Wirtschaftlichkeitslehre

The social Theory of Georg Simmel

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Monograph

Identifikator:: 1794536604

URN:: urn:nbn:de:zbw-retromon-186153

Document type:: Monograph

Title:: Binnengrosshandel

Place of publication:: Berlin

Publisher:: Beuth-Vertrieb GmbH

Year of publication:: [1960]

Scope:: 2, 46, 1 Blatt; Tab

Digitisation:: 2022

Collection:: Economics Books

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Document type:: Monograph

Structure type:: Chapter

Title:: 3. Ergebnisse der Untersuchung

Collection:: Economics Books

SOCIAL DIFFERENTIATION 195 have become so attenuated that he practically lives in iso- lation. But the formation of purposive associations creates a compensation for this isolation which has resulted from the ever growing extension of the community circle. The degree of compactness or sociological density of such associations can in a way be measured by the extent to which they have developed a special group honor. The existence of a family honor, a military honor, or a business men’s honor is indicative of the fact that a strong con- sciousness of group unity has been developed. Only a strong consciousness of group unity and a fairly close-knit association can make the individual feel that the group as a collective personality has a special honor and that any dishonorable behavior on the part of one member involves a loss of honor for all members. Only such groups can se- cure a socially desirable behavior on the part of their mem- bers without having recourse to methods of force and external restraint. The formation of such groups in our modern social structure has led to an entire redistribution of freedom and restraint. The small community in which the group as a whole or its centralized authority regulated the life of the individual in nearly all of its aspects has disappeared. In the modern state the centralized authority limits its regu- lative function to what is the inevitable minimum neces- sary to protect the group as a whole. The individual has become free and unrestricted in a wider and wider field. This field does not remain a field of unrestricted indi- vidual activity, but it becomes occupied by new group for- mations and purposeful associations. But the interests of the individual and his own free choice determine to which of these he shall belong. The result is that they can dis- pense with methods of forceful external restraint for the preservation of their group unity and rely on an honor

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