Future Of Modernization
Essay by Mayda • December 5, 2011 • 1,056 Words (5 Pages) • 1,059 Views
Modernization is adapting to modern ways of values and life in the environment, lifestyles, habits, choices, ideas, societal, and changes. Technical advancements, urbanization, and specialization affect the industrial advancement in any society.
In highly skilled societies particular expertise enhances competition and dependence. Modernization is present and growing in modern societies. Modernization produces changes, implementations, and progresses to manifest in different ways. For many people it can be a productive improvement needed and many may disagree. Modernization manifested in the United States by new ideas and modern technologies to culturally exist together in contemporary times.
Modernization has four characteristics, smaller communities, personal choice, increase of social diversity, and time awareness. Emile Durkheim believed in the modernization of economic activities and increasing division of labor (Macionis, 2006). Durkheim viewed people of modern societies have special roles and traditional societies perform same activities, people of preindustrial societies were viewed as having the same moral values by belonging and working together. Durkheim strongly believed in the profound division of labor and changes people make because of differences and not held together.
Max Weber's theories are the most I identify with. Weber speaks of rationalization of need to change, understand conflicts changes can cause problems, the manifestation of the circumstances that will arise from the change, and the importance in believing in changes.
Modernization will continue to be a worldwide trend with progresses in the growth of many countries. Once underdeveloped countries start modernizing people will react positively toward new changes, new environment, and see the wonders of what has been created to make peoples' lives easier (Saler, 2006).
However, modernization has consequences. The air is polluted; landfills are taking more space with the accumulation of garbage with manmade products as plastics and nonperishable items, pesticides, factories, and carbons that people breathe every day.
Another approach in modernization is the revival of traditions. The difference in subjectivity of the modernization theory has obtained a highly divided perspective in evaluation of the importance of tradition in the modernized world. The popular of modernity current today is essentially modern Universalist thinking that caused a functionalist understanding of traditions and from different sources, it has not been able to address multiculturalism in globalization.
The revival of tradition should not be left to the functionalist by examined by cultural integration and reflections on modernity on globalization and should consider the changes in histories circumstances.
Modernization theory is confusing, difficult for theoretical research, and interpretations in sociology, history, anthropology, and social science. Countries like China are going through economic modernization with societies as family, culture, relationships, and routines viewed as obstructive. Through regional government and local communities, modernization is rapidly advancing in rural societies to increase economic modernization. Therefore, modernization has reached conclusions from scholars as functional transformations of traditional society. The scholars main points are that the traditional society are different than modern Western society, is a construction of modernity, substituting modernity for modernization, include social changes under modernity, and to continue traditional societies as legitimately constructing modernity.
The divided perspective of modernization in the past two decades in the Chinese society is economy, culture, and government has gone through many changes in modernization that affected the ways of thinking and transformation of social institution. The idea of modernization is to increase economic development and social wealth. Many attempts have been provided by theorist on interpretation and descriptions of modernization in China with disclosures of social changes and transformations, modernization, social development, and globalization. These changes in China have caused a methodological position and situation in modernization on their social communities (Li, 2009).
The abandonment of modernization has been proposed to replace earlier modernization from downplaying ideological overtones associated with the modernization concept to continue traditional societies to modern societies, including the Western societies, by focusing on the framework of social theory of traditional or pre-modern societies will change.
Others are searching for interaction of modernization by developing capitalist countries and less developed countries for economic advancement and national autonomy. The point is between traditional and modern societies. The primary focus is to examine modern societies from the traditional societies in determining new structural
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