The history and ideas of sociological functionalism: Talcott Parsons, modern sociological theory, and the relevance for OR

During the first half of the 20th century Talcott Parsons developed his social theory of functionalism. His synthesis of the insights of Durkheim, Webber, and others provided the corner stone for his “grand theory.” Parsons’ functionalism takes the form of a schema or descriptive framework of society, its component parts, and the interactions between them. Post-WW2 the new framework was widely welcomed by the growing army of researchers conducting empirical research into social phenomena, but it was fiercely criticised by social theorists. As a consequence, new variants of functionalism were developed, existing programmes were re-examined, and new schools evolved. This article first describes functionalism and examines some current schools of social theory in relation to it. Then it examines the use made of social theory by OR researchers to develop an understanding of the context of OR interventions, underpin the development of OR methods, provide methods and frameworks for empirical research, inform and motivate critique of OR practice and research, and contribute to sociology. This article demonstrates that functionalism offers a point of entry for OR researchers intent on gaining an understanding of social theories, a notoriously difficult subject on which all sociological theorising is founded.