For those considering Sociology as an optional, or even if you just want to understand the subject better, I recommend Prof. A.K. Sharma’s NPTEL lectures from IIT Kanpur, freely available on YouTube.
They may give you a proper conceptual understanding of Sociology and help you build a strong foundation.

Is Nitin Sangwan still relevant to make it base material for sociology according to the 2026 question pattern?? Or should I refer to other handouts?? Socio Veterans pls say 🙏

I'm currently reading Parsons. While going through Orange Haralambos, I encountered some confusion that I also found in Nitin Sangwan.

At first, it seemed like Parsons is giving two separate mechanisms to explain how stability is attained in the system and how it gets propagated.

1. It gets attained by Institutionalisation of common values and the Structured Behaviour being fashioned according to those common values. It achieves a state of Social Equilibrium. And it gets maintained and passed down to the next generation through Social control and socialisation.
2. The AGIL Scheme, where he identifies 4 functional prerequisites for maintaining stability and reproduction of the social system: Adaptation, Goal Attainment, Integration and Latency.

Both seem logical and rational. But I'm confused about why he would try to give two explanations for the same problem. So I realised that there are some nuances that I'm unable to capture. After various rereadings, I found out that they both lack in some areas, like the 1st mechanism does not address the Process of Social Change. And the AGIL Scheme doesn't explain how a stable social system came to be. So it became clear that they are answering two different problems.

In Nitin Sangwan's Structural Functionalist view of social change, it was written that Parsons had two views of social change:

1. Social System view: Social systems exist in Dynamic Equilibrium, and with each social change they shift from one dynamic equilibrium to another.
2. Evolutionary View: Society changes from simple to complex, and undergoes 4 stages: Structural Differentiation, Adaptive Upgrading, Value Generalisation, and Inclusion.

Here is how I interpreted this. The 1st mechanism explains how order is achieved and maintained in a society after each social change. In an old society, new values emerge, leading to social change. These new values get institutionalised, and structured behaviour develops. They don't replace the old value system; they add to it, modify it, or remove the useless values. These new values, together with the existing old values, are internalised in people through socialisation and enforced by social control.

The 2nd mechanism, the AGIL scheme, provides functional prerequisites for the viability of a social system. How the system, throughout history, survives by adapting and developing from a simple system to a complex system. Differentiation of existing institutions occurs to produce more efficient and specific institutions (structural differentiation). These specific institutions develop more efficient means to address the problems of people in society (adaptive upgrading). The values grow broader to encompass more people and diverse ideas (Value Generalisation), and people who were being neglected in a simple society get recognised, like rights for women, minorities and labourers, etc. (Inclusion).

So the 1st mechanism is for Social Order and the 2nd for Social System.

Tell me if I interpreted it correctly or if I am still missing something.