Posted on December 3, 2009 - by David

Anomie: What Did Durkheim Say?

In this essay published in Southern Rural Sociology, Phyllis Puffer argues that most introductory sociology textbooks incorrectly define Durkheim’s concept of anomie and anomic suicide. The most common incorrect definition of anomie, she maintains, is something along the lines of “normlessness.” What Durkheim actually said, Puffer claims, is that “anomie is lack of regulation of the economy.” (Puffer 205) More generally, anomie means a lack of regulation, and she highlights Durkheim’s example of conjugal anomy – the lack of regulation (experienced only by men) caused by divorce .

While Puffer criticizes the commonly given definitions of anomie for ignoring the economic element, I believe she attributes a much narrower definition of anomie (by referring strictly to economic conditions) than Durkheim actually gives in Suicide.

While Durkheim does clearly refer to swings in the economy in his discussion of anomic suicide, it seems that for anomie to be contributing to rising rates of suicide, it must have become endemic in that society. Puffer refers to the Great Depression and other economic crises, but Durkheim’s analysis identifies steadily increasing annual rates of suicide, and he contends that in “the sphere of trade and industry- it [anomie] is actually in a chronic state.” (Durkheim 254)

I would argue that lack of regulation of the economy is the reflection, rather than the cause, of anomie as it is experienced by the individual. Durkheim’s own work appears to confirm this. In the chapter on anomic suicide, Durkheim describes the cultural condition of individuals in an anomic society:

“The limits are unknown between the possible and the impossible, what is just and what is unjust, legitimate claims and hopes and those which are immoderate. Consequently there is no restraint upon aspirations.” (Durkheim 253)

While Puffer emphasizes the problems individuals face when their economic status changes abruptly (i.e not knowing how to regulate spending and live at their new level), Durkheim’s explanation of the crisis the individual experiences after an economic disturbance is more complex:

“Above all, since this race for an unattainable goal can give no other pleasure but that of the race itself, if it is one, once it is interrupted the participants are left empty-handed.” (Durkheim 253)

“The longing for infinity is daily represented as a mark of moral distinction, whereas it can only appear within unregulated consciences which elevate to a rule the lack of rule from which they suffer. The doctrine of the most ruthless and swift progress has become an article of faith.” (Durkheim 257)

In Durkheim’s description, then, it seems that unregulated ambition (resulting from a change in cultural values) leads to a lack of regulation in the economy, and it is the lack of regulation of ambition, (which is not neccesarily ambition for pure financial gain), from which the individual suffers. Puffer criticizes the textbook definitions for their emphasis on the individual’s feelings, claiming that “Durkheim spent little time and space on describing the feelings individuals experience,” but my reading of Suicide leads me to strongly disagree. Furthermore, she generalizes, “Durkheim concluded that the economy must be controlled and both books together [Suicide and The Division of Labor in Society] form a critique of pure laissez-faire capitalism” (Puffer 205). Actually, what Durkheim concludes is that occupational groups may offer a solution to the problem of anomic (and, importantly, egoistic) suicide by providing a social structure near enough to the individual to make him feel sufficiently integrated and to aid him in directing his ambition properly. Durkheim believed that these groups, (corporations), would in turn help to regulate the economy.

Puffer states that the majority of suicides seem to be the egoistic type, and this is the kind she teaches to her Intro to Sociology students. While she suggests that the confusion in the textbook definitions of anomic suicide may result from mixing Durkheim’s term with the ideas of other sociologists who used the word ‘anomie’ to denote something else, I believe the problem results at least in part from Durkheim’s failure to demonstrate a sufficient difference between egoistic and anomic suicide.

In an upcoming post on this topic, I’ll try to show how these two types of suicide fall into the same category, using Greenfeld’s refined definition of anomie.