Arvin De Jesus
Professor John Orth
SO 223
January 28, 2023
Chapter 1 Summary
What is a Social Problems?
Social Problems is consisting of multiple issues in the society such as crime, poverty,
lack of medical care, violence, drug abuse, and other situations. The main sociological methods
for understanding the social problems are studied from a functionalist, conflict, as well as
interactionist viewpoints.
In the society, people are given status based on their jobs. People who worked at the
hospitals or any medical group companies are considered as healthcare workers. While teachers,
professors, and coaches of any kinds are placed as educators. People from the social status are
expected to play their designated role. If people disobeyed or did not behave accordingly to their
roles in society, then it becomes into a problem. People, laws, economy, and societies are always
changing and never constant; people whose minds are unchanged and unadopted can cause
problems in the society. When this problem spread to other organization and social group, it
becomes a social problem.
The conflict views first started with Karl Marx. Marx tried to prove that problems such as
poverty, crime, and war are not because of people or their organizations. He believes that these
social issues are caused by capitalism. Marx mentioned that capitalist are compelled by the
profits of their companies and do not care about the workers situations. Bosses do not care if
people will lose their jobs if it means that they will save more money and gain more by building
factories run by machinery. Situations like this creates a problem because many people will be
jobless and can increase the numbers in poverty and homelessness.
The final view is the interactionist perspective. Some social roles or people are seen more
superior than others. In the labeling theory, the deviant and nondeviant people differs from each
other by what they do and how the society views it. For example, criminals of different colors
with the same offence are treated differently. Black criminals are sentenced much longer that
someone that is white. This becomes a problem because if a group is labelled negatively, then
that group will encounter problems such as discrimination. People who are labelled negatively by
the society will have difficulties getting rid of the label that was put on them eventually falling
into its negativity. For example, if a person made a mistake of shoplifting, the person could be
labelled as a criminal. As a result, depending on how the society see and treats the person, the
person could be forced into following the acts of a criminal.
