The Mass Society and the Parapolitical Structure

The hypothesis that the urban milieu leads inescapably toward a state of the political masses is re-examined in an analysis, in one major metropolitan community, of the effect on political participation of the parapolitical organizational structure (consisting of ostensibly nonpolitical organizations which can represent, in political terms if necessary, an area of autonomous social value). Variations in population type are related to a theory of spatially based social organization following a previously published formulation. The continued involvement of the citizenry in political affairs, regardless of the scale of the local polity, is found to be closely related to involvement in the parapolitical organizational structure. However, the strength of the parapolitical organizational structure is found to vary widely among the subareas of the metropolis. This variation is explained by the concept of variations in the scale of interaction derived fom population types based on differences in style of life and level of living. Metropolitanites who are not involved in either a local community or a geographically wider associational structure-the casualties of increasing scale in metropolitan society -are found to be far from a majority.