Social Stratification, Stratification in Industry, Diversity in Work

Place

I. Social Stratification:

 Social Stratification is the hierarchically organized structures of social inequality

(ranks, status groups) which exist in any society. Social Stratification means
division of members of a society by social status. Social Stratification means
division of society into permanent vertical layers or strata which are related to
each other by attributes of superiority and inferiority determined by certain
principles or values commonly held by the society. The layers consist of social
groups, and the emphasis is on the ways in which inequalities between groups are
structured and persist over time. The term provides a focus in which distinctions
can be made between the different forms of social ranking and inequality
characterizing different societies or found within one society.
 Example: Master-Slave, lord-serf, caste divisions, class divisions etc. Also,
gender, ethnicity and age have in various ways been important in relations of
domination and subordination in different historical periods and cultures. Access
to or command over particular social resources has also been important in
producing and sustaining inequalities. Stratification is not a sub-system, rather is a
generalized aspect of the structure of all complex social systems.
 Social Stratification in contemporary society takes the major form of class under
the impact of industrialization. The values dominant in contemporary society are
individualistic and utilitarian, and express themselves in occupation, income and
education, though descent is still held in high esteem. It is these factors which
determine the status of individuals and groups in contemporary society.

II. Class as a Form of Social Stratification:

 The influence of industry on stratification system in the wider society is most

clearly seen in the phenomenon of social classes. Marxists believe that industrial
societies are divided into two major social classes according to ownership or non-
ownership of capital or property. For Weber, class means the differences between
categories or groups of persons in their ‘typical probabilities’ of ‘procuring
goods’, ‘gaining positions in life’ and ‘finding inner satisfaction’ – life chances.
Thus, for Weber, class means all persons in the same class situation, whatever the
basis of this and whatever its implications may be for the longer-term destiny of
societies. Weber identified a number of overlapping possible bases of class
situation, based on ownership and non-ownership of property and also including
reference to different kinds of property and the different kinds of income that this
yields (Property classes, Commercial classes, and Social classes). Class
situations, and the social classes these give rise to, may be ‘positively privileged’
or ‘negatively privileged’, with various ‘middle classes’ in between. Others who
accept that there is a class division in society treat it most widely as a division
between those with or without power, irrespective of whether that power is
economic or not. In the latter, it then becomes a matter of contention whether the

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 non-economic power is in fact associated with economic position, that is, to what
extent there is generalized elite in society which has superior power or authority
(legitimated power) in all social spheres. Thus, industrial society has its dynamic
values that are factoring-in a peculiar hierarchical structure, or rearrangement of
society, which is known as ‘social class’ structure, or simply class. Occupation,
income and level of educational attainment are the most important determinants
of ones’ class position.

III. Social Stratification of Occupational Groupings:

 Different occupational roles carry different amounts of prestige. The order of the
general evaluation placed upon them by the community follows the order in
which listings of occupations usually appear, except that government officials
stand higher than usually indicated. In evaluating jobs, pay is important, but so
also are service to humanity, extended preparation, high moral standards, and
responsibility.
The prestige of people’s occupations tends to correlate closely with their class
standing, but class position involves more than mere occupational prestige, as it
represents a method of perceiving the society by its members. Different people in
different times and places see their fellow citizens as divided into different
systems of classes, and some do not appear to use class concepts at all. Consensus
is relatively poor. Yet many people on many occasions do perceive their
communities or the larger society as being composed of four general strata with
most of the people in two large groupings generally labeled middle class and
working class with much smaller upper and lower classes above and below them
respectively. The fact that we do sometimes think in terms of class is supported
by evidence of our tendency to have stereotyped pictures of people with particular
occupations.
In the study of work organization, the division between large middle and working
classes is particularly important; for in very broad way contemporary
industrialized society may be properly perceived as encompassing two poles of
political and social philosophy represented by the more successful business and
professional people on the one hand and the manual workers on the other, with
the remaining occupational groups distributed along the axis so formed, but
tending to adhere to one of the polar positions.

IV. Diversity in Work Place:

 Industrialization affects the activities of the entire population: People are forced
increasingly into the cities, increase in education and vocational training among
children, women are joining work force, expansion in productive work force,
change in age structure of the population, workers experience an increasing
amount of geographic and social mobility, and most importantly the workers are
distributed differently in various industries and occupations as economy matures.
 Major types of occupation and workplace:
 White collar workers
 Professional, technical and kindred workers

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  Managers, officials, and proprietors (except farm)
 Clerical and kindred workers
 Sales workers
 Manual Workers
 Crafts-persons, supervisors, and kindred workers
 Operatives and kindred workers
 Labourers (except farm & mine)
 Service Workers
 Private household workers
 Service Workers (except private household workers)
 Farm Workers
 Farmers and Farm managers
 Farm labourers and supervisors

 Indian occupational distribution of working population (in percentage)

Sector &Industrial Categories Year 1991

Agricultural Sector (Cultivators, Agricultural labourers, livestock, 66.7
forestry, fishing, etc.)
Industrial Sector ( Mining & Quarrying, Large & small industries, 12.7
Construction)
Service Sector (Trade & Commerce, Transport, storage and 20.5
Communications)
Other Services 10.2

 Impact of New technology:

 New technology has given rise to the opportunity to replace human
activity and its creation of new manufacturing opportunities;
 New technology has eliminated, changed and supported the work of
people within manufacturing industry;
 New jobs have been created through the development of the new
technology, particularly those associated with computers;

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