“Weber and Post-Weberians” section in the Social Stratification reader (ed. Grusky)
Sections include:
Weber, Max. “Class, Status, Party”
---. “Status Groups and Classes”
---. “Open and Closed Relationships”
---. “The Rationalization of Education and Training”
Giddens, Anthony. “The Class Structure of the Advanced Societies”
Parkin, Frank. “Marxism and Class Theory: A Bourgeois Critique”
Summary by Brian Asner
ABSTRACT
Each of these selections criticizes Marx for determining classes only in terms of ownership or non-ownership of the means of production. Weber untangles “class,” based purely on economic standing, from “status,” which implies a community with a common level of social honor and maintained by exclusionary life-styles and consumption patterns. The separation of Status also allows for a discussion of “credentialism” and other ways in which social groups create exclusionary boundaries to membership. Parkin focuses specifically on these points of “closure,” while Giddens suggests a more nuanced view of how class structuration occurs. Weber also distinguishes “Party,” although it is less important in this section.
SUMMARY
1)Power: “… the chance of a man or of a number of men to realize their own will in a communal action even against the resistance of others” (132).
2)Social Order: “… the way in which social honor is distributed in a community” (132)
a)This is distinct from the economic order: “… merely the way in which economic goods are distributed and used” (132)
3)Class: A group who share common life-chances and “market situation” based on their “economic interests in the possession of goods and opportunities for income” (133).
a)Agreeing with Marx: “‘Property’ and ‘lack of property’ are therefore, the basic categories of all class situations” (133), since property-owners have a distinct advantage in the marketplace over non-owners
i)Weber agrees that this group becomes more restricted as capitalism develops (154)
b)Disagrees with Marx on other details:
i)Even without class conflicts, class still exists objectively
ii)Weber has a pluralistic conception of class: distinctions can occur on multiple axes
(1)“Property classes” are determined by ownership of capital (i.e. a warehouse or machinery) – corresponds most closely to Marx’s conception of class
(2)“Acquisition classes” are determined by the ability to exploit “services that can be offered in the market” (133) (i.e. creditors).
(3)“Social classes” are based on a “plurality of class situations” (142)
iii)A class does not necessarily constitute a community with common interests, especially since classes may emerge along different axes and with different interests (and therefore, classes will not necessarily develop class consciousness)
iv)Class situations are not determined by the members of a class, but by communal actions involving different classes (i.e. in the market or a factory)
4)Status: “… social estimation of honor… expressed by the fact that above all else a specific style of life[i] can be expected” (136-7, emphasis in original)
a)Can be identified by distinctions in:
i)style of life
ii)prestige of birth or occupations
iii)education and training (especially rigidified through credentialism)
b)Unlike classes, status groups are usually communities
c)Restrictions on certain social behaviors or interactions are important to maintaining status boundaries
d)Status is essentially a “usurpation” of honor [see Parkin discussion (pt. 9) for more info]
e)It its most extreme form, status becomes cemented into a caste, and normally unrelated ethnic differences are realigned into a system of “super- and sub-ordination” (138)
5)Comparing Class to Status
a)While economic/class situation does not directly produce status, it frequently provides an individual with the resources necessary to pursue a high-status style of life.
i)Status may also contribute to class
ii)But, class and status rankings may be opposed to each other (see pt. d in this section)
b)High status groups resist free-market competition for goods which confer status
c)“With some over-simplification, one might thus say that ‘classes’ are stratified according to their relations to the production and acquisition of goods; whereas ‘status groups’ are stratified according to the principles of their consumption of goods as represented by special ‘styles of life’” (140, emphasis in original).
d)“Every society where status groups play a prominent part is controlled to a large extent by conventional rules of conduct. It thus creates economically irrational conditions of consumption and hinders the development of free markets by monopolistic appropriation and by restricting free disposal of the individual’s own economic ability” (145).
e)According to Giddens: “The point of Weber’s analysis is not that class and status constitute two ‘dimensions of stratification,’ but that classes and status communities represent two possible, and competing modes of group formation in relation to the distribution of power in society” (154)
6)Party: A group of individuals “oriented toward the acquisition of social ‘power’” (141).
a)Can overlap with class, with status, with both, or with neither
b)Parties are “societalized,” meaning they have “some rational order and a staff of persons available who are ready to enforce it” (141)
7)Closed Relationships
a)When members of a group believe that the admission of others will be detrimental to the group’s interests, they tend to pursue group “closure” by creating exclusionary conditions for membership (146)
i)Most groups begin with an expansionary/recruitment phase, but shift towards an exclusionary strategy as they grow
ii)Exclusion can be implemented in a wide variety of forms
b)Primary motives for exclusion/closure:
i)Maintaining a particular level of quality of members
ii)“… the contraction of advantages in relation to consumption[1] needs” (148)
iii)“… growing scarcity of opportunities for acquisition” (148)
c)Economic closure occurs when additional competitors threaten profits
i)Often, one group will exclude the other based on the most immediately evident identifiable characteristic (race, religion, etc.)
ii)Even though the excluders still compete with each other, they are now an interest group which will pursue monopolistic practices through the law or force (148)
(1)In some cases, the group may base their exclusionary criteria on qualities acquired through “upbringing, apprenticeship and training” (149).
d)Education is increasingly dominated by a system of special examinations and credentials
i)Exams and credentials are somewhat democratic because they are, in principle, available to anyone who qualifies, regardless of qualities
ii)However, “democracy fears that a merit system and educational certificates will result in a privileged ‘caste’” (150).
iii)Therefore, privileged groups may use educational credentials as means of exclusion: “When we hear from all sides the demand for an introduction of regular curricula and special examinations, the reason behind it is, of course, not a suddenly awakened ‘thirst for education’ but the desire for restricting the supply of these positions and their monopolization by the owners of educational certificates” (151).
The “Post-Weberians” – Anthony Giddens and Frank Parkin
8)Giddens – Rethinking the Theory of Class
a)Problems with the current conception of “class”
i)Often used to describe both an economic category and a social category
ii)“… a class is not a specific ‘entity’… [and] has no publicly sanctioned identity” (157)
iii)Class theory is not the study of stratification, since a stratum must have precise boundaries for measurement, and classes never have these precise boundaries (157)
b)Marx’s overemphasis on deriving classes from property ownership misses the fact that individual market capacity is also determined by the possession of particular skills, educational qualifications, training, and/or certification (which Weber emphasizes)
c)Free-market capitalism cannot have legally sanctioned limitations on mobility, but the above characteristics of market capacity create “mobility closure” (i.e. restrictions)
d)Additionally, there are three sources of “proximate” (i.e. localized) structuration (158)
i)The division of labor creates homogenous groupings of workers with common occupational tasks, especially distinguishing manual and non-manual workers
ii)Ownership of (productive) property grants authority to the ownership class
iii)Structuration in the consumption sphere (Weber’s status)
e)Class structuration is also facilitated when it overlaps with other criteria of status group membership, such as ethnic or cultural differences
9)Parkin
a)Boundary Problems in Marxism
i)The manual/non-manual class division is not useful as a model of class cleavage, since these two groups are not usually in antagonistic conflict with each other (especially as public sector employment has increased post-WWII)
ii)Marxists struggle to distinguish between higher and lower white-collar groups – for example, should a CEO and an insurance salesman be considered in the same class?
b)Parkin offers the “Closure Model” as an alternative
i)Rather than focusing on relations in the productive process, Parkin considers the relation to modes of “social closure” (a term borrowed from Weber)
ii)Social closure: “the process by which social collectivities seek to maximize rewards by restricting access to resources and opportunities to a limited circle” (165).
(1)Any group attribute may be used, as long as it creates an effective boundary
(2)Excluded groups will respond to exclusion by creating their own social closure in order to restrict access to the remaining opportunities not taken by the dominant group or usurp some of the excluded rewards
iii)“Exclusion and usurpation may therefore be regarded as the two main generic types of social closure, the latter always being a consequence of, and collective response to, the former” (166, emphasis in original).
iv)Property is once again analytically important, but because of its exclusionary function, not by its ability to confer authority
v)Credentialism is another important closure process
(1)Includes increased examinations and “professionalization”
(2)Attaining professional status limits the supply of potential participants and thus enhances market value
(3)As more people acquire a qualification, minimum standards will be raised
(4)Credentialism deems individuals competent for the rest of their lives, and masks “all but the most extreme variations in the level of ability of professional members, thereby shielding the least competent” (171).
(5)Licensing by the state creates a “legal monopoly” for professional status (171).
vi)Class Reproduction
(1)Closure by property and credentials conflicts with the desire to pass on benefits from generation to generation
(a)These closure forms correspond to individualistic doctrines
(b)Kinship links can only be maintained by family adaptation to closure structure
(2)The character of subordinate classes is shaped by the type of exclusion
(a)Collectivist exclusion targets a group (religious, racial, etc.), and thus creates a communal subordinate group (which is often degraded and dehumanized)
(b)Individualist exclusion (such as credentialism) creates a socially fragmented group of individuals who have achieved certain social demarcations
(c)In reality, social classes are formed as a process of both forms of exclusion
vii)Concludes: “… the relation between classes is neither one of harmony and mutual benefit, nor of irresolvable and fatal contradiction. Rather, the relationship is understood as one of mutual antagonism and permanent tension; that is, a condition of unrelieved distributive struggle that is not… inevitably fought to a conclusion” (175).
RELEVANCE / CONNECTIONS
Everything in this section is a response to Marx’s conception of class.
Grusky Reader: “Weber and Post Weberians” Section 1
[1] Parts ii and iii are difficult to distinguish, but I think ii is referring to status group boundaries and iii is referring to class boundaries (based on the choice of language: “consumption” and “acquisition”… see pt 5c)
[i] Note the similarity to Bourdieu’s “cultural capital” in this section. In fact, Bourdieu’s dimensions of economic and cultural capital are very similar to Weber’s Class and Status. But, Weber sees the two classifications as distinct, while I believe Bourdieu views them as two components of the same characteristic (habitus)… although I’m pretty shaky on Bourdieu.