Introduction
Marx, Weber, and Durkheim were each troubled about societal changes and the subsequent transformations they saw in the quality of people’s lives in modern industrial society. This paper will set forth how the Fathers of Sociology might respond to a future society through the examination of Andrew Niccol’s 1997 film, “Gattaca”.
The paper is claimed to discuss the views of Karl Marx, Max Weber, and Emil Durkheim. These scientists were bothered with the issue, how the industrial epoch changes society, and to what extent the social structure changes. The key aim of the paper is to put forth an idea, how all the three would respond to a probable variant of future society, by the example of the film “Gattaca.”
Main body
In their works, the three sociologists explored the problem of class relations. Understanding the way Marx, Weber, and Durkheim viewed class relations is relevant to the film as it also focuses on this problem. Along with numerous opportunities genetic engineering offers classical inequality: genetically superior discriminate genetically inferior against not for whom they are but for what they are made of (Perriman). In a genetically run society, genetically superior will feel more confident in their freedom and rights having the best-paid jobs and better opportunities to succeed in life.
We will start modeling the sociologists’ response to a probable variant of future society with an analysis of the views on society and class and the way they are applicable to the situation presented in the film.
Marx and Weber’s views on class relations result from the belief that any social order involves the regulation of opposing interests. The conflict between individuals and among groups according to this view is an essential part of every society,
“The history of all hitherto existing society is the history of class struggles. Freeman and slave, patrician and plebeian, lord and serf, guild-master and journeyman, in a word, oppressor and oppressed, stood in constant opposition to one another, carried on an uninterrupted, now hidden, now open fight, a fight that each time ended, either in a revolutionary reconstitution of society at large or in the common ruin of the contending classes” (Marx 2002: 30).
The quote implies that society does not exist without class struggle. No matter which direction the societal development might take any existing contradictions will definitely spill into class struggle. This seems to be the message of “Gattaca” in which at the beginning the society is proud of the scientific achievements and then gradually experiences the shortcomings of the existing contradictions between the representatives of different classes.
Marxism divides people into oppressed proletarians and bourgeois (Marx 1932). Marx described the proletariat as “a class of laborers who live only as long as they find work, and who find work only as long as their labor increases capital.” (Briefs 1937: XI) In Marx’s theory of class struggle, the bourgeoisie plays a significant role. By overthrowing the feudal organization it is seen as an originally progressive force that afterward becomes a reactionary force as it strives to prevent the ascendency of the proletariat from maintaining its own position of predominance (The Columbia Encyclopedia 2007).
Thus, according to Marx the class struggle under capitalism consists in the contradiction between the ruling class, that is, the bourgeoisie that owns the means of production, and the working class, the proletariat that labor for a wage. Admitting the progressive role of the bourgeoisie in destroying feudalism the sociologists claim that the contradiction between the forces of production and the relations of production created by the bourgeoisie led to its downfall.
The same situation is observed in the film. Genetic engineering offers numerous opportunities in the future if the human genome is examined in more detail: people will be able to build “designer babies” and project one’s future detrimental physical characteristics and health problems through examining his or her DNA at birth (Perriman). Still, the film suggests that the society of such “perfect” humans will definitely experience three major problems: “discrimination, expectations of prophetic genetics, and a loss of human diversity” (Perriman) which one day will lead to its complete downfall.
“Gattaca” depicts the class struggle that is much similar to that examined by Marx and Weber. The difference consists in the confronting classes whereas the principles of the struggle remain the same. The class confrontation depicted in the film is the struggle of valid and invalids. The relations between valid and genetically discriminated seems to be a metaphor for the struggle between the proletariat and the bourgeoisie, which took place in Eastern-European states at the beginning of the 20th century. As well as bourgeoisie appeared to be a progressive force, valid can also be regarded as the promoters of societal development.
The developments in genetic engineering move the progress on but cause the class struggle. The struggle of the classes serves as the prerequisite of social development. It presupposes the stops, and even recoils for the sake of moving forward. Thus, the ideology of division into classes promotes the development of society (Bartos & Wehr 2002).
Weber states that social structure and social division are determined historically, and cannot be made artificially just to make “the wrong” and “the right” (Weber 1919). In the case of the society depicted in the “Gattaca”, the division is quite artificial and absolutely wrong, as people still have their individual traits and spirit, which cannot be transmitted genetically. The spirit and the soul make one a human. They shape the system of general norms and values in the society and when this system fails due to the absence of any ethical directions that the humans are provided with, the social control system breaks down. The controlling impact of society on personal propensities becomes no longer effectual and individuals are left to their own means.
To define such a situation Durkheim resorts to the notion of anomie, a term that relates the condition of comparative absence of norms in a whole community or in some of its components. Anomie does not refer to feelings, but to possessions of the social arrangement scheme. It distinguishes a situation in which personal wishes and strivings are no longer controlled by general norms and where, as an effect, persons are left without ethical direction in the chase of their aims (McIntosh 1997).
For Durkheim, the level of integration and regulation felt by the society is a by-product of the evolution from mechanical solidarity, based on the likeness and similarities among individuals in a society, and largely dependent on common rituals, routines, and religion (these concepts are strong because the peoples share the same values), to organic solidarity, based on the interdependence of individuals wherein religion is secondary to the value of individuality, as the force that caused a break down of the collective effervescence (a life of the group above and beyond the individual lives of the members). This happened because people turned away from historical social institutions of religion and family and began to rely on the modern social institutions of government, education, economy to form social cohesion (McIntosh 1997).
The society depicted in the movie can be seen from both a mechanical and organic view. The people are all held together by their likeness and similarities to each other in so much that they are all genetically born but they are held together as a group through modern technology. Durkheim believed that society is in a constant state of change. During times of massive, swift change a state of normlessness, or anomie takes place. During a state of anomie, individuals have a loss of attachment, the maintenance of social ties and the goals of the group as well as the perception of being part of a larger collective. The state of anomie is self-regulating as society adapts to the changes and responds to them in a reasonable manner (McIntosh 1997).
As total anomie, or complete absence of norms, is practically impossible by Durkheim, existing normative directives may regulate life in communities (McIntosh 1997). Within any separate community, groups may vary in the extent of anomie that inundates them. Communal modification may create anomie either in the whole community or in some segments of it.
When crisis heads for sudden descending mobility, de-regulation of people’s lives happens – a defeat of honest certainty and normal anticipations that are no longer maintained by the group to which these men once belonged. Likewise, the quick inception of affluence may lead some people to rapid upward mobility and hence divest them of the communal support needed for their new methods of life (Kautsky 1994).
Social division does not only foster the development of society but leads to the restriction of rights and freedoms of the discriminated class as well. The movie offers numerous examples of how bureaucracy sets barriers for ordinary people. The examples fit Marx’s position that the political state of civil society is “the state of generalized egoism from which the bourgeoisie alone reaps an advantage because of private ownership of the means of production” (Glassman et al. 1987: 15).
In this society, bureaucracy becomes autonomous through creating certain institutional and attitudinal prerequisites. It establishes a hierarchy of knowledge based on the authority of the office. The main principle of the hierarchy is that the higher the rank, the deeper the grasp of the universal. It encourages submission and requires actions based on “fixed principles, views and traditions”, the world thus becomes a “mere object” to be manipulated (Glassman et al. 1987: 16).
Weber also speaks of the hierarchy that bureaucracy presupposes. This is a firmly ordered system of super- and subordination based on supervision of the lower offices by the higher ones (Weber 1921). The sociologist speaks of the possibility of appealing the decision of a lower office to its higher authority (Weber 1921), but the film offers the idea that there was no such a possibility for the invalids in the Gattaca society.
Bureaucracy from the film seems to be dehumanized due to the destructive powers of efficiency and effectiveness of human domination over nature. All three sociologists agree that effectiveness and efficiency have been greatly increased which allows greater domination of men over nature, which in its turn leads to the dehumanization of all involved.
Conclusion
Thus, Marx, Weber, and Durkheim if responded to the social changes that the film depicted would speak of the destructive powers that a man’s domination over nature brings. Class struggle is the direct consequence of the work of such powers as the main problem that the Gattaca society experiences are the gradual loss of moral principles and values that unite people. Those who belong to this society should decide whether genetic engineering achievements are worth of dehumanization that they will inevitably face.
References
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