ABSTRACT
"On Suicide" was written while its author battled to establish and shape sociology in France. Emile Durkheim wanted to show how sociology- the study of social world's structure and development- was distinct from psychology- the study of the mind and its functions, and how it affects behavior. Gabriel Tarde was the director of the French Ministry of Justice's criminal statistics bureau, and arguably France's most important sociologist at the time Durkheim was writing On Suicide. Tarde had been involved in a debate with Durkheim ever since he had reviewed Durkheim's first major work, The Division of Labor, from 1893. Durkheim thought that basing sociology on a psychological concept such as imitation was a mistake. As the British sociologist Anthony Giddens points out, Durkheim brings a coherent sociological approach to the problem that allows him to explore the meaning of, and relationship between, various empirical correlations.
