Solidarity as a social relation: history of Durkheim's project. Some remarks about solidarity and "lien social" in Durkheim's works

Durkheim’s contribution in the construction of the notion of solidarity is universally acknowledged, even when his views on this matter are criticised or rejected. Despite the misfortunes of its first reception, the major twofold typology of The Division of Labour (1893) – organic and mechanic solidarity – is now correctly appreciated in its historical and theoretical relevance. However, this well-known distinction sometimes seems to absorb almost completely the scholar’s attention, as if Durkheim’s reflections on solidarity had reached in 1893 their definitive formulation. Therefore it could be of some interest to follow the career of “solidarity” (as a word and as a notion) in Durkheim’s later works, in order to see if and when the word reappears or disappears; if and how the conceptual elements that compose the notion solidarity (egoism and altruism, difference or assimilation, interdependence or sympathy, integration or regulation,…) transformed themselves. Starting from a lexical and historical reconstruction, some light may be thrown on the different meanings that solidarity had for Durkheim, and on the overall importance of this notion for his sociology.