Social relations crystallize into fixed external forms that cannot keep pace with inner life

Evidence

A basic dualism … pervades the fundamental form of all sociation. The dualism consists in the fact that a relation, which is a fluctuating, constantly developing life-process, nevertheless receives a relatively stable external form. The sociological forms of reciprocal behavior, of unification, of presentation toward the outside, cannot follow, with any precise adaptation, the changes of their inside, that is, of the processes that occur in the individual in regard to the other. These two layers, relation and form, have different tempi of development; or it often is the nature of the external form not to develop properly at all. — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 778

Categorization

• DEFINE: Core statement of the form/content dualism that grounds Simmel’s whole sociology of forms.
• XREF: Foundational for how forms harden — connects directly to how blasé attitude and civil inattention freeze social responses into fixed patterns. — connects to: The individual’s inner mental relations mirror social relations among persons — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 354; Cultivation develops a thing’s inner core rather than imposing external forms — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 550; Social institutions are peace treaties between imitation and individual differentiation. — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 712 (+28 more)

Related

• Relational qualities can harden into intrinsic traits of an element (similarity 0.88)
• The individual’s inner mental relations mirror social relations among persons (similarity 0.86)
• Functional differentiation makes social structures contingent and permanently revisable (similarity 0.86)
• The formal content distinction in sociology can only be illustrated, not yet defined (similarity 0.84)
• Sociology treats psychological processes only as carriers of social forms (similarity 0.83)
• Societies require a mix of discord and harmony to take determinate shape (similarity 0.82)
• Sociology’s proper object is the forms relating two or more individuals (similarity 0.82)
• Individual motives become social only through forms of mutual interaction (similarity 0.81)
• Belief that existing arrangements are natural blocks real social change. (similarity 0.81)
• Social institutions are peace treaties between imitation and individual differentiation. (similarity 0.81)
• Form-versus-life conflict anticipates modern structure-versus-antistructure debates (similarity 0.81)
• Cultural forms ossify and drift apart from the life that created them (similarity 0.80)
• Identical interaction forms recur across radically different social groups (similarity 0.80)
• Society presupposes a harmony between its structure and individual inner callings (similarity 0.80)
• Forms differ from Kantian categories by informing all experience and changing over time (similarity 0.79)

Broader Connections

• Social norms make people present stable identities that others can trust #expands (0.72)
• Society presupposes a harmony between its structure and individual inner callings #complicates (0.70) — Georg Simmel, on individuality and social forms_…, 191
• Market relations are real yet structurally unable to express the underlying social labor #exemplifies (0.60)
• Culture names the forms, not the content, of social relationships #expands (0.55) — Hall, Stuart, Essential Essays, Volume 1, 882