Watch the video and summarise your understanding in 150 words.

In this video, Émile Durkheim’s on modern capitalism and what does it do our minds is
touched upon. Durkheim talks about the ills of capitalism stemming from his first hand
observation of a changing French society as a professor at the Sorbonne. He saw the switch
from a traditional agricultural society to a society that wanted to become capitalistic in its
orientation. His 1897 work on suicide put into focus an important finding – the capitalistic
economic system was becoming the reason for an increase in suicide rates. The suicide rates
had doubled up in Britain when compared to Italy because of this whole transitory phase to
capitalism and even in countries that were richer and advanced such as Denmark, the suicide
rate was four times higher. His study of suicide rates was originally intended to study the
general despair that exists in society but it seemed to manifest as suicide rates highlighting
the level of mental distress that capitalism brings about. He had come up with five reasons
that explained the cause for unhappiness in modern societies – iindividual identities in
traditional societies are closely tied to the clan / class identity which doesn’t invoke much
self-conscious decision making and people just continue to what they are told to by their
family. But in a modern capitalist system, the individual has choice when it comes to every
aspect of his / her life but since they get this power to make decisions, they also become
responsible if things go wrong. Failure becomes a burden in such a system. Advertisement
proposes lots of opportunities in such a system and envy and disappointment is also very
widespread when one fails to secure their ambitious plans. Capitalism projected this happy
view of life and when people failed to be happy, they felt that they had failed – a lack of
discourse in mental health matters is clearly evident. Traditional societies are famed for their
endless norms and lack of freedom which is replaced with a great extent of individual
freedom in a capitalist society which has its own set of problems like feeling lost and having
no sense of connection with others. Durkheim was an atheist but he understood the power
that religion held in providing people a sense of community and support which capitalism
couldn’t provide. The importance of family has also changed in a capitalist society and it
didn’t play the same stable role it did earlier in a traditional society. Durkheim’s main
emphasis is that modern capitalistic economies pressurise individuals to pursue ambitions but
they have no guidance and communal solace to help them move through these difficult times.