Functionalists see society as built on harmony and consensus and free from major conflict. Functionalists see policies as helping families to perform their functions more effectively and make life better.
Ronald Fletcher (1966) argues that the introduction of heath, education and housing policies in the years since the industrial revolution has generally led to the development of a welfare state that supports the family in performing its functions more effectively.
The functionalists view has been criticised on two main counts:
-It assumes that all members of the family benefit from social policies, whereas feminists argue that policies often benefit men at the expense of women.
-It assumes that there is a 'march of progress' with social policies steadily making family life better and better, whereas Marxists argue that policies can also turn the clock back and reverse progress previously made, for example by cutting welfare benefit to poor families.
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