Sociological Imagination: How to Gain Wisdom about the Society in which We All Participate and for Whose Future We Are All Responsible (part 48)

My students often ask me, 'What is sociology?' And I tell them, 'It's the study of the way in which human beings are shaped by things that they don't see.'

Sam Richards

A significant aspect of modern science is its contribution to the rapid pace of technological change. The technologies produced by scientific research are applied to all aspects of human life and hence are a major force in shaping and changing other institutions in addition to scientific institutions themselves. An example is the impact of technological change on the institutions of mass communication. The advent of radio and then television dramatically changed the ways in which social and cultural values are transmitted to various groups in society. Now it is possible for people and regions of the world that lack up-to-date telephone systems to "leapfrog" over technical problems by purchasing cellular phones, which do not require a vast telecommunications infrastructure. We will note other examples of the impact of technology in the following sections, but first it is necessary to enlarge our understanding of what is meant by the term technology.

Dimensions of Technology

Technology encompasses more than tools and skills, ways of organizing work are also part of technology. Technology has three dimensions, which may be summarized as follows:

1. Technological tools, instruments, machines, gadgets, which are used in accomplishing a variety of tasks. These material objects are best referred to as apparatus, the physical devices of technical performance.
2. The body of technical skills, procedures, routines---all activities or behaviors that employ a purposive, step-by-step, rational method of doing things
3. The organizational networks associated with activities and apparatus (Winner, 1977, Autonomous Technology, pp. 11-12)

The last of these dimensions may be clarified buy an example. Organizational networks are sets of statuses and roles. All technologies establish or modify such networks. Thus the automobile owner is part of a network that includes dealers, mechanics, parts suppliers, insurers, licensing agents, and junkyard owners. Our great-great-grandparents were probably part of a network of horse dealers, harness makers, buggy suppliers, and blacksmiths, a network that has been largely eliminated by the advent of motorized vehicles.

Technological change can occur in any or all of the dimensions just listed. The most far-reaching changes involve all three, especially the third. For example, the Industrial Revolution completely changed the organization of economic institutions and also had significant effects on other institutions, such as the family. Likewise, the internal combustion engine, which made possible the development of the automobile, has completely transformed the ecology of North America (Flink, 1988, The Automobile Age). Since 1969 the total number of vehicles in the United States has grown 6 times faster than the total population (Wald, M. I. (Sep. 21, 1997) Number of Cars is Growing Faster Than Human Population. New York Times, p. 35). On the other hand, some technological changes are limited to modifications in the apparatus or technical skills needed for a particular task (the surgical stapler is an example) and do not affect large numbers of people or have major social impacts.

Not only do technological changes affect various groups and institutions within a society, and sometimes transform a society, but technology itself is affected by the social conditions prevailing at any given time. The acceptance of a particular technological innovation may depend on prior changes in other aspects of a society. Thus television might not have had as great an impact if it had been invented in the nineteenth century, when working people had far less leisure time than they do today. Other Innovations have failed to gain acceptance because they appeared too soon. An example is the Sony Corporation's unsuccessful attempt to introduce tape recorders in Japan in 1950. Japanese consumers did not perceive a need or use for them, and they went unsold (Kornblum, W., 2003, Sociology in a Changing World, 6th ed., p.653).

Technological Dualism

It should be noted that the effects of new technologies are not always positive. The phrase technological dualism is sometimes used to refer to the fact that technological changes often have both positive and negative effects. The introduction of diesel locomotives, for example, greatly increased the efficiency of railroad operations, but it also led to the decline and eventual abandonment of railroad towns whose economies were based on the servicing of steam locomotives (Cottrell, 1951, Death by Dieselization. American Sociological Review, 16, 358-365). Another example is the automation of industrial production. Automation has greatly improved the manufacturing processes in many industries. It has increased the safety of certain production tasks and led to improved product quality in many cases. But it has also replaced thousands of manual workers with machines, and significant numbers of those workers find themselves unemployed and lacking the skills required by the high-tech occupations of post industrial society.

Technology and Social Change

Among catalysts of social change, technological innovation ranks extremely high, along with major social forces such as population growth, war, epidemics, and rising expectations for better lives. Technological change can also rapidly effect large-scale social change, often well within an individual life span. One need only think of the impact of television. This powerful communications medium, introduced in the United States on a mass basis in the 1950s has significantly altered the way people receive information about their society and the world, how they behave as consumers, how they engage in politics, and how they use their leisure time. 

William Fielding Ogburn's theory of cultural lag is the classic sociological treatment of how societies adjust to technological change and the problems that can result. The Lags described by Ogburn can be at least partially reduced by the process of technology assessment, or efforts to anticipate the consequences of particular technologies for individuals and for society as a whole. For instance, a massive plan to reduce air pollution in any the Los Angeles basin requires careful assessment. According to the National Environmental Policy Act and related state laws, any major action by a public agency that affects the environment must be assessed for its impact on the environment and on the citizens involved. Laws that require technology assessment---especially those that require corporations to abide by the findings of such assessments---tend to increase the power of citizens in communities affected by technological change. They are there for a source of both conflict and of movements for social reform. In the Los Angeles case, a few small, and adequately funded environmental organizations have succeeded in forcing the California Environmental Policy Administration to fund the plan to reduce air pollution (Brown & Kiel, 2000; Kahn, 2000).

*MAIN SOURCE: KORNBLUM, W., (2003), SOCIOLOGY IN A CHANGING WORLD, 6TH ED., PP. 652-656*

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