Sociology is all around us. It is found all over the world. Sociology is the scientific study of social structure. An analysis of the crisis that is occurring today in East Timor is a good example to understand how sociology is broke down and studied. One can identify the social dynamics and the social institutions involved in the crisis at East Timor. They can be determined from the events that occurred in East Timor. Theory conflict would be the best way to characterize the problems in East Timor. In order to understand the situation, one must look at this event in a macrosociological approach. Macrosociology will be used to refer to the study of both societies as a whole as well as the relationships among social structures with societies. But first one must understand the background and the recent events that occurred in East Timor. Then this topic can be fully understood from a sociological approach.
             The 20th century started violently with people trying to break free from colonial rulers. At the end of the same century we see similar violence with struggles in East Timor, Puerto Rico and a few other places had the same problem. Portugal ruled East Timor for about 3 centuries. During World War II, thousands of East Timorese lost their lives helping Australia forces fight against the Japanese. Indonesia then invaded East Timor shortly after Portugal abruptly left, in 1975. This was the day after President Ford's visit. Furthermore, Indonesia at that time had military, economic and political support from UK, USA and Australia. 200,000 people have been killed since 1975, one third of the entire East Timorese population (Mydans, Oct 23rd 1999).
             East Timor came to a point where they had a chance to finally get freedom when on August 20th 1999. They were allowed to have a vote on whether they wanted their independence. They were constantly trying to fight for their freedom and the outcome of the vote clearly show...