Soc 1101 Prelim 3

What country did Weber live in?

Germany

When and how did Weber die?

• died young (age 56) in 1920

• due to later wave of spanish flu

Why did Weber have a nervous breakdown?

He insulted and kicked out his father (his father was overtly patriarchal and abusive towards Weber’s mother) then his father died shortly after, so Weber had a massive breakdown that lasted about 5 years

What important negotiation was Weber a part of?

WW1 in the Versailles France as a representative of the German govenment

What were the sociological areas that his wife Marianne researched and why?

gender issues & sociology of patriarchy

How was Weber’s legacy established?

Marianne Weber published his books in a 2 set encyclopedia after he passed away

What famous American sociologist and activist did Weber meet when he visited the U.S.? Why did they connect with each other so quickly and easily?

WEB Du Bois in 1904

connected because the essential sociological theories in weber's "protestant ethic" research were very similar to what Du Bois was writing about in his sociological history of race in the US

Du Bois became very active in which movement?

The Niagara movement

Question Weber asked:

What is going on here?

What was the “spell” that all kinds of organizations were under?

Rationalization

Weber’s mechanism of social change

Rationalization

Weber’s 4 big sociological themes

1. The protestant ethic and the “spirit” of Capitalism (rationization, The Iron Cage)

2. The types of legitimate authority (Traditional, charismatic, Bureaucratic)

3. The core categories of human identity (class-status-party (social networks))

4. Research methods: ideal types, worldviews, verstehen, historical/interpretive sociology)

What were the 3 clues he used to guide his famous study on The Protestant Ethic?

1. capitalist emerges in western europe

2. protestants are in the highest rungs of organizations in modern society

3. most people work very hard in modern society

What is worldview

A set of beliefs about the world connected to a particular social group

Who did Weber study (4 people)?

Luther, Calvin, Wesley, and Benjamin Franklin

What is predestination in the Protestant religious worldview?

an individual's eventual destiny in the afterlife is already determined at birth (whether they will go to heaven at all)

The quest to get a sign is called

"salvation anxiety" because people do not know their fate but want to be among the chosen

What was the ‘sign’ of a person’s eventual destiny in the afterworld?

material wealth

What were the 3 practices that Protestant’s engaged in their attempts to achieve ‘the sign’ of the chosen?

1. they worked hard (protestant work ethic)

2. they engaged in careful rational planning and calculation (rationalization)

they used logic and planning to organize their lives efficiently

3. they tried to build wealth (profit)

What are the 3 practices of the Protestants similar to?

Capitalism

Which two important new social forces get released into the modern world through the religious beliefs?

1. Capitalism is the new economic system

2. Rationalization becomes a force of its own and congeals into a new organization called bureaucracy

What was built out of the Protestant Ethic?

The bureaucratic organization

What happens when the “cloak” of religion falls away?

Only rationalization remains known as the "disenchantment" thesis where rationalization becomes the critical social force in the world and we all must live in the presence of bureaucratic authority

What is the iron cage?

Trap that prevents us from experiencing us from experiencing ourselves as independent creative humans capable of all kinds of emotions and special experiences

3 warnings of the classicists

1) Marx - Inequality

2) Durkehiem - loneliness

3) Weber - rationalization (the iron cage)

Why did Weber refer to the increasing rationalization in modern society as an “iron cage”?

because rationality can trap and prevent people from experiencing themselves as independent, creative humans capable of emotions and special experiences

What is the definition of worldview?

set of beliefs about the world connected to a particular social group

What is re-federalization of society?

Transition from democracy to mass society

Weber’s study in authority began with a simple question. What was that question?

why do people obey?

What is the definition of authority?

The ability to make people do things

What is illegitimate authority?

making someone do something using illegal force, like violence, or threat of violence

What are the 3 types of legitimate authority? Name, brief description, example for each type.

• Traditional

  • grounded in traditional order of society

  • examples: parents/children, teachers/students, a caste system

• Charismatic

  • grounded in strong leader who develops a faithful following, often convinces followers to ignore traditional or bureaucratic forms of authority

  • examples: cult leaders, Hitler, Jesus

• Bureaucratic

  • based on legal/rational framework of written rules and laws

  • example: attending cornell university

Which is the most powerful type of authority of the three in modern societies?

bureaucratic authority

What are the three core categories of human identity according to Weber? Why is this approach to understanding human life necessary?

• class, status, and party

• this approach is necessary because humans are never just one single thing, we are shaped by multiple influences:

• class (occupations)

• status groups (family, religion, race/ethnicity, neighborhoods)

• party (political involvement)

What are “ideal types?”

building models of social things (ex the protestant ethic or bureaucratic organization model)

How did Weber study/discover “ideal types”

weber created these by studying historical documents and ideas

What is “verstehen?”

Approaching a research subject by practicing sympathetic understanding

verstehen example

understanding protestants were trying to achieve salvation, not just get rich

What are the synonyms to power?

Power, authority, and domination

How is Mills’ study similar to Weber’s study of the Protestant Ethic?

• mills asks same basic question that captured weber's sociological imagination: who holds power and why?

• weber noticed protestants were at the top of organizations and studied them

• similarly, mills studied who is at the top of modern bureaucratic organizations to understand power in society

What is the power elite

Individuals who occupy the highest circles of organizations in the 3 spheres of business corporations, military organizations, and government organizations (the 3 spheres of power)

How are the power elite socialized into the norms of being a member of this special group

Attendance at prestigious colleges and universities (like the Ivy league)

Where is power located in the modern world according to Mills?

Power elite

Who are the people that get to use this power?

Those that occupy the higher circles in large bureaucratic organizations in 3 spheres: business, politics, and the military (triangle of power).

Where do they (powerful people) come from, and how do they learn how to be this type of person?

• Socialization into the power elites by learning social group norms.

• They learn norms by having access to other members of the power elite, like attending a prestigious university. Through the sociological process of socialization (the process of learning social norms). Common interests and intermarry within themselves.

4 things about current political affairs

1) President Trump and his supporters have complained about something they refer to as the “deep administrative state” (referring to the modern world includes the presence of powerful bureaucratic organizations including government bureaucratic orgs)

2) Dr. Lachmann claimed that interesting things happen when elites disagree with each other such as some elites are supportive of trump, some are not

3) The current Trump administration is attacking Ivy League schools (and other influential schools), but many of the members of the Trym admin have Ivy League backgrounds

4) Elite have a lot of control over their lives and the lives of others

Bureaucracies often rely on a culture of + example

Secrecy

The epstein files

The Power Elite book compares and contrasts 2 societies

1) Public - a democratic society where the citizens freely participate in discussion of issues that forms public opinion that is turned into action by elected political leaders

2) Mass - power elite control the society and especially control the mass media (using public relations techniques) to control and steer public option

Summary - public participates, a mass is manipulated

Important quote from the Power Elite

By combining these several points, we can construct little models or diagrams of several types of modern societies

Mills uses ideal-type concepts like “higher circles” and “triangle of power” in his theory of power in society. Where and what are the “higher circles?” And what is the “triangle of power?”

• higher circles

  • the top levels of large bureaucratic organizations

  • this is where the elites are located and where major decisions are made

• triangle of power

  • the three main spheres where elites hold power (business, government, military)

  • elites can move between these spheres and still maintain power

Mills and lecture used 4 models of power across different historical social structures. How are the models useful to understand this difference? What are the 4 models?

• the models are useful because they show how power is structured differently across historical periods and how the flow of power changes

• public sphere = structured influential conversations

• life world = everyday people's lived experiences

• 4 models

  • 1) feudal monarchy (absolute power/authority)

    • power is held by nobility and the church which is shared power

    • they share power and have complete control over the lifeworld (ordinary people) ordinary people have no power

  • 2) public/democracy model

    • power is located with the public (citizens)

    • people gather in the public sphere to discuss issues and then their discussions produce public opinion, which influences government decisions

    • Requires

      • a place to gather (public spheres)

      • a free, independent press

  • 3) mass society/power elite model ("re-feudalizaiton" thesis)

    • power shifts back to elites in the triangle of power (government, corporations, military)

    • decisions are made in higher circles, often in secret

    • the public sphere becomes controlled by mass media and public relations

    • the public becomes voiceless, powerless mass of individuals

  • 4) rise of the internet model

    • adds the internet as a new sphere that interacts with power

    • disrupts the previous model by changing communication and the public sphere

    • raises questions about where power now sits and how information flows

What is the structure of the broadcasting model of the mass media?

• one transmitter can transmit a flow of controlled information to many receivers the flow of information is one way only

• there is no channel for feedback or discussion

• it is a tightly controlled system for controlling information

How does the rise of the Internet disrupt the power elite system?

Lowers barriers to entry - anyone can post. Yet, it is highly surveilled, policed, and algorithmically shaped by the triangle of power.

it complicates the structure of power by raising questions about:

where internet fits in the model

how much influence it has compared to government/corporations

Who is Jurgen Habermas?

Famous german sociologist and historian and philosopher was very influenced by Mill’s study of elites

Dedicated his life to answering “is democracy possible?”

Subsequent changes in the democratic model as “the re-feudalization of the public sphere

What is the definition of poverty?

being extremely poor

Who speaks for poor people?

American sociology, along with all of non-profits and government agencies at all levels

The process of moral application of a basic scale of need that separates the poor into two basic ideal-types

1) The worthy (people who had barriers to work, elderly, injured people)

2) The unworthy (people who were able to work but did not work)

What is the general poverty rate in the U.S. that I suggested we use in this class?

around 10-13%

there are debates about how this is calculated, and some argue the real rate is higher

What is the rate of the US population experiencing poverty at some point in their lives?

60-70%

Who is Matthew Desmond?

• Has an eviction lab at princeton

• He came from a poor family that had experienced eviction

• His early experiences in a poor family helped to focus his choice of research topics as a graduate student and as a professor of sociology

Who is Katheryn Edin

• Director of the Bendheim-Thoman Center for Research on Child Wellbeing (CRWC) at Princeton

• One of the top poverty researchers in the world

Who is Arleen? What is her life like?

• single black mother of two sons

• Evicted twice in 6 months

• First time: man broke down door after kids threw snowballs. 

• Second time: house was deemed uninhabitable (Arleen was happy at this location).

Who is Sherrena? What is her life story? Her biography?

• Arleen's landlord

• a former schoolteacher turned entrepreneur managing properties w her husband. Good at managing property and investing; works with husband who is property manager. Has two other businesses: Shuttle service to bring girlfriends and family members to visit jailed loved ones; credit repair business

When a person gets evicted they can choose between two methods for the eviction, what are the two methods of eviction?

curb: belongings dumped onto the curb

truck: belongings are stored in truck/storage facility, but it ends up costing money to access and there are daily fees

people often choose curb because they don't want to lose belongings or can't afford the fees to retrieve them

What was the name of the homeless shelter where Arlene takes her children? Why is the name important?

• the lodge

• the name is important because it helps remove some of the stigma around living in a homeless shelter

What did Sherrena bring to Arleen the day Arleen moved in?

she brought groceries/food to help Arleen get started in the apartment

What are the bureaucratic organizations in the eviction industry?

• DNS (department of neighborhood services)

• eviction courts and police

• moving companies (remove possessions)

What is the nickname of Sherrena and Quentin’s Chevy Suburban?

the beast

What are the historical demographics of Milwaukee? Why?

• african american community

• industry town (factories were key source of wealth)

• problem - factories shut down; plunged into poverty

• severe racial segregation

• factories need exploitable workers

Why was it hard for Sherrena to evict Lamar?

he had no legs

Sherrena has another business connected to the prison system, what is that business? What is her other business?

driving families to see incarcerated relatives (connected to prison system)

other business: landlord/real estate (housing low income tenants)

What is DNS?

department of neighborhood services

investigates reports of substandard living conditions

supposed to bring homes up to code and ensure safety

in reality, can declare homes unlivable, leads to eviction, people lose shelter

shows how a system with good intentions can produce harmful outcomes

Why did Sherrena decide to evict the tenant? There was a legal complication, how did Sherrena avoid the complication?

because of ongoing problems related to lease violations like disturbances/trouble at the property

legal complication: difficult for her to evict under standard conditions

she avoided it using a legal loophole, filing the conviction under different claim

What happens when Sherrena and Quentin deliver an eviction notice to their tenant?

• tenant becomes angry and confrontational when they receive the notice

• there was a verbal conflict by the stepdad

• shows how emotionally charged and conflict heavy evictions are

How do the authors define people who live on “$2 A Day?”

• people are living on $2 per person per day (or less) in cash income

• refers to extreme poverty in the US, where families have almost no steady cash income or even if they receive some non cash aid (like SNAP)

Who is Jennifer Hernandez? What is her life like?

• works cleaning foreclosed homes in chicago

• lives in extreme poverty

• cleans abandoned houses after 2008 financial crisis

• uses minimal resources (ex bucket of water, no running water or heat)

• struggles to access basic needs and stability)

What are the rules for the program at La Casa shelter for the homeless?

• two stage system

• stage 1: given 3 months to find a job, if they fail they are evicted

• stage 2: if successful, helps them find subsidized housing, can stay until housing is found

• goal: motivate people out of poverty

• problem: does not account of instability (ex getting fired) and assumes people are lazy (not addressing structural issues)

What are low wage jobs like? What is Jennifer’s job like at Chicago City Custodial Services?

• low wage jobs

  • exist in gig economy

  • workers must be available, but work is not guaranteed

  • pay is not enough to live

  • employers avoid giving benefits

• jennifer's job

  • cleaning foreclosed homes in chicago

  • uses very limited resources (not running water or heat in homes)

  • lack of basic utilities like running water and heat

Why were there so many foreclosed houses that needed to be cleaned? What condition were many of these houses in?

• why so many foreclosed homes

  • after 2008 financial crisis

  • low income families were given homes they could not afford

  • leads to mass abandonment

• condition of homes

  • poor condition, abandoned

Why did Jennifer quit her job?

• extremely poor working conditions

• cleaning foreclosed homes with almost no resources (no running water, heat, or proper supplies)

• the work was unsustainable and exploitative, making it impossible to continue

Why did Jennifer take her children to see a play put on by Chicago’s famous Shakespeare in the Park troupe?

• she wanted to give her children a meaningful, enriching experience outside of poverty

• it provided a sense of normalcy and culture, not just survival

• shows that even in extreme poverty, parents still try to create a "good life" and opportunities for their kids

Computer technology is embedded in the core societal structures. How does Jennifer get access to computer technology? What does Jennifer use her cell phone for and why?

• uses a public computer in the basement of a homeless shelter

• has a cell phone even though it is expensive

• needed because employers expect constant communication (calls/texts)

• also lets her kids use it for games

The authors make a very important point about work and the poor.

• Poor people work!

• ex: rae mccormick is very harding working and good at their job

• this challenges the stereotype that poor people are lazy

What are EITC and SNAP? How do they run in opposite directions?

• SNAP: provides monthly, income based food assistance; for people with very low or no income

• EITC: refundable, annual tax credit designed to reward work; for people earning some income

• how they run in opposite directions:

  • there is a middle zone where people earn too much to qualify for SNAP but not enough to qualify for EITC

  • EITC benefits are not enough to replace SNAP

  • this can discourage working more because people lose benefits

What is the vision of a decent life described by these people?

• full time job, dependable schedule

• pay slightly above minimum wage

• ability to balance work and childcare

• focus is not on wealth, just on a stable and decent work environment

Why was Susan Brown late for her interview at the clothing thrift shop?

• could not afford the bus, had to walk

• used phone for directions but got wrong address

• walked 20 blocks to wrong location

• called and apologized but still looked bad

What is Susan Brown’s educational history?

• high school education (did not complete college)

• her limited formal education makes it harder to access stable, higher paying jobs

There are two IT-related things that cause Susan Brown a lot of anxiety when she applies for a job? What are they?

• online application systems

  • long computerized questionnaires

  • questions unclear

  • judged by AI systems she doesn't understand

• name confusion

  • another "susan brown" in texas has a felony on her record

  • she has been disqualified because of this in the past

  • feels like the computer is against her

What are the findings of the racial employment application process studies discussed in the chapter?

white applicants who claimed to have felonies were more likely to get interviews than black applicants with clean records

Why did these findings depress the paid research team?

• people are living extremely difficult, punishing lives

• created feelings of empathy and frustration

Susan’s husband Devin got a job. Why are the sociological characteristics of this job?

• grocery store job

• not full time, no benefits

• provides some income but still unstable

• enough to move them slightly away from disaster

Was Rae McCormick very good at her job? Why did she like going to work?

• excellent at her job (employee of the month multiple times)

• liked work because it gave her a break from the stress of poverty and home life

She has an anger management challenge. Why is she so angry?

father died at age 11, mother abandoned her, lived in poverty, lost all teeth by age 20 (limits ability in social world)

Why did she get fired from her job?

could not get to work, ran out of gas after roommate used money, employer had no tolerance for her missing one day, shows lack of flexibility in low wage jobs

How did the 1996 Welfare Reform Act affect the structure of low wage jobs because of basic economic theory of supply and demand?

• increased supply of low wage workers (more single mothers entering workforce)

• good for employers (can pick and chose workers)

• jobs became less competitive -> lower wages, worse conditions

• supposed to help workers but actually harms them

What is the structure of low wage employment in the U.S.? Pay, weekly hours, benefits, expectations of availability.

• gig economy structure

• pay: not enough to live

• hours: often under full time (ex 39 hours to avoid benefits)

• benefits: often not provided

• expectations: must always be available, but work is not guaranteed

What does the American dream look like for these people? What do they hope to get?

• full time job, dependable schedule

• slightly above minimum wage

• ability to care for children

• a decent, stable work environment

What is the effect of housing instability on kids before age 5

It can lead to delays in kindergarten readiness and is associated with attention and behavior challenges and delayed cognitive skills throughout school. In adolescence, their children are more likely to have depression and anxiety and challenged with information processing

Who is Michael Foucault

French scholar who died in 1948 from AIDS