KARL MARX AND HIS THEORY ON SOCIAL STRATIFICATION

Submitted to HNLU in partial fulfillment of award of degree BA LL. B[Hons]

Submitted to: Submitted by:

Dr. Ayan Hazra Aaditya Das

Faculty: Sociology Semester-II

Roll. No 1

Section ‘A’

HIDAYATULLAH NATIONAL LAW UNIVERSITY

ATAL NAGAR, CHHATISGARH
Contents
DECLARATION...............................................................................................................................................I
CERTIFICATE................................................................................................................................................II
ACKNOWLEDGEMENT................................................................................................................................III
INTRODUCTION.......................................................................................................................................- 1 -
RESEARCH METHODOLOGY.....................................................................................................................- 2 -
1. Rationale:...................................................................................................................................- 2 -
2. Objectives:..................................................................................................................................- 2 -
3. Research Question:.....................................................................................................................- 2 -
4. Research Design:........................................................................................................................- 2 -
5. Limitation of study:....................................................................................................................- 3 -
MARX’S THEORY OF TWO CLASSES.........................................................................................................- 4 -
BOURGEOISIE..................................................................................................................................- 4 -
PROLETARIAT..................................................................................................................................- 5 -
KARL MARX’S PERSPECTIVE.....................................................................................................................- 7 -
MARX’S HISTORICAL MATERIALISM........................................................................................................- 8 -
USING MARX AS A FOUNDATION............................................................................................................- 8 -
CONTEMPORARY INFLUENCE..................................................................................................................- 8 -
LABOUR THEORY OF VALUE....................................................................................................................- 9 -
ECONOMIC CHANGE TO SOCIAL TRANSFORMATION..............................................................................- 9 -
DIFFERENCES BETWEEN MARX’S AND WEBER’S THEORY OF SOCIAL STRATIFICATION.........................- 11 -
CONCLUSION.........................................................................................................................................- 13 -
BIBLIOGRAPHY/WEBLIOGRAPHY...........................................................................................................- 14 -
 DECLARATION

I, Aaditya Das, a student of BA LLB(HONS) at Hidayatullah National Law University, Raipur

would like to declare that the project titled “Karl Marx and his theory on Social Stratification”
submitted by me under the guidance of Dr. Ayan Hazra has been written by me and is a result
of my efforts. Due credit has been given to the sources for information if any and there has been
no plagiarism from my side. This project and the contents in it are a result of my own efforts.

Aaditya Das

Semester-II

Date: 5th March 2020

Place: Atal Nagar, Chhattisgarh

 CERTIFICATE

This is to Certify that Aaditya Das, a student of BA LL. B[Hons] has successfully completed
the research on the project “Karl Marx and his theory on Social Stratification” under the
guidance of Dr. Ayan Hazra during the year 2020.

Dr. Ayan Hazra

Faculty: Sociology
 ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

Making this project would not have been possible without the help and guidance of a lot of
people to whom I owe a debt of gratitude.

First and foremost, I would like to thank the almighty who gave me strength to complete the
project.

My parents, with their unconditional love and blessings have encouraged me in every step of the
way in my life and this project was no exception. It is their love and blessings that has helped me
to make this project.

I would like to extend my heartful gratitude to my Sociology teacher Dr. Ayan Hazra who
allotted me the topic for the research and cleared the doubts I had.
 INTRODUCTION

Social stratification refers to society's categorization of its people into groups based

on socioeconomic factors like wealth, income, race, education, gender, occupation, and social
status, or derived power (social and political). As such, stratification is the relative social
position of persons within a social group, category, geographic region, or social unit.

In modern Western societies, social stratification is typically defined in terms of three social

classes: (i) the upper class, (ii) the middle class, and (iii) the lower class; in turn, each class can
be subdivided into, e.g. the upper-stratum, the middle-stratum, and the lower stratum. Moreover,
a social stratum can be formed upon the bases of kinship, clan, tribe, or caste, or all four.

The categorization of people by social strata occurs most clearly in complex state-

based, polycentric, or feudal societies, the latter being based upon socio-economic relations
among classes of nobility and classes of peasants. Historically, whether or not hunter-
gatherer, tribal, and band societies can be defined as socially stratified, or if social stratification
otherwise began with agriculture and large-scale means of social exchange, remains a debated
matter in the social sciences. Determining the structures of social stratification arises from
inequalities of status among persons, therefore, the degree of social inequality determines a
person's social stratum. Generally, the greater the social complexity of a society, the more social
stratification exists, by way of social differentiation.
 RESEARCH METHODOLOGY

1. Rationale:

Social stratification still exist in almost the entire world on several ground especially castes
and classes. Therefore, to understand how such class based distinctions have shaped up in the
modern era, it is essential to understand the theories that have driven it to its present stage. In
the field of social stratification, Karl Marx has really contributed significantly.

2. Objectives:

o To evaluate and study the basis of social stratification as suggested by Karl Marx.

3. Research Question:
o Are the social stratifications suggested by Karl Marx still applicable in the present
era?

4. Research Design:

o Nature of the study: Non empirical

o Sources of Data: Secondary sources (Reports, opinions and articles)
o Method of Data collection: Online research and reference.
5. Limitation of study:

The study only aims to study the theory of social stratification propounded by Karl Marx
and thus, it does not cover other essential grounds of social stratification like castes.
 MARX’S THEORY OF TWO CLASSES

Marx’s theory for understanding society and its issues has been seen as a central argument for both his
followers and for those who wish for a different point of view from which to look at the social classes in
other ways. In other words, those followers have attempted to continue and develop his understanding of
society, it might be the same for social class issues and supporters who have been focused on his analyses
and arguments in terms of social class issues. Moreover, Cassidy pointed out that, Marxism might be
gone, but his work and perspective still exert a crucial effort on capitalist society, and it rapidly generates
a great sagacity in terms of the workers class “Proletariat”. Social conflict became a significant issue to
Marx’s theory. Marxism is not only a political creed, it is also, a technique of acceptance and, particularly
for his followers, this theory can be used to describe anything essential in society which involves class
systems whether it be family, sexuality, art, music, literature, government, beliefs and so on. In his work,
The Capital, he shows that in an advanced society only property owners and a non-owner class exist, and
he saw the Bourgeoisie in modern society as owners of workers and production, he further believed that
employees are meaningless to the production process, they have only their man power to sell, for a living.

Despite the above arguments it is often disputed by hostile groups that the humanities should look at
Marx to find a new and different approach to explain and cope with its issues and that, in this day and
age, the social, political and economic circumstances of post-modern societies are entirely different in
comparison with Marx’s lifetime.

BOURGEOISIE

According to Karl Marx, the bourgeois during Middle Ages usually was a self-employed businessman –
such as a merchant, banker, or entrepreneur – whose economic role in society was being the financial
intermediary to the feudal landlord and the peasant who worked the fief, the land of the lord. Yet, by the
18th century, the time of the Industrial Revolution and of industrial capitalism, the bourgeoisie had
become the economic ruling class who owned the means of production (capital and land), and who
controlled the means of coercion (armed forces and legal system, police forces and prison system).

In such a society, the bourgeoisie's ownership of the means of production allowed them to employ and
exploit the wage-earning working class (urban and rural), people whose only economic means is labour;
and the bourgeois control of the means of coercion suppressed the sociopolitical challenges by the lower
classes, and so preserved the economic status quo; workers remained workers, and employers remained
employers.

In the 19th century, Marx distinguished two types of bourgeois capitalist: (i) the functional capitalists,
who are business administrators of the means of production; and (ii) rentier capitalists whose livelihoods
derive either from the rent of property or from the interest-income produced by finance capital, or both. In
the course of economic relations, the working class and the bourgeoisie continually engage in class
struggle, where the capitalists exploit the workers, while the workers resist their economic exploitation,
which occurs because the worker owns no means of production, and, to earn a living, seeks employment
from the bourgeois capitalist; the worker produces goods and services that are property of the employer,
who sells them for a price.

PROLETARIAT

In Marxist theory, the borders between the proletariat and some layers of the petite bourgeoisie, who rely
primarily but not exclusively on self-employment at an income no different from an ordinary wage or
below it – and the lumpenproletariat, who are not in legal employment – are not necessarily well defined.
Intermediate positions are possible, where some wage-labor for an employer combines with self-
employment. Marx makes a clear distinction between proletariat as salaried workers, which he sees as a
progressive class, and Lumpenproletariat, "rag-proletariat", the poorest and outcasts of the society, such
as beggars, tricksters, entertainers, buskers, criminals and prostitutes, which he considers a retrograde
class. Socialist parties have often struggled over the question of whether they should seek to organize and
represent all the lower classes, or just the wage-earning proletariat.

According to Marxism, capitalism is a system based on the exploitation of the proletariat by the
bourgeoisie. This exploitation takes place as follows: the workers, who own no means of production of
their own, must use the means of production that are property of others in order to produce, and
consequently earn, their living. Instead of hiring those means of production, they themselves get hired by
capitalists and work for them, producing goods or services. These goods or services become the property
of the capitalist, who sells them at the market.

One part of the wealth produced is used to pay the workers' wages (variable costs), another part to renew
the means of production (constant costs) while the third part, surplus value is split between the capitalist's
private takings (profit), and the money used to pay rents, taxes, interests, etc. Surplus value is the
difference between the wealth that the proletariat produces through its work, and the wealth it consumes
to survive and to provide labor to the capitalist companies. A part of the surplus value is used to renew or
increase the means of production, either in quantity or quality (i.e., it is turned into capital), and is called
capitalized surplus value. What remains is consumed by the capitalist class.

The commodities that proletarians produce and capitalists sell are valued for the amount of labor
embodied in them. The same goes for the workers' labor power itself: it is valued, not for the amount of
wealth it produces, but for the amount of labor necessary to produce and reproduce it. Thus, the capitalists
earn wealth from the labor of their employees, not as a function of their personal contribution to the
productive process, which may even be null, but as a function of the juridical relation of property to the
means of production. Marxists argue that new wealth is created through labor applied to natural resources.

Marx argued that the proletariat would displace the capitalist system with the dictatorship of the
proletariat, abolishing the social relationships underpinning the class system and then developing into a
communist society in which "the free development of each is the condition for the free development of
all".
 KARL MARX’S PERSPECTIVE

At this point it is necessary gain a deeper understanding of Marx’s perspective. Karl Marx was born in
1818 in Trier; in the Rhine land of Prussia and he died in 1883 in London, England, he was a “sociologist,
historian, and economist” (Encyclopaedia Britannica, 2012). Furthermore, he was the greatest theorist and
truth-seeker of his lifetime. ‘Manifest der Kommunistischen Partei’, the Manifesto of the Communist
Party, was published by Marx with the help of Friedrich Engels in 1848; it is widely regarded as the most
famous booklet in the history of the communist movement. He also was the writer of the movement’s
greatest and most significant manuscript “Das Kapital” (Ibid). In addition, he established this crucial idea
about the class structure of present societies in the forty years following the wave of European revolutions
in 1848. It appeared to Marx that he was observing the occurrence of a new stage in which the separation
between the two main social groups was intended to convert the central feature (Saunders, 1990).
Moreover, Marxism is an approach that includes many differing perspectives; generally, this theory is a
strong attempt to build a critique of development capitalist society (Sociology, 2005). As Marx saw it, all
societies that had ever existed had been 'class societies' of one kind or another. There was, in his
perspective, a monopolization of all material sources by one social group, the bourgeoisie, while the other
huge social group owned nothing in modern society. One obvious instance was in early Rome where the
land has been owned by one social group; however, the second group was required to work as slaves in
order to get the subsistence, mainly food and shelter, required to live (Saunders, 1990). Additionally, in
the Communist Manifesto that was published by Marx and Engels, they identified the two classes: the
bourgeoisie and the proletariat. At the end of his life, in Capital, Marx mentioned another one:

“The owners merely of labour power, owners of capital, and landowners, whose respective sources of
income are wages, profit and ground rent, in other words, wage-labourers, capitalists and landowners,
constitute then three big class of modern society based upon the capitalist mode of production”(Calvert,
1982, p 11).

Although, Marx starts with the powers of production, he rapidly goes on to the relationships of making
goods that are centred on these powers. For him, the links between making goods can be seen as the
crucial point to comprehending the whole social order and structure of society (Elwell, 2005).
 MARX’S HISTORICAL MATERIALISM

Another important theory developed by Marx is known as historical materialism. This theory posits that
society at any given point in time is ordered by the type of technology used in the process of production.
Under industrial capitalism, society is ordered with capitalists organizing labor in factories or offices
where they work for wages. Prior to capitalism, Marx suggested that feudalism existed as a specific set of
social relations between lord and peasant classes related to the hand-powered or animal-powered means
of production prevalent at the time.

USING MARX AS A FOUNDATION

Marx's work laid the foundations for future communist leaders such as Vladimir Lenin and Josef Stalin.
Operating from the premise that capitalism contained the seeds of its own destruction, his ideas formed
the basis of Marxism and served as a theoretical base for communism. Nearly everything Marx wrote was
viewed through the lens of the common labourers. From Marx comes the idea that capitalist profits are
possible because the value is "stolen" from the workers and transferred to employers. He was, without
question, one of the most important and revolutionary thinkers of his time.

CONTEMPORARY INFLUENCE

Marxist ideas in their pure form have very few direct adherents in contemporary times; indeed, very few
Western thinkers embraced Marxism after 1898, when economist Eugen von Böhm-Bawerk's Karl Marx
and the Close of His System was first translated into English. In his damning rebuke, Böhm-Bawerk
showed that Marx failed to incorporate capital markets or subjective values in his analysis, nullifying
most of his more pronounced conclusions. Still, there are some lessons that even modern economic
thinkers can learn from Marx.

Though he was the capitalist system's harshest critic, Marx understood that it was far more productive
than previous or alternative economic systems. In Das Kapital, he wrote of "capitalist production" that
combined "together of various processes into a social whole," which included developing new
technologies. He believed all countries should become capitalist and develop that productive capacity,
and then workers would naturally revolt into communism. But, like Adam Smith and David Ricardo
before him, Marx predicted that because of capitalism's relentless pursuit of profit by way of competition
and technological progress to lower the costs of production, that the rate of profit in an economy would
always be falling over time.

LABOUR THEORY OF VALUE

Like the other classical economists, Karl Marx believed in the labour theory of value to explain relative
differences in market prices. This theory stated that the value of a produced economic good can be
measured objectively by the average number of labour-hours required to produce it. In other words, if a
table takes twice as long to make as a chair, then the table should be considered twice as valuable.

Marx understood the labour theory better than his predecessors (even Adam Smith) and contemporaries,
and presented a devastating intellectual challenge to laissez-faire economists in Das Kapital: If goods and
services tend to be sold at their true objective labour values as measured in labor hours, how do any
capitalists enjoy profits? It must mean, Marx concluded, that capitalists were underpaying or
overworking, and thereby exploiting, laborers to drive down the cost of production.

While Marx's answer was eventually proved incorrect and later economists adopted the subjective theory
of value, his simple assertion was enough to show the weakness of the labour theory's logic and
assumptions; Marx unintentionally helped fuel a revolution in economic thinking.

ECONOMIC CHANGE TO SOCIAL TRANSFORMATION

Dr. James Bradford "Brad" DeLong, professor of economics at UC-Berkeley, wrote in 2011 that Marx's
"primary contribution" to economic science actually came in a 10-paragraph stretch of  The Communist
Manifesto, in which he describes how economic growth causes shifts among social classes, often leading
to a struggle for political power.

This underlies an often unappreciated aspect of economics: the emotions and political activity of the
actors involved. A corollary of this argument was later made by French economist Thomas Piketty, who
proposed that while nothing was wrong with income inequality in an economic sense, it could create
blowback against capitalism among the people. Thus, there is a moral and anthropological consideration
of any economic system. The idea that societal structure and transformations from one order to the next
can be the result of technological change in how things are produced in an economy is known as
historical materialism.
 DIFFERENCES BETWEEN MARX’S AND WEBER’S THEORY OF
SOCIAL STRATIFICATION

During their lifetime, there were several different points of view between Marx and Weber; the greatest
sociologists, economists and revolutionary thinkers of their day. Although, each of them had a quite
unique perspective and different look at social class issues.

Marx and Weber investigated the social classes in various ways. There was a key role, in their perspective
or methods, that was an important issue for humanitarian communities at this time and it was that of why
there was inequality between the social classes, of why people had been stratified into differing social
groups, and of what created this kind of division in society (Suchting, 1983). Marx and Weber looked at
social changes in industrial societies. Marx had a dream for revolution while Weber was attempting to
explore the causes of the development of capitalism. Both of them thought that human society was
progressing in a way which was not suitable for human beings (Milliken, no date).

In Marx’s theory it can be seen that it was deeply related to production and historical materialism. He
supposed that in developed society, dissimilar social classes were formed owing to the production
processes at the time. More specifically, the relationship between the different social groups to the means
of production; for instance, he mentioned that throughout the industrial revolution the whole of society
had been divided into two social class, the factory proprietor class, also referred to as the capital class,
which had monopolized and controlled everything which Marx termed the Bourgeois and the other class
was the Proletariat which had nothing to sell other than their own labour in order to survive (Bilton, et al,
1996). He further stated that in certain circumstances, such as those which existed at the time, these
classes directly struggled with one another, particularly in capitalist society (Suchting , 1983).

Marx believed that conflict between social classes in society had the result of controlling the production
process causing a direct struggle with one another particularly in the industrial society (Suchting , 1983).

“The Marx’s view point of the proletariat is victim of the system and its potential gravedigger. As Marx
clearly asserted in his preface to Capital, this class perspective is at the root of his critique of bourgeois
political economy. It is from this social viewpoint that values as "justice" are reinterpreted: their concrete
meaning is not the same according to the situation and the interests of different classes” (Lowy, 2007).

Weber’s thinking, in terms of social class, is similar to Marx, he believed that owning private materials
played a role in the creation of social classes in societies, he also believed that the differences between
social classes in society might be the cause of social struggle between them but not like that of which
Marx mentioned. Weber had seen that the social conflict between the classes over production goods as a
normal conflict in every society (Parkin, 1982). He viewed social class as "the totality of those class
situations within which individual and generational mobility is easy and typical" (Gane, 2012, p. 98).

Weber thought that people had been stratified to different layers due to the dissimilarities emerging from
“power, wealth and prestige” (Gane, 2012). He explained that individuals can use power and status to
obtain opportunity and prosperity and to move from their class to another (Bilton, et al, 1996).
Additionally, he believed that the inequalities which had been seen as the creation of social class were
related to the market, and had no relation with who did or did not own private property as Marx had
asserted. Weber stated that these differences were founded on the market ability or on the abilities which
that person takes to the market. People with the top market capability, those individuals with the greatest
abilities, may have better opportunities in life, which was the one thing which Weber believed could
create differences among people and group them into various social classes in all societies (Bilton, et al,
1996).
 CONCLUSION

For Marx, social stratification comes down to the basic concept of economics.  To phrase it in
the most banal of terms, Marx believes that stratification in capitalist society is predicated upon
the idea of those who have wealth controlling or subjugating those who lack it.  Marx's
conception of dialectical materialism suggests that historical development has passed through the
same fundamental idea where those in the position of social, economic, and political power has
been based on the idea that those who control the means of production possess overall control. 
These individuals create a stratification system where they remain in power and all others seek to
emulate their own patterns of power recognition.  Marx believes that this will change under a
socialist system, where the means of production will be owned in a public setting and not a
privatized one.  In making this public, stratification will presumably disappear.

It can be observed that stratification on the basis of the economic status of an individual divided
into 3 different broad classes majorly, upper class, middle class and low class, are still prevalent
in the present day scenario. Therefore, Marxist theory of social stratification has played a
significant role in shaping the present day idea of social stratification on the basis of class
distinctions.

.
 BIBLIOGRAPHY/WEBLIOGRAPHY

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 https://www.jstor.org/stable/40401479
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 https://socialsci.libretexts.org/Bookshelves/Sociology/Book%3A_Sociology_(Boundless)/
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 https://www.researchgate.net/publication/
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