Social Change and Social Systems *

Social systems are going concerns through which actors adapt to their environment, attain goals, integrate their activities, maintain boundaries, and manage tension. The two patterns, the external and the internal, represent selections from the structural-functional whole which comprises a given social system. In few American social systems is the element of space more important than among sects which organize their activities on a territorial basis and prohibit the use of modern transportation. Authority is the right, as determined by the social system, to control others, whereas influence is non-authoritative. Capitalistic societies, which form an important stage in world social development, create two major systems or classes—a "propertyless wage earners&s; class" which includes most of the masses, and a small class called bourgeoisie which owns and controls the facilities. The process whereby the proposed change is evaluated as "rightful" in the target system is legitimation.