Functionalism addresses the society as a whole in terms of function of its constituent elements such as norms, customs, traditions, institutions etc. Social structures are stressed and placed at the center of analysis and social functions are deduced from these structures. Gender inequality offers a good illustration. According to Structural Functionalist perspective, women being subordinate to men allows the wage-earners to function smoothly as everyone in the society knows his or her respective position in the hierarchy. Whereas many variations of feminist theory exist, they all emphasize that society is filled with gender inequality such that women are the subordinate sex in many dimensions of social, political, and economic life

Structural functional theory view society as a complex, but interconnected system, where each part works together as a functional whole, in summary this theory focuses on the society as a whole, it studies how each part of the larger social world works together, whereas feminism is a perspective that views society as traditionally unequal between men and women and strive for equality between the sexes. So meaning that the structural functionalist. The two theories contradicts because the other one focuses on the society as a whole whereas the other one focuses on voiceless women who's voices has been denied in science research.

The similarities are that they both protect people living in the society, they both ensure social stability by protecting the rights of the people despite  social problems or negativity encountered.