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In this article we will discuss about the division of labour in society.
One of the striking features of modern industrial economy is the complex division of labour.
The complex nature of division of labour was brought out very dramatically by Adam Smith as late as 1776 when he described the production of a very simple product like ‘pin’:
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“One man draws out the wire; another straights it; a third cuts it; a fourth points it; a fifth grinds it at the top fen-receiving the head; to make the head requires two or three distinct operations; to put it on is a peculiar business; to whiten the pins is another, it is even a trade by itself to put them into the paper, and the important business of making a pin is, in this manner divided into about eighteen distinct operations….”
The description of the complex nature of division of labour as given by Adam Smith does not, however, throw any light on the social and psychological implications of complex division of labour. Both Marx and Durkheim have examined these aspects from their respective points of view.
Marxian Perspective: Alienated Labour:
To Marx, work provides “the most important and vital means for man to fulfill his basic needs, his individuality and his humanity”. Man gets satisfaction when he applies his creative powers in the production of certain commodity. It is his creation and, as such, he takes pride in and feels joy over the outcome of his effort. Another source of his happiness opens up when his product is appreciated by others.
At this stage, his work becomes a fully satisfying activity, encompassing both himself and the community of fellow human beings. Work, though an individual activity, thus becomes a social activity as well.
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In Marx’s words, ‘each of us would in his production have doubly affirmed himself and his fellow men’. That is, work becomes a fully satisfying activity when an individual works both for meeting his needs as well as the needs of others.
Marx observes that apart from possibly the dawn of history, this ideal relationship of work to man has never been established. On the contrary, work has been “destructive both to the human spirit and to human relationships” all throughout history. Marx sought to focus attention to this state of affairs by developing the idea of ‘alienated labour’.
Marx meant by alienated labour the state of a man being cut off from his work. This means that he no longer finds work satisfying to him. He is no longer creative. He works simply because he has to.
Being thus unable to express his creative faculties, he actually alienates himself from his true self. Further, since work is a social activity, alienation from work also involves alienation from others. Alienation is thus complete. He is alienated from his wok, from his true self and from his fellow workers.
Why and how does this happen? Marx argued that the source of alienation is to be sought in man’s distorted view of the nature of a commodity or an object. A commodity or object is meant for consumption, and not for accumulation. That is, a commodity is a means, and not an end in itself. When, however, man makes commodity the end, it is only a short step to the idea of private ownership.
The idea of private ownership finds a dramatic expression in a capitalist economy in which the ownership of the means of production is concentrated in the hands of a very small number of individuals. They engage workers who simply carry out the biddings of their employers. The workers do not follow their own creative urges. Goods are thus no longer a proud possession of those who produce them.
In this way “the worker is related to the product of his labour as to an alien object”. In course of time, alienation is further increased by the complex division of labour and the introduction of machine. Marx gives us a step-by-step analysis of the accentuation of alienation in a capitalist economy.
The first phase in the development of the productive forces within the capitalist mode of production was described by Marx as ‘simple co-operation’. Simple co-operation prevails during that period in which capital operates on a large scale, but division of labour and machinery play a subordinate part.
Co-operation of this kind takes place mainly in hand production. Production in these early stages is distinguished from handicraft production in the guilds only by the greater number of workers simultaneously employed by one and the same capitalist. Here the emphasis is on the socially productive force that comes into being by bringing many men together to work side by side and to co-operate with one another.
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The capitalist pays each individual worker for his individual labour. The amount so paid is much less than the value of the product which the workers help to produce. As a result, the capitalist gets more than he bargained for.
At this stage, the existence of large outlays of capital becomes a pre-condition for the co-operation of many workers. The co-operation among workers is not possible unless they are employed simultaneously by the same capitalist.
During this phase, capitalists with adequate means of production and money engage workers who do not own either of these, viz., means of production and money. Thus, the ‘productive forces’ do not come into conflict with ‘relations of production.’
The later phase of hand production is based on a more complex division of labour, each worker doing only a part of what he did before. Manufacture naturally involves the union of the formerly independent craftsmen, forcing them into one productive organisation whose parts are human beings.
This is a new phase in the growth of productive forces. This phase, however, retains the character of handicraft because each operation is still performed by hand, and is, therefore, dependent on the skill and dexterity of the individual worker in handling his tools.
Since he is now engaged in one simple operation, the worker is “alienated from some of the creative prerogatives he exercised before”. What he loses in creativity, he gains in efficiency. This is because of the fact that he now takes less time in performing the specific operation than the craftsman who performs the entire series of operations in succession.
The division of labour among many workers, each doing a specialised operation, is the basis of the productive system called manufacture.
Such a division of labour enables the manufacturer to make necessary changes in the tools employed in production. Unlike the craftsman who used a number of tools for different operations, the workers now use only a specialised tool designed for each specialised operation.
To Marx, this development is important for a number of reasons. First, it brings about radical changes in the personality of the worker. The increasingly complex division of labour alienates the worker from his creative powers and thus diminishes him as a human being.
Second, what is taken away from the individual worker in artistic skill, creativity and reflective powers is given to the organisation in terms of higher productivity. The deficiencies of the former become the virtues of the latter. The organisation as a whole is enriched by alienating the worker from his individual powers. Third, manufacture develops a hierarchy of labour.
At the very bottom of the hierarchy are those who perform the simplest operations of which anyone is capable. Hence, in contrast to guild production, manufacture brings into being a class of unskilled labourers, a class unknown in handicraft production.
The separation of the workers into skilled and unskilled is thus brought into being. According to Marx, therefore, the main tendencies of the catalyst system appear during this phase of production. The next phase was the introduction of machine. In manufacture the revolution in production began with the organisation of labour power.
In modern industry it begins with the introduction of machine. According to Marx, the employment of machinery in the modern industry is the most important phase in the development of the capitalist mode of production.
The changes brought about by machine were far-reaching in their effect on the worker. In manufacture, the productive process was adapted to the skills of the worker; the machine system compelled the worker to adapt himself to it.
“The lifelong specialty of handling one and the same tool now becomes the life-long specialty of serving one and the same machine”. In manufacture, the worker used the tool; in the factory the machine uses him.
In this way, the worker’s dependence upon the factory, and hence on the capitalist, is rendered complete. Under these circumstances, the intellectual powers of the worker become redundant and completely disappear in the face of the gigantic physical set-up of the total factory organisation and the mind hidden behind it all.
Hence the Marxian concept of alienation which emphasises the growing de-humanization of man in a capitalist society.
What is the Marxian answer to this problem? His solution to the problem of alienated labour is a communist society in which the forces of production are communally owned. According to Marx, the concentration of alienated labour in large industrial establishments would encourage awareness of exploitation and oppression.
They would sooner or later find these conditions intolerable and wrest all capital and power from their oppressors. This would lead to the eventual abolition of classes and class conflicts. In such a society workmen would at one and the same time produce goods for themselves and the community and thereby satisfy both individual and collective needs.
Marx gives little indication of how the specialised division of labour can be dispensed with in a socialist or communist society.
Marx simply states:
“In a communist society, where nobody has one exclusive sphere of activity but each can become accomplished in any branch he wishes, society regulates the general production and thus makes it possible for me to do one thing today and another tomorrow, to hunt in the morning, fish in the afternoon, rear cattle in the evening, criticize after dinner, just as I have a mind, without ever becoming hunter, fisherman, shepherd, or critic”.
Marx thus conjures up the vision of a society in which each individual is free to choose his occupation in terms of his inclinations and to move from one occupation to the other in terms of his changing moods. Marxian view that alienated labour would not exist in a socialist or communist society is criticised as being too simplistic and naive.
“In his analysis of East European Communism. Milovan Djilas argues that though the forces of production are communally owned, they are controlled by and for the benefit of ruling elite”.
Djilas, therefore, concludes: “labour cannot be free in a society where all material goods are monopolized by one group”. It is also pointed out by critics that the picture of a society in which a worker would not be tied down to one job against his mood are too unrealistic and exceeds the bounds of practical possibility.
We can also assume that in socialist society’s technology would be increasingly used in production in future on a scale comparable to that in capitalist societies. These needs must be done in order to give the people goods of better quality and of adequate quantity. Increasing use of technology demands greater and more complex division of labour.
It is not clear as to how a socialist society can avoid the problem of alienated labour when a worker would be reduced to an appendage of the machine as a result of mechanisation of the processes of production. That machine tends to de-humanize the worker has been recognised by many philosophers, social scientists and writers.
The crucial questions are: Can machine be dispensed with? Can complex division of labour in a highly technological society be eliminated? The answers to both the questions will probably be in the negative. What is, then, the remedy?
If machined and division of labour cannot be dispensed with, the solution, though partial and inadequate, probably lies in giving the workers more free time, so that they can pursue their leisure-time activities according to their inclinations and changing moods.
It will be quite pertinent to consider that when Marx outlined his views on alienated labour in 1844, the working hours in a factory varied between 12 and 16 hours a day.
Naturally, he had little time for anything else except what Marx described as “animal functions” – i.e., eating, sleeping and procreating. The situation has radically changed today in advanced industrial societies; there has been a significant reduction in working hours and a steady rise in the living standards and income of the population as a whole.
Writers of leftist persuasion, such as the French sociologist and journalist Andre Gorz and Herbert Marc use however, argue that the leisure-time activities of workers are also planned and channelized by big business. There is little or no scope of self-directed and creative leisure.
Marcuse argues that: “The people recognize themselves in their commodities; they find their soul in their automobile, hi-fi set, split-level home, kitchen equipment”. It is pointed out that “relative affluences and the extension of leisure have simply changed chains of iron into chains of gold. These observations seem to be an implied call for restoration of pristine values and making people aware of those values.
A herculean task indeed which only a handful of brave souls can undertake. The old maxim that man does not live by bread alone seems to acquire a new dimension and urgency in modern affluent societies, it is a challenge for which adequate response has to be found in the coming years.
In this context, it will be illuminating to consider the views of Marx and Rousseau on the question of alienation. There are some striking similarities in their views. In the first place, both the philosophers have faith in the inherent goodness, strength of character and power of discrimination of the people. Secondly, both the philosophers agree that man was initially in possession of his self.
According to Rousseau, that initial condition was the state of nature and, according to Marx, it was primitive communism. Thirdly, both the philosophers agree that the origin of private ownership of property and the institutions which developed around ‘property’ distorted values and introduced aberrations in the natural flow of life.
Fourthly, both the philosophers agree that class divisions with accent on inequality bring to the fore the oppressive and distorted view of society. Class divisions keep people apart and artificial bakers to spontaneous social relationships are created.
Man becomes the greatest enemy of man. Fifthly, both agree that man was born free and that gradually with the unfolding of civilisation this freedom has been restricted.
According to Rousseau, the norms prescribed by society imposed these restrictions. Marx pointed his accusing finger at the growth and development of capitalism which tend to dwarf human personality and stifle the spontaneity of his thinking and action.
Emile Durkheim: A Functionalist Perspective on the Division of Labour in Society:
While Marx was pessimistic about the division of labour in society, Durkheim was cautiously optimistic. “Marx saw the specialised division of labour trailing the worker in his occupational role and dividing society into antagonistic social classes, Durkheim saw a number of problems arising from specialisation in industrial society but believed the promise of the division of labour outweighed the problems”.
The theme of Duikheimian thought, as expressed in his book The Division of labour in Society (first published in 1983), is the relation between individuals and the collectivity. He posed the problem thus: How can a multiplicity of individuals make up a society? How can individuals achieve a consensus which is the condition of social existence?
In answer to this central question, Durkheim kept in view a fundamental difference between pre-industrial and industrial societies, and made a distinction between two forms of social solidarity, namely, mechanical solidarity and organic solidarity.
Mechanical solidarity is, to use Durkheim’s language, solidarity of resemblance. The chief characteristic of a society in which mechanical solidarity prevails is that the individuals differ from one another as little as possible.
They resemble each other because they feel the same motions, cherish the same values and hold sacred the same things. The society is harmonious and coherent because there is little social differentiation and division of labour is unspecialized.
The other form of solidarity, namely, organic solidarity, is one in which consensus or the harmonious and coherent unity of the collectivity results from differentiation. The individuals, who are members of the same collectivity, are not similar, but different. In such a situation, the consensus is achieved precisely because the individuals are different their interdependence brings them closer, and social solidarity is established.
Why does he refer to this form of unity as “organic solidarity”? The reason for this terminology is probably this. The parts of a living organism do not resemble one another. Each of the organs of a living creature (for example, the heart, liver, brain, etc.) performs a function. Each such organ is, however, indispensable to life. There is thus a unity or interdependence of these different parts or organs.
In Durkheim’s thought, these two forms of solidarity correspond to two extreme forms of social organisation. The pre-industrial society or the society which was called primitive in Durkheim’s day is characterised by the predominance of mechanical solidarity.
The individuals of a clan are, so to speak, interchangeable. It follows from this – and this idea is central to Durkheim’s conception – that the individual does not come first historically.
The individual, the awareness of oneself as an individual, is born of the development of society itself. In primitive societies, each man is the same as the others. In the consciousness of each, collective feelings – i.e., feelings common to all predominate in number and intensity.
As social organisation becomes more differentiated, characterised by multiplication of industrial activities, the ‘sameness’ among the members in terms of ideas and outlook is missing.
There are differences amongst the members by virtue of variety of experience, upbringing and training – in short, by the division of labour. It is to be noted that the division of labour which Durkheim refers to is not to be confused with the one envisaged by economists.
According to his use of the term, division of labour refers to social differentiation which is associated with differentiation of occupations and multiplication of industrial activities. The division of labour Durkheim speaks about concerns the structure of the society as a whole of which economic division of labour is merely an expression.
Durkheim raises the question: If an industrial society is marked by so much of-social differentiation, how is it that such a society coheres? Why is there not more social disruption and more social disorganization, leading to a breakdown of relationships and hence of social order? Durkheim argues that it is the very function of the division of labour to provide this cohesive factor.
Durkheim also discusses other characteristics of these two types of society. In societies marked by mechanical solidarity, law is repressive because in such a society an offence against the community is met with collective reaction of a punitive and repressive kind.
On the other hand, in societies marked by organic solidarity, there is a greater preponderance of recitative law — i.e., a law which endeavors after a breach to restore the status quo ante. In such a society law is also differentiated in the sense that some portions of law apply to merchants only, some portions to employers, to professional men and so forth.
In a society marked by organic solidarity, there is also repressive law. But it is only a small part of the total, and it is resorted to only after other measures have failed. Durkheim further points out that in the primitive society most offences are public while in modern societies they are private, civil rather than criminal, calling for adjustments rather than strong and violent reactions.
Durkheim classifies division of labour into two categories: normal division of labour and abnormal division of labour. The division of labour which strengthens social solidarity is characterised by him as normal division of labour. The division of labour which weakens social solidarity is called abnormal division of labour.
He further classified abnormal division of labour into two categories: anomic division of labour and forced division of labour. When division of labour is pushed to such an extreme limit that the workers are divorced completely from the entire production process and there is a permanent estrangement between the employers on the one hand and the workers on the other, such a division of labour is called by Durkheim as anomic division of labour.
R.A. Nisbet explains the nature of anomic division of labour thus:
“In his division of labour Durkheim had noted the virtually inverse relation between the development of culture and human happiness. States of boredom, anxiety, and despair are relatively unknown in primitive or simple society………….. In civilization they mount and, with them, endemic unhappiness”.
When workers are forced to take up some employment against their will in the absence of an alternative occupation, such division of labour is characterised by Durkheim as forced division of labour. In his view, absence of co-ordination or adjustment between job requirements and professional competence gives rises to this kind of problem.
In order to meet the problem of anomic division of labour, Durkheim advocates the setting up of professional associations and corporations with a view to facilitating regular contacts among workers. He also advocates the setting up of an agency for the purpose of reconciling disputes between the workers on the one hand and the employers on the other.
Whereas Manti suggests a radical solution to the problem of alienation, viz., the abolition of capitalism and its replacement by socialism, Durkheim suggests that the solution to the problem of anomie can be provided within the existing framework of industrial society.
According to him, self-interest which dominates business and commerce should be replaced by a code of ethics which emphasizes the needs of society as a whole.
He looks upon occupational associations as the means to subject economic activity to moral regulation. Such associations would solve the problem of anomie in two ways. First, professional or occupational associations would check individualistic inclinations by re-integrating individuals into a social group within the membership of these associations which would re-enforce social controls.
Second, these associations would lay down a code of conduct for their members, their rights as well as their obligations to the community as a whole.
Durkheim is obviously influenced by his view of professional associations, such as those of doctors and lawyers, which lay down a code of conduct that is binding on their members. Through control of training and education, the professional associations establish both professional competence and professional ethics. Thus, the lawyer is the guardian of the law in the interests of society as a whole.
The doctor, directed by his Hippocratic Oath, is concerned primarily in his occupation with the health of the community. These features are lacking in commerce and industry. In his view, professional ethics must permeate all spheres of economic activities, and that is “the key to a future moral order in industrial society”.
In order to meet the problems arising out of forced division of labour he advocates the expansion of opportunities for the spread of general education and technical training among workers.
In modern industrialized societies, the above proposals of Durkheim are being seriously considered and put into effect. The branch of sociology which is concerned with these problems is known as Occupational Sociology.
In will, however, be quite in order to consider also the anti-professional perspectives. According to one view, professional or occupational groups deliberately control entry into respective professions in order to restrict competition and obtain high rewards for the services rendered by the professional group.
It is argued that “professional ethics, and in particular the emphasis on altruism, care and community service, are simply a smokescreen which serves to disguise professional self-interest”.
The second anti-professional view is presented from the Marxian perspective. It is argued that professionals are servants of ruling classes and ruling elites. Their services are requisitioned by the state and private industry. It is particularly so in the case of lawyers, accountants and engineers.
They serve the interests of those who can pay their high fees and not the interests of the large number of people who cannot do so. It is doubtful as to whether doctors and teachers may be excluded from this charmed circle.
A Note on Anomie: Views of Durkheim and Merton:
With a particular meaning of the word ‘anomie’ in mind, Durkheim used the term ‘anomic division of labour’, and elsewhere the term ‘anomic suicide’. In what sense does Durkheim use the term ‘anomic’? The word ‘anomia’ is Greek. It simply means lawlessness—worse than anarchy because anarchy means a society in which there is no ruler but in which, the anarchists hope, the natural order prevails.
It appears in English dictionaries as anomic because it came into English language from French or German which transform the Greek final ‘a’ into a final ‘e’. Durkheim uses the word ‘anomie’ in the sense that the people have a sense of ‘normlessness’.
The term has been applied to the state of mind of individuals regardless of the state of society. Anomie is not the same thing as the absence of norms. In the condition called anomie, norms are present. They are clear enough, and the actors in the social system are, to some extent, oriented to them.
But this orientation, on the part of many, is ambivalent. It either leads toward conformity, but with misgivings, or leans toward deviation, but with misgivings.
It is interesting to note that R. K. Mraton uses the word ‘anomic’ in a different sense. According to him, “anomie may be conceived as breakdown in the cultural structure occurring particularly when there is an acute disjunction between cultural norms and goals and the socially structured capacities of members of the group to act in accord with them”.
According to him, in American social structure there is a “strain towards anomie”.
The accepted goal of the American society is to achieve metical success, to be affluent. But a large number of people do not have the means to achieve this goal. This kind of incongruence between ends and means places pressure upon people to use other than the approved means in pursuit of success.
Thus, according to Merton, anomie arises out of the “seeming contradictions between cultural goals and socially restricted access to these goals”.