Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 1.djvu/501

Rh The general laws of association form the subject of general sociology, a science distinct but not disconnected from the branch sciences of economics, politics, etc., which rest upon it, though in part developed before it." H. H. Powers, Am. Acad., March, 1895.

2. Statical Sociology or Social Statics views the materials of descriptive Sociology from the standpoint of status: i. e., regards order rather than change. It studies the equilibrium of social forces as they tend to maintain structures. Hence, Statical Sociology concerns itself with the laws of coexistence primarily and chiefly in contemporary or historical social orders. But it may also legitimately deal with the laws of social equilibrium as applied to an ideal social order. "The theory of a social order not yet realized is as properly statical as the theory of a past order."—Small. To that division of Social Statics which deals with future régimes. Small has applied tentatively the term ideostatics. We have then:

a) Statics of the actual.

b) Ideostatics, theories of the possible and desirable.

3. Social Dynamics, on the other hand, examines the materials of Descriptive Sociology to determine the laws of social change or progress. "Social dynamics studies the laws of succession, while social statics seeks those of coexistence." "All considerations of structure and function are static . . . . Merely quantitative change is static. In dynamic phenomena the change is qualitative."—Ward. Progress may be viewed in two ways: either as the result of undirected social forces acting in the past and present, or as furnishing the theory for future conscious utilization of social forces. The first has been described by Ward as passive progress, the second as active. As in the case of social statics so with that of social dynamics chief emphasis is laid upon study of past and present, but this fact does not exclude the scientific determination of methods for organizing active progress in harmony with the criteria furnished by ideostatics. There are, therefore, two divisions of dynamic sociology: