What Are The Three Major Sociological Perspectives

The three major sociological perspectives, functionalism, conflict theory, and interactionism, are perception lenses which Sociologists utilize to answer the two basic questions in building theory; what issues should we study? And how should the facts be linked? Essentially, each perspective conceptualizes and analyzes how society influences people as well as how people can influence society.
Functionalism or structural-functionalism is sociological perspective that analyzes society on a macro level. The functionalist perspective asserts the idea that every aspect of society is interdependent and how each aspect is functional for the stability of society as a whole. It was best described by Herbert Spencer, who compared the society to the human body; the muscles, skeleton, and various internal organs are all necessary in the continuation of life for the entire organism. The comparison conveys how social structures function together to preserve society or the social consensus. The social consensus, two forms created by Emile Durkheim, was the basic for structural-functionalism cohesion; mechanical solidarity, where people maintain similar values and beliefs and
Karl Marx focuses his theory around the two different social classes within a society; the capitalists (who hold majority of the wealth) and the proletarians (the working class). The social conflict theory though can easily be applied to numerous cases including the differential between male in correspondence to female and the differential in white man to minorities. The conflict theory primarily focuses on how certain social patterns benefit certain people (capitalists) while hindering others (proletarians). Karl Marx exerted the idea that revolution was the only way to reform the social structure; that the proletarians needed to realize their position of weakness and revolt against the