In the 60s of the twentieth century, theories of industrial society gained immense popularity in social philosophy and philosophy of history. They appeared in connection with the so-called systematic approach to history. Proponents of this approach linked historical and historical-philosophical problems with social theories and tried to cover the historical process as a whole, understanding it as a complex process of development and organization of complex systems. Industrial society and its post-industrial stage have become the most prominent concepts of this type.
The emergence of these concepts was caused by the understanding that it is not enough just to criticize the Marxist theory of formations. Indeed, human psychology has always demanded a positive sense of history, a “dream of a future millennium,” capable of replacing the Marxist ideal.
The French sociologist Raymond Aron, in his Lectures on Industrial Society, described the ideological differences between the socialist and capitalist camps as insignificant. Both of these camps, from his point of view, represented the same “single industrial society”, only in different versions. This concept was developed by the American sociologist Walt Rostow. In 1960, he published his acclaimed "non-communist manifesto", namely, the work of the "Stage of Economic Growth". In this book, he proposed a different principle of structural division than in Marxism — not on the basis of socio-economic formations, but according to the stages of economic growth. Thus, industrial society fit into the concept of development of the whole history of mankind.
There are five stages of growth associated with the level of development of industry, technology, science and economic growth, according to Rostow:
1) a traditional society in which the agrarian economic system, a hierarchical social structure and an invariable system of values dominate;
2) a transitional society, which begins with the XVII-beginning of the XVIII centuries, when the beginnings of private enterprise appear;
3) the period of "take-off" when industrialization begins (different countries reached this period at different times, from the end of the 18th century to the 50s of the 20th century);
4) the period of "maturity" or completion of industrialization;
5) the era of mass consumption or welfare, which, according to the sociologist, has been achieved in the United States. She must create a society where intellectual and family values will prevail .
W. Rostow believed that the engine of progress is the development of science and technology, and social upheavals and revolutions are “growth diseases” associated with the low level of development of society. Nevertheless, he wrote about Russia that after the October Revolution, the country entered a stage of maturity, and gradually evolves to the level of industrial capitalist society, since sooner or later industrial society will become a development model for any country in the world. The fact is that the logic of industrialization entails social characteristics that have similar features.
The theory of W. Rostow suggests certain signs of an industrial society. First of all, this is the presence of large-scale engineering, which determines the development of the entire economy. Then, the presence of a wide production of consumer goods, such as televisions, cars, household appliances and so on. The next sign is the scientific and technological revolution, which leads to innovations in production and management, as well as to a high level of urbanization and the presence of a wide layer of managerial managers. This, in turn, changes the social structure and industrial society itself.
Signs of such changes:
- class struggle (which is waged in the framework of elections, trade union activity and collective agreements),
- other forms of behavior and social communication of people,
- rationalization of thinking in general.
The concept of industrial society influenced the emergence of social theories such as the theory of convergence, deideologization, mass society and mass culture.