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HUMANISTIC SOCIOLOGY : PHANTOM MOVEMENT OR REALITY?
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have tried to ascertain the ways in which political regimes accomplish their manifest (obvious) and latent (hidden or unintended) purposes.
It should be noted, however, that some functionalists have cast judgment on the status quo. Karl Marx, for example, made a functional analysis of the economy and concluded that it works," despite its manifest, injustices, only because laborers are misled by a "false consciousness." Therefore, the functional view does not force its users to be value free nor to support the established order (Merton, 1968:91-96). But many functionalists have used it to that end.
Status quo functionalists have become enthusiastic about the concept system which denotes any set of interrelated elements that may be regarded as a single entity. Popularity of the concept was insured when it was found that only within the framework of such a conceptual idea could electronic analyzing devices be utilized adequately. System, thus, gave an aura of "real science" to a discipline that was often unsystematic. In the words of Robert Friedrichs 1970:16), “System’had an obviously attractive ring...” for sociologists who wanted to be known as scientists. The concept :
...anointed their work with the clarity of logic, (and) blessed it with a conceptual rigor that they associated with the more firmly
established sciences.
"System” was admirably suited to the inclinations of value-free advocates because the concept generally connotes a set of nested sub-units interacting in dynamic equilibrium. If society is thus perceived, then continuity and stability are regarded as normal, and change and challenge as deviant. This being the case, there is ample justification for not making negative judgments about society. Instead, value-free system analysts asserted, the central problem for a truly objective social science is, first to, specify the "needs" (or, in systems language,"functional prerequisites") of societies and, second, indicate how to avoid upsetting an on-going process.
Challenges to the Value-free Position Politically neutral sociology has been challenged from time to time. Perhaps the most significant challenger relevant for present purposes was Robert S. Lynd (1939). In the late thirties, speaking for ahead of the time when significant numbers would listen to him, Lynd asserted that when it comes to anything that counts in human affairs, there is no such thing as a truly value-free position. When considered in terms of its consequencesand what matters other than consequences ? Lynd asked it is clear that a value-free stance gives support to the existing order and is thus a commitment, a value stand. A Hitler can function with impunity if the intellectuals of his society tender him nothing but "benign neglect." With such “neutrality” he needs few storm troopers and secret police. Or, to bring the point closer to home, an American government can, with relative ease, commit the nation to an inhumane, exploitive war just so long as those who are most knowledgeable will say, "I take no stand on the war; I am a