Puru DubeyAIR 86 · CSE 2025 · 164 wordsTheir whole copy
Opening
Max Weber was perhaps the first to highlight that culture including religion can inhibit or promote social change in society. Sociology has thereafter explored these dimensions in detail.
Body · points
CULTURAL FACTORS PREVENTING SOCIAL CHANGE
- Patriarchy and the ideology of stri-dhamma inhibited women's participation in traditional economy preventing social change.
- Caste system excluded Dalits to the margins to thereby keeping the system intact and preventing social change. Louis Dumont argues how hierarchy leads to consensus preventing social change.
However, culture can also promote social change -
CULTURE AND SOCIAL CHANGE
Max Weber highlights how in pre-capitalist Europe, Protestant ethics led to the spirit of capitalism.
In Hinduism, Bhakti age contested caste, gender inequality leading to social change. eg Maharashtra Wari tradition treats all pilgrims as equal.
By using MN Srinivas logic, one may argue how Sanskritisation due to Varna system provides social mobility and change.
Close · a summary
Culture and social change are thus not opposites but can mutually influence each other.