Social stratification in modern Russia

Категория реферата: Рефераты по социологии
Теги реферата: реферат по русскому языку, доклад по обж
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1. Certain position in any society are functionally more important than others and require special skills for their performance.

2. Only a limited number of individuals in any society have the talents which can be trained into the skills appropriate to these positions.

3. the conversion of talents into skills involves a training period during which sacrifices of one kind or another are made by those undergoing the training.

4. In order to induce the talented persons to undergo these sacrifices and acquire the training, their future positions must carry an inducement value in the form of differential, i.e., privileged and disproportionate access to the scarce and desired rewards which the society has to offer.

5. These scarce and desired goods consist of the rights and perquisites attached to or built into, the positions, and can be classified into those things which contribute to a.) sustenance and comfort, b.) humor an diversion, c.) self-respect and ego expansion.

6. This differential access to the basic rewards to the society has a consequence the differentiation of the prestige and esteem which various strata acquire. This may be said, along with the rights and perquisites, to constitute institutionalized social inequality, i.e., stratification.

7. Therefore, social inequality among different strata in the amounts of scarce and desired goods, and the amounts of prestige and esteem, which they receive, is both positively functional and inevitable in any society.

Social mobility

Social mobility is a process, when individuals or groups can move from one level (stratum) to another in the stratification system. There are three types of social mobility:

1. Vertical mobility involves movement from one social status to another of higher or lower rank.

2. Horizontal mobility entails movement from one social status to another that approximately equivalent in rank.

3. Integrational mobility involves a comparison of the social status of parents and their children at the same point in their respective careers.

Integrational mobility entails a comparison of the social status of a person over an extended time period.

Identifying social classes

There are three main approaches to identifying social classes: the objective method, the self-placement method, and the reputational method.
Although all the approaches overlap in classes, there are appreciable differences in the results afforded by each. Moreover, each method has certain advantages and disadvantages (see Table 1).

1. The objective method. The objective method views social class as a statistical category. The categories are formed not by the members themselves, but by sociologists or statisticians. Most commonly people assigned to social classes on the basis of income, occupation, or education (or some combination of these characteristics). The label

“objective” can be misleading, for it is not meant to imply that the approach is more “scientific” or “unbiased” than the others. Rather, it is objective in that numerically measurable criteria are employed for the placement of individuals.

2. The self-placement method. The self-placement method (also known as the subjective method) has people identify the social class to which they think they belong. Class is viewed as a social category, one in which people group themselves with other individuals they perceive as sharing certain attributes in common with them. The class lines may or may not conform to what social scientists think are logical lines of cleavage in the objective sense.

3. The reputational method. In the self-placement method people are asked to rank themselves. In the reputational method they are asked how they classify other individuals. This approach view class as a social group, one in which people share a feeling of oneness and are bound together in relatively stable patterns of interaction. Thus class rests on knowledge of who associates with whom.

Table 1. Identifying social classes

|Method |Advantages |Disadvantages |
|Objective |A clear-cut method for studying the |The method often does not |
| |correlates of social class. It is |yield divisions that |
| |commonly the simplest and cheapest |people themselves employ |
| |approach since data can usually be |in their daily lives. |
| |obtained from government sources. | |
|Self-place|The method can be applied to a large |The class with which |
|ment |population since survey techniques |people identify may |
| |can be employed for securing the |represent their |
| |data. A useful method for predicting |aspirations rather than |
| |political behavior since who people |their current associations|
| |think they are influences how they |or the appraisals of other|
| |vote. |people. |
|Reputation|The method provides a valuable tool |The method is difficult to|
|al |for investigating social distinctions|use in large samples where|
| |in small groups and communities. It |people have little or no |
| |is specially useful for predicting |knowledge of one another. |
| |associational patterns among people. | |

Middles rank according to profession

|Professionals |Whole amount|Middle |Ideal |
| |of |class of |middle |
| |respondents |Russia |class |
|1. Industrial workers |35.2 |25.2 |4.2 |
|2. Technicians, middle part managers |14.4 |23.4 |20.8 |
|3. Directors of public industries and |1.2 |2.1 |- |
|joint-stock companies | | | |
|4. Businessmen |6.9 |12.8 |25.0 |
|5. Accountant, financier etc. |4.0 |4.2 |12.5 |
|6. Humanitarian intelligence |20.5 |23.4 |16.7 |
|7. Workers of communal sphere |10.2 |8.5 |20.8 |
|8. Trade and supply workers |7.6 |- |- |

Russian middle class: 6% of all respondents

. self-identification: middle place

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