Social Class: Summary of Sociologists

Emile Durkheim- Individuals are accepting of their position in the division of labour.

Talcott Parsons (1951)- Parons says in all societies, some individuals are better off than others at achieving things that are seen worthy of reward.

(Key terms include: Meritocracy, value consensus and functions of social stratification)

(Contemporary evidence: Lord Alan Sugar)

Davis & Moore (1945)- Main function of social stratification is to ensure the right role allocation and performance of people. It puts people in the right roles by offering them higher rewards, such as income. People in these roles perform to their highest standards.

(Key terms include: Role allocation)

Savage (1995)- There are more university lecturers in the UK than coal miners.

Tumin (1953)- Criticised Davis & Moore by arguing that people can be motivated by a sense of service, not just money and role allocation. Tumin believes stratification causes problems in society. Not everyone in life has the same chances.

Charles Murray (1984)- Believes welfare benefits created a 'dependency culture' and gave the poor no motivation  to better themselves. He saw that the underclass drained taxpayers money and tended to socialise their children badly too. This leads to crime and underachievement at school. He also took into account rising birth rates outside of marriage as well as crime and youth unemployment infected neighbourhoods.

(Key terms include: Underclass)

Saunders (1990)- Believes everyone has the right to legal equality and opportunity, therefore everyone has the same chance to compete. He argued that middle-class children are more able/intelligent, so they deserve to do better than working-class.

(Key terms include: Meritocracy and free markets)

Karl Marx (1818-1883)- Workers create the wealth, but only a fraction of what Marx called the 'surplus value' that they create comes back to them in wages. Workers exploited by employers who keep wages low and profits high. Problems would occur which lead to the downfall of capitalism, such as polarisation of social classes, alienation and economic crisis

(Key terms include: Proletariat, bourgeoise and communism)

Althusser (1972)- Meritocracy is a myth. Working class students are contained in a working class education. The disadvantaged believe they can get to the top but in fact, they cannot. 

Antonio Gramsci (1971)- Hegemony: ruling classes rule through persuasion and use the media and education to control.

(Key terms include: Hegemony and dual consciousness)

John Westergaard & Henrietta Resier (1976)- Argued that there was little evidence of class divisions in British society and that inequalities could only be understood as the result of the way that the capitalist system operates. Some argue class divisions increased since the 1970s.

Harry Bravermann (1974)- Argued the middle class have been deskilled and many jobs replaced with machines or less skilled workers. This leads to less ownership of jobs, lower wages and the prolettarrianization of the middle classes.

(Key terms include: Proletarisation)

• Any examples of inequality linked to the needs of capitalism rather than meritocracy
• Growth of economic inequalities seemingly unrelated to distribution of talent or effort e.g. the rise of the super-rich
• Socil class and early years outcome- working class children have the lowest vocab and the highest behavioural problems compared to children from higher incomes
• Increased teenage mother rates in working class families (9% compared to 4% from intermediate or 1% from managerial backgrounds
• The Spirit Level- Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett (2009): Compares the effects of inequality in a range of societies. The higher the inequality, the more health and social problems.
• In 1911, 1% held 69% of the wealth
• In 2003, the top 1% owned 18% of the wealth
• Top 10% owned 50% of the remainng wealth respectively

Weber (1864-1920)- Weber defined social class as a group who share a similar market situation. Members of a social class recieve similar economic rewards and similar life chances. Weber agreed with Marx in the economic division between property owners and those that work for them. Owners of big businesses can earn bigger profits than small businesses. Also, highly qualified white-collar workers can sell their labour at a higher price than manual workers who have less qualifications.

• The propertied upper class
• The property-less white-collar workers 
• The petty bourgeoisie 
• The manual working class

Status- how much respect a person recieves from others

Party- groups who were concerned with influencing decision making

(Key terms include- Market, status, party, multiclass models, social mobility, life chances and social movements)

Savage (2000)- Relative poverty in 1997. Twice of that in the 1960s. Three times more than the late 1970s. Children were particularly affected. 40% of the children born into families in bottom 30% of income distribution

Savage & Egerton (1997)- Ability does not wipe out class advantage. Less than 1/2 of 'high ability' working-class boys made it into the service compared to the 3/4 of the middle class boys. 65% of low ability middle class boys did not fall into manual work

Rex & Tomlinson (1970s)- Power and status is what leads to poverty. More power means less chance of suffering from poverty. Conducted a study on Handsworth in Birmingham

• Weberian theory,inequalities reflect market situation of different groups e.g. ability of groups to operate closure or exert differing degrees of power in distribution of rewards
• Growth of economic inequalities seemingly unrelated to distribution of talent or effort e.g. rise of super-rich
• Evidence of how life chances are related to class/gender/ethnicity rather than meritocracy
• Data on social mobility e.g. relative obility rates
• Data on poverty e.g. growth of poverty in the UK, impact of poverty on life chances
• Dysfunctional aspects of ageism/age inequalities
• Sutton Trust 2007- Westminster Public School- 50% 27 private schools amongst top 30 and 43 in the top 50. 7-8% privately educated students. 83% of judges are privately educated.

Pamela Abbot (1990)- Criticises Goldthorpe's study of social mobility as it completely ignored women. Women's experiences are different to men at work. Women have lower rates of absolute mobility as they have less chance of reaching the top jobs. This has led to recent studies changing to includ men and women

(Key terms include: Gender inequalities and life chances)

• Any feminist arguements concerning gender inequalities being linked to patriarchy
• Surrey Occupattional Class Schema (Arber, Dale and Gilbert) reflects the gendered nature of work, such as distinguishing netween mainly male skilled manual jobs and mainly female personal service jobs. Developed by feminist sociologists as an alternative to existing classifications baed on patriarchal bias
• Gender pay gap
• Differences in gender poverty
• Gender inequalities in work and employment
• Gender inequalities in social mobility
• Women more likely to be part time
• Dual Burden- paid work and domestic labour
• Glass ceiling- patriarchal bias prevents talented women from being promoted and assists male social mobility
• Higher widow rate- less likely to have a pension and to live in poverty

Pakulski & Waters (1996)- Argue that people are now stratified by culture rather than the economy

Beck (1992)- People now have enough money to meet their material needs, such as food and housing. It is not wealth that is the problem, it is the 'risk society' that is

(Key terms include: Culture)