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Durkheim On Types of Suicide

Emile Durkheim's theory of suicide posits that suicide is primarily a social phenomenon rather than an individual act, emphasizing the role of social integration and disorganization. He classifies suicides into four types: egoistic, altruistic, anomic, and fatalistic, each based on the individual's relationship with society. While his focus on social factors has advanced the understanding of suicide, critics argue that he neglects other influencing factors, making his theory somewhat one-sided.

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42 views12 pages

Durkheim On Types of Suicide

Emile Durkheim's theory of suicide posits that suicide is primarily a social phenomenon rather than an individual act, emphasizing the role of social integration and disorganization. He classifies suicides into four types: egoistic, altruistic, anomic, and fatalistic, each based on the individual's relationship with society. While his focus on social factors has advanced the understanding of suicide, critics argue that he neglects other influencing factors, making his theory somewhat one-sided.

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cherryblossom2020a
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Durkheim’s theory of ‘suicide’

• Emile Durkheim was a French philosopher


who was born on 15 April, 1858. Durkheim
acknowledged Comte as his master. On a
sociological perspective when Comte and
Spencer were considered as the founding
fathers of Sociology, Durkheim is considered
as the grandfather and the systematic
approach to study the society began with him.
• Durkheim’s theory of ‘suicide’ is related in
various ways to his study of the division of
labour. It is also linked with the theory of
‘social constraint’. Durkheim has established
the view that there are no societies in which
suicide does not occur
• Rejecting most of the accepted theories of suicide,
Durkheim on the basis of his monographic studies
claims suicide as primarily a social phenomena in
terms of the breakdown of the vital bond of life.
Durkheim in his classical study of ‘Le Suicide’ which
was published in 1897, demonstrates that neither
psycho-pathic factor nor heredity nor climate nor
poverty, nor unhappy love nor other personal
factors motivate along form sufficient explanation
of suicide
• According to Durkheim, suicide is not an
individual act nor a personal action. It is
caused by some power which is over and
above the individual or super individual. He
viewed “all classes of deaths resulting directly
or indirectly from the positive or negative acts
of the victim itself who knows the result they
produce”
• ” Having defined the phenomenon Durkheim
dismisses the psychological explanation. Many
doctors and psychologists develop the theory
that majority of people who take their own life
are in a pathological state, but Durkheim
emphasises that the force, which determines the
suicide, is not psychological but social. He
concludes that suicide is the result of social
disorganisation or lack of social integration or
social solidarity.
Types of Suicide

• Emile Durkheim classified different types of


suicides on the basis of different types of
relationship between the actor and his society.
(1) Egoistic suicide:
• According to Durkheim, when a man becomes
socially isolated or feels that he has no place
in the society he destroys himself. This is the
suicide of self-centred person who lacks
altruistic feelings and is usually cut off from
main stream of the society.
(2) Altruistic suicide:

• This type of suicide occurs when individuals


and the group are too close and intimate. This
kind of suicide results from the over
integration of the individual into social proof,
for example – Sati customs, Dannies warriors.
(3) Anomic suicide:
• This type of suicide is due to certain
breakdown of social equilibrium, such as,
suicide after bankruptcy or after winning a
lottery. In other words, anomic suicide takes
place in a situation which has cropped up
suddenly.
(4) Fatalistic suicide:

• This type of suicide is due to overregulation in


society. Under the overregulation of a society,
when a servant or slave commits suicide,
when a barren woman commits suicide, it is
the example of fatalistic suicide
Critical evaluation of Durkheim’s theory

• Although Durkheim’s theory of suicide has


contributed much about the understanding of
the phenomenon because of his stress on
social rather than on biological or personal
factors, the main drawback of the theory is
that he has laid too much stress only on one
factor, namely social factor and has forgotten
or undermined other factors, thereby making
his theory defective and only one sided.

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