You are enjoying dinner after a hard days work and the phone rings. You pick it up and some mechanical voice asks you to hold. The voice runs through a programmed version of how you can now save more money than ever on long distance calls. You listen; then hang up the phone to resume your meal. How functional is this? Well Telemarketing is a booming industry within the United States. One only has to stay home on any given night to have this point proven. This paper will show that out of the three major theoretical perspectives in sociology (Functionalist, Conflict, and integrationist) the functional perspective best describes the boom in telemarketing over the recent years. .
The functionalist approach is simple. According to Talcott Parsons, a Harvard University sociologist, and key figure in developing the functionalist theory, "If an aspect of social life does not contribute to a society's stability or survival-if it does not serve some identifiably useful function or promote value consensus among members of a society-it will not be passed on from one generation or the next (Schaefer, 15)." This simply means that as long as something is serving a useful purpose in society it will be passed from one generation to the next. To look at the purpose telemarketers serve, let's first define telemarketing. Telemarketing is defined, according to investorwords.com, as: "The act of selling, soliciting or promoting a product or service over the telephone." If we go back to the Parson's definition of functionalist perspective, one can easily see that Telemarketing is connected to something invaluable to our society the telephone. The connection is direct and distinct. Therefore telemarketing is solidly in our lives because if we have a phone, (as the majority of us do right now in America), telemarketers have access. This access is both personal and private. Thus promoting personal selling in the privacy of your own home.
