Sociology of Work and Organisations - Essay Example

In this conceptualisation, these sociologists also defined the working and relationships of these variables in their conceptual framework. This in turn provided the sociologists with a framework that that oriented them towards a particular philosophical position (Watson, 2008). Today’s sociologists use three theoretical perspectives to understand how a society influences its people. These perspectives are: symbolic interactionist perspective, functionalist perspective and last but not the least conflict perspective.

These perspectives give sociologist the pertinent frameworks to understand how a society influences its people (Beckert, 2009). The first perspective that is the symbolic interactionist perspective, find its roots from the theory given by Max Weber’s. According to Weber’s, an individual understands the world by interpreting the means of the symbols surrounding him. After deciphering the meanings of these symbols, an individual plans his actions accordingly. Symbols can be anything which has a meaning associated with it and needs someone to decipher that meaning.

Conversation, music, brail etch all are symbols which require the audience to decode them (Cuff, Sharrock, and Francis, 2003). In can of financial markets, potential symbols can be the securities which are trade in these markets, the prices of these securities, the sentiments of the overall market, the trading company’s financial books and etc (Donaghy and Clarke, 2003). All these are subjects, which require people or participant of the sock markets to interpret them. Since they carry an intrinsic meaning that creates their utility in the environment, therefore it becomes necessary for the participant of these financial markets to decipher them.

Moreover, the extent to which the participants of these financial markets are successful in deciphering these subjects will decide the current and future profitability of the participants (Erikson and Goldthorpe, 2002). The second perspective that is the functional perspective also known as functionalism, says that different aspects of the society are not at all autonomous but rather they are heavily interdependent on one another. According to this perspective, a society is like a human body; every part of which is connected with every other part of the body.

In case any part of the body stops functioning, other parts of the body will also start to suffer the negative impacts of this malfunctioning. Similarly, a financial market is not completely responsible for the events that happen in it (Knorr-Cetina, 2005). These financial markets are a part of a broader institutional framework, in which other institutions are also involved. Events and circumstances which define the working of these institutions directly or indirectly effect things happen inside a financial market.

For example the world’s stock markets saw a massive plunge in the stock prices of their listed securities, just because the construction industry underwent a spiral. So, this shows that a negative or positive event in one institute has the potential to impact the dynamics and functionality of another institute. Necessary condition in this argument is that these institutes are part of the same social fabric (Knorr-Cetina, and Brugger, 2000). The third sociological perspective is conflict perspective. This