Structural Functionalism

Structural functionalism Introduction A (Chagua hii) Structural functionalism, or simply functionalism, is a frame take to the woods for building supposition that sees hunting lodge as a complex placement whose parts get going together to promote solidarity and stability. 1 This sexual climax looks at alliance through a macro-level orientation, which is a broad focus on the neighborly coordinates that name hostelry as a whole, and believes that society has evolved like organisms. 2 This approach looks at twain social structure and social functions.Functionalism addresses society as a whole in terms of the function of its constituent elements namely norms, customs, traditions, and institutions. A harsh analogy, popularized by Herbert Spencer, presents these parts of society as organs that work toward the tight-laced functioning of the body as a whole. 3 In the most staple fiber terms, it simply emphasizes the effort to impute, as rigorously as possible, to apiece featu re, custom, or practice, its effect on the functioning of a supposedly stable, cohesive system.For Talcott Parsons, structural-functionalism came to describe a particular stage in the methodological maturement of social science, rather than a specific school of thought. 45 The structural functionalism approach is a macrosociological analysis, with a broad focus on social structures that shape society as a whole. INTRODUCTION B (au chagua hii) Functionalism is a consensus opinion that sees society as based on shargond values into which members are socialized. It sees society as like an organism, each part performing functions to harbour the system as a whole.For example, religion, the education system and the family perform acculturation functions. The functionalist theory though developed from the ideas of theorists such as Herbert Spencer and Emile Durkheim, can adopt its origins as far back as the founding father of sociology, Auguste Comte. stratification refers to the syst em where society ranks categories of mickle in a hierarchy of classes (upper, mettle and lower class) based on a criterion or a combination such as religion, color, race, age, sex, wealth, occupation, and education.It represents the structured inequality characterized by groups of people with differential access to the rewards of society because of their relative position in the social hierarchy. SRENGHTS AND WEAKNESSES The functionalist theory has much strength as well as weaknesses. cardinal of the strengths of Functionalism is that it asserts that there are purposes for social conditions or facts. For example, under a functionalist pull down of view the janitor and the sewer worker all contribute to the function of the entire unit.Without serving these purposes, the social structure would not function properly. Functionalists are of the premiss that the needs of society are greater than the needs of individuals in align words, the good of society is greater than the good of the individual thus bring to the maintenance of society. Davis and Moore argue that all societies need some mechanism for insuring rough-and-ready role allocation and performance. One of the weaknesses of this perspective, however, is that some could arguably assert that exiguity serves a function in such a society.You can define this argument, but as Durkheim saw function, he was much more than optimistic and may have argued that poverty was more a product of anomie than actually serving a function. Another, more general review article of functionalism is the argument that it is somewhat naive in that it assumes that there is consensus that everyone in the structure holds the same norms and values that we all essentially believe in and work for the same affair.Many theorists take issue with this component and argue that Western society is more accurately characterized as groups of people in a society competing for resources, wealth, and power. More importantly, these groups do not all believe the same thing (in fact, many are counter-culture) and are thus in conflict with each other. Many Conflict theorists would take the pessimistic view expressed primitively that poverty serves a function in a society.