Breaking down the question
The instruction is “evaluate”, which is decisive for a ten-mark answer. The question is not asking for a description of stratification but for a judgement on a specific claim — that stratification performs a positive function for society as a whole. The answer must therefore present the functionalist case, weigh the principal objections against it, and arrive at a defensible conclusion rather than sitting on the fence.
The phrasing “functional for society” points straight to the Davis and Moore thesis and the debate it provoked. A candidate should recognise that the claim is a normative and analytical one about social benefit, and that its most famous critics did not deny that stratification exists but denied that it is beneficial or inevitable in the form the functionalists described. Given the limited word budget, precision matters: state the thesis crisply, then let one or two sharp criticisms do the evaluative work.
How to approach it
Structure the answer as claim, critique, judgement. Open with the functionalist argument in its strongest form so that the evaluation has something substantial to test. Then deploy the classical criticisms, keeping each tight. Close with a balanced verdict that concedes what is sound in the thesis while rejecting its overreach.
The functionalist claim
State the Davis and Moore position: every society must place individuals in social positions and motivate them to fill the most important and demanding roles. Since some positions require scarce talent and long training, society attaches differential rewards — income, prestige, power — to ensure they are filled by capable people. Stratification is thus a mechanism of role allocation and motivation, functionally necessary for any complex society.
The critical response
Bring in Tumin's rejoinder as the pivot of the evaluation. He questioned how “functional importance” is measured, argued that stratification blocks the discovery of talent by restricting access to training, and noted that it transmits privilege across generations rather than rewarding merit afresh. Add the conflict view, following Marx, that stratification serves the dominant class rather than society as a whole and reproduces inequality of life chances.
Model answer
Whether social stratification is functional for society is the question crystallised by the Davis and Moore thesis, and a fair evaluation must weigh that thesis against its critics. Davis and Moore argued that stratification is a universal and necessary feature of society because every social order faces the problem of ensuring that its most important positions are filled by the most competent people. Some roles demand scarce ability and prolonged, sacrificial training. To motivate individuals to undertake them, society attaches unequal rewards of income, prestige and power to different positions. Inequality, on this view, is a functional device for role allocation and for the motivation of talent, and a society that abolished it would struggle to staff its essential and difficult work.
The thesis captures something real: differential rewards do influence the choices people make about effort and training, and no large society has dispensed entirely with graded rewards. But as a general account of stratification it does not survive scrutiny. Tumin's critique is decisive on several points. The notion of functional importance is left undefined and often circular, since importance tends to be inferred from the reward a position already commands. Stratification does not efficiently discover talent; by restricting access to education and training along lines of class, caste and gender, it wastes ability in the excluded and secures advantage for the already privileged. Reward is inherited as much as earned, so the system reproduces existing hierarchies rather than allocating roles afresh by merit. From the conflict standpoint associated with Marx, stratification is functional not for society as a whole but for the dominant group, whose interests it serves while presenting inequality as natural and necessary. It thereby entrenches unequal life chances and generates conflict rather than smooth cooperation.
The balanced conclusion is that stratification performs some functions but is not, in the strong sense claimed, functional for society. Differential motivation has a genuine role, yet the functionalist account exaggerates its necessity, ignores its costs, and mistakes the interests of the advantaged for the interests of all. Stratification is better understood as a structure that is simultaneously functional for some and dysfunctional for many, which is precisely why its justification remains contested.
Examiner's perspective
At ten marks the examiner is looking for a disciplined evaluation, not a survey. The strongest answers state the Davis and Moore thesis in its best form and then let Tumin's specific objections carry the critique, because vague disagreement scores far less than named, precise points such as the circularity of functional importance and the inheritance of privilege. A one-line conflict perspective adds range without padding.
The commonest weakness is a purely descriptive answer that explains what stratification is and never reaches a judgement, which forfeits the “evaluate” command. Reach a clear verdict — that the thesis is partly right but overstated — and you demonstrate the analytical balance the paper rewards. The competing theories are developed further in the note on theories of social stratification.