There are several types of Social Systems. Let’s take a look at them using the movie “Jungle Fever” to explain their essence.
The three major perspectives of organizations are a rational system, a natural system and an open system. But in generally in the movie we saw the closest attention is paid to a mezzo open system (the main heroes and their environment), organization of which is open to and dependent on the environment and circumstances, there are connections both with external (such as society, traditional moral principles, social opinion) and internal (feelings, relationships, fears, motivation) components.
At the same time the structure we observe in the “Jungle Fever” is a part of a macro-system – the society itself, which influences are reflected on the members of mezzo-group. On the other hand – an open micro system of Spike and Annabella. One more system – a rational open one, where cooperation between people is conscious and deliberate – Spike and his boss.
The type of system can be determined on the basis of how the boundaries of the system are defined. Whether a given system is open or closed depends on how much of the universe is included in the system and how much in the environment. Most of the systems we can observe in the movie are the open for they are much influenced by external factors.
The social system is always more complex than an individual, more open to environmental influence, more adaptive to circumstance because of collective experience & wider reservoir of skills.
All systems have common elements. These are: input, output, throughput or process, feedback, control, environment, goal.
The inputs of systems presented in “Jungle Fever” are information, energy, time, individual efforts which are aimed at the goal.
The throughput is presented in thinking, planning, decision-making, sharing information, meeting in groups, discussing, etc.
The output – decisions made by people, results of their activity, events which follow the decisions, actually their reaction to understanding of rules and restrictions of the society.
The feedback – is information which our heroes get for consideration and analysis, everything new that may be used for some purposes, actually their knowledge of general moral and primary principles of the society.
In my opinion all the micro and mezzo systems we see in the movie (the office department, the family, the couple, etc.) are the subsystems of a large social macro system. Of all of them the couple represents a dynamic system because their relationships are developing, coming to new stages; they influence the people around and are influenced by the people and customs.
The boundaries of all systems stated before are defined by people: Spike and Annabella represent the boundaries of their system, Spike and his wife – of theirs, all they together – of the third one and so on. All the systems are much related and several micro systems create some mezzo ones, which, in their turn, are parts of the social macro system.
Each of these systems has its own goal. For example, if we take the Spike and his girlfriend, his goal (for he himself represents a separate micro (sub)system) is to find a solution of the problem which erase before him.
Not the least place in the movie is given to social roles of the heroes. Five types of social roles may be defined:
- Age and sex groupings: young people, older ones, men, women.
- Family groupings: husband, brother.
- Status groupings, e.g. employee, manager.
- Occupational groupings, e.g. unemployed, waiter, secretary.
- Common interest groupings, e.g. sports club member, pub local, game enthusiast.
Roles bring with them expectations about the way that the people in those roles will behave. And whatever communication there is it is circumscribed by the role expectations. Some role expectations may be well formalized in some way. For example, in the situation the heroes meet in the movie they are not expected to have such relationships for their status/cultural grouping rules explicitly prevent them from it. According to it the society expects black people to communicate with black people, not to be promoted to managing posts, etc. Nevertheless, everyone is free to interpret their role as they see fit, within the limits imposed on them.
Social systems affect how, why, to and from whom, and with what effects communication occurs. Communication affects the social system and vice-versa. Neither can be analyzed separately without distorting the nature of the process. So, analyzing behavior of the couple we for sure should also consider behavior of their families, colleagues, friends, etc.
In the ideal system, prescriptions, descriptions, and expectations about a given role all fit together. In most groups in the real world, though, they don't. If they differ radically, communication breakdowns occur within the system. When our expectations of a role don't match the performance of that role then there will be communication problems.
Obviously, we operate simultaneously in a large number of systems. An individual occupies positions in each group, performs behaviors in each group. In addition to these groups, there are groups she would like to belong to. These groups serve as reference groups. Reference groups are the social systems that serve as reference points for the individual, groups whose norms and role behaviors are predictors of her own behavior and beliefs.
In our case we observe communication problems arisen as a result of stereotyping.