...Identify and discuss the key features of both Functionalist and Marxist theories. [25 Marks] Functionalist and Marxist are macro sociological theories that give a better understanding of the society. Functionalist theory is referred to as the consensus whilst the Marxist theory is known as the conflict theory. Key features of both theories are going to be identified and discussed. According to Haralambos and Holborn (2008), a theory is a set of ideas which attempts to explain how something works. Functionalism is one of the major theoretical perspectives in sociology which explains how social order is possible or how society remains relatively stable. Marxism is a theoretical perspective that emphasizes the role of coercion and power in producing social order and is derived from the works of Karl Max. Functionalism has its origins in the works of Durkheim, E who was especially interested in how social order is possible or how society remains relatively stable. Functionalist theory has got its main features and other theories have different views towards it. Value consensus is one of the key features of functionalist theory. Value consensus forms the fundamental integrating principle in society. The functionalist subscribes that the majority of the people in a community share common goals and only a few deviants oppose. This is supported by Haralambos and Holborn (2008) that if members of society are committed to the same values, they will tend to share a common...
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...Identify and discuss the key features of both Functionalist and Marxist theories. [25 Marks] Functionalist and Marxist are macro sociological theories that give a better understanding of the society. Functionalist theory is referred to as the consensus whilst the Marxist theory is known as the conflict theory. Key features of both theories are going to be identified and discussed. According to Haralambos and Holborn (2008), a theory is a set of ideas which attempts to explain how something works. Functionalism is one of the major theoretical perspectives in sociology which explains how social order is possible or how society remains relatively stable. Marxism is a theoretical perspective that emphasizes the role of coercion and power in producing social order and is derived from the works of Karl Max. Functionalism has its origins in the works of Durkheim, E who was especially interested in how social order is possible or how society remains relatively stable. Functionalist theory has got its main features and other theories have different views towards it. Value consensus is one of the key features of functionalist theory. Value consensus forms the fundamental integrating principle in society. The functionalist subscribes that the majority of the people in a community share common goals and only a few deviants oppose. This is supported by Haralambos and Holborn (2008) that if members of society are committed to the same values, they will tend to share a common...
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...Capitalism which is another name for Laissez-Faire. The United States, Canada, and Great Britain are countries whose economies are driven by the principles of Capitalism. The vital features for Capitalism is private ownership, for example you own your own property such as housing and land. The second is market competition which means competing with one another, third is the pursuit of profit, which in this case can mean individuals selling items for more than what they are worth and what they paid for themselves . Capitalism has been criticized for leading to social inequality. Another is that the tiny top layer wields vast political power. Capitalists believe that he only purpose of a government is to protect its citizens from force or fraud. In a capitalist society all people can start any kind of business they want. From a purely economic view a capitalist is a person who buys in order to sell for profit. Socialism is quite different compared to capitalism, almost like an exact opposite Instead of the ownership of private property, the government plays a large role where society owns social property such as banks and factories. Socialism is a term for political and economical theory. Socialism arose in the late eighteenth and early nineteenth century. The vital features of socialism is public ownership of the means of production, central planning and the distribution of...
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...Geography 252 Review Chapter 1: A Geographical Approach to the Economy 1. Definitions · Map- is a visual representation of an area – a symbolic depiction highlighting relationships between elements of that space such as objects[->0], regions[->1], and themes[->2]. · Latitude- measures north and south of the equator · Longitude- measures east and west of the prime meridian · Meridian- A circle of constant longitude passing through a given place on the earth's surface and the terrestrial poles. · Globalization- the development of an increasingly integrated global[->3] economy marked especially by free trade, free flow of capital, and the tapping of cheaper foreign labor markets · Budget surplus/deficit-The Government budget balance is the overall result of a country's general government budget over the course of an accounting period[->4], usually one year. It includes all government levels (from national to local) and public social security funds. The budget balance is the difference between government revenues (e.g., tax) and spending. A positive balance is called a government budget surplus, and a negative balance is called a government budget deficit. 2. Critiques of Economic Geography · The IMF and the World Bank provide a specific list of factors that explain the country’s poverty: Limited resources, the climatic conditions, and the weak development of income-generating activities in rural areas, strong demographic...
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...Domestic Product (GDP) per capita equalled that of poorer countries in Africa and Asia. Today, it’s GDP at official exchange rate (OER) is US $1.151 trillion, ranking it as the world’s 12th largest economy; its unemployment sits at 3.2%; and, its Human Development (HDI)[1] ranks 12th in the world (US 2013). Indeed, why wouldn’t such a growth trajectory take on a supernatural descriptor? What’s more, in the 1960s few could have predicted such an ascent given that the Republic of Korea (ROK) lacked an abundance of natural resources, land mass or population size – frequently used indicators to forecast power potential (Organski 1968, 340). This has led researchers to question why South Korea was able to grow at such a remarkable pace, while other potential risers were not. For instance, Egypt, with a larger abundance of profitable natural resources, a larger land mass and nearly twice the population size, has had sluggish growth during that same time. Egypt’s GDP (OER) is US $255 billion; its unemployment is 12.5% or 130th in the world; and, its HDI ranking is 112th. Immanuel Wallerstein’s World System Analysis[2] provides a theoretical framework to consider such growth and development inequalities. He argues an essential organizing characteristic of the modern capitalist world economy is the division of labour. Wallerstein argues systemic power structures institutionalize structural divisions in labour and amplify core-periphery relations. This essay will consider the role of strong...
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...This paper is concerned with the relationship between capitalism and demographic trends; with the late twentieth century development of neoliberalism alongside historically low levels of fertility in rich capitalist societies. In particular, I question if and how the shift from postwar, regulated capitalism to contemporary, neoliberal capitalism has contributed to the aggregate decline and stagnation of birth rates in advanced capitalist countries. In short, my claim is that the institutional and ideational features of neoliberal capitalism undermine the various requirements for reproduction. More specifically, by reducing the material and psychological means to reproduce, and diminishing the normative value of social-reproductive activities,...
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...the stock market crash of October 29, 1929 (known as Black Tuesday). It started from USA, and quickly sweep European countries as well as all over the world. This crisis had huge impact on all the people across the world, various industries, economic fields, and all the social life. Personal income, tax revenue, profits and prices dropped, while international trade plunged by more than 50%. Unemployment in the U.S. rose to 25%, and in some countries rose as high as 33 %2. The Features of the Great Depression Compared with all the crisis happened before and after, this crisis gets some distinct features: firstly, the scope of the influence of the great depression is so wide. At that time, USA was the most powerful country in the world as well as the biggest creditor country. The American finance had close connection with all the capitalist countries and the international business market. The crisis spread from American to the vital capitalist countries Germany, Japan, Britain and France. The capitalist countries wanted to transfer the crisis to other countries, so the depression affected all the colonies in a wide range, semi-colonies and underdeveloped countries. Besides, if we analyze the economic scale of this Great Depression, we could find the credit and loan crisis, industrial crisis and agricultural crisis all happened together. Secondly, the duration of the Great...
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...1:10……………………………………………………………………….…………. References The History of capitalism 1; 1 Introduction | Capitalism as we all know is an economic system of producing wealth in which the wealth is privately owned. in capitalism, the land, labor, and capital are owned and operated by private individuals who are trading for one purpose that is, the generation of more income or profits in a legitimate way without force or fraud, by singly or jointly, and investments, distribution, income, production, pricing and supply of goods, commodities and services are determined by voluntary private decision in a market economy. A distinguishing feature of capitalism is that each person is entitled to his or her own labor and therefore is allowed to sell the use of it to any employee. In a "capitalist state", private rights and property relations are protected by the rule of law of a limited regulatory framework. In the modern capitalist state, legislative action is confined to defining and enforcing the basic rules of the market, though the state may provide some public goods and infrastructure. Some people consider laissez-faire to be "pure capitalism."...
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...has been dominant in mainstream macroeconomics since the 1980s. Post-Keynesian economics can be seen as an attempt to rebuild economic theory in the light of Keynes's ideas and insights. However even in the early years in the late 1940s post-Keynesians such as Joan Robinson sought to distance themselves from Keynes himself, as well as from the then emergent neo-Keynesianism. Some post-Keynesians took an even more progressive view than Keynes with greater emphases on worker friendly policies and re-distribution. Robinson, Paul Davidson and Hyman Minsky were notable for emphasising the effects on the economy of the practical differences between different types of investments in contrast to Keynes more abstract treatment. A feature of post-Keynesian economics is the principle of effective demand, that demand matters in the long as well as the short run, so that a competitive market economy has no natural or automatic tendency towards full employment. Contrary to a view often expressed, the theoretical basis of this market failure is not rigid or sticky prices or wages (as in New Keynesian...
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...just as postmodernism was the most fashionable and debated topic of the 1980s. A wide and diverse range of social theorists have argued that today's world is organized by accelerating globalization, which is strengthening the dominance of a world capitalist economic system, supplanting the primacy of the nation-state by transnational corporations and organizations, and eroding local cultures and traditions through a global culture. Contemporary theorists from a wide range of political and theoretical positions are converging on the position that globalization is a distinguishing trend of the present moment, but there are hot debates concerning its nature, effects, and future. Moreover, advocates of a post-modern break in history argue that developments in transnational capitalism are producing a new global historical configuration of post- Fordism, or postmodernism as an emergent cultural logic of capitalism (Harvey 1989; Soja 1989; Jameson 1991; and Gottdiener 1995). Others define the emergent global economy and culture as a "network society" grounded in new communications and information technology (Castells 1996, 1997, and 1998). For its defenders, globalization marks the triumph of capitalism and its market economy (see apologists such as Fukuyama 1992 and Friedman 1999 who perceive this process as positive), while its critics portray globalization as negative (see, for example, Mander and Goldsmith 1996; Eisenstein 1998; and Robins and Webster 1999). Some theorists...
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...Proceedings No. 21 Of the Agricultural Policy Forum on Social Market Economy In the Context of National & International Challenges Prepared by Mrs. Nawal Nehme Info-Com Division Held in Damascus on 13 April 2006 With the support of Table of Contents Introduction ...................................................................................................................................... 3 Synthesis of The Presentation .......................................................................................................... 3 Summary of Discussion ...................................................................................................................12 Annex (1) List of Participants .......................................................................................................... 15 Annex (2) Slides of The Presentation ..............................................................................................18 Proceedings No. 21– Social Economy Market 1 2 Proceedings No. 21 – Social Economy Market Introduction The workshop “the Social Market Economy in the Context of National & International Challenges” was the first activity of the 2006 Agricultural Policy Forum series organized by the National Agricultural Policy Center (NAPC) with the support of the FAO Project GCP/SYR/006/ITA. Dr Isam El-Zaim, Director General of The Arab Center for Strategic Studies and Head of the Syrian Economic Scientific Association, presented...
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...theory, relations of production, social classes and the structures of capitalist society. Hegelian dialectic approach was the key figure for Marx while he was building the social theory....
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...There are different theories that relate to the global economy. One of these theories is the world systems theory, which was developed by Wallerstein. This theory acts as a model that describes all the changes that resulted in shaping the world into what it is today. Its focus is specifically on the changes that took place in Western Europe a few centuries ago during a period of significant economic development. The world systems theory saw the division of the world into some three parts, which are the core, the semi-periphery, and the periphery. The core mainly comprised those countries that were economically developed as the United States, countries from Western Europe, and Japan. The semi-periphery included those countries from Asia that were less developed while the periphery included those countries that were very rich in resources, but very poor and highly underdeveloped. These countries were mainly from Africa and Latin America (Frank, 2001). The world systems theory takes a Marxian approach in understanding the lack of development particularly in Latin America and Africa. This theory is materialist as it oversees politically and cultural, the collective and religious characteristics of the country all determined by the economy and it is an analysis of the system because all is perceived as one organization. The world systems theory is an analysis of capitalism and thus it finds its origination in the Annales School and the dependency theories. This theory was developed...
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...The role of the state in modern capitalist economies can hardly be ignored. Whether through legislation, macro-economic policy or its role as an employer, the presence of the state is pervasive. Developing countries has developed an Industrial Relations System in which the state plays an active role. As in other African Countries, the state through its most powerful apparatus Government have accepted and are applying the policies based on the belief that the other parties in Industrial Relations System (workers and Employers) cannot be left entirely to regulate all aspect of the work system. In few of the above, this essay seek to discuss the view that non-state intervention in industrial relations is intervention in favour of capital. Initially, key terms are defined, main topic is discussed and subsequently concluded. Otobo (2000) defines the state as an institutional system of political government, with a monopoly over tax and the legitimate use of force in a society (Otobo, 2000). Wailes (2002) states that, industrial relations means relationship between management and workmen in a unit or an industry. In its wider connotation, it means the organisation and practice of multi pronged (split) relationships between workers and management,unions and workers, in an industry. Therefore, Industrial relations is that part of management which is concerned with the manpower of the enterprise (pp. 31-34). Plowman (2006) postulates that the notion of non-state intervention in industrial...
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...Mixed Economy A mixed economy is an economic system that incorporates aspects of more than one economic system. This usually means an economy that contains both privately-owned and state-owned enterprises or that combines elements of capitalism and socialism, or a mix of market economy and planned economy characteristics. This system overcomes the disadvantages of both the market and planned economic systems. Features * Resources are owned both by the government as well as private individuals. i.e. co-existence of both public sector and private sector. * Market forces prevail but are closely monitored by the government. Advantages * Producers and consumer have sovereignty to choose what to produce and what to consume but production and consumption of harmful goods and services may be stopped by the government. * Social cost of business activities may be reduced by carrying out cost-benefit analysis by the government. * As compared to Market economy, a mixed economy may have less income inequality due to the role played by the government. * Monopolies may be existing but under close supervision of the government. http://www.dineshbakshi.com What Are The Advantages And Disadvantages Of Mixed Economy? The mixed economy refers to such an economic system wherein two the sector exist and function for achieving national objectives. The two sectors are the public sector and private sector. Both these sectors exist and function for achieving national objectives...
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