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Differences between Formal and Informal Social Control

admin — Sun, 25 Oct 2009 10:13:55 +0000

Social control can be considered as an important aspect of an individual’s socialization process. There are some universal norms or rules which should be followed by members of all societies. Any deviation from these norms may result in a minimum level of punishment for ensuring the social order. It refers to the processes of regulation of an individual or group behavior in a society, which encourages conformity and obedience. It may include social or political mechanisms. Its two forms are formal and informal controls.

Formal Social Control:
Formal social control is implemented by authorized agents including police officers, employers, military officers, and others. It is carried out as a last option at some places when the desired behavior is not possible through informal social control. The situations and severity where formal control is practiced varies with countries.

This is practiced through law as statutes, rules, and regulations against deviant social behavior. For example, certain laws like prohibition of murder can be directed at all members of a society. Fishing and hunting regulations are made for certain groups. Corporate laws are laid for governing the behavior of social institutions. Formal control is conducted by government and organizations through law enforcement mechanisms. It can also be conducted through some formal sanctions including fines and imprisonment. Processes of formal control in democratic societies are determined and designed through legislation by elected representatives.

Courts or judges, military officers, police officers, school systems or teachers, and government agencies or bureaucrats, enforce formal control.

Informal Social Control:
It is exercised by a society without stating any rules or laws. It is expressed through norms and customs. Social control is performed by informal agents on their own in an unofficial capacity. Traditional societies mostly embed informal social control culture to establish social order.

Shame, sarcasm, criticism, ridicule and disapproval are some of the informal sanctions. Social discrimination and exclusion are included in informal control at extreme deviant cases. Self-identity, self-worth and self-esteem are affected in informal control through loss of group approval or membership. The severity and nature of informal control mechanisms differ from varied individuals, groups, and societies.

Informal is effective in small group settings including friends, family, neighborhood, work group and others. However, in some large and complex societies, informal social control and disapproval is ignored easily. At such situations, it is necessary to follow the formal one.

Some of the differences of formal and informal social control are:

Formal social control includes written, formalized and codified statements in laws, rules, and regulations. Whereas informal control does not contain any written rules.
Formal control agencies are authorized ones created by government and informal control agencies are created by social networks and organizations but not by government.
Formal control is much effective and stronger than informal social control. Any situations which cannot be handled by informal control are subjected to formal one.
Formal control is effective for even large groups of population but informal control is effective only for a small group of people.

Social control, formal or informal, thus helps in regulation of society. The study of social control includes disciplines of sociology, anthropology, psychology, law and political science.

Do the three magical words still have the charm?

admin — Mon, 07 Jan 2008 10:41:26 +0000

I remember those days when I first started schooling. The first lesson I have been taught were about the three magical words and their impact on humans. Since then I have been using them every where in the society and been given a recognition as a gentle man.

The three magical words Please, Sorry and Thank you, were the most common and basic words that any Gentle man (even woman) uses in his conversation in good sense. The word good sense here is very important because people often get embraced when they see that a person is using words as a habit rather than as moral thing.

But these days it seems that the charm of these magical words is declining. It depends on the changed social attitudes of both the receiver and sender.

And with the introduction of the so called SMS language, things for these have still worsened. They type “pls” for please, something like “thx” or “ty” for Thank you and “sry “for sorry. This does not deliver the actual expression of those words, and now you know where the problem is from.

It is still worse when delivering those words orally.

Say hello to Uncle Liar!

admin — Fri, 20 Jul 2007 09:47:46 +0000

There are many situations in a day when someone is compelled to tell a lie. Philosophers say that it is OK to tell a lie if it is to save someone from getting harm. But there are many Uncle Liars who simply like to lie for no good reason. Or even to cheat people. An Uncle Liar is very competent in fooling people with lies but he gives off some signs that he is lying, through his body language. It is easy to get hold of a liar if you know what he does while lying.

Some symptoms of Uncle Liar includes

Eyes can tell the inner feelings of a person. When Uncle Liar tries to lie he tries to conceal his eyes by frequent blinking. Their pupils widens little more than others.
It is true that people don’t make good eye contact while lying. But Uncle Liar makes too much eye contact to appear sincere.
Don’t try to soothe the person when he over reacts to your questions, like getting angry or defensive. This is where you can catch the person of his lie.
You can even hold the person from his verbal expressions like equivocation, using excessive pronouns, echoing back to your question as if trying to make sure, stammering or pausing in between trying to gather his thoughts.