Examples Of Modernization In Sociology

Shubham Dabas

Professor Amit

Sociology (Allied Course)

As A Sociology How Do You Appreciate The Idea Of Modernization

Modernization has been defined as a “progressive transition from a ‘pre-modern’ or ‘traditional’ to a ‘modern’ society”. The proponents of modernization theory argue that modernized societies are usually more developed, have better communication and educational facilities and a better standard of living as a whole. Traditional anthropological literature on the subject makes this distinction explicitly in what is termed as the study of the ‘other’. There has also been some criticism of modernization. Much of this criticism has come either from the traditional Third World scholars or Marxist critics. I will be getting into

Although the difference is subtle but if confused it can lead to huge misunderstandings. Modernism is more of a philosophical and artistic movement. Modernism had been defined as “a mode of thinking – one or more philosophically defined characteristics, like self-consciousness or self-reference, that run across all the novelties in the arts and the disciplines.” Among the factors that shaped Modernism were the development of modern industrial societies and the rapid growth of cities. In other words, modernization theory that is, changes in the material conditions of the society, led to this movement in art and philosophy called Modernism. Modernism, in general, includes the activities and creations of those who felt the traditional forms of art, architecture, literature, religious faith, philosophy, social organization, activities of daily life, and even the sciences, were becoming ill-fitted to their tasks and outdated in the new economic, social, and political environment of an emerging fully industrialized world. In other words, just like modernization theory, Modernism also stands in opposition to tradition. We will be discussing more about Modernism in relation to

I’d like to show how Marxism and modernization are not as against each other as it is claimed, they in fact share many similarities. Marxism is a radical political philosophy that views world from economic and sociologist lenses. Marxism acknowledges that society comprises various classes of people and that capitalistic mode of economy further deepens this class structure by creating a gap between those haves and have-nots. In other words, Marxism believes that capitalism forms two major economic classes in the society; one is bourgeoisie that holds major forms of productions and processes most of the resources of the society while the other is proletariat that sells labour to bourgeoisie and virtually suffers from hand to mouth problem all the time. To make matter worse, modernization theory, which Marxism believes is an essential element of capitalism, further worsens the imbalances between the economic classes. For example, globalization advocates for lesser intervention of government in economic activities but Marxists believe that such action would encourage the growth of bourgeoisie while proletariats would always suffer. Thus, Marxism is a humanity-cantered philosophy. It is also an activist view of looking at the society. It recognizes the constraints upon human action and also acknowledges that those constraints are the creations of other sets of human beings. In the end,