SOCIAL STRATIFICATION

LEARNING OUTLINE

1. INTRODUCTION• Definitions• Origin• Causes• Characteristics2. IMPACTS OF SOCIAL STRATIFICATION3. FORMS OF STRATIFICATION

LEARNING OUTLINE

5. POVERTY6. SOURCES OF STRATIFICATION• Structural-Functionalist Perspectives• Social conflict Perspectives• Multidimensional Perspectives7. MAINTAINING STRATIFICATION8. SOCIAL MOBILITY

SOCIAL STRATIFICATIONSocial stratification is a term used in the social sciences to describe: the relative social position of persons in a given social group, category,

geographical region or other social unit. It derives from

the Latin stratum (plural strata; parallel, horizontal layers)

referring to a given society’s categorization of its people into rankings of socioeconomic tiers

based on factors like wealth, income, social status, occupation and power.

SOCIAL STRATIFICATION According Raymond W. Murray:

“Social Stratification is horizontal division of society

into ‘higher’ and ‘lower’ social units.”

SOCIAL STRATIFICATION According to Gilbert:

“Social Stratification is the division of society into permanent groups or

categories linked with each other by the relationship of

superiority and subordination.”

SOCIAL STRATIFICATION According to Kurt B. Mayer:

“Social Stratification is, a system of differentiation which includes social positions whose occupants are treated as superior, equal or inferior relative to one another in

socially important respect.”

SOCIAL STRATIFICATION According to Lundberg:

“A stratified society is one marked by inequality, by

difference among people that are evaluated by them as being ‘lower’ and ‘higher’.

ORIGIN OF SOCIAL STRATIFICATION

Hunting and Gathering Societies Horticultural, Pastoral, and Agricultural

Societies Division of Labor and Job Specialization Industrialized Societies The Improvement of Working Conditions Postindustrial Societies

CAUSES OF SOCIAL STRATIFICATION

There are five basic points which gives clear idea about the causes of social stratification:1. Inequality2. Conflict 3. Power4. Wealth 5. Instability

CHARACTERISTICS OF SOCIAL STRATIFICATION

Social stratification may have the following characteristics:1. Social stratification is universal2. Stratification is social3. It is ancient4. It is in diverse forms5. Social stratification is Consequential

IMPACTS OF STRATIFICATION ON OUR LIFE

It leads to inequality regarding…

o Health sector.

o Education.

o Bounds individual actions.

o Specification of social roles.

o Societal laws.

o Whom will live or die.

HEALTH SECTOR

o Expensive health care facilities

o VIP culture

o Different treatment quality

o Discriminating attitude of care providers

o Unequal distribution of clean water and safe

environment in different zones of a city

EDUCATIONo Different Education Systems

o Specific methods of teaching

o Out dated syllabus

o Language Conflicts

o Leads to job discriminations

BOUNDS INDIVIDUAL ACTIONS

o Different Political Affiliation

o Limit our Opportunities to work

o Limit our Perceptive

o Stereotyping

o Labialization

o Stops one to ask question

SPECIFICATION OF SOCIAL ROLES

o Mother bound to care for children

o Preferred specific professions like doctors, engineers and

bankers etc.

o Father bound to be bread earner

o Child are bound to respect their elders and parent

SOCIETAL LAWS

o Punishment amplificationo Traffic ruleso Banks policieso Discrimination in journalism

WHOM WILL LIVE OR DIEo At time of flood protection of major cities

o In case of shortage of any basic food item

o In a case of protest lower political class political agents

actually suffer

For example :

Sinking titanic

FORMS OF STRATIFICATION

1. The Slavery System

2. The Estate System

3. The Caste System

4. The Class System

THE SLAVERY SYSTEM“It is an extreme form of inequality in which some individuals are owned by others as their property.”

L.T Hobhouse defined slave as a man whom law and

custom regard as the property of another. In extreme cases

he is wholly without rights. He is in lower condition as

compared with freemen. The slaves have no political rights

he does not choose his government, he does not attend the

public councils. Socially he is despised. He is compelled to

work.

EXAMPLE: Societies of the ancient world based upon slavery (Greek

and Roman) and southern states of USA in the 18th and

19th centuries.

According to H.J Nieboer the basis of slavery is always

economic because with it emerged a kind of aristocracy

which lived upon slave labour.

THE ESTATE SYSTEM“The estate system is synonymous with Feudalism”.

Characteristics of Feudal Estate:

I. In the first place they were legally defined; each estate had a

status with legal rights and duties, privileges and obligations.

II.  Secondly the estates represented a broad division of labor

and were regarded as having definite functions. The nobility

were ordained to defend all, the clergy to pray for all and the

commons to provide food for all.

THE ESTATE SYSTEM

III. Thirdly the feudal estates were political groups. An

assembly of estates possessed political power. 

o Thus the three estates clergy, nobility and

commoners functioned like three political groups.

THE CASTE SYSTEM“ A person’s location in the social strata is ascribed by

birth rather than based on individual accomplishments.”The system is maintained through , • Endogamous Marriages:

Cultural rules requiring that

people marry only within their own group.

• Aparthied:

Laws that formalized strict racial

segregation.

THE CASTE SYSTEMThis system of stratification is mostly prominent in India and

the Hindu religion.

1. The Brahmins (priests/teachers/healers) From the most

pure

2. The Kshatriyas (soldiers/warriors)

3. The Vaishyas (traders/merchants)

4. The Shudras (servants/labourers)

5. The Untouchables (social outcastes/impure) To the least

pure.

THE CLASS SYSTEM

Industrial society gave rise to class based system of

stratification.

“It is based on a combination of ascribed and achieved

statuses.”

o Usually synonymous with socioeconomic status, which is

one's social position as determined by income, wealth,

occupational prestige, and educational attainment.

THE COMMON THREE-STRATUM MODEL

The upper class is the social class composed of those who are

wealthy, well-born, or both. They usually wield the greatest

political power.

The middle class is the most contested of the three categories,

consisting of the broad group of people in contemporary society

who fall socioeconomically between the lower class and upper

class. Middle class workers are sometimes called white-collar

workers.

THE COMMON THREE-STRATUM MODEL

The lower or working class is sometimes separated into

those who are employed as wage or hourly workers, and

an underclass—those who are long-term unemployed

and/or homeless, especially those receiving welfare

from the state. Members of the working class are

sometimes called blue-collar workers.

EXAMPLE The British aristocracy is an instance where wealth,

power, and prestige do not necessarily align — the

aristocracy is upper class and generally has significant 

political influence, but members are not necessarily

wealthy.

PovertyDiscussions of income inequality are often conducted in

concert with discussions of poverty.

But what is poverty, and

who is poor?

In a stratified system in which resources are unequally

distributed, those having the least are the“poor.”

Poverty can be defined in absolute or relative terms.

“Those people living in families with an income below this poverty

threshold are considered “poor” by the government definition. These

thresholds vary by family size and composition. However, they are not

adjusted for variations in the cost of living across the nation.”

“Poverty threshold”

A snapshot of these poverty threshold

Share of Aggregate Income among Households, Selected

Years 1967–2003

Cont’d

Cont’dIn 2003, the poverty

threshold for a family of four (consisting of two adults and two children) was $18,660. By these official definitions, 35.8 million Americans (or 12.5 percent) lived in poverty in 2003 (U.S. Census Bureau 2004b).

Most people define poverty in non-numerical terms based on their personal circumstances. They are using a relative definition of poverty, measuring it on the basis of whether their basic needs and wants are met. 

• Research has documented a number of hidden costs of being

poor.

• The poor pay more for many items.

• Rent-to-own arrangements

• These rent-to-own stores may charge lower payments for items,

but they have longer contracts.

• They may also be able to avoid legal problems from charging

high interest rates by replacing them with other fees and charges.

Breyer and Hudson

• Costs are also more than financial. The poor face a bigger time

squeeze than the affluent.

• They face trade-offs in demands between work and family life.

• This dilemma includes time to monitor their children’s educational

needs (e.g., supervised study time)

• Income and poverty are unequally distributed by such factors as

race and sex.

• Not all groups have an equivalent chance of being poor.

Heymann, Newman and Chin

• The median income for black and Hispanic households is lower

than the median income for white and Asian households.

• Racial and ethnic minorities are also disproportionately poor.

• The poverty rates for blacks and Hispanics is more than double

the rate for whites and Asians.

Poverty by race

Unequal distribution between Gender(Figart and Lapidus)

• Income and poverty are also unequally distributed between males and

females.

• In 2003, women in the United States earned 80 cents for every dollar

earned by men.

• That was a record earning ratio (BLS 2004a).

• Even women in high-status positions earn less than their male

counterparts

• Recent decades have seen a feminization of poverty, an increase

in the proportion of the poor who are women.

• Increasing divorce rates and single-parent families headed by

women trying to care for children and support them on lower

incomes than men have contributed to this trend.

• These female-headed households are also disproportionately

poor, a situation that is compounded by race and ethnicity

Feminization of Poverty

Two of the major questions sociologists studying stratification

have tried to answer is why stratification exists and if it is

inevitable.

Sociologists working from the two major macro-theoretical

perspectives.

1. Structural-Functionalist Perspectives

2. Social-Conflict Perspectives

3. Multidimensional Perspectives

SOURCES OF STRATIFICATION

Perspective that in-equality serves a social function, sociologists

working in the structural-functionalist tradition have examined how

stratification contributes to the operation of society as a whole.

Kingsley Davis, profiled below, and Wilbert Moore (1945) offered an

early and controversial, but still influential, functionalist analysis of

stratification.

1. Structural-Functionalist Perspectives

Structural-Functionalist Perspectives

• They argue that some form of stratification is universal across all

societies. To operate smoothly, societies face a “motivational

problem” in ensuring that the best, most qualified people fill the most

important roles in society.

• By offering the greatest rewards to people who fill the most important

positions, Stratification is an “unconsciously evolved device by which

societies insure that the important positions are conscientiously filled

by the most qualified persons”

Davis and Moore

This perspective has been widely criticized (Tumin 1953, 1985).

Critics have charged that the Davis-Moore thesis implies that

individual attributes determine how people are located in society, and

that the most talented earn their positions through their hard work

and merits.

This idea disregards the impact of social factors such as

discrimination that are outside of individual control.

It does not give appropriate attention to the tensions and

divisiveness that can arise as a result of inequality.

Critics

For example, hard feeling may result among those who work hard

yet are treated unfairly or feel they are not properly rewarded for

their efforts.

Example

Sociologist Herbert Gans (2001), analyzed the functions of poverty.

• He described 13 functions the poor play in society.

• The poor ensure that society’s “dirty work” gets done, their

existence creates jobs that serve the poor

• (e.g., social-service workers, shelter providers), and the poor buy

goods others do not want (e.g., day-old bread, used clothing and

vehicles).

• The poor also absorb the costs of social change

Herbert Gans

Gans says that his analysis does not mean that poverty must, or should,

Exist

• He argues that a “functional analysis must conclude that poverty

persists not only because it fulfills a number of positive functions

but also because many of the functional alternatives to poverty

would be quite dysfunctional for the affluent members of society”

• He also uses his analysis to show that functionalism, accused by

critics of being inherently conservative, can be used in more liberal

and radical analyses.

Cont’d

STRUCTURAL FUNCTIONALISM:

Emile Durkheim: (1858-1917)

STRUCTURAL FUNCTIONALISM: “This perspective views society as a complex system of interrelated parts that work together to maintain stability.”

According to this perspective:Social system’s parts are

interdependent.System has a normal healthy state

of equilibrium.When disturbed parts reorganize

them.

FUNCTIOALISM ACCORDING TO STRATIFICATION:

Kingsley Davis & Wilbert Moore:

“Stratification is an unconsciously evolved device by which societies ensure that the important positions are filled conscientiously by the most qualified persons.’’

CRITICISM:This idea disregards the impacts of

social factors such as discrimination that are outside one’s control

Disregards those who inherit wealth and positions.

Disregard ability of those who have higher status.

Most highly rewarded positions do not always fill the most important roles in society.

It does not account for disparity between poor and rich.

FUNCTIONS OF POVERTY:Dirty workCreate jobsBuy goods others don’t wantGuarantee status of wealthy onesAbsorb costs of social change

‘’Functional analysis must conclude That poverty persists not because it fulfills a number of positive functions but because many of the functional alternatives to poverty would be quite dysfunctional for for other affluent members of society’’

SOCIAL CONFLICT PERSECTIVE:Focuses on tensions in societies.CAUSES:Limited resourcesConflict between groups

ACCORDING TO STRATIFICATION:Karl Marx: SOCIAL CLASSES: ‘’Positions based on the unequal locations of people within economic groups’’BOURGEOISIE / HAVES:‘’ who own factories, industrial machinery and banks’’

PROLETRAIT/ HAVE NOTS:‘’ The factory workers who actually work to produce these products’’CLASS CONSCIOUSNESS:‘’A recognition of themselves as a social class with interests opposed to the bourgeoisie’’

CRITICISM:Did not predict the rise of middle

class Inequality persists and increases.

MULTIDIMENSIONAL PERSPECTIVE Max Weber developed a more complex view

of social stratification than Marx’s view of economically based classes.

Weber developed three interrelated dimensions of stratification:

1. Class2. Status 3. Power

MAINTAINING STRATIFICATIONStratification is influenced by ascribed statuses such as race, ethnic background, gender and age. We are born with these statuses and despite our personal efforts and achievements, they impact our lifestyle and life chances. Prejudices and Discrimination based on these ascribed statuses serve to justify and maintain systems of stratification.

“Prejudice is a preconceived and irrational attitude toward people based on their group membership.”It is inflexible and not based on direct evidence or contact. Prejudices can take the form of positive or negative attitudes toward a group, but the term often used with a negative connotation.

EUGENE HARTLEY Express the reaction to various minorities

groups Prejudice against actual racial and ethnic

groups Prejudicial attitudes against fictitious groups

Common and damaging forms of prejudice are found in the “isms” that exist throughout society. For example racism, sexism, ageism. All of these “isms” take the form of a belief that one group is naturally inferior or superior, that justifying unequal treatment of the group on the basis of their assumed characteristics.

In racism, that belief is based on racial or ethnic group membership.

Sexism is the belief that one sex is naturally inferior or superior, thereby justifying unequal treatment. Feminist sociologists focus on sexism.

Ageism takes the form of prejudice against the elderly.

Other “isms” include ableism (prejudice against the disabled) and heterosexism (prejudice toward homosexuals).These “isms” reinforce and are reinforced by, another common and potentially destructive form of prejudice that is stereotypes. Stereotypes are beliefs that generalize certain exaggerated traits to an entire category of people.

DISCRIMINATIONDiscrimination, unequal treatment of people based on their group membership, also perpetuates stratification.Prejudice is an attitude; discrimination is a behavior. Although the two may, and often do, occur together, they can also exist separately.

INSTITUTIONAL DISCRIMINATION“When discrimination becomes part of the operation of social institution.”It perpetuates stratification patterns by systematically disadvantaging certain groups.According to Joe Feagin and Melvin Sikes, racism is still alive and well, although less overt than in the past. However institutional racism is rampant.

These ascribed factors require a multidimensional approach to stratification . They can have multiple, interrelated effects. Stratification also applies to many more social factors than race, ethnicity, gender and age. We are also ranked to varying degrees by other factors such as religious affiliation and sexual preference.

Some sociologists are also starting to explore stratification and oppression regarding animals, just as they have long studied the impact of stratification and oppression of the poor, women and minorities.

Sociologists added another “isms” to the sociological vocabulary with the term speciesism, (a belief in the superiority of humans over other species of animals). They cite examples such as food industries that rely on animals bred and raised under poor conditions, experimentation on animals, and the use of animals in circuses and rodeos.

SOCIAL MOBILITY

SOCIAL MOBILITY Social mobility is the movement of individuals, families,

households or other categories of people within or between social strata in a society.

It is a change in social status relative to others social location within a given society.

HORIZONTAL MOBILITY If mobility involves a change in position, especially in

occupation, but no change in social class, it is called

“horizontal mobility”.

EXAMPLEA person who moves from a managerial position in one company to a similar position in another.

VERTICAL MOBILITYIf, however, the move involves a change in social class, it is called “vertical mobility” and involves

either “upward mobility” or “downward mobility”.EXAMPLE An industrial worker who becomes a wealthy

businessman moves upward in the class system, a landed aristocrat who loses everything in a revolution moves downward in the system.

TYPES OF MOBILITY

Mobility can be examined by how much time it takes to

occur: Intragenerational mobility Intergenerational mobility

Mobility can also be examined by the factors behind the change: Structural mobility Positional mobility

INTRAGENERATIONAL MOBILITY

Intragenerational mobility is movement that occurs within the lifetime of an individual.

EXAMPLEWhen a child rises above the class of his or her parents. An employee that starts in the mail room and becomes corporate vice president.

INTERGENERATIONAL MOBILITY

Intergenerational mobility is the movement that occurs

from generation to generation.

EXAMPLE

When individual changes class because of business

success. The mail-rom clerk’s son becomes the corporate

officer.

STRUCTURAL MOBILITY Mobility that occurs as a result of changes in the

occupational structure of a society is structural mobility. EXAMPLEThe dot-com businesses that arose with the growth of the internet provided new, often high paying employment opportunities during the late 1990s. When the dot-com bust came at the end of the decade the occupational structure once again changed , and many workers lost their jobs.

POSITIONAL MOBILITY Positional mobility is movement that occurs

due to individual effort. EXAMPLE

Hard work, winning the lottery.

FACTORS THAT LIMIT MOBILITY

RACISM: Racism is a factor that has a huge, limiting impact on mobility and achievement. CLASS : Class is a more important factor that race in limiting social mobility. Poor job training Little opportunity to obtain education