7.

3 Explain How Human Relations Are Transformed by Social

Systems
Change As a Condition of Modern Life
As industry changed, social and political conditions transformed.
Cities grew quickly as the percentage of farmers in the
population declined.
When an individual becomes a factory employee, he has to
work long hours, leaving his little farm, and live near the factory,
often in a crowded district (Heidegger 1997).
The revolutionary change in our way of life in modern times.
For the first time in history, a universal pattern of modernity is
emerging from the wide diversity of traditional values and
institutions, and peoples of all nations are confronted with the
challenge of defining their attitudes toward fundamental changes
that are worldwide in scope.
A. New Knowledge
Slowly, and with a rapid quickening of pace after fifteenth
century, humanity has met with increasing success in
understanding the secrets of nature and applying this new
knowledge to human affairs.
In the 20th century, this expansion has been so rapid that local
knowledge no longer remains purely local and accepted systems
of knowledge in specialized fields have been overturned within a
single generation.
B. Policy Making
The private realm, systems of transportation, communication,
business and education have tended to become larger and more
centralized. Most communication at the national level has become
unified, and many are now organized on a worldwide basis.

 In the public realm, governments have increasingly tended to

accumulate functions formerly performed by the province, district,
tribe or family.
Legal system has also grown to the point where almost all
human activities come in court act with law in one form or another.
This integration of policy making has brought people within
states into an unprecedentedly closer relationship and has
resulted in greater complexity of social organization.
C. Economic Sphere
The effects of new knowledge have been partially noticeable in
the economic sphere. Technical improvements have made
possible a mechanization of labor that has resulted in mass
production, the raid growth in per capita productivity, and an
increasing division of labor.
D. Social Realm
Equally important are the changes that have taken place in the
social realm. Traditional societies are typically closed and rigid in
their structure. The members of such societies are primarily
peasants living in relatively isolated villages, poor and illiterate
and having little contact with the central political authorities. The
way of life of the peasants may remain virtually unchanged for
centuries. Modern knowledge and the technology it has created
have had an immense impact on this traditional way of life.
This complex and interrelated series of changes in humanitys
way of life is generally known as modernization.
At the same time, societies have become more Independent,
and the conduct of their relations has been transformed. While
many of the traditional forms of international relations have
survivedalliances and war.

 Modernization is seen as part of the universal experience, and

in many respects, it is one that holds great hope for the welfare of
humanity. Yet, it has also been in many respects a destructive
process. It has destroyed traditional patterns of life, which had
evolved through the centuries many humane values.
In exchange for the old, it has created a mass society where
privacy, individualism, and quality tend to be submerged by
standards of taste and administrative processes in which the
expediency of public affairs is frequently he determining factor.
We see young white-collar workers in London and Tokyo riding
subways to work. They take care of their daily assignments with
computers and stop to a fast food center for a quick bite. In the
evening, they watch videos and listen to CDs. Technology has
made this homogenizing trend of lifestyle possible among young
people everywhere in the world.
E. Technology
The more society is influenced by technology, the more we
need to consider the social, ethical and technological, and
scientific aspects of each decision and choice (Germain 2000).
In the present era, humanity does not live according to the
natural cycles regulated by natural rhythms anymore (Germain
2000). Instead, it is governed by a second nature that is an
artificial environment characterized by the results of technology.
The modern era is characterized by new inventions that
sometimes cannot be followed by most people, because
technology is not only the copy of the first nature but a
replacement of nature itself. The advancement of technology, its
success in developing itself, is faced with the inability and lack of
humanistic knowledge to answer the real problems of masses
such as poverty, ignorance, and famine, which undermined the

position of humanistic science and efforts to develop it.

Modernity is not just machines and use of money but also an
attitude.
Modern technology influenced policy making within states.
F. On (Womens) Friendships.