The concept of âclassâ is the subject of analysis for sociologists, political scientists, anthropologists and social historians. However, there is no single definition of this concept, and the term has a wide range of sometimes conflicting meanings. In general, the concept of âclassâ is usually synonymous with a socio-economic class, which is defined as âa large group of people with the same social, economic, cultural, political or educational statusâ. For example: âworkerâ, ânew professionalâ, etc. Nevertheless, scientists separate social and socio-economic status from each other, in the first case they refer to a relatively stable sociocultural background, and in the second to the current social the economic situation that makes this status more volatile and volatile.
Classes: A Concept on History
Historically, the stratum and its social role were sometimes established by law. For example, the permitted regime in strictly regulated places, permission for luxury only for the aristocracy, etc. The quality and variety of clothes are still a reflection of the concept of a social class, because it has developed historically.
Theoretical models
The definitions of social roles reflect a number of sociological schools that are simultaneously associated with anthropology, economics, psychology and sociology. The main schools historically were Marxism and structural functionalism - it was they who set the basic concepts of strata in sociology, philosophy, and political science. The general stratigraphic model divides society into a simple hierarchy of the working, middle and upper classes. Two broad schools of definitions appear in academic circles: those that correspond to the sociological stratum models of the 20th century, and those that correspond to the historical materialistic economic models of the 19th century, relevant for Marxists and anarchists.
Another difference in the interpretation of the concept of âclassâ can be made between analytical social concepts, such as Marxist and Weber, as well as empirical ones, such as the approach to socio-economic status, which marks the correlation of income, education, and wealth with social results without the need to take into account the relationship to a specific social structure.
Marx Classes
For Marx, social status is a combination of objective and subjective factors. Objectively, it shares a common connection with the means of production. Subjectively, the members of one stratum will necessarily have some perception (âclass consciousnessâ) and similarity of common interests. Class consciousness is not just the awareness of one's own group interest, but also the totality of general views on how society should be organized legally, culturally, socially and politically. These collective relationships are reproduced over time.
In Marxist theory, the structure of capitalist society is characterized by a growing conflict between two main social formations: the bourgeoisie or capitalists, who possess all the necessary tools of production, and the proletariat, which is forced to sell their own labor power, existing at the expense of âhumiliatingâ (according to Marxists) wage labor . This fundamental economic structure of the correlation of labor and property exposes an unnatural state of inequality, which is supposedly legitimized through culture and ideology. The concept of the word "class" in Marxism is closely related to the concepts of basis and superstructure.
Marxists explain the history of âcivilizedâ societies in terms of the struggle between those who control production and those who produce goods or services in society. In the Marxist view of capitalism, this is a conflict between capitalists (the bourgeoisie) and wage workers (proletariat). For Marxists, fundamental antagonism is rooted in a situation where control over social production necessarily entails control over a group of people producing goods â in capitalism, this is the exploitation of workers by the bourgeoisie. Therefore, the concept of "class" in Marxism has a rather specific political color.
Eternal struggle
The meta-historical conflict, often called the "class war" or "class struggle", is, in the view of Marxists, the eternal antagonism that exists in society because of competing socio-economic interests and desires between people of different social strata.
For Marx, the history of human society was a history of class conflict. He pointed to the successful upsurge of the bourgeoisie and the need for revolutionary violence in securing the rights of the bourgeoisie, which supported the capitalist economy.
Marx argued that the exploitation and poverty inherent in capitalism were already an existing form of this conflict. Marx believed that wage earners would need to rebel in order to ensure a more equitable distribution of wealth and political power.
Weber Classes
Weber deduced many of his key concepts of social stratification by examining the social structure of many countries. He noted that, contrary to the theories of Marx, stratification is based not only on capital ownership. Weber noted that some members of the aristocracy do not have economic wealth, but nevertheless may have political power. Similarly, in Europe, many wealthy Jewish families lacked prestige and honesty, as they were considered members of the Pariah group.
At the peak of historical materialism, Marx Weber emphasized the importance of cultural influences embedded in religion as a means of understanding the genesis of capitalism. Protestant ethics was the earliest part of Weber's broader study of the world religion - he continued to study the religions of China, India and ancient Judaism, with particular regard to their various economic consequences and conditions of social stratification. In another major work, âPolitics as a Calling,â Weber defined the state as an enterprise that successfully states âa monopoly on the legal use of physical force in a given territory.â He was also the first to classify social power in various forms, which he called charismatic, traditional, and rational. His analysis of the bureaucracy emphasized that modern state institutions are increasingly based on rational power.
Modern tripartite model
Today it is generally accepted that society consists of three elements: a very rich and powerful upper class that owns and controls the means of production, a middle stratum of professional workers, small business owners and low-level managers, and a lower social group that relies on low paid salaries for their livelihoods and often face poverty. Such a division today exists in all countries. The tripartite model has become so popular that it has long migrated from sociology to everyday language.
Whenever someone is asked to give a definition of the concept of "class", then this is the model that is familiar to everyone.
Pyramid top
The top of the pyramid of socio-economic relations is a social class consisting of rich, noble, powerful people. Usually they have the greatest political power. In some countries, it is enough to be rich and successful to allow yourself to enter this category of people. In others, only people who are born or marry in certain aristocratic families are considered members of this stratum, and those who acquire great wealth through commercial activity look at the aristocracy as nouveau riche.
For example, in the United Kingdom the upper classes are the aristocracy and members of the royal family, and wealth plays a less important role in status. Many peers and other title holders have places attached to them, and the title holder (such as Count Bristol) and his family are house keepers, but not owners. Many of them are expensive, so aristocrats usually require wealth. Many homes are parts of estates owned and managed by the title holder with cash received from land sales, rents, or other sources of income. However, in the United States, where there is no aristocracy or royal power, the highest status belongs to the extremely wealthy, the so-called "super-rich" people. Although even in the United States, representatives of old noble families have a habit of looking down on those who have earned their money in business: there it is called the struggle between New Money and Old Money.
The upper class, as a rule, makes up 2% of the population. Its members are often born already with their status and are distinguished by their enormous wealth, which is passed down from generation to generation in the form of estates and capital.
Mid pyramid
Any system consisting of three elements implies that between the lower and upper elements will be something in between, like between a rock and a hard place. The same goes for sociology. The concept of the middle class in sociology implies a large group of people who are socially and economically between the lower and upper classes. One example of the variability of this term is that in the United States the word "middle class" is used to refer to people who would otherwise be considered representatives of the proletariat. Such workers are sometimes called "employees."
Many theorists, such as Ralph Dahrendorf, have noticed a tendency to increase the number and influence of the middle class in modern developed societies, especially in connection with the need for an educated workforce (in other words, specialists) in a high-tech economy.
Bottom of the pyramid
The lower class is people working in low-paying jobs with very low economic security. This term also refers to low-income individuals.
The proletariat is sometimes divided into those who are hired but lack financial security (the âworking poorâ), and the unemployed poor â those who are unemployed in the long run and / or homeless, especially those who receive subsidies from the state. The latter is analogous to the Marxist term âlumpen proletariatâ. Members of the working class in America are sometimes called blue-collar workers.
The role of social strata
The socio-economic class of a person has widespread consequences for his life. This may affect the school he will attend, his health, the availability of jobs, the opportunity to marry, the availability of social services.
Angus Deaton and Anne Keyes analyzed the mortality rate associated with a group of white Americans aged 45 to 54 years and their relationship to a particular class. The number of suicides and deaths from substance abuse in this particular group of Americans is growing. This group has also been reported with an increase in reports of chronic pain and poor general health. Deaton and Case concluded from these observations that not only the mind, but also the body suffers because of the constant tension that these Americans feel due to the struggle against poverty and the constant fluctuation between the lower and working classes.
Social stratifications can also determine sporting events in which representatives of particular classes participate. It is assumed that representatives of the upper strata of society are more likely to participate in sporting events, while people of low social status are less likely to participate in them.
Popular Utopia
âClassless societyâ describes a system in which no one is born within the framework of a particular social group. Differences in wealth, income, education, culture or social ties can arise and be determined only by individual experience and achievements in such a society.
Since these differences are difficult to avoid, proponents of this system of society (for example, anarchists and communists) offer various means for its achievement and maintenance and attach a different degree of importance to it as a logical conclusion to their political goals. Often they reject the need for the concept of a social class as such.
Classless society and the evolution of Marxism
As far back as the 19th century, Marx noted that there should be some kind of transitional form between the society of capitalism and the society of communism. This transitional link, which he called socialism, would still be class, but instead of capitalists, workers would rule in it. Being the ruling force, the workers would then develop productive capacities to the stage where the comprehensive development of each person could be and the principle âto each according to his needsâ could be realized.
In the United States, production forces are already developed to the point that a classless society can theoretically exist. Although, according to Marx, it can only be realized under communism. But since the time of the Russian Revolution, all modern types of socialists have been separated from the Communists in terms of political organization, but they never doubted that socialism is only a transitional society on the path to communism and that only under communism can it be a classless society.
How did the revolutionary socialists come to dwell only on socialism, while still claiming the right to call themselves Marxists? The turning point was the Russian revolution. If the Bolsheviks had never committed a revolution, socialism and communism as the ultimate goal would have remained part of Marxist ideology, and the Marxist organizations of the whole world could continue their struggle against capitalism alone.
The concept of "class" in mathematics
This word has many special meanings in mathematics. In this area, it belongs to a group of objects with some common property.
In statistics, the definition of the concept of âclassâ means a group of values ââby which data is linked to calculate the frequency distribution. The range of these values ââis called the interval, the boundaries of the interval are called restrictions, and the middle of the interval is called the label.
Outside of theory, the word "class" is sometimes used as an analogue of the word "set." This habit dates back to a special period in the history of mathematics, when they were not distinguished from the concept of sets, as in modern set-theoretic terminology. Many discussions about them in the 19th century and earlier actually refer to sets or, perhaps, to a more ambiguous concept. The concept of verb classes has undergone a similar transformation.
Another approach is used by the von Neumann-Bernays-GĂśdel axioms (NBG) - classes are the main objects in this theory. However, the axioms of the existence of the class NBG are limited, so that they are only quantified by the set. This leads to the fact that NBG is a conservative extension of ZF. Whatever the concept of a class, a set is always its attribute.
Morse-Kelly set theory admits the correct classes as basic objects, such as NBG, but also allows them to be quantified in their axioms. This makes MK be strictly stronger than NBG and ZF.
In other set theories, such as ânew foundationsâ or âhalf-net theoryâ, the concept of âright classâ still makes sense (not all of them are sets). For example, any set theory with a universal set has its own sets, which are subclasses of sets.
Each similar element is a set - it is known to everyone who is familiar with mathematics. Classes are the basic concept in these mathematical theories.