ABSTRACT
Causal priority, in our conception of ways of life, is given neither to cultural bias nor to social relations. The viability of a way of life depends upon a mutually supportive relationship between a particular cultural bias and a particular pattern of social relations. A way of life will remain viable only if it inculcates in its constituent individuals the cultural bias that justifies it. The extent to which individuals are aware of providing support to their way of life depends on their level of cultural consciousness. Intended functions play as important a role as do latent functions in sociocultural viability. Modes of social control are the focal point of grid-group analysis. Individual choice, this mode of analysis contends, may be constricted either through requiring that a person be bound by group decisions or by demanding that individuals follow the rules accompanying their station in life.
