Social Stratification Flashcards
Determinants of social stratification
Social inequality exists in all known societies. Power, prestige and wealth are unevenly distributed among individuals and groups in these societies.
Power refers to the degree that one can impose his will/desire on another (knowingly or unknowingly).
Prestige refers to the amount of esteem and social honor one has associated with his position.
Wealth refers to the material possessions that one accumulates.
Subculture refers to the norms, values and codes of conduct that are specific to a specific group (stratum)
Social Mobility refers to the incidence of movement from one class (stratum) to another. When there is movement, the system is said to be relatively open, conversely, where there are effective barriers to social movement, the system is said to be a closed one. Open systems tend to favour achieved statuses (meritocracy in western societies), while close systems tend to favour ascribed statuses (fixed at birth in Caste system of India).
Types of Systems in social stratification
Open and Caste system
Caste system
The best known example of this phenomenon is the Caste system in India. In this system, one’s position, ability to accumulate wealth, and ability to influence others is established by birth, it is determined by the social group in which he finds himself. In this system, individuals and groups are ranked in terms of ritual purity. The highest positions are held by the Brahmins, and the lowest ones by the ‘untouchables’.
Functionalist perspective(Parsons)
FUNCTIONALIST PERSPECTIVE
Parsons: He believed that order, stability and co-operation were based on Value Consensus. The stratification system is derived from this Value Consensus (common values held by a community)
‘Stratification is the ranking of units in a social system in accordance with the common value system.’ Therefore, those who perform successfully to values that are held high will invariable receive high rewards and prestige.
Stratification is inevitable in society. Because all societies rank performance and tasks, there must be some differential given, and this is the basis for stratification.
Those who organize and plan the activities have a certain amount of control and therefore will have a higher status, as others depend on them for guidance and the success of the process.
Power is legitimate authority. Once the system is generally accepted as legitimate by those in the community, it is believed that the leaders will act on behalf of the society for its advancement and preservation. E.g. it is believed that the businessmen in the U.S. have the power to increase productivity, thus they are afforded the freedom and power to do so.
Functionalist perspective (Davis and Moore)
Davis and Moore:- Wrote the 1945 article entitled ‘Some Principles of Stratification’
Role allocation and Performance: All roles in society must be filled All roles must be filled by the people best able to perform them The more specialized roles need more training to be performed efficiently and diligently All roles must be performed conscientiously
The best mechanism for role allocation and performance is the stratification system.
They speak about the functional importance of some tasks, this is dependent on two things:
its functional uniqueness (doctor vs. nurse)
the degree to which other tasks depend on it (manager vs. clerk)
The purpose of stratification is to match the right individuals with the right jobs.
Functionalist perspective (Tumin)
He criticizes Davis and Moore’s concept of social stratification.
To do this he made certain points:
They assume that the highly rewarded people are actually the most functionally important
Power also influences the uneven distribution of rewards, and they ignored this fact (coal miners vs. farmers)
The pool of talent argument is weak for a number of reasons: a. the measurement of talent is invalid
there is no real proof that exceptional talent is need to perform the most ‘important’ jobs
the pool of talent may be much larger than Davis and Moore assume
The training is not really a sacrifice, and even if it was, there is no reason why they should be compensated forever. It may be better to compensate them for only a certain period of time.
Stratification may be a barrier to motivation rather than a major motivating fact, as Davis and Moore see it.
There is the existence of ‘inequality of opportunity’ for people (children) that come from the lower strata of society.
Social Stratification is divisive and does not integrate society.
Social Stratification serves to weaken social integration by giving members a feeling of exclusion from the larger society. It makes them feel like they are on the outside looking in.
N.B. Different rewards encourage antagonisms, conflict, resentment and hostility.
Marxist perspective
To Marx, Social Stratification is divisive and does not have an integration function in society. He speaks about classes, members of social groups who share the sane relation to the means of production. He makes several points to explain his theory: Society is divided into two major groups, the ruling class and the subject class
The power of the ruling class is derived from its control over the means of production
The ruling class exploits the subject class
Conflict in society arises from the exploitation of one class over the other
Societal institutions are instrumental in ruling class domination
Only when all the means of production are communally owned, would the inherent contradictions of the system cease, and the conflict resolved.
History was divided into historical epochs:
Primitive communism, where no one owned the means of production
Ancient society, the masters exerted control over (exploited) the slaves
Feudal society, the land lords exerted control over (exploited) the serfs
Capitalist society, the capitalists exert control over (exploit) the workers
Communist society, after the proletariat revolution where all will have the same relation to the means of production, there will cease to be the ownership of private property.
Classes and Capitalist Society
At this point we will review the changing positions of the upper class in Britain and America. John Westergaard and Henrietta Resler (1975 study)- A Marxist view of the ruling class.
Like classical Marxists, they believe that the ownership of private property provides the key to explaining class divisions. They believe that they class system is simple; the significant different is still between the capitalist and the worker, but by looking at the sub-divisions in each group, we merely obscure the truth. What we should look at is the wide gulf that exists between all groups.
Distribution of Wealth
They look at the concentration of wealth in the hands of a small minority in society. They believe that they maintain their control of the majority of the society’s wealth. There has been some distribution of late, this has taken place within the richest 10% of the population.
They note that the spread of home ownership has taken place and helped to distribute wealth a little, but ownership of capital has remained in the same hands. Even though many people now hold shares in companies, they found that these people were small shareholders, and did not have controlling interests in these companies.
Ruling Class Power
They maintain that because the ruling class exhibits power, that they maintain the inequalities in wealth.
“The favoured enjoy effective power, even when its members take no active steps to exercise power. They do not need to do so- for much of the time at least- simply because things work that way in any case.”
They go on to say that it is generally understood by all that the investments in society should bring about profits that will benefit all; while at the same time, the living standards of the property-less should be based on the demand of the market for their skills.
Weberian perspective
Weber sees the existence of Social Stratification coming from the struggle for scarce resources in society. He says that although it is primarily economic, it can also involve struggles for prestige and power.
Like Marx, he saw class in economic terms. He states that class develops in market economies where individuals compete for economic gain.
He sees class as a group of individuals who share the same market situation in a market economy, and by virtue of that, they share similar economic rewards. Thus they also share similar life chances.
Like Marx, he sees a division between those who own the forces of production and those who do not. However, Weber saw significant differences in the market situation of the property-less class (the skilled workers and professionals). He saw the class groupings as follows:
The Propertied upper class
The property-less white collar workers
The petty bourgeoisie
The manual working class.
Weber disagreed with Marx on a number of points:
He believed that factors other than the ownership of the factors of production are important in the formation of classes
To date, there has been no evidence to support Marx’s prediction of the polarization of classes
Weber rejects the inevitability of the proletariat revolution
Weber rejects the view that political power derives only from economic power
Weber believes that status is important when dealing with Social Stratification. He sees people who share the same status as having the same lifestyle, and identifying with each other. He believes that they also impose restrictions on their membership, the most developed of this is the Caste system in India. He sees social closure as the exclusion of some from the membership in status groups.
Weber states that ‘even though property is not recognized as a status group qualification, in the long run it is, with extra-ordinary regularity’.
Weber is quick to note that status groups may create divisions within classes. E.g. Margaret Stacey’s study in the 1950s in Banbury showed that there were three distinguishable status groups in the lower class (the upper, middle and lower working class).
Parties are groups that are specifically concerned with influencing policies and making decisions in the interests of their membership.
More on Ruling Class
Composition of the Ruling Class
They dispute the generally held belief that there has been a continuous separation of ownership ad control in the joint stock companies. This view states that there is a rising class of managers who are to be placed in the middle class. The control and ownership lies in the hands of the directors and large stock -holders. This control has not changed hands.
Westergaard and Resler’s views have been challenged by the New Right Theorists. We will now take a look at these.
Peter Saunders agrees that there is a small group who controls the wealth of Britain, and he believes that there is a network of directors and managers who own shares in all the big companies. However, he refuses to believe that these people constitute a capitalist ruling class- he sees them as merely as ‘influential economic elite’.
He believes that the families that own a lot of the majority share-holdings, land and businesses do exist. However, he says that they control only a small percentage of the British economy, stating that most business are run by the managers and directors, whose income and power is derived not from ownership of wealth but from their positions. He argues that it is becoming increasingly difficult to distinguish a specific capitalist class. He sees that as Britain progressed, less shares were held by individuals, and more by banks, insurance companies and unit trusts. Millions of people now have investments tied up in the capitalist economy by virtue of pensions, annuities, mortgages and life insurance policies. He says that the capitalist class has been ‘fragmented into millions of tiny pieces’.
The Ruling Class
Scott believes that a ruling class exists when ‘there is both political domination and political rule by a capitalist class’. Scott refers to a power
bloc as a group of people who have the ability to monopolize political power over a country for some time. He refers to the power elite as those people from the power bloc who occupy key positions in the state (Prime Minister, Cabinet, Judges, Permanent Secretaries). This can be seen as people who occupy these positions all come from the same schools, social clubs, areas of residence and the like. He makes to point to say that although parties may change, the power holders do not. In his view, the party in power may ‘govern’, but it does not necessarily ‘rule’ the country.
