Deviance: Anomie and the Promotion of Order in the State

Deviance: Anomie and the Promotion of

Order in the State

Thesis Statement

Although deviant acts are unacceptable in the society, everyone must accept the fact that it is relevant in terms of promoting order in the state.

Outline

I. Deviance in general

A. What is deviance?

B. Is it relative?

II. Anomie and deviance

A. What is anomie?

B. How does anomie cause deviance?

III. Order in the state

A. What is order in the state?

B. How it is attained?

IV. Deviance and order

A. How does deviance affect order?

B. Why are deviance and order related?

V. Deviance is relevant to promote order in the state

A. The First Quarter Storm

B. Martial Law in the Philippines

C. Assassination of Ninoy Aquino

D. EDSA People Power Revolution I

E. The return of democracy and order in the Philippines

VI. Evaluation of the historical events

VII. Conclusion

It takes a valiant action to restore order. What kind of action is that? That action is deviance. What is really meant of that word?

There are lots of studies and researches that are conducted and many papers are published to explain the concept of deviance. One of those are of Schaefer who states that it is socially built and is based to various social interpretations over the ages and amongst cultures (Schaefer, 2003, p. 178). Then this idea about deviance led to the fact that deviance is relative (www.angelfire .com/or3/tss/reldev.html).

Study of deviance is highly necessary because it explains the dynamics of the society. In terms of social order, it serves as a means of restoring order if and if the state undergoes normlessness or anomie.

This research is relatively different to those past researches since the researcher aims to explain the importance of deviance on promoting order in the state by means of anomie. Anomie is when the society is normless (www.d.umn.edu/~bmork/2306/theories/ BAManomie.htm). Included in this research is the excerpt in the Philippine history which serves as the basis. Finally, although deviant acts are unacceptable in the society, everyone must accept the fact that it is relevant in terms of promoting order in the state.

First of all, in order to understand this research, let the researcher define what deviance is.

Deviance is a very big concept. It is an action that usually violates the norms or the expectations of the society (Schaefer, 2004, p. 181). Once a person violated a norm, he/she is now considered as deviant or when a person had done an extraordinary action which does not usually appears to be common in the society.

Deviance is also considered to be common on all the societies but it is only acceptable not because of the nature of the activity but because on how the society understands or views the activity. Hence, deviance is very common and just natural in a society and it is just normal and inseparable aspect of the social life. Deviation is inseparable in the moral character of the society. As it is cited by Farrell and Swiggert(p. 5), "giving one to laws and the chance on disobeying those laws are coming the same thing." Thus, indeed, in deviancy, there is always a relationship between the individuals doing those kinds of behaviors and the society that defines that behavior (Farrell & Swiggert, 1975, p. 5). As an effect, deviance is considered as relative.

Everybody must not be confused of what is deviance or in classifying deviant behaviors. This does not really rely on statistical rarity. For example, a person walks thousands of miles every day before taking his breakfast. Then, the society cannot be divided into good or bad. It is because most of the people do good things and incidentally do bad things. Thus, deviance is really relative (Social Sciences and Philosophy, UP, 1987, pp. 413-415).

Considering an action to be deviant is subject to many conditions:

First, the time it happened. It must be considered that the time an activity happened is very important to categorize it as a deviant act.

Second is the place it happened because every place has its own norms and laws which varies from one place to another. Third, what is the context or situation of the behavior? Some of the behaviors are permitted while some are not. Example, the situation on the boxing ring is very different on the fist fight in a basketball court. Fourth, who is the person/s who engaged in the behavior? Lastly, who is the person/s who observed it? This last factor is the society itself which entails to judge the behavior to be deviant or not (www.angelfire.com/or3/tsc/reldev.html). Thus, "deviance is constructed in the society and subject to various social understanding over time and across cultures." (Schaefer, 2004, p. 178).

To understand more about deviance, anomie is put into this research. According to Durkheim, anomie refers to a situation in which cultural norms breakdown because of rapid change. Moreover, it is a situation in which the society becomes normless because of a sudden social change. Example, the community became normless because of a sudden economic downfall.

On the other side, Merton says that anomie refers to a situation in which there is an obvious lack of fit between the culture's norms and goals and the culture's norms and the means in which those goals are attained. This theory led to realization on why U.S. has high deviant rates compared to other societies, and it led to explain for the distribution of deviant behaviors defined by class, race, ethnicity and the like. Indeed, in America, success is probably a lot more highly than virtue.

In accordance to Merton's theory, there are five modes of adaptation namely: conformity, innovation, ritualism, retreatism, and rebellion. Conformity means that the norms are in accordance with their goals and means. Innovation

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