THE CONTRIBUTION OF ROBERT MERTON TO SOCIOLOGY.
Introduction
Sociology is the study of social life, social changes, and social causes and outcomes of human behavior. Robert Merton’s passion for sociology made him have an interest in the interactions and significance between social and cultural structures and science. Merton contributed to sociology by developing the self-fulfilling prophecy, the middle-range theories, manifest and latent functions, and crime. He also made contributions towards social consequences, culture and structure, theories on deviance, and the strain between culture and social structure.
The self-filling prophecy concept is a type of process through which a belief impacts the outcome of a situation or the way an individual or a group will behave. Sometimes a belief brings out consequences that make the reality match the belief. Individuals who are at the center of the self-fulfilling prophecy do not understand that their beliefs were the cause of the consequences that they expected or feared (Stukas & Snyder 2016). These prophecies can involve intrapersonal and interpersonal processes meaning that a person’s belief affects their behavior and a person’s belief affects another person’s behavior respectively. An example of an intrapersonal self-fulfilling prophecy is the placebo effect; expecting a spouse to cheat contributes to the spouse cheating. Self-fulfilling processes can manifest in many ways but Merton’s interest was understanding how it plays out in racial bias and discrimination. He noted that people with racial bias were likely to treat people from other races in a manner that confirmed their bias. An example of this is, the people who thought that people of color were less in terms of intelligence avoided talking to them and gave no opportunity to prove the racist individual wrong. Unfortunately, the whole group is considered to be intelligently inferior and is denied the same opportunities as the others which would allow them to build their knowledge and improve their capabilities.
The middle-range theory is an approach that is aimed at integrating theory and empirical research. It is used in sociology to guide empirical inquiry (Kaidesoja 2018). They involve abstractions but are close to observed data which is incorporated in propositions that allow empirical testing. Middle range theories deal with restricted factors of social phenomena as shown by their labels. They are intermediate to universal theories of social systems that are too remote from specific classes of social behavior, organization, and change to justify what is observed and to the organized descriptions of specifics that are not general. The empirical raw materials of social inquiry change with time due to the vigorous social mechanisms. People tend to be familiar with social regularities and are therefore capable of changing them. Through the intended and unintended mechanisms, these transformations happen frequently.
The manifest and latent functions can be defined as an outcome of people’s actions. These actions could either be a latent function or a manifest function in any social association. Latent functions are those functions that are not intended or are not recognized outcomes of any social pattern. Manifest functions are those functions that are intended, cognizant or thoughtful functions of the social guidelines which are developed for the society’s advantage (Mathieu 2018). Manifest functions are normally anticipated to be satisfied. An example is, it is expected for a hospital to take care of the sick. A latent function example can again be that in a hospital when doctors somehow save a sick person who is ailing from an incurable disease by discovering a way to treat the patient. In the manifest function, the actor knows of the outcomes of their action whereas, in the latent function, the actor does not know the outcome of their actions.
Manifest functions are beneficial since the actor is aware of their actions. On the other hand, latent functions could be beneficial or harmful to society mainly because the actor is not aware of the consequences. Latent functions tend to turn into dysfunctions in some cases. Dysfunctions are the latent functions that cause damage to society, creating social chaos and conflicts (Mathieu 2018). They are often not noticed unless they are functions or dysfunctions that result in negative consequences. The latent dysfunctions are of more concern because they are unpredictable and not known which makes them more harmful to the society which is often irreversible.
The unintended or unanticipated consequences of actions include those that are functional for a designated system, those that are dysfunctional for a designated system, and those that are not relevant to the system because they do not have functional consequences. An unanticipated consequence could influence future actions (Zwart 2015). They are important at the micro-level as social actors are mistaken in interpreting the situation and their action result in unanticipated consequences. Anticipating the outcomes of purposive action is significant for policymakers but they frequently fail. A change in the real world shows that the ability for people to anticipate the impacts of purposive action has improved with time. Policymakers now have more facts and theories to work with. Merton maintained that if unintended effects are anticipated, they are a different phenomenon because they follow from purposive choice unlike the unanticipated effects from ignorance, mistakes, and conceptual blindness.
The strain theory according to Merton argues that crime happens when there is a lack of opportunities that are legit for individuals to accomplish the goals in a society (Bernburg 2002). In this case, there is a strain between the goals and the way of achieving them which makes individuals turn to crime for them to accomplish these goals. Merton maintained that the cultural system in America was made to provide equal opportunities to each person despite their class, gender, or ethnicity. It encouraged the people to follow a goal of success through a legitimate way which is education and employment. Not everyone was able to attain these goals because of the structural organization which did not distribute the means to achieve the goals fairly.
Merton developed the concept of anomie to explain this imbalance between cultural goals and institutionalized means (Bernburg 2002). He maintained that such an imbalanced society generates anomie whereby there is a strain between the goals and the means which generate unfulfilled goals. When people are faced with a gap between their goals, mostly finances, and their current status there is an occurrence of a strain. To adapt to this strain, people adapt through conformity whereby they pursue cultural goals through socially appropriate means. Others adapt through innovation by using ways that are not socially approved to obtain culturally approved goals. Another adaptation is ritualism which is done by using the same means that is socially approved to acquire less elusive goals. Other people adapt through retreatism whereby they reject the cultural goals and the means of achieving it and then find a way to escape it. Other people adapt by rebelling whereby they reject the cultural goals and means, then work towards replacing them.
Merton observed that a higher proportion of acquisitive crime is committed by people who are from minor social classes. He outlined that American society encouraged material achievements as a legitimate objective and focused on self- discipline and putting more effort as the means to achieve that goal. This was with the notion that anyone regardless of their social class could acquire material success. Merton argued that the people who were from the lower social classes could not achieve this dream because the legitimate opportunities were not available to them (Bernburg 2002).
Those that did not acquire success legitimately were judged for not working hard. These circumstances force people to succeed illegitimately to avoid the brand of a failure. He maintained that America was an imbalanced and divided society that encouraged accomplishments that could not be realistically achieved by every person. Many people desired to achieve material success but they could only commit a crime for that to be possible. So it’s not about the imperfections of a person that make them commit a crime but relatively anomie in the society which is caused by the pressure to have material success and the lack of legitimate opportunities to acquire that success.
Conclusion
Merton’s contribution to sociology enlightens us more about society, changes, consequences, and social structures. Among the contributions he made was through the self-filling prophecy concept which shows how a belief impacts the outcome of a situation. The middle-range theory which is used to guide empirical research is another concept. He also contributed by the manifest and latent functions which explain the intended and unintended functions and their impact on society. He used the strain theory to show how unequal society is when it comes to achieving their goals and how they adapt when they are faced with this gap
References
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