Some historians and sociologists of punishment have, on the other hand, rather like the functionalist anthropologists, challenged the idea that simple societies have irrational means of social control and modern societies have rational means. They have argued that control systems may well be rational for the societies in which they exist (Philips 1983); different types of society pose different problems of social order and gener¬ation of solidarity (as Durkheim saw) and may call forth different models of rationality (as Weber demonstrates).