KSLU Solved Question Papers
Sociology I
Previous Year Question Paper with Solution
B.A. LL.B. (Five Years) · Sem 1
2021 Oct Examination
munotes.in
Mumbai
B.A. LL.B. (Five Years) Sem 1 Sociology I 2021 Oct Question Paper with Solutions
First published on munotes.in on 21 October 2026.
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Contents
The questions below are the paper as Karnataka State Law University set it at the 2021 Oct examination, in the order it was set.
MarksPage
MarksPage
The Paper as Set
The questions in this volume are the questions asked at the 2021 Oct examination, reproduced as Karnataka State Law University set them, in the order it set them. Long reading passages are shortened to their first and last lines and our summary; the original paper prints them in full. Only the answers are ours. See the original question paper.
Duration 3 hours · Total marks 80 · 20 questions answered
How to use this volume
Solve the paper first, under exam conditions and against the clock. Then read the answers here and mark your own. Reading a solution before attempting the question feels productive and teaches very little, because recognising an answer is not the same as being able to write one.
Q1
(a)Explain the different forces for the emergence of Sociology.[10]
Answer
For full marks, cover: when and where sociology emerged; the intellectual forces (the Enlightenment, the scientific revolution, the idea of progress, the comparative study of other societies); the social and political forces (the French Revolution, the Industrial Revolution, urbanisation, new social problems, the decline of religious authority); how the founders answered these forces; the emergence of sociology in India; a conclusion.
When and where
Sociology emerged in western Europe in the nineteenth century. Auguste Comte named it in 1838. It was a response to a period of rapid and unsettling change, in which old ways of understanding society no longer worked. The forces behind its emergence fall into two groups. Intellectual forces gave thinkers new ideas and methods. Social and political forces gave them urgent new problems.
Intellectual forces
1. The Enlightenment. Eighteenth-century thinkers argued that human reason, not tradition or religious authority, should be the guide to truth. They questioned inherited institutions and asked how society could be organised rationally. This critical spirit was the starting point of sociology.
2. The scientific revolution. Astronomy, physics, chemistry and biology had shown that nature follows regular laws discovered by observation and experiment. Thinkers asked whether society too might follow laws. Comte believed it did, and wanted a "positive" science of society on the model of the natural sciences.
3. The idea of progress. Many Enlightenment thinkers believed that human history moves forward towards greater knowledge and freedom. Sociology took up the task of explaining how societies develop through stages, as in Comte's law of three stages.
4. Knowledge of other societies. Travel, trade and colonial expansion brought Europeans into contact with very different societies. Comparing them raised questions about why social arrangements differ, which encouraged a comparative science of society.
Social and political forces
1. The French Revolution of 1789. The Revolution overthrew the monarchy, attacked the nobility and the church, and proclaimed liberty and equality. It showed that a social order could be torn down by human action. Conservative thinkers worried about how order could be restored; radicals asked how society could be rebuilt. Comte's sociology was in part an answer to the disorder that followed.
2. The Industrial Revolution. Beginning in Great Britain around 1760 and spreading to Europe and America by about 1840, it replaced home and craft production with factories. It created a new class of industrial workers and a new class of owners.
3. Urbanisation. Factories drew vast numbers of people from villages to towns. Cities grew rapidly, with crowded slums, poor sanitation and disease. Traditional community life broke down.
4. New social problems. Poverty, child labour, long working hours, crime, alcoholism and the breakdown of the family appeared on a new scale. These problems demanded systematic study.
5. The decline of traditional authority. The church and the aristocracy lost much of their power. The question of what would hold society together in their place, which Durkheim later called the problem of social solidarity, became pressing.
How the founders responded
Auguste Comte sought a science of society that would restore order through knowledge. Herbert Spencer (1820 to 1903) saw society as an organism evolving towards greater complexity. Karl Marx analysed the conflict between capital and labour created by industrialisation. Emile Durkheim studied how modern society could hold together amid specialisation, and Max Weber studied the spread of rational, bureaucratic organisation. Each was responding to the forces described above.
Why these forces mattered together
No single force created sociology. The Enlightenment supplied the belief that society could be understood by reason. Science supplied the method. The revolutions supplied the urgency, since the old order was collapsing before people's eyes. Sociology was born where a new way of thinking met a new kind of society. That is why its founding question, what holds society together and what drives it to change, still shapes the subject today.
Emergence in India
Sociology reached India as a university subject in the twentieth century. Patrick Geddes founded the Department of Sociology at the University of Bombay in 1919, and G. S. Ghurye headed it from 1924. Indian sociology turned its attention to caste, the village, the family and the changes brought by colonial rule and independence.
Why sociology arose in Europe first
Sociology emerged first in Europe because the forces described above struck there earliest and hardest. The Industrial Revolution began in Great Britain around 1760, and the French Revolution overturned the old social order. Rapid urbanisation, new classes and the decline of traditional authority raised urgent questions about how society holds together. The growth of science also encouraged thinkers to study society by observation. Europe thus had both the problems and the methods that gave birth to the new discipline.
Conclusion. Sociology emerged in nineteenth-century Europe from the meeting of two kinds of force. The intellectual forces were the Enlightenment, the scientific revolution, the idea of progress and the comparison of societies. The social and political forces were the French and Industrial Revolutions, urbanisation, new social problems and the decline of traditional authority. Its founders used science to understand a society in upheaval, and the subject reached India in 1919.
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