ABSTRACT
The idea of social order forms one of the central points in Max Weber's sociology of law; this author expresses the opinion that every order is based upon recognition and, on the other hand, considers transgressions as somehow related to the order. Law produces similarity or uniformity in the behavior of individuals within a social group. Legal, moral or customary behavior, or behavior based upon obedience to power, develops uniformities immediately caused by the imposition of patterns of behavior. The imposition of patterns is a social phenomenon, determined socially. It might happen that determination would belong to other classes of social uniformities. The assertion that the province of law coincides with that of ethico-imperative coordination is the statement of a working hypothesis. There have been in sociology certain tendencies to explain the total social process from the viewpoint of invention on the part of the élite and imitation on the part of the mass.
