The Definition of Primary and Secondary Society

You-Sheng Li has recently introduced the concepts of primary society and secondary society, and explored their implications in anthropology and sociology. (You-Sheng Li, 2005)

The Concept of Primary Society and Secondary Society

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Primary Society is genetically coded society, and it based on our genetics. Human nature and instinct are enough to keep primary society in harmony and functional. Primary society is the basic social organization of man immediately above families. The ideal number of people in this primary society is believed to be around 150. Bands and tribes are regarded as primary societies. Chiefdoms and states are not .The culture of primary societies is close to basic human nature, and has no power to modify human nature. Overextension of peripheral potentials of human nature is rarely institutionalized in the primary society.

Secondary society is man-made society. Since it is man-made, it has its purpose, namely the ideology or the value system, and the social stucture to support the purpose. A secondary society is usualy far larger than the primary society. The introduction of social stratification and other institutions that are against human nature is often necessary to keep a secondary society stable. Secondary society is created by human culture, and therefore, it has limitless possibilities with different value systems, and different directions while primary society, dictated by human genetics, has only one type.

All animal societies are primary society including those of apes. Most nonhuman primates are highly social, and live in a group throughout all or nearly all of their long lives. Living in a group is far more beneficial than living alone. People often refer to the hierarchal societies of primates as the explanation of why we humans have war and inequality in our society. In fact the current secondary society is not a large copy of the primary society but a deviation from it. The hierarchal society of primates is similar to our primary society but different from our secondary society. The latter is a pure invention of human culture. In the secondary society, hierarchy is the fixed social order that nobody is allowed to challenge though there may be some social ladders allowing people to climb and compete.

The social bond of primates is based on reciprocity rather than a fixed hierarchy. Primates continuously groom each other and help each other to solidify their social bond. Physical strength is important but far from the decisive factor.

Primary Society and Primary Group

Primary society has long been disintegrated in modern civilized society. Since primary society is determined by genetics and human genetics has not been substantially changed, we can still see the shadow or ghost of primary society. It is the primary group.

Charles Horton Cooley (1864-1929) first saw the self as a social product that is formed in the process of interaction within the primary group. Cooley called this kind of self-conception the looking glass self, saying, “a person’s perception of himself is determined by the way he imagines he appears to others. Cooley was one of two theorists of the self who suggested that the me can be seen only through the eyes of others. The other theorist was G.H. Mead. (1863-1931)

Cooley identified the primary group as “those characterized by intimate face-to-face association and cooperation. They are primary in several senses but chiefly in that they are fundamental in forming the social nature and ideals of individuals. The result of intimate association, psychologically, is a certain fusion of individualities in a common whole, so that one’s very self, for many purposes at least, is the common life and purpose of the group. Perhaps the simplest way of describing this wholeness is by saying that it is a ‘we’”.

Thus Cooley’s primary group is based on modern society that forms the environment that nurtures the self. Modern primary groups have been penetrated by the peripheral desires and social power of modern society, and thus Cooley embraced competition and ambition.

The egalitarian primary society was the only society our ancestors lived in until some 100,000 years ago when agriculture appeared and the people began to settle down. Even with the agricultural era, the primary society, bands and tribes, was still the only society people knew until the chiefdoms of ranked society and the states of stratified society started to appear five or six thousand years ago. Once the first state structure appeared, it either assimilated or conquered its neighbour by force.

In modern cities the crowded tenements and the general economic and social confusion have seriously wounded the family and the neighbourhood. Everybody has to adapt himself to the laws and the way of life before he can survive in modern society. The primary society was the direct outgrowth of human nature but it had too to adapt to modern life and became Cooley’s primary group. In spite all of that, we can still clearly see the beauty of the primary group in the family and the neighbourhood surrounding the family. Such spirit was kept alive in the village community for the common people throughout the Middle Age Europe. In today’s Russia the self-governing village group is still the main theatre of life for some fifty millions peasants. Their high spirits are not dampened a bit by the national economic malaise.

The ancient face-to-face and heart-to-heart social interactions are still much alive in the primary group. The atmosphere is warm, passionate, and loving. It is a shelter against the inhumane elements of the secondary society and it is the hospital for the human heart where the wounded soul is healed. Only here a man is valued as a whole human being, no more and no less. Of course with the highly mobile nature of our society, people can easily form clubs, fraternal societies and the like that provide some congeniality and intimacy.

The Two Levels of Society and East/West Cultural Difference

According to You-Sheng Li (2005), Chinese and Western civilizations differed fundamentally when they first developed into secondary society. Western civilization originated from Mesopotamia and ancient Greek civilizations. Both Mesopotamia and ancient Greek civilizations were city states. Primary societies or clans were broken up into free individuals, and such free individuals formed the city states to fight and compete with their neighbouring states. Thus they formed a typical secondary society where humans were separated from nature but faced each other as potential enemy. When you face an enemy or rival who are as clever as you are, the future is uncertain. When humans have to fight for their survival, they ignored their basic human nature but explored their peripheral potentials or over-stretched their nature.

The Chinese secondary society, when first appeared, formed several levels with the bottom level as numerous primary societies. According to You-Sheng Li, such a system allowed humans to live in a society that was similar to primary society, or so-called quasi- primary society.

An important assumption:

n A primary society or quasi-primary society will form automatically if :

u 1. The population is less than a few hundred;

u 2. The society is based on face-to-face interactions;

u 3. No contact with and no ideological influence from secondary society;

u 4. No outside force threatening their survival.

The first Chinese dynasty is Hsia Dynasty ( ?2100-1766 BC ) in Chinese history. It was founded by Yu the Great in cooperation with all the tribes in the Yellow river valley to fight flood. In stead of building banks and dams, Yu tried to find a better course for the water to go to the sea, and he succeeded and was remembered as a hero by Chinese people. The population was about 2.4 million, but the territory was big. No conflict due to overpopulation. No other nation in their world competed with the super nation. The Hsia dynasty was a super state in their known world, and the first such super state in the West was the Roman Empire or the one set up by Alexander the Great. Both were after the so-called Axial Age during which humans laid down their philosophical foundation or set up the frame of thinking. In other words, both Roman Empire and the Empire by Alexander the Great had well established the direction and value system of their secondary society.

The Two Level System of Chinese Ancient Society from 2200 BC to 221 BC

1. King and his clan (quasi-primary society + intellectuals)

2. Vassals and their clans (quasi-primary society + intellectuals)

3. Tribal village and their clans (primary society)

The above three level system plus the important assumption may allow humans mainly live their lives in primary society, or quasi-primary society:

The six criteria and quasi-primary societies in the two level system

n The clans of the king, the vassals, and the tribal villages were all quasi-primary societies;

n The king and vassals may live a richer life but 10 percent tax rate did not change the idle style of the rural life;

n The king and vassals formed a face-to-face quasi-primary society;

n The vassal and the headmen of the tribal village all formed face-to-face primary society;

n Equality and reciprocity are the principles guiding the interactions at all levels;

n It was the social ideal that the administration and military conflicts were minimal.

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