SOCIOLOGY OF SOCIAL STRATIFICATION

Akancha singh
18/SOC/03
Sociology honours
Question- How does the study of inequality differ in Marxian and Weberian framewok?
Explain.
In the recent reading we have been focusing on a key aspect related to the concepts of
inequality and stratification: CLASS. The sociological examination of class has been explained in
different ways by Karl Marx and Max Weber in their works. Now we will be focusing on a
detailed comparative analysis of the gap sociologists' understanding of class and consciousness
towards collective action.
Weber is at logger heads with Marx. Weber looks at the idea of class, with a different approach
that is “is power possible without money or does money give power?” this is what Weber asks,
does economic power give one access to all kinds of power. Max weber wants to counter or
rather expand the spectrum of power which Marx has given. Weber is not completely ignoring
the economic aspect, it is one important determinant of power. In this text the basic question
that is highlighted is how social order is composed and how stratification takes place in it? In
what way property enhances one’s access to power. Further Weber talks about how Marx
conceptualises class in terms of labour, capital etc.
Max Weber is using the concept of power to understand class, he problematizes the three key
terms – class,-situation, status group and parties. There were two terms pronounced in the text
that were legal order and economic order, Legal order explains a conformity to law. Weber is
trying to understand power beyond economic powers/aspects. Money may define class but it
does not give power and power comes from the legal order. If one has the back up of authority
or helps impose authority, one rises above the ordinary. Merely economic power cannot
guarantee power or social status, which is linked with social capital, a capital of networks, the
ways in which power (legal order) separates or stratifies us. Social order can be understood
through economic and legal order. Class situation defines the economic class group one belongs
to. Weber understanding of class situation is how we are connected to social class. Legal order
is used to keep social order maintained. Weber thinks of how class can be understood in a more
nuanced way in terms of power and authority. Terms like class situation and market situation
and lack of property were brought up. How property is to be understood in relation to class,
class situation is actually how easily you can access the market or acquire property. The
position in the market is directly linked with your class situation. Here, the idea of market
expands beyond the economic aspect, and takes into account socio-cultural aspect. Class
situation is ultimately market situation. Class situation is related to class identity,
communalization, class interest and class struggle what is it that connects individuals with a
class group. Common class interest does not necessarily mean that its immediate outcome will
be communalization or unionization for class struggle. It is here, Weber contradicts Marx’s idea,
how revolution cannot be only dependent on class interest. Class interest does not mean it will
lead to class struggle, weber says that the workers in factories or mills can adopt different
tactics or techniques of resistance like workers refused to work and so on, but the power
structure remain same it doesn’t mean a class struggle.
What really brings a class into action? What does the term class action mean. He brings the
term and uses the term. Belonging to a certain class doesn’t lead to class action or communal
action, which include people belonging to different class, status group. Here status is linked to a
sense of honour, status group is linked to status honour that drives people to take communal
action. For Weber it’s the complex sense of the term class which helps people bring into
communal action. It is class, ethnicity, market, situation that will determine status group. He is
building on from this point to talk about status priviledge, can status groups become close in
nature, social enclosure by elites, desire to limit access and the number of people who can
identify with the status honour. After these two reading on Weber and Marx we will step into
functionalist perspective we will be moving to reinhard bendix text. Bendix (1974) provides you
a detailed analysis of how, in the period of modern history, the concept of class inequalities has
evolved. He chooses Marxist framework of class and Weberian explanation of class/power in
this text. Marx, in Communist Manifesto and other works, had emphasised on understanding a
framework for organisation of production. His emphasis was primarily organisation of
production as the basis of social classes in capitalist societies. Marxist framework of class
undertook economic analysis of capitalism. It is through this analysis, built on class and
economic structure, that Marx understood theories of group formation and collective action.
He also tried to examine the polarisation between ruling class and working class as a source of
labour movement. It was this politics of class consciousness that remained central to Marxist
analysis of class inequalities. Marx has also drawn attention to the pursuit of individual interests
in understanding class divisions in the nineteenth century. The control over means of
production on economic dominance and its exercise in the Marxist framework helps raise
Bendix a central question:
Can ownership be the only basis of class and power? What is the role of deprivation as a base for
exercise of power and division of classes?
These questions make way for us to understand how Weber shifts focus towards status groups
and power in understanding inequalities. After elaborating on Marxian approach to inequality
and class, Bendix moves towards understands understanding the linkage between class situation
and collective organisation from Weber's perspective. Bendix, in his text, builds his arguments
on the grounds of differences between Weber's approach and Marx's understanding of class
inequalities. Weber, in his previous text, had explained the significance of class situation in
understanding the role of class as organised groups. Classic situation exists wherever men are
similarly situated by their "relative control over goods and skills".
Control --- Income; goods; profits ----- certain lifestyle that leads to a common class culture
further resulting to collective action.
In one of his major difference with Marxist framework, Weber notes that a common class
situation is not enough to produce association or collective action by a class group or among
workers. It rarher holds capacity for an abrupt disruption or amorphous mass reaction, as Bendix
notes. While Marx underlines the importance of linking class situation and class organisation, this
linkage has been problematic as he is keen to go beyond an 'ideal concept' of class that Marx
framed on the grounds of observed tendencies. Weber is also aiming to broaden Marx's concept
of economic determination of class situation. He wants to go beyond the "class trichotomy"
explained by Marx in order to expand the categories of class distinctions and individual
experiences and responses towards market situation. Weber, through a constant emphasis on
the role of power and authority, has underlined the role of intelligentsia and intellectuals in giving
political voice to workers' experiences. Who interprets and addresses the goals of class
organisation among the working class? Weber has thus highlighted the significance of a social
order in which "status is an effective claim to social esteem" -- largely dependent on a lifestyle,
formal education, heredity or occupation.
CIRCLE OF SOCIAL EQUALS ----- MEANS OF SOCIAL DISCRIMINATION
Status stratification, as Bendix notes, is built on economic differentiation, control over means of
production, familial distinction of status, and self interest. The instability of class divisions is also
a major reason for Weber's difference with Marxist theory on class. Weber has reiterated the
importance of desires for mobility, hinting towards an instability of class structure. Marx, on the
other hand, had focused on class polarisation and 'final overthrow of capitalism'. Weber and his
proximity to Tocqueville's argument is built on going against Marxist reductionism of bringing
down individual and social group as class conscious or economic collective. It is an exclusion of
the 'other' that helps Weber explain the difference between classes and status groups. The study
of inequality differs in Marxist and weberian frameworks through an understanding of society
across transition in modern history. The political and historical differences are what Bendix
emphasises in his work. In doing so, as you will notice in the text, the home, changes in the
structure of the home and industrial society have been discussed. So, this was how study of
inequality differ in weberian and Marxian framework.