Social organization or social institution, is a group of social positions, connected by social relations, performing a social role. It can be also defined in a narrow sense as any institution in a society that works to socialise the groups or people in it. Common examples include education, governments, families, economic systems, religions, and any people or groups that you have social interactions with. It is a major sphere of social life organized to meet some human needs. In sociology, social status also known as Social position social status means a position of an individual in a given society and culture. ... Social relation can refer to a multitude of social interactions, regulated by social norms, between two or more people, with each having a social position and performing a social role. ... A function is part of an answer to a question about why some object or process occurred in a system that evolved or was designed with some goal. ... Institutions are structures and mechanisms of social order and cooperation governing the behavior of two or more individuals. ... Young people interacting within an ethnically diverse society. ... In psychology, socialization is the process by which children and others adopt the behavior patterns of the culture that surrounds them. ... A family in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso in 1997 A family consists of a domestic group of people (or a number of domestic groups), typically affiliated by birth or marriage, or by analogous or comparable relationships — including domestic partnership, cohabitation, adoption, surname and (in some cases) ownership (as occurred in the... An economic system is a mechanism (social institution) which deals with the production, distribution and consumption of goods and services in a particular society. ... Social interaction is a dynamic, changing sequence of social actions between individuals (or groups) who modify their actions and reactions due to the actions by their interaction partner(s). ...

Social organisations can take many forms, depending on a social context. For example, for family context the corresponding social organisation is of course the family. For business context - an enterprise, company, corporation, etc. For educational context - school, university, etc. For political context - government, political party, and others. Commonly, experts officially recognise these five major social institutions that have been evident in some way in every civilization in history: government, religion, education, economics, and family. The social environment or social context is a group of identical or similar social positions and social roles. ... A family in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso in 1997 A family consists of a domestic group of people (or a number of domestic groups), typically affiliated by birth or marriage, or by analogous or comparable relationships — including domestic partnership, cohabitation, adoption, surname and (in some cases) ownership (as occurred in the... Wall Street, Manhattan is the location of the New York Stock Exchange and is often used as a symbol for the world of business. ... The term company may refer to a separate legal entity, as in English law, or may simply refer to a business, as is the common use in the United States. ... Corporate redirects here. ... Students in Rome, Italy. ... Representation of a university class, 1350s. ... Political parties Part of the Politics series Politics Portal This box:      A political party is a political organization that seeks to attain political power within a government, usually by participating in electoral campaigns. ... Cities are a major hallmark of human civilization. ... History studies the past in human terms. ... Face-to-face trading interactions on the New York Stock Exchange trading floor. ... A family in Ouagadougou, Burkina Faso in 1997 A family consists of a domestic group of people (or a number of domestic groups), typically affiliated by birth or marriage, or by analogous or comparable relationships — including domestic partnership, cohabitation, adoption, surname and (in some cases) ownership (as occurred in the...

To give a simple example: productive institutions are dependent on educational institutions for a skilled workforce, educational institutions are dependent on the government for their funding, and government institutions, in turn, rely on productive institutions to create wealth to finance government spending. Sociologist call this institutional interdependence.

Max Weber concluded that in the history of mankind, organisations evolved towards rationalisation in form of a rational-legal organisation, like bureaucracy. For the painter, see Max Weber (artist). ... Rational-legal authority (also known as rational authority, legal authority, rational domination, legal domination) is a form of leadership in which the authority of an organization or a ruling regime is largely tied to legal rationality, legal legitimacy and bureaucracy. ... The Politics series Politics Portal This box:      Bureaucracy. ...

Organisation vs institution

The term organization is in sociology sometimes used interchangeably with the term institution, as when referring to a formal organization like a hospital or a prison. In other parts of sociology, like sociology of organizations and especially new institutionalism (also new institutional economics in economics and historical institutionalism in political science), 'organisation' and 'institution' refer to two different phenomena. Organisations are social entities that have members, resources, structures, authority, boundaries, etc. Institutions are ideas about how something should be done, look or be constituted in order to be viewed as legitimate. The issue is complicated by the fact that one may talk of institutions that govern organizations and the organization as an institution. New institutionalism is a social theory that focuses on developing a sociological view of institutions, the way they interact and the effects of institutions on society. ... Institutional economics focuses on understanding the role of human-made institutions in shaping economic behavior. ... Historical institutionalism (HI) is a social science method of inquiry that uses institutions as subject of study in order to find, measure and trace patterns and sequences of social, political, economic behavior and change accross time and space. ...

See also

• Functionalism (sociology)
• Sociology