French sociologist Emile Durkheim and his theory of anomie

Increasingly, news appears in the news and on the Internet about the cruelty of teenagers, attacks, beatings and hooliganism, and the indifference of others. The older generation says that young people have become spoiled and have lost their values. In fact, the phenomenon of anomie (the destruction of moral and moral values) has been known since 1893. It applies to the whole society, but teenagers are at particular risk.

What is anomie

The name is derived from the French word anomie, which means lawlessness, lack of norms. The concept of anomie in sociology was introduced by the French sociologist E. Durkheim, and later his ideas were developed by the American sociologist R. Merton. According to the definition of anomie from Wikipedia, social anomie is a state of society in which there is a destruction of social norms and institutions, instability and uncertainty of human actions, fragmentation of social systems, contradiction of social goals and the means available to people to achieve them.

The concept of anomie at the individual level (psychology) is somewhat different. This is a psychological state of an individual in which there is demoralization of values, loss of connection with society, a feeling of alienation, uselessness, and meaninglessness of life. It seems to a person that there is no place for him in the world. The world does not understand him, and he does not understand the world. Anomie causes depression, suicide and deviant behavior. We'll talk more about this at the end of this article.

Norms and anomie

Social norms are a lever that regulates people's behavior. This category includes official laws, unspoken rules and regulations, and expected behavior approved by society. Norms are a kind of templates that tell a person what to say, think, feel, and do in certain situations and conditions. Fulfillment of social norms is an obligation, a duty of one individual to all others.

What is anomie in society? Anomie is the denial and/or disregard of social norms of behavior. This leads to the destruction of society. The longer anomie persists, the more difficult it will be to restore the structure of society. Old traditions and connections are broken, new ones are not created. People become asocial and suffer from desocialization. They are concerned about their personal lives and are guided by their own interests.

Examples

In a state of anomie, a person suffers from a contradiction between expectations and reality, from the inability to achieve a goal by generally accepted means. The individual finds himself in a state of social crisis.

Examples of anomie:

• the desire for wealth, a carefree life and attempts to achieve this by fraud in real life and on the Internet;
• the desire for fame and attempts to gain it through provocative videos on the Internet.

We see and hear private examples of anomie every day: attacks, robberies, beatings captured on video and broadcast on the Internet, public copulation, indifference of passersby and much more. At the individual level, anomie is felt as uncertainty about the future, loss of meaning in life, focus on survival, serving the allotted days; at the social level – social unrest.

Social norm and social anomie

One of the fundamental concepts of sociology is the social norm, which is considered as a mechanism for assessing and regulating the behavioral response of individuals, categories and social communities. Social norms are instructions, attitudes, and expectations of appropriate (socially approved) behavior. Norms are some ideal patterns that determine what individuals should say, think, feel and do under certain conditions. The system of norms that operate in a particular society forms an integral set, the various structural elements of which are interdependent.

Social norms are the responsibility of one individual in relation to another or the social environment. They determine the formation of a network of social relations of a group, society. Social norms also represent the expectations of groups of different sizes and of society as a whole. The surrounding society expects a certain behavioral response from each individual who adheres to the norms. Social norms determine the development of a system of social relationships, including motivation, ideals, aspirations of the subjects of action, expectations, and evaluation.

A social condition consisting in the loss by its members of the significance of social attitudes and ideals, which provokes an increase in deviant behavior, is called social anomie. In addition, it manifests itself:

• in the absence of standards of comparison among people, social assessment of their own behavior, which provokes an “lumpenized” state and loss of group unity;
• in the inconsistency of social goals with the approved methods of achieving them, which pushes individuals towards illegal means of achieving them if the goals set are unattainable through legal means.

Sociologists, comparing the concepts of anomie and deviant behavior, considered the point of intersection of their non-compliance by members of society with the norms established by it. The main difference between the terms anomie and deviant behavior lies in the social scale of the factors that provoked their manifestation. The nature of anomie goes much deeper. It is caused by serious social transformations that affect society as a single system and its individual members.

Social anomie theory

Anomie (sociology) is the loss of a common culture, the absence of a common system of norms. Because of this, people’s lives, their thoughts, actions, and actions cease to correspond to the norms of society.

Durkheim's Anomie Theory (briefly)

The author described his theory in the book “Suicide”. According to E. Durkheim, this is a contradiction between mechanical and organic solidarity. According to Durkheim's theory of anomie, the trigger for the development of anomie as such was the transition from an industrial society to a society of individualists. E. Durkheim believed that self-discipline and human solidarity based on morality could not be formed. At the moral and ethical level, the transition of society was not completed.

Durkheim examined in detail one of the forms of deviation associated with anomie - suicide. The author identified three types of suicide:

1. Egoistic. This is an individual protest of a person who could not enter society.
2. Altruistic (endemic). A person sacrifices himself for the sake of society, for the sake of other people. For example, when old people kill themselves if they become a burden to others. In Hinduism, wives burn themselves at their husband's funeral. Such suicide is based on group pressure and social approval.
3. Anomic. Having been in social uncertainty and instability for some time, a person decides to die. Old norms have been destroyed, new ones have not yet been created. A person does not understand, does not know what to do, where to go, what to be.

During periods of economic, political, social, and spiritual crises, the number of suicides increases. As Durkheim notes, at the same time the number of divorces increases, and accordingly, anomie affects not only individuals, but also the institution of the family. Divorce can be a cause of suicide. Divorce, in turn, is caused by job loss, a riotous lifestyle, addictions, that is, deviations that arise due to the destruction of the morality of society.

Anomie Merton

R. Merton is a follower of E. Durkheim. The sociologist continued to study the phenomenon and concept of anomie. As a result, R. Merton included the following supporting points in his definition of the destruction of values:

• the contradiction of the goals, desires, needs of the majority of representatives of society and the means of achievement that are offered to them (society does not accept them), that is, the goals not only do not justify the means, but also contradict them;
• the impact of social norms tends to zero (people are out of control, norms do not regulate their behavior).

Thus, according to Merton’s theory of anomie, the phenomenon is caused by the contradiction between the goals (norms) of society and the means that are available to the individual. For example, a person accepts the idea of ​​wealth, success, well-being, but he cannot get a good education and find a prestigious job, because he was originally born into a poor family, and he does not have the means for this. Then he chooses another way to achieve the same goal - crime (robbery, fraud, deception, extortion, begging, etc.). Inequality is one of the causes of anomie according to Merton.

However, this does not always lead to deviations. Merton will highlight 5 reactions to the “ends-means” contradiction within the framework of the concept of anomie, 4 of them lead to deviations:

• conformism - adaptation to the goals and means, proposed norms (does not cause deviations);
• innovation - the search for new means of achieving the proposed goals (prostitution, fraud, blackmail, theft, drug trafficking, etc.);
• ritualism – denial and belittlement of goals, use of proposed methods (means become an end in themselves);
• retreatism - denial of goals and means, lack of one’s own proposals (drug addicts, alcoholics, tramps);
• rebellion - denial of goals and means, proposal of their alternatives (political and revolutionary movements, subcultures, sects, social movements).

Anomie Parsons

American psychologist T. Parsons believed that anomie is caused not by a contradiction between goals and means, but by freedom of choice. The norms of individual institutions are so contradictory that people begin to choose one group and limit themselves to it. Groups change very often. As a result, a person finds himself in an unstable state, he does not have a stable perception of reality as a whole, there are no stable connections with other institutions, groups, the state and society. This leads to deviations.

Anomie Srawl

Psychologist L. Sroul was the first to study anomie from a psychological point of view; before that, it was considered only as social anomie. Srawl explored the phenomenon at the personal level. According to the theory of anomie in psychology, the destruction of moral norms and values ​​leads to the destruction of cohesion with society, the emergence of a craving for self-destruction through addictions (physical, moral).

Concept of anomie and morality

The concept of anomie is the destruction of morality in order to achieve an egocentric goal. What is morality? There are three types of morality:

1. Social, or external.
2. Programmed, individual.
3. Self-motivated, individual.

All people can be divided into 4 groups:

1. Immoral people who break the law.
2. Immoral people who obey the law out of fear.
3. People who follow social morality not out of fear, but out of conviction formed under the influence of education. In this case, their morality is nothing more than a conditioned reflex, since it lacks self-motivation.
4. People who follow moral and legal laws voluntarily, out of internal motivation, free from external pressure.

It is necessary to realize that real moral merit does not consist in respect for the force of the law, but is based on the “I” of a person, that is, his conviction and voluntary desire to follow the norms that he considers moral. Otherwise, it cannot be said that a person commits moral actions; he only passively, blindly and mechanically follows certain rules, completely not understanding their real meaning. There is no true morality without understanding the importance of moral principles.

There are people who perform moral acts while being intrinsically immoral. Of course, this is better than being immoral both internally and externally. For society, the distinction between internal and external morality is not important, but it is extremely important for a person who strives for spiritual perfection. Only spirituality makes a person moral, guarantees the stability and constancy of this quality, and also helps him to voluntarily, and not forcibly, follow the laws. Even if the law does not provide for punishment, a moral person will not violate it, since such behavior corresponds to his essence. He behaves this way not because he is programmed, but of his own free will.

External morality is not a guarantee of internal morality, but internal morality always means external morality. In this way, man achieves an inner, moral, self-motivated consciousness that is active and dynamic rather than programmed and static. It is interesting to note that everyone who follows the laws is considered honest and moral by society. What about those who broke the law, committed a serious crime, but were not caught? In this case, a person can maintain his reputation before society, but will still enter the group of people of anomie.

So, a person is truly moral only if he follows the laws out of love for truth and justice, respecting the natural order of things, understanding the principle of cause and effect, and not out of fear of punishment, not out of coercion, and not because of a conditioned reflex. Thus, there is legality without morality and morality without legality. Kant argued that a moral person is aware of the essence of morality and law and follows both. True morality should not depend on fear, hope, or other external influences.

Manifestations of anomie

Social anomie has three manifestations:

1. Uncertainty, instability, contradictory norms and values. The government says to focus on one thing, but creates conditions for people to focus on something else.
2. Ineffectiveness of rules and regulations. Laws do not apply to a person; they do not influence his behavior.
3. The absence or partial absence of norms at a time when the old value system is destroyed and a new one has not yet been built. A striking example in Russia is the period of the collapse of the USSR.

Anomie manifests itself at all levels and affects all institutions. Recently, it has been especially noticeable in politics, religion, the institution of family, and economics. People do not understand what society expects from them; it is difficult for them to coordinate their actions according to unclear norms.

World of Psychology

Anomie, Anonymity

Anomie

1. Anomia (English anomia; from Greek an - negation + onyma - name) - partial or complete loss of the ability to remember proper names. The term applies to amnestic syndromes, but not to cases of forgetting names, which often occur in completely normal people.
2. Anomie (French anomie - absence of law; English anomie or anomy) is a sociological term introduced by E. Durkheim for the concept of such a state of society when many of its members lose respect and trust in existing norms, values, institutions, which is typical for periods of unrest and restructuring. See Deviant Behavior.
3. A hypothetical stage in the development of human society, at which there are no norms and values ​​regulating the behavior and life of people in a group; it was assumed (for example, S.I. Gessen) that humanity, in general, goes through 3 stages of development: A., heteronomy and autonomy.

Similar 3 stages are assumed in the moral development of a child. (B.M.)

Psychological Dictionary. A.V. Petrovsky M.G. Yaroshevsky

Anomie (gr. a - negative particle, nomos - law) is a concept introduced by E. Durkheim to explain deviant behavior (suicide, apathy and disappointment) and expresses a historically determined process of destruction of the basic elements of culture, primarily in the aspect of ethical norms. With a sufficiently sharp change in social ideals and morality, certain social groups cease to feel their involvement in a given society, their alienation occurs, new social norms and values ​​are rejected by members of these groups, including socially declared patterns of behavior, and instead of conventional means of achieving individual or public goals their own (in particular, illegal ones) are put forward.

The phenomena of Anomie, affecting all segments of the population during social upheavals, have a particularly strong effect on young people.

Dictionary of psychiatric terms. V.M. Bleikher, I.V. Crook

Anonymity (an(a) + Greek onyma - name) - the patient’s refusal of his name, sometimes denial of the very fact of having a name. Most often observed in schizophrenia, sometimes in profound dementia due to organic diseases of the brain. May be of an installation nature.

Neurology. Complete explanatory dictionary. Nikiforov A.S.

Anonymity is a mental patient’s denial of having a name.

Oxford Dictionary of Psychology

Anomie

1. Partial or complete loss of the ability to remember names. The term in this sense is used only to refer to aphasic and amnestic syndromes, but not to the usual condition familiar to very many.
2. In a society or group, a state where the social structure is destroyed and social values ​​and cultural norms are lost. Anomie involves disorder, disorganization and a threat to collective security and can be observed in a number of conditions, for example after some kind of disaster, such as an earthquake, war or, less obviously, when large groups of people emigrate from rural areas to cities where their original social values ​​do not exist. correspond to the local ones, and besides, assimilation is opposed by the urban population.
3. A condition in which members of a seemingly well-ordered society feel isolated and alienated by an overly specialized social structure that limits intimacy. This meaning is used to characterize the psychological state of many people living in highly developed, technological, urban societies.

subject area of ​​the term

Anomia

1. Knowing a certain word but not being able to pronounce it; nominal aphasia.
2. Defective moral sense.

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Causes of anomie

The reason is a sharp change in morals, values, ideals, and ethical standards in society. The source of change is the socio-political activity of the state. Some members of society do not have time to accept new values ​​and new means of achieving previous goals, and therefore certain social groups feel that society has rejected them. New values ​​are not perceived as social and useful for all people; they are perceived as dangerous, useful only to certain representatives.

In simple words, anomie in society is the destruction of social order. A number of negative factors lead to this:

• socioeconomic and political changes that have made physical survival a priority for most people;
• criticism of previous values, changing the boundaries between the concepts of good and evil.

The corruption of values ​​occurs in times of unrest, perestroika, revolutions, and social crises. At this time, people lose confidence in social institutions, the government and the norms and guidelines that they offer. A cohesive and stable society is the best prevention of anomie.

Anomie

What is meant by anomie? This is the absence of laws and ignorance of moral principles, which leads to destructive behavior and the emergence of negative thoughts that destroy the social order. This problem is dealt with by psychologists, sociologists, related sciences and even medicine.

In the medical sense, anomia is a pathological “loss” of the name or name of an object from memory.

Anomie can manifest itself individually or in groups. For example, suicidal thoughts or illegal behavior may be called individual anomie. Group anomy arises in times when the country is in turmoil, war, perestroika, revolution, crisis. This is provoked by the inability to implement the moral principles proclaimed by society. Certain groups notice that in current circumstances, achieving moral values ​​is impossible, so this leads to a destructive attitude.

Anomie can also include disappointment in life, degradation in professional activity, and separation from society.

At the state level, anomie is understood as a violation of the integrity of society due to differences in moral principles and methods of achieving them. In such a society, murder, suicide, violence and other criminal acts increase. If society proclaims something that cannot be achieved through legal actions, then people resort to illegal actions:

1. Conformism - a person, under existing conditions, tries to achieve his goals.
2. Innovation – a person tries to achieve what he wants by creating new conditions.
3. Ritualism - a person does not change conditions, but changes goals.
4. Withdrawal - a person abandons goals and does not accept existing conditions.
5. Rebellion is a rejection of existing goals and circumstances in order to replace them with new goals and conditions.

Anomia and deviant behavior

The destruction of values ​​and alienation from society leads to deviations:

• alcoholism,
• addiction,
• crime,
• divorces,
• rape,
• early pregnancy,
• single-parent families,
• suicide,
• xenophobia,
• fascism,
• extremism,
• sexual promiscuity,
• vagrancy,
• other.

A crisis can affect anyone, but teenagers are a particular risk group. This is the period of formation of values, at this time there is a breakdown and construction of a new system of moral norms, that is, at the internal individual level, adolescents are already unstable. If this is accompanied by instability and destruction of the morality of the entire society, the risk of developing deviations doubles.

We have already said that one of the characteristics of devaluation is the denial by certain categories of citizens of the means of achieving goals that society offers. Instead, they offer their means, which are usually criminal and illegal. A person does not believe that he owes anything to society. He focuses only on his needs and desires.

Durkheim believed that society cannot exist without crime. There have always been deviants. There is no need to try to completely eradicate crime; it is necessary to maintain it at the minimum acceptable level. Criminals ensure the progress of society. Social norms, punishment, unity and cohesion of society make it possible to maintain an acceptable level of deviation. If community is destroyed, crime increases. This is dangerous for society and leads to regression.

Anomie theory

Different orientations understand the phenomenon of anomie in their own way. However, they all describe the same thing. In simple words, anomie means lawlessness and lack of norms. It was considered as a criminal phenomenon in Durkheim's theory. He believed that a society without crime is simply unable to exist and progress. Only total control over the behavior of other people can rid society of crime. However, in this case, you will have to find other behavior patterns that will be punished.

Since no two people are the same, their behavior is also different. Anything that violates the freedom and lives of others is considered illegal. All other actions that cause mental pain to others who expected specific behavior from people are called immoral.

Without diversity in actions and thoughts, a person does not progress. Where social norms arise, social anomie inevitably forms. Thus, according to Durkheim, anomie is an indicator of a healthy society. Social norms create certain expectations in people who suffer if they are not met. At the same time, social anomie provokes the progress of society, which must find a structure of society with all its moral principles that will satisfy the needs of all people.

In psychological theory, anomie is understood as the loss of a person’s involvement with society. The individual becomes an isolated individual who does not feel part of the group or society as a whole. This leads to the development of deviant behavior when a person starts drinking alcohol, becomes depressed, lives a boring life, etc.

This development of events is explained by specialists from the psychiatric help website psymedcare.ru as a person’s inability to adequately respond to their own detachment. Loneliness is condemned by society. A lonely person is constantly pressured and reacted negatively. If a person succumbs to external pressure, then he begins to self-destruct. Accepting your own desire to be individual allows you to protect yourself from anomie.

A person enters a state of anomie when he notices that there is a crisis in the country, perestroika, or his personal desires are not realized by those legal actions that are acceptable in society. In this case:

• A person stops trusting society, which allows him to behave immorally.
• Previous goals become meaningless. A person is not able to find “his place,” which causes boredom, loss, and depression.
• There is isolation, isolation from society, recluse, and inability to resume contacts with people.

In medical theory, anomie refers to aphasia and the inability to remember certain names and objects.

Anomie in modern society

Modern Russian society is also in a state of instability, and there is a destruction of values. People do not feel confident in the future, they do not have time to adapt to rapidly changing guidelines and dominant values, and they experience financial difficulties. There was the same reorientation from moral values ​​to physical survival. The destruction of values ​​leads to professional degradation of people, disappointment in themselves and life, their work, and loss of self-identity.

Thoughts that concern modern citizens, especially young people:

• “hopes for a better life have been destroyed, there will be no improvement in its quality and level”;
• “my future and the future of the country is unclear, it’s not worth having children now”;
• “I’m scared to live, I don’t feel stability or security”;
• “I feel vulnerable, I don’t know what to do or where to go”;
• “I don’t understand who I should be, what to do, I don’t know what I want”;
• “I know what I want, but I don’t know how to achieve it”;
• “everything is so unclear, it’s difficult for a simple person like me to understand what’s happening in the country”;
• “now everything is devalued, only money, connections, personal success are important”;
• “everyone lives one day at a time, doesn’t think about the future”;
• “I’m not sure of anything and I can’t trust anyone, now I can’t trust anyone.”

Chaos, apathy, confusion, market and consumer attitudes, social infantilism, restlessness, uselessness - this is how we can briefly characterize the state of modern society and each individual person. As a result, we already have three so-called lost generations. Representatives of one of them are about 50 years old, but they still do not understand how to live in this world. The youngest generation is distinguished by its revolutionary, extremist orientation. Some of them clearly understand what they want to achieve in life, but at the same time the interests of the country and the entire society are not important to them. The middle generation is focused on consumption and market relations. However, most of him was mired in alcohol and drugs, channeling his lack of demand in society there.

How to deal with anomie? Find out the cause and the conflict that gave rise to it, eliminate it. It is necessary to choose one of the systems that are relevant at a given time, or create something completely new, or borrow someone’s ready-made system, for example, turn to the past.

Emile Durkheim's theory of anomie (page 1 of 2)

CONTENT

INTRODUCTION

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Emile Durkheim's theory of anomie……………………………………………………….5

CONCLUSION

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BIBLIOGRAPHY

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INTRODUCTION

The emergence of sociology as a science dates back to the 1830s, although attempts at sociological analysis of the problems of social life had been made earlier. Their presence gives reason to see the “beginning” of sociology by one author in antiquity, connecting him with the names of Plato and Aristotle. However, most researchers believe that the emergence of sociology must be considered in connection with the development of capitalism in the first third of the 19th century. It was capitalism that put the problems of society and the individual in their interaction at the center of social knowledge.

Sociology uses all the wealth of philosophical knowledge about consciousness in general and social consciousness in particular, about activity and its role in social life, about the influence of objective and subjective conditions on this consciousness and behavior. For social analysis, the conclusions of psychological science about the consciousness and behavior of each individual, individual micro- and macrogroups are also important.

Despite the diversity of theories, concepts and approaches in various schools in the 19th century, they were all united in one thing - the object and subject of sociology is society, all social life.

The beginning of the 20th century made significant amendments to these ideas. More and more criticism was heard that sociology pretends to play a certain role as a metascience, which seeks to absorb data from all other sciences about society and draw global conclusions on this basis. The first to doubt this formulation of the question was E. Durkheim (1858 - 1917). He believed that sociology, having society as the object of its study, should not pretend to “know everything” about this society - the subject of its interest should only be social facts that form social reality. Based on this, he interpreted reality (laws, customs, rules of conduct, religious beliefs, monetary system, etc.) as objective, because they do not depend on man. An equally important feature of Durkheim's concept was that he addressed social groups, highly appreciating the role of collective consciousness. Only thanks to this consciousness does social integration exist, because members of society attach importance to its norms and are guided by them in their lives. If the individual does not want to follow these norms, anomie arises, which is typical for all societies experiencing a sharp change in their structure. In this regard, the application of sociology as a theory of society to the study of the causes of crime has revealed unusual processes occurring both in society and in the individual.

I chose this topic to understand what causes people’s deviant behavior. What motives lead them to this. To do this, I consider various points of view of famous sociologists, their views on this problem. How do they assess the origin and development of anomie, and whether it can be avoided. And is it even possible for a society to exist without this phenomenon?

The English word "anomy" as given in the Oxford Anonymous Dictionary by William Lambard in 1951 is "to create disturbance, confusion, and uncertainty." The concept of “anomie” was introduced into modern sociology by Emile Durkheim, who defined it as a temporary loss of effectiveness by social norms as a result of an economic or political crisis.

Emile Durkheim's theory of anomie

Anomie is a state of lawlessness, the absence of legal norms. The foundation for the theory of anomie, used to explain the causes of crime, was laid by Emile Durkheim. He believed that socially deviant behavior and crime are completely normal phenomena. If there is no such behavior in society, then it is painfully controlled. When crime is eliminated, progress stops. Crime is the price to pay for social change. To the same extent that a genius must have the opportunity for self-improvement, a criminal must have the chance to commit a crime. A society without crime is unthinkable. If everything that is now called criminal stopped happening, some new types of behavior would have to be included in the category of crime. For crime is inevitable, ineradicable. And the reason for this is not that people are weak and evil, but that there is an infinite variety of different types of behavior in society. Solidarity in human society is achieved only when conformist pressure is used against this diversity in behavior. This pressure is provided by punishments. Crime is a factor of public health; in a society without crime, the pressure of collective consciousness would be so strong and harsh that no one would be able to resist it. In this case, crime would, of course, be eliminated. But along with it, any possibility of progressive social development would disappear. And if the originality of the idealist, whose dreams are ahead of his time, expresses itself, then the “originality” of the criminal, who is considerably behind his time, must also find its expression. A criminal is not some kind of creature incapable of socialization, not a parasite, not an alien element that has not adapted to society, but a factor that plays a certain role in the life of society.

According to Durkheim, crime is insignificant in a society where human solidarity and social cohesion are sufficient. As a result of social changes, which can go either towards economic collapse or towards prosperity, favorable conditions are created for the division of labor and a greater diversity of life, and the integrating forces are weakened. Society is falling apart and splitting. Its individual fragments are isolated. When the unity of society is destroyed and the isolation of its elements increases, socially deviant behavior and crime increase. Society finds itself in a state of anomie. Durkheim argues this point as follows. French society in the last 100 years has deliberately eradicated the factors of self-government by human instincts and passions. Religion has almost completely lost its influence on people. Traditional professional associations such as craft guilds (guilds and corporations) were liquidated. The government firmly pursued a policy of freedom of enterprise and non-interference in the economy. And the result of this policy was that dreams and aspirations were no longer restrained. This freedom of aspiration became the driving force behind the French Industrial Revolution; but it has also created a chronic state of anomie with an accompanying high rate of suicide.

According to Durkheim, punishment of criminals plays an important role in maintaining social solidarity. The original and most important source of social solidarity is a correct understanding of honesty and integrity. Punishment of the criminal is necessary to maintain the commitment of the average citizen to a given social structure. Without the threat of punishment, the average citizen may lose his deep attachment to a given society and his willingness to make the necessary sacrifice to maintain that attachment. In addition, the punishment of a criminal serves as visible public confirmation of his inferiority and the justification of censure of any criminal group. This censure and belittlement of criminals increases the feeling of superiority and self-righteousness among the general population, which in turn strengthens the solidarity of the entire society. It groups criminals into categories, making criminal punishment the strongest available means of justifying and preserving social solidarity.

CONCLUSION

People's lives pass in communication with each other. A person can receive any need - food, clothing, work, education, friendship, love - only through interaction with other people. The main condition for organized social life is the existence of certain agreements between people, which are called norms. The actual actions of some people often go beyond what others consider acceptable behavior.

Deviant behavior, deviance (lat. deviatio - deviation) is:

- an act or actions of a person that do not correspond to officially established or actually established norms and expectations in a given society (social group);

- a social phenomenon expressed in relatively massive and sustainable forms of human activity that do not correspond to officially established or actually established norms and expectations in a given society.

The theory of anomie (disregulation) occupies an important place in explaining the causes of deviant behavior. Emile Durkheim used this approach in his classic study of the essence and causes of suicide. He considered the main cause of suicide to be a phenomenon he called anomie.

“Anomie is a social condition that is characterized by the decomposition of the value system, caused by the crisis of the entire society, its social institutions, the contradiction between the declared goals and the impossibility of their implementation for the majority.”

E. Durkheim emphasized that social rules play a major role in regulating people's lives.

“The mental horizon of the lower classes is limited by the limit set for them by the classes standing above, and because of this their desires are more definite in nature. But those who feel superior to themselves only by empty space, involuntarily get lost in it in the absence of that amount that could push them back.”

“Whatever a person does, his desires to a certain extent must be consistent with his means; the current financial situation always serves in some way as a starting point for determining what it would be desirable to have... The less a person is limited in his desires, the more difficult any limitation is for him...”