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Infonomics

U. MatzatSociologie /HTI group

School of Innovation SciencesTU/e

email: umatzat@gmail.com

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Today

Two of the “big three” problems

1. Social order

2. Social inequality

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Do you remember…..

…. old wine in new bottles

Or stated differently:

new problems can be treated as old problems (but under new conditions)

We transfer old and general theories to new problems

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Problem 1: Social order in society (I)

Thomas Hobbes (1588-1679, English)

book: Leviathan (1651):

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new problem

Successful knowledge sharing in a virtual team that aims at sharing knowledge through social media…

I will ask you in a few minutes how to apply the ideas of Hobbes to social media….

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Under which conditions do people live together peacefully?

Hobbes’ search for an answer uses:

1.) (simple) behavior about human nature

2.) conclusions based on these assumptions: what will people do when?

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Hobbes’ assumptions about human nature

People have goals / needs / aversions

• everybody fears death and injury, everybody needs food and water, and everybody wants wealth and honor

To achieve their goals, people use

• property and knowledge (for instance to achieve a long life)•Physical strength

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Hobbes’ assumptions

A thought experiment

• suppose there is no government, no laws, no morals that prescribe certain kinds of behavior

This is what Hobbes calls the “state of nature”

Further assumptions:

• goods are scarce (competition)• people do not differ much in terms of physical power• people are willing to use force to achieve their goals (given the fact that there are no moral standards)

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Thomas Hobbes: conclusions

Hobbes’ solution

A powerful state forcing people not to make use of violence

Powerful state is in the best interest of citizens

Cooperative behavior does not emerge endogenously

In an area without a state, under scarcity and with people of equal strength there will be “a war of all against all"

Het leven is dan "eenzaam, schamel , naar, wreed en kort“

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Social Order II

Scottish Moral PhilosophyAdam Smith (1723-1790)David Hume (1711-1776)Adam Ferguson (1723-1816)Bernard de Mandeville (1670-1733 = one of the early ones)

A. Smith:

“An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations” (1776)

“The Theory of Moral Sentiments” (1759)

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Same question as Hobbes:

When do people live together peacefully?

Again: assumption about human nature

... But the assumptions emphasize other skills of people

... And there are some other assumptions about the conditions under which people live

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Scottish Moral philosophers: assumptions

• people strive for goals, and behave to achieve them

• people’s behavior will be awarded or sanctioned through the reactions of others

• scepticism with respect to general altriusm (only for family)

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Scottish Moral Philosophy: assumptions about conditions

• social relations are a web of achievements and counter-achievements

• people’s interests are inter-twined: ”By helping myself I help you”

• positive interdependencies between people!

• a difference between intentions and objective consequences of behavior

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Scottish Moral Philosophers: conclusions

cooperative behavior “peaceful coexistence” is possible even without a strong central authority who enforces this peaceful behavior

humans help each other because them might need help themselves in the future

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Scottish Moral Philosophers: conclusion

Cooperation improves through:

identifiabilityLong-term relations

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Application: implications by Hobbes / Smith

(this is not just old stuff ... It has implications now!)

Construction: how do you shape neighborhoods?

ICT: when do you expect problems on the Internet with social media? How do you manage an online community according to these two theories?

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The problem of social order: subdivision

Violence / order

People to peopleviolence

State vs stateViolence (war)

Violence of stateto its citizens

Violence of peopleagainst their state(revolution)

Violence of manyto many(civil war)

Violence of oneperson to the next(crime)

Violence of fewto many (terrorism)

Violence of manyagainst few(organized crime)

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Hobbes / Scottish Moral Philosophers

What they have in common Type of analysis:

assumptions of human nature in general (behavioral assumptions): goals, means

assumptions on circumstances (different) conclusions about characteristics of society

(war vs. peace)

differences

•Competition vs reciprocity

•negative versus positive interdependencies

•Very different conclusions: disorder vs. order

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Problem 2: social inequality

Karl Marx: 1818-1883

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Social inequality – Karl Marx

Two different types of theories

2. individualistic theories about behavior of humans and groups under specific social conditions (capitalistic society); behavior has consequences for macro-level

hier: mostly type 2 - theories

1. collectivistic theories (only at the macro-level)

• History (of societies) is always the history of social classes and their struggles

Slave owner versus slaves ... ..... capitalist versus workers

Final development had a specific goal: society without classes (communism!)

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historical materialism (core, NL “kale kern”)

a Whatever mode of production prevails in a society,b every inequality in that society,c rests on some form of compulsion resulting from this mode of

production;d this compulsion leads to a certain type of strife,e and sometimes this strife results in the abolition of the old mode of

production with its ensuing forms of compulsion and the disappearance of old inequalities,

f and under certain circumstances in the coming of equality.

historical materialism Changes in the division of material resources shape the

development of societies (“history”)

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Classic historical materialism

a In societies with capital goods as the most important means of production and universal freedom of property and of labour (capitalists and workers),

b wages of workers fall and profits of capitalists risec because of the threat that capitalists dismiss workers and replace them

by machines;d this threat results in violence by workers against capitalists, e and to the extent that workers become conscious of this compulsion and

unite, they win this strife and abolish private ownership of the means of production, and

f if the means of production become common property, the distribution of consumer goods among the inhabitants of this society will proceed according to their needs.

part b: “law of capitalist accumulation”

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Classic historical materialism

• "accumulation": replacment of labour through machines

• why? centralisation hypothesis

a In capitalist societiesb the growing amount of capital gets concentrated in the hands of

fewer capitalistsc because owners of small amounts of capital go bankrupt in the

wake of price cuts by owners of large amounts of capital.

centralisation as unintended consequence of competition in the free market economy

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Empirical test of the law of capitalist accumulation

•No convincing evidence

•New try: not absolute but relative differences

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revisionist historical materialism: Eduard Bernstein

a In capitalist societies without a constitution stipulating universal freedom of assembly, general suffrage for parliament, one vote for each inhabitant in elections for parliament and …..,

b workers do not become absolutely poorer, but they do become less well off in a relative sense;

c workers improve their condition in an absolute sense, since the substitution of labour by machines, goes together with an increase in the skills of workers, whereas skilled workers are less easily compelled to accept lower wages than unskilled workers; workers become relatively poorer since skills cannot fully counter the threat that labour will be replaced by machines;

d under these conditions the struggle of workers against capitalists becomes focused on the extension of political rights; ……;

e the more workers unite into trade unions and labour parties, the more they gain through gradual reforms various social rights;

f and with the extension of social rights, income disparities between workers and capitalists will narrow.

1850-1932

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revisionist historical materialism

• proposition c: Bernsteins "schoolingshypothese"

Substition of centralisation hypothesis:

a In capitalist societiesb the number of small capitalists does not decrease; it

increasesc because the growing demand for consumer goods gives rise

to new sectors of production, with large capitalists in old sectors offering little competition to small capitalists in new sectors.

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Social mobility and socialism in the USA: Werner Sombart

Reference point: classic historical materialism

a In capitalist societiesb all inhabitants with respect to the freedom of labour and the right to

own property are equal before the law; in actual fact, the longer these laws persist, the more difficult it becomes for workers to start their own enterprise and accumulate capital;

c this is the case since established capitalists corner newcomers.

Problem: there is no socialism in the USA

(1863-1941)

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Social mobility and socialism in the USA :

Sombarts’ mobility hypothesis

a In capitalist societies without a feudal past and with uncultivated land not yet private property

b more workers start their own business, making them upwardly mobile;c they do so because dismissal is less of a threat in these societies;d and since the workers of these societies experience upward mobility,

their struggle against capitalists takes on peaceful forms.

==> de jure and de facto openness of society

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Social inequality: questions on mobility

•Sombart clarifies: inequality questions consist of different parts

• Skewness and mobility

•Differences between classic historical materialism (Marx) vs. revisionist historical materialism (Bernstein) partly about social mobility

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Social inequality: questions on mobility

•Bernstein 1: training ==> climbing up of workers

•Bernstein 2: higher salary ==> more small owners = climbing up of workers

•Marx 1: climbing down of works who remain without training

•Marx 2: climbing down of smaller groups because of competition with larger owners

•Questions about inequality have 2 parts: questions of skewness and mobility

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Questions on skewness

a) relative differences:

•Did the proportion of the income of the poorest 10 percent of the Dutch population during the past 10 years decrease?

•Did the use of Amazon and bol.com increase more within the 50+ group less than within the <50 year group?

b) absolute differences:

•How many people earn more than the minimum salary prescribed by law?

•Do weakly educated people read too few books?

•Do weakly educated people hardly use Facebook?

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questions on mobility

a) intergenerational mobility:

•How many daughters/sons have a higher education than their father?

b) intragenerational mobility:

•How many people earn now more than 10 years ago?

•How many people increased their digital skills substantially during the last 3 years?

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Opdeling van ongelijkheidsvragen sinds Sombart

Ongelijkheden tussen boven- en ondergeschikten

Ongelijkheden tussen personen met een sterkere dan wel zwakkere positie op de arbeids- en kapitaalmarkt

Scheefheid

Mobiliteit

Absolute afwijkingen

Relatieve verschillen

Intragenerationele mobiliteit

Intergenerationele mobiliteit

skewness mobility

absolute difference

s

relative differences

Intra-generational differences

Inter-generational differences

inequalities

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Difference in income and earnings in the Netherlands

earnings of the richest 0.5%, 1% and 5% of the population as a percentage of the overall private earnings in NL

Jaar Categorie 0.5% 1% 5%

1894 44 54 79 1905 45 55 79 1914 46 57 80 1920 40 50 76 1925 38 47 73 1935 33 42 69 1951 26 34 60 1960 29 37 64 1970 24 31 57 1980 17 24 49 1986 22 29 53 1989 22 30 54

year category

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Gross salary of full time employees with different (increasing) education

NL in 1979, 1985, 1995, and 1997; salary of employees with lowest education set on 100

opleiding 1979 1985 1989 1995 1997

Allen lager onderwijs

100 100 100 100 100

Uitgebreid lager onderwijs

104 104 102 102 103

Middelbaar onderwijs

131 120 115 114 117

Hoger beroeps-onderwijs

180 148 151 155 158

Wetenschappelijk onderwijs

247 213 192 203 198

Bernstein’s training hypothesis

Bernstein‘s training hypothesis

education

Very low

Very high

middle

somewhat low

somewhat high

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Digital divide / digital inequality

Differences between social groups/categories in

•Acess to the internet

•Forms of use of internet

Dependent on:

•Income, education, gender, age, ethnicity

•“highly-educated people profit more from the internet”

•How can inequality be reduced?

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Digital divide / digital inequality

•digital skills

•consequences: position on the labor market, social capital, etc.

•Bernstein’s training hypothesis

•How to train people?

•self-learning by trial-and-error

•guided training / courses

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Digital divide / digital inequality

•Which digital skills?

•Operational skills – yes, but in addition…

•Formal skills (evaluation of quality of information)

•Communication skills (group communication in social media!)

•Ethical considerations

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To do’s for next time

read Ultee et al. (2003). chapters 5 and 11