SOC 105 Lecture Notes - Lecture 11: Thorstein Veblen, Norbert Elias, Cultural Lag

• School: Ryerson University
• Department: Sociology
• Course: SOC 105
• Professor: Mustafa Koc

Document Summary

Sociologists use the term social movements to refer to organized collective activities to bring about or resist fundamental change in an existing group or society. Social movements imply the existence of conflict, but we can also analyze their activities from a functionalist perspective, which views social movements as training grounds for leaders of the political establishment. The term relative deprivation is defined as the conscious feeling of a negative discrepancy between legitimate expectations and present actualities. It may be characterized by scarcity rather than lack of necessities. A group will not mobilize into a social movement unless there is a shared perception that its relative deprivation can be ended only through collective action. Refers to the ways in which a social movement utilizes such resources as money, political influence, access to the media, and personnel. Leadership is a central factor in the mobilization of the discontented into social movements.