SOSC 103D Social Inequality in HK

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SOSC 103DSocial Inequality in HK

• Lecture 3 Explanation of Inequality
• - Functionalist Approach

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Basic Concepts

• Social Differences
• Social Ordering and Ranking
• Evaluation of the Ranking
• Who/ How to apply a meaning to the differences
  and the order
• Who make the judgment on how people should be
  ranked
• The meaning and judgment determine the
  distribution of resources, prestige privilege

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Major Assumptions of Functionalist Theory

• Inequality is inevitable in our society
• Human beings are social animals
• Resources are limited
• Individuals are different

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Productions

• Division of labour
• International division of labour
• Gender division of labour

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Allocation and Selection

• Allocate people into different positions/ jobs
• Select the most able and suitable people to
  important positions
• Therefore, we need systems of social ordering and
  ranking

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Distribution

• We face a problem of motivation
• People need motivation to do the jobs which are
  more difficult, need more skills and training
• Distribute the resources and services according
  to the importance of positions

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Functionalist Theory

• Major Arguments
• Different importance of positions in society
• Limited number of talented people
• Sacrifice for training
• Differential reward as attraction
• Reward is attached to the positions
• Social inequality is positively functional and
  inevitable

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Functionalist Theory
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Critique of the Theory

• Functional importance?!
• No standard measure of importance and
  contribution
• Difficult to define and compare the importance
• Rewards of certain positions do not necessarily
  reflect their actual importance

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Think about it!

• Their contributions to the survival of society

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Think about it!

• Relations between importance and rewards