A Critical outline of the main features of Functionalism, Symbolic Interactionism And Marxism

Marx believed that, through class consciousness, the workers would eventually recognize they were being exploited, and put an end to privilege. That they would revolt against their oppressors and end Capitalism once and for all; and a new utopia of equality under Communism would emerge.

Marx thought of capitalism in a pessimistic way, he saw the relationship between the employee and employer in a capitalistic society as toxic. To Marx, in a capitalistic society the employee would always be at a constant struggle for power be never endlessly repressed by the bourgeoisie. The employer would pay employees only what they needed to survive making it impossible to move up in class or society. He also recognized that in capitalism everything becomes corporatized. Things like marriage go from a sacred bond between two individuals that once never included money or the government, to something that is regulated by the national government and must be done through the federal court and include ties between the individual's financial status. Small businesses would also become corporatized, a local family doctor has now become part of a larger practice that brings in complex forms of payment such as insurance instead of simply paying a small family doctor directly. He also goes into the downfall of capitalism. The way capitalism works is through a series of economic highs and lows, each high is marked by prosperous times, high employment rate, and overall happiness. But the lows are marked by deterioration of the national economy, low employment rates, and struggle for all classes. To Marx’s these highs and lows are what's killing capitalism with each low being worse than the last until the people revolt and create a new form of government. The next would be socialism and once this fell like capitalism, the new governing system would be communism. Communism is an ideal system where people are never struggling for money and are paid based on their needs rather than their particular job. Through this system a

Functionalism sees society as a whole. It is often referred to as the consensus theory as it doesn 't choose to see the issue of conflict in society. It looks at the important factors which make up society such as the economy, the family, the political system and the educational system. It is how these all function together as a whole to create society that functionalists look at. If you think of society as a human body, and the factors functionalists see as important and the organs. If one does not work then it prevents the others from working. In order for society to run smoothly everyone must see these factors as critical and work to keep them going as smoothly as possible. To understand how any part of society, for example education, the functionalists would look at how education in terms of its contribution to the maintenance of the social system as a whole works. All the key institutions in society need to be well integrated for society to survive and operate efficiently.

In order to understand the entirety of a society, we must first understand each part and how it contributes to the stability of the society. According to the functionalist

Functionalism: According to the functionalist perspective of sociology, each aspect of society is interdependent and contributes to society's stability and functioning as a whole. For example, the government provides education for the children of the family, which in turn pays taxes on which the state depends to keep itself running. The family is dependent upon the school to help children grow up to have good jobs so that they can raise and support their own families.

First, functionalism is simply defined as: how a society works (Ferris and Stein 2016). This is a technique that is used through a

As capitalist societies expanded, Marx argued that exploitation amongst workers became more apparent. Marx believed that the only way to get rid of the exploitation, oppression and alienation was for a revolution amongst the proletariat workers. Marx suggests that it is only when the means of production are communally owned, that class divisions among the masses will disappear.

Marx believed all historical societies contain basic contradictions: the exploitation of one social group by another. Perhaps in a way, Marxism is perhaps a little more

Functionalism is a macro system theory which sees society as a mega structure of linked social institutions such as school, family and the legal system. Each different institution is functional to ensure the whole of society is maintained. For example primary socialisation takes place within the home where children are taught basic life

Although the relationship between the classes was based highly on economic standards set by society, Marx described the class relationships as social exploitation rather than an object of the labor market.5 Marx’s class relationship is described “in these two ways the worker becomes a slave to his object: firstly he receives an object of labor, that is he receives labor, and secondly, he receives the means of subsistence.”6 Marx believed that the Bourgeoisie would eventually lose its power to the working class, which would rebel against its exploitation and eventually bring about the creation of a middle class.

Karl Marx came up later with a theory of a classless society to help the working class fight back. Marx came up with many radical ideas to change the way society was proceeding socially which, caused him to be banished from his native land in Germany and then from France, eventually he ended up in England. (Compton's Encyclopedia, 121) Karl Marx believed that social conflict was needed for society to function. He showed people not to be scared of conflict but rather to except it as a way of life. Karl Marx believes that people have a "class consciousness" which means that people are aware of differences between one another and that it causes a separation between groups of people. People mostly look at material objects for a sense of class status. If you are wealthy in life then you have many material objects and if you are poor then you have very little. People need to be educated in order to move up in society, which is why the working class people rarely have a chance to be very successful. Karl Marx realized that the working class deserved more then they were receiving and he tried to help the situation. Marx wanted the wealthy people and the poor to become more economically equal in status. Karl Marx also discusses the economic issues that the working class faces with change. With capitalism growing there is a greater need for production in the factories. More products need to be produced and at

Marx viewed society as a conflict between two classes in competition for material goods. He looked at the history of class conflicts and determined that the coming of the industrial age was what strengthened the capitalist revolution. Marx called the dominant class in the capitalist society the bourgeoisie and the laborers the proletariat. The bourgeoisie owned or controlled the means of production, exploited laborers, and controlled the goods produced for its own needs. He believed that the oppressed class of laborers was in a position to organize itself against the dominating class. He felt that it was the course of nature, that is, it is the way that society evolves and that the communist society would be free of class conflict, "the free development of each is the condition for the free development of all." (Marx & Engels 1948, 37)

Marx seen the economy as the basis of society and called this the infrastructure, he saw the institutions of society such as the political system, the education system, the mass media, religion and even family as developing out of the economic system which he called the superstructure which was shaped by the base (infrastructure), the means of production (everything required to produce), machines, factories, land and raw materials all owned by the bourgeoisie.

Marx came to his conclusion through tracing the proletariat and bourgeoisie roots to the fall of the feudal system. In his book The Communist Manifesto he says that it was here that he saw the bourgeoisie coming to power while the proletariat fell on the economic ladder. While he admits that there has always been a class division in society, it has become increasingly obvious to detect. Due to the inventions of the steam engine and the assembly line, the bourgeoisie became more selective while the proletariat grew in size and started forming unions. He began to notice that the bourgeoisie were beginning to come to power while the proletariat started to grow in numbers. Marx believed that there were multiple reasons that led the bourgeoisie to create their own destruction. First, the bourgeoisie could not help but oppress the proletariats and stand by as they began to sink lower and lower into society, thus increasing the chance of a proletariat uprising. Second, Marx writes, “The advance of industry…replaces the isolation of the laborers, due to competition…due to association” (Marx p. 21). Marx believed that human reasoning would ultimately prevail and that the proletariats would eventually rise up and cast out the bourgeoisie. Human intuition,

Functionalism is one of the major theoretical perspectives in sociology which explains how social order is possible or how society remains relatively stable.