Unit 3 – Explaining Social Inequality: Classical and Contemporary Theories Flashcards
How does Marx define class, and which major (and minor) classes did he identify?
Marx defined class as any aggregate of persons who play the same part in the production mechanism.
The three main economic classes
(1) capitalists, orowners of the means of production;
(2) workers, or all those who are employed by
others;
(3) landowners, who in Marx’s theory seemingly differ from capitalists
and are regarded as survivors of feudalism
Additionally, the small businessmen, or petty bourgeoisie, were perceived as a transitional class, a group that will be pressed by economic tendencies inherent in capitalism to bifurcate into those who descend to the working class and those who so improve their circumstances that they become significant capitalists
According to Marx, how are modern wage-labourers similar to, and different from, serfs and slaves?
The small-holding peasants form a vast mass, the members of which live in similar conditions, but without entering into manifold relations with one another. Their mode of production isolates them from one another, instead of bringing them into mutual intercourse. The isolation is increased by France’s bad means of communication and by the poverty of the peasants…. In so far as millions of families live under economic conditions of existence that separate their mode of life, their interests and their culture from those of other classes, and put them in hostile opposition to the latter, they form a class. In so far as there is merely a local interconnection among these small-holding peasants, and the identity of their interests begets no community, no national bond and no political organization among them, they do not form a class.
According to Marx, what were the three major economic classes in society, and in what form did each of these classes receive its revenue (or income)?
(1) capitalists, or owners of the means of production; Took the surplus value of the workers
(2) workers, gained waged from the capitalists
(3) landowners, received rents from the workers
How does the study of social class differ from the study of social stratification?
Theories of social class refer to the conditions affecting the existence of strata that have developed or should develop some “consciousness of kind,” that is, some sense of existence as a group attribute of society.
Stratification refers to the entire complex of hierarchical differentiation, whether group-related or not
What do Marxists see as the primary function of social organization?
class consciousness which would likely arise in times of revolution when the social system in question broke down
How did Marx distinguish between the “objective” existence of classes, and the “subjective” formation of class identities?
Although a group may of people may be in the same oppressive situation and objectively oppressed by a greater class, the class may not subjectively realize they are in fact a class
. The first stage, in which a class is a class "in itself" (the German an sich), occurs when the class members do not understand their class position, the controls over them, or their "true class interests." The proletariat, as long as they are simply fighting for higher wages without recognizing that this is part of a necessary class struggle between themselves and the bourgeoisie that will end in the victory of one or the other, are a class an sich. In ideal-type terms the opposite of the class in itself is the class "for itself" (fur sich). The class fur sick is a self-conscious class, a large proportion of whose members consciously identify with it and think in terms of the class's struggle with another class. As long as most persons in a lower class think in an sich terms, the behavior of class members will be characterized by intraclass competition in which individual members of the class strive to get ahead of other members. In such a period, class conflict will be weak
Any individual, therefore, though objectively a
member of the lower class, may subjectively be identified with or may be acting in ways which correspond to the position of another class
According to Marx, how does a ruling class maintain its authority and power over the rest of society?
the ruling class prevents class
consciousness. The dominant class possesses social legitimacy, controls the media
of communication, is supported by the various mechanisms of socialization and
social control, such as the school and the church, and during its period of
stability is able to “buy off” those inclined to lead or participate in opposition
movements. The Marxist term that characterizes the ideology of the lower class
in the period of the predominance of the other classes is “false consciousness.”
What did Marx mean by the term “alienation,” and why did he see this as an “objective” condition?
Men are distinguished from animals-are less animal
and more human-insofar as they become increasingly self-conscious about and freely selective in their work and conditions of life. Insofar as men do not freely choose their work but, rather, do whatever tasks are set before them, simply in order to exist, they remain in a less than human state. If work (or leisure) is imposed on man, so far from being free, he is objectively exploited and alienated from the truly human, that is, autonomous, condition.
Alienation, for Marx, is an objective, not a subjective, condition. It signifies lack of autonomy, of self-control. The fact that workers may say that they like their work or social conditions does not mean that they are free actors, even if they think they are. Thus, in a slave society the fact that some slaves may have believed that they preferred to be slaves, and even that they were better off as slaves than as freed men, did not change the fact that objectively they were slaves. Similarly, the fact that a wage worker likes his conditions of work does not affect his position of being alienated and economically exploited or his potential as a free human being. In this sense, class society is akin to slavery. Class society must produce alienated individuals who are distorted, partial people.
What were the three most important dimensions of social stratification according to Weber, and how did he distinguish them from each another?
Class,
Status,, status, refers to the quality of perceived interaction. Status was defined by Weber as the positive or negative estimation of honor, or prestige- Since status involves perception of how much one is valued by others, men value it
more than economic gain.
Party-the ability to organize effectively
What does Weber mean by class? How does his definition of class differ from Marx’s? What are the relative strengths and weaknesses of the two writers’ conceptions of class?
Weber conceptualizes class in terms of differential opportunities for individuals in the market, whereas Marx focuses on the social relation of capital and labour in production. Weber acknowledges these, but they are less central to his theory. What Marx regards as systematic exploitation, Weber sees as a structured inequality of life chances contingent on differential possession of scarce goods (capital, land) or skills (types of labour). For Weber, capital is just a thing whose ownership confers power—in the same way as does the possession of a scarce skill, such as medical expertise. For Marx, capital is a social relationship in which “dead labour” exploits living labour, a relation that is merely manifested in or mediated by things like money or machines.
Weber reserved the concept of class for economically determined stratification. He defined a class as being composed of people who have life chances in common, as determined by their power to dispose of goods and skills for the sake of income. Property is a class asset, but it is not the only criterion of class. For Weber, the crucial aspect of a class situation is, ultimately, the market situation
What, for Weber, are the major social classes in modern capitalist society? Do you see any advantages in his position as compared with Marx’s?
Weber identifies four main classes as opposed to Marx’s two. These classes are: the manual working class, the petty bourgeoisie, the property-less white collar workers, and the dominant entrepreneurial and propertied groups
What did Weber mean by “status group” and “party”? What is the basis of each? How are each related to class, both in general and in modern capitalism?
Status groups are therefore identifiable by specific styles of life. Even though the original source of status was economic achievement, a status system, once in existence, operates independently of the class system and even seeks to negate its values i.e. factors such as family origin, manners, education, and the like-attributes It involves the assumption that high status reflects aspects of the system that are unachievable. Thus it operates to inhibit social mobility, up or down.
Party is the ability to organize effectively
In what sense may Weber’s analysis of social inequality be termed a “pluralist” one?
It would be termed pluralist because Weber considers not only the economic opportunities of class in social inequality but also other factors such as status and party or the ability to organize effectivley. This is unlike Marxists analysis which primarily considered economic factors.
Is there any counterpart in Weber to Marx’s distinction between a class “in-itself” and a class “for-itself”? How does each see the major social classes of capitalist society in these terms?
Weber, like Marx, was concerned with the conditions under which class consciousness arises. For him, however, there was no single form of class consciousness. Rather, which groups develop a consciousness of common interest opposed to those of another group is a specific empirical question; different groups acquire historical significance at different times and in different places. The extent of consciousness of kind depends to a considerable degree on the general culture of a society, particularly the set of intellectual ideas current within it. Concepts or values that might foster or inhibit the emergence of class-conscious groups cannot be derived solely from knowledge about the objective economic structure of a society. The existence of different strata subjected to variations in life chances does not necessarily lead to class action. The causal relationship posited by Marx between the fact of group inferiority and other aspects of the structure that might be changed by action had to be demonstrated to people; consciousness of it need not develop spontaneously. The presence or absence of such consciousness is not, of course, a fortuitous matter. The extent to which ideas emerge pointing to a causal relationship between class position and other social conditions is linked to the transparency of the relationship-that is, to how obvious it is that one class will benefit by action directed against another
Marx attempted to deal with this problem by his theory of transitional stages in the development of class. The first stage, in which a class is a class “in itself” (the German an sich), occurs when the class members do not understand their class position, the controls over them, or their “true class interests.” The proletariat, as long as they are simply fighting for higher wages without recognizing that this is part of a necessary class struggle between themselves and the bourgeoisie that will end in the victory of one or the other, are a class an sich. In ideal-type terms the opposite of the class in itself is the class “for itself” (fur sich). The class fur sick is a self-conscious class, a large proportion of whose members consciously identify with it and think in terms of the class’s struggle with another class. As long as most persons in a lower class think in an sich terms, the behavior of class members will be characterized by intraclass competition in which individual members of the class strive to get ahead of other members. In such a period, class conflict will be weak. Only when fur sich attitudes develop does the class struggle really emerge. Members of a lower class who do not yet identify with their class are, according to Marx, thinking in terms of values or concepts that are functional for the stability of the position of the dominant class. Any individual, therefore, though objectively a member of the lower class, may subjectively be identified with or may be acting in ways which correspond to the position of another class. At different periods varying portions of an underprivileged population may be either an sich or ftir sich. One of the purposes of Marxist analysis is the investigation of this discrepancy
How do Marx and Weber differ in their analysis of the “middle class” in capitalist societies? Which do you think is the most useful perspective in the light of the development of capitalist societies since Weber’s death in 1920?
The middle class, Marx’s writings suggest, is a descriptive concept that refers to an empirically variable, heterogeneous set of strata located in an intermediate position between workers and capitalists. Weber’s concept of class is neither relational nor centered on exploitation.
Marx also differentiates among class fractions—for example, industrialists, merchants, and financiers among capitalists, or skilled and unskilled workers and a lumpenproletariat within the working class, as well as a professional/managerial middle class—in ways not unlike Weber.
Finally, Weber conceptualizes class in terms of differential opportunities for individuals in the market, whereas Marx focuses on the social relation of capital and labour in production. Weber acknowledges these, but they are less central to his theory. What Marx regards as systematic exploitation, Weber sees as a structured inequality of life chances contingent on differential possession of scarce goods (capital, land) or skills (types of labour). For Weber, capital is just a thing whose ownership confers power—in the same way as does the possession of a scarce skill, such as medical expertise. For Marx, capital is a social relationship in which “dead labour” exploits living labour, a relation that is merely manifested in or mediated by things like money or machines.
