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Sociology Unit 6: Social change, population and urbanization

Societies change through population shifts, urbanization, technology and social movements.

Covers: Population and demography, urbanization, the environment, collective behavior, social movements, theories of social change, modernity

Study guide

Demography is the study of population. Fertility is the incidence of childbearing, and mortality is the incidence of death; migration moves people in and out. The demographic transition theory links population patterns to technology: high birth and death rates in preindustrial societies, falling death rates and rapid growth during industrialization, and low birth and death rates in postindustrial societies. Malthus warned that population would outgrow food, while modern critics point to rising agricultural productivity.

Urbanization is the concentration of people in cities. Ferdinand Tönnies contrasted Gemeinschaft (close-knit, traditional community) with Gesellschaft (impersonal, modern society). Durkheim distinguished mechanical solidarity, based on shared beliefs in traditional societies, from organic solidarity, based on interdependence in modern ones. Urban ecology studies how cities fit their environment. Environmental sociology examines problems like pollution and climate change, and environmental racism describes how pollution disproportionately harms poor and minority communities.

Collective behavior is spontaneous activity by large groups, like crowds, mobs, riots, rumors, fads, fashions and panics. Social movements are organized efforts to promote or resist change. Types include alternative (changing a few people a little), redemptive (changing individuals deeply), reformative (changing society in limited ways) and revolutionary (transforming society). Resource mobilization theory says movements succeed when they gather resources like money, members and leadership, and relative deprivation theory says movements arise when people feel disadvantaged compared with others. Movements often go through emergence, coalescence, bureaucratization and decline. Social change comes from culture, conflict, technology and ideas. Modernization brings the decline of small communities, more individualism and bureaucracy, and some theorists describe a postmodern society shaped by information technology.

Migration can be voluntary, chosen for reasons like jobs, or involuntary, forced by slavery, war or persecution. People are moved by push factors that drive them away from a place and pull factors that attract them to a new one. Carrying capacity is the largest population an environment can sustain. Malthus said population would be held in check by war, famine and disease. Cornucopian theory instead argues that human ingenuity and technology will solve resource shortages. Hardin's tragedy of the commons describes how shared resources get overused when everyone acts in self-interest.

Burgess's concentric zone model pictures a city growing outward in rings from the business district, with a zone in transition of deteriorating housing next to it. Suburbanization and exurbs pushed growth outward. Gentrification brings wealthier residents into poorer neighborhoods, raising property values but displacing longtime residents. Blumer classified crowds as casual (loosely gathered), conventional (gathered for a planned event), expressive (sharing emotion) and acting (focused on a goal). Emergent-norm theory says crowds develop their own norms to define a new situation. Smelser's value-added theory lists conditions, including a precipitating event, that must be present for collective behavior to occur.

Movements frame issues to win support: diagnostic framing names the problem, prognostic framing offers a solution, and motivational framing calls people to act. A social movement industry is the set of organizations pursuing one movement's goals. The digital divide is the unequal access to computers and the internet between rich and poor groups or nations.

Key ideas

• Demography studies fertility, mortality and migration.
• Tönnies and Durkheim contrasted traditional and modern societies.
• Environmental racism shows how pollution harms poor and minority communities.
• Social movements range from alternative to revolutionary.
• Resource mobilization and relative deprivation theories explain movements.

Formulas and rules

Common mistakes

• Confusing Gemeinschaft (traditional) with Gesellschaft (modern).
• Thinking Durkheim's organic solidarity is traditional; it describes modern societies.

Words to know

Demography

The study of population.

Fertility

The incidence of childbearing in a population.

Mortality

The incidence of death in a population.

Demographic transition theory

Linking population patterns to technological development.

Gemeinschaft

Close-knit, traditional community.

Gesellschaft

Impersonal, modern society.

Mechanical solidarity

Unity based on shared beliefs.

Organic solidarity

Unity based on interdependence.

Urban ecology

The study of how cities relate to their environment.

Environmental racism

Pollution disproportionately harming minority communities.

Collective behavior

Spontaneous activity by a large group.

Mob

A highly emotional crowd pursuing a violent goal.

Fad

A short-lived, enthusiastic trend.

Social movement

An organized effort to promote or resist change.

Reformative movement

A movement seeking limited change for everyone.

Revolutionary movement

A movement seeking to transform society.

Resource mobilization theory

Movements succeed by gathering resources.

Relative deprivation

Feeling disadvantaged compared with others.

Modernization

Social changes brought by industrialization.

Sample practice questions

5 more questions like these, from level 1 to 5, are in the practice set.