Factors Affecting Social Change
In order for social change to occur, there needs to be a force – or catalyst -
pushing the change forward. Without impetus nothing would alter.
Sometimes the force is obvious to an observer; at other times, it is either
hard to identify or disguised behind another factor.
There are also barriers to change - reasons for which change does not
occur. Again, these might be obvious or might require some investigation.
In order to be overcome, barriers to social change need to be addressed.
Interestingly, what might be a force for change in one situation, may act as
a barrier to change in another.
Physical Environment:
A culture can be greatly changed by climate, although sometimes the
changes happen so slowly they are largely unnoticed. Human misuse can
bring very rapid changes in physical environment which in turn change the
social and cultural life of a people. For example, deforestation brings land
erosion and reduces rainfall. Many human groups throughout history have
changed their physical environment through migration. In the primitive
societies whose members are very directly dependent upon their physical
environment migration to a different environment brings major changes in
the culture. Civilization makes it easy to transport a culture and practice it in
a new and different environment.
Population Changes:
A population change is itself a social change but also becomes a casual
factor in further social and cultural changes. When a thinly settled frontier
fills up with people the hospitality pattern fades away, secondary group
relations multiply, institutional structures grow more elaborate and many
other changes follow. A stable population may be able to resist change but
a rapidly growing population must migrate, improve its productivity or
starve. Great historic migrations and conquests of the Huns, Vikings and
many others have arisen from the pressure of a growing population upon
limited resources. Migration encourages further change for it brings a group
into a new environment subjects it to new social contacts and confronts it
with new problems. No major population change leaves the culture
unchanged.
Isolation and Contact:
Societies located at world crossroads have always been centers of change.
Since most new traits come through diffusion, those societies in closest
contact with other societies are likely to change most rapidly. In ancient
times of overland transport, the land bridge connecting Asia, Africa and
Europe was the centre of civilizing change. Later sailing vessels shifted the
centre to the fringes of the Mediterranean Sea and still later to the north-
west coast of Europe. Areas of greatest intercultural contact are the centers
of change. War and trade have always brought intercultural contact and
today tourism is adding to the contacts between cultures. Conversely
isolated areas are centers of stability, conservatism and resistance to
change. The most primitive tribes have been those who were the most
isolated like the polar Eskimos or the Aranda of Central Australia.
Social Structure:
The structure of a society affects its rate of change in subtle and not
immediately apparent ways. A society which vests great authority in the
very old people as classical China did for centuries is likely to be
conservative and stable. A highly centralized bureaucracy is very favorable
to the promotion and diffusion of change although bureaucracy has
sometimes been used in an attempt to suppress change usually with no
more than temporary success. When a culture is very highly integrated so
that each element is rightly interwoven with all the others in a mutually
interdependent system change is difficult and costly. But when the culture
is less highly integrated so that work, play, family, religion and other
activities are less dependent upon one another change is easier and more
frequent. A tightly structured society wherein every person's roles, duties,
privileges and obligations are precisely and rigidly defined is less given to
changes than a more loosely structured society wherein roles, lines of
authority, privileges and obligations are more open to individual
rearrangement.
Attitudes and Values:
To people in developed nations and societies change is normal. Children
there are socialized to anticipate and appreciate change. By contrast the
Trobriand Islanders off the coast of New Guinea had no concept of change
and did not even have any words in their language to express or describe
change. Societies differ greatly in their general attitude toward change.
People who revere the past and are preoccupied with traditions and rituals
will change slowly and unwillingly. When a culture has been relatively static
for a long time the people are likely to assume that it should remain so
indefinitely. They are intensely and unconsciously ethnocentric; they
assume that their customs and techniques are correct and everlasting. A
possible change is unlikely even to be seriously considered. Any change in
such a society is likely to be too gradual to be noticed. A rapidly changing
society has a different attitude toward change and this attitude is both
cause and effect of the changes already taking place. Rapidly changing
societies are aware of the social change. They are somewhat skeptical and
critical of some parts of their traditional culture and will consider and
experiment with innovations. Such attitudes powerfully stimulate the
proposal and acceptance of changes by individuals within the society.
Different groups within a locality or a society may show differing receptivity
to change. Every changing society has its liberals and its conservatives.
Literate and educated people tend to accept changes more readily than the
illiterate and uneducated. Attitudes and values affect both the amount and
the direction of social change. The ancient Greeks made great
contributions to art and learning but contributed little to technology. No
society has been equally dynamic in all aspects and its values determine in
which area-art, music, warfare, technology, philosophy or religion it will be
innovative.
Technology Factors:
The technological factors represent the conditions created by man which
have a profound influence on his life. In the attempt to satisfy his wants,
fulfill his needs and to make his life more comfortable man creates
civilization. Technology is a by-product of civilization. When the scientific
knowledge is applied to the problems in life it becomes technology.
Technology is a systematic knowledge which is put into practice that is to
use tools and run machines to serve human purpose. Science and
technology go together. In utilizing the products of technology man brings
social change. The social effects of technology are far-reaching. According
to Karl Marx even the formation of social relations and mental conceptions
and attitudes are dependent upon technology. He has regarded technology
as a sole explanation of social change. W.F Ogburn says technology
changes society by changing our environment to which we in turn adapt.
These changes are usually in the material environment and the adjustment
that we make with these changes often modifies customs and social
institutions. Jacques Ellul's, author of 'the technological society', claims
that in modern industrial societies, “technologism” has engulfed every
aspect of social existence in much the same way Catholicism did in the
middle ages. The loss of human freedom and the large-scale destruction of
human beings are due to the increasing use of certain types of technology
which has begun to threaten the life support systems of the earth as a
whole.
