La moral y los valores vistos por los niños

The research employed structural functional approach as the framework of analysis.

Structural functionalism has been found useful in the comparison of political system. In the 1960s political scientist like Gabriel Almond and Bingham Powell further develop their approach in their work “comparative politics: A developmental approach (1966)”.

Almond and his group argued that all political systems, regardless of their type must perform a specific set of task if they are to remain in existence as system in working order or in equilibrium. That is; to say an on-going system.

In this approach, the focus of attraction is the structures and functions.

Structures are patterned behaviour and they are not formalized and located in concrete institutions. Functions on the other hand, are the relevant consequences of activity and relevance is traced to the system of which the activity generating unit is an integral component. In structural functional analysis, one identifies the important structures and then seeks to discover their functions.

Moreover, Gabriel Almond defines the political system as a special system of interaction that exists universally in all societies performing the functions of interaction and adaptation by means of employment or threat of

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employment, of more or less legitimate physical comparison (1966:176 - 77). “Legitimate force is the thread that runs through the input and outputs of the political system, giving its special quality and salience and its coherence as a system”. The political systems in structural–functional analysis are systematic whole that influence the existence of boundaries.

The basic units of structural functional analysis are “roles” not individuals.

At its most basic level, the model of structural functionalism posits that a political system is made up of institutions (Structures) such as interest groups, political parties, the executive, legislative and judicial branches of government and bureaucratic machinery.

However, for Almond, a fuller understanding of political system emerges only when one begins to examine how institutions act within the political process. As he described it, interest groups serve to articulate political issues, parties then aggregate and express them in coherent and meaningful way, government in turn enacts public policies to address them, and bureaucracies finally regulate and adjudicate them.

Furthermore, in a more elaborate way, Almond argued that all political systems must perform two sets of basic functions viz. the input functions and output functions. The input functions are political socialization and recruitment, interest-articulation, interest-aggregation and political communication. Political socialization refers to the process by which a society inculcated civic virtue, or the habit of effective citizenship. While

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recruitment on the other hand, denotes the process by which a political system generates interest, engagement and participation from citizens. As regards the interest aggregation functions are performed by legislative bodies, political executives, bureaucracies, media communication, party system, interest groups etc. This will provide durable links between elite and masses. And lastly, political communication all functions in the political system are performed by means of communication. The agents of political socialization perform their functions through communication.

Legislator enacts laws on the basis of information communicated to them and by communicating with one another and with other elements of the political system. The bureaucrats revive and analyze the information.

The output functions, Almond makes a threefold classification of governmental output functions which are associated with policy making and implement. The three authoritative governmental functions are rule making, rule application and rule adjudication. They refer to the traditional separation of power functions.

The legislative (rule-making), the executive (rule-application) and the judiciary (rule-adjudication).

According to Almond, the functions of any political system may also be viewed in terms of its capabilities defined as “the way it performs as a unit in its environment”.

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Almond formulations have been failed like any other socio-political phenomenon in the sense that it is culture bound, since the functions attributed to the political system are very closely modeled on western political system. Secondly, its emphasis on system maintenance by which it is said to be status quo-oriented and therefore conservative.

However, the relevance of this framework to this study cannot be overemphasize in the sense that its analysis of how different institutions performs their functions in the political system. For instance, the legislature as a branch of government is constituted through electoral process.

Conventionally, therefore, this institution is structured to perform the functions of law making representation and conduct oversights activities.

These functions are essentially central to the realization of political parties and democratic governance which involve (among other things) political equality, accountability, human rights, liberties and public deliberations.

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CHAPTER THREE

PARTY POLITICS AND DEMOCRATIC GOVERNANCE IN NIGERIA’S FOURTH REPUBLIC: AN ASSESSMENT 3.1 INTRODUCTION

This chapter is concerned with the interpretations of data elicited from sampling frame (i.e. respondents). The information or data was collected through the means of questionnaire distribute to them.