Due to the increasing presidential style of recent prime ministers and the party loyalty of the executive one can consider Parliament’s control of executive power minimal. However, due to the development of independent bodies surrounding Select Committees and the delaying of legislation by the House of Lords it can still be argued to be effective. The government usually has an overall majority. This is due to our voting system of FPTP which gives preference to the two main parties, normally giving them majorities (and increasingly large ones) as opposed to coalitions and minority governments which are produced through other voting systems such as AV in Scotland and Wales. Although we are currently in a coalition the government still has a majority through the combination of Conservatives and Liberal Democrats.
Functionalism is a macro theory, which looks at society as a whole rather than focuses on each individual. It is a theory that concentrates on the harmony between social institutions in society that is based on a consensus view rather than a conflict view as a Marxism theory. As a comparison to society as a whole, Functionalists use an organic analogy as an example. Each organ of the human body has a different job to do and if one part became ill or diseased, the rest could be contaminated or will produce changes in other parts. Similarly the operation of any society is dependent on its social institutions as they provide vital functions which maintain harmony, stability and solidarity within a society.
They usually have a fairly open membership. Elitist have power concentrated at the upper end of the hierarchy of members, so not all members have the same say within the group. But how does this apply to the UK? Time to see. These pressure groups have less power than most elitist groups due to lack of resources and the lack of leadership that they have.
Many sociologists have given alternate views about the main function of education. Functionalists argue that the main function of education is to maintain a value consensus – agreed social values – whereas Marxists argue that education transmits values that benefit the ruling class. Durkheim (1903), a functionalist, argues that society needs a sense of social solidarity because without it, social life and cooperation would be impossible as individuals would pursue their own selfish desires. The education system helps create social solidarity by transmitting society’s culture from one generation to the next so the main function of education is to maintain a value consensus in society. However, Marxists criticise this and argue that education in capitalist society only transmits the ideology of the ruling class and not the shared values of society.
Structural theories such as functionalism and Marxism are macro (large scale), and deterministic: they see society as a real thing existing over and above us, shaping our ideas and behaviour – individuals are like puppets, manipulated by society. Social action theorists use qualitative research methods to gather an in-depth understanding of human behaviour and the reasons behind such behaviour. This method investigates the why and how of decision making, not just what, where and when, for example, covert or overt participant observations and unstructured interviews. Structural approaches use methods that are scientific, as they want quantitative data (e.g. questionnaires and surveys).
This essay will explore the differences and similarities between two social scientists’ view of how social order is made and rebuilt. Both are concerned with governance (Silva, E, pg. 309), that being the action or manner of governing either individuals or society as a whole and how authority and discipline are exercised. The two propositions that will be compared and contrasted are: · Goffman - that social order is produced through the everyday actions and practices of people as they live their lives (Silva, E, pg. 316) · Foucault - that social order is produced through the power of knowledge and discourse (that which is talked about), which are the products of historical processes (Silva, E, pg.
A system that privileges one race at the expense of others necessarily privileges one economic class over another as well. Racial hegemony at its core centers whiteness as the default in society, with everything else viewed as different or other. Due to this, the white experience is given higher standing over other cultures because historically Western society has been dominated by whites. In fact, even the color white in our society is associated with purity, being clean, and superior to other colors. This applies to the way we view certain professions and economic classes as well.
The consensus theory (agreement) also suggests that the structures in the system and institutions all are healthy to help function and maintain cohesion in society, binding individuals together for common good. According to Durkheim, crime is inevitable feature of social life. As individuals are composed to different influences and circumstances, therefore not everyone can be equally committed to the shared values and moral beliefs of society. Durkheim also believed that crimes were higher in industrial cities comparison to rural areas because of complexity of the modern world rapidly re-inventing itself, old traditions are lost and replaced by more modern ways of behaving and acting. This implies that geographical location, of where you live have an affect whether you’re likely to be a victim or participate in crime.
In a world where appearances are an indication of caste, Bernard's identity is brought into question, along with his authority. In a conformist society, it should be expected that individualism would stir. In Aldus Huxley’s A Brave New World, the collective experience of the masses defines people into recognized groups. Individual traits are traded for conformity. There are many factors that lead to conformity or non-conformity and Aldus Huxley shows this trough his dystopian novel Brave New World.
One of the important concepts in his understanding of power is the defined word ‘doxa’ which is the combination of both norms and beliefs: the This would be described as a common sense or assumed resort. Bourdieu also uses the term ‘misrecognition’ which is closely resembled to the Marxian ideas of ‘a false conscious’ but working at a level much deeper that passes any intent at conscious influences by a group or several groups. Misrecognition is more of a cultural trend than an ideological trend, mostly because it expresses a set of active social processes that way down the common sense assumptions into the reality of social life and crucially they are born in the middle of culture. All forms of power require structure and culture are in the specific grounds where the conformity is disputed and eventually imbedded between agents, thus creating social indifferences and unequal circumstances. (Such as that with disability) Habitus is utilized