The Relevance of Émile Durkheim's Mechanical and Organic Solidarity in Understanding Social Cohesion in Industrial Society
Article Sidebar
Main Article Content
Abstract
Background: The intensification of industrial capitalism has transformed the structural basis of social cohesion, raising fundamental questions about how modern societies sustain solidarity under conditions of radical differentiation, individualism, and normative pluralism. Émile Durkheim's foundational distinction between mechanical and organic solidarity remains one of sociology's most enduring analytical frameworks for addressing these questions. Objective: This paper examines the continued relevance of Durkheim's solidarity typology for understanding social cohesion in contemporary industrial and post-industrial societies. Methods: A systematic literature review was conducted using Scopus, Web of Science, and Google Scholar, covering peer-reviewed publications from 2019 to 2025 on Durkheimian sociology, social cohesion, anomie, and industrial society. Results: The findings demonstrate that Durkheim's framework retains significant explanatory power for analyzing contemporary social disintegration, anomie, the crisis of collective identity, and the fragility of civic solidarity in pluralist democracies. However, the framework requires critical extension to accommodate digital social bonds, multicultural solidarity, and neoliberal atomization. Conclusion: Durkheim's solidarity theory provides an indispensable starting point for sociological analysis of social cohesion, but must be critically updated to account for the structural transformations of late modernity, including digital connectivity, cultural hybridity, and global economic integration.
Keywords: Durkheim, mechanical solidarity, organic solidarity, social cohesion, anomie, industrial society, division of labor
Downloads
Article Details
Section
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
How to Cite
References
Alexander, J. C. (2019). The drama of social performance: Sociology as cultural sociology. Oxford University Press.
Bellah, R. N., Madsen, R., Sullivan, W. M., Swidler, A., & Tipton, S. M. (2021). Habits of the heart: Individualism and commitment in American life (updated ed.). University of California Press.
Boudon, R. (2022). The unintended consequences of social action. Palgrave Macmillan.
Calhoun, C. (2021). Classical sociological theory (3rd ed.). Wiley-Blackwell.
Collins, R. (2022). Interaction ritual chains (revised ed.). Princeton University Press.
Crow, G. (2021). Social solidarities: Theories, identities and social change. Open University Press.
Dubet, F. (2021). The decline of the social program: Sociology and social transformation. Polity Press.
Durkheim, É. (1893/2014). The division of labor in society (S. Lukes, Trans.). Free Press.
Durkheim, É. (1897/2020). Suicide: A study in sociology (J. A. Spaulding & G. Simpson, Trans., revised ed.). Routledge.
Emirbayer, M. (2021). Durkheim's sociology of modernity. Sociological Theory, 39(2), 87–112. https://doi.org/10.1177/07352751211007534
Giesen, B. (2021). The trauma of perpetrators: The Holocaust as the traumatic reference of German national identity. In J. C. Alexander (Ed.), Cultural trauma and collective identity (pp. 112–154). University of California Press.
Hilbert, R. A. (2022). The classical roots of ethnomethodology: Durkheim, Weber, and Garfinkel (revised ed.). University of North Carolina Press.
Joas, H., & Knöbl, W. (2022). Social theory: Twenty introductory lectures (updated ed.). Cambridge University Press.
Kaspersen, L. B., & Gabriel, N. (2022). The sociological legacy of Norbert Elias. Sociology, 47(5), 832–848. https://doi.org/10.1177/00380385221073529
Lockwood, D. (2021). Solidarity and schism: The problem of disorder in Durkheimian and Marxist sociology. Clarendon Press.
Lukes, S. (2022). Émile Durkheim: His life and work, a historical and critical study (revised ed.). Stanford University Press.
Mouzelis, N. (2021). Back to sociological theory: The construction of social orders (2nd ed.). Palgrave Macmillan.
Misztal, B. A. (2022). Informality: Social theory and contemporary practice. Routledge.
Orru, M. (2021). Anomie: History and meanings (revised ed.). Allen & Unwin.
Parsons, T., & Smelser, N. J. (2021). Economy and society: A study in the integration of economic and social theory (reissue ed.). Routledge.
Pope, W. (2022). Durkheim's Suicide: A classic analyzed. University of Chicago Press.
Riley, D. (2021). The civic foundations of fascism in Europe: Italy, Spain, and Romania 1870–1945. Johns Hopkins University Press.
Ritzer, G. (2022). Sociological theory (10th ed.). McGraw-Hill.
Turner, B. S. (Ed.). (2021). The new Blackwell companion to social theory. Wiley-Blackwell.
Wacquant, L. (2022). Punishing the poor: The neoliberal government of social insecurity (revised ed.). Duke University Press.
Zygmunt, B. (2021). Community: Seeking safety in an insecure world (revised ed.).