Development of Sociology

 Karl Marx contributed to the study of sociology in that he explored the relationship between economy and the workers within that system. Over his lifetime, he developed a theory that human societies progress through a struggle between two distinct social classes. The workers, the lower class and the upper class managers, bosses and rulers. This system became known as Marxism, which protected the wealthy, not the common good. I think his discovery was incredibly important as many countries would probably be run a whole lot different now if they didn't really know about this system consciously. He also created a type of sociology called Marxist sociology that looks at the way economics define social roles and expectations. Marxist sociology theories are used to study society through economic systems. Max Weber is someone else who I believe to have contributed much to the study of sociology. Max Weber suggested that the technological and economic relationships that organized and grew out of capitalist production became themselves fundamental forces in society. Thus, if you are born into a society organized this way, with the division of labor and hierarchical social structure that comes with it, you can't help but live within this system. As such, one's life and worldview are shaped by it to such an extent that one probably can't even imagine what an alternative way of life would look like. So, those born into the cage live out its dictates, and in doing so, reproduce the cage in perpetuity. For this reason, Weber considered the iron cage a massive hindrance to freedom. This was one of his 3 biggest contributions to sociology, and it is in my opinion the most impactful to me. This theory impacted me the most as I can sometimes rarely imagine myself doing something different then what I am doing right now.