「格差社会論」から「階級‐社会階層研究」へ

DOI Web Site 被引用文献2件 参考文献12件

書誌事項

タイトル別名
  • From "Gap-Widening Society Discourse" to "Class-Stratification Studies"
  • カクサ シャカイロン カラ カイキュウ シャカイ カイソウ ケンキュウ エ

この論文をさがす

説明

The prevalence of discourses on "gap-widening society" is an important phenomenon for sociology in so far as it has revealed the weakness and crisis of class studies and stratification studies. Current class and stratification studies cannot provide sharp and effective tools for understanding the widening economic disparities and so-called immobilization of an unequal society. Furthermore, current class and stratification studies cannot fulfill their central function of providing effective independent variables for other sociological fields.<br>Such difficulties and stagnation have been produced by a specific developmental process of class and stratification studies in post-war Japan. Class studies were established by Ryuuken Ohashi and his class scheme was accepted among many Japanese sociologists. However, his two-class scheme was based on polarization theory and an overpoliticized understanding of class ; since the 1980s, its explanation power has diminished. Kunio Odaka, who established stratification studies in post-war Japan, also regarded class as a political subject. Odaka argued that there was no apparent class in Japanese society and he promoted the study of stratification as a hierarchical continuum that can be artificially operationalized into certain statistical categories. In this process, the concepts of class and stratification have been regarded as conflicting sociological viewpoints ; thus, their validities and actualities have diminished to a large extent.<br>In order to conquer such weakness and difficulty in class and stratification studies, we propose two suggestions: (1) We must explicitly deny Marx's two-class scheme and adopt a four-class—capitalist, new middle, working, and old middle class—scheme that is widely accepted in European sociology ; (2) Social stratification is understood as a system of social categories that is formed when class locations are mediated by institutions such as industrial structures, the labor market, family, and the State. From this viewpoint, class and stratification are regarded not as antagonistic but as complementary, and we can proceed to newly defined and fruitful sociological fields : class-stratification studies.

収録刊行物

被引用文献 (2)*注記

もっと見る

参考文献 (12)*注記

もっと見る

キーワード

詳細情報 詳細情報について

問題の指摘

ページトップへ