Normal DOL

Analysis of the Division of Labor, the Development of Organic Solidarity in the Normal Form

Isaac Christiansen

Durkheim analyzes the division of labor from a different perspective to how most of us have come to conceptualize it. Instead of examining it from a purely economic perspective and of purely economic genesis based on people placed in positions that most fit their natural inherited abilities, he examines the division of labor through a social lens analogous to that of an organism that develops features to deal with the environment in which it finds itself. Durkheim encourages the reader to see past the economical components and functions of the division of labor, to examine its social and moral components. Similarly he does not see the genesis of society and the division of labor as arising through random individuals coming together and deciding to exchange goods and cooperate through their self-interest but rather through a series of adjustments and adaptations to increased social volume and density leading to organic solidarity. If the former argument were the case, Durkheim indicates that this would be, at best, ephemeral due to the capricious nature of self-interest (Durkheim 1933: p152).
Organic solidarity, or the combination of consciousness and conscience of the interdependence of a society’s members whose labor has become divided and specialized, arises to the extent that individuality is allowed to flourish due to the recession of the common consciousness of the mechanical type, which is eroded by augmentation of population density and social volume. Necessarily we must return to examine mechanical solidarity and the origin of its erosion. Durkheim examines the transitions from horde to clan, clan to tribe, tribe to village, village to small town, and small town to city as a progression of the division of labor.
The horde is the “ideal type” of an undifferentiated mass, in terms of the labor that each member performs. In this theoretical ideal type all members of the society perform the same functions as everyone else, and the absence of hierarchy (pp 126-127). Durkheim indicates that often many clans together may form the society, however each clan is like a segment and that all of the clans contain within themselves the entire division of labor, thus from any one “segment” the social organization could be reproduced. Within the Iroquois or the Haudenosaunee (the term that the Iroquois used to refer to themselves and to their confederacy), Durkheim makes reference to fictitious kin, and that all “treat one another as brothers or cousins” (p128). The key is that mechanical solidarity is based on all the members of the group sharing a similar (although not identical) consciousness- hence: solidarity based on similarities.
Mechanical solidarity, Durkheim maintains, is based on the preservation of this collective consciousness, characterized by a predominance of repressive law, with a lesser role given to restitutory and regulatory law. Another characteristic that goes hand in hand with this is the role played by elders as both an embodiment and guardian of tradition. Thus, there is a need for the preservation of tradition, to continue the common consciousness:

“What constitutes the strength of tradition is the character of those who hand it on and inculcate it, that is, the older generation. They are its living expression; they alone have witnessed what are predecessors are wont to do. They are the unique mediator between the past and the present. Moreover, they enjoy among the generations brought up under their supervision and control a prestige that nothing can supplant” (p.235).

As social volume, or the totality of social interactions, within a community increases, due to an increase in density the elders are less and less able to monitor all of the social interactions allowing for the entrance of more and more variety of ideas that may differ from the common consciousness, leading to the erosion of mechanical solidarity, age based privileges and prestige as well as the erosion of the power of custom and tradition. As the society continues to grow and become more dense, in a large part through immigration and contact with the outside world, there is more exposure to different moral codes and they tend to reduce towards their common denominator. This is seen clearly in the transformations of villages to small towns (p.241). It is important to emphasize that although the two solidarities may exist simultaneously, they compete over the space of consciousness, and have an inverse relationship, although the collective consciousness never disappears as evidenced by the persistence of norms and morality reflected in retributive law that remains in organic societies.
Through the increase of population density the division of labor arises out of necessity. If all were to stay in the same profession, along with an increase in the total of un-met needs in society, there would be increased competition to the point where all are encroached upon, ultimately leading to a saturation of the market, and a redundancy of a particular function. Thus, as society grows larger the solidarity of similarities weakens, through redundancy it may even become like two magnets that repel one another. The segments must either separate or diversify. In the event that this leads to diversification, we witness the creation of more and more specialization and the development of mutual interdependence (pp.210-213). The division of labor is not thus born out of any conscious effort of man to maximize his happiness, but out of necessity for survival.

References:
Durkheim, Emile. 1933. 1984. “The Division of Labor in Society” The Free Press. New York NY