Abstract
If morality influences human action, it does so through emotions. Some emotions are long-run commitments and orientations, not short-run displays, and these come in two types: affective loyalties such as hate and love, liking, and contempt; and moral commitments such as shame and pride, compassion, and indignation over injustice. We can find emotions throughout classic, defining works in the sociology of morality, but they are rarely addressed and labeled directly, much less incorporated into models of action. Sociologists of morality can fall into a kind of idealism when they search instead for well-articulated values, principles, and frames. Although some emotions arise and subside quickly, as a part of what is called fast thinking, most moral emotions are fairly permanent and so are a component of slow thinking as well. I examine how Michele Lamont and Robert Wuthnow use emotions in their foundational work in the sociology of emotion and look at moral heroes who are widely admired.
I thank Shai Dromi, Michele Lamont, and Aliza Luft on an earlier draft
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Notes
- 1.
Durkheimian sociology has included emotions, of course, ranging from Durkheim’s own collective effervescence to Alexander’s neofunctionalist inclusion of feelings alongside thoughts in his formulations (discussed below). For Durkheim, emotions, in my view, were potentially creative, but also irrational and overly reducible to social structure.
- 2.
Non-Germans certainly experience schadenfreude, although the mix of FTPs may vary more without the concept to discipline them.
- 3.
In this volume Hitlin and Andersson, using the nice phrase “a locally recognized humanity,” elaborate on this dual nature of dignity, combining one’s own sense of self and one’s position in a broader community, or the interweaving of the personal and social, but they do not address what dignity feels like. Also see Hodson (2001).
- 4.
Zygmunt Bauman (1989: 5) makes a similar claim about Holocaust rescuers, who “come from all corners and sectors of ‘social structure,’ thereby calling the bluff of there being ‘social determinants’ of moral behavior,” and suggesting that pre-existing empathy and compassion are key (Monroe, 2004). But Luft (2015a, 2015b) casts doubt on the weight of pre-existing moral and emotional commitments by showing that many participants in Rwanda’s killings changed their actions during the course of the massacres, depending on immediate situational factors. Of course, these include emotions of many kinds as well as social networks, opportunities, resources, and other structural factors. My thanks to Aliza for helping me work this through.
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Jasper, J.M. (2023). Missing Emotions in the Sociology of Morality. In: Hitlin, S., Dromi, S.M., Luft, A. (eds) Handbook of the Sociology of Morality, Volume 2 . Handbooks of Sociology and Social Research. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-32022-4_6
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