Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 6.djvu/364

 35 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY

regularity of a unique sort. 1 Objective description of this inci- dent of association is still an unsatisfied demand. Attempts to accomplish it have resulted in much clarifying analysis, along with vast waste of energy in debate over physiological analogies. In the absence of agreement about the terms in which the fact and the means of coordination in association shall be described, one is liable to irrelevant and confusing criticism when using the readiest and simplest explanation. Without wishing to raise any of the mooted questions about the terms which will best apply to the facts here in view, we have to note that what men do industrially, for instance, is not merely conditioned by what they do artistically, scientifically, politically, and religiously ; but it is controlled by a network of interrelations that are a part of association. Social coordination is not like a mechanical coordi- nation of grains of sand dumped in a heap ; it is the operation of interacting spiritual energies and material devices, as consist- ent and constant after their kind as the principles of military tactics. We see the fact illustrated in different degrees in the case of Chicago industries after the fire, the industries of the southern states after the war, and the industries of France after the Revolution. In each case both the form and the volume of the industries were determined, first and foremost, by immediate local circumstances and by essential personal wants. They were determined, secondly, by larger connections extending to the whole form and spirit of the world-association of which these groups were parts. Thus Chicago could not start afresh on the basis of communism of land, for the laws of Illinois would not permit it, even supposing that the people of Chicago wanted it. Chicago could not build a city without streets, or depend on the moon for light at night, or revert to the household system of industry, because the whole commercial system, as illustrated forcibly for instance in the insurance factor, would have vetoed such irregularity. The same fact of traditional and contemporary social determination of activity might be illustrated at length in the other cases just named. What goes on among associated

1 Vid. SMALL AND VINCENT, Introduction to the Study of Society, pp. 215-36 and 237-66.