This title was first published in 1978. How far have sociologists working in countries commonly designated as "socialist" gone in studying the class structure and social consciousness of their own societies? What kinds of questions have they posed, and what is the degree of technical sophistication applied in answering them? Western sociologists interested in the fate of their discipline in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union have long recognized that the answers to these questions will differ substantially depending upon which particular socialist society one has in mind. The selection from Polish sociological literature brought together here by Stomczynski and Krauze should help to answer the questions raised and provide readers with the opportunity to assess the quality of Polish sociological studies in the areas of class structure, social mobility, and class consciousness.
This book is about long-term changes to class and inequality in Poland. Drawing upon major social surveys, the team of authors from the Polish Academy of Sciences offer the rare comprehensive study of important changes to the social structure from the communist era to the present. The core argument is that, even during extreme societal transformations, key features of social life have long-lasting, stratifying effects. The authors analyse the core issues of inequality research that best explain “who gets what and why:” social mobility, status attainment and their mechanisms, with a focus on education, occupation, and income. The transition from communist political economy to liberal democracy and market capitalism offers a unique opportunity for scholars to understand how people move from one stratifi cation regime to the next. There are valuable lessons to be learned from linking past to present. Classic issues of class, stratification, mobility, and attainment have endured decades of radical social change. These concepts remain valid even when society tries to eradicate them.
This title was first published in 1978. How far have sociologists working in countries commonly designated as "socialist" gone in studying the class structure and social consciousness of their own societies? What kinds of questions have they posed, and what is the degree of technical sophistication applied in answering them? Western sociologists interested in the fate of their discipline in Eastern Europe and the Soviet Union have long recognized that the answers to these questions will differ substantially depending upon which particular socialist society one has in mind. The selection from Polish sociological literature brought together here by Stomczynski and Krauze should help to answer the questions raised and provide readers with the opportunity to assess the quality of Polish sociological studies in the areas of class structure, social mobility, and class consciousness.
Social Mobility in Europe is the most comprehensive study to date of trends in intergenerational social mobility. It uses data from 11 European countries covering the last 30 years of the twentieth century to analyze differences between countries and changes through time.The findings call into question several long-standing views about social mobility. We find a growing similarity between countries in their class structures and rates of absolute mobility: in other words, the countries of Europe are now more alike in their flows between class origins and destinations than they were thirty years ago. However, differences between countries in social fluidity (that is, the relative chances, between people of different class origins, of being found in given classdestinations) show no reduction and so there is no evidence supporting theories of modernization which predict such convergence. Our results also contradict the long-standing Featherman Jones Hauser hypothesis of a basic similarity in social fluidity in all industrial societies 'with a market economyand a nuclear family system'. There are considerable differences between countries like Israel and Sweden, where societal openness is very marked, and Italy, France, and Germany, where social fluidity rates are low. Similarly, there is a substantial difference between, for example, the Netherlands in the 1970s (which was quite closed) and in the 1990s, when it ranks among the most open societies.Mobility tables reflect many underlying processes and this makes it difficult to explain mobility and fluidity or to provide policy prescriptions. Nevertheless, those countries in which fluidity increased over the last decades of the twentieth century had not only succeeded in reducing class inequalities in educational attainment but had also restricted the degree to which, among people with the same level of education, class background affected their chances of gaining access to better classdestinations.
The Oxford Handbook of the Social Science of Poverty builds a common scholarly ground in the study of poverty by bringing together an international, inter-disciplinary group of scholars to provide their perspectives on the issue. Contributors engage in discussions about the leading theories and conceptual debates regarding poverty, the most salient topics in poverty research, and the far-reaching consequences of poverty on the individual and societal level.
This book is about long-term changes to class and inequality in Poland. Drawing upon major social surveys, the team of authors from the Polish Academy of Sciences offer the rare comprehensive study of important changes to the social structure from the communist era to the present. The core argument is that, even during extreme societal transformations, key features of social life have long-lasting, stratifying effects. The authors analyse the core issues of inequality research that best explain “who gets what and why:” social mobility, status attainment and their mechanisms, with a focus on education, occupation, and income. The transition from communist political economy to liberal democracy and market capitalism offers a unique opportunity for scholars to understand how people move from one stratifi cation regime to the next. There are valuable lessons to be learned from linking past to present. Classic issues of class, stratification, mobility, and attainment have endured decades of radical social change. These concepts remain valid even when society tries to eradicate them.
The American press and American television news have been filled with stories from Gdansk, Warsaw, Krakow, Lódz, and other Polish cities and towns. The names of a number of Polish leaders have become almost as familiar to Americans as the names of their own leaders, and the word " Solidarity" has acquired an important new meaning for Americans as well as Poles. The editor's identify that this interest of the American public has not been matched by corresponding interest from American sociologists, stating that Polish society is seldom mentioned either in major scholarly journals or in the textbooks written for students. This collection of studies seeks to address some of this issue, looking at works and the systems in Poland since 1956.
Drawing inspiration from Pierre Bourdieu’s social space theory, this book provides an unprecedent overview of class relations, covering topics such as class polarisation, cultural reproduction, political orientations, and globalisation. The book applies Bourdieusian social space approach to show how class boundaries have been maintained or transformed in different European countries. Based on quantiative data, it proposes a renewal of the analysis of distances, divides, and relations of domination between social classes, documenting objective and symbolic boundaries that form the basis of individuals’ living and working conditions in 11 European countries. Focusing on transformations of wealth inequalities, education strategies, and European labour markets, the book examines the role of cultural, economic and social capital. It will be of interest to students and scholars across the social sciences, in particular to those studying social and wealth inequalities in a comparative perspective and Master's students in European studies.
