Rule-governed Society and Freedom: a Review of Durkheim's View

The present article is aiming at analyzing Durkheim's theory on rule-governed nature of society and human's freedom. This is one of the major discussions on social order. Solving the abovementioned issue would have important practical and scientific results. The present article deals with a review of Durkheim's view. The method used is documentary and textual analysis: extracting Durkheim's view from his own works and analyzing them thereupon. Regarding this issue, three views are considered: 1) The rule-governed the society would result in a complete negation of human's free will, just as the rules governing the nature; 2) The rule-governed society is not similar to the rule-governed nature in negating human's free will; rather, it limits human's free will in the framework of social rules; 3) Society's being rule-governed does not even limit human's free will, because his free will is an element of the final cause. For Durkheim, social compulsion has been considered sometimes as a necessity and certainty, and sometimes as limitation. Accordingly, the rule-governed society and human's freedom may not exist simultaneously. What causes Durkheim not to be able to reconcile society's being rule-governed with human's freedom is his incorrect perception of society's nature, human's true nature, and the principle of causality.