Theories and Concepts of Social Change: Insights by Yogendra Singh

Concepts and Theories of Social Change Concepts and Theories of Social Change By Yogendra Singh By Yogendra Singh Presented By : Prof. Alok Kumar Head Department of Sociology Chaudhary Charan Singh University

Introduction Social change is the change in established patterns of social relations, or change in social values, or change in structures and subsystems operating in society. Yogendra Singh in his report deals with theories and concepts of social change rather than with the substantial aspects. He traces the development of concepts and theories since the 19thcentury when the British and Indian scholars were concerned with the origin and development of the caste system.

Types of Approach Gradually, these concepts and formulations got differentiated and a variety of approaches emerged. In the present report, these approaches can be classified into the following types : Evolutionary Approach Cultural Approach Structural Approach Dialectical Historical Approach

Evolutionary Approach In the evolutionary approach, gradual development is studied from simple to complex, through a long series of small changes. Each change results in a minor modification of the system, but the cumulative effect of many changes over a long period is the emergence of new complex forms. The evolutionary approaches analyze the stages through which the institutions like caste, family, marriage and kinship and village community moved in India.

Studies with this approach have focused on village community, caste system, and family as follows: Scholars like NK Dutt (1931), Ghurye (1945) have focused on the origin of caste and its racial composition with emphasis on the factors which contributed to the emergence of caste. Similarly, Henry S Maine(1890), Baden Powell (1908) in their studies of villages and land systems tried either to find out the historical stage of growth or their comparative evolutionary sequence and succession of forms. BN Seal and RK Mukherjee(1967) disapproved of the assumption given by western scholars that social institutions in India were at a lower level of evolution than in the west.

Cultural Approach In the cultural approach, change is studied by analyzing the changing cultural elements of society. Within this approach, MN Srinivas studied change through Sanskritization and westernization processes. Robert Redfield through a change in Little and Great traditions, and McKim Marriot through the process of Parochialisation and Universalisation.

Sanskritization and Westernization processes Sanskritization According to MN Srinivas(1973), Sanskritization refers to the process of adopting customs, rituals, ideology, and way of life of higher castes by the lower castes with a view to raise their position in the caste hierarchy. It is the process of cultural mobility in the traditional social structure. The higher castes are not always Brahmins, they could be Kshatriyas, Vaisyas, and so on in various regions of the country. Yogendra Singh, in the present report, comments on the concept of Sanskritisation as having two connotations : 1. Historical Context: In this, Sanskritisation is seen as a process of social mobility throughout the history of Indian society. 2. Contextual Context: In this perspective, Sanskritisation is a process of change in a relative sense.

Sanskritization and Westernization processes Westernization MN Srinivas(1973) defines that Westernization is adopting the ideals, values (like rationalism, humanism), institutions, and technology of the western society by the non-western society. Simply, it refers to changes brought out as a consequence of contact with western culture. Srinivas refers to three levels of westernization : 1) Primary: The Primary level refers to those people who came directly into contact with the British. 2) Secondary: The Secondary level includes those who were directly benefited from the people who were at the primary level. 3) Tertiary: These are the people who were remotely benefited by the process of westernization.

Little and Great traditions Following Robert Redfield (1955) who analyzed the social change in the Mexican communities with the help of the concepts of Little and Great traditions, McKim Mariott (1955) and Milton Singer (1959) studied social change in India with this conceptual framework. Little traditions are indigenous customs, deities, and rites found at the folks or peasants level. They persist at the level of the village community and their growth is internal. Great traditions are those traditions that grow because of outside contacts and are found at the elite level.

Parochialisation and Universalisation The process of moving elements of Little tradition (customs, rites, etc) upward to the level of Great tradition is called universalization by McKim Marriott. The process of moving of elements of Great tradition downward to become part of the Little tradition is called parochialization . Thus, these concepts (of universalization and parochialization) also describe the processes of cultural change.

Structural Approach This approach analyzes the change in the network of social relationships and social structures (like castes, kinship, factory, administrative structures, etc ). These social relationships and structures are compared intra-culturally as well as cross-culturally. According to Yogendra Singh (1977), a structural analysis of change consists of demonstrating the qualitative nature of new adaptations in the patterned relationships. To explain further he cites an example where when the spouse is selected by a child himself and not by his parents, the nature of quality of conjugal relations is bound to be different. For Yogendra Singh, Family is today functionally joint to a large extent, but structurally it is nuclear. Further, caste is becoming increasingly an interest group of the articulate few from among the members of a caste.

Dialectical Historical Approach The main architects of this approach are Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels. According to Yogendra Singh(1973), Marx mentioned five stages in social differentiation : 1. The tribal community with undivided land and agriculture in common 2. The disintegration of the tribal community and its transformation into family communities with the loosening of common property 3. Shares fixed by inheritance rights or the degree of kinship, thus creating inequality. 4. Transformation of inequality based on kinship into inequality based on possession as expressed bu actual cultivation 5. A system of periodic distribution of communal lands

DP Mukerji (1958) applied the Marxist approach to study social change in India found that in the emergence of new class structures(in the form of the middle class), the role of the Indian Tradition was immense. On similar lines, RK Mukherjee, in his book Rise and Fall of East India Company applies the Dialectical- Historical approach for the study of change. AR Desai (1966) in his book Social background of Indian Nationalism finds that class-based inequalities and contradictions determine the nature of social change and development.

Conclusions and Suggestions Yogendra Singh concludes that while some conceptual schemes have been evolved to analyze the social change in India, no theories have yet emerged. Most of the studies have been done based on a cultural approach ignoring the structural and dialectical-historical approach. He suggests that it was the need of the hour that the study of social change must be done from a systematic and dialectical-historical frame of reference instead of continuum models.

References Singh,Yogendra 1974 : Concepts and Theories of social change , A survey of Research in sociology and social anthropology, Vol.1, Popular Prakasan,Bombay ,pp:383 - 425