 One of the pioneers of the discipline of Sociology.

 Founder of functionalist tradition in Sociology.

 Laid a scientific foundation for the new discipline.
 He gave a macro view of society.
 Individual is subordinate to society and is also governed by it.
 Defined the subject matter of Sociology and attempted to develop a science of society.
 He often used methods of multivariate analysis.
 According to him, a social science should
• Deal with specific subject matter and not total knowledge that is around.
• Aim at identifying general types rather than describing individual types.
• Study objective reality.
• Yield general principles or laws.
• Use methods similar to natural sciences.

SOCIAL FACTS

 Tried to understand society in terms of some universal laws.

 Social facts are visualised as akin to natural facts.
 Just as behaviour of matter in nature can be regarded as a reaction to natural stimuli, behaviour of men can
also be seen as a response to the external constraints of such social facts.
 Task of sociologist is to study social facts as things as we study things in the natural world.
 Social facts are ways of acting, thinking and feeling which are external to the individual and are endowed
with the power of coercion by reason of which they control him.
 Social facts exist outside the individual as a force which cause the individual to think, act and feel in a
particular manner.

CHARACTERISTICS OF SOCIAL FACTS

 Externality – social facts exist outside the individual. They are sui-generis.
 Constraining – exercise constraining influence over the individual action.
 Generality – He rejects the study of exceptions and focuses upon identification of the general types.
 Independence – social facts are independent of the will of the individuals and individuals cannot change
the social facts.

TYPES OF SOCIAL FACTS

 Culture, social institutions, morality, collective concience and social currents are examples of non-material
social facts.
 Styles of architecture, forms of technology, division of labour and legal codes are examples of material
social facts.

SOCIAL FACTS AS OBJECTIVE REALITY

 Social facts should be studied as things.

 Rules of Classification
• Structural or morphological facts – the facts which gives a particular society its appearance.
• Institutional social facts – includes religion, division of labour, rate of suicide, etc
 • Non-institutional social facts – may rise spontaneously and may not sustain like crowd behaviour or
social currents.
 Social facts are considered normal when they are present in their original form and fulfill functions for
society.
 They can be considered dysfunctional in their pathological state.

CRITICISMS

 Heildleman considers that Durkheim is more concerned about making a society rather than describing a
methodology for it.
 Merton discarded the universalistic and general theories and recommended middle range theories.
 Stephen Lukes condemns that Durkheim has glorified empiricism and neglected individual subjectivity.
 Weber says that social facts lie inside an individual and their influences are on the basis of individual’s
own interpretation of the social fact.

Emile Durkheim - Social Facts

Emile Durkheim was a French sociologist. His goal was to establish Sociology as an independent academic discipline.
With this aim in mind, he published The Rules of Sociological Method' in 1895 to describe the scientific method of
inquiry in sociology. In the same publication, he introduced a new term 'Social Fact' by defining sociology as the
science of social facts. Durkheim believed that social facts are the ways of behaving which are external to the
individual, and which exerts some force on the individual to shape his behavior.

The above explanation of social facts gives three characteristics of social facts, as follows.

1. Social facts are ways of behavior (eg, acting, thinking and feeling)

2. Social facts are external to the individual

3. Social facts exert a force on the individual to shape his behavior.

The above characteristics can be summed up to define social facts as external influences that shape the social behavior
of an individual. Based on this explanation. social facts are simply social norms and values. Social norms are the
social expectations which means that how an individual is expected to behave in a social context. In other words, it
means how others expect from us to behave in a social context. Therefore, social norms act as an external force that
exerts coercive pressure on us to behave in a specific manner. In this way, the social norms can be understood
as social facts.

Durkheim defined sociology as the scientific study of social facts. It can be implied that sociology is the scientific
study of social norms. However, Durkheim intentionally used the term social fact in order to not restrict the subject
matter of sociology only to social norms. Therefore, he used a broad term (instead of social norms) to have wider
criteria for the subject matter of sociology. The social facts are not limited only to social norms and can include any
external factor which exerts some force on an individual to behave in a specific manner. Though social norms are the
major source of external influence which shape our behaviour, there can also be other factors which become the basis
for patronizing the social behaviour of people such as formal laws, legal rules, the penal system and so on. Therefore,
social facts include all the factors which are external to an individual, and which exert some force on the individual to
shape their behavior in different ways.

Again, it is important to note that our social norms, values, customs and traditions are the major social facts because
these are external influences which shape the major part of our routine behaviour. For this reason, most sociologists
have interpreted social facts as social norms and values. For instance, Catherine, a known British sociologist, argued
that by the term social facts, Durkheim meant social norms and values. This interpretation of social facts is also
supported by many other sociologists because these social norms, values, customs and traditions are basic
determinants of social behaviour. These are the main areas focused on by sociologists to understand the social
behaviour of individuals. Therefore, as Durkheim defined sociology as the study of social facts, it again points to the
interpretation of social facts as norms and values.
Purpose of introducing the term 'SOCIAL FACT

Durkheim's purpose of introducing the term social fact in the realm of sociology was:

1. To establish sociology as an independent discipline: Sociology was initially not a separate discipline but a part of
history and economics. Durkheim wanted to establish sociology as an independent discipline. To achieve this goal, he
published many works where he argued that sociology is not a part of any other discipline but is itself a distinct
discipline. He wanted that sociology, like any other discipline, must have a common concept as the focus of all areas
of its study. Therefore, he coined the term social fact to define sociology as the study of social fact. As noted above,
the term social fact (as determiner or influencer of social behaviour) is a common focus of all areas of sociology.

2. To describe the subject-matter of this newly emerging science: Durkheim has contributed a lot to the field of
sociology. He was the first academic sociologist as the University of Bordeaux awarded him first academic
appointment in sociology in 1817. Through his practical efforts and scholarly contributions. sociology emerged as a
new science. He presented his ideas in his published works to describe the subject-matter of this newly emerging
science. For instance, in his article The Rules of Sociological Method in 1895, he laid down foundation of the
scientific method of inquiry for acquisition of sociological knowledge. In the same publication, he defined sociology
as the scientific study of social facts - the collective patterns of behavior. This offered the basic theme of the
sociological study that is-social behaviour. The theme offered by the term social fact is the basis for different areas of
the subject matter of sociology. In other words, different areas of subject matter sociology revolve around this basic
theme-social fact.

Suicide as a Social Fact

Emile Durkheim published his famous Theory of Suicide in 1897. In this theory, he has explored the phenomena of
suicide with regards to its causative factors. He was of the view that biological and psychological factors are not
sufficient to explain the act of suicide because he believed that the real causes of suicide are social factors. He argued
that motives for suicide cannot be understood without probing into its social causes.

He argued that suicide is a social fact. He believed that like any other behavior. suicidal behavior is also shaped by
external social factors. There are certain social factors that may make a person prone to suicide. These factors reside in
the social context which may act as an external force on the individual to commit suicide.

For this reason, suicide can be seen as a behaviour pattern in some areas. For instance, there are some countries which
have high suicide rate than other countries. In countries with high suicide rates, the suicide rate remained constantly
high for a long time. For example, Hungary remained on the top in terms of a high suicidal rate for about half a
century. Moreover, there are general similarities in causes and methods of suicide in a specific region. For instance, in
traditional societies, when a wife of an old farmer died, the farmer committed suicide and this practice was seen
repetitively. It means that in some societies, suicide is the way of dealing with or getting rid of problems. Constant
rate of suicide for a long time in a region as well as similarities in causes and methods of suicide in that region reveal
that 1) suicide is a behavior pattern and 2) there are some social factors for suicide which are specific to the social
context where suicides are committed. This implies that suicide is a social fact because there are social factors
exerting force on individuals to adopt a behaviour pattern for committing suicide.