Conflict Theory and Sociology

Employer/Employee Relationship Issues

The issue that the author of this paper will discuss is employer/employee relations. This issue is an important one for many different reasons. Firstly, the history of labor relations is really the history of civilized society. There has always been tension between the working class and their employers who frequently exploit them. As such, this is a timeless issue that is much more worthy for the author to address than some of the fleeting issues of technology or collegiate cliques that the author could have chosen to analyze.

The functionalist perspective is highly important to examining employer/employee relations. This viewpoint would maintain that relations between employers and their employees provides a critical function in society. Specifically, those who embrace a functionalist perspective would state that it is necessary to have a relationship for these two classes of people in order for society to properly function (Mooney et al., 2007). The core of that relationship is based on the fact that there are those who need to get work done, and their there are those who are willing to labor to complete that work in order to provide for themselves.

Furthermore, the two different roles in employee/employer relationships help to provide critical functions for society as well, those who adhere to this notion would argue. Employers function as a means of using jobs to those who need them. Granting jobs to those who need money is the explicit function that employers provision to society. Therefore, relations between employers and employees need to exist in such a way that employers can continue to provide this function. As such, employers are authoritarian in their role in the labor relations -- which is required of a society in which a certain function is needed to employ people.

Additionally, there are certain cultural ramifications that those who follow the functionalist perspective of society would attribute to employer and employee relationships. Specifically, training is frequently administered at different jobs in which employers teach employees the necessary skills to succeed. In this respect, employer/employee relations are providing another function for society: the means of disseminating knowledge and helping the very culture of society to progress through learning.

Those who approach the subject of employer/employee relations through the perspective of conflict theory would have a decidedly different viewpoint than those who approach it from a functionalist perspective. The former viewpoint is based on the notion that conflict is an inherent part of society. Additionally, this theory contends that one of the reasons that conflict is necessary is because it helps society to evolve and to ultimately achieve more than it could with the absence of conflict (Iowa, 2016). Thus, those who utilize conflict theory would tend to emphasize some of the tension and points of conflict that traditionally exist -- and which still persist -- between employers and employees.

To their credit, it is easy to determine the validity of this sociological perspective -- especially as it applies to employer/employee relations. The central conflict between these two groups is that the former is exploiting the labor of the latter. Labor exploitation is a natural consequence of capitalism; it makes sense to move U.S. Jobs overseas to pay people in India nine cents an hour than to keep the jobs domestically and pay yearly salaries and benefits packages for them.

The conflict theory perspective of employer/employee relations would posit the fact that conflict is essential to change that degree of exploitation, and make it better. Therefore, conflict is needed in this relationship in the form of strikes, protests, and the passing of childhood labor laws, etc. in order to address the social ill of labor exploitation.

Interactionism is the sociological perspective that states that society and social issues are the result of social interaction. In this respect it is somewhat like conflict theory because it agrees that there are different social groups that interact with each other. Unlike conflict theory, however, the interactionist perspective does not state that those interactions are always centered on conflict. Instead, it supposes that different groups can work together to achieve social gains, for example, or simply interact in other ways that do not involve conflict.

The interactionism perspective would view the relationship between employers and employees as one that is vital to the livelihood of each of these groups. Those who follow it would likely pose the notion that the interaction of these two groups is critical to benefiting both of them. Moreover, he or she would agree with the notion that there are certain cultural and developmental benefits associated with that action, and that without the exchange of ideas and information between these two groups those benefits would not exist.