Page 239 - DSOC201_SOCIAL_STRUCTURE_AND_SOCIAL_CHANGE_ENGLISH

Social Structure and Social Change

Notes Ethnocentrism (belief in the superiority of one’s culture) also prevents persons in accepting things/
innovations from other cultures. Ethnocentrism is so deeply engrained in the minds of Indians that
even when they are sensitive to the philosophy of cultural relativism, they easily fall victim to
evaluating others in terms of their own views. The pride and dignity too prevent people from accepting
things suggested by others. They think that they are so matured and learned that others’ suggestions
need to be discarded.

The Power Elite
It has been recognized almost by all scholars in our country that government has been a principal
agency of social change and a good part of social change has been stimulated and directed by
government agencies. In government, the innovative and reformist functions rest with ‘power elite’,
or what Pareto has called the ‘governing elite’. All elites are not committed to community’s welfare
or society’s development. Many elites function on the basis of vested interests. In terms of their
interest in self (S) and in public (P), I classify them in four groups (Ahuja: 1975: 65-66): indifferent
(S –, P –), manipulative (S +, P –), progressive (S –, P +), and rationalist (S +, P +). The progress in a
society depends upon the type of political elite who predominate. My contention is that in the first
two decades of independence our elites were nationalist-rational while in the last two and a half
decades, they are parochialist-irrational. Since indifferent and manipulative elites have dominated
over progressive and rationalist elites, the development of our society has been blocked. Like political
elites, our bureaucrats are more ritualists than innovative, our judiciary is more traditional than
liberal, our police is committed more to politicians in power than to law. Thus, since our policy-
makers and law-enforcers do not share the necessity of social change conducive to people’s welfare,
development has been overlooked.
Population Explosion
The nation’s potential for achieving the set goals is handicapped by explosion in our population.
About 47.3 thousand persons are added to our existing population every day, or 17 million persons
every year, or 170 million people in a decade. It has been calculated that for every addition of about
135 million people in our country, we will require every year 20 million cereals, 25,000 meters of
cloth, and also 2,500 million houses, 1.35 lakh primary and secondary schools, 4,000 hospitals and
dispensaries, 1,500 primary health centres, 2 lakhs hospital beds and 50 thousand doctors (India
Today, September 16-30, 1979: 53). The large population thus checks our efforts to contain poverty
and bring rapid development.
It may be concluded that as regards the direction of social change in India is concerned, there has
been considerable cultural continuity along with change based on imbibing modern values, practices
and institutions. The traditional patterns have not been held static and modern behaviour is commonly
fitted into long-standing patterns of action.
10.6 Forms of Social Change

Transformations and Revolution
Group conflict has often been viewed as a basic form of social change, especially of those radical and
sudden social transformations identified as revolutions. Marxists in particular tend to depict social
life in capitalist society as a struggle between a ruling class, which wishes to maintain the system,
and a dominated class, which strives for radical change. Social change then is the result of that struggle.
These ideas are basic to what sociologist Ralf Dahrendorf has called a conflict model of society.
The notion of conflict becomes more relevant to the explanation of social change if it is broadened to
include competition between rival groups. Nations, firms, universities, sports associations, and artistic
schools are groups between which such rivalry occurs. Competition stimulates the introduction and
diffusion of innovations, especially when they are potentially power-enhancing. Thus, the leaders of
non-Western states feel the necessity of adopting Western science and technology, even though their
ideology may be anti-Western, because it is only by these means that they can maintain or enhance
national autonomy and power.

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