邓超：西方社会控制思想研究：以爱德华·罗斯为重点

摘要

　　19世纪末20世纪初，以美国为首的发达工业国家经历了多年剧烈的社会冲突。在工业化和城市化进程中，诸多社会问题纷至沓来，社会矛盾日益尖锐，社会冲突此起彼伏。这些问题包括政治腐败、经济垄断、贫富分化、环境污染、食品安全等，以及工人运动和阶级冲突所造成的革命前景，资本主义制度面临着前所未有的挑战。社会控制思想正是在这种背景下应运而生，是社会危机的产物。

　　本项目将对十九世纪末产生社会控制思想的历史语境进行追溯，回顾欧美学者们特别是爱德华·罗斯在考察社会运行机制与改善人类处境过程中的探索与思考。由于研究时间所限，本项目重点梳理社会控制思想的创始人爱德华?罗斯的有关论述，而对于罗斯之前和之后的相关研究仅作必要介绍。在此基础上，本项目将聚焦于以下问题：1.什么是社会控制？2.为什么社会控制思想产生于19世纪末的美国？3.罗斯的社会控制思想对社会变革有何影响？4.社会控制思想在罗斯之后出现了哪些流变？5.社会控制思想在当前语境下有何现实意义？通过对这些问题的思考，简单回顾近现代世界历史上社会控制思想的形成与发展，从一个侧面部分展示欧美学者解决社会问题和化解社会矛盾的百年探索。同时，致力于对不同维度的社会控制思想进行比较，用跨学科分析的视角来认识和揭示社会控制与社会秩序的关系。通过此项研究，可以参考西方学者对于如何形成良好社会秩序的思想，有助于促进社会变革与社会稳定方面的研究，最终服务于我国当前改革、发展、稳定的现实需要。

　　本文认为，社会控制思想本质上是西方改良主义思潮的一个分支，是理解资本主义为什么垂而不死的重要维度之一。发达工业国家的社会秩序在整个20世纪出现过起伏变化，时而矛盾激化、时而走向缓和，但是大多数时期能够维持社会秩序的基本稳定。在某种意义上说，有效的社会控制是这些国家保持经济社会稳定发展的关键之一。社会主义国家并不排斥发达工业国家的有益经验，而且能够在这些探索的基础上进一步丰富人类优秀的物质文化成果。这一点尤其对于正处在工业化和城市化阶段的中国而言具有一定的现实与启发意义。

　　关键词：社会矛盾，社会控制，社会稳定，爱德华·罗斯

Abstract

　　At the threshold of the 20th century，the industrial countries led by the United States experienced years of fierce social conflict. In the process of industrialization and urbanization, a lot of social problems came forth one after another in those countries, which created an increasingly unstable society. Such problems always included political corruption, economic monopoly, polarization between the rich and the poor, environmental pollution, food safety and class conflict, which especially led to a prospect of revolution. Therefore, capitalism was at that time facing an unprecedented challenge. The thought of social control presented itself in this very context, and became an important product of social crises.

　　This report is going to trace back the historical context in which the thoughts of social control were generated, in order to review the exploration and thinking of related scholars, especially Edward Ross, who made great efforts to improve the living conditions of human beings. However, since this topic covered too many historical materials in this field, a practical way is to focus on the thought of Edward Ross, who is the founder of Social Control studies, and to pay less attention on the related studies before and after him. In fact, this report discusses such questions as follows: 1.What is Social Control? 2. Why were the thoughts of social control created in the United States of later 19th century? 3. How did the thought of social control put forward by Edward Ross influence the social transformation? 4. How did these thoughts changed with time after Ross? 5. What is the realistic significance of these thoughts in modern context? On the basis of these questions, this report briefly examines the formation and development of the thoughts of social control in modern world history, and reviews the exploration of western scholars’ effort to resolve social problems of their age. Meanwhile, the report pays more attention to compare the different schools of Social Control and employs inter-disciplinary analyses to understand and explain the relationship between Social Control and Social Order. It is surely useful for China to learn something from the western intellectuals’ reflection on how to build a steady social order, beneficial to accelerate the study about social transformation and social stability, and finally to supply an optional suggestion to Chinese real need for its reform, development and stability.

　　As this report makes clear, the thoughts of social control are essentially a branch of western reformism, and also an important factor to explain why Capitalism can last for such a long time. In 20th century, the industrial countries had a lot of ups and downs, but those societies survived. In some sense, the effective social control was one of the keys for those countries to maintain their economical development. The socialist countries can also learn something good from those industrial countries, and enrich the splendid human civilization on the basis of their exploration. This point is to some extent significant for those countries which are going through the industrialization and urbanization, especially for China.

　　Keywords: social conflict; social control; social stability; Edward Ross