Terrorism Paper Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

Terrorism Paper - Essay Example This covers the terrorist groups and activities originating from within the European continent, and also the involvement of terrorist organizations and activities from outside Europe. The paper also will also discuss how terrorism operates in both method and rationale, such as going over examples of their various modus operandi and goals. There will also be discussion of the foreign support and involvement of other countries to these groups, whether within or outside Europe, and their alleged agendas or reasons for doing so. At the tail end of this paper, there will be theoretical recommendations or applications in dealing with the issue of terrorism in Europe. As such, possible practical scenarios could be given as examples based from the analysis of the research made for this paper. Insight can also be given as a personal output in reference to the information studied for this research. Before discussing the various terrorist acts in 20th century Europe, it should first be understood what terrorism is and how one is defined as a terrorist. Usually, an individual is considered a terrorist if he or she has political goals or beliefs that are strong motivations to commit acts of violence against their enemies, regardless if done on non-combatants. It can be said then that terrorism is an act of violence made against non-combatants or civilians for the purpose of waging a psychological warfare of fear. This can be in the form of indiscriminate bombings, assassinations, and sabotage in highly populated civilian areas. These actions are done for a politically or culturally motivated goal and made aware through violent and fearful acts. Modern European history has many incidents and episodes of violent terrorist acts. Perhaps one of the most well known would be the assassination of Austrian Archduke Franz Ferdinand and his wife by a Serbian nationalist radical by the name of Gavrilo Princip. The attack was motivated by an individual

Introduction to Synchronization

Introduction to Synchronization Synchronization is a mechanism which helps to use shared memory resources in an operating system. In the current world, most of the computers are multi-tasking computers. So these computers can do more than one process at the same time. And the networking technology is has become one of the most modern and developed technologies in the current worlds. So both these computer and network technologies work together in order to achieve common goals. While working together these technologies have to share resources such as memory at the same time. While sharing memory, there can be many problems. To avoid these problems synchronization mechanisms were implemented. Concurrency As it is mentioned above, operating systems share memory in order to achieve common goals. The data can be shared among two processes in one operating system or two operating systems over a network. However there are sometimes that the shared data can be accessed by only one process at a time. As a real life example, shared bathroom can be taken. A shared bathroom can be used by many people but it can be used by only one person at the time. If someone is using the bathroom, others have to wait until that person to come out. Then the one of the waited people can use the bathroom. Another real life example for this is shared streets or junctions. In shared streets, people can use only one direction at one time. If the shared street is used by any direction, people from other direction have to wait till others to stop using the shared street. Otherwise there can be clashes and a lot of problems. Like these, when the operating systems use shared memory, sometimes only one process can acc ess the data at one time. So this is called concurrency. There must be some mechanisms to avoid this concurrency. In the above given two real life examples, the shared bathroom can use a lock in its door to make sure that only one person is using the bathroom at one time. In the shared streets, traffic lights can be used to make sure that only one direction is using the street and avoid the clashes. Like this, locking and synchronizations are the mechanisms that can be used to avoid concurrency in operating systems. Properties of systems with concurrency There are some properties of the systems with concurrency. Those properties are, multiple actors, shared resources and rules for accessing the resources. In the above given two real life examples, the multiple actors are people and vehicles while the shared resources become bathroom and street. The rules for accessing these shared resources are one person at one time for the bathroom and one direction for one time for the shared streets. When talking about these three properties in relating to the operating systems, it can be explained like this. Here, the multiple actors are processes within the operating system or threads in processes. Shared memory, global variables and shared devices can be taken as the examples for the shared resources property while locking and semaphores techniques become the rules for accessing the shared resources in operating systems. These are the three properties of the systems with concurrency and it helps to understand what the concurrency is. Situations with no risk of concurrency In the current computer technology, there are some situations that there is no risk of concurrency but the shared resources are accessed by more than one processes or threads at the same time. Those situations are as follows, No shared memory or communication :- Here, the processes or threads do not have shared memory or communication. So those processes or threads work only with its private memory. Shared memory with read-only access :- Here, the shared memory can be accessed by one or more processes or threads at the same time. But in this situation, the shared memory is only available for processes or threads to read-only. So the shared memory cannot be modified in this situation. Copy-on-Write (COW) :- Here, the shared memory is accessed by one or more processes or threads at the same time and each process or thread has a separate copy of the shared memory. So each process is accessing its own copy of the shared memory and there is no risk of concurrency. Situation with risk of concurrency As well as the situations with no risk of concurrency, there are some situations with risk of concurrency in the current operating systems. Those situations can be explained as follows, Using of shared memory without any synchronization :- Here, if the shared memory is accessed by more than one processes or threads at the same time without and synchronization (without having any separate copy for each process or threads), there is a risk of concurrency. Any modification to the shared memory :- If the shared memory is accessed by more than one processes or threads, and at least one of the processes or threads makes any changes to the shared memory, then there is a risk of concurrency. These are the situations with risk of concurrency. If one of these happens, then there is a risk of concurrency in the system. If a concurrency is happened, then there may be a lot of problems in the system. And the risk of happening the concurrency is known as race condition. Race condition Under this topic, the race conditions is discussed by using an example. Here, an example of a bank account is taken to discuss the race condition. In this example, there are two peoples and a bank account. Execution of the code of this example as follows, account.balance =  £200; int withdraw (account, amount =  £50){ balance = account.balance; balance -= amount; int deposit (account, amount= £100){ balance = account.balance; balance += amount; account.balance = balance; return balance; } account.balance = balance; return balance; } For this example, the two persons are named as person1 and person2. The code executed by the person1 is coloured with blue colour while the code executed by the person2 is coloured with red colour. This is a sketch of the programme but not coded with any programming language. In the very first line, the balance of the account is set to  £200. The rest of the code is explained as follows, Line 1 :- person1 starts executing the code and calls the withdraw() by giving the account and  £50 of amount as the parameters. Line 2 :- person1 reads the balance from the account class and assigns the value of balance variable in account class to his balance variable in his withdraw(). Line 3 :- person1 modifies the value of the balance variable in his withdraw() by subtracting the value of amount. So the value of the balance variable in his withdraw() becomes  £150. Line 4 :- In this line, the person2 starts executing the code by calling his deposit() by parsing account and  £100 of amount as the parameters. Line 5 :- Here, person2 reads the value of the balance variable in account class and assigns it to the balance variable in his deposit(). Here, still the value of balance variable in account class is  £200 as the person1 has not updated the balance in account class. Line 6 :- Person2 modifies the value of the balance variable by adding the value of amount variable to it. So the value of balance variable in deposit() becomes  £300. Line 7 :- person1 updates the value of the balance variable in the account class as  £150. Line 8 :- person 1 returns the value of the balance variable in withdraw() Line 9 :- person2 updates the value of the balance variable in the account class as  £300 Line 10 :- person2 returns the value of the balance variable in his deposit() After executing this code 2 peoples complete their transactions by leaving the final value of the balance variable in account class as  £300 while the real value of the balance variable in account class has to be  £250. So there is clear error in the final output of the process and this is called as the race condition. Manage concurrency Manage Synchronization means, use synchronization mechanism programs to write rues for control concurrency situations. One of these rules are as follows: Atomicity Atomicity allows one threat to access data to manipulate at a single situation. In another way, will allows no other threats to change data while one is running. This will either will lock the threat is in progress of manipulating the record or let other records to be waiting while one record access record. The other rule is conditional synchronization In this explain threats will be in a particular order to access the record. When threats arrives to access record rule will check the order and add to the queue and let wait until the turn of the threat to access the records. All above access methods will be easy to implement when can identify which is the critical part of the process should allow to access at a time. i.e. When Person A accessing account balance person B not allows to access balance at the same time. If extract further as bellow. 1.int withdraw (account, amount) { 2.int balance = account.balance; 3.balance -= amount; 4.account.balance = balance; 5.return balance; 6.} Line 1: will initialize threat and pass external parameter values into the threat withdraw as account and amount in this situation. Line 2: will declare balance variable locally to retrieve stored account balance from the database for threat to process and pass account balance in the account table account.balance. Line 3: will manipulate balance variable value (in this situation, we will deduct since it is withdrawal) from the amount has been pass form external parameter. -= notation for the deduction. Line 4: will update database with new balance value after withdrawal amount deducted from original balance. balance which is a local variable holding the new balance transfer to the account.balance and update record with new balance value. Line 5: will return new balance value to the screen if necessary Line 6: will terminate the process of withdraw by } There will be no concurrent when two threat access lines 1, 5 and 6. But if any threat try to access lines 2, 3 and 4 will be given incorrect information for one of the threats. Therefore from line 2 to 4 is very critical to let access only for one threat at any given time of the process as explain bellow. int withdraw (account, amount) { int balance = account.balance; balance -= amount;Critical Section account.balance = balance; return balance; } This identified sections will call as a critical section in another word, no other threats will allows to access while one threat is using at any given time because data will be manipulate when access line 2, 3 and 4. Critical section Critical section is set of codes access shared resources and there are several ways of developing critical section such as: Locks, Semaphores, Monitors and Messages. In this report will describe locks and semaphores how behave and how priority will work. Locks in synchronization First method of synchronization is locks. Locking is a very primitive system been used. Lock will lock the threat in the critical section while it is processing the record. Mainly lock has two stats Held and Not Held. At the Held state, one threat is in the critical section and at the Not Held state no threats in the critical section and can prioritised threats to have access. Also locks having two operations Acquire and Release. Which threat will request the lock to be held to access critical section and once threat previously use critical section release the lock acquired thread will get a chance and change the state as held. When threat finish it process in the critical section must release the lock to use by the other threats which are waiting in the queue. Figure The above figure has explain how acquire and release will behave at the critical section access, i.e. threats A, B and C request access permission to critical section at the same time by Acquire operation and threat A will grant access with the lock Held state enable. Once threat complete the process will call release operation to change the lock state to Not Held and lock will change state to Held with threat B and so on will be proceed to complete different threat request at the critical section. By using previous example take a look where to use Acquire and Release operations threat. int withdraw (account, amount) { acquire (lock); // Request lock to held to access critical section int balance = account.balance; balance -= amount;Critical Section account.balance = balance; release (lock); // Release lock after complete critical section access return balance; } With further explanation considering previous withdraw and deposit situation Figure 2. Overcome concurrency situation had occurred while both people access same account balance to manipulate the amount. Figure When implement locks use Boolean variable to check is lock held TRUE or FALSE? Acquire operation will keep other threats in the waiting state while lock held values is TRUE. If lock held VALUE is false, will change to TRUE with requested threat. When the threat completed process in critical section will call release operation and change lock held value as FALSE to make lock available for other threats will show in below construct. First create a global Boolean type variable held values TRUE or FALSE to check is lock holding by a threat or not and by default lock will not hold by any threat and value will be FALSE. structure lock { bool held; // initial value FALSE } Construct acquire by requesting a lock to be held and if lock à ¯Ã†â€™Ã‚  held value TRUE request threat will wait in the queue for lock to be released. If lock à ¯Ã†â€™Ã‚  held is FALSE and by acquire change value of lock à ¯Ã†â€™Ã‚  held to TRUE and take the control of the critical section access. void acquire (lock) { while (lock à ¯Ã†â€™Ã‚   held) ; // Hold other threats in the wait queue lock à ¯Ã†â€™Ã‚   held = TRUE; // Once get the lock, change lock value to TRUE } Construct release operation simply will change the start of lock à ¯Ã†â€™Ã‚  held value to false and allows other threat to access critical section for the next process. void release (lock) { lock à ¯Ã†â€™Ã‚   held = FALSE; // When complete process in the critical section, change lock value to FALSE } Semaphores in synchronization This is the second method of synchronization. This method is a very basic and powerful mechanism but difficult Implementation method and use blocking threats to access critical section instead of locking threats while using critical section. Semaphores has two operations and they are: wait (semaphore) or P() First of all as soon as threat request access permission P() or wait (semaphore) will decrease the counter values which is 1 by default. Then check is counter value become 0 or signal (semaphore) or V() Once a threat complete process in the critical section will call V() or signal (semaphore) and will increase counter value by 1. i.e. if a P() had decrease counter value 0 while it was in critical section and no other threats can access, but second threat has decreased to -1 while requesting permission to access critical section and waited. Also since second threat is still waiting to get permission it goes to sleep mode, hence V() will wake up threat in a sleep to start it process in critical section explains in Figure à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦. Figure à ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦Ãƒ ¢Ã¢â€š ¬Ã‚ ¦.. Figure Readers/Writers synchronization This is another powerful method of synchronization. In this method, the data is accessed by two different ways. Those two ways are, readers and writers. Here, the readers only read files and writers update file contents or data. There are four (4) rules while using the readers/writers synchronization methods and they are as follows, If any reader(s) read the file and no writer is pending, the next reader can read the file without waiting. Writers have to wait till the reader(s) finish reading file. After readers finish reading, writer(s) will can start writing. If any writer is writing to the file, acquiring readers have to wait till writer finish writing. If one writer is writing to the file and if both readers and writers are waiting, at this situation priority will be given for writers who are waiting. Therefore readers will wait till all writers to compete writing and then readers will start reading. So readers can read most updated file. Future trends of synchronization In the current situation, locks and semaphores are widely used in order to prevent the concurrency. So it is very important to deal with the codes in critical section as otherwise there will be a lot of problems with the reliability of information systems. However using of systems with the locks are not time efficiency. So in the current situation of the computer technology, there is a trend of implementing lock free systems. According to the previous example of shared street, the shared street has to be controlled by using traffic lights. So on the shared streets, only one direction is allowed at one time. So the other directions are blocked at the same time. But there is a technique that does not need of using any traffic lights on the shared street. Here, fly over technique can be used and avoid blocking the directions. So all the directions on the shared street can be used at once without having any problem. But here, this technique may has some more waiting time as the length of the street can be increased while using fly over technique. Like in this example, lock free systems can be implemented in information systems. Semaphore method can be taken as an example for lock free system. But here as well, the processes have to wait sometimes as in the give example of fly over technique on shared streets. The weakness of this method is that lock free and wait free features cannot be implemented in the same information system. So only one of these methods (lock free or wait free) can be implemented in information system.

Ken Keseys One Flew Over the Cuckoos Nest Essay -- One Flew Over the

Ken Kesey's One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest Ken Kesey's One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest is a multidimensional novel with many important messages in which Kesey strives to relay to the readers. Kesey did not write this novel for the sole purpose of entertainment, even though it was very entertaining, but did write it with the intent to show the readers many realities of life. First of all Kesey shows in this book that how people are perceived in society may not really be how that person is and that things are sometimes different than what they seem. Secondly Kesey sends the message that a single person can be significant and make a difference in other peoples lives, and finally Kesey shows readers that the spirit a person has can live on and make a difference even when that person is gone. One message relayed by Kesey is the fact that in society people who may be thought of as "good people" who are trying to help (nurse Ratched), and people who are considered "bad people" by society (McMurphy, Acutes), may in reality be the opposite of what they seem. Just because society puts a label on people doesn't necessarily mean it's true. In this novel Kesey shows the true evil of nurse Ratched. He shows in detail the way she mechanically tares the men's courage, pride and eventually all of their manhood down to nothing. She even goes so far as to driving two men to suicide. Outside of the ward the Big Nurse is perceived as a "good person" and as someone who has dedicated her life to helping others. This view of nurse Ratched is reflected in the awards won by the ward that she has total control over and also by the Public relations man who guides a group of people through the ward telling ... ...otomy and by taking away a man who was like a god to the Acutes she would regain all of her control and put fear back into the men. What she did not realize was all of McMurphy's strength, courage and spirit would stay with the men. McMurphy, even after he was gone, still gave the men the strength to stand up for themselves and not let the Big Nurse regain her control of the ward. Although Ken Kesey's One Flew Over The Cuckoo's Nest was very entertaining he also had many point to get across to the reader. Ken Kesey drove home many truths of life, such as, a single person can make a difference in other peoples lives, things aren't always what they seem, and finally that a person's spirit can live on and stay with people causing them to change in seemingly impossible situations. This book was written to be very insightful and also extremely entertaining.

Nature-Nurture Debate Essay

Introduction In this report I will examine and explain effective communication by looking at the role of effective communication and interpersonal interaction in health and social care context, theories of communication, methods of communication (verbal, non-verbal and written communication), communication cycle, what is effective communication, formal and informal communication, differences between language and culture. Communication between people enables us to exchange ideas and information, but it involves much more than simply passing on information to others. Communication helps people to feel safe, to form relationships and develop self-esteem. Poor communication can make an individual feel vulnerable, inferior and emotionally threatened. Effective communication helps us understand a person or situation, enables us to resolve differences, build trust and respect and create an warm environment. The effective communication helps us improving communication skills in everyday live, business, relationships, but also in health and social care context. Learning and understanding the effective communication skills the people can better connect with the family members, friends, co-workers (by improving teamwork), people looked after in care homes. What is effective communication Effective communication combines a set of skills including verbal and non-verbal communication, attentive listening, the ability to manage stress, the capacity to recognize and understand your own emotions and those of the person you are communicating with . Effective communication is about more than exchanging information. It requires also understanding the emotion behind the information. It enables us to communicate even negative or difficult messages without creating conflict or destroying trust. Effective communication-Methods of communication Verbal communication The basis of communication is the interaction between people. Verbal communication is the main way for people to communicate face to face. The components of the verbal communication are: sounds, words, speaking and language. Only people can put meaning into words; words alone have no meaning. As meaning is an assigned to words, language develops, which leads to the development of speaking. Over 3000 languages and major dialects are spoken in the world. The huge variety of languages creates difficulties between different languages, but even in one language there can be many problems in understanding. Speaking can be looked in two major areas: interpersonal and public speaking. To communicate effectively we must not simply clean up our language, but learn to relate to people. To be an effective communicator, one must speak in a manner that is not offending to the receiver. Listening Successful listening means not just understanding the words or the information being communicated, but also understanding how the speaker feels about what they are communicating. Effective listening can: -create an environment where everyone feels safe; -save time; -relieve negative emotions; -focus fully on the speaker, make the speaker feel heard and understood; -avoid interrupting; -show you interest. The communication cycle According to Michael Argyle(1972) skilled interpersonal interaction (social skills) involves a cycle in which you have to translate or â€Å"decode† what other people are communicating and constantly adapt you own behaviour in order to communicate effectively. Good communication involves the process of checking understanding, using reflective or active listening. The communication cycle supposes: -an idea occurs: you have an idea that you want to communicate; -message coded: you think through how you are going to say what you are thinking and you put your thoughts in to language or sign language; -message sent: you speak, or sign, or write, or send your message in some other way; -message received: the other person has to sense your message; -message decoded: the other person has to interpret or â€Å"decode† your message; -message understood: your ideas will be understood if all goes well. Non-verbal communication Non-verbal means â€Å"without words†, so non-verbal communication refers to the messages that we send without using words. We send these messages using our eyes, the tone of our voice, our facial expression, our hands and arms, the way we sit or stand. We can enhance effective communication by using open body language (arms uncrossed, standing with an open stance, maintaining eye contact with the person you are talking to). When we speak about non-verbal communication we actually mean: -posture; -the way we move; -facing other people; -gestures; -facial expression; -touch; -silence; -voice tone; -proximity; -reflective listening. As well as remembering what a person says, good listeners will make sure that their non-verbal behaviour shows interest. Skilled listening involves: -looking interested and communicating that you are ready to listen; -hearing what it is said to you; -remembering what was said to you, together with non-verbal messages; -checking your understanding with the person who was speaking to you. Written communication When people remember conversations they have had, they will probably miss out or change some details. Written statements are much more permanent and if they are accurate when they are written, they may be useful later on. Written records are essential for communicating formal information that needs to be reviewed at a future date. For the people who cannot see written scripts or who have limited vision there is a communication system known as Braille which uses raised marks that can be felt with the fingers and it’s based on the sense of touch. This system is now widely used for reading and writing by the people who cannot see written script. Theories of communication The verbal and non-verbal communication is not always straightforward. Effective communication involves a two-way process in which each person tries to understand the view point of the other person. According to Michael Argyle (1972) interpersonal communication is a skill that could be learned and developed. Skilled interpersonal communication, interaction(social skills) involve a cycle in which you have to translate or â€Å"decode† what people are communicating and constantly adapt your own behaviour in order to communicate effectively. The communication cycle involves a kind of code that has to be translated. The stages of communication cycle might be: 1. An idea occurs. 2. Message coded. 3. Message sent. 4. Message received. 5. Message decoded. 6. Message understood. Tuckman ‘s stages of group interaction Bruce Wayne Tuckman(1965) argued that communication in groups can be influenced by the degree to which people feel they belong together. Tuckman suggested that most groups go through a process involving four stages: 1. Forming refers to people meeting for the first time and sharing information. 2. Storming involves tension, struggle and arguments about the way the group may function. 3. Norming sees the group coming together and agreeing on their group values. 4. Performing means that the group will be an effectively performing group, once they have established common expectations and values. Formal and informal communication in health and social care Health and social care work often involves formal communication, which is understood by a wide range of people and shows respect for others. Usually care workers will adjust the way they speak, in order to communicate respect for different communities they address to, as the service users, visitors, colleagues. Formal communication is used in local authority social services and supposes proper English. It also shows respect for others (e.g.: if one went to a local authority social services reception desk, that person will expect to be greeted in a formal way like â€Å"Hello! How can I help you?†, and not informally, like â€Å"Hi! How’s it going?† In many situations such informal language could make people feel not being respected; so it is often risky to use informal language unless you are sure that people expect you to do so. The formal communication is also used in social care services with the manager and even between colleagues if they don’t know very well each other. Otherwise, when they know each other better, they will use informal language. Communication with people at work (between colleagues) is different, because care workers must communicate respect for each other. Colleagues, who do not show respect for each other, may fail to show respect for people who use care services. Colleagues have to develop trust in each other. It is important to demonstrate respect for confidentiality of conversation with colleagues. Care settings may have their own social expectations about the correct way to communicate thoughts and feelings. Communication between professional people and people using services involves the professionals being well aware of the need to translate technical language in to everyday language, when they work with people from other professions or people who use services. Professional people such as doctors or nurses often use their own specialised language, called jargon. It is important that people check that they are being understood correctly. Differences between language and culture Language There are many minority languages in the world. Some people grow up in multilingual communities, where they learn several languages from birth. Many people have grown up using only one language to think and communicate. People who learn a second language later in life find more difficult to express their thoughts and feelings in that language, and prefer to use their first language. Working with later languages can be difficult, as mental translation may be required. Different localities, ethnic groups, professions and work cultures have their own special words or phrases known as speech communities. Some people might feel threatened or excluded by that kind of language they encounter in these speech communities. The technical terminology used by care workers (called jargon) can also create barriers for people who are not a part of that speech community. When people who use services communicate with professionals there is always a risk of misunderstanding between people from different language communities, therefore the health and social care staff needs to check their understanding with the people communicating with them. Culture means the history, customs and ways of behaving that people learn as they grow up. People from different regions use different expressions. Also non-verbal signs may vary from culture to culture. In Europe and North America people often expect other people to look them in the eyes when talking. If a person looks down or away they think it is a sign of dishonesty, sadness or depression. On the other hand, in some other cultures (some black communities or Muslim communities) looking down or away when talking is a sign of respect. (E.g.: in social care settings a Hindu or Muslim person will not accept to be looked after by a person of the opposite sex). People from different geographical areas who use different words and pronounce words differently, they are often using a different dialect. Some social groups use slang (non standard words that are understood by other members of a social group or community, but which cannot be usually found in a dictionary). BTEC Level 3-Health and Social Care-Book 1-Beryl Stretch/Mary Whitehouse www.helpguide.org/effectivecommunication http://louisville.edu

Asses the Contribution of Functionalism to Our Understanding Essay

Functionalist views are based on that society is a system of interdependent parts held together by a shared culture or consensus. They believe that every part of society performs functions that help keep society running effectively. They use the example of a body to explain the way society runs as each part of our body has to work together in order for us to stay alive this is the same as society according to a functionalist. Education according to Emilie Durkheim (1903) consists of two main functions, creating social solidarity and teaching specialist skills. Social solidarity is the sense of being part of a group or society. Functionalists believe this is key to making education run accordingly as without social solidarity people would only self indulge in their own desires. Education helps to create social solidarity as it helps transmit societies culture, beliefs and values from ‘generation to generation‘keeping society running correspondingly. Schools also act in preparing children for society in real life by teaching the concepts of working together with people you do not always no. his links with working as in work you have to work coherently with people who you will not know. Specialist skills are having the necessary skills to perform their role in education to the ‘bride way’ towards working life. Education helps children prepare for this through teaching children in different a range of subjects which they will then come to specialise in the subjects they are good in which will in turn help them earn mon ey in society in later life. Education also according to functionalists gives all children an equal opportunity to develop on their own individual talents also known as meritocracy which is achieving through your own effort. Davis and Moore (1945) argue that education sorts children into their future educational roles by sorting their ‘aptitudes’ and ‘abilities’ which also links to social solidarity as to do certain jobs you need the necessary qualification and experience. However there are criticisms of functionalists and education. Melvin Tumin (1953) put forward a circular argument and criticises David and Moore by putting forward such questions as ‘how do we know what job is more important? ’ answer ‘because it’s highly Rewarded’ and why are some jobs higher rewarded than others? ’ answer ‘because they are more important’. Marxists believe that society only transmits the ideology of the ruling class therefore it disadvantages the working classes in education. One example is that Marxists prepare the working class for there jobs through education therefore it is only transmitting values of the ruling class. Also Marxists believe that the state is controlled by the ruling classes who transmit the ideology state apparatus which is that it maintains control through controlling people’s ideas, values and beliefs through religion, mass media and the education system. This criticises the functionalist view as social solidarity is meant to transmit these values and beliefs which according to Marxists are only means to control the working class. Meritocracy according to Marxists is a myth as we are controlled by the higher classes and we cannot achieve our status we ascribe our status. Another big criticism of functionalism in education is that functionalists believe that everybody at school behaves and accepts all that is taught when this is not the true case. It does not explain why some people come to fail examinations if everybody works in a general ‘consensus’. Dennis Wrong (1961) refers to this as ‘puppets in society’. The new right believe that the state fails to prepare the young for work as the state discourages choice and competition. Another disadvantage is that functionalists cannot explain under-achievement and inequality of opportunity in education. In conclusion Functionalism has a good general understanding of Education but it has quite obvious flaws as not everybody is going to get on in society so it is impossible to have a general consensus. Also the disadvantages of Functionalism in education seem to out weigh the positives therefore functionalism does not give a real positive understanding of education.