The downfalls caused by lack of cooperation within Cape Canaveral shuttle program Essay

Association to duties) of another. It reinforced a healthy dose of functional dependence which led to care for one another. For example, the education system (disregarding largescale capitalism) supports society by assuring that there will be future generations of engineers, doctors, teachers, etc,. It is a cycle which would not be possible without individual roles including teachers to allowed educational progression, construction workers to build facilities, faculty and staff to make immediate decisions and overlook schools, and a board of education on the political level to ensure educational guidelines are met and regulated. Educational systems alone are a microcosm of the larger scale society in which it operates. 

APPLYING

The structural functionalist can easily analyze and make sense of the problems that came along with the loss of the shuttle program in Cape Canaveral. One would immediately see the lack of cooperation between individuals (possibly corporations as this is a larger scale local issue) that resulted in the downfall of this beneficial program. Since there was a strict process and hierarchical assembly of people that made decision within NASA it would seem that the problem, at least to Durkheim, would be a lack of cooperation from the national government. Why is this a problem? The government has the final say in how the program operates, if it operates at all. With this sort of power the immediate community is at a standstill. Imagine that NASA headquarters is the heart of the working community in Cape Canaveral. Without the command from the brain (higher government) the heart cannot allow blood (smallerlevel commands) to flow. This creates local problems as drafting, construction, and even cleaning companies are now halted until funding returns. The cause of this sort of problem is a lack of involvement from higher powers to reform the safety regulations that halted the shuttle program. Without this allowance there is a delay in the ability to build new space vehicles which halted funding meaning that many employees were no longer useful to the company.

The body suffered as a result as limbs were being cut off. NASA recently contracted SpaceX, a private company, as an effort to keep space exploration in the Cape Canaveral area. An attempt that could possibly reinstate and create new jobs (spacex.com). The good that comes out of these efforts is that it brought in jobs but it didnt necessarily help those who were let go, as most were only contract jobs. No new ventures were established and no new goals were created. The shuttle program was a major cog that connected local businesses and skilled workers to the larger system.The functionalist, it seems, would feel the need to create a new program entirely in order to keep a healthy level of interdependence within small community. This is the way small villages work. The head of the community has a large say in the way things work but as the head he is primarily concerned with the quality of life which his people experience.