Category:Anomie

Anomie, also it can be spelled anomy in some houses, found in societies or individuals, is a condition of non-stability resulting from a breakdown of standards and values or from a lack of purpose or ideals.

The term was introduced by the Frenchman Émile Durkheim in his study of suicide. He believed that one type of suicide (anomic) resulted from the breakdown of the social standards necessary for regulating behaviour.

When a social system is in a state of anomie, common values and common meanings are no longer understood or accepted, and new values and meanings have not developed.

According to Durkheim, such a society produces, in many of its members, psychological states characterized by a sense of futility, lack of purpose, and emotional emptiness and despair.

Striving is considered useless, because there is no accepted definition of what is desirable.