CLASS SYSTEM

CLASS SYSTEM

▪ Basis of stratification
▪ Defacto group
▪ Relatively open, not closed
▪ Not legally defined
▪ Not religious defined and sanctioned
▪ Basis, economic
▪ But more than economic groups
CHARACTERSTICS

▪ Hierarchy order
▪ Superiority, inferiority
▪ Maintain distance
▪ Class has openness
▪ Achieved status
▪ Mobility among classes
▪ Its own culture, styles , values
BASIS OF CLASS formation

▪ Occupation
▪ Religion
▪ Education
▪ Wealth, property, income
▪ Prestige and power
TYPES OF CLASS

A. Giddens –
▪ Upper Class - Middle Class - Labour Class
Karl Marx -
▪ Capitalist Class - Proletarian Class - Petty Bourgeois
V. Pareto –

▪ The Elite Class - The masses

MACIVER AND PAGE

▪ Eastern Civilizations – Birth determines class

▪ Western Civilizations – Wealth, Class

Determinant
THEORIES OF SOCIAL STRATIFICATION

Functional Theory - Davis, Moore, Parsons

▪ No society classless or un-stratified

▪ Functional necessity
▪ Most important position filled by most qualified

Parsons
▪ Stratification – based on value system
▪ Value system – based on quality, efficiency, possession
ELECTIC THEORY - Max Webber

▪ Related to unequal power

▪ He stratifies society by class, status and power

CONFLICT THEORY – Karl Marx

▪ Human society – history of class struggles

▪ Stratification based on class system

He classified society

▪ Primitive communism – no stratification

▪ Stage of slavery – feudal class, , slaves
▪ Feudalism – Landlords, landless
▪ Capitalism – Capitalist class, Proletariat class
▪ Communism – Dictatorship of Proletariat class