Week 1
Theory
Structural – functional Theory
Structural – functional theory is a framework for building theory that sees society as a complex system whose parts work together to promote solidarity and stability. This approach looks at society through a macro-level orientation, which is a broad focus on the social structures that shape society as a whole.[ This approach looks at both social structure and social functions. Functionalism addresses society as a whole in terms of the function of its constituent elements; namely norms, customs, traditions, and institutions.
Auguste Comte
In Comte’s version of positivism these laws can be derived from doing research on the social world and/or from theorizing about that world. Research is needed to uncover these laws, but in Comte’s view the facts derived from research are of secondary importance to sound speculation. Thus Comte’s positivism involved empirical research, but that research is subordinated to theory. Comte’s thinking is premised on the idea that there is a real world (for example, biological, sociological) out there and that it is the task of the scientist to discover and report on it.
Comte explicitly identified three basic methods for sociology-three basic ways of doing social research in order to gain empirical knowledge of the real social world.
-Observation should be directed by some theory, and when made, they should be connected to some law.
-Experiment would be a natural experiment in which the consequences of something that happens in one setting are observed and compared to the conditions in settings in which such an event did not occur.
-Comparison was divided into three subtypes – human to lower animal societies, societies in different parts of the world, and the different states of societies over time.
Moreover, Auguste Comte, the "Father of Positivism", pointed out the need to keep society unified as many traditions were diminishing. He was the first person to coin the term sociology. Auguste Comte suggests that sociology is the product of a three-stage development.
1. Theological Stage: From the beginning of human history until the end of the European Middle Ages, people took a religious view that society expressed God's will. In the theological state, the human mind, seeking the essential nature of beings, the first and final causes (the origin and purpose) of all effects—in short, absolute knowledge—supposes all phenomena to be produced by the immediate action of supernatural beings.
2. Metaphysical Stage: People began seeing society as a natural system as opposed to the supernatural. Began with the Enlightenment and the ideas of Hobbes, Locke,and Rousseau. Reflected the failings of a selfish human nature rather than the perfection of God.
3. Scientific Stage: Describing society through the application of the scientific approach, which draws on the work of scientists.