Institutions

• Patterned and enduring sets of practices and ideas that perform a function in society

  • Common, recognized, stable 

  • Politics (ex) - voting (practice) and “Rule by the people” (idea)

• Politics, education, religion, economy, etc 

• Social institutions limit our choices and enable us to make choices

• Politics: A Social Institution

  • Politics - methods/techniques by which power and influence are exercised and negotiated

    • Particularly re: government policy, attitudes, activities 

• How does sociology help to understand the distributions of political power?

  • Power elite

  • Special interest groups & PACs

• The Power Elite:

  • Conflict theory perspective

  • A small # of influential people hold the most powerful positions in U.S political, economic, and military institutions.

  • Exert hidden influence on the government.

  • Pluralism - sees power as spread across a variety of organizations and institutions.

    • Structural functionalist perspective 

  • Special interest groups - organizations that raise money to influence government

  • PACs- groups that raise money to campaign for political candidates or legislation (usually support a specific group or agenda) 

  • Super PACs - PACs that can raise and spend unlimited amounts to influence elections

• Education: (a social institution that) disseminates knowledge, values, and expectations that are necessary for social functioning

• Tracking: students’ placement into educational “tracks” shapes which classes are available.

  • Informed by teachers’ expectations (bias)

  • Puts some students on the “fast track”

  • Can shape student performance

  • Courses offered in different tracks are shaped by school funding

• Hidden Curriculum:  lessons that are taught indirectly via education (e.g., how to follow the rules)

• Tracking leads to hidden curriculum, which leads to cultural capital 

• Cultural capital: knowledge, skills, expectations, preferences, and other cultural assets that help individuals succeed in society

• CAN BE PASSED ON EXPLICITLY or implicitly ( hidden curriculum)

• Can be tangible objects with cultural value, or embodied knowledge/skills

• Connects to financial capital ($) and social capital ( social networks)

  • Examples - Degree, how to apply for college, blue collar skills, learning how not to take drugs from strangers, how to act responsibly, how to do math, language

• Religion: a social institution that bonds communities through shared beliefs and rituals. 

  • Religiosity: a measure of individual religiousness 

  • Participation in religious beliefs, activities, and practices

• Spirituality: the search for meaning and purpose; trusting in a high power. More fluid than religion; doesn't have clearly defined practices. 

• Fundamentalism: emphasizes conservative and traditional religious practices; strict interpretation

• Secularization: trend towards a non-religious society; movement away from identification with religious values and institutions

  • CHURCH/STATE NOT ALWAYS SEPARATE

    • “In God We Trust” on the dollar bill. 

    • School vouchers to private schools.  

    • Almost all presidents are Christian.

    • Observation of Christian holidays.

• The Economy: A social institution that organizes production, distribution, exchange, and consumption of goods and services

  • Economic sociology: economic behavior

• Labor Markets: Markets in which labor is bought (by employers) and sold (by workers)

  • E.g. 

    • How people find jobs

    • How salaries/wages are set

    • How job applicants are evaluated

• Cubervetting: Employers’ practice of using online information (particularly social media) to evaluate job applicants

• Red flags:

  • Dishonesty

  • Illegal activity

  • Alcohol or drug use

  • Sexual behavior

  • Profanity

  • Negative attitudes toward work

  • Negative content about prior employers and coworkers

  • High-frequency posts

  • Unemployment

  • Poor spelling and grammar

• Stereotypes: lazy, hard to work with

• “Looking for work” equated with “unemployed”

• Impacts of Cybervetting: Hurts job applicants and future job-seekers:

  • Pressures people into managing their online presence

  • Enables exclusion of applicants based on irrelevant criteria

  • Can disqualify applicants without their realizing it

Globalization: Changes arising from increased international trade and exchange

• Economic

• Cultural/ Ideological

• Compresses time and space

• Generates new flows of information, goods, and people around the globe

• Produces more powerful global corporations (TNCs)

• Rise of outsourcing & sweatshops for production

  • Outsourcing: Shifting production of goods and services by contracting or moving them

  • Sweatshops: Workplaces in which workers face extreme exploitation

  • Rise of service and knowledge work

  • And declining terms of work

    • Generally lower wages, reduced benefits

    • Short-term, contract work

    • Shift toward “gigs”

    • On-call/unpredictable schedules

    • Pressure to build skillsets, do personal branding

    • Blurred boundaries between work/personal life 

    • Inability to demand better treatment

  • Worker Resistance

    • Issues w/ exploitation & lack of control

    • Resistance generates a sense of control & freedom

      • Quiet quitting