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Spencer’s major contribution to sociology was an evolutionary perspective on social order and social change. Spencer’s theory, “ The Theory of General Evolution” basically stated that society like a biological organism has various interdependent parts that work together to ensure the stability and survival of the entire society. He like Charles Darwin believed in survival of the fittest, so much so that his view was often called Social Darwinism. He believed that the most fit, would survive whereas the unfit would eventually die out and be filtered out of the society. There were several flaws with this idea though, people are not like animals, they can work to change their situations. In his opinion all the working class people would die out and only the rich people would survive. However, without the laborers to do work now the “not as rich” people would be the lower class and eventually die out as well. So then the rich people would have to do the work. With his idea, the society would die out because eventually there wouldn’t be a division of labor anymore. His ideas also led to social racism against Africans and Indians, it served as the rationalization for the white race, it justified the “superiority” they believed they had. So of course his ideas were more popular with the upper class people than the lower class. Even today Spencer’s ideas and concepts are prevalent with people still thinking that they are better than others because of their race. His thoughts have become embedded in social thinking for over a century.
In contrast to Spencer’s views Durkheim stressed that people are the product of their social environment and that their behavior can’t be fully understood in terms of individual and psychological traits. He believed that the limits of human potential are socially based not biologically based. His idea that societies are built on social facts was expressed in his work, “The Rules of Sociological Method” which was his most important contribution to sociology. A social fact is a way of thinking that exists outside the individual but controls each person. For example, an upper class family switching homes for a year with a family who lives in rural farmland. Now the man of the upper class family isn’t worried about how his car looks compared to his neighbors he is worried if his crops will do all right in the summer. The poor man is now worried by appearances, when before he was worried about getting food for his family. Durkheim believed that social facts must be explained by other social facts. He has been viewed as an advocate of the scientific approach to examining social facts outside the individual. He’s also described as the founding figure of the functionalist theoretical tradition. Spencer and Durkheim both emphasized that sociology should be a science based on observation of social facts rather than individual traits.
Durkheim was a functionalist who analyzed on the macro level. A functionalist is someone who assumes that society is a stable, orderly system characterized by societal consensus. According to this perspective, a society is composed of interrelated parts that serve functions such as contributing to the stability of society. However, this stability is threatened by dysfunctional facts like famine or economic loss, thus putting a strain on society and causing an increase of unfavorable actions such as crime and suicide.
Karl Marx believed something entirely different from Durkheim and Spencer. He believed that history is a continuous clash between conflicting ideas and forces. He believed that class conflict is necessary in order to produce social change and better society. From his view point the capitalist class controls and exploits the masses of struggling workers by paying less than the value of their labor. This resulted in the workers feeling powerless. He predicted that the working class would see this and overthrow the capitalists and establish a classless society. As we can see today, that has never happened in society, there has always been a division of labor between the working and upper class. Today, Marx is regarded as one of the most profound sociological thinkers because he combined ideas from other areas of interest such as philosophy, into a new theoretical configuration. Yet, he believed that society should not only be studied, but changed as well since the status quo was usually a small group of wealthy people oppressing the majority of the society. I believe with others who say he puts to much focus on class standing. Also, I disagree with him wanting to change factors in the society, once that happens you are no longer monitoring the society you are having a direct influence on the way things will be run. And that defects the purpose of coming up with theories based on the observation of the society.
Weber emphasized that sociology should be value free-conducted in a scientific manner and should exclude the researchers personal values. He was similar to Marx in that he agreed that economics have a profound impact on shaping a society. He stressed that researchers should employ insight to gain the ability to see the world as others see it. In contemporary society Weber’s ideas have been incorporated into the concept of sociological imagination. According to Weber, rational bureaucracy rather than class struggle was the most significant factor in deterring social relations. In this view, bureaucratic domination can be used to maintain powerful interests in society. Weber’s work on bureaucracy has had a far-reaching impact on society today.
Parsons was the most influential contemporary advocate of the functionalist perspective; other theorists have refined his theory of functionalism over time. In his theory he stressed that all societies must provide for and meet social needs in order to survive. He not only believed in a division of labor between upper and lower classes, he believed in division of labor within the family as well. He believed that a husband should do specific tasks such as working to provide the family with food and be involved in decision making while a wife should care for the children and provide emotional support to the family as a whole. This division is essential to family stability and social order and those other instations such as school and church should work together to preserve the system.
Mills was a key figure in the development of the contemporary conflict theory; he also encouraged sociologists to get involved with social reform. Mills also studied on the macro level. He came up with the power elite theory witch states that the most important decisions are made by the power elite- high ranking military, political, and government officials. This theory is used today, however we as a society have a small say in who we want making these decisions for us by voting. We ultimately as an individual do not have say in important government decisions such as when we go to war, or what countries we should be allies with.
The conflict perspective is composed of three branches. The neo-Marxist which views struggle between the classes as inevitable and as a prime source of social change, the racial/ethnic inequalities, and the feminist, which focuses on, gender struggles. In this arrangement certain social situations benefit some of the group at the expense of others. Take equal opportunity for example, now a company has to hire a certain amount of black, white, and Mexican people, and half of the staff has to be female. Certain people who are qualified for the job will get turned away because they can’t fit the slot that’s needed, but now a minority will have a good job even if he’s totally unqualified for the position. I don’t think it’s very fair when that happens.
Mead was the only theorist who focused on ideas at the micro level. He focused on small groups rather than large-scale social structures. He explored how individual personalities are developed from social experience.
He believed that an individual’s personality is developed by the societies commentary and how we wouldn’t have an identity without commentary from other people. He primarily emphasized that we communicate by symbols like language, hand signals etc. Mead was an interactionist. The definition of that is a person who focuses on how people make sense of their everyday social interactions which are made possible by the use of mutually understood symbols, how people define a situation becomes the foundation for which they will behave.
The newest perspective is the postmodern approach. This perspective is both based on the micro as well as macro level. This shows that based on post industrialization, consumerism, and global communications, we now need entirely new ways besides the other three perspectives to examine social life. I don’t agree with a lot of the theories presented by the theorists, however it’s very interesting to compare them to each other and what type of perspective they mostly relate to.
*Information derived from Sociology in Our Times textbook and Encarta online.
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