Adam Smith
Smith is the author of the bible of capitalism, The Wealth of Nations. His significance to the premise of the book is explicitly identified by the author who tags Smith as “the first to attempt the elaborate the theory” of the division of labor.
Herbert Spencer
Spencer earns the distinction of being the most-often cited character in the book. In fact, much analysis for the text testifies to the premise that it is essentially boiled down to a debate with Spencer over various sociological theories. Boiled down to essentials, Spencer was a—if not the—Social Darwinist of his time while Durkheim expresses profound criticism of many of the tenets associated with such a sociological ideology.
Gabriel Tarde
Tarde was a criminologist and social psychologist who engaged those two disciplines for the purpose of sociological study. The premises he worked out through this commingling of social sciences wound up putting him in direct opposition to Durkheim as almost every point along the way of explaining social behaviors. Although a minor character in the text, he becomes something a foil to Durkheim on a fundamental foundational basis of constructing sociological theory.
August Comte
French philosopher who developed a doctrine of thought called positivism. He is forwarded by Durkheim as the positive opposition to Herbert Spencer. Comte’s basic assumption of society differs from Spencer on the nature of co-operative necessity with Spencer placing it as the cause while Comte argues it is instead an effect.
