FOUNDATION OF EDUCATION :: FACTORS OF SOCIAL CHANGE

Change is an important law of nature. Even a tree changes the direction of its roots around the stones it overcomes to reach the water, in order to live and sustain. Anything which does not change is considered dead. In today's arena when we see changes in the society, there is always a question are these changes for our own betterment or not, where it leads the society to??
 Social change is characteristic of all societies, whether simple or complex, strongly or loosely integrated. It involves changes in the material aspects of culture. Change can come from any source, including discovery and invention, rise of a religious or political movement, ideals of individuals at the leadership position or contact of one civilization with the other through commerce or welfare. For example, if a change occurs in political system, it affects religious and economic aspects of society. Hence, change in one aspect affects the other aspect. Several factors are responsible for these changes. 

The factors of social change can be classified as the following:

PHYSICAL FACTORS:
It is a fact that changes in the physical environment changes the society. Physical environment and changes in a country can bring change in the society.

 

  
For example, floods, tsunami, drought, earthquake can bring radical changes in the basic amenities like food, shelter, clothing. There by bringing changes in the society. Physical and Demographic changes like geographical environmental factors, climate topography, means of communication availability and non-availability have a permanent impact on the life and culture of people. If the physical environment is helpful and wholesome, people lead a happy and better life. In case of any obstruction the reverse will happen. Hence, different physical environment in different parts of the countries will lead to different pattern of life. Generally, changes in physical environment force migration of people in large numbers and this brings major changes in social life and cultural values also. Migration itself encourages change, for it brings a group into a new environment, subject to its new social contacts, and confronts it with new problems.

 

DEMOGRAPHIC FACTORS:
Broadly speaking, demography is concerned with the size and structure of human population. The social structure of a society is closely related with the changes in the size, composition and distri­bution of population. The size of the population is based mainly upon three factors—birth rate, death rate and migration (immigration and emigration).

The composition of population depends upon variables like age, sex, marital status, literacy etc. Changes in demographic structure, which may be caused by changes in mortality rates, will produce changes in the ratio of breadwinners to dependents.

Such a change can have consequences for the structure of family, kinship, political and other institutions. The size of population affects each of us quite personally. Whether, we are born into a growing or a shrinking population has a bearing on our education, the age at which we marry, our ability to get a job, the taxes we pay and many other factors.

Population analysis shows that there is a relationship between population changes and economic, social and cultural variables like poverty, illiteracy, ill-health, family structure, forms of marriage, work etc. Population growth is the most important factor in poverty.

Poverty is related with health and the size of the family also. Nations with large population (e.g., China and India) are more poverty- stricken than the countries which have not much population. Sex imbalance affects the forms of marriage (monogamy or polygamy). It is seen that communities, which have more males than females, resorted to polyandry system. Polygamy was generally found in such communities where females were in more numbers than males.

The population of every society is always changing both in numbers as well as in composition. Population changes have occurred all through human history because of migration, war, pesti­lence, changing mores etc. In modern times, adoption of two artificial ways to population growth, viz., birth control and abortion are also affecting the number and composition of population structure. The decline of both the birth rate and the death rate bring social transfor­mation. With changes in size goes the changes in composition. While the birth rate is falling, the proportion of younger people in the proportion of youth’s declines and that elders advances significant social changes occurs

SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGICAL FACTORS:

Social change depends upon several factors, we cannot expect changes happening one independently of the other. Things are co-related. Science and technology has a major effect on the social values. So, technological techniques and social values both are essential to bring change in the society. Technological techniques and social values together with their interaction determine the nature of the society at a particular point of time.

 Technology is the application of scientific knowledge to the making of tools to solve specific problems. Technological advances such as automobiles, airplanes, radio, television, cellular phones, computers, modems, and fax machines have brought major advances and changes to the world. Indeed, 20th century technology has completely—and irreversibly—changed the way people meet, interact, learn, work, play, travel, worship, and do business.

Technological information increases exponentially: The entire database of scientific knowledge doubles every several years. This “technological explosion” is due in part to an “Information explosion,” as well as to advances in storage, retrieval, and communication of data. In other words, a cycle occurs: Improvements in technology lead to increases in knowledge and information and, thus, to uncovering the means to create better technology. Consequently, sociologists are concerned with how technological societies will be forced to adapt to the social changes that improvements in technology will continue to bring. 

COMPUTER TECHNOLOGY:
 In the 1990s, people witnessed an explosion of computer technology—around the globe, which has in turn led to a change in how and where people work. Telecommuters are employees of agencies or business firms who work full‐time or part‐time at home instead of in the office. They connect to their offices via electronic networking: phone, computer, e‐mail, and fax. Telecommuting allows employees to work under supervisors in another state or country. This form of employment especially helps disabled individuals who are unable to leave home or travel to an office, as well as working parents of young children. The Internet—the world's largest computer network—has revolutionized electronic networking. The number of people using the Internet continues to double annually, with at least 50 percent of people “online” in 2000.
The Internet originally developed from a system built by the U.S. Defense Department to permit governmental work in the aftermath of a nuclear attack. Although originally only those with governmental or university positions could access the Internet, now virtually any home can purchase World Wide Web service. Net‐surfers can telecommute, read articles, check stock prices, conduct research, comparison price, shop from home, meet others in chat rooms or on bulletin boards, take college courses, and even earn an accredited degree.
The Internet has certainly provided exciting new possibilities for electronic communication, yet critics argue that a dark side exists to this informational tool. One area of special concern, especially for families with young children, is the ability to access and download pornographic materials. Internet users can download pornographic photos and videos. In the recent years, sexual predators have also used the Internet to identify potential victims. Other areas of concern include potential social isolation, random and reckless dissemination of non-verifiable or inaccurate information and plagiarism. Technology in one scenario brings advantages and on the other hand adds its disadvantages, the recent  WannaCry ransomware attack was a worldwide cyberattack by the ransomware cryptoworm, which targeted computers running the Microsoft Windows operating system by encrypting data and demanding ransom payments in the Bitcoin cryptocurrency.

REPRODUCTIVE TECHNOLOGIES AND SEX PRESELECTION:
Not every couple wanting to conceive can do so. If they fail to conceive after one year or more of trying, the couple is considered infertile. In many cases, doctors can successfully treat infertility using the following procedures:

• Fertility drugs (ovulation‐stimulating hormones) can help when the woman's inability to ovulate causes the infertility.
• Artificial insemination, which involves collecting and introducing sperm into the vagina using a syringe, proves particularly useful when the man possesses a below‐normal sperm count.
• In-vitro fertilization, or the “test‐tube baby” method, involves fertilizing an egg outside the woman's body and implanting it into the uterus. This procedure is useful when the woman has blocked fallopian tubes.
• Gamete intrafallopian transfer (“GIFT”) involves taking eggs from the woman's ovaries, mixing them with the man's sperm, and then inserting them into the fallopian tube. In this procedure, fertilization takes place inside the woman's body rather than outside.

Some couples or individuals decide that adopting a child represents the best way of dealing with infertility. Others elect to utilize the services of a surrogate mother—a woman who contracts with a couple to carry their foetus to full term, deliver it, and adopt it to the couple. A physician may artificially inseminate the surrogate with the man's sperm or implant an in-vitro fertilized egg into her uterus. Either way, the procedure remains controversial, given the many potential ethical, legal, and moral issues it raises. For example, questions of legal, moral, and biological parenthood can give rise to long and complicated custody proceedings. 
 
Like surrogate motherhood, and controversial, is carrier implantation. The procedure involves implanting a fertilized egg into a relative's uterus. Because a relative carries the foetus to term, the woman or couple avoids the expense and hassle of hiring a surrogate mother. Physicians have now successfully implanted embryos into women in their 50s, following hormone therapy to reverse the effects of menopause.
 
Sex preselection techniques designed to help a couple choose the gender of their unborn child have also proven controversial. Because sperm bearing the Y chromosome produce males, couples wanting a male baby attempt to increase the chances of a Y‐bearing sperm fusing with the X‐ovum. Several sperm‐separating techniques supposedly accomplish this. For example, doctors can impregnate the mother‐to‐be via artificial insemination of primarily Y‐bearing sperm, which they have separated in a test tube. Success rates of sperm‐separating techniques are questionable, with reported figures approaching 85 percent. Critics note that society cannot know the effects of gender imbalances created through sex preselection. 

GENETIC ENGINEERING:

Perhaps even more presumptuous and alarming, according to some critics than the reproductive technologies and sex preselection is altering human behaviour through genetic engineering. Cloning, or the creation of exact replicas from a single genetic ancestor, represents the most extreme form of genetic engineering. Geneticists have cloned animals for years, but may soon focus their efforts on human beings. One of the latest advances in genetic engineering is gene therapy, in which genetic engineers, in limited cases, can disable genes carrying undesirable traits and replace them with genes carrying desirable traits. While these sorts of developments pose many possibilities for altering various organisms and eradicating certain diseases and disabilities, gene therapy remains experimental.
For obvious reasons, certain groups, such as the National Multiple Sclerosis Society and the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation, support genetic engineering in the hopes of dramatic cures being developed. Still others, like certain religious groups, oppose genetic engineering.
 Recent decades have produced dramatic—though controversial—scientific advances in biotechnology (the application of technology to the practice of medicine). Advances in these areas as reproductive technologies, surrogate parenthood, sex preselection, and genetic engineering have raised difficult political, ethical, and moral questions.

POLITICO-ECONOMIC FACTORS:

State is the most powerful organization which regulates the social relationships. It has the power to legislate new laws, repeal old ones to bring social change in the society. Laws regarding child marriage, widow remarriage, divorce, inheritance and succession, untouchability are some of the examples which have brought many changes in the social structure of Indian society.

The type of political leadership and individuals in power also influences the rate and direction of social change. In many societies, the political leadership controls the economy also. Scientific-technological and non-techno­logical change are also dependent on political development which indirectly affects social change.

Political development in the last two or three centuries (in India especially after independence) has certainly influenced economic change as much as economic change has influenced politics. Govern­ments now play a major role in stimulating (and sometimes retarding) rates of economic growth. In all industrial societies, there is high level of state intervention in production. Of economic influences, the most far-reaching is the impact of industrialization. It has revolutionized the whole way of life, institutions, organizations and community life. In traditional production systems, levels of production were static since they were geared to habitual, customary needs. Modern industrial capitalism promotes the constant revision of the technology of production, a process into which science is increasingly drawn.

The impact of industrialization and science and technology  can easily be seen on Indian family system and caste system.

RELIGIOUS FACTORS: 
 Historically, religion has been amongst the most powerful agents for changing human attitude and behaviour. Religion has traditionally defined what it means to be human, and it has defined the nature of our goals and relationships. The various religions are the different ways to attain the same possession in life i.e. the liberation and eternal peace.

History points to the central role of religion in social and political change. Every continent offers numerous examples of faith-based and faith-motivated individuals, groups and institutions. It is manifestly clear that religion has often been instrumental in preserving and promoting unjust hierarchies and oppressive regime. However, the role of religion in positive social transformation is observed through advocacy. Advocacy masks its truest significance in the broad definitions assigned to it. Advocacy is about the promotion and support of the individual or group in social, legal and political arenas. But at the heart of advocacy is the protection and empowerment of the powerless.

CULTURAL DIFFUSION: 

A society isolated from other without any outside contact is a static society. There should be proper interaction and over a period it leads to flow of new elements making the society a dynamic society. This is called as cultural diffusion. It is responsible for the development of western civilization. Many people feel that western civilization originated and developed in Europe, but it is proved by the historians that they borrowed things from different countries of the world and then collectively influenced others.

It is an established fact that there is an intimate connection between our beliefs and social institutions, our values and social relationships. Values, beliefs, ideas, institutions are the basic elements of a culture. Certainly, all cultural changes involve social change.

Social and the cultural aspects are closely interwoven. Thus, any change in the culture  brings a corresponding change in the whole social order. Social institutions cannot live on life shells within which life is extinct. Social systems are directly or indirectly the creations of cultural values.

Culture gives speed and direction to social change and deter­mines the limit beyond which social change cannot occur”. (Dawson and Getty’s, 1948). If we choose to travel by a ship, the direction in which we travel is not predetermined by the design of the ship but it is the culture that decides the direction and the destination both. The port we sail to remains a cultural choice. Cultural factor is not only responsive to technological change but also acts back on it to influence its direction and its character.

Cultural change in society has two major aspects: 

•  Cultural change by discovery and invention, and
• Cultural change by diffusion and borrowing.

The first comes from within a society and culture, and the second from another culture outside of the society. A discovery or an invention adds to the fund of our verified knowledge which later becomes a factor of social change. Knowledge of bacterial infection brought about many changes in the behaviour of people in the form of prevention and cure of disease.

Socio-cultural changes are also brought about by people from other cultures all over the world. Diffusion is the spread of cultural traits or patterns from group to group. Borrowing refers to the adoption of a cultural trait by people whose culture did not have that cultural trait. We have borrowed many cultural traits from the western civilization let it be the clothing or our style of eating food. These days we hear people say and talk things which, once even we were not aware of.

ROLE OF WAR IN SOCIAL CHANGE: 

Events in the past has proved that the two World Wars have changed the political and economic ideologies of the people. War brings in new values and new problems. War leads to the transfer of a population from one place to another. This kind of transfer and migration causes huge economic and political problems/changes. By this it leads to social change.

IMPACT OF IDEAS AND IDEOLOGIES: 

In every age ideas and ideologies have proved to be powerful instruments of social change. The world famous French revolution (1769) was the result of the ideas like liberty, equality, fraternity. Besides these ideologies like socialism, communism, fascism, democracy, secularism and humanism etc. have also influenced towards social change.

Among the cultural factors affecting social change in modern times, the development of science and secularization of thought have contributed a lot to the development of the critical and innovative character of the modern outlook. We no longer follow many customs or habits merely because they have the age-old authority of tradition. On the contrary, our ways of life have increasingly become based on rationality.

Some writers have interpreted social change at ideational level and asserted that all social change is ideational. They argued that ideas could influence the course of social change. For them, ideational changes are important contributory factors to many or most types of social change. Ideas and ideologies together are powerful motivating forces in social change.

For instance, after independence, the directive principles—equality, fraternity, liberty and justice laid down in our constitution—have not only revolutionized the Indian society but it has even affected greatly the relations between the members of the family. India is still a country where family plays an important role day-in, day-out. Love and affection need not require appointments prior for celebrations and togetherness. 
Social philosophers, who believed in the force of ideas, argued that no material or social factors can produce change unless there is also a change in ideas within society or ideas about society and nature.

In modern times, not only the way we think, but the contents of ideas have also changed. Ideals of self-betterment, freedom, equality and democratic participation are largely creations of the past two to three centuries. Such ideals have served to mobilize processes of social and political change, including reformation movements and revolutions. In today's world the multiple role of women is also a part of this, coming out of the taboos and seclusion of the four walls of house. Society has changed and is continuously accepting the things which are for the betterment of all as a whole.

Thus, there are many factors which leads to social change. Scientists and inventors, the thinkers and reformers, an exceptional individual or a group of people together with their needs deeds may lead to change in the society as a whole. 


Even me as a blogger, form an important part of the society; who is trying to create awareness regarding the various situations our Mother India and world  is going through, as we all together make a society, a nation and a world as a whole. I would end up this blog by saying that anything which is limited is good..... over load of anything is poisonous.