Functionalism Vs Marxism
Although quite different, both Functionalism and Marxism have their similarities. They also have their good and bad aspects, and ways in which each theory dysfunctions. Functionalism is the study of society as a functioning system including interdependent institutions or patterned relations that are steady overtime, and that enact specialized functions for the whole. The main focus is on how direction is kept between parts of society. Any given pattern of relations or structures within society is interpreted by reference to the results or functions that such patterns have for them majority. It is a essential assumption within the functionalist perspective is that participation in social systems is voluntary. When a sociologist uses a functionalist perspective, they create attention to the long-term familiar and predictable character of large-scale social organization, stopping only catastrophic events. "To get a sense of how a sociologist would analyse society using a functionalist perspective, think about how biologists study an animal's body". The main assumption is that social life can most usefully be understood by thinking in general terms about society as a relatively self-co
These hegemonic ideas and ways of thinking usually blame "attitudes, motivation, and values, rather than economic conditions, as the cause of economic inequality". The central assumption of the political economy perspective is that the organization of economic relations strongly impacts upon, and some claim even determines, all other aspects of society. "Social equilibrium is dynamic, not static, because societies must continually change to respond to changing circumstances". "Latent functions may explain the continuation of social organizations long after their intended function has become irrelevant or even devalued". They must arrange themselves "collectively" to work with the help of tools to change attainable natural resources into products that are needed. The capitalist system appears both balanced and inevitable, while other economies, like Soviet and Chinese communism, seem impossible or worse. Functionalist societies lean towards dynamic equilibrium. Political economy sees cultural traditions as extending material conditions and how people group collectively to "distribute, produce, and consume the goods and services that sustain". It assumes that capable members will discover through socialization to recognize and understand these focus elements, and will identify non-conformity as "deviant". Therefore, "a revolt seems misguided, wrong-handed, unreasonable, and naive". The political economy perspective also shares with functionalism the idea that culture functions to publicize "social integration". The Marxist predicton that "exploited masses" would increase and defeat the capitalist system has not happened yet, but the prediction and the senses behind it are adequate knowledge to union leaders and business societies alike. Any infirmities or ineffectiveness in the functioning of these simple mechanisms aid in accounting for difficulty and disequilibrium or the end of order. "Marxist analysis starts with the essential theory that people must produce in order to live". Individual societies can be seen as subsystems working within an "increasingly interconnected global system of transnational economic, legal institutions, and politics".
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