Functionalism

In the social sciences, specifically sociology and sociocultural anthropology, functionalism (also called functional analysis) is a sociological perspective that originally attempted to explain social institutions as collective means to fill individual biological needs. Later, it came to focus on the ways in which social institutions fill social needs, especially social stability. Functionalism is based around a number of key concepts. Firstly, society is viewed as a system – a collection of interdependent parts, with a tendency toward equilibrium. Secondly, there are functional requirements that must be met in a society for its survival (such as reproduction of the population). Thirdly, phenomena are seen to exist because they serve a function [Holmwood, 2005:87]. Functionalism is a major sociological tradition, alongside other schools of thought, such as conflict theory, interactionism, or exchange theory. The theory is associated with Émile Durkheim and more recently with Talcott Parsons.