Question

“The term modernisation has a long history. From the 19th and more so the 20th century, the term began to be associated with positive and desirable values. People and societies wanted to be modern. In the early years, modernisation referred to improvement in technology and production processes. Increasingly, however, the term had a wider usage.”

What, according to sociologists, constitutes the modernisation process?

Answer 1

1. ‘Modernity’ assumes that local ties and parochial perspectives give way to universal commitments and cosmopolitan attitudes.
2. That the truths of utility, calculation, and science take precedence over those of the emotions, the sacred, and the non-rational.
3. The individual rather than the group is the primary unit of society and politics.
4. The associations in which men live and work are based on choice, not birth.
5. That mastery rather than fatalism orients their attitude towards the material and human environment.
6. That identity be chosen and achieved, not ascribed and affirmed.
7. That work be separated from family, residence, and community in bureaucratic organisation.