Homelessness Analysis

Food, water, clothing, and shelter are among the very basic and most important needs that a person requires in order to survive. When a person is homeless, they struggle to obtain all four of these basic need on a daily basis. There is not one single cause of homelessness. There are number of factors that can cause or contribute to a person becoming homeless. Some of these contributing factors include poverty, physical and mental illness, substance abuse, and domestic violence. In the following paragraphs we will look at homelessness through the conflict and functionalist perspectives. *Add summarizing line here.

Homelessness is not a simple to define term. While some may view homelessness as living on the street, this a very narrow definition

of the term. A person can be considered homeless if they do not have regular housing of their own (Bates 2013). This definition would includes people who temporary live in motels, are staying at another person's home or in a shelters in addition to those who are living on the living in a place that is not designed to house a person (Lane 2014)
There is not one single cause of homelessness.

There are number of factors that can cause or contribute to a person becoming homeless. Some of these contributing factors include poverty, physical and mental illness, substance abuse, and domestic violence (Lane 2014).

In conflict theory, society is in a constant struggle for power. A person or a group is in conflict with others to get a societies resources. Those who are homeless do not have access to these resources. Power and class structure is important to understand conflict theory. Those at the top of the class system have the bigger share of societies resources. They are the ones who have the power. Those who have very little of societies resources are at the bottom and have now power.

Karl Marx, an influence on conflict theory, would view this in terms of a capitalist system.Homelessness is a result of the class structure. The ruling class, or bourgeois have control of the labor force. "The labor and the product only help add to the wealth or power of the employer." (Marx & Engels 1963) Poverty is caused by capitalism, wealth and power belong to those in control of the capitalist system. The homeless are those who suffer the most from this class

structure.
In conflict theory, we can look at health care as one of society's resources. Individuals in higher up in the class structure have better access health care and more likely to receive treatment for both physical and mental illness. People in poverty have a higher chance of becoming sick and once sick, substandard care makes it increasingly difficult to improve their health (Barkan).
If we look at domestic violence through a conflict perspective we could say that with in this relationship there is a struggle of resources. The abusive partner will often take control over financial resources like money or shared property. The abusive partner will often threaten to take emotional resources from the abused. For example the abuser may threaten to keep the children away from the abused. Additionally, domestic violence could look at this through conflict theorist C.Wright Mills' theory of The Sociological Imagination "It is the political task of the social scientist, as of any liberal educator, continually to translate personal troubles into public issues, and public issues into the terms of their human meaning for a variety of individuals." (Mills )While domestic violence is an intimate and personal trouble within a relationship it is also very much a public issue.