Man is a rational being. He chooses housing, food and where to put his energy. However, it is pointless to have freedom of choice if no one appreciates your choice.

We need society. Nature has endowed us with an invariable trait - a thirst for communication. Thanks to this feature, we think not only about ourselves. Within a family or an entire planet, a person makes decisions for the sake of common progress. Thanks to the thirst for communication, we push the world forward.

As soon as our ancestors descended from the palm tree, they were faced with the increasing hostility of nature. The little primate could not defeat the mammoth. Natural skin is not enough to keep you warm in winter. Sleeping outdoors is three times more dangerous.

The nascent consciousness understood - we can only survive together. The forefathers created a primitive language to understand each other. They gathered in communities. Communities were divided into castes. The strong and fearless went hunting. The offspring were raised to be gentle and understanding. They built shacks that were smart and practical. Even then, a person was engaged in what he was predisposed to.

But nature provided only rough raw materials. You cannot build a city from stones alone. It is difficult to kill an animal with stones. Ancestors learned to process materials in order to work more efficiently and live longer.

Broadly defined society- the part of nature that has tamed nature, using will and consciousness to survive.

In a group, we can not get carried away with superficial knowledge. Each of us has our own inclinations. A professional plumber, even for a million-dollar salary, will not be happy to grow bonsai - his brain is technically sharpened. The union allows us to do what we love and leave the rest to others.

We now understand the narrow definition society - a conscious gathering of individuals to work towards a common goal.

Society as a dynamic system

We are cogs in the social mechanism. Goals are not determined by anyone alone. They come as general needs. Society, through the strength of its individual members, solves an endless stream of problems. Finding solutions forces society to improve and creates new and complex problems. Humanity builds itself, which characterizes society as a dynamic system capable of self-development.

Society has a complex dynamic structure. Like any system, it consists of subsystems. Subsystems in the group are divided into spheres of influence. Sociologists note four subsystems of society:

1. Spiritual- responsible for culture.
2. Political- regulates relations by laws.
3. Social- caste division: nation, class, social stratum.
4. Economic- production and distribution of goods.

Subsystems are systems in relation to their individual members. They only work when all the elements are in place. Both subsystems and individual parts are inextricably linked. Without production and regulation, spiritual life loses its meaning. Without a person, life is not nice to another.

The social system is constantly moving. It is driven by subsystems. Subsystems move due to elements. The elements are divided into:

1. Material - factories, homes, resources.
2. Ideal - values, ideals, beliefs, traditions.

Material values ​​characterize subsystems more, while ideal values ​​characterize a human trait. Man is the only indivisible element in the social system. A person has a will, aspirations and beliefs.

The system works thanks to communication - social relations. Social relations are the main link between people and subsystems.

People play roles. In the family we play an exemplary father. At work, we are expected to obey unquestioningly. Among friends, we are the life of the party. We don't choose roles. They are dictated to us by society.

Each person has more than one personality, but several at once. Each person behaves differently in different situations. You can't scold your boss the same way you scold a child, right?

Animals have a fixed social role: if the leader “said” that you will sleep from below and eat last, this will happen all your life. And even in another pack, an individual will never be able to take on the role of leader.

Man is universal. Every day we wear dozens of masks. Thanks to this, we easily adapt to different situations. You are the main one, what you understand. You will never demand submission from a competent leader. Great survival mechanism!

Scientists divide social relationships:

• between individuals;
• within the group;
• between groups;
• local (indoors);
• ethnic (within race or nation);
• within the organization;
• institutional (within the boundaries of a social institution);
• inside the country;
• international.

We communicate not only with whomever we want, but also when necessary. For example, we don’t want to communicate with a colleague, but he sits in the same office with us. And we must work. That's why relationships exist:

• informal- with friends and loved ones whom we ourselves chose;
• formalized- with whom we must contact if necessary.

You can communicate with like-minded people and with enemies. there are:

• cooperative- cooperative relationships;
• competitive- confrontation.

Results

Society - complex dynamic system. People launched it only once, and now it determines every stage of our lives.

• flexibility- regulates all areas of life, even if they have not yet appeared;
• mobility- continuously changes as needed;
• difficult well-oiled mechanism from subsystems and elements;
• independence- society itself creates the conditions for existence;
• relationship all elements;
• adequate reaction for changes.

Thanks to the dynamic social mechanism, man is the most resilient creature on the planet. For only a person changes the world around him.

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In philosophy, society is defined as a “dynamic system.” The word “system” is translated from Greek as “a whole made up of parts.” Society as a dynamic system includes parts, elements, subsystems that interact with each other, as well as connections and relationships between them. It changes, develops, new parts or subsystems appear and old ones disappear, they are modified, acquiring new forms and qualities.

Society as a dynamic system has a complex multi-level structure and includes a large number of levels, sublevels, and elements. For example, human society on a global scale includes many societies in the form of different states, which in turn consist of various social groups, and humans are included in them.

Consists of four subsystems that are fundamental to man - political, economic, social and spiritual. Each sphere has its own structure and is itself a complex system. For example, it is a system that includes a huge number of components - parties, government, parliament, public organizations and more. But government can also be viewed as a system with many components.

Each is a subsystem in relation to the whole society, but at the same time it is itself a rather complex system. Thus, we already have a hierarchy of the systems and subsystems themselves, that is, in other words, society is a complex system of systems, a kind of supersystem or, as they sometimes say, a metasystem.

Society as a complex dynamic system is characterized by the presence in its composition of various elements, both material (buildings, technical systems, institutions, organizations) and ideal (ideas, values, customs, traditions, mentality). For example, the economic subsystem includes organizations, banks, transport, produced goods and services and, at the same time, economic knowledge, laws, values, and more.

Society as a dynamic system contains a special element, which is its main, system-forming element. This is a person who has free will, the ability to set a goal and choose the means to achieve this goal, which makes social systems more mobile and dynamic than, say, natural ones.

The life of society is constantly in a state of flux. The pace, scale and quality of these changes may vary; There was a time in the history of human development when the established order of things did not change fundamentally for centuries, however, over time, the pace of change began to increase. Compared to natural systems in human society, qualitative and quantitative changes occur much faster, which suggests that society is constantly changing and developing.

Society, like any system, is an ordered integrity. This means that the elements of the system are located within it in a certain position and, to one degree or another, are connected with other elements. Consequently, society as an integral dynamic system has a certain quality that characterizes it as a single whole, having a property that none of its elements has. This property is sometimes called the non-additivity of the system.

Society as a dynamic system is characterized by another feature, which is that it is one of the self-governing and self-organizing systems. This function belongs to the political subsystem, which gives consistency and harmonious relationship to all elements that form the social integral system.

Main types (types) of social activities

So there are 4 element human activity: people, things, symbols, connections between them. Implementation of any type of joint activity of people without them is impossible.

Highlight 4 main type (type) of social activity:

Main types of social activities:

Material production;

Spiritual activity (production)

Regulatory activities

Social activity (in the narrow sense of the word)

1. Material production– creates practical means of activity that are used in all its types. Allows people physically transform natural and social reality. Everything necessary for everyday people's lives (housing, food, clothing, etc.).

However, we cannot talk about absolutization the role of material production in social activities. The role is constantly increasing information resources. IN post-industrial society is growing sharply the role of culture and science, transition from the production of goods to the service sector. Therefore, the role of material production will gradually decline.

2. Spiritual production (activity) – does not produce things, ideas, images, values ​​(paintings, books, etc.).

In the process of spiritual activity, a person learns about the world around him, its diversity and essence, develops a system of value concepts, determining the meaning (value) of certain phenomena.

“Mumu”, L. Tolstoy “Vanya and the plums”, sausage in the toilet.

His role is constantly growing.

3. Regulatory activities – the activities of administrators, managers, politicians.

It is aimed at ensuring consistency and orderliness in various spheres of public life.

4. Social activities (in the narrow sense of the word) – activities aimed at directly serving people. This is the activity of a doctor, a teacher, an artist, workers in the service sector, recreation, and tourism.

Creates conditions for maintaining the activity and life of people.

These four basic types of activity exist in any society and form basis spheres of public life.

Society as a dynamic system

Basic Concepts

Society is constantly changing, dynamic system.

Process(P. Sorokin) – yes any change to an object for a certain time

(whether it is a change in its place in space or a modification of its quantitative or qualitative characteristics).

Social process – sequential change in the state of society or its subsystems.

Types of social processes:

They differ:

1. By the nature of the changes:

A. Functioning of society - happening in society reversible changes related to everyday activities of society (with reproduction and maintaining it in a state of balance and stability).

B. Change –First stage internal rebirth in society or in its individual parts and their properties, bearing quantitative character.

B. Development –irreversible quality shifts resulting from gradual quantitative changes (see Hegel's law).

2. According to the degree of awareness of people:

A. Natural– not realized by people (riots).

B. Conscious – purposeful human activity.

3. By scale:

A. Global– covering all of humanity as a whole or a large group of societies (information revolution, computerization, Internet).

B. Local– affecting individual regions or countries.

B. Single- associated with specific groups of people.

4. By direction:

A. Progress– progressive development society from less perfect to more, increasing vitality, complication systemic organization.

B. Regression- movement of society along descending lines with simplification and, in the long term, with the destruction of the system.

Section 1. Social studies. Society. Man – 18 hours.

Topic 1. Social science as a body of knowledge about society – 2 hours.

General definition of the concept of society. The essence of society. Characteristics of social relations. Human society (man) and the animal world (animal): distinctive characteristics. Basic social phenomena of human life: communication, cognition, work. Society as a complex dynamic system.

General definition of the concept of society.

In a broad sense society - this is a part of the material world, isolated from nature, but closely connected with it, which consists of individuals with will and consciousness, and includes ways of interaction between people and forms of their unification.

In the narrow sense society can be understood as a certain group of people united to communicate and jointly perform some activity, or a specific stage in the historical development of a people or country.

The essence of society is that in the course of his life, each person interacts with other people. Such diverse forms of interaction between people, as well as connections that arise between different social groups (or within them), are usually called social relations.

Characteristics of social relations.

All social relations can be divided into three large groups:

1. interpersonal (socio-psychological), by which we mean relationships between individuals. At the same time, individuals, as a rule, belong to different social strata, have different cultural and educational levels, but they are united by common needs and interests in the sphere of leisure or everyday life. The famous sociologist Pitirim Sorokin highlighted the following types interpersonal interaction:

a) between two individuals (husband and wife, teacher and student, two comrades);

b) between three individuals (father, mother, child);

c) between four, five or more people (the singer and his listeners);

d) between many, many people (members of an unorganized crowd).

Interpersonal relationships arise and are realized in society and are social relationships even if they are of the nature of purely individual communication. They act as a personalized form of social relations.

2. material (socio-economic), which arise and develop directly in the course of human practical activity, outside of human consciousness and independently of him. They are divided into industrial, environmental and office relations.

3. spiritual (or ideal), which are formed by first “passing through the consciousness” of people and are determined by their values ​​that are significant to them. They are divided into moral, political, legal, artistic, philosophical and religious social relations.

Basic social phenomena of human life:

1. Communication (mostly emotions involved, pleasant/unpleasant, want);

2. Cognition (intellect is mainly involved, true/false, I can);

3. Labor (mainly the will is involved, it is necessary/not necessary, it must).

Human society (man) and the animal world (animal): distinctive characteristics.

1. Consciousness and self-awareness. 2. Word (2nd signal system). 3. Religion.

Society as a complex dynamic system.

In philosophical science, society is characterized as a dynamic self-developing system, i.e., a system that is capable of seriously changing and at the same time maintaining its essence and qualitative certainty. In this case, the system is understood as a complex of interacting elements. In turn, an element is some further indecomposable component of the system that is directly involved in its creation.

To analyze complex systems, such as the one that society represents, scientists have developed the concept of “subsystem”. Subsystems are “intermediate” complexes that are more complex than the elements, but less complex than the system itself.

1) economic, the elements of which are material production and relationships that arise between people in the process of production of material goods, their exchange and distribution;

2) socio-political, consisting of such structural formations as classes, social strata, nations, taken in their relationships and interactions with each other, manifested in such phenomena as politics, state, law, their relationship and functioning;

3) spiritual, covering various forms and levels of social consciousness, which, being embodied in the real process of social life, form what is commonly called spiritual culture.

There is a variety of approaches to defining the concept of “society” in the scientific literature, which emphasizes the abstract nature of this category, and when defining it in each specific case, it is necessary to proceed from the context in which this concept is used.

1) Natural (the influence of geographical and climatic conditions on the development of society).

2) Social (the reasons and starting points of social development are determined by society itself).

The combination of these factors predetermines social development.

There are different ways of developing society:

Evolutionary (gradual accumulation of changes and their naturally determined nature);

Revolutionary (characterized by relatively rapid change, subjectively directed on the basis of knowledge and action).

DIVERSITY OF PATHS AND FORMS OF SOCIAL DEVELOPMENT

Social progress in those created in the 18th-19th centuries. works of J. Condorcet, G. Hegel, K. Marx and other philosophers was understood as a natural movement along a single main path for all humanity. On the contrary, in the concept of local civilizations, progress is seen to occur in different civilizations in different ways.

If you take a mental look at the course of world history, you will notice many similarities in the development of different countries and peoples. Primitive society was everywhere replaced by a state-governed society. Feudal fragmentation was replaced by centralized monarchies. Bourgeois revolutions took place in many countries. Colonial empires collapsed and dozens of independent states emerged in their place. You yourself could continue listing similar events and processes that took place in different countries, on different continents. This similarity reveals the unity of the historical process, a certain identity of successive orders, the common destinies of different countries and peoples.

At the same time, the specific paths of development of individual countries and peoples are diverse. There are no peoples, countries, states with the same history. The diversity of concrete historical processes is caused by differences in natural conditions, the specifics of the economy, the uniqueness of spiritual culture, the peculiarities of the way of life, and many other factors. Does this mean that each country is predetermined by its own development option and that it is the only possible one? Historical experience shows that under certain conditions, various options for solving pressing problems are possible, a choice of methods, forms, and paths for further development is possible, i.e., a historical alternative. Alternative options are often offered by certain groups of society and various political forces.

Let us remember that in preparation Peasant reform, held in Russia in 1861, different social forces proposed different forms of implementing changes in the life of the country. Some defended the revolutionary path, others - the reformist one. But among the latter there was no unity. Several reform options were proposed.

And in 1917-1918. A new alternative arose before Russia: either a democratic republic, one of the symbols of which was a popularly elected Constituent Assembly, or a republic of Soviets led by the Bolsheviks.

In each case, a choice was made. This choice is made by statesmen, ruling elites, and the masses, depending on the balance of power and influence of each of the subjects of history.

Any country, any people at certain moments in history are faced with a fateful choice, and its history is carried out in the process of realizing this choice.

The variety of ways and forms of social development is unlimited. It is included within the framework of certain trends in historical development.

So, for example, we saw that the abolition of outdated serfdom was possible both in the form of a revolution and in the form of reforms carried out by the state. And the urgent need to accelerate economic growth in different countries was carried out either by attracting new and new natural resources, i.e. extensively, or by introducing new equipment and technology, improving the skills of workers, based on increased labor productivity, i.e. intensive way. Different countries or the same country may use different options for implementing the same type of changes.

Thus, the historical process, in which general trends manifest themselves - the unity of diverse social development, creates the possibility of choice, on which the uniqueness of the paths and forms of further movement of a given country depends. This speaks to the historical responsibility of those who make this choice.