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Object and subject of sociology
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As any other science, sociology has its own object, subject and methods of research. The object of research is understood as a definite part of the surrounding us environment that has either natural or social character. Various objects studied by various sciences possess one important property that is common for all of them – objects exist outside us and do not depend on our consciousness and will.
As comes from the name of the discipline, the object of sociology is the society. But the society is also studied by other sciences such as history, political and demographic sciences, social psychology etc. Specificity of sociology is displayed only when from the whole complex of social phenomena we pick out those phenomena which are directly connected with human world and structural elements used to make up the society as an integral social system. That’s why the object of research for sociology is not only the society as a whole and its basic characteristics in local and global scales, but also its parts, subsystems, elements and various processes taking place in the society. The object of sociology is as objective as the object of research of any other science because the society, like physical or biological events and processes, exists being independent on people’s consciousness and will.
On the other hand, the object of sociology is of peculiar character. It’s proved of that, for instance, physical processes and phenomena bear an absolutely objective character. Apart from them, processes taking place in the society are in any case connected with people’s consciousness. Thus, they bear both objective and subjective character because the object and subject of actions are bound together. Moreover, if the society in general does not depend on consciousness and will of man, man himself depends on the society as far as his consciousness, development and activities are concerned. Such are distinctive features that determine specificity of the sociological object of research.
If the object of sociology exists outside consciousness of the theorist, the subject of research is in his head as the researcher studies some object of the surrounding milieu. It appears as the subject of research only in the researcher’s consciousness when he tries to single out some parts, elements or peculiarities of this object which are important for him at this very moment or in this very relationship.
Long ago A. Comte stated that the society is made up of people’s interactions which form definite types of social relationships (economic, political, moral ones) which, in turn, encourage development of science, economy, education etc. Such interactions serve as the grounds for creating social structures of different levels (from the family to the society), these structures may have different aims (from going in for sport to creating political parties) and unite different numbers of people (from two people to the world community as a whole).
In turn, a question may arise about the basis of these interactions. Normally, people interact if they have some common or most significant interests. By their character interests can be objective, e.g. division of labour or uniting people according to their nationality, and subjective, e.g. a system of social values, norms etc. The final result of people’s interactions is a created social reality which is represented in spiritual culture of the society, groups and separate people.
A famous American sociologist N. Smelser was right when he asserted that sociology is a way of learning people. As people’s needs and interests form the basis for their social interactions, a person is an active subject of any social relations, structures and organizations. The person’s social type includes, on the one hand, individual unique character displayed in the character of person’s behaviour at interacting with other people, and on the other hand, – most spread-out social features of the society. Watching a person in the system of social interactions, one can judge about the society in general. It means that a person is a unit of observation in sociology.
Thus, the subject area of sociology is social interactions of people and social groups, people’s social life as the society is studied through man and his social behaviour, values, views, interests etc.
As sociology deals with the diversity of social phenomena and problems, researchers’ attempt to put them in order results in emerging different scientific schools that have different views on the subject of sociology. A dominating viewpoint in world sociological science states that sociology is regarded as a multi-paradigmatic science. It means that it has not one but a few paradigms which can be considered the subjects of sociology. To define the subject of sociology different sociologists suggest as the key ones the following phenomena: “social relations”, “social institutions”, “social organizations”, “systems of social actions”, “social groups”, “social interaction”, “social structures of society”, “social behaviour” etc. Although there is no uniformity in understanding the subject of sociology, it’s clear that the problem of human interactions ranks first in the list of the subject areas.
There are some approaches to interpret the contents of sociology. The basic ones are sociological realism and sociological nominalism. Sociological realism gives priority to integral social groupings (social groups, communities, society in general) considering human social actions as secondary, derived and dependent on the functioning of social communities with the person as their member. This approach is mostly highlighted on the macro-level in the theory of conflict and structural functionalism. The theories consider a person basically as a representative of a social class whose behaviour and characteristics are determined by settled social structures and social relationships in social macro-systems.
Sociological nominalism considers humans and their social actions as the key factors of social life. Supporters of this approach believe that it is people who create integral social structures. Among such structures one can find the society as well, the society that is dependent on the actions of separate people – members of the given society. Directions of this approach are traced on the micro-level in social behaviourism, symbolic interactionism, theory of exchange and ethnomethodology.
As each approach has its own advantages and disadvantages, it is easier to understand the contents of sociology if consider the subject of its research in the context of the concept “system”. One is likely to avoid extremes of realism and nominalism and apply results of researches based on different theoretic and methodological orientations, if one adheres to the view of a systemic understanding of the society. It means that the society is a complex integral system, and its integral characteristics are in a dialectic interrelationship with the elements which constitute the system. One of the elements a social system is made up of is a human who reproduces in his social characteristics the properties of social groupings (social groups, communities, society as a whole). In turn, social groupings acquire a specific character due to the peculiarities of social qualities and behaviour of their members, namely people.
For instance, a sociologist studying typical features of a contemporary Belarusian society cannot investigate them without exposing the peculiarities of social actions of the people living in this society today. To achieve the aim he gathers objective (statistic) and subjective-appraising information about the Republic’s population, studies the public opinion about social processes and phenomena taking place in the society, social activities of the citizens and various social groups. All this enables to highlight the type-forming characteristics of a contemporary society in our country.
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