the active society. a theory of societal and political processesby amitai etzioni

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The Active Society. A Theory of Societal and Political Processes by Amitai Etzioni Review by: Edmund Dahlström Acta Sociologica, Vol. 12, No. 1 (1969), pp. 40-43 Published by: Sage Publications, Ltd. Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4193689 . Accessed: 25/09/2013 23:56 Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at . http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp . JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range of content in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new forms of scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected]. . Sage Publications, Ltd. is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to Acta Sociologica. http://www.jstor.org This content downloaded from 131.94.16.10 on Wed, 25 Sep 2013 23:56:01 PM All use subject to JSTOR Terms and Conditions

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The Active Society. A Theory of Societal and Political Processes by Amitai EtzioniReview by: Edmund DahlströmActa Sociologica, Vol. 12, No. 1 (1969), pp. 40-43Published by: Sage Publications, Ltd.Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/4193689 .

Accessed: 25/09/2013 23:56

Your use of the JSTOR archive indicates your acceptance of the Terms & Conditions of Use, available at .http://www.jstor.org/page/info/about/policies/terms.jsp

.JSTOR is a not-for-profit service that helps scholars, researchers, and students discover, use, and build upon a wide range ofcontent in a trusted digital archive. We use information technology and tools to increase productivity and facilitate new formsof scholarship. For more information about JSTOR, please contact [email protected].

.

Sage Publications, Ltd. is collaborating with JSTOR to digitize, preserve and extend access to ActaSociologica.

http://www.jstor.org

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BOOK REVIEWS

The Active Society. A Theory of Societal and Political Processes. By Amitai Etzioni. New York: The Free Press, 1968,698 pp. 112/.

In his work Etzioni integrates many new ideas in social science and the humanities. Thus reviewing Etzioni's interesting contribution implies an evaluation of new approaches.

The kind of sociology presented in The Active Society appCs to the reviewer: It is an inter- disciplinary, macroscopic approach dealing with centra problems of society today. It is partly free from obsessivc jagon found in single socal science disciplines. It ascribes an active rolc to the social scientist in the information and decision making processes of total society. Etzioni's contribution is thus in line with classical traditions of socal science. His work is optimistic, to the reviewer perhaps a bit too otimi tic.

Etzioni s grand vision of society has its roots in general systems theory. He explicitly refers to Karl Deutsch's attempt (The Nerves of Goverment) to conceive of the political system as a cybernetic system. The core of Society consists of a controlling overlayer (control center), processing incoming knowledge and making major decisions. The decisions are transmitted and induce implementation processes, generating power and influencing parts of society outside the center. The results of the implementing actvities stimulate feedback mechanisms. This cybernetic model applies to the total society and other types of societal units, e.g. collectivities or international units to the extent they are organized. The tcrm 'societal' is used to indicate the macroscopic approach.

A central concept in Etzioni's theory is collectivity; "a macroscopic unit that has a potential capacity to act by drawing on a set of macroscopic normativc bonds which tie members of a strat- ification category". Subcollectivities mean small homogeneous social units often ecologically based e.g. a socio-economic, ethnic group in a residential area. Collectivities are characterized by shared objectve interest, shared values, consciousness, similar symbols and vantage points among members, intra-collectivity communication channels and leadership. A collectivity becomes an active part of a society by means of organization. Organization is conceptualized, as in Etzioni's previous work, Compex Organizations, as a control system and he uses a compliance typology of coercive, utilitarian and normative organizations. Society is a collectivity of collectivities. The state is the organizational fiamework of society. However, the state is conceived more as a mechanism of downward political control than a mchanism of upward consensus-formation.

Etzioni's theory of societal guidance is concerned with the integration of social units and societies and the linking of units by control networks into organizations and states. The societal guidance approach is a combinaton of a 'collectvistic' and a 'voluntaristic' approach. The collectivistic approach recognizes macroscopic supra-units which have properties and dynamics of their own. Etzioni soes this assumption in contrast to reductionistic ideas and niicroscoRic approaches. The voluntaristic approach perceives the societal units as acting like " macropersons with will or nund, i.e. with the potentiality of guiding themselves. The capacity of guiding itself is the corc of the dimension of activity. A societal unit's capacity to guide itself presupposes that it has a controlling overlayer and that the 'consensus formation' is strong, i.e. that the perspectivc of the mcmber units is transmitted upwards to the controlling overlayer and integrated in the decisions made there.

The cybermec point of view emphasizes the information process, and Etziomn has some interest- ing ideas on the conditions for an adequate societal communication process. He stresses the iu.portant function of synthesizng information and the social barriers towards integrating information bits. He also shows the occurance of rigid "community-of-assumptions" and hc sees a more plurlistic pattern of information processing and the existence of 'fundamcntal criticism' as a means of avoiding this thrat. Hc presents a socictal guidance perspectve of knowledge where he seeS thC elitc and the public as mutually intcrdependent, wher institutionalized contexts set the limits for the clites' scope of influence. The elite "is the control unit that slizes on the cybernetic functions of know- ledge-processing and decision making and the application of power". The 'community-of-assump- tion' is defined as "thc set of assumptions shared by members of a societal unit which sets a contex for its view of the world itseif". Communities-of-assumptions are usually held without awarcness of their hypothetical nature. "Fundamental critici i the function of those sub-units whose task is to overview the community-of-assumptions and challenge them when they become detached firom reality". It is necessary for an adequate collective reality testing to, have a value of tolerance for fundamental criticism, induded as a part of the established commumity-of-assumptions. Etzioni

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believes that central decision-making bodies in modern societies have only very small knowledge- collecting-and-proc g units and should be provided with greatly increased capacities to collect and process knowledge.

"Societas conscioul ess" is a central conccpt in Etzioni's theory; it is a precondition for the active society. A convincing discussion is given of the operationalization and uselnss of this concept. Another central concept of the cybernetic model is societal decision making. Decision making s the process that links the consciousness, knowledge and goal commitment to implementation (down- ward communication and application bf power). Social scientists have visualized the decision making process in controversial models. Etzioni treats spedally two decision-models. The traditional ration- ality-model and the "incrementalist model". According to the incremcntalist model (Lindblom's "muddli through" or "disjointed incrementalist') decision makers do not investigate all alter- native polices but only those which incrementally differ from the existing policy. Etzioni finds both these models impossible and suggests a "mixed-scanning model". According to this program the decision making unit will perform a less ambitious and rational program than the rationality model assumes, but the unit will be more surveying and evaluating alternatives than the incremen- talist theory assumes. The mixed scanning also considers the implemcntation stage and includes certain limited decision processes during this phase, with possible feedback mechanisms included.

Power is a factor of the implementation stage of the societal process. Power is defined as a capac- ity to overcome parts or alll resistance, and to introduce change in the face of opposition. The power asset is the distributive aspect and a ratio of these assets may bc utilized through a conversion process to exercise power. Control implies the exercise of power, including the use of threats and promises. Etzioni applies his compliance theory to total societies. There is a congruence in societies (as in organizanons) between the types of power exercised and the prevailing type of member moti- vation. Coercion is congruent to alienation. In modern (post-modern) societies there is more nor- mative and less coercive control and this trend is a condition for the active society. But moderni- zations does not imply a decrease of total control. On the contrary, Etzioni believes that modern- ization and the evolution of an active society presupposes a high degree of control, mainly normative control. Modernization or activization implies a high degree of mobilization, i.e. "the processes by which a unit gains significantly in the control of assets it previously did not control". In the total society mobilization implies mobilization of collectivities.

Etzioni criticizes mass-society theories that assume a decline in significance of sub-collectivities. Rather modeization has transformed the sub-collectivity structure and sub-collectivities are still the bases of organization formation. However, societes vary in the degree to which supra-organi- zations, particularly their states and society-wide economic systems, draw on non-collective lements. Societies also differ in the degree to which their collective units are integrated into supra units by shared values and symbols and interaction processes. Modernization and development toward the actve society presumes that the society-wide political processes deal much more with organizations that represent sub-collectivities and their combinations than with organizations that have no col- lective base.

Societies and states differ in the degree to which they merely provide a context for their member units as against the extent to which they also specifically control their conduct. This is called the degree of specification. Contextuating control "sets the limits within which those who are subject to control are fice to alter their conduct and make their decisions". Prscriptive control is the opposite term: here the subjects' conduct is specifically directed. Democratic societies fall on the contextuating side and toNltari societics on the prescriptive. The active society is char- acterized by a high dcgree of contextual control which means a reaonable amount of autonomy for the collectivities and sub-collectvities.

Consensus building is a prerequisite of societal guidance, i.e. the upward and downward pro- cesses by which cotiscnsus is created and sustained. Consensus formation consisu of the upward transmisson of the member units' perspectives to the controlling overlaysr, while consenstu mo- bilization is the downward communication from the control centcr to the member unit The acd quate functioning of society must indude both of these kind of proes. Some degree of consensus is a prerequisite of effecive societal action. But it need not be high. High consensus has its costs. However, there cannot be an active society without a comparatively high capacIty to build c

The societal guidance theory thus includes two antral dimensions; control and c blding. The active society is a reasonable mixture of these variables, institutionally related to each ot. However, it is also the choice of qualitative values with respect to kind of control. Actvating societies need a qualitatve change of control toward a more contextual and less prescriptive, more loewly related to consensus building. If control is increasd without icreasing consensus building thre will be greater rcliance on coercion (to a greater extent the more prescptive the control is). If con- sensus is increased without increasing control, a relatively greater relce on normative means occurs. In an effort to srengthicn societal. guidance all modern societies have eim ted often

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deliberately with a variety of mechanisms to improve control and consensus, e.g. with new organi- zations and societal techniques of contextuating control so as to link control more closely to consensus formation.

A fundamental characteristic of the active society is its responsiveness to the needs of the units involved. The level of responsiveness is affected by the effectiveness of the controlling center. Unre- sponsiveness is closely related to political and societal rigidities, such as the political overrepresentation of the societally powerful collectivities; on the average political democracy is less rigid than other forms of govemment. However, democracies may include deficiencies in the controlling overlayer and imply lack of {uidance in the form of overresponsiveness. While authoritarian tend to be "over- managed societies' and underresponsive, capitalistic democracies tend to have too weak controlling overlayers.

Intuitively the reviewer is inclined to agree with many of these ideas: the more active role of the social scientist, with the emphasis on fundamental criticism (cf Haberma's ideas), society as a system of collectivities and sub-collectivities, the mixed scanning character of societal decision making, and the analytic prerequisites of an active society. Etzioni has to an amazingly high degree managed to free himself of ideologically limited perspectives, i.e. with respect to special institutional arrangements. However, this approach also involves him in serious difficulties and limitations ac- cording to the reviewer's opinion. I shall deal with some of them.

It is interesting to compare Etzioni's approach in The Active Society with his approach in his previous work, Complex Organizations. This latter work is obviously one of the most important contributions in the area of organizational study. In Complex Organizations he develops a theory of organizational compliance that makes it possible to interpret research findings of central interest in the organizational field, and gives a classification that seems to relate to a set of central organi- zational dimensions. His conceptual scheme on compliance allows him to make comparative analysis and the comparisons give evidence that his model fits available findings.

To what extent does Etzioni's theory of the active society allow him to integrate comparative research on societies. The structure of the active society theory implies the same claim as his com- pliance theory: to cover the field of complex societies. However, Etzioni never shows convincingly that his theory fits facts with respect to documented societal variation. He never attempts to test his societal theory with respect to comparative research findings in a systematic way. His method of using data is rather arbitrary and capricious and the critical reader feels worried about the validity of the theory from this point of view. Is it possible to differentiate societies with respect to the main dimensions of his theory and show that the variables are related to each other the way he assumes?

This consideration brings out an other interesting point. Etzioni's whole theory is oriented toward general systems theory. Is this type of theory useful for comparative research either of a cross- sectional or more historical genetic character? To the reviewer this is an open question. The advantage of Etzioni's organizational theory of compliance presented in Complex Organizations is its fitness for comparative research compared with alternative organizational theories of the type of general systems theory. The general systems theories developed in organizational research according to the reviewer's opinion have been unsuitable for comparative research i.e. have not been able to explain organizational variation. The interest has been to show that organizational structures and processes may be expressed and explicated in terms of general system models. The same seems to be the case when system models are used to analyze societies, as has been done e.g. by Karl Deutsch, David Easton, Walter Buckley and Arnitai Etzioni. The system approach has advantages of showing how factors may be dynamically and interactionally related to each other, and how previous ideas of equilibrium may be substituted by cybemetic types of balances with better fit to social reality.

The general concepts in the societal guidance theory are partly cybernetic (controlling overlayer, goal direction, data processing, mixed scanning, outgoing signals, control, etc.) and partly psycho- logical (self consciousness, reality testing and responsiveness). The approach presupposes that the new concepts are operationalized in societal observables and some kind of correspondence found between units and processes in the model and units in processes in social variables. Doubts may be raised if Etzioni has carried through this semantic process in a satisfactory manner. Though efforts in this direction occur in the book, it is done in a sketchy manner and according to the reviewer it is very difficult to grasp what social relations, processes and structures are denoted by the terms of the model.

The model is general for all types of societal units and all societes. Etzioni relates some of his concepts to traditional- concepts such as authonrtarian-democratic, traditional-modern-premodem. But this is done in a rather unsystematic way and at least to the reviewer it is difficult to identify what social structures and processes correspond to the new concepts in different types of societal units and/or societies. These difficulties apply to the dimensions defining the active society, such as self-consciousness, adequate reality testing, goal commiitment, fundamental criticism, mobilization,

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responsiveness, prescriptive-contextuating control, etc. It is even unclear to what extent these con- cepts are analytically independent and to what extent we can find independent indicators.

In an appendix (p. 123-125) Etzioni brings up the methodological problem of the fit of his model. He compares concrete versus abstract units and systems. He argues against the fallacy of misplaced concreteness. The general systems theory is an abstraction and the units are analytic con- ceptions. The subsystems in the abstract system such as the "educational subsystem" should not be confused with existing school institutions. "The theory of societal guidance is an attempt to add to highly abstract systems analysis a related but more concrete set of concepts and theorems". Thus Etzioni's theoretical position is that more concrete, synthesized underpinning of systems theories are needed, and he believes that the widest use of "social system" is a "reified" use, i.e. concrete phe- nomena.

But how do we underpin the general systems theory in relation to societal units. To the reviewer there seems to be involved more serious problems here than is conceived of by many social system theorists. Walter Buckley who works with a similar system theory vision of society in his book, Sociology and Modem Systems Theory, mentions problems of system theory application in his con- cluding remarks (p. 206). "A simple cybernetic model of explicit group goal seeking does not fit most societies of the past and present because of a lack in the societies of informed, centralized direc- tion and wide spread promotively interdependent goal behaviors of individuals and subgroups." To the reviewer some of the concepts used in system theory seem too crude to fit all societies e.g. the concept of controlling overlayer. The concept seems to be difficult to apply in situations when we have a high degree of polarization (in the Marxian meaning) or when the power structure can be described as one of "countervailing powers". What controls what in a society of the type as Sweden of 1910 ("polarized society") or Sweden of 1960 ("countervailing powers")?

Etzioni's theory of societal guidance is a merger of societal systems theory and some ideas con- cering social power and organizational theory. Power comes in under the label of implementing factors. The elite that usually is defined in terms of power is in Etzioni's theory defined with respect to the controlling overlayer ("a control unit that specializes in the cybernetic function of knowledge processing and decision making and in the application of power"). Power comes as something added to the subsystem of the controlling overlayer and has to do only with implementation of the decision. However, the position of processing information and making decisions implies directly power. The power related to the implementation of decisions seems to be a limited sector of the total societal power. To the reviewer the separation of processing-decision making and exercise of power is problematic.

Etzioni's theory is also a merger of systems theory and a theory of societal collectivities, and the question may be raised whether these models are compatible. How does the idea of society as a cy- bernetic system agree with the notion of society as a system of collectivities and subcollectivities? To what extent does the controlling overlayer "stand above" the competing collectivities? According to Etzioni the controlling overlayer is an analytic unit and should notbe confused with the state ("the shell" in Etzioni's terminology). Some further clarification is needed here.

To the reviewer Etzioni deals too little with one important kind of methodological consideration that is called for by the "activistic" approach recommended and carried out in the volume in agree- ment with new ideas of science and society (new metascientific vision). If the social scientist is given a more active role in dealing with society and its problems, this forces social research to penetrate the methodological problems of evaluations and values. In general it is taken for granted that the active society and all the above mentioned characteristics of this society are something good. Solu- tions are assumed to give the best mixture e.g. with respect to the power of the controlling over- layer or the distribution of economic activity on governmental, cooperative and private enterprise forms. But the reason why a specific "mix" is the best andwhy certain values on the "active dimen- sions" is constitutive for the "good society" is very little discussed. I think an "activistic" approach in social science has to deal much more seriously with methodological problems of ethics in a wide sense and problems of the whole social enterise of social research. There are many pitfalls and dangers here according to the reviewer. If these are not observed the social scientist might just become an ordinary politician or propagandist. Etzioni shows how facts and evaluations are con- fused and mixed in cognitive reactions of participants. But he does not analyze the problem, how social science shall process facts and values, and hardly anywhere does he explicitly analyze the factual and evaluative in his own decsions as to the active society.

Edmund Dahlstrom University of Gothenburg

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