Sociology is the study of man when organized as a group for a common goal. However, it also studies also the group as a fact.
The sociologist’s objects are behaviour and rules, processes and references, be them stable, provisory, natural, rational or spontaneous.
Each group has its own identity which is supplied by the goal, means, place and time.
Who is, what produces, why, in which way, where and when. O.I.F. (outline of identity and function).
Micro and macroprocesses – quantitative and qualitative, structural and functional, normogenic and pathogenic – are always connected to the thematic outline of identity and function.
The first type of society to be studied was the ecclesiology, which began and took place in Christian revelations since the first century after Christ.
Still active, ecclesiology defines itself as the community of believers in Christ on earth. One ideological criterion is revealed, whereas instead there are several applications.
Scientific sociology does not recognise the exactness of criterion, but includes “in Christ”, in Muhammad, in Buddha etc., as one of the ways of social structure in action.
From Auguste Comte on, the comparative method has always been used among the various types of society’s behaviour. This is due to the fact that, still today, sociology lacks a criterion of real value, due to the fact that since sociology does not know man himself, it is not able to know the associative and complex behaviour of his relations. Consequently, it uses the comparative method, having as a constant background the systems which are validated as more democratic by the best known and imposing societies (UN, EU, USA, etc.).
From societies to institutions, and from industries to provisory communities, sociology presents descriptive documents of behaviour, but never definitive and evident configurations.
That is why we have so many sociologies rationalized as structure, function, dialectics, action, interaction, ideology, demand, information, and parental, symbolic, economic systems etc. And from here, the various approaches of sociology to the individual’s behaviour as a group take place. They are all “specializations” which reveal more the attempts of configuration by the researchers than the analysis of reality. Therefore: sociology of communication, immigration, medicine, rural, technological, of education etc.
