Is social change revolutionary or evolutionary?
Social change is the alteration of social order of a society. Sociological theories of change may be divided into theories of social evolution and theories of social revolution. The evolution theories supported by Functionalism argue that social change is a natural gradual development process while revolutionary theories mainly argued by Marxists believe that change is sudden, rapid and initiated by members of society.
Evolutionary theory was formulated by August Comte. Along with Talcott Parsons and Emile Durkheim, they believed that societies evolve (develop) from less to more complex forms of social structure. The underlying assumption being that societies become increasingly ‘civilized’. Consider the history of UK for example; its pre-industrial past was less complex in technological and social terms than today’s society. Parsons explain that evolution is when society’s control over the environment increases. He argued that evolution involved ‘general adaptive capacity’ where human beings learn from experience, allowing what was learned from past incidents to shape future behaviors. Each new civilization is able to learn from the mistakes and to borrow from cultures of others.
Functionalist has often been criticized on failing to provide a sufficient explanation on social change. If the system is in equilibrium, with various part of the society being contributed towards order and stability, then it is difficult to identify how it changes. Parson argued that, in practice there is no social system in a perfect state of equilibrium. Social change can be pictured as a ‘moving equilibrium’. The organic analogy explains that each part of the society like an organism has its role to play in order to maintain social order. To Parsons, social problems bring about anomie which is the state of normless ness when social order is absent. This he explained is a temporary rift which is similar to the organism falling ill. Just as how an organism’s body would adapt itself in order to be cured, the society adapts itself to the complexity. An organism has basic needs (functional prerequisites) that must be satisfied to survive and exist, like society this allows society to maintain social order. Parsons argued that any social system has four functional prerequisites. Goal attainment, integration, latency and adaptation can be seen as problems that society must solve in order to survive. The functional prerequisites are interrelated and the change in one produce change in others in order to return society back to a state of equilibrium. When these adjustments do not occur, equilibrium disappears, threatening social order. It is actually a step-by-step process to achieve social change. In Parson’s words, ‘once a disturbance has been introduces into an equilibrated system there will tend to be a reaction to this disturbance which tends to restore the system to equilibrium.’ Society may change but it remains stable through new forms of integration.
