A Comparison of Marxist and Functionalist Views on Society Essay

A Comparison of Marxist and Functionalist Views on Society There is a division surrounded by functionalists and Marxists over the functions of the society. Marxism was founded by Karl Marx. Marx saw society as divided into two major parts, the economic base otherwise known as the infrastructure and the super-structure. Functionalists light upon society as a set of parts which work together to form a whole. Functionalism is also called a consensus theory. Marxism and functionalism are similar in that they check into that the way society is structured as an important part in determining the way people have relationships and behave between themselves. This is known as structural perspective. Both functionalists and Marxists believe that people are portrayed as creature within the social system. Functionalists believe that society operates to the benefit of everybody. They stress that societies come about to exist because a lot of the time there is conse nsus between various aspects of society. They believe that family, education, govern...