e or another representative. Society as an integrated entity supersedes the individual consciousness of particular persons or groups within the whole.
Now of course there are deviations from this description, for according to Durkheim, the larger consciousness informs and in part determines the development of individuals within it. Crime, or homicide, would be one example of deviation. So is suicide, and Durkheim devotes an entire volume to the discussion of suicide in modern industrial society. Suicide is a consequence of an "everlastingly repeated . . . nature to be eternally dissatisfied, constantly to advance, without relief or rest, toward in indefinite goal" (Durkheim 257). But the functionalism view is of the bigger picture; what does one more suicide really matter after all in a structured society? In other words, the complex functioning of society itself always overtakes the vicissitudes of individual psychology or expression. This basic position is reflected throughout the functionalism discourse.
For functionalists, the position of the individual in society is measured either mechanically or organically, but always in relation to the society as integrated organism. To varying degrees, Radcliffe-Browne and Parsons take this view. In other words, functionalism's main assumption is that individuals have a mutual interest in the coherence of social units and subunits. That is where Durkheim's view of the division of labor comes into play. This concept operates as a natural law governing human interaction. As interaction becomes more complex and labor divisions become more specialized, the moral structures of society tend toward an organic collective conscience, because no single person or group can provide for all its wants and needs. Rather, individual elements of a society rely upon one another and so constitute the integrated society itself. In other words, a fully developed society itself is characterized by complex div...