TSR Wiki > Study Help > Subjects and Revision > Revision Notes > Sociology > Mechanical and Organic Solidarity
Distinction appears in Durkheim's 1893 work The Division of Labour in Society. Mechanical and Organic solidarity are ways in which social solidarity is fostered.
Mechanical Solidarity
Characterised by:
- A small, isolated homogeneous population
- Little or no specialisation
- Division of labour based on cooperation
- System where social links are based on custom, obligation and emotion.
- Shared Values and Beliefs
- A system of social institutions in which religion is dominant
- Produced a system of social cohesion
- Legal system based on repressive sanctions, which serves to reaffirm traditional values
- As a result of the dominance of a few shared values, society can mobilise en masse.
- Little individual freedom
- System in which individualism is undeveloped
- The status of the individual is determined by kinship
Organic Solidarity
Characterised by:
- Larger population spread out over a larger geographical area
- Complex division of labour
- Individuals are dependent on others to perform economic functions that they themselves can not perform
- Performs a key role in ensuring interdepence and development of social ties
- Replaces interdependence based on kinsip, religious ties or shared values
- Much individual freedom
- Individual the object of legal rights and freedoms
- Individual status determined by occupation rather than kinship ties
- Legal System
- Based on restitutive sanctions
- Redress social wrongs by restoring situation to previous state
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