Class Structure

Sociologists use the term class structure to refer to the hierarchical organization by which a society or community is divided into classes. The word class, though problematic as there is no consensus on what it actually means, can be defined with reference to a number of persons regarded as forming a group by reason of common attributes, qualities, or traits. It may also refer to people who share the same (or similar) social, economic, or educational status. The word often merges with the definition of social stratification in which a society is divided into layers (or strata) whose occupants have unequal access to social opportunities and rewards. People on the top of the strata enjoy privileges that are not available to other members of the society, leading to social inequality. In a stratified society, inequality is part of the social structure and is passed from one generation to the next. People who occupy the same layer of the socioeconomic hierarchy are commonly treated as a social class.

The major theoretical tradition within class analysis derives from the work of Karl Marx and Max Weber on the newly emerging class structure of industrial capitalism in the 19th century. From their perspective, classes are defined in economic terms, though views differ as to what the crucial economic determinants are. Marx analyzed class in relation to the ownership of capital and the means of production that polarized capitalist societies into two classes—the bourgeoisie and the proletariat.

Weber, on the other hand, divided classes in terms of economic differences of market capacity that gave rise to different life chances. Capital was one source of market capacity, but skill and education formed another.

Thus, Weber distinguished four classes—the propertied upper class, the administrative and managerial class, the traditional petty bourgeois class of small businessmen and shopkeepers, and the manual working class. Weber also referred to two other principles of stratification in society— social honor and status.

Although the classic concept of class structure as presented by Marx and Friedrich Engels assumes that social classes are based on different modes of production, this idea does not sufficiently explain class structure in the 21st century. In an attempt to update Marxist ideas, Erik Olin Wright’s description of contemporary class structure rests on the idea that it is characterized by nonexploitative oppression, as opposed to the exploitation conceptualized by Marx. According to Wright, the exploiters need the exploited and depend upon them for their own success. In a capitalist, industrialized society the proletariat possesses potential power against their oppressors in their capacity to disrupt production.

Nevertheless, in the postindustrialized world characterized by technological innovation and globalization, the underclass no longer has much capacity to organize the labor force. In essence, the exploiters no longer need the exploited, and the underclass continues to be denied access to resources such as education and housing. Their only source of power stems from their ability to interfere with consumption through crime and other forms of violence. As a result, class structure is still a product of economic oppression that creates a situation in which the material benefits of one group are acquired at the expense of another, and in which unjust coercion is an essential part of the process by which this occurs. In this context, the underclass now has very little recourse to combat oppression.

...