Cities and towns; Social psychology; Sociology; Sociology, Urban
What we do observe, as a result of the crisis, is that control that was
formerly based on mores was replaced by control based on positive law.
This change runs parallel to the movement by which secondary
relationships have taken the place of primary relationships in the
association of individuals in the city environment.
It is characteristic of the United States that great political changes
should be effected experimentally under the pressure of agitation or
upon the initiative of small but militant minorities. There is probably
no other country in the world in which so many “reforms” are in progress
as at the present time in the United States. Reform has, in fact, become
a kind of popular “indoor sport.” The reforms thus effected, almost
without exception, involve some sort of restriction or governmental
control over activities that were formerly “free” or controlled only by
the mores and public opinion.
The effect of this extension of what is called the police power has been
to produce a change, not merely in the fundamental policy of the law,
but in the character and standing of the courts.
The juvenile and morals courts illustrate a change which is perhaps
taking place elsewhere. In these courts the judges have assumed
something of the functions of administrative officers, their duties
consisting less in the interpretation of law than in prescribing
remedies and administering advice intended to restore delinquents
brought before them to their normal place in society.
A similar tendency to give judges a wide discretion and to impose upon
them a further responsibility is manifest in those courts which have to
deal with the technical affairs of the business world, and in the growth
in popularity of commissions in which judicial and administrative
functions are combined, for example, the Interstate Commerce Commission.
In order to interpret in a fundamental way the facts in regard to social
control it is important to start with a clear conception of the nature
of corporate action.
Corporate action begins when there is some sort of communication between
individuals who constitute a group. Communication may take place at
different levels; that is, suggestions may be given and responded to on
the instinctive, senso-motor, or ideo-motor levels. The mechanism of
communication is very subtle, so subtle, in fact, that it is often
difficult to conceive how suggestions are conveyed from one mind to
another. This does not imply that there is any special form of
consciousness, any special sense of kinship or consciousness of kind,
necessary to explain corporate action.
In fact, it has recently been shown that in the case of certain highly
organized and static societies, like that of the well-known ant,
probably nothing that we would call communication takes place.
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