Organisation Theory and Behaviour Assignment“Undertake an analysis of the extent the classical sociological theories of Durkheim, Weber and Marx have shaped contemporary organisation theory. In your analysis also discuss the implications of the three c
...rder of solidarity in society…” (OTB Lecture Notes – lesson 2), which incorporates the view that; a social system to not disintegrate, requires a minimum level of solidarity amongst its members. His studies and concepts in social solidarity include division of labour, suicide and elementary forms of the religious life. “…Societies may grow in size, heightening pressure on increasingly scarce resources…” (‘Key Sociological Thinkers’, p49). Durkheim felt an intensified struggle for existence would produce a specialization and ‘division of labour’ in society, to permit the same resources to support more people. His studies reflect the radical society changes of his time, where an agriculture society of a mechanical solidarity, was transforming and becoming supplanted by an industrial society of organic solidarity - whereby individuals of the society were differentiated into specialized groups in their respective functions, but all working together to maintain equilibrium. This equilibrium regulates social order and solidarity. It was one of Durkheim’s methodological dictums that social facts have to be treated as ‘things’, and so we see the organic representation of solidarity used in the industrialised society. Should one group break, the entire society is said to suffer and fall apart; just how a vital organ would affect the human body. Durkheim believed that solidarity was based on different variables. In an agriculture society where little social differentiation exists between individuals, he felt the common activiti...