Chapter 7 Outline Introduction

Stratification is systematic inequalities between groups of people that arise as intended or unintended consequences of social processes and relationships.

Views of Inequality

In the eighteenth century, Jean-Jacques Rousseau argued that private property creates social inequality and that this inequality ultimately leads to social conflict. The Scottish Enlightenment thinkers Adam Ferguson and John Millar agreed with Rousseau that private property creates inequality, but they argued that this is good because it means that some people prosper and create assets (a form of wealth that can be stored for the future). The ability to create assets provides an incentive to work hard and be productive, which in turn leads to higher degrees of social organization and efficiency and ultimately to an improved society and civilization. The irony, however, is that this ability to create and store surpluses is what creates inequality.

Thomas Malthus also viewed inequality favorably, but only as a means for controlling population growth. He thought that a more equal distribution of resources would increase the worlds population to unsustainable levels and ultimately bring about mass starvation and conflict.

Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegels masterslave dialectic posited that most social relationships in the world were based on a masterslave model in which the master becomes as dependent on the slave as the slave is on the master. Hegel also believed that over time society would have more and more free people and the masterslave model would die out as the primary social relationship.

Standards of Equality

Ontological equality is the notion that everyone is created equal in the eyes of God. Equality of opportunity is the idea that inequality of condition is acceptable so long as everyone has the same opportunities for advancement and is judged by the same standards. This standard of equality is most closely associated with modern capitalist society and a cornerstone of arguments made by civil rights activists in the United States in the 1960s.

Equality of condition is the idea that everyone should have an equal starting point from which to pursue his or her goals. Belief in this standard of equality has led to policies, such as affirmative action, which try to compensate social actors for differences in their conditions or starting points.

Equality of outcome is the notion that everyone in a society should end up with the same rewards regardless of his or her starting point, opportunities, or contributions. This standard of equality is most closely associated with Communist ideology, and critics argue that without greater incentives to work hard and be productive, people will slack off and social progress will be stymied.

Forms of Stratification

The estate system is a politically based system of stratification characterized by limited social mobility that is best exemplified in the social organization of feudal Europe and the preCivil War American South.

The caste system is a system of stratification based on hereditary notions of religious and theological purity and generally offers no prospects for social mobility. The varna system in India is the most common example today of a caste system. The class system is an economically based system of stratification characterized by somewhat loose social mobility and categories based on roles in the production process rather than individual characteristics.

Karl Marx felt that society was divided strictly into two classesthe proletariat, or working class, and the bourgeoisie, or employing class. Erik Olin Wright developed the concept of contradictory class locations, which is the idea that people can occupy locations in the class structure that fall between the two pure classes defined by Marx.

It can be difficult to define class because class means different things to different people and because people dont always fit neatly into just one category. Max Webers concept of class is based on grouping people according to the value of their property or labor in the commercial marketplace. The status hierarchy system is a system of stratification based on social prestige. This prestige can be linked to different thingsoccupation, lifestyle, membership in certain organizationsbut sociologists have most often studied occupational status. The elitemass dichotomy system is a system of stratification that has a governing elitea few leaders who broadly hold the power of society. Vilfredo Pareto thought that the masses were better off in such a system because the most skilled and talented people would reach the governing elite. C. Wright Mills viewed this system as dangerous and detrimental as it consolidates power in the hands of the few who will act according to their interests as opposed to the interests of the masses.

How Is America Stratified Today?

Socioeconomic status refers to an individuals position in a stratified social order. In the United States, the upper class is associated with income, wealth, power, and prestige, but definitions related to specific levels of income or net worth can vary. There is little consensus about how to define the middle class, yet almost 90 percent of Americans define themselves as being in the middle class. A further complication is how to separate middle class from working class.

The middle class has historically been composed of white-collar workers, and the working class of manual laborers. However, in the postWorld War II economic boom, the working class essentially merged with the middle class. Higher wages gave manual laborers access to markers of middle-class achievement such as home ownership, providing their children with a

college education, and an ample retirements savings. Another major change in the workforce that has blurred the lines between the middle and working classes is the rise of the low-wage service sector composed of ostensibly white-collar jobs that earn working-class wages.

The income gap between high-income and low-income individuals has increased dramatically over the last 30 years; a number of competing theories exist as to why this has happened. Poverty has an official, government definition, but there are less official categories such as the working poor and the nonworking poor (sometimes called the underclass). These unofficial

categories dont represent stable, homogenous groups because people at this end of the socioeconomic spectrum tend to shift in and out of poverty over the course of their lives.

Global Inequality

Taking a broad view of history, it is clear that global inequality has increased dramatically in the past 500 years. However, by some measures there has been a noticeable decrease in income inequality in the past 20 to 30 years. One key to these conclusions is whether you look at inequality within different countries or between countries.

Many scholars have examined the question of why Europe developed first and why many former colonies have struggled to improve social and economic conditions for their populations. Theories range from geographic differences to the importance of social institutions to the types of relationships different colonial powers had with their colonies.

Social Reproduction versus Social Mobility

Social mobility, the movement between different positions within a system of social stratification in any given society, can be either horizontal or vertical and can take place on the individual or group level. Structural mobility is mobility that is inevitable from changes in the economy such as the expansion of high-tech jobs in the past 20 years. Exchange mobility occurs when people essentially trade positionsthe number of overall jobs stays the same, with some people

moving up into better jobs and others moving down into worse ones. A mobility table is a way to examine the process of individual mobility by comparing changes in occupational status between generations. A status-attainment model also looks at changes in occupational status between generations, but it includes factors such as educational attainment, income, and the prestige of a persons first job.

The estate tax in the United States is related to the issue of stratification because it goes to the heart of questions about how to promote business growth, how wealth should be distributed, how to encourage meritocracy, and how to build a more equitable society.