Sociocultural evolution(ism) is an umbrella term for theories of cultural evolution and social evolution, describing how cultures and societies have changed over time.
Note that "sociocultural evolution" is not an equivalent of "sociocultural development" (unified processes of differentiation and integration involving increases in sociocultural complexity), as sociocultural evolution also encompasses sociocultural transformations accompanied by decreases of complexity (degeneration) as well as ones not accompanied by any significant changes of sociocultural complexity (cladogenesis).
Thus, sociocultural evolution can be defined as "the process by which structural reorganization is affected through time, eventually producing a form or structure which is qualitatively different from the ancestral form.... Evolutionism then becomes the scientific activity of finding nomothetic explanations for the occurrence of such structural changes".
Although such theories typically provide models for understanding the relationship between technologies, social structure, the values of a society, and how and why they change with time, they vary as to the extent to which they describe specific mechanisms of variation and social change.
Historically, Europeans had tried to explain the meaning of “primitive” societies, with some arguing that primitive peoples had degenerated from a “barbarous” to an even lower “savage” state. These observers often saw European society as symbolizing the highest state of “civilization.”Over time, important commentators like Edward Burnett Tylor, Lewis Henry Morgan, Franz Boas, Leslie White, and Julian Steward elaborated on this thinking with theories from unilinear evolution to the “culture history” approach.
Sociocultural modeling is an umbrella term for theories of cultural and social evolution, which aims to describe how cultures and societies have developed over time. Such theories typically provide models for understanding the relationship between technologies, social structure, the beliefs, values and goals of a society, and how and why they change with time.
Such models are of particular interest to the military in helping unstable regions transition to more stable sustainable states. Most 19th century and some 20th century approaches aimed to provide models for the evolution of humankind as a whole, arguing that different societies are at different stages of social development. The most comprehensive attempt to develop a general theory of social evolution with center in the development of socio-cultural system was done by Talcott Parsons on a scale which included a theory of world-history. Another attempt both on a less systematic scale was attempted by World System approach. Many of the more recent 20th-century approaches focus on changes specific to individual societies and reject the idea of directional change, or social progress. Most archaeologists and cultural anthropologists work within the framework of modern theories of sociocultural evolution. Modern approaches to sociocultural evolution include neoevolutionism, sociobiology, theory of modernization and theory of postindustrial society.
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- Ockham wielding his razor!
- Review of The Beatles Anthology, Chronicle Books 2000 (367pp).
- A brief discussion note about Susan James, Passion and Action: The Emotions in Seventeenth-Century Philosophy.
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