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Social Stratification: Meaning, Origin, Development and other Details!
It we cast our glance on the society around us we find that it is heterogeneous in nature. Here are the rich, there the poor; here are the industrialists, there the peasantry; here are the rulers, there the sweepers.
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Everywhere society is divided into various classes, economic, social, political and religious.
I. The Meaning of Social Stratification:
The process by which individuals and groups are ranked in a more or less enduring hierarchy of status is known as stratification.’ According to Raymond W. Murray, “Social stratification is a horizontal division of society into “higher” and “lower” social units.” Every society is divided into more or less distinct groups. Even the most primitive societies had some form of social stratification.
As Sorokin pointed out, “Un-stratified society with real equality of its members is a myth which has never been realized in the history of mankind.” He writes, “Social stratification means the differentiation of a given population into hierarchically superimposed classes. It is manifested in the existence of upper and lower social layer. Its basis and very essence consists in an unequal distribution of rights and privileges, duties and responsibilities, social values and privations, social power and influences among the members of a society.
No society is un-stratified. Stratification involves the distribution of unequal rights and privileges among the members of a society. According to Gisbert, “Social Stratification is the division of society into permanent groups or categories linked with each other by the relationship of superiority and subordination.” John F. Cuber and William F. Kenkel regarded it as “a pattern of superimposed status of a. person or a group of persons in society with the result that there comes to exist people, high or low, superior or inferior.”
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According to Kurt B. Mayer, social stratification is “a system of differentiation which includes a hierarchy of social positions whose occupants are treated as superior, equal, or inferior relative to one another in socially important respects.” Lundberg writes, “A stratified society is one marked by inequality, by differences among people that are evaluated by them as being “lower” and “higher”. Williams defines social stratification as the ranking of individuals on a scale of superiority-equality, according to some commonly accepted basis of valuation.” Stratification is a process of ranking statuses which is found in all societies.
It would thus be seen that inequality of status or rank differentiation is the distinguishing feature of social stratification; where there is social stratification, there is social inequality. Although men have always dreamed of a world in which there are no distinctions of rank and all are equal, yet the hard fact is that society attaches different rights and perquisites to different positions.
Some individuals and groups are rated higher than others on the basis of opportunities and privileges that they enjoy. For example, in India doctors or engineers are rated higher than teachers. As a class the former have a higher social prestige. The prestige attached to different positions becomes a part of the social order and that is stratification.
It may however, be noted that the amount or type of prestige attached to different positions need not be the same in all societies. Further, the basis for attaching different prestige to different positions need not be rational.
There may be many causes for status differentiation. Some of these may be absolutely superstitious, non-rational and hidden in the remote and forgotten past. It may be simply a religious belief that a certain position was given higher prestige by divine decree.
Stratification tends to restrict interaction, so that there is more interaction of a given sort within strata than between strata. In a given stratification system, certain kinds of interaction may be more restricted than others.
In seeking a marriage partner, in choosing a profession, in making friends there may exist more restrictions than in the flow of automobile traffic. A motorist takes or yields the right of way according to certain rules and not according to the social position to which he and others may belong.
How did stratification originate?
Gumplowicz, Oppenheimer and other sociologists contended that its origin is to be found in the conquest of one group by another. The conquering group set itself as an upper class dominating the conquered class which became lower class. Cecil North also considered conquest of one group by another to be. highly conducive to the appearance of privilege.
He even asserted that “No great and permanent divisions of class appeared so long as a peaceful mode of life was maintained.” Sorokin, however, did not agree with this view.
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According to him, conflict may be regarded as facilitating stratification, but not as originating it. Stratification is found in all the societies peaceful as well as warlike. He attributed social stratification mainly to inherited individual differences and differences in environmental conditions.
Racial differences accompanied by cultural dissimilarity also lead to stratification. India was subjected to a series of racial and cultural invasions that overwhelmed the native people and eventually led to caste system. Race is the chief factor in the American stratification system.
According to Spengler, stratification is founded upon scarcity. Short supply or scarcity is created whenever society differentiates positions in terms of functions and powers and assigns rights and privileges to them. This makes some positions more desirable than others for society grades them by their rewards. There are only a few corporation presidencies or government executive offices available. Stratification evolves from the allocation of scarce privileges and powers.
Kingsley Davis lays emphasis on the functional necessity of stratification. According to him, a society must provide some rewards which it can use as inducements and have some way of distributing these rewards differently according to position. The rewards and their distribution, as attached to social positions, create social stratification.
These rewards may be in the form of economic incentives, aesthetic incentives and symbolic incentives, (Symbolic incentives are the ones which contributed to self-respect and ego-expansion). The differentiation of rewards produces social inequality.
According to Davis, social inequality is an unconsciously evolved device by which societies insure that the most important positions are conscientiously filled by the most qualified persons. Hence, every society must possess a certain amount of institutionalized inequality, or social stratification.
The functional account of stratification is not accepted by other sociologists. According to them, a system of stratification continues to exist because the members of society who are in the highest strata want the system to continue unchanged. Power, not functional necessity, is the key to understanding stratification.
Chiefs, kings, aristocrats or the upper class all have the same interest; to secure their position, to discourage outsiders and thereby to control power relations so completely that they alone determine who can enter their circle. What looks like functional necessity therefore, is really elite control.
Social stratification assumes the form of class divisions in society. In the course of history, various social classes have existed at different periods. Thus the slaves and slave-masters, vassals and feudal lords, capitalists and workers have been the prominent classes. In India, class has assumed a peculiar form in caste.
Since social stratification means division of society into social classes, therefore, now we shall examine the idea of a ‘social class’.
II. Meaning and Nature of Social Class:
Status-the basic criterion of social class. According to Ogburn and Nimkoff, a social class is “one or two or more broad groups of individuals who are ranked by the members of the community in socially superior and inferior positions.” Max Weber held that classes are aggregates of individuals “who have the same opportunities of acquiring goods, the same exhibited standard of living.”
It is a portion of the community or collection of individuals “standing to each other in the relation of equality, and marked off from other portion by accepted or sanctioned standards of inferiority and superiority.” Each particular social class has its own particular social behaviour, its standards and occupations.
It is “a culturally defined group that is accorded a particular position or status within the population as a whole.” According to Ginsberg, “A class is a group of individuals who through common descent, similarity of occupation, wealth and education have come to have a similar mode of life, a similar stock of ideas, feelings, attitudes and forms of behaviour.”
The relative position of the class in the society arises from the degree of prestige attached to the status. Wherever, the considerations of status, lower and higher, limit social intercourse, there social class exists. Status is the basic criterion of social class or, in other words, class is a status group.
MacIver and Page write: “This understanding of social class as a distinct status group provides us with a precise concept and is generally applicable to any system of social stratification, wherever found … It is the sense of status, sustained by economic, political, or ecclesiastical power and by the distinctive modes of life and cultural expressions corresponding to them, that draws class apart from class, gives cohesion to each class and stratifies a whole society.”
Thus, in a social class there is, firstly, a feeling of equality, in relation to members of one’s own class, a consciousness that one’s mode of behaviour will harmonize with the behaviour of similar standards of life. Individuals belonging to the same social class are expected to maintain similar standards of life, “and to choose their occupations within a limited range.
There is realisation of a similarity of attitude and behaviour with members of one class. Secondly, there is a feeling of inferiority in relation to those who stand above in the social scale. Thirdly, there is the feeling of superiority to those below in the social hierarchy.
Thus, the fundamental attribute of a social class is its social position of relative inferiority or superiority to other social classes. It is the social position which determines for its possessor the degree of respect, prestige and influence. The arrangement is much like the army with its officers commissioned and non-commissioned.
In Rome, for instance, there were the slaves, plebeian and five superior classes. In the medieval society, there were the throw class, cottars, villeins, free tenants, and lesser gentry, with the nobility, royalty and ecclesiastical officers at the top. The throw class included the slaves who could be sold at will. The cottars and villeins were serfs bound to soil. The free tenants had land of their own. The governmental power rested in the hands of nobles, the ecclesiastical and royal officers.
The members of each social class constitute something of an in-group. They recognize one another as social equals and distinguish in a variety of ways between themselves and the members of other classes. They usually associate with the members of their own class and live together and apart from other classes. They have their own distinctive ways of life. In a sense, each social class is a society within a society. But it is not a complete and independent society.
Element of Stability:
A social class is distinguished from other classes by certain customary modes of behaviour which are taken to be characteristic of that class and may be concerned with such things as mode of dress, the types of conveyance, the way recreation and expenditure. Thus, the upper class is released from manual labour.
Its members are masters rather than servants. It members live in the castles rather than in the huts, eat the choicest food and have leisure, The society sometimes resents the breach of these modes by that class which is expected to observe them. Sometimes the members of a lower social class resent any interference in their modes of behaviour by the upper class even ii it is done for humanitarian reasons.
It is also to be noted that the members of a social class often put obstacles in the way of those people who wish to come up to their position. It also means that a class possessing certain privileges would like not only to possess them exclusively but also increase them. Capitalists and the upper classes never like to give up their privileges voluntarily.
III. Development of Class:
According to Cooley, there are three principal conditions favouring the growth of social classes. These are (i) marked differences in the constituent parts of the population, (ii) little communication and enlightenment; and (iii) a slow rate of social change. When the population is composed of different races, this racial heterogeneity facilitates the growth of social classes as there comes into existence racial barriers. Thus, in the United States the Negroes form a separate social class.
The lack of inter-communication among the people also favours the growth of social classes as social contacts are lessened and social distances increase. Perhaps the slow rate of social change is the principal factor favouring the growth of social classes. When society does not change and conditions remain much the same from generation to generation, social classes develop.
The Indian society remained static for about three thousand years with the result that untouchables were not permitted to use public wells or enter temples. They were placed at the bottom of the social scale. It was with the growth of industrialisation and cities that class distinctions were loosened. In cities outcastes were permitted to engage in occupations above their degree. Anonymity of city life made caste identification difficult.
In the earliest stages of civilization, i.e., in the age of primitive barbaric tribes there are no social classes to be found. The reason being that the savage was not in a position to establish his superiority over his neighbours because he was all the time engaged in the struggle for existence and lived from hand to mouth. “There is” writes Hob-house, “always the distinction between its own members and outsiders; there is also a greater or less distinction in the rights enjoyed by the two sexes. In other respects, the obligations constituting its ethical life are fairly uniform.” In other words, equality of rank prevailed among the ancient tribes. There were no distinctions of rank enjoyed by particular groups. There was no difference of rich or poor because property itself was too limited to create differences of wealth.
Rise of Slavery System:
But as the savage tribes grew in culture and especially in military strength the first result was that the conquered enemies were eaten tortured or in any case put to death. After a while with a certain softening of attitudes, captives were not killed or eaten but spared and enslaved.
This was first reserved for women and children but was afterwards extended to male captives. A class of slaves was thus formed who were within the jurisdiction of the conquering tribe. This class was destitute of rights. A slave was a pure chattel. He could be flogged, sold, pawned, exchanged or put to death.
Some sociologists are of the opinion that slavery was an industrial system rather than a system of social stratification. But if we regard social stratification in terms of social inequalities we can legitimately regard slavery as a system of stratification.
Guild System:
Modern classes are a development from the class structure of the middle Ages when feudal lords or landed gentry were at the top and the serfs at the bottom of society. There was another class of household servants, soldiers, fighters or artisans in between these two classes.
The artisans together with the small tradesmen at about the eleventh century became powerful in the towns which had remained independent of the control of feudal lords and kings. The townsmen organised themselves in guilds which formed the basis of economic structure of the middle Ages. Over and above the guild-men the lawyers, doctors and financiers, who were mostly Jews, constituted a higher class in the town.
Burgeoise System:
With the Industrial Revolution the class structure of medieval society underwent a change. Now the society became divided into two distinct classes—the capitalists and the proletariat. The capitalists owned the means of production and wielded great political power enjoying thereby high status.
The proletariats were the industrial workers dispossessed of wealth, divorced from the management of all enterprise and deprived from any saying on the product of their labour. They could only sell their labour.
The modern capitalist class is less cohesive than the medieval aristocracy which was based on noble descent. The new capitalist class did not come from a particular blood. It hardly objected to new members coming from the other strata of society.
A working man could enter the capitalist class by his spirit of enterprise and initiative. There was no restriction against his climbing up in the social scale. And some people did succeed in so climbing up and rising to prominence. Rockefeller, Carnegie. Henry Ford, Birla are such names who ascended to the highest ranks of an industrial society by their own initiatives and enterprise.
Middle Class:
The division of society into capitalists ant proletariat, was not, however, the final division of society. A new class, middle class, arose which modified the classical capitalism proletarian dualism of the social structure. The new middle class was different from the medieval middle class in which’ the tradesmen predominated and which was a homogeneous group.
The present day middle class is a heterogeneous group consisting not only of tradesmen but also of doctors, lawyers, and engineer? Teachers, architects, and many other white collar workers whose number is on the increase. The middle class, as its very name signifies, stands below the capitalist and above the proletarian class. It is inferior to the former but superior to the latter in social status.
Sub-divisions of Middle Class:
The middle class has been sub-divided into three sub-classes in terms of income an standard of living. These sub-classes are upper, middle class middle class and lower middle class. The upper middle class identifies itself with the upper strata of society, so that sometimes it becomes difficult to draw the line between them and the upper class.
The lower middle class feels more and more attracted towards the middle class, though some of its members may not be better off than the members of the working class. “In point of fact, writes Lapiere, the upper ranks of the labouring classes receive a higher daily wage than do the members of the lower middle class.”
IV. The Criteria of Class Distinctions:
From the above discussion of the development of social classes it is clear that society has been divided into different classes at different times. Now the question arises: What principles are involved in the various modes of social classification?
In a society there are so many different bases of prestige that we might wonder whether social classes are definite groups, with definite membership, or whether they are only social categories whose defining characteristics and membership are somewhat arbitrarily determined by sociologists. Different bases have been adopted from time to time for determining the status of persons.
We place a person higher or lower in a status scale according to whether or not he has the given characteristic. But when we compare different societies, we find that people respond differently to different characteristics. In fact, any characteristics, such as occupation, wealth, birth, race, religion, education, speech, etiquette, may become the basis for social ranking. Sometimes two or more characteristics combine to determine the status.
Criterion of Birth:
In feudal and early medieval times status was fixed by birth. Thus there were the slave and slave-master, the noble and serf, the gentry and the commonalty. When status is determined by birth, the class structure becomes rigid and integrated. Social mobility is impossible. The attitude of members of each class tends to become habitual and quasi- automatic.
Criterion of Wealth:
Birth as a determinant of status remained the controlling factor of social position until new social and economic developments undermined the feudal system. It was the “middle class” which was historically responsible for revolutionizing the feudal class system and secured a new definition of social status in terms of wealth. Under the feudal system the principal form of wealth was the land.
In fact the whole system of feudal relationship was based on land ownership, which was the elemental fact in the feudal structure. The idea of subservience, loyalty, duty, honour depended on this intrinsic fact that one man holds land from another who thereby is his superior,” I become your man, as touching the fief I hold from you” -so runs the oath of homage- “and will be faithful to you in matters of life and limb, and of earthly honour against all men.
But with the progress of Industrial Revolution and with the growth of commercial, financial and factory production enterprise, wealth was redefined so that land was now subordinated to the new forms of money and credit. The evolution of wealth as an independent social value weakened birth as the controlling factor of status.
Status now came to be defined in terms of wealth. A class system came into existence which was not rigid but permitted persons of initiative and enterprise to rise on the basis of their individual achievements. The accidental factor of birth no longer determined once for all the social position of the persons. Instead, thereof, an open class structure evolved in which persons could freely enter.
In the new mobile capitalistic society wealth took on a more determinative role. In modern societies there is a fairly close relation between economic and social status. The traditional class demarcations were blurred and a new social structure was given birth to in which the worker and the capitalists alike strived to “keep up with Jonesses.” Wealth now penetrated all social divisions and provided a universal and significant basis for social stratification. Those classes were demarcated as an upper class, a middle class and a lower class.
Criterion of Occupation:
Thus, in modern communities wealth- is the primary determinant of social stratification. It is the possession of wealth for the most part which determines the sort of education an individual is likely to receive and consequently the range of occupations open to him. There is an intimate relation between the social class and the occupation it follows. Occupation while not an altogether accurate indication of status is a fair index of a social class, its mode of life and general social standing.
Take, for instance, the case of farmers. In earlier times there were two great classes associated with the land, the land-owner and the land cultivator. In modern times a class of ‘owner- cultivators’ has come into existence. In India through the abolition of Zamindari System, the tenant has been made the owner of the land he cultivates.
He is now no longer dominated by a landowning aristocracy. He employs relatively few labourers outside his own family; moreover, his relation to the labourer is not the same as that of the landlord to the peasant. The owner farmer and the tenant farmer now form together an agricultural class with common characteristics arising from the nature of their occupation. They have more or less a common standard of living, their relatively low and inelastic income and a common group consciousness and form a separate social class.
In recent years within the agricultural class also social stratification is developing. With the introduction of mechanized forms of cultivation some of the agriculturists have become farm house owners, tractor owners and white-collar agriculturists enjoying higher status. At the other end of the scale there stand low-class peasantry with their traditional implements of agriculture separating themselves from the high class peasantry.
Similarly, in non-agricultural field the type of occupation is a particularly useful general index of social class. The so-called white collar jobs carry greater prestige than the jobs otherwise, though the former may not yield greater income. If the lower paid teacher is held in a greater esteem than the better paid technician, obviously, income does not determine the social status.
The ministers, the secretaries, the commissioners hold a higher position than the businessman who may be wallowing in wealth, though the former are of an inferior economic position. One of the best known attempts to rank occupations was made in the United States by the National Opinion Research Centre in 1947.
The study revealed that the highest score was obtained for the occupation by U. S. Supreme Court Justice and the lowest for shoe shiner. On the basis of this study it has been concluded that government officials were held in high esteem; clerical jobs and managerial position were held in moderate regard while the occupation of service workers and labourers were held in lowest estimation.
The question arises as to what factors affect the prestige of an occupation. According to Davis, two factors determine the relative rank of different occupations: first, the functional importance of an occupation; and second, the scarcity of personnel for the occupation relative to demand. Henry M. Johnson has pointed out several problems in accepting the explanation given by Davis. Firstly, many different degrees of talent, knowledge and skill are often covered by the same occupational title.
Therefore, the prestige should be explained in terms of occupational qualities rather than in terms of functional importance. Secondly, there are many different jobs in the same occupation that are important in prestige. Thus, a “school headmaster” in a small town may have less prestige than that in a large city. Likewise the prestige of a doctor may be rated by the average prestige of his patients.
Thus, while assessing the functional importance one would have to take into account the different occupational positions of a particular occupation. Thirdly, the same position can be filled with varying degrees of success. Therefore, the prestige to be given to a role occupant should be judged in terms of role performance. Fourthly, relative functional importance is usually easier to appreciate in a small social system than in a total society.
Considerable variation is possible in “functional emphasis.” Thus, religious functions in India have relatively higher prestige than in the Soviet Russia. Further the relative importance of an activity varies from time to time, according to the internal structure of the social system. In India religious functions do not enjoy the same prestige as they enjoyed in the Brahminic age.
Thus, it is quite possible that at any given moment, certain occupations might be overrated or underrated. Occupations cannot be ranked according to their functional importance in an “absolute” sense. They are ranked according to their importance in the eyes of men in a particular social system.
The prestige of an occupation is also affected to some extent by the average income of those who follow it. Though, a high average income may be due, in part, to the functional importance of the occupation and the relative scarcity of qualified personnel, but these are not the only factors that affect the average income of an occupation. Another important factor is the source of remuneration of those who follow it.
Thus a private firm may pay higher income to a particular occupation than a philanthropic institution. It may, however, be noted that income as an independent factor is only a rough index of the prestige of an occupation, for example, a managing director of a large public enterprise may not be regarded as more important than the president despite the fact that the director may have a higher salary.
Therefore, the prestige attached to different kinds of occupations does not depend entirely on the functional importance, a variable factor, of an occupation or its scarcity or on the income they yield, but also on the skill involved in them, the training and education they presuppose, the prestige of those who engage in them, their scarcity value, the amount of personal independence they bring with them and no doubt numerous irrational factors which enter into people’s valuation of the different types of work which appear to vary considerably in different societies and in the same society at different times.
Criterion of Polity:
In the modern society the political system is an important determinant of social system. A democratic political system aims to abolish the social distinctions and establish social equality which means that no person will be rated high or low on the basis of one’s income, occupation or birth.
An aristocratic political system, on the other hand, starts with the belief that some are born to rule and others to be ruled. Such a system stratifies the society into distinct classes of rulers and ruled. In every society rulers have enjoyed a higher status. In democracy also, the legislators and ministers enjoy a higher prestige though some of them may even be illiterate.
Criterion of Education:
Social class and education interact in two ways. Firstly, to get higher education one needs money. The children of wealthier classes can get better education and ride upto the highest step of social hierarchy. The poorer youths cannot afford to meet the expenses of higher education and so are left at the bottom of the social hierarchy. Secondly, one’s amount and kind of education affects the class rank he will secure. Higher education brings not only occupational skills; it also brings changes in tastes, interests, goals, etiquette and speech.
Thus, we conclude that though wealth is a significant factor of social stratification in modern communities, it is not, however, the only factor. The attitude which a community holds towards the different groups is determined by a number of factors.
Thus, factors like race, age, sex, lineage, religion, occupation, education, and mode of life may still modify and limit the status attitude. Sometimes, the attitude held by a community may be merely traditional and not the result of any logical conclusion.
In that case to know as to why a particular community classifies a particular class inferior or superior, we may have to study the past or present experiences which have produced that attitude. In the case of the United States the prevalent attitude assigning low status to the Negro class is perhaps adequately explained by the historical fact that Negroes were for one hundred years or more assigned to a slave status.
Every society has a large inheritance of purely customary, habitual and non-functional class stratification for which no rational justification can be found. Therefore, in attempting to account for the fact of social stratification, we must not lose sight of the factors for which no rational justification can be found. We need not be surprised at the lack of rational foundation for many of the facts of social organisation.
V. The Functions of Classes:
Why are the people in a society categorised in different classes? Why should not all the individuals enjoy social prestige according to their individual merits rather than according to the class to which they have been assigned by reason of certain characteristics? Since there is a great variation in individual intelligence, education, personality, skill and character, each individual should be treated according to his particular merits irrespective of any classification. This suggestion is, of course, a laudable one but it overlooks its impracticability.
(i) Simplification:
The classification of people into classes is a device for simplifying the world to which we must respond.In a society we deal with many strangers, all of whose characteristics we cannot possibly know. Therefore, we resort to the practice of classifying them and reacting to them as members of a class. In the absence of such a classification we would have to act in a highly laborious manner for determining the status of all the individuals separately. For example, the teachers are generally employed only from the class of pe6ple possessing a degree.
The Public Service Commission which is confronted with the task of selecting a large number of people who are strangers to them, will, on the whole, make fewer errors by this practice than if an attempt was made to select teachers on the basis of individual and personal investigation of the applicants. So only individuals of particular classes are allowed to apply to the exclusion of other classes.
(ii) Motivation and Coordination:
Further, classification of people according to the prestige which is to be accorded to them enables a class to perform more readily the functions expected of it. W. Lloyd Warner writes: “when a society is complex, when there are large numbers of individuals in it pursuing diverse and complex tasks and functioning in a multiplicity of ways, individuals, positions and behaviours are evaluated and ranked. This happens primarily because, to maintain itself, the society must co-ordinate the efforts of all its members into common enterprises necessary for the preservation of the group, and it must solidify and integrate all these enterprises into a working whole.”
It is possible that classification of people as members of a class and attributing to them the class prestige may result in injustice to certain individuals. But the remedy does not lie in doing away with the system of social stratification. It lies in a more accurate and relevant system of classification. Further, there should be free opportunity for individuals to find the place in society for which they are best qualified; otherwise inefficiency and unhappiness may result.
VI. Social Class and Style of Life:
The style of life of an individual is determined by the social class to which he belongs. A social class is generally distinguished from other classes by certain modes of behaviour which includes such things as the mode of dress, the type of conveyance, their mode of recreation and the contents of diet.
The members of a particular class have more or less the same ‘life chances’ i.e., the same probability of securing the good things of life. Lass-well has well said that, “The influential are those who get the most of what there is to get.” Thus the members of a social class possess similar social chances and since classes differ in their social chances so they also differ in what they learn, how they behave and how they regard the world about them. We find great diversity in the outlook and behaviour of the several social classes.
Thus the members of the upper class hate manual labour. They live in castles, ride automobiles, eat the choicest food, put on superfine clothes and speak polished language. For recreation they visit clubs and play sophisticated games like golf, tennis, chess etc. On the other hand, the members of the lower class are given to manual labour.
They live in slums and take coarse food. They are shabbily dressed and hardly know of any recreation. Similarly, the members of upper class are educated and hold administrative posts or run big industrial concerns. The members of the lower class are mostly illiterate and labourers. They are servants rather than masters.
It has also been found that criminality prevails more among the members of the lower class than the upper class. The lowest levels of the social hierarchy furnish the greatest number of criminals.
Studies also show differences in the family behaviour of the different social classes. The lower classes rear their children in the homes and observe strict sex code. The children in the upper class families are reared by maid servants and fed on bottle milk.
The children brought up in the upper class families are taught to be polite, to develop good manners, to pay attention to dress and appearance, to play with equals, to get good grades in schools and to stress achievement. The lower class children learn the opposite in most instances.
Thus, it is evident that social class affects the life style of its members. Those who belong to a superior class enjoy greater status, prestige and power. They have a high notion of their self-importance.
The members of the inferior class, on the other hand, are given to obedience and yield to the wishes of the superior class members. Indeed, there is hardly any aspect of life which is not differentiated according to the class one belongs to. Social classes constitute sub-cultures and, therefore, the groups which live differently, also think and behave differently.
However, whatever influence social class may still have on style of life, it is waning. Occupation is rapidly becoming the key determinant and index of status. A member of lower class changes his style of life on having secured a berth in the cabinet or administrative hierarchy. Occupation is now more predictive about style of life. The style of life of a family unit depends chiefly on the occupation of the father.
VII. The Marxian Concept of Class:
Karl Marx, the father of Communism, gave an economic interpretation to the meaning of class. Thus, he differentiated between the bourgeoisie who own the means of production and the proletariat who do not. The bourgeoisie enjoy high status in society because they own property while the proletariat’s status is inferior because instead of owning the means of production they rather work upon them.
According to Marx, therefore, ownership of the means of production determines the status of individuals. Max Weber also conceived of class as the product of economic factors. He asserted that “property and lack of property are the basic categories of all class situations.
The factor that creates class is unambiguously economic interest, and indeed, only those interests involved in the existence of the market.” It may, however, be seen that according to Weber class is the result of economic distribution rather than of economic production. Ginsberg also considers that the primary determinants of class are economic.
Marx had also said that all previous history had been the history of class struggle, a condition that would cease, however, when the proletariat organized to overthrow the bourgeoisie in bloody revolt establishes an international classless society of proletarian equals.
MacIver has criticized the Marxian distinction between proletariat and the bourgeois classes as basically erroneous and ill-founded. The identification of social class with economic division is inadequate for two reasons. First, there are status- class differences which do not correspond to economic differences.
Thus, members of the Brahmin class, a superior class, may be the employees of a lower class and very inferior to the latter with respect to wealth. According to Marxian thesis, Brahmins would form an inferior class because they do not own property in this case, but in Hindu society they nevertheless are considered belonging to the superior class.
Again, an old established landed class may be regarded as socially superior to a monetarily wealthier class. In terms of economic factors it may be difficult to differentiate. The white-collar clerk may not earn more than a manual worker and even earn less, yet his status is higher in society to the status of a manual worker.
Thus he is economically inferior but socially he is superior. Moreover, all the workers cannot be grouped into a single class—the proletariat. The modern western society makes distinction between workers in different fields and of different skills. They differ in their interests, attitudes and sentiments.
There is found competitive class feeling among the workers. One can hardly think of them as belonging to one class. Even the capitalists do not form a single class. The small capitalists are opposed to big capitalists. Their interests collide and so they can hardly be regarded as members of the same social class.
Secondly, if we define social class in terms of any objective criterion, such as ownership of property, it loses its sociological significance. The distinguishing feature of a class is its possession of “class-consciousness,” a sentiment that unites them and separates them from others. If white-collar workers do not regard themselves as belonging to the same class as industrial workers, they do not form one social class.
The members of a class share a common sentiment, and unless they share this sentiment they cannot form a social class. Marx maintained that the experience of similar economic situations develops in the members of a class similar attitudes and beliefs, i.e., a class consciousness.
But there is no necessary coincidence between class membership defined by economic criteria and subjective class consciousness. It is important, as Tawney says, to avoid confusing “the fact of class with the consciousness of class which is a different phenomenon. The fact creates the consciousness, not the consciousness the fact.”
Moreover, Marx could not foresee the later evolution of industrialism, with its separation of ownership and managerial functions and its demand for a vast new middle class of clerks, managers and technicians. The rise of middle class ended the drift toward two isolated camps of capitalists and industrial workers.
Thus, Marx proved to be a false prophet about the evolution of classes in the modern world. The distinctions among classes are more than economic; they are also social, political, attitudinal, and based on a way and style of life. In their behaviour men are not motivated solely by economic interests.
VIII. Veblen’s Theory of the Leisure Class:
Thorstein Veblen in his famous book “The Theory of the Leisure class” published in 1899 analyzed the origin, nature and characteristics of the leisure class. He divided human culture into three major stages: the savage, the barbarian, and the civilized. He further sub-divided each of these three stages into lower and higher stages. In the lower savage societies there was no leisure class.
Differentiation was based mainly on the division of labour between men and women, the latter being assigned inferior tasks. It was with the transition of the primitive society to a war like society that there emerged a leisure class. The two sets of conditions which caused appearance of such a class were a predatory mode of life and an adequate supply of the necessities of life.
The latter condition made it possible to release a group of people from productive labour. A group of people came into existence which did not do any productive work. They passed their time in leisure without engaging themselves in any industrial occupation and a differentiation came to exist between leisure class and working class.
Thus, to define leisure class is such groups who do not contributes to the production of social satisfactions and have enough wealth to enjoy their leisure. They retain some or many of their privileges though they have lost their functional significance.
Exemption from work is the main characteristic of the leisure class which distinguishes it from the lower classes. In the lower stages of barbarism Veblen asserted the leisure class is still in a rudimentary stage. In the higher stages of barbarism, the distinction on the basis of employment is complete and the leisure class is fully established.
In some of the societies there is absolute taboo on any type of work for certain people. Veblen cited the example of Polynesian chiefs who are forbidden even to feed themselves and would rather starve than carry food to their mouths. There is a story of a French king who in the absence of a servant did not move his chair on which he sat near the fire place and ultimately was burnt to death.
Although the old bases upon which the leisure class was based have since been modified, yet they persist even in our present-day society. There is habitual aversion to menial work. The so-called .higher classes do not do any work. They have somehow sufficient accumulated wealth. They need not work. So even today some people make no contribution to the production of social satisfaction.
They have enough wealth to enjoy themselves. According to Veblen, accumulated wealth has become one of the most important bases of distinction between the upper and the lower classes in modern society. What we witness now, said Veblen, is “the transformation of modern culture into a pecuniary culture, the characteristics of which are pecuniary emulation, pecuniary standards of living, pecuniary canons of taste with conspicuous leisure and conspicuous consumption.”
The leisure class, although it exists at the expense of the socially productive members of the society, has its social importance. Although they make no tangible contribution to the society, they may give a certain representation to the dreams of the working members.
Every society, it has been said, should have a well-dressed aristocracy, presumably to give to the common man something to look upto. But such a class must be small one. If it constitutes a large proportion of the population, it may exercise its power for the maintenance of the privileges whereby it lives on the labours of others and perpetuation of social disequilibrium.
IX. Class Consciousness:
What is Class Consciousness? Some kind or degree of class consciousness is almost universal in society. Class consciousness is “the sentiment that characterizes the relations of men toward the members of their own and other classes.” It “consists in the realization of a similarity of attitude and behaviour with members of other classes.” It is “the inner aspect of class” which unites those who feel distinct from other classes.
According to Mannheim, class consciousness is the “awareness of the similarity of social chances, the arising of a notion about similarity of interests, the growth of an emotional tie connected with this similarity of experiences and of a common striving towards a common social goal.” Class consciousness is the means by which the spiritual integration of persons possessing a similarity of social position and of life chances is transformed into a common group activity.
Workers are said to possess class consciousness when they feel that their interests as workers are common and since the interests are common they must exhibit class solidarity among themselves and common attitudes towards their enemy class—the capitalists. Karl Marx laid great emphasis on class consciousness among the working classes. It was his endeavour to accentuate in the working classes the consciousness of their corporate capacity.
Hence his exhortation in the Communist Manifesto “Workers of the world, unite,” But class consciousness alone does not bring about an acting class; it is only the soil for an easier growth of similar activities, a favourable soil for the development of social movements. There must arise a certain organ of the class which may transform this consciousness into activity. The most important organ is the political party. That is why Lenin added the idea of a party in Marxism to prepare the workers for revolution.
The Conditions of Consciousness:
What are the conditions which tend to make members of a class conscious of their membership? Ginsberg mentions three conditions. First is the ease and amount of social mobility. If, movement up and down is easy and rapid, differences in mode of life disappear; if it is impossible the attitudes of members of different classes to each other become habitual and quasi-automatic; if it is possible but not easy, the consciousness of differences is heightened.
The second condition of class consciousness is rivalry and conflict. When the members of a class possess common interests, this possession is brought into consciousness by the need of defence against the common enemy, e.g., workers possessing common interests have class consciousness because they have to defend themselves against a common enemy, the capitalists. Their class is associational in character.
The third factor is the growth of a common tradition embodying common standards of value and common experiences. When the members come to possess common traditions and they have common experiences, it leads to the rise of class consciousness among them.
According to Sorokin, the ideal society is one in which each individual finds employment and status in accordance with his capacities. It means that opportunities must be open to individuals for changing and improving one’s social status. Now, opportunity is related to social mobility. In theory, a mobile society can provide this opportunity but in practice it is difficult.
Opportunity means that man is provided with work and status corresponding to his abilities. It is necessary, therefore, to ascertain by definite criterion and adequate tests the abilities of the individual. But, in mobile societies methods of testing have been inadequate with the result that societies have failed to treat each individual on the basis of merit.
The consequence is that grafters, irresponsible adventurers, demagogues and favorites reach at the top positions for which they are not qualified. Thus it cannot be said that in mobile societies everyone is assigned his proper place.
On the other hand, there are some immobile societies (such as Indian) in which the distribution of status has not been so bad. Sorokin was, however, of the opinion that social mobility despite serious drawbacks facilitates social progress and well-being. It may also be noted that social mobility may be downward as well as upward. It does not necessarily lessen inequality.
Corporate Class Consciousness:
MacIver draws a distinction between corporate class consciousness and competitive class feeling. Corporate class consciousness is “a sentiment uniting a whole group sharing a similar social status.” The working class exhibits most clearly corporate class consciousness which has developed under the spur of strong economic incentives and gained more strength in the struggle to maintain or destroy the pre-status.
Karl Marx laid great emphasis upon the need of corporate class consciousness among the working class. His aim was to develop solidarity and organization of the whole class of proletariat the property-less wage earners. According to him, proletariat class is essentially homogeneous. Its interests are common and commonly subject to the bourgeoisie. Hence any competitive struggle for position between its members is inimical to their common interest and solidarity.
Competitive Class Feeling:
Competitive class feeling is characteristic of the competitive system that developed in modern society. It is a “personal form of class sentiment .that often determines the conduct of individuals towards one another without involving on their part any express recognition of whole groups to which they respectively belong.”
When Mr. A blackballs Mr. B from membership in his club, it does not mean that he thereby necessarily upholds the standards or the interest of a whole class, or when Mr. A patronizes Mr. B, nor does it mean that he necessarily feels solidarity with a whole order of “superiors” of Mr. B.
In such cases, the conduct of A is specific, personalized, an expression of competitive class feeling. According to MacIver, corporate class consciousness and competitive class feeling are fundamentally antagonistic. The former is a manifestation of the common interest of the class, the latter expresses in great measure the individual or self-limited interest.
Class consciousness tends to be stronger or weaker according to the degree in which the element of caste is present. When social conditions and customs fix rigidly a man’s status in life, he identifies himself with the fellows living under the same conditions. In a caste-ridden society, for example, Indian society, the class sentiment is stronger as it is among Harijans.
So when the mores of an authoritative religion hold sway, the members of the group slowly and reverently order themselves to all their superiors. But if the mores break, there comes a great social change. The members of the low class rise up higher in the social scale according to their individual efforts and enterprise.
If the belief prevails that status is not rigidly determined and that higher status can be individually acquired, the class solidarity tends to be broken and the class consciousness weakened. In other words, the sentiment of class consciousness is stronger in a closed society than in an open society.
It may also be remarked that class stratification in societies today is in a state of flux. In some societies, for example, communist lands, there is a rigid class organization, while in others people are pressing for democratic organisation with class emphasis at a minimum.