prominent in society today; moreover people have become a society of strangers who are so individualized that there is no longer a sense of community.  Everyone is set apart from everyone else. With computers, telephones, television, and other forms of mass media it is no longer necessary for people to connect physically. Everything can be done in the privacy of ones own home. Families are becoming a thing of the past and traditional morals are seen as backwards and archaic. Society is becoming dehumanized and the supposed benefits are no match for what is being lost.

    Which theorist best reflects your perceptions of modernization? I would have to say that Ferdinand Tonnies with his theories on loss of community are what best reflects my perceptions of modernization.  His theories are based on what he calls Gemeinschaft and Gesellschaft. Gemeinschaft refers to the increasing loss of community. He sees the industrial revolution as weakening the basic social principles of family and tradition and replaces them with the need for business and efficiency and money, in other words greed and power have replaced morals and tradition. It has separated family ties and scattered community relations. Macionis describes Tonnies’ other half of his theory as “European and North American societies gradually became rootless and impersonal as people came to associate with one another mostly on the basis of self-interest, the state Tönnies termed Gesellschaft” ( Society the Basics, 2006 pp 457). According to Adair-Toteff, C. Tonnies is described as:

Among the founders of German sociology; Ferdinand Tonnies is still relatively neglected. Many reasons are given, but the most widespread and the most damming is that Tonnies is a pessimist, who wished in the face of modernity, to return to the supposed golden age of rural Germany when the community, ruled by patriarchs, gathered on the land. This interpretation though is fundamentally flawed; although Tonnies wanted to describe the rootless, ruthless, calculating individuals of modern society, he wished to recall the past primarily to develop a blueprint for the future, in which the so called feminine traits of conscience, empathy, and care would govern the community. Rather than yearning for the past, Tonnies was a utopian who had a vision of the future and tried to make it a reality (Ferdinand Tonnies: Utopian Visionary, 2003)

          In Modernity and Enchantment a Historiographic Review Saler, M. states, “In broad outline, modernity has come to signify a mixture of political, social, intellectual, economic, technological, and psychological factors, several of which can be traced to earlier centuries and other cultures, which merged synergistically in the West between the sixteenth and nineteenth centuries.”  However it is defined it has come to mean the degradation of society in my views. Hopefully we as a society can move away from modernization and back to some semblance of the traditional values we once held. That morality can be redefined and that people will once again have a purpose and understanding of what is right and wrong. In so doing they will be able to live their lives to a fuller extent.

References


Adair-Toteff, C., Ferdinand Tonnies: Utopian Visionary., American University of

    Bulgaria. Copyright 2003 EBSCO Publishing., Retrieved October 1, 2006 from
   
    EBSCOHost


Macionis, J.J., Chapter 7 Deviance. Society the Basics 8th Edition, Published by

    Prentice-Hall Copyright 2006 Pearson Education, INC.


Saler, M., Modernity and Enchantment a Historiographic Review., American Historical

    Review., Vol. 111(3) p692-716, 25p June 2006, Retrieved October 1, 2006 from

    EBSCOHost