Rai Nisseem Krishna

Roll No.- 179

The Functionalism theory was developed by
Emile Durkheim and was refined by Talcott
Parsons.

Functionalism views society as a social
system which is very well organised and
systematic and all parts perform important
role in its maintainance. Eg. relegion,
marriage, kinship, family etc.

Its all parts are interrelated and
interdependent to each other and each one
makes contribution for smooth functioning
of society.

The early Functionalists always drew
analogy between society and an organism
such as human body.

They argues that just as an organism has
certain basic needs which must be satisfied,
society has also some basic needs which
must be met if it is to continue to exist.



Functionalists also employ the concept of
dyfunction to refer to the effects of any
social institution which detract from
maintainance of the society.











He was an American Sociologist who also
served as a Professor in Hardvard
University.
He Founded the Department of Social Relations
combining Sociology, Anthropology, and
Psychology in 1944.

He was heavily influenced by the writings of
Durkheim

Key works:
The Structure of Social Action (1937)
The Social System (1951)
Social Structure and Personality (1964)
The System of Modern Societies (1971)
The Structure and Change of the Social System
(1983)

Parsons spent his whole career trying to
develop a general theory of social action and
of social system by means of which and
within which, social action takes place.

A system is something that has a boundary,
so that there is an inside and an outside to
the environment comprising the system.
System has interdependent parts, order or
equilibrium, and a tendency to maintain the
boundaries and relations of the parts to the
whole.

These are action system in sense that they
involve social action, and each system has
certain needs or conditions that are necessary
for the survival and continued operation of
system.

THE UNIT ACT:
Parsons in his theoretical scheme of social
action firstly specified that the basic building
block of all social action is the unit act. This
is the smallest unit of an action system
which still, makes sense as a part of a
concrete system of action.

He identified four basic elements, all of which
have to be included for a particular piece of
behaviour to be counted as action for the
purposes of his theory of action.
These basic elements are:
i. An agent or actor
ii. A goal or ends
iii. Responses made to situational conditions.
These can be thought of as a means to
achieving particular ends.
iv. The business of acting to achieve a purpose
by responding to environmental conditions
has to be done in a way that conforms to
the prevailing norms of the society.


THE ACTION FRAME OF REFERENCCE:
Parsons refers to his approach as an action
frame of reference as he was keen to specify
that he was developing a theoretical
framework not only for making objective
assessments of social action in the manner of
a positivist, but also to include the subjective
assessment or voluntaristic dimesions of
action as well.

He regards social actors as concious,
knowledgeable and intentional.
THE SOCIAL SYSTEM:
Parsons discussed a theoretical framework of
the overall social system where action takes
place. He suggested that society must fulfill
four basic functions in order for it to function
as a society. These are:

1. Adaptation: It refers to the relationship
between the system and its environment.
The economy is the institution primarily
concerned with this function.

2. Goal attainment: It refers to the need for all
societies to set goals towards which social
activity is directed. Political system is the
main institution concerned with this
function.

3. Integration: It refers primarily to the
adjustment of conflict. It is concerned with
the coordination and mutual adjustment of
the parts of the social system. The law is the
main institution which meets this need.





4. Pattern maintainance: It refers to the
maintainance of basic pattern of values,
institutionalized in the society. Institutions
which perform this function includes the
family, the education system and religion.

PATTERN VARIABLES:
Parsons constructed a set of variables that
can be used to analyze the various systems.
The Pattern Variables provide a means of
looking at various forms that norms and
social actions can take, and what their
orientation is. There can be certain pattern
variables but Parsons considered four of
these as essential to the satisfactory
functioning of the social system.
These are:
i. Affectivity versus affective neutrality: It
refers to the level of emotion or rational
detachment that is appropriate or expected
in a given form of situation.
ii. Diffuseness versus specificity: It refers to
whether the range or scope of obligations
in an interaction situation is broad or
narrow.
iii. Universalism versus particularism: It refers
to whether evaluative standards are based
on universal criteria or beliefs of a
particular society.

iv. Achievement versus ascription: It refers to
whether social status is assessed in terms
of performance criteria, i.e. how
successful actors are in their achievements,
or of forms of endowment, i.e. labels and
categories based on something other than
merit.
Parsons was also very much concerned with
the question of how social order is possible .

He observed that social life is characterized
by mutual advantage and peaceful
cooperation rather than mutual hostility and
destruction.

He considered the views of Thomas Hobbes
who claimed to have discovered the basis of
social order.

According to Hobbes self preservation is the
fundamental basis of establishing social
order.

Parson argued that Hobbes picture of man
pursuing personal ends and restrained only
by sovereign power fails to provide an
adequate explanation of social order and
believed that only a commitment to common
values provides a basis for order in the
society, i.e. Value consensus forms the
fundamental integrating principle in the
society.

According to Parsons the main task of
sociology is to analyse the institutionalisation
of patterns of value orientation in the social
system.

When values are institutionalised and
behaviour structured in terms of them, the
result is a stable system.

A state of social equilibrium is attained when
there is balance between various parts of the
system.

There are two ways in which social
equilibrium is maintained. The first involves
socialization by means of which societys
values are transmitted from one generation to
the next and internalized to form an integral
part of individual personalities. The second
involves the various mechanisms of social
control which discourages deviance and so
maintain order in the system.

It has been critcised for failing to provide an
adequate explanation for social change.
Stronger criticisms include epistemological
argument that functionalism is tautologous,
that is it attempts to account for the
development of social institutions solely
through recourse to the effects that are
attributed to them and thereby explains the
two circularly.
A further criticism directed at functionalism is
that it contains no sense of agency, that
individuals are seen as puppets, acting as
their role requires.
Conflict theorists criticised functionalism's
concept of system as giving far too much
weight to integration and consensus, and
neglecting independence and conflict.
The feminists argued that the functionalism
neglected the suppression of women within
the family structure.