This introduces a harsh and brutal equality into our theory of human life and it contradicts our experience of human beings as unique and irreplaceable, valuable in virtue of their variety – in what they don't share – not in virtue of their common ability to reason. The sociologist Elizabeth Wolgast asserts that,įrom the atomistic standpoint, the individuals who make up a society are interchangeable like molecules in a bucket of water – society a mere aggregate of individuals. Those who criticize the theory of social atomism believe that it neglects the idea of the individual as unique.
The term is also applied to contemporary doctrines which hark back to social contract theory, or which try to defend in some sense the priority of the individual and his rights over society, or which present a purely instrumental view of society. Certain forms of utilitarianism are successor doctrines in this sense. The term "atomism" is used loosely to characterize the doctrines of social contract theory which arose in the seventeenth century and also successor doctrines which may not have made use of the concept of social contract but which inherited a vision of society as in some sense constituted by individuals for the fulfilment of ends which were primarily individual. Īccording to the philosopher Charles Taylor, Ultimately, although some rights are renounced, self-interested cooperation occurs for the mutual preservation of the individuals and for society at large.
Those participating in society must sacrifice a portion of their individual rights in order to form a social contract with the other persons in society.
They assert that human beings are fundamentally self-interested, equal, and rational social atoms that together form an aggregate society of self-interested individuals. Political theorists such as John Locke and Thomas Hobbes extend social atomism to the political realm.
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