The most influential conceptualizations of the term have been those of Talcott Parsons, stemming from his The Structure of Social Action, 1937, and finding recent expression in ‘An Outline of the Social System’, in Talcott Parsons , Theories of Society, 1961. Parson’s discussion of this issue has two main aspects

First, what is called the problem of social order; i.e. the nature of the forces giving rise to relatively stable forms of social interaction and organization, and promoting orderly change. Parsons took Thomas Hobbes’s Leviathan, 1651, as his point of departure in this part of his analysis. Hobbes had maintained that man’s fundamental motivation was the craving for power and that men were always basically in conflict with each other. Thus order could only consist in strong government. To counter this Parsons invoked the work of Max Weber and, in particular, Durkheim, who had placed considerable emphasis on the functions of normative factors in social life, such as ideals and values. Factors of this kind came to constitute the mainspring in Parson’s delineation of social system. Thus in his major theoretical work, The Social System, 1951, he defines a social system as consisting in ‘a plurality of individual actors interacting with each other in a situation which has at least a physical or environmental aspect, actors who are motivated in terms of a tendency to the “optimization of gratification” and whose relations to their situations, including each other, is defined and mediated in terms of a system of culturally structured and shared symbols’. The major units of a social system are said to be collectivities and roles (i.e. not individuals as such); and the major patterns or relationships linking these units are values (ends or broad guides to action) and norms (rules governing role performance in the context of system values).

A social system, according to Parsons, has the following characteristics:

It involves an interaction between two or more actors, and the interaction process is its main focus.

Interaction takes place in a situation, which implies other actors or alters. These alters are objects of emotion and value judgment and through them goals and means of action are achieved.

There exists in a social system collective goal orientation or common values and a consensus on expectations in normative and cognitive (intellectual) senses.

Parson’s second major interest has been to make sociology more scientific and systematic, by developing abstract conceptions of the social system; one of his points being that even though Weber placed much emphasis upon normative factors as guiding action, there was in Weber’s sociology no elaboration of a theoretically integrated total system of action. Hence the attempt to combine in one framework both a conception of actors in social situations and an overall, highly abstract, ‘outside’ view of the major factors involved in a social system as a going concern.

Various points in Parson’s formulation have been criticized. Notably, objections have been made to the emphasis upon normative regulation, and it has been alleged that Parsons neglects social conflict under the pressure of his systematic perspective; i.e. preoccupation with systemness and analytical elegance blinds the sociologist to dissensus in real life and spurs him to stress integrative phenomena in his analyses. However, it is widely agreed that sociologists should operate with some clearly defined conception of what constitutes a social system. Thus, for many sociologists the term social system is not by any means restricted to those situations where there is thought to be binding normative regulation; but in order to qualify as ‘social’ a system must involve a common focus, or set of foci, of orientations and a shared mode of communication among a majority of actors. Thus on this basis there can be a system of conflict.

Types Of Structures Of Social Systems

Parsons has dealt primarily with four types of structures of social systems in his sociological analysis. These are the economic system, the family system, the political system and the personality system.

Ideas about dilemmas of role expectations and role performance enunciated in the form of pattern variables and formulation of functional prerequisites, taken together would further our knowledge of societies significantly. We find that it helps us to identify different types of structures of social systems, their social characteristics and their place in society. We can identify social systems not just theoretically, , but empirically as well.

In his book The Social System (1951), Parsons mentions many types of empirical (i.e., that which can be observed in the field [societies] and can be verified) social systems with different clustering of social structures. Parsons made a distinction between the concept of social system and social structure. Social system is manifested through the totality of the principles through which roles and related elements of social interaction are organized. Social structure, on the other hand, reflects the specific manner in which these roles in an interaction situation are configurated or composed together. For instance, family is a social system but its social structure can be seen in the empirical clustering of kinship roles.

Similarly, the economic system can be treated as another example of a social system, but its social structure is characterized by roles related to production, marketing, management, etc. Pattern variables illustrate in a precise manner the principal types of clustering of social structures. Parsons mentions four such types

•          The universalistic-achievement pattern
•          The universalistic-ascription pattern
•          The particularistic-achievement pattern
•         The particularistic-ascription pattern

The Universalistic-Achievement Pattern is a type of structure of social system in whose roles those value-orientations are dominant, which encourage achievement based on legal rational methods among members of a society. It exemplifies modern industrial societies where the governing values are those of equality, democracy, freedom of enterprise, rational management and openness in social interactions. Divisions of society based on caste, ethnicity or other particularistic values do not go well with this social system. The nearest example of this types of structure of a social system, in Parsons’ opinion, would be the America society.

The Universalistic-Ascription Pattern  is yet another type of configuration of roles which makes a kind of social system in which values of legal rationality are encouraged in performance of roles but the distribution of authority is not on the basis of equality or democracy. Modern principles of science and technology are employed in work and occupation, in industry and communication but the distribution of these takes place on ascriptive principles, such as membership to a particular ideological association, or party, or cult. Parsons believes that Nazi Germany is an example of one such society.

German social structure during the Nazi regime manifested a peculiar combination of rational methods of organisation of roles in industries, management and productive institutions but discriminated between those who, according to them symbolized ideal qualities of German people such as white Nordic races, and those that did not, namely the Jews. There could be other examples drawn from other periods of social history as well.

The Particularistic-Achievement Pattern is a type of social structure, according to Parsons, is best seen in the classical Chinese society. This society was dominated by values of ‘familism’. By ‘familism’ we mean the notion of continuity with ancestors (ancestor worship), strong ties of kinship, but where the female line of descent was undermined in favour of male. This led to an overall female subordination in that society. it was based on a configuration of roles in which occupation, authority, management, etc. were organised not on universalistic principles but on particularistic ones.

Of all the particularistic principles in operation in traditional or classical Chinese society birth and kinship were emphasized the most. But at the same time, the society also emphasized achievement and a “code of propriety” in the conduct of roles, which was equivalent to legal rationality (universalistic principle). All these features were contained in Confucianism, which was the official ethic in classical China. The dominance of universalism along with the ascription principle can be seen in the recruitment of civil servants in China. Entrance into these services was based on competitive examinations, which only those candidates who conformed to the official ethic could take.

The Particularistic-Ascription Pattern refers to such types of social structures in which the roles are organised in terms of values, which are associated with kinship, birth and other ascriptive features. In social structures of this kind, achievement through individual effort is not encouraged. Work, in this type “is considered as a necessary evil just as morality is a necessary condition of minimum stability” says Talcott Parsons.

Overwhelming emphasis, in this kind of society, is placed on expressive or artistic orientations. Society is traditionalistic as thee is no incentive to disturb tradition and a strong vested interest exists in favour of stability. In Parsons’ view the “Spanish American” in the USA exemplify this type of social structure. But one can also debate whether traditional Indian caste society had features, which were particularistic-ascriptive, or not.