Social control

The social control refers to the social mechanisms which control the individual behaviors and of the groups of individuals, in term of “punishments” and “rewards”.

That can also indicate the processes of social control, which include processes " transparents" (one speaks about abstract control) like the social norms and the social conventions, as well as official processes (formal control): rules, laws concerning the deviating behaviors.

Typology

Formal control is obtained by laws and payments, enacted by governments or organizations, which use the mechanisms of justice to inflict penal sanctions: fines or custodial sentences.

Abstract control is exerted by the company, without explicitly describing these rules. They are put into practice by the social norms, like the glance of the others, criticism, the feelings of guilt or of shame. Abstract social control has more influence on the behaviors, because it is deeply comparable in the personality of each individual.

The traditional companies use especially abstract social control, through their own culture, and the social practices their members who establish an social order. The companies more rigidly structured set up a system where formal control has an important place.

In the democratic companies , the goals and the mechanisms of social control is determined by the Législation, voted by elected Gouvernement S, and this legislation profits thus from an acceptance and a broad support of the population.

According to the Model of propaganda , the officers of the company directed by the companies employ the endoctrination like a means of social control. The Marketing, the Publicity and the companies of Public relations use Communication of mass to support the interests of the elites. According to this thesis, the economic and religious leaders use the education system and the centralization of the electronic communications to open the Public opinion with their ideas. The Démocratie is thus imperfect, since the majority of the population does not have the necessary information to make rational decisions on the social questions, or concerning the economy or the ethical .

In order to maintain a social control on the individuals, the dictatorial organizations and governments promulgate laws and decrees. However, since the population does not support these practices, these organizations or these governments need to have an active recourse to the force and the severe sanctions as the Censure or the Expulsion. In the totalitarian extreme cases, governments like old the Soviet Union or current the North Korea resorts to a police force of State.

The sociologists regard as crucial the means of social control to maintain the Law and order, and recognize also the need for the formal means, in particular in increasingly complex companies, and also to answer the specific crises. The study of social control is an academic discipline which is attached to the Anthropologie, the economy, the Histoire, with the Droit, the Political sciences, the Psychologie, the Philosophie and the Sociologie.

See too

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