Social Order Essay

Words: 1693
Pages: 7

Social order is a concept that refers to a set of linked social structures and practices which maintain and enforce "normal" ‘normal’ways of relating and behaving. Social change provides the rules and regulations for what is ‘normal behaviour’ at the present time. This assignment incorporates the contrasts and comparisons of how social order is made and remade through the theories of Erving Goffman and Michael Foucault. This sentence is a bit complex—why not say this assignment compares and contrasts the work of ---In order to illustrate this, two case studies of traffic regulation, ‘The Buchanan report’ and ‘ Monderman’s thesis’ will be used to relate and feature, (illustrate/exemplify?) key points from both social scientists. This is a …show more content…
In this report Buchanan was given the task of finding a way for road infrastructure to be matched with that of vehicle demand. “A future of choking road congestion was feared unless the rapid rise in demand for car travel was matched by an increased supply of roads” (Silva, 2009, p.327).Buchannan’s approach was to restrict car use in towns. This meant that cars and pedestrians would be segregated from one another. “Cars were afforded their own generously proportioned network and pedestrians were safely tucked away in residential blocks often terminating in quiet cul-de-sacs” (Silva, 2009, p.329).

Monderman’s thesis was created by Hans Monderman, “a Dutch engineer who in the 1980’s devised the principle of the ‘naked street’” (Silva, 2009, p.325) . This approach was different to that of segregation which was archetypal in Buchanan’s approach, in that it used the ‘shared space’ philosophy. Monderman believed that far from being segregated from one another vehicles and pedestrians should be able to co-exist and negotiate space between them. He did this through removing much of the ‘psychological traffic calming measures’ that were in place. “The trouble with traffic engineers is that when there’s a problem with a road, they always try to add something. To my mind, it’s much better to remove things’ (Monderman,quoted in Silva,2009). Monderman felt the best approach was to remove white lines, eliminate the curb and change the colour of the tarmac so as to merge the