Thread: 5 major forces of society?

I've been toying with a short for a while, in which I want to symbolize the major forces of society as members of a family. I want to try to keep it small (as many top-tier forces as possible) and I've come up with (the family member assignment is arbitrary):

grandad - religion
dad - military
mom - government
sis - corporations
bro - labour class
bro - service class

I'd like to not make this a sociology debate, but in a way that's what it is. What might we consider the major forces at the top tiers of social evolution?

edit: 6 forces... but I keep the title because I thought it was funny.

I think that sums the forces at work up fairly well. Sounds interesting. I wish I had something to add, but I think you pretty much nailed this one.

Not sure what you're asking exactly. It occurred to me the 2nd 'bro' on the list could be "Personal Robot" for service class. Wasn't it predicted many years ago that we would all have personal robots by this time? The personal robot is supposed to be doing the dishes, vacuuming, ironing etc. (reminds me of an old cartoon show called The Jetsons). Maybe I read too many Popular Mechanics magazines when I was younger! But I still want a personal robot!

In labour/service I'd like to think of a way to represent the low classes (low=economic, not human value) who are struggling to get by, and the middle who "struggle" with bills, jobs and etc., but are never really missing a life essential.

I'm primarily thinking about the distributions of food, money, and other resources.

how about
spirituality (religion)
Might (Military)
Wealth (corporations)
Land owners
Wheeler dealers (Politicians)
Those who produce
Those who service

I know 6/7 are similar to yours, but 'might' for example includes more than just the military. When I say "landowners" that is probably becoming out of date, but there is still a class, separate from the corporation, that control the sub strata that it is based on, even if the corporation controls the economic product.

Good insight. My plan, which isn't wholly developed, is to show the ways these forces relate to each other and the resulting dysfunction. Being a people-watcher and far from a sociologist I'm venturing into deep waters. . . but I ain't scerd!

Sometimes it could be dysfunction, others it is a dynamic causing social change, a big error of the early sociologists, the Margaret Meads and Ruth Benedicts, was describing a society in a sliver of time as though it were fixed.

What I want to show is a household at the pivotal point of that dynamic, where one or two family members are being grossly mistreated, and they react violently. But rather than the reaction leading to change in the household it will be suppressed both physically and economically by other members of the household.

Religion
Government
Business

If you need to flesh out the family more...

Grandmother: Religion
Grandfather: Business
Father: Government
Mother: Labor (those who make)
Older Brother: Enforcement (police) and/or Military (protection from outside threats, conquest)
Younger Sister: Service (those who do)

In many ways, Religion and Business compete and are on equal footing for attention. One wants your soul, the other has your body. Neither 'does' much but both are respected so grandparents are good choices for embodying those forces on society, just as grandparents themselves are the reason (as forces) and creation mechanism (as family members) for society.

Prepare for Old World sexism:
Women are mystical. They make stuff and serve stuff. They fit religion, sevice and labor well and have historically captured all of those roles well in propaganda/art. Grandma talks about God. Mom makes dinner and Sis helps with the dishes while Dad talks business with Gramps and instructs Bro how to properly play Battleship and Monopoly. Men bring home the bacon but women cook it up and put it on the table. If you're looking for societal allegory, this is a great place to start.

What foundation does society rest on? What was the first step in civilisation? Was it religion, business, government?

None of the above.

Civilisation began when people first put seed in the ground and waited around for the harvest. Take away agriculture and everything else collapses. Agriculture is not just a major force in society. It is the major force from which all else derives.

To have a complete picture I suggest you start with a farmer somewhere in the family and build from there.

I lump agriculture with Labor and Business. People need to eat; therefore demand is high and the farmer/rancher/hunter/gatherer/fisherman supplies. It is a business, a bajillion-dollar business, no matter where one goes or has ever gone in the history of mankind. Even subsistance farming is still about meeting demands (and liberation from the market, thus saving currency). If one meets by his own labor a need, he does not need to barter to have it met.

In many ways, I'm hesitant to place Military as a force for society. It fits with government/enforcement but also with meeting the needs of a populace--not in direction (government) but for protection and the acquisition of resources (territory, goods). Government may lean on the military and build it, but without the people to make a military, it cannot be wielded or do its job. Many wars have been started because a society involved felt it had the might to carry out such a plan. Diplomacy happens more often when one side does not have people to spare. So, while the military can be reduced to the Government's henchman, it is still a separate entity.

So Labor might be more correctly summed up as Those Who Provide Goods as opposed to Those Who Provide Services. Blue collar and white collar.

These are some great insights guys! So, I think Garza's right (from the perspective of the story I'm working with) that I should have a distinction between food production and other labour. I won't go as far as actual agriculture, because many societies -and mine that I'm building on- aren't really agrarian. And I'll never be using the words like military, government, etc. in the story itself, they're just labels to help me keep it sorted. So, by military I'm thinking generally of the power of arms. I think primarily of policing and civic control, but I'll have to consider where national defense and enlisting fits into this.

Civilisation began when people first put seed in the ground and waited around for the harvest. Take away agriculture and everything else collapses. Agriculture is not just a major force in society. It is the major force from which all else derives.

When agriculture starts is when someone builds a barn and creams off a % as profit. this allows them to maintain a force of armed men to control the population, the people are moved into villages where they can be controlled and exploited. Their sustenance is restricted to the controlled foodstuffs (grain). The natural sources of food are made off limits (The Kings hunting forest) and looking for food there becomes trespass and poaching, what begins with agriculture is social control and power. Civilisation begins with speech, we have an eight million year old skeleton from the Great Rift Valley showing that she died of vitamin A poisoning, but was kept alive in a helpless state for some months and made a partial recovery, that's civilisation, the caring and nurturing, not the exploitation for surplus and the development of slavery and serfdom.
That makes me think 'labour' and 'service' are both the enforced forms, how about 'carer', the one who does it through love and affection?

And "Educator/teacher2 they should be in there somewhere to pass culture down the generations.

Education and health were once both branches of religion, and now are both branches of government (in Canada anyway). But this is something that would be good to take into account. As for labour/service vs. care... I want it to mostly reflect the modern world... and I see a lot of labour and service and not a lot of care... Maybe I'm just jaded.