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So if individual and cultural development are in opposition to each other and each has its own conscience, where does that leave us? As civilization becomes more complicated and absorbs more of our life and through Freud one can see that indeed it is the society whose conscience comes first over the individual. Sociologist Max Weber used the relationship between society and the individual to explain the evolution of capitalism in terms of social development. …

…hypotheses of Weber and Freud though, there is no doubt that both authors describe a society that exercises considerable control over the individual. Now as we approach the turn of the century and again experience another surge of technological development we might do good in asking ourselves how much power over our lives we have as individuals, and how much power has been subverted from us by a society which has its own “individual” needs.