3 page Behavioral Analysis Paper.

Global Stratification7CHAPTE R

Let’s contrast two “average” families from around the world: For Getu Mulleta, 33, and his wife, Zenebu, 28, of rural

Ethiopia, life is a constant struggle to avoid starvation. They and their seven children live in a 320-square-foot manure- plastered hut with no electricity, gas, or running water. They have a radio, but the battery is dead. The family farms teff, a grain, and survives on $130 a year.

The Mulletas’ poverty is not due to a lack of hard work. Getu works about eighty hours a week, while Zenebu puts in even more hours. “Housework” for Zenebu includes fetching water, cleaning animal stables, and making fuel pellets out of cow dung for the open fire over which she cooks the family’s food. Like other Ethiopian women, she eats after the men.

In Ethiopia, the average male can expect to live to age 48, the average female to 50.

The Mulletas’ most valu- able possession is their oxen. Their wishes for the future: more animals, better seed, and a second set of clothing.

* * * * *

Springfield, Illinois, is home to the Kellys—Rick, 36, Patti, 34, Julie, 10, and Michael, 7. The Kellys live in a three-bed- room, 21⁄2-bath, 2,438-square-foot, ranch-style house with a fireplace, central heating and air conditioning, a basement, and a two-car garage. Their home is equipped with a refrigerator, freezer, washing machine, clothes dryer, dishwasher, garbage disposal, vacuum cleaner, food processor, microwave, and con- vection stovetop and oven. They also own cell phones, color televisions, a Kindle, digital cameras, an iPod, computers with DVD players, a printer-scanner-fax machine, blow dryers, a juicer, an espresso coffee maker, a pickup truck, and an SUV.

Rick works forty hours a week as a cable splicer for a tele- phone company. Patti teaches school part-time. Together they make $60,088, plus benefits. The Kellys can choose from among dozens of superstocked supermarkets. They spend $5,187 for food they eat at home, and another $3,543 eating out, a total of 15 percent of their annual income.

In the United States, the average life expectancy is 76 for males, 81 for females.

On the Kellys’ wish list are a new hybrid car with satellite radio, a 5,000-gigabyte laptop with Bluetooth wi-fi, a 60-inch LCD TV with surround sound, a boat, a motor home, an ATV, and, oh, yes, farther down the road, an in-ground heated swim- ming pool. They also have an eye on a cabin at a nearby lake.

Menzel 1994; Statistical Abstract 2012:Tables 104, 687, 696, 971.

They live in a 320-square-foot manure-plastered hut with no electricity, gas, or running water.

Chad

184 CHAPTER 7 Global Stratification

The Mulleta family of Ethiopia, described in the opening vignette.

Systems of Social Stratification Some of the world’s nations are wealthy, others poor, and some in between. This divi- sion of nations, as well as the layering of groups of people within a nation, is called social stratification. Social stratification is one of the most significant topics we shall discuss in this book, for, as you saw in the opening vignette, it profoundly affects our life chances—from our access to material possessions to the age at which we die.

Social stratification also affects the way we think about life. If you had been born into the Ethiopian family in our opening vignette, you would expect hunger to be a part of life and would not expect all of your children to survive. You would also be illit- erate and would assume that your children would be as well. In contrast, if you were one of the U.S. parents, you would expect your children not only to survive, but to go to college as well. You can see that social stratification brings with it not just material things but also ideas of what we can expect out of life.

Social stratification is a system in which groups of people are divided into layers according to their relative property, power, and prestige. It is important to emphasize that social stratification does not refer to individuals. It is a way of ranking large groups of people into a hierarchy according to their relative privileges.

It is also important to note that every society stratifies its members. Some societies have greater inequality than others, but social stratification is universal. In addition, in every society of the world, gender is a basis for stratifying people. On the basis of their gender, people are either allowed or denied access to the good things offered by their society.

Let’s consider three major systems of social stratification: slavery, caste, and class.

Slavery Slavery, whose essential characteristic is that some individuals own other people, has been common throughout world history. The Old Testament even lays out rules for

What is social stratification? How does it affect people’s ideas of what they can expect out of life?

Systems of Social Stratification 185

how owners should treat their slaves. So does the Koran. The Romans also had slaves, as did the Africans and Greeks. In classical Greece and Rome, slaves did the work, freeing citizens to engage in politics and the arts. Slavery was most widespread in agricultural societies and least common among nomads, especially hunters and gatherers (Landtman 1938/1968). As we examine the major causes and conditions of slavery, you will see how remarkably slavery has varied around the world.

Causes of Slavery. Contrary to popular assumption, slavery was usually based not on racism but on one of three other factors. The first was debt. In some soci- eties, creditors would enslave people who could not pay their debts. The second was crime. Instead of being killed, a murderer or thief might be enslaved by the victim’s family as compensation for their loss. The third was war. When one group of people conquered another, they often enslaved some of the vanquished. Historian Gerda Lerner (1986) notes that women were the first people enslaved through warfare. When tribal men raided another group, they killed the men, raped the women, and then brought the women back as slaves. The women were valued for sexual purposes, for reproduction, and for their labor.

Roughly twenty-five hundred years ago, when Greece was but a collection of city-states, slavery was common. A city that became powerful and conquered another city would enslave some of the vanquished. Both slaves and slave- holders were Greek. Similarly, when Rome became the supreme power of the Mediterranean area about two thousand years ago, following the custom of the time, the Romans enslaved some of the Greeks they had conquered. More edu- cated than their conquerors, some of these slaves served as tutors in Roman homes. Slavery, then, was a sign of debt, of crime, or of defeat in battle. It was not a sign that the slave was viewed as inherently inferior.

Conditions of Slavery. The conditions of slavery have varied widely around the world. In some places, slavery was temporary. Slaves of the Israelites were set free in the year of jubilee, which occurred every fifty years. Roman slaves ordinarily had the right to buy themselves out of slavery. They knew what their purchase price was, and some were able to meet this price by striking a bargain with their owners and selling their services to others. In most instances, however, slavery was a lifelong condition. Some criminals, for example, became slaves when they were given life sentences as oarsmen on Roman war ships. There they served until death, which often came quickly to those in this exhausting service.

Slavery was not necessarily inheritable. In most places, the children of slaves were slaves themselves. But in some instances, the child of a slave who served a rich fam- ily might even be adopted by that family, becoming an heir who bore the family name along with the other sons or daughters of the household. In ancient Mexico, the children of slaves were always free (Landtman 1938/1968:271).

Slaves were not necessarily powerless and poor. In almost all instances, slaves owned no property and had no power. Among some groups, however, slaves could accumulate property and even rise to high positions in the community. Occasionally, a slave might even become wealthy, loan money to the master, and, while still a slave, own slaves himself or herself (Landtman 1938/1968). This, however, was rare.

Slavery in the New World. To meet the growing need for labor, some colonists tried to enslave Native Americans. This attempt failed miserably, in part because when Indians escaped, they knew how to survive in the wilderness and were able to make their way back to their tribe. The colonists then turned to Africans, who were being brought to North and South America by the Dutch, English, Portuguese, and Spanish.

Because slavery has a broad range of causes, some analysts conclude that racism didn’t lead to slavery, but, rather, that slavery led to racism. To defend slavery, U.S. slave owners developed an ideology, beliefs that justify social arrangements, making those arrangements seem necessary and fair. They developed the view that their slaves

Under slavery, humans, like horses, could be sold, leased, borrowed, even raffled off.

What are the causes and conditions of slavery?

were inferior. Some even said that they were not fully human. In short, the colonists wove elaborate justifications for slavery, built on the presumed superiority of their own group.

To make slavery even more profitable, slave states passed laws that made slavery inheritable; that is, the babies born to slaves became the property of the slave owners (Stampp 1956). These children could be sold, bartered, or traded. To strengthen their control, slave states passed laws making it illegal for slaves to hold meetings or to be away from the master’s premises without carrying a pass (Lerner 1972). As sociologist W. E. B. Du Bois (1935/1992:12) noted, “gradually the entire white South became an armed camp to keep Negroes in slavery and to kill the black rebel.”

The Civil War did not end legal discrimination. For example, until 1954 many states operated separate school systems for blacks and whites. Until the 1950s, in order to keep the races from “mixing,” it was illegal in Mississippi for a white and an African American to sit together on the same seat of a car! There was no outright ban on blacks and whites being in the same car, however, so whites could employ African American chauffeurs.

Slavery Today. Slavery has again reared its ugly head in several parts of the world. The Ivory Coast, Mauritania, Niger, and Sudan have a long history of slavery, and not until the 1980s was slavery made illegal in Mauritania and Sudan (Ayittey 1998). It took until 2003 for slavery to be banned in Niger (Polgreen 2008). Although officially abolished, slavery in

this region continues, the topic of the Mass Media box on the next page. The enslavement of children for work and sex is a problem in Africa, Asia, and South

America (Trafficking in Persons Report 2011). A unique form of child slavery in some Mideast desert countries is buying little boys around the age of 5 or 6 to race camels. Their screams of terror are thought to make the camels run faster. In Qatar and the United Arab Emirates, which recently banned this practice, robots are supposed to replace the children (de Pastino 2005; Nelson 2009).

Caste The second system of social stratification is caste. In a caste system, birth determines status, which is lifelong. Someone who is born into a low-status group will always have low status, no matter how much that person may accomplish in life. In sociological terms, a caste system is built on ascribed status (discussed on page 97). Achieved status cannot change an individual’s place in this system.

Societies with this form of stratification try to make certain that the boundaries between castes remain firm. They practice endogamy, marriage within their own group, and prohibit intermarriage. Elaborate rules about ritual pollution—touching an inferior caste contaminates the superior caste—keep contact between castes to a minimum.

India’s Religious Castes. India provides the best example of a caste system. Based not on race but on religion, the caste system has existed for almost three

thousand years (Chandra 1993a; Jaffrelot 2006). India’s four main castes are depicted in Table 7.1. These four castes are subdivided into about three thousand subcastes, or jati. Each jati specializes in a particular occupation. For example, one sub- caste washes clothes, another sharpens knives, and yet another repairs shoes.

The lowest group listed in Table 7.1, the Dalit, make up India’s “untouchables.” If a Dalit touches someone of a higher caste, that person becomes unclean. Even the shadow of an untouchable can contaminate. Early morning and late afternoons are especially risky, for the long shadows of these periods pose a danger to everyone higher up the caste system. Consequently, Dalits are not allowed

What were the characteristics of slavery in the United States? Is there slavery today?

During my research in India, I interviewed this 8-year-old girl. Mahashury is a bonded laborer who was exchanged by her parents for a 2,000 rupee loan (about $14). To repay the loan, Mahashury must do construction work for one year. She will receive one meal a day and one set of clothing for the year. Because this centuries-old practice is now illegal, the master bribes Indian officials, who inform him when they are going to inspect the construction site. He then hides his bonded laborers. I was able to interview and photograph Mahashury because her master was absent the day I visited the construction site.

TABLE 7.1 India’s Caste System

Caste Occupation

Brahman Priests and teachers Kshatriya Rulers and soldiers Vaishya Merchants and traders Shudra Peasants and laborers Dalit (untouchables) The outcastes; degrading

or polluting labor

Systems of Social Stratification 187

Mass Media in Social Life

In this photo, a representative of the Liason Agency Network (on the right) is buying the freedom of the Sudanese slaves (in the background).

On the morning of the raid, 10-year-old Adhieu had been watching the cattle. “We were very happy because we would soon leave the cattle camps and return home to our parents. But in the morning, there was shooting. There was yelling and crying everywhere. My uncle grabbed me by the hand, and we ran. We swam across the river. I saw some children drown- ing. We hid behind a rock.”

By morning’s end, 500 children were either dead or enslaved. Their attackers were their fellow countrymen—Arabs from northern Sudan. The children who were captured were forced to march hundreds of miles north. Some escaped on the way. Others tried to—and were shot (Akol 1998). This raid occurred in rural Sudan, where children of the Dinka tribe tend the cattle that are essential to the Dinka’s way of life.

Public television (PBS) has run film footage of captive children in chains. And escaped slaves have recounted their ordeal in horrifying detail (Salopek 2003; Mende and Lewis 2005).

The United States bombed Serbia into submission for its crimes against humanity, but in the face of this outrage it remained largely silent. A cynic might say that Serbia was located at a politically strategic spot in Europe, but Sudan occupies an area of Africa in which the United States and European powers have had little interest. A cynic might add that these powers fear Arab retaliation, which might take the form of oil embar- goes and terrorism. A cynic might also suggest that outrages against black Africans are not as significant to these powers as those against white Europeans. Finally, a cynic might add that this indifference will end as Sudan’s oil reserves become more strategic to Western interests.

When the world’s most powerful governments didn’t act on behalf of the slaves, private groups stepped in. One was Switzerland’s Christian Solidarity International (CSI). CSI sent Arab “retrievers” to northern Sudan, where they either bought or abducted slaves. CSI paid the retrievers $100 per slave.

Critics claimed that buying slaves, even to free them, encour- ages slavery. The money provides motivation to enslave people in order to turn around and sell them. Certainly $100 is a lot of money in Sudan, where the average person makes $92 a month (Statistical Abstract 2012:Table 1348).

CSI said that this was a bogus argument. What is intolerable, they said, is to leave women and children in slavery where they are deprived of their freedom and families and are beaten and raped by brutal masters.

For Your Consideration↑

What do you think about buying the freedom of slaves? Can you suggest a workable alternative? Why do you think the U.S. government remained largely silent about this issue, when it invaded other countries such as Serbia and Haiti for human rights abuses? Do you think that, perhaps, political motivations outweigh human rights motivations?

Some U.S. high schools—and even grade schools—raised money to participate in slave buyback programs. If you were a school principal, would you support this? Why or why not?

What Price Freedom? Slavery Today

in some villages during these times. Anyone who becomes contaminated must follow ablution, or washing rituals, to restore purity.

Although the Indian government formally abolished the caste system in 1949, centuries-old practices cannot be eliminated easily, and the caste system remains part of everyday life in India (Beckett 2007). The ceremonies people follow at births, marriages, and deaths, for example, are dictated by caste (Chandra 1993a). The upper castes dread the upward mobility of the untouchables, sometimes even resisting this change with murder and ritual suicide (Crossette 1996; Trofimov 2007). From personal observations in India, I can add that in some villages Dalit children are not allowed in the government schools. If they try to enroll, they are beaten.

What are the main characteristics of a caste system?

Did the U.S. ever have a caste system? How does class differ from slavery and caste systems?

A U.S. Racial Caste System. Before leaving the subject of caste, we should note that when slavery ended in the United States, it was replaced by a racial caste system. From the moment of birth, race marked everyone for life (Berger 1963/2012a). All whites, even if they were poor and uneducated, considered themselves to have a higher status than all African Americans. As in India and South Africa, the upper caste, fear- ing pollution from the lower caste, made intermarriage illegal. There were also sepa- rate schools, hotels, restaurants, and even toilets and drinking fountains for blacks and whites. In the South, when any white met any African American on a sidewalk, the African American had to move aside. The untouchables of India still must do this when they meet someone of a higher caste (Deliege 2001).

Class As we have seen, stratification systems based on slavery and caste are rigid. The lines drawn between people are firm, and there is little or no movement from one group to another. A class system, in contrast, is much more open, for it is based primarily on money or material possessions, which can be acquired. This system, too, is in place at birth, when children are ascribed the status of their parents. Unlike the other sys- tems, however, individuals can change their social class by what they achieve (or fail to achieve) in life. In addition, no laws specify people’s occupations on the basis of birth or prohibit marriage between the classes.

A major characteristic of the class system, then, is its relatively fluid boundaries. A class system allows social mobility, movement up or down the class ladder. The poten- tial for improving one’s life—or for falling down the class ladder—is a major force that drives people to go far in school and to work hard. In the extreme, the family back- ground that a child inherits at birth may present such obstacles that he or she has little chance of climbing very far—or it may provide such privileges that it makes it almost impossible to fall down the class ladder. Because social class is so significant for our own lives, we will focus on class in the next chapter.

Global Stratification and the Status of Females In every society of the world, gender is a basis for social stratification. In no society is gender the sole basis for stratifying people, but gender cuts across all systems of social stratification—whether slavery, caste, or class (Huber 1990). In all these systems, on the basis of their gender, people are sorted into categories and given different access to the good things available in their society.

In a caste system, status is determined by birth and is lifelong. At birth, these women received not only membership in a lower caste but also, because of their gender, a predetermined position in that caste. When I photographed these women, they were carrying sand to the second floor of a house being constructed in Andhra Pradesh, India.

What Determines Social Class? 189

Apparently these distinctions always favor males. It is remarkable, for example, that in every society of the world men’s earnings are higher than women’s. Men’s dominance is even more evident when we consider female circum- cision (see the box on page 285). That most of the world’s illiterate are females also drives home women’s relative position in society. Of the several hundred million adults who cannot read, about two-thirds are women (UNESCO 2011). Because gender is such a significant factor in what happens to us in life, we shall focus on it more closely in Chapter 10.

The Global Superclass The growing interconnections among the world’s wealthiest people have produced a global superclass, one in which wealth and power are more concentrated than ever before. There are only about 6,000 members of this superclass—the richest 1,000 of them have more wealth than the 21⁄2 billion poorest people on this planet (Rothkopf 2008:37). Almost all of them are white, and except as wives and daughters, few women are an active part of the superclass. We will have more to say about the superclass in Chapter 11, but for now, let’s just stress their incredible wealth. There is nothing in history to compare with what you see in Figure 7.1.

What Determines Social Class? In the early days of sociology, a disagreement arose about the meaning of social class. Let’s compare how Marx and Weber analyzed the issue.

Karl Marx: The Means of Production As we discussed in Chapter 1, as agricultural society gave way to an industrial one, masses of peasants were displaced from their traditional lands and occupations. Fleeing to cit- ies, they competed for the few available jobs. Paid only a pit- tance for their labor, they wore rags, went hungry, and slept under bridges and in shacks. In contrast, the factory owners built mansions, hired servants, and lived in the lap of luxury. Seeing this great disparity between owners and workers, Karl Marx (1818–1883) concluded that social class depends on a single factor: people’s relationship to the means of production—the tools, factories, land, and investment capital used to produce wealth (Marx 1844/1964; Marx and Engels 1848/1967).

Marx argued that the distinctions people often make among themselves—such as clothing, speech, education, paycheck, the neighborhood they live in, even the car they drive—are superficial matters. These things camouflage the only dividing line that counts. There are just two classes of people, said Marx: the bourgeoisie (capitalists), those who own the means of production, and the proletariat (workers),

How is gender part of social stratification? What is the global superclass?

In early industrialization, children worked alongside adults. They worked 12 hours a day Monday to Friday and 15 hours on Saturday, often in dangerous, filthy conditions. In this 1909 protest in New York City, two girls are wearing banners with the slogan “ABOLISH CHILD SLAVERY” in English and Yiddish.

Source: By the author. Based on Rothkopf 2008:37.

FIGURE 7.1 The Distribution of the

...own 85 percent of the earth's wealth

The wealthiest 10 percent of adults worldwide...

90%90%

10%

15%

85%

...own 40 percent of the earth's wealth

The wealthiest 1 percent of adults worldwide...

40%

60%

1%

99%99%

1%

Earth’s Wealth

190 CHAPTER 7 Global Stratification

Taken at the end of the 1800s, these photos illustrate the contrasting worlds of social classes produced by early capitalism. The sleeping boys shown in this classic 1890 photo by Jacob Riis sold newspapers in London. They did not go to school, and they had no home. The children on the right, Cornelius and Gladys Vanderbilt, are shown in front of their parents’ estate. They went to school and did not work. You can see how the social locations illustrated in these photos would have produced different orientations to life and, therefore, politics, ideas about marriage, values, and so on—the stuff of which life is made.

How did Marx explain social class? How did Weber explain social class?

those who work for the owners. In short, people’s relationship to the means of produc- tion determines their social class.

Marx did recognize other groups: farmers and peasants; a lumpenproletariat (people living on the margin of society, such as beggars, vagrants, and criminals); and a middle group of self-employed professionals. Marx did not consider these groups social classes, however, for they lack class consciousness—a shared identity based on their position in the means of production. In other words, they did not perceive themselves as exploited workers whose plight could be resolved by collective action. Marx thought of these groups as insignificant in the future he foresaw—a workers’ revolution that would over- throw capitalism.

The capitalists will grow even wealthier, Marx said, and hostilities will increase. When workers come to realize that capitalists are the source of their oppression, they will unite and throw off the chains of their oppressors. In a bloody revolution, they will seize the means of production and usher in a classless society—and no longer will the few grow rich at the expense of the many. What holds back the workers’ unity and their revolu- tion is false class consciousness, workers mistakenly thinking of themselves as capital- ists. For example, workers with a few dollars in the bank may forget that they are workers and instead see themselves as investors, or as capitalists who are about to launch a successful business.

Max Weber: Property, Power, and Prestige Max Weber (1864–1920) was an outspoken critic of Marx. Weber argued that property is only part of the picture. Social class, he said, has three components: property, power, and prestige (Gerth and Mills 1958; Weber 1922/1978). Some call these the three P’s of social class. (Although Weber used the terms class, power, and status, some sociolo- gists find property, power, and prestige to be clearer terms. To make them even clearer, you may wish to substitute wealth for property.)

Property (or wealth), said Weber, is certainly significant in determining a person’s standing in society. On this point he agreed with Marx. But, added Weber, ownership is not the only significant aspect of property. For example, some powerful people, such as managers of corporations, control the means of production even though they do not own them. If managers can control property for their own benefit—awarding themselves huge bonuses and magnificent perks—it makes no practical difference that they do not own the property that they use so generously for their own benefit.

Power, the second element of social class, is the ability to control others, even over their objections. Weber agreed with Marx that property is a major source of power, but

Why Is Social Stratification Universal? 191

he added that it is not the only source. For example, prestige can be turned into power. Two well-known examples are actors Arnold Schwarzenegger, who became governor of California, and Ronald Reagan, who was elected governor of California and president of the United States. Figure 7.2 shows how property, power, and prestige are interrelated.

Prestige, the third element in Weber’s analysis, is often derived from property and power, for people tend to admire the wealthy and powerful. Prestige, however, can be based on other factors. Olympic gold medalists, for example, might not own property or be powerful, yet they have high prestige. Some are even able to exchange their prestige for property—such as those who are paid a small fortune for endorsing a certain brand of sportswear or for claiming that they start their day with “the breakfast of champions.” In other words, property and prestige are not one-way streets: Although property can bring prestige, prestige can also bring property.

In Sum: For Marx, the only distinction that counted was property, more specifically people’s relationship to the means of production. Whether we are owners or workers decides everything else, for this determines our lifestyle and shapes our orientation to life. Weber, in contrast, argued that social class has three components—a combination of property, power, and prestige.

Why Is Social Stratification Universal? What is it about social life that makes all societies stratified? We shall first consider the explanation proposed by functionalists, which has aroused much controversy in sociology, and then explanations proposed by conflict theorists.

The Functionalist View: Motivating Qualified People Functionalists take the position that the patterns of behavior that characterize a society exist because they are functional for that society. Because social inequality is universal, inequality must help societies survive. But how?

Davis and Moore’s Explanation. Two functionalists, Kingsley Davis and Wilbert Moore (1945, 1953), wrestled with this question. They concluded that stratification of society is inevitable because

1. Society must make certain that its positions are filled. 2. Some positions are more important than others. 3. The more important positions must be filled by the more qualified people. 4. To motivate the more qualified people to fill these positions, they must offer greater

rewards.

To flesh out this functionalist argument, consider college presidents and military generals. The position of college president is more important than that of student because the president’s decisions affect a large number of people, including many students. College presidents are also accountable for their performance to boards of trustees. It is the same with generals. Their decisions affect many people and sometimes even determine life and death. Generals are accountable to superior generals and to the country’s leader.

Why do people accept demanding, high-pressure positions? Why don’t they just take easier jobs? The answer, said Davis and Moore, is that these positions offer greater rewards—more prestige, pay, and benefits. To get highly qualified people to compete with one another, some positions offer a salary of $2 million a year, country club mem- bership, a private jet and pilot, and a chauffeured limousine. For less demanding posi- tions, a $30,000 salary without fringe benefits is enough to get hundreds of people to compete. If a job requires rigorous training, it, too, must offer more salary and benefits. If you can get the same pay with a high school diploma, why suffer through the many tests and term papers that college requires?

How do functionalists explain why social stratification is universal?

(Warren Buffet; the wealthy in general)

(Olympic gold medalists who

endorse products)

(Abe Lincoln; Barack Obama)

(the wealthy men who become

presidents)

Property

Power Prestige

(Ronald Reagan; Arnold

Schwarzenegger)

Prestige

Power Property

(crooked politicians)

Power

Property Prestige

Source: By the author.

FIGURE 7.2 Weber’s Three Components of Social Class

192 CHAPTER 7 Global Stratification

Tumin’s Critique of Davis and Moore. Davis and Moore were not attempt- ing to justify social inequality, just to explain why social stratification is universal. Nevertheless, their view makes many sociologists uncomfortable, for they see it as coming close to justifying the inequalities in society. Its bottom line seems to be: The people who contribute more to society are paid more, while those who contribute less are paid less.

Melvin Tumin (1953) was the first sociologist to point out what he saw as major flaws in the functionalist position. Here are three of his arguments.

First, how do we know that the positions that offer the higher rewards are more important? A heart surgeon, for example, saves lives and earns much more than a garbage collector, but this doesn’t mean that garbage collectors are less important to society. By helping to prevent contagious diseases, garbage collec- tors save more lives than heart surgeons do. We need independent methods of measuring importance, and we don’t have them.

Second, if stratification worked as Davis and Moore described it, society would be a meritocracy; that is, positions would be awarded on the basis of merit. But is this what we have? The best predictor of who goes to col- lege, for example, is not ability but income: The more a family earns, the more likely their children are to go to college (Bailey and Dynarski 2011). Not merit, then, but money—another form of the inequality that is built into society. In short, people’s positions in society are based on many factors other than merit.

Third, if social stratification is so functional, it ought to benefit almost everyone. Yet social stratification is dysfunctional for many. Think of the people who could have made valuable contributions to society had they not been born in slums, dropped out of school, and taken menial jobs to help support their families. Then there are the many who, born female,

are assigned “women’s work,” thus ensuring that they do not maximize their mental abilities.

In Sum: Functionalists argue that some positions are more important to society than others. Offering higher rewards for these positions motivates more talented people to take them. For example, to get highly capable people to become surgeons—to undergo years of rigorous training and then cope with life-and-death situations, as well as malpractice suits—that position must provide a high payoff.

Next, let’s see how conflict theorists explain why social stratification is universal. Before we do, look at Table 7.2 which compares the functionalist and conflict views.

Prestige can sometimes be converted into property or power: Shaun White, the winner of two Olympic gold medals for snowboarding, gained endorsements worth millions. His corporate sponsors include Red Bull, Target, and Hewlett-Packard. He stars in his own video games.

What are the criticisms of functionalism?

TABLE 7.2 Functionalist and Conflict Views of Stratification: The Distribution of Resources

Source: By the author.

Why are society’s resources (rewards) distributed the way they are?

Highest Resources go to those who

Lowest Resources go to those who

Source of Rewards

The Functionalist View Perform the most important functions (the most capable and most industrious)

Perform the least important functions (the less capable and less industrious)

Given to motivate people to sacrifice present rewards for future gains

The Conflict View Occupy the most powerful positions (in society or in an organization)

Occupy the least powerful positions (in society or in an organization)

Seized by those who gain power (and distributed by them to maintain their power)

Why Is Social Stratification Universal? 193

The Conflict Perspective: Class Conflict and Scarce Resources Conflict theorists don’t just criticize details of the functionalist argument. Rather, they go for the throat and attack its basic premise. Conflict, not function, they stress, is the reason that we have social stratification. Let’s look at the major arguments.

Mosca’s Argument. Italian sociologist Gaetano Mosca argued that every society will be stratified by power. This is inevitable, he said in an 1896 book titled The Ruling Class, because:

1. No society can exist unless it is organized. This requires leadership in order to coordinate people’s actions.

2. Leadership requires inequalities of power. By definition, some people take leadership positions, while others follow.

3. Because human nature is self-centered, people in power will use their positions to seize greater rewards for themselves.

There is no way around these facts of life, added Mosca. Social stratification is inevitable, and every society will stratify itself along lines of power.

Marx’s Argument. If he were alive to hear the functionalist argument, Karl Marx would be enraged. From his point of view, the people in power are not there because of superior traits, as the functionalists would have us believe. This view is an ideology that members of the elite use to justify their being at the top—and to seduce the oppressed into believing that their welfare depends on keeping quiet and following authorities like sheep. What is human history, Marx asked, except the chronicle of class struggle? All of human history is an account of small groups of people in power using society’s resources to benefit themselves and to oppress those beneath them—and of oppressed groups trying to overcome that oppression.

Marx predicted that the workers will revolt. Capitalist ideology now blinds them, but one day class consciousness will throw off that blindfold and expose the truth. When workers realize their common oppression, they will rebel. The struggle to control the means of production may be covert at first, taking such forms as work slowdowns and industrial sabotage. Ultimately, however, resistance will break out into the open. The revolution will not be easy, for the bourgeoisie control the police, the military, and even the educational system, where they implant false class consciousness in the minds of the workers’ children.

Current Applications of Conflict Theory. Just as Marx focused on overarching his- toric events—the accumulation of capital and power and the struggle between workers and capitalists—so do some of today’s conflict sociologists. In analyzing global stratifi- cation and global capitalism, they look at power relations among nations, how national elites control workers, and how power shifts as capital is shuffled among nations (Jessop 2010).

Other conflict sociologists, in contrast, examine conflict wherever it is found, not just as it relates to capitalists and workers. They examine how groups within the same class compete with one another for a larger slice of the pie (Collins 1999; King et al. 2010). Even within the same industry, for example, union will fight against union for higher salaries, shorter hours, and more power. A special focus is conflict between racial–ethnic groups as they compete for education, housing, and even prestige—whatever rewards society has to offer. Another focus is relations between women and men, which conflict theorists say are best understood as a conflict over power—over who controls society’s resources. Unlike functionalists, conflict theorists say that just beneath the surface of what may appear to be a tranquil society lies conflict that is barely held in check.

Shown here are sisters Venus and Serena Williams after winning gold medals at the Beijing Olympics. To determine the social class of athletes as highly successful as the Williams sisters presents a sociological puzzle. With their high prestige and growing wealth, what do you think their social class is? Why?

How do conflict theorists explain why social stratification is universal?

194 CHAPTER 7 Global Stratification

The divine right of kings was an ideology that made the king God’s direct representative on earth—to administer justice and punish evildoers. This theological-political concept was supported by the Roman Catholic Church, whose representatives crowned the king. Shown here is the coronation in 998 of Otto III as king of the Saxony area of Germany.

Lenski’s Synthesis As you can see, functionalist and conflict theorists disagree sharply. Is it possible to reconcile their views? Sociologist Gerhard Lenski (1966) thought so. He suggested that surplus is the key. He said that the functionalists are right when it comes to groups that don’t accumulate a surplus, such as hunting and gathering societies. These societies give a greater share of their resources to those who take on important tasks, such as war- riors who risk their lives in battle. It is a different story, said Lenski, with societies that accumulate surpluses. In them, groups fight over the surplus, and the group that wins becomes an elite. This dominant group rules from the top, controlling the groups below it. In the resulting system of social stratification, where you are born in that society, not personal merit, is important.

In Sum: Conflict theorists stress that in every society groups struggle with one another to gain a larger share of their society’s resources. Whenever a group gains power, it uses that power to extract what it can from the groups beneath it. This elite group also uses the social institutions to keep itself in power.

How Do Elites Maintain Stratification? Suppose that you are part of the ruling elite of your society. You want to make sure that you and your family and friends are going to be able to keep your privileged position for the next generation. How will you accomplish this?

You might think about passing laws and using the police and the military. After all, you are a member of the ruling elite, so you have this power. You could use force, but this can lead to resentment and rebellion. It is much more effective to control people’s ideas, information, and technology—which is just what the elite try to do. Let’s look at some of their techniques.

Soft Control Versus Force Let’s start with Medieval Europe, where we find an excellent example of how ideology is part of “soft” control. At that time, land was the primary source of wealth—and only the nobility and the church could own land. Almost everyone was a peasant (a serf) who worked for these powerful landowners. The peasants farmed the land, took care

of the livestock, and built the roads and bridges. Each year, they had to turn over a designated portion of their crops to their feudal lord. Year after year, for centuries, they did so. Why?

Controlling People’s Ideas. Why didn’t the peasants rebel and take over the land themselves? There were many reasons, not the least of which was that the nobility and church controlled the army. Coercion, however, goes only so far, for it breeds hostility and nourishes rebellion. How much more effective it is to get the masses to want to do what the ruling elite desires. This is where ideology (beliefs that justify the way things are) comes into play, which the nobility and clergy used to great effect. They developed an ideology known as the divine right of kings—the idea that the king’s authority comes directly from God. The king delegates authority to nobles, who, as God’s representatives, must be obeyed. To disobey is a sin against God; to rebel is to merit physical punishment on earth and eternal suffering in hell.

Controlling people’s ideas can be remarkably more effective than using brute force. Although this particular ideology governs few minds today, the elite in every society develops ideologies to justify its position at the top. For example, around the world, schools teach that their country’s form of government—no matter what form of government that is—is good. Religious leaders teach that we owe obedience to authority, that laws are to be obeyed. To the degree that their ideologies are accepted by the masses, the elite remains securely in power.

How did Lenski attempt to reconcile the functionalist and conflict views of social stratification?

Comparative Social Stratification 195

Controlling Information. To maintain their power, elites try to control informa- tion. Chinese leaders have put tight controls on Internet cafes and search engines (Blanchard 2010). In North Korea, you can spend six months in a labor camp just for watching a Jackie Chan movie (LaFraniere 2010). Lacking such power, the rul- ing elites of democracies rely on covert means. A favorite tactic of U.S. presidents is to withhold information “in the interest of national security,” a phrase that usually translates as “in the interest of protecting me.”

Stifling Criticism. Like the rest of us, the power elite doesn’t like criticism. But unlike the rest of us, they have the power to do something about it. When the U.S. Defense Department found out that an author had criticized its handling of 9/11, it bought and destroyed 9,500 copies of his book (Thompson 2010). Fear is a favorite tactic of the elite. In Thailand, you can be put in prison for criticizing the king or his family (Peck 2009). It was worse in Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, where the penalty for telling a joke about Hussein was having your tongue cut out (Nordland 2003).

Big Brother Technology. The new technology allows the elite to monitor citizens without anyone knowing they are being watched. Computer programs can read the entire contents of a computer in a second—and not leave a trace. Security cameras— “Tiny Brothers”—have sprouted almost everywhere. Face-recognition systems can scan a crowd of thousands, instantly matching the scans with digitized files of individuals. It is likely that the digitized facial image of every citizen will eventually be on file. Dictators have few checks on how they use this technology, but democracies do have some, such as requiring court orders for search and seizure. Such restraints on power always frus- trate officials, so they are delighted with our new Homeland Security laws that allow them to spy on citizens without their knowledge.

The new technology, however, is a two-edged sword. Just as it gives the elite powerful tools for monitoring citizens, it also makes it more difficult for them to control information. With international borders meaning nothing to satellite commu- nications, e-mail, and the Internet, information (both true and fabricated) flies around the globe in seconds. Internet users also have free access to some versions of PGP (Pretty Good Privacy) and TrueCrypt, codes that no government has been able to break. Then, too, there is zFone, a voice encryption for telephone calls that prevents wiretappers from understanding what people are saying.

In Sum: To maintain stratification, the elite tries to dominate its society’s institu- tions. In a dictatorship, the elite makes the laws. In a democracy, the elite influences the laws. In both, the elite controls the police and military and can give orders to crush a rebellion—or to run the post office or air traffic control if workers strike. With force having its limits, especially the potential of provoking resistance, most power elites prefer to keep themselves in power by peaceful means, especially by controlling technology and influencing the thinking of their people.

Comparative Social Stratification Now that we have examined systems of social stratification, considered why stratifica- tion is universal, and looked at how elites keep themselves in power, let’s compare social stratification in Great Britain and in the former Soviet Union. In the next chapter, we’ll look at social stratification in the United States.

Social Stratification in Great Britain Great Britain is often called England by Americans, but England is only one of the countries that make up the island of Great Britain. The others are Scotland and Wales. In addition, Northern Ireland is part of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland.

Like other industrialized countries, Great Britain has a class system that can be divided into a lower, a middle, and an upper class. Great Britain’s population is about evenly

How do ruling elites maintain their positions (control populations) without using force?

196 CHAPTER 7 Global Stratification

divided between the middle class and the lower (or working) class. A tiny upper class— wealthy, powerful, and highly educated—makes up perhaps 1 percent of the population.

Compared with Americans, the British are very class conscious (Kerswill 2006). Like Americans, they recognize class distinctions on the basis of the type of car a person drives or the stores someone patronizes. But the most striking characteristics of the British class system are language and education. Because these often show up in distinc- tive speech, accent has a powerful impact on British life. Accent almost always betrays class. As soon as someone speaks, the listener is aware of that person’s social class—and treats him or her accordingly (Sullivan 1998).

Education is the primary way by which the British perpetuate their class system from one generation to the next. Almost all children go to neighborhood schools. Great Britain’s richest 5 percent, however—who own half the nation’s wealth—send their chil- dren to exclusive private boarding schools. There the children of the elite are trained in subjects that are considered “proper” for members of the ruling class. An astounding 50 percent of the students at Oxford and Cambridge, the country’s most elite universities, come from this 5 percent of the population. So do half of the prime minister’s cabinet (Neil 2011). To illustrate how powerfully this system of stratified education affects the national life of Great Britain, sociologist Ian Robertson (1987) said,

Eighteen former pupils of the most exclusive of [England’s high schools], Eton, have become prime minister. Imagine the chances of a single American high school producing eighteen presidents!

Social Stratification in the Former Soviet Union Heeding Karl Marx’s call for a classless society, Vladimir Ilyich Lenin (1870–1924) and Leon Trotsky (1879–1940) led a revolution in Russia in 1917. They, and the nations that followed their banner, never claimed to have achieved the ideal of communism, in which all contribute their labor to the common good and receive according to their needs. Instead, they used the term socialism to describe the intermediate step between capitalism and communism, in which social classes are abolished but some inequality remains.

To tweak the nose of Uncle Sam, the socialist countries would trumpet their equality and point a finger at glaring inequalities in the United States. These countries, however, also were marked by huge disparities in privilege. Their major basis of stratification was membership in the Communist party. Party members decided who would gain admis- sion to the better schools or obtain the more desirable jobs and housing. The equally qualified son or daughter of a nonmember would be turned down, for such privileges came with demonstrated loyalty to the party.

The Communist party, too, was highly stratified. Most members occupied a low level, where they fulfilled such tasks as spying on fellow workers. For this, they might get easier jobs in the factory or occasional access to special stores to purchase hard- to-find goods. The middle level consisted of bureaucrats who were given better than average access to resources and privileges. At the top level was a small elite: party members who enjoyed not only power but also limousines, imported delicacies, vaca- tion homes, and even servants and hunting lodges. As with other stratification sys- tems around the world, women held lower positions in the party. This was evident at each year’s May Day, when the top members of the party reviewed the latest weapons paraded in Moscow’s Red Square. Photos of these events showed only men.

The leaders of the USSR became frustrated as they saw the West thrive. They strug- gled with a bloated bureaucracy, the inefficiencies of central planning, workers who did the minimum because they could not be fired, and a military so costly that it spent one of every eight of the nation’s rubles (Statistical Abstract 1993:1432, table dropped in later editions). Socialist ideology did not call for their citizens to be deprived, and in an attempt to turn things around, the Soviet leadership initiated reforms. They allowed elections to be held in which more than one candidate ran for an office. (Before this, voters had a choice of only one candidate per office.) They also sold huge chunks of

What are the main characteristics of social stratification in Great Britain? In the former Soviet Union?

Global Stratification: Three Worlds 197

state-owned businesses to the public. Overnight, making investments to try to turn a profit changed from a crime into a respectable goal.

Russia’s transition to capitalism took a bizarre twist. As authority broke down, a powerful Mafia emerged (Varese 2005; Hignett 2010). These criminal groups are headed by gangsters, corrupt government officials (including members of the secret police, the FSB), and crooked businessmen. In some towns, they buy the entire judicial system—the police force, prosecutors, and judges. They assassinate business leaders, reporters, and politicians who refuse to cooperate. They amass wealth, launder money through banks they control, and buy luxury properties in popular tourist areas in South America, Asia, and Europe. A favorite is Marbella, a watering and wintering spot on Spain’s Costa del Sol.

As Moscow reestablishes its authority, Mafia ties have brought wealth to some of the members of this central government. This group of organized criminals is taking its place as part of Russia’s new capitalist class.

Global Stratification: Three Worlds As was noted at the beginning of this chapter, just as the people within a nation are stratified by property, power, and prestige, so are the world’s nations. Until recently, a simple model consisting of First, Second, and Third Worlds was used to depict global stratification. First World referred to the industrialized capitalist nations, Second World to the communist (or socialist) countries, and Third World to any nation that did not fit into the first two categories. The breakup of the Soviet Union in 1989 made these terms outdated. In addition, although first, second, and third did not mean “best,” “better,” and “worst,” they implied it. An alternative classification that some now use—developed, developing, and undeveloped nations—has the same drawback. By calling ourselves “developed,” it sounds as though we are mature and the “undeveloped” nations are somehow retarded.

To resolve this problem, I use more neutral, descriptive terms: Most Industrialized, Industrializing, and Least Industrialized nations. We can measure industrialization with no judgment implied as to whether a nation’s industrialization represents “development,” ranks it “first,” or is even desirable at all. The intention is to depict on a global level the three primary dimensions of social stratification: property, power, and prestige. The Most Industrialized Nations have much greater property (wealth), power (they usually get their way in international relations), and prestige (they are looked up to as world leaders).

As you read this analysis, don’t forget the sociological significance of the stratification of nations, its far-reaching effects on people’s lives, as illustrated by the two families sketched in our opening vignette.

The Most Industrialized Nations The Most Industrialized Nations are the United States and Canada in North America; Great Britain, France, Germany, Switzerland, and the other industrialized countries of western Europe; Japan in Asia; and Australia and New Zealand in the area of the world known as Oceania. Although there are variations in their economic systems, these nations are capitalistic. As Table 7.3 shows, although these nations have only 16 percent of the world’s people, they possess 31 percent of the earth’s land. Their wealth is so enormous that even their poor live better and longer lives than do the average citizens of the Least Industrialized Nations. The Social Map on the next two pages shows the tremendous disparities in income among the world’s nations.

TABLE 7.3 Distribution of the World’s

Land Population

Most Industrialized Nations 31% 16% Industrializing Nations 20% 16% Least Industrialized Nations 49% 68%

Sources: By the author. Computed from Kurian 1990, 1991, 1992.

Land and Population

The contrast between poverty and wealth is a characteristics of all contemporary societies. I took this photo in Riga, the capital of Latvia, one of the countries Russia ruled as a satellite nation.

Why does the author propose a model of Most Industrialized, Industrializing, and Least Industrialized Nations?

198 CHAPTER 7 Global Stratification

FIGURE 7.3 Global Stratification: Income1 of the World’s Nations

The Most Industrialized Nations

Nation Income per

Person 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25 26

27 28 29 30 31 32 33 34 35 36 37 38 39 40 41 42 43 44 45 46 47 48 49 50 51 52 53 54 55

The Industrializing Nations

Nation Income per

Person

The Least Industrialized Nations

Nation Income per

Person 56 57 58 59 60 61 62 63 64 65 66 67 68 69

70 71

Nation Income per

Person 72 73 74 75 76 77 78 79 80 81 82 83 84 85 86 87 88

5

11

44

64

97

93

103

52

75

69

60

71

65

86

92

76 67

70

54 134

72

49

51

58

40

38

14

28

Luxembourg Singapore Norway Hong Kong United States Switzerland Netherlands Austria Australia Sweden Canada Denmark Finland Iceland Germany Taiwan Belgium United Kingdom France Japan Korea, South Israel Italy Slovenia New Zealand Czech Republic

$84,700 $59,900 $53,300 $49,300 $48,100 $43,400 $42,300 $41,700 $40,800 $40,600 $40,300 $40,200 $38,300 $38,000 $37,900 $37,900 $37,600 $35,900 $35,000 $34,300 $31,700 $31,000 $30,100 $29,100 $27,900 $25,900

$39,500 $36,500 $30,600 $27,600 $23,400 $23,200 $20,200 $20,100 $19,600 $18,700 $18,300 $17,400 $16,700 $16,100 $16,000 $15,600 $15,400 $15,100 $15,000 $14,600 $14,100 $13,500 $12,400 $12,300 $11,600 $11,500 $11,000

$9,900 $8,400

Ireland Greenland Spain Greece Slovakia Portugal Estonia Poland Hungary Lithuania Croatia Argentina Russia Chile Gabon Malaysia Latvia Mexico Mauritius Turkey Libya Bulgaria Venezuela Romania Brazil Costa Rica South Africa Cuba China

Ecuador Bosnia Albania El Salvador Guyana Turkmenistan Namibia Algeria Ukraine Egypt Bhutan Angola Jordan Sri Lanka Paraguay Armenia Georgia

$8,300 $8,200 $7,800 $7,600 $7,500 $7,500 $7,300 $7,200 $7,200 $6,500 $6,000 $5,900 $5,900 $5,600 $5,500 $5,400 $5,400

Botswana2

Lebanon Uruguay Belarus Panama Kazakhstan Macedonia Azerbaijan Colombia Peru Thailand Suriname Tunisia Dominican Republic Jamaica Belize

$16,300 $15,600 $15,400 $14,900 $13,600 $13,000 $10,400 $10,200 $10,100 $10,000 $9,700 $9,500 $9,500

$9,300 $9,000 $8,300

Global Stratification: Three Worlds 199

1Income is a country’s purchasing power parity based on a country’s Gross Domestic Product, where the value of a country’s goods and services are valued at prices prevailing in the United States. Totals vary from year to year and should be considered as approximations.

2Botswana’s income is based largely on its diamond mines. 3Iraq’s oil wealth has been disrupted by war. Source: By the author. Based on CIA World Factbook 2012.

The Least Industrialized Nations

Nation Income per

Person Nation Income per

Person Nation Income per

Person Nation Income per

Person 89 90 91 92 93 94 95 96 97 98 99

100 101 102 103 104 105

106 107 108 109 110

111 112 113 114 115 116 117 118 119 120 121

122 123 124 125 126 127 128 129 130 131 132 133 134 135 136 137 138

139 140 141 142 143

144 145 146 147 148 149

The Oil-Rich Nations

Nation Income per

Person 150 151

152 153 154 155 156

157 158

1

6

3

17

12

8

727 15

13

19

10

18

23 2932 30

26 35

73

34

39

37

59

43

46

36

50 31

33

24

68 57

156

53

56

114

121

107 129

120

113

131

96

133

82

83

143

117

139

122

125 126

146

108

132

118

140

45

109

138

130

124

144

137

149

95

127

145 135

141

105

123

142

119 98

84 55

77

80

8147

90

91

63 88

87

100

74

85

48

61

112101

99

110

102 136

115

116

106

41

79

78

147

104

62

22

20

16 4

21

66

42

94

2

153 150

155

157

154

158

151

111

152

9

25

128

89

148

14

Afghanistan Madagascar Malawi Togo Central African Republic Niger Sierra Leone Eritrea Zimbabwe Burundi Congo, Dem. Rep.

$1,000 $1,000

$900 $900

$800 $800 $800 $700 $500 $400

$300

Swaziland Morocco Syria Guatemala Bolivia Indonesia Congo Mongolia Honduras Philippines India Moldova Uzbekistan Vietnam Nicaragua Ghana Sudan

$5,200 $5,100 $5,100 $5,000 $4,800 $4,700 $4,600 $4,500 $4,300 $4,100 $3,700 $3,400 $3,300 $3,300 $3,200 $3,100 $3,000

Pakistan Laos Djibouti Nigeria Papua-New Guinea Yemen Krygyzstan Cambodia Cameroon Mauritania Gambia Tajikistan Chad Senegal Korea, North Bangladesh

$2,800 $2,700 $2,600 $2,600

$2,500 $2,500 $2,400 $2,300 $2,300 $2,200 $2,100 $2,000 $1,900 $1,900 $1,800 $1,700

Kenya Cote d'Ivoire Zambia Benin Burkina Faso Tanzania Lesotho Burma Mali Nepal Rwanda Uganda Haiti Ethiopia Guinea Guinea-Bissau Mozambique

$1,700 $1,600 $1,600 $1,500 $1,500 $1,500 $1,400 $1,300 $1,300 $1,300 $1,300 $1,300 $1,200 $1,100 $1,100 $1,100 $1,100

Qatar United Arab Emirates Kuwait Bahrain Oman Saudi Arabia Equatorial Guinea Iran Iraq3

$102,700

$48,500 $40,700 $27,300 $26,200 $24,000

$19,300 $12,200 $3,900

200 CHAPTER 7 Global Stratification

The Industrializing Nations The Industrializing Nations include most of the nations of the former Soviet Union and its former satellites in eastern Europe. As Table 7.3 shows, these nations account for 20 percent of the earth’s land and 16 percent of its people.

The dividing points between the three “worlds” are soft, making it diffi- cult to know how to classify some nations. This is especially the case with the Industrializing Nations. Exactly how much industrialization must a nation have to be in this category? Although soft, these categories do pinpoint essential dif- ferences among nations. Most people who live in the Industrializing Nations have much lower incomes and standards of living than do those who live in the Most Industrialized Nations. The majority, however, are better off than those who live in the Least Industrialized Nations. For example, on such measures as access to electricity, indoor plumbing, automobiles, telephones, and even food, most citizens of the Industrializing Nations rank lower than those in the Most Industrialized Nations, but higher than those in the Least Industrialized Nations. As you saw in the opening vignette, stratification affects even life expectancy.

The benefits of industrialization are uneven. Large numbers of people in the Industrializing Nations remain illiterate and desperately poor. Conditions can be gruesome, as we explore in the following Thinking Critically section.

THINKING CRITICALLY Open Season: Children as Prey

W hat is childhood like in the Industrializing Nations? The answer depends on who your parents are. If you are the son or daughter of rich parents, child-hood can be pleasant—a world filled with luxuries and even servants. If you are born into poverty, but live in a rural area where there is plenty to eat, life can still be good—although there may be no books, television, and little education. If you live in a slum, however, life can be horrible—worse even than in the slums of the Most Industrialized Nations (Barbassa 2010). Let’s take a glance at a notorious slum in Brazil.

Not enough food—this you can take for granted—along with wife abuse, broken homes, alcoholism, drug abuse, and a lot of crime. From your knowledge of slums in the Most Industrialized Nations, you would expect these things. What you may not expect, however, are the brutal conditions in which Brazilian slum (favela) children live.

Sociologist Martha Huggins (Huggins et al. 2002) reports that poverty is so deep that children and adults swarm through garbage dumps to try to find enough decay- ing food to keep them alive. You might also be surprised to discover that the owners of some of these dumps hire armed guards to keep the poor out—so that they can sell the garbage for pig food. And you might be shocked to learn that some shop owners hire hit men, auctioning designated victims to the lowest bidder!

Life is cheap in the poor nations—but death squads for children? To understand this, we must first note that Brazil has a long history of violence. Brazil also has a high rate of poverty, has only a tiny middle class, and is controlled by a small group of families who, under a veneer of democracy, make the country’s major decisions. Hordes of homeless children, with no schools or jobs, roam the streets. To survive, they wash windshields, shine shoes, beg, and steal (Huggins and Rodrigues 2004).

The “respectable” classes see these children as nothing but trouble. They hurt business, for customers feel intimidated when they see begging children—especially teenaged boys—clustered in front of stores. Some shoplift. Others break into the stores. With no effective social institutions to care for these children, one solution is to kill them. As Huggins notes, murder sends a clear message—especially if it is accompanied by ritual torture: gouging out the eyes, ripping open the chest, cutting off the genitals, raping the girls, and burning the victim’s body.

Not all life is bad in the Industrializing Nations, but this is about as bad as it gets.

Watch

Slum Features

on mysoclab.com

What is life like for the very poor in the Industrializing Nations?

How Did the World’s Nations Become Stratified? 201

For Your Consideration Do you think there is anything the Most Industrialized Nations can do about this situa- tion? Or is it, though unfortunate, just an “internal” affair that is up to Brazil to handle as it wishes?

Directed by the police, death squads in the Philippine slums also assassinate rapists and drug dealers (“You Can Die Anytime” 2009). What do you think about this? !

Homeless people sleeping on the streets is a common sight in India’s cities. I took this photo in Chennai (formerly Madras).

The Least Industrialized Nations In the Least Industrialized Nations, most people live on small farms or in villages, have large families, and barely survive. These nations account for 68 percent of the world’s people but only 49 percent of the earth’s land.

Poverty plagues these nations to such an extent that some families actually live in city dumps. This is hard to believe, but look at the photos on the next two pages, which I took in Phnom Penh, the capital of Cambodia. Although wealthy nations have their pockets of poverty, most people in the Least Industrialized Nations are poor. Most of them have no running water, indoor plumbing, or access to trained teachers or doctors. As we will review in Chapter 14, most of the world’s population growth occurs in these nations, placing even greater burdens on their limited resources and causing them to fall farther behind each year.

How Did the World’s Nations Become Stratified?

How did the globe become stratified into such distinct worlds? The commonsense answer is that the poorer nations have fewer resources than the richer nations. As with many commonsense answers, however, this one, too, falls short. Many of the Industrializing and Least Industrialized Nations are rich in natural resources, while one Most Industrialized Nation, Japan, has few. Three theories explain how glob- al stratification came about.

Colonialism The first theory, colonialism, stresses that the countries that industrialized first got the jump on the rest of the world. Beginning in Great Britain about 1750, industrialization spread throughout western Europe. Plowing some of their profits into powerful armaments and fast ships, these countries invaded weaker nations, making colonies out of them (Harrison 1993). After sub- duing these weaker nations, the more powerful countries left behind a controlling force in order to exploit the nations’ labor and natural resources. At one point, there was even a free-for-all among the industrialized European countries as they rushed to divide up an entire continent. As they sliced Africa into pieces, even tiny Belgium got into the act and acquired the Congo, which was seventy-five times larger than itself.

The purpose of colonialism was to establish economic colonies—to exploit the nation’s people and resources for the benefit of the “mother” country. The more powerful European countries would plant their national flags in a colony and send their representatives to run the government, but the United States usually chose to plant corporate flags in a colony and let these corporations dominate the territory’s government. Central and South America are prime examples. There were exceptions, such as the U.S. army’s conquest of the Philippines, which President McKinley said was motivated by the desire “to educate the Filipinos, and uplift and civilize and Christianize them” (Krugman 2002).

According to colonialism, how did the world’s nations become stratified?

I did. And there I foun d

a highly developed soc ial

organization—an intric ate

support system. Beca use words are

inadequate to depict the abject poverty

of the Least Industria lized Nations, these

photos can provide mo re insight into these

people's lives than anyth ing I could say.

The Dump People: Wo rking and Living and P

laying

in the City Dump of P hnom Penh, Cambodia

I went to Cambodia to i nspect orphanages,

to see how well the childr en are being cared

for. While in Phnom Pen h, Cambodia's capi-

tal, I was told about peo ple who live in the

city dump. Live there? I c ould hardly believe

my ears. I knew that peo ple made their living

by picking scraps from th e city dump, but I

didn't know they actually lived among the

garbage. This I had to s ee for myself.

This is a typical sight—family and friends working together. The trash, which is constantly burning, contains harmful chemicals. Why do people work under such conditions? Because they have few options. It is either this or starve.

After the garbage arrives by truck, people st ream around it,

struggling to be the fi rst to discover somethi ng of value. To sift

through the trash, the workers use metal pic ks, like the one this

child is holding. Note that children work alon gside the adults.

The children who live in the dump also play there. These children are riding bicycles on a “road,” a packed, leveled area of garbage that leads to their huts. The huge stacks in the background are piled trash. Note the ubiquitous Nike.

© James M. Henslin, all photos

One of my many surprises was to fi nd food stands in the dump. Although this one primarily offers drinks and snacks, others serve more substantial food. One even has chairs for its customers.

The people live at the edge of the dump, in homemade huts (v isible in

the background). This woman, who was on her way home after a day’s

work, put down her sack of salvaged items to let me take her p icture.

At the day’s end, the workers wash at the community pump. This hand pump serves all their water needs—drinking, washing, and cooking. There is no indoor plumbing. The weeds in the background serve that purpose. Can you imagine drinking water that comes from below this garbage dump?

Not too many visitors to Phnom Penh tell a cab driver to take them to the city dump. The cabbie looked a bit perplexed, but he did as I asked. Two cabs are shown here because my friends insisted on accompanying me. I know they were curious themselves, but my friends had also discovered that the destinations I want to visit are usually not in the tourist guides, and they wanted to protect me.

I was surprised to learn t hat ice

is delivered to the dump . This

woman is using a hand g rinder

to crush ice for drinks fo r her

customers. The custome rs, of

course, are other people who

also live in the dump.

204 CHAPTER 7 Global Stratification

According to world system theory, how did the world’s nations become stratified?

Colonialism, then, shaped many of the Least Industrialized Nations. In some instances, the Most Industrialized Nations were so powerful that when dividing their spoils, they drew lines across a map, creating new states without regard for tribal or cultural considerations (Kifner 1999). Britain and France did just this as they divided up North Africa and parts of the Middle East—which is why the national boundaries of Libya, Saudi Arabia, Kuwait, and other countries are so straight. This legacy of European conquests is a background factor in much of today’s racial–ethnic and tribal violence: Groups with no history of national iden- tity were incorporated arbitrarily into the same political boundaries.

World System Theory The second explanation of how global stratification came about was proposed by Immanuel Wallerstein (1974, 1979, 1990). According to world system theory, indus- trialization led to four groups of nations. The first group consists of the core nations, the countries that industrialized first (Britain, France, Holland, and later Germany), which grew rich and powerful. The second group is the semiperiphery. The economies of these nations, located around the Mediterranean, stagnated because they grew dependent on trade with the core nations. The economies of the third group, the periphery, or fringe nations, developed even less. These are the eastern European countries, which sold cash crops to the core nations. The fourth group of nations includes most of Africa and Asia. Called the external area, these nations were left out of the development of capitalism altogether. The current expansion of capitalism has changed the relationships among these groups. Most notably, eastern Europe and Asia are no longer left out of capitalism.

The globalization of capitalism—the adoption of capitalism around the world— has created extensive ties among the world’s nations. Production and trade are now so interconnected that events around the globe affect us all. Sometimes this is immediate, as happens when a civil war disrupts the flow of oil, or—perish the thought—as would be the case if terrorists managed to get their hands on nuclear or biological weapons. At other times, the effects are like a slow ripple, as when a government adopts some policy that gradually impedes its ability to compete in world markets. All of today’s societies, then, no matter where they are located, are part of a world system.

The interconnections are most evident among nations that do extensive trading with one another. The following Thinking Critically section explores implications of Mexico’s maquiladoras.

THINKING CRITICALLY When Globalization Comes Home: Maquiladoras South of the Border

Two hundred thousand Mexicans rush to Juarez each year, fleeing the hopeless-ness of the rural areas in pursuit of a better life. They have no running water or plumbing, but they didn’t have any in the country either, and here they have the possibility of a job, a weekly check to buy food for the kids.

The pay is $100 for a 48-hour work week, about $2 an hour (Harris 2008). This may not sound like much, but it is more than twice the minimum daily wage

in Mexico. Assembly-for-export plants, known as maquiladoras, dot the Mexican border (Wise

and Cypher 2007). The North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) allows U.S. companies to import materials to Mexico without paying tax and to then export the finished products into the United States, again without tax. It’s a sweet deal: few taxes and $17 a day for workers starved for jobs.

That these workers live in shacks, with no running water or sewage disposal, is not the employers’ concern.

Nor is the pollution. The stinking air doesn’t stay on the Mexican side of the border. Neither does the garbage. Heavy rains wash torrents of untreated sewage and industrial wastes into the Rio Grande (M. Lacey 2007).

Read

The Uses of Global Poverty: How

Economic Inequality Benefits the West

by Diane Stukulis Eglitis

on mysoclab.com

How Did the World’s Nations Become Stratified? 205

Culture of Poverty The third explanation of global stratification is quite unlike the other two. Economist John Kenneth Galbraith (1979) claimed that the cultures of the Least Industrialized Nations hold them back. Building on the ideas of anthropologist Oscar Lewis (1966a,

There is also the loss of jobs for U.S. workers. Six of the fifteen poorest cities in the United States are located along the sewage-infested Rio Grande. NAFTA didn’t bring poverty to these cities. They were poor before this treaty, but residents resent the transfer of jobs across the border (Thompson 2001).

What if the maquilas (maquiladora workers) orga- nize and demand better pay? Farther south, even cheaper labor beckons. Workers in Guatemala and Honduras, even more desperate than those in Mexico, will gladly take these jobs (Brown 2008). China, too, is competing for them (Utar and Ruiz 2010).

Many Mexican politicians would say that this presentation is one-sided. “Sure there are problems,” they would say, “but this is how it always is when a country industrializes. Don’t you realize that the maqui- ladoras bring jobs to people who have no work? They also bring roads, telephone lines, and electricity to undeveloped areas.” “In fact,” said Vicente Fox, when he was the president of Mexico, “workers at the maquiladoras make more than the average salary in Mexico— and that’s what we call fair wages” (Fraser 2001).

During our economic crisis, the wages of many maquilas were cut in half (Muñoz Martinez 2010).

For Your Consideration Let’s apply our three theoretical perspectives.

↑

Some conflict theorists analyze how capitalists try to weaken the bargaining power of workers by exploiting divisions among them. In what is known as the split labor market, capitalists pit one group of workers against another to lower the cost of labor. How do you think that maquiladoras fit this conflict perspective?

↑

When functionalists analyze a situation, they identify its functions and dysfunctions. What functions and dysfunctions of maquiladoras do you see?

↑

Symbolic interactionists analyze how people’s experiences shape their views of the world. How would people’s experiences in contrasting social locations lead to different answers to “Do maquiladoras represent exploitation or opportunity?” What multiple realities do you see here? !

A photo taken inside a maquiladora in Matamoros, Mexico. The steering wheels are for U.S. automakers.

The home of a maquiladora worker.

For whom are maquiladoras functional? According to the culture of poverty, how did the world’s nations become stratified?

206 CHAPTER 7 Global Stratification

1966b), Galbraith argued that some nations are crippled by a culture of poverty, a way of life that perpetuates poverty from one generation to the next. He explained it this way: Most of the world’s poor people are farmers who live on little plots of land. They barely produce enough food to survive. Living on the edge of starvation, they have little room for risk—so they stick closely to tried-and-true, traditional ways. To experiment with new farming techniques is to court disaster, for failure would lead to hunger and death.

Their religion also encourages them to accept their situation, for it teaches fatalism: the belief that an individual’s position in life is God’s will. For example, in India, the Dalits are taught that they must have done very bad things in a previous life to suffer so. They are supposed to submit to their situation—and in the next life maybe they’ll come back in a more desirable state.

Evaluating the Theories Most sociologists prefer colonialism and world system theory. To them, an explanation based on a culture of poverty places blame on the victim—the poor nations themselves. It points to characteristics of the poor nations, rather than to international political arrange- ments that benefit the Most Industrialized Nations at the expense of the poor nations. But even taken together, these theories yield only part of the picture. None of these theo- ries, for example, would have led anyone to expect that after World War II, Japan would become an economic powerhouse: Japan had a religion that stressed fatalism, two of its major cities had been destroyed by atomic bombs, and it had been stripped of its colonies.

Each theory, then, yields but a partial explanation, and the grand theorist who will put the many pieces of this puzzle together has yet to appear.

Maintaining Global Stratification Regardless of how the world’s nations became stratified, why do countries remain rich— or poor—year after year? Let’s look at two explanations of how global stratification is maintained.

Neocolonialism Sociologist Michael Harrington (1977) argued that when colonialism fell out of style it was replaced by neocolonialism. When World War II changed public sentiment about sending soldiers and colonists to exploit weaker countries, the Most Industrialized Nations turned to the international markets as a way of controlling the Least Industrialized Nations. By selling them goods on credit—weapons that the local elites

desire so they can keep themselves in power—the Most Industrialized Nations entrap the poor nations with a circle of debt.

As many of us learn the hard way, owing a large debt and falling behind on payments puts us at the mercy of our creditors. So it is with neoco- lonialism. The policy of selling weapons and other manufactured goods to the Least Industrialized Nations on credit turns those countries into eter- nal debtors. The capital they need to develop their own industries goes instead as payments toward the debt, which becomes bloated with mount- ing interest. Keeping these nations in debt forces them to submit to trading terms dictated by the neocolonialists (Carrington 1993; Smith 2001).

Relevance Today. Neocolonialism might seem remote from our own lives, but its heritage affects us directly. Consider the oil-rich Middle Eastern countries, our two wars in the Persian Gulf, and

The maintenance of global stratification has many faces. Here is one, a displaced girl in a United Nations camp in South Darfur, in Sudan.

How does neocolonialism help to maintain global stratification?

Maintaining Global Stratification 207

the terrorism that emanates from this region (Strategic Energy Policy 2001; Mouawad 2007). Although this is an area of ancient civilizations, the countries themselves are recent. Great Britain created Saudi Arabia, drawing its boundaries and even naming the country after the man (Ibn Saud) whom British officials picked to lead it. This created a debt for the Saudi family, which for decades it repaid by providing low-cost oil, which the Most Industrialized Nations need to maintain their way of life. When other nations pumped less oil—no matter the cause, whether revolution or an attempt to raise prices— the Saudis helped keep prices low by making up the shortfall. In return, the United States (and other nations) overlooked the human rights violations of the Saudi royal fam- ily, keeping them in power by selling them the latest weapons. This mutually sycophantic arrangement continues.

Multinational Corporations Multinational corporations, companies that operate across many national boundar- ies, also help to maintain the global dominance of the Most Industrialized Nations. In some cases, multinational corporations exploit the Least Industrialized Nations directly. A prime example is the United Fruit Company, a U.S. corporation that used to run Central American nations as its own fiefdoms. The CIA would plot and overthrow elect- ed, but uncooperative, governments (CIA 2003), and an occasional invasion by Marines would remind area politicians of the military power that backed U.S. corporations.

Most commonly, however, it is simply by doing business that multinational corpora- tions help to maintain international stratification. A single multinational corporation may manage mining operations in several countries, manufacture goods in others, and market its products around the globe. No matter where the profits are made, or where they are reinvested, the primary beneficiaries are the Most Industrialized Nations, espe- cially the one in which the multinational corporation has its world headquarters.

Buying Political Stability. In their pursuit of profits, the multinational corporations need cooperative power elites in the Least Industrialized Nations (Wise and Cypher 2007; Jessop 2010). In return for funneling money to the elites and selling them mod- ern weapons, the corporations get a “favorable business climate”—that is, low taxes and cheap labor. The corporations politely call the money they pay to the elites “subsidies” and “offsets”—which are much prettier to the ear than “bribes.” Able to siphon money from their country’s tax collections and government budgets, these elites live a sophis- ticated upper-class life in the major cities of their home country. Although most of the citizens of these countries live a hard-scrabble life, the elites are able to send their chil- dren to prestigious Western universities, such as Oxford, the Sorbonne, and Harvard.

You can see how this cozy arrangement helps to maintain global stratification. The sig- nificance of these payoffs is not so much the genteel lifestyles that they allow the elites to maintain, but the translation of the payoffs into power. They allow the elites to purchase high-tech weapons with which they preserve their positions of privilege, even though they must oppress their people to do so. The result is a political stability that keeps alive this diabolical partnership between the multinational corporations and the national elites.

Unanticipated Consequences. This, however, is not the full story. An unintentional by-product of the multinationals’ global search for cheap resources and labor is to modify global stratification. When corporations move manufacturing from the Most Industrialized Nations to the Least Industrialized Nations, they not only exploit cheap labor but they also bring jobs and money to these nations. Although workers in the Least Industrialized Nations are paid a pittance, it is more than they can earn elsewhere. With new factories come opportunities to develop skills, acquire technology, and accumulate a capital base from which local elites can launch their own factories.

The Pacific Rim nations provide a remarkable example. In return for providing the “favorable business climate” just mentioned, multinational corporations invested billions of dollars in the “Asian tigers” (Hong Kong, Singapore, South Korea, and Taiwan). These nations have developed such a strong capital base that, along with China, they have begun to rival the older capitalist countries. This has also made them subject to

How do multinational corporations help to maintain global stratification?

208 CHAPTER 7 Global Stratification

How does technology help to maintain global stratification? What changes in stratification are occurring?

Systems of Social Stratification What is social stratification? Social stratification refers to a hierarchy of privilege based on property, power, and prestige. Every society stratifies its members, and in every society men as a group are placed above women as a group. P. 184.

What are three major systems of social stratification? Three major stratification systems are slavery, caste, and class. The essential characteristic of slavery is that some people own other people. Initially, slavery was based not on race but on debt, punishment for crime, or defeat in battle. Slavery could be temporary or permanent and was not

Summary and ReviewCH A

P T

E R

7

capitalism’s “boom and bust” cycles, and workers and investors in these nations, includ- ing those in the maquiladoras that you just read about, have their dreams smashed when capitalism suffers a downturn.

Technology and Global Domination The race between the Most and Least Industrialized Nations to develop and apply the new technologies might seem like a race between a marathon runner and someone with a broken leg. Can the outcome be in doubt? As the multinational corporations amass profits, they are able to invest huge sums in the latest technology while the Least Industrialized Nations are struggling to put scraps on the table.

So it would appear, but the race is not this simple. Although the Most Industrialized Nations have a seemingly insurmountable head start, some of the other nations are short- ening the distance between themselves and the front-runners. With cheap labor making their manufactured goods inexpensive, China and India are exporting goods on a massive scale. They are using the capital from these exports to adopt high technology to modern- ize their infrastructure (transportation, communication, electrical, and banking systems), with the goal of advancing their industry. Although global domination remains in the hands of the West, it could be on the verge of a major shift from West to East.

Strains in the Global System It is never easy to maintain global stratification. At the very least, a continuous stream of unanticipated events forces the elite to stay on their toes, and at times huge currents of history threaten to sweep them aside. Now matter how secure a stratification system may seem, it always contains unresolved issues. These contradictions can be covered up for a while, but inevitably they rear up. Some are just little dogs nipping at the heels of the world’s elites, bringing issues that can be resolved with a few tanks or bombs—or, bet- ter, with a scowl and the threat to bomb some opponent. Other issues are of a broader nature, part of huge historical shifts. Baring their teeth, both emerging and old unre- solved contradictions snarlingly demand change, even the rearrangement of global power.

Such broad, history changing events are rare, but when they come they bring cata- clysmic disruptions. We are now living through such a time. The far-reaching economic– political changes in Russia and China have been accompanied by huge cracks in a creak- ing global banking system. In desperation, the global powers have pumped trillions of dollars into their economic–political systems. As curious as we are about the outcome and as much as our lives are affected, we don’t know the end point of this current strain in the global system and the power elites’ desperate attempts to patch up the most glar- ing inconsistencies in their global domination. As this process of realignment continues, however, it is likely to sweep all of us into its unwelcome net.

Summary and Review 209

and almost all of the elite attend private schools. In the former Soviet Union, communism was supposed to abolish class distinctions. Instead, it merely ushered in a different set of classes. Pp. 195–197.

Global Stratification: Three Worlds How are the world’s nations stratified? The model presented here divides the world’s nations into three groups: the Most Industrialized, the Industrializing, and the Least Industrialized. This layering represents rela- tive property, power, and prestige. The oil-rich nations are an exception. Pp. 197–201.

How Did the World’s Nations Become Stratified? The main theories that seek to account for global stratifica- tion are colonialism, world system theory, and the culture of poverty. Pp. 201–206.

Maintaining Global Stratification How do the Most Industrialized Nations maintain their position? There are two basic explanations for how the Most Industrialized Nations maintain their dominance. The first, neocolonialism, refers to keeping the poorer nations in debt and selling weapons to their elite. The second explana- tion points to the influence of multinational corporations. The new technology gives further advantage to the Most Industrialized Nations. Pp. 206–208.

Strains in the Global System What strains are showing up in global stratification? All stratification systems have contradictions that threaten to erupt, forcing the system to change. Currently, capital- ism is in crisis, and we seem to be experiencing a global shift in economic (and, ultimately political) power from the West to the East. P. 208.

necessarily passed on to one’s children. North American slavery was gradually buttressed by a racist ideology. In a caste system, status is determined by birth and is lifelong. A class system is much more open than these other sys- tems, for it is based primarily on money or material posses- sions, which can be acquired. Industrialization encourages the formation of class systems. Gender cuts across all forms of social stratification. Pp. 184–189.

What Determines Social Class? Karl Marx argued that a single factor determines social class: If you own the means of production, you belong to the bourgeoisie; if you do not, you are one of the proletariat. Max Weber argued that three elements determine social class: property, power, and prestige. Pp. 189–191.

Why Is Social Stratification Universal? To explain why stratification is universal, functionalists Kingsley Davis and Wilbert Moore argued that to attract the most capable people to fill its important positions, soci- ety must offer them greater rewards. Melvin Tumin said that if this view were correct, society would be a meritoc- racy, with positions awarded on the basis of merit. Gaetano Mosca argued that stratification is inevitable because every society must have leadership, which by definition means inequality. Conflict theorists argue that stratification is the outcome of an elite emerging as groups struggle for limited resources. Gerhard Lenski suggested a synthesis between the functionalist and conflict perspectives. Pp. 191–194.

How Do Elites Maintain Stratification? To maintain social stratification within a nation, the ruling class adopts an ideology that justifies its current arrange- ments. It also controls information and uses technology. When all else fails, it turns to brute force. Pp. 194–195.

Comparative Social Stratification What are key characteristics of stratification systems in other nations? The most striking features of the British class system are speech and education. In Britain, accent reveals social class,

Thinking Critically about Chapter 7 1. How do slavery, caste, and class systems of social stratifi-

cation differ? 2. Why is social stratification universal? 3. How do elites maintain stratification (keep themselves

in power)?

4. What shifts in global stratification seem to be taking place? Why?

Social Class in the United States8CHAPTE R

Ah, New Orleans, that fabled city on the Mississippi Delta. Images from its rich past floated through my head—pirates, treasure, intrigue. Memories from a pleasant vacation stirred my thoughts—the exotic French Quarter with its enticing aroma of Creole food and sounds of earthy jazz drifting through the air.

The shelter for the homeless, however, forced me back to an unwelcome reality. The shelter was like those I had visited in the North, West, and East—only dirtier. The dirt, in fact, was the worst that I had encountered during my research. On top of that, this was the only shelter to insist on payment in exchange for sleeping in one of its filthy beds.

The men here looked the same as the homeless anywhere in the country—disheveled and haggard, wearing that unmistak- able expression of sorrow and despair. Except for the accent, you wouldn’t know what region you were in. Poverty wears the same tired face wherever you are, I realized. The accent may differ, but the look remains the same.

I had grown used to the sights and smells of abject poverty. Those no longer sur- prised me. But after my fitful sleep with the homeless that night, I saw something that did. Just a block or so from the shelter, I was startled by a sight so out of step with the misery and despair I had just experienced that I stopped and stared.

I felt indignation swelling within me. Confronting me were life-size, full-color photos mounted on the transparent Plexiglas shelter of a bus stop. Staring back at me were images of finely dressed men and women, proudly strutting about as they modeled elegant suits, dresses, diamonds, and furs.

A wave of disgust swept over me. “Something is cockeyed in this society,” I thought, as my mind refused to stop juxtapos- ing these images of extravagance with the suffering I had just seen.

“My mind refused to stop juxtapos- ing these images of extravagance with the suffering I had just seen.”

Florida

212 CHAPTER 8 Social Class in the United States

The disjunction that I felt in New Orleans was triggered by the ads, but it was not the first time that I had experienced this sensation. Whenever my research abruptly trans- ported me from the world of the homeless to one of another social class, I experienced a sense of disjointed unreality. Each social class has its own way of thinking and behaving, and because these fundamental orientations to the world contrast so sharply, the classes do not mix well.

What Is Social Class? If you ask most Americans about their country’s social class system, you are likely to get a blank look. If you press the matter, you are likely to get an answer like this: “There are the poor and the rich—and then there are you and I, neither poor nor rich.” This is just about as far as most Americans’ consciousness of social class goes. Let’s try to flesh out this idea.

Our task is made somewhat difficult because sociologists have no clear-cut, agreed- on definition of social class (Crompton 2010). As was noted in the last chapter, con- flict sociologists (of the Marxist orientation) see only two social classes: those who own the means of production and those who do not. The problem with this view, say most sociologists, is that it lumps too many people together. Teenage “order takers” at McDonald’s who work for $15,000 a year are lumped together with that company’s executives who make $500,000 a year—because they both are workers at McDonald’s, not owners.

Most sociologists agree with Weber that there is more to social class than just a per- son’s relationship to the means of production. Consequently, most sociologists use the components Weber identified and define social class as a large group of people who rank closely to one another in property, power, and prestige. These three elements separate people into different lifestyles, give them different chances in life, and provide them with distinctive ways of looking at the self and the world.

Let’s look at how sociologists measure these three components of social class.

Property Property comes in many forms, such as buildings, land, animals, machinery, cars, stocks, bonds, businesses, furniture, jewelry, and bank accounts. When you add up the value of someone’s property and subtract that person’s debts, you have what sociologists call wealth. This term can be misleading, as some of us have little wealth—especially most college students. Nevertheless, if your net total comes to $10, then that is your wealth. (Obviously, wealth as a sociological term does not mean wealthy.)

Distinguishing Between Wealth and Income. Wealth and income are sometimes confused, but they are not the same. Where wealth is a person’s net worth, income is a flow of money. Income has many sources: The most common is wages or a business, but other sources are rent, interest, and royalties, even alimony, an allowance, or gambling. Some people have much wealth and little income. For example, a farmer may own considerable land (a form of wealth), but bad weather, combined with the high cost of fertil- izers and machinery, can cause the income to dry up. Others have much income and little wealth. An executive with a $250,000 annual income may be debt-ridden. Below the surface prosperity— the exotic vacations, country club membership, private schools for the children, sports cars, and an elegant home—the credit cards may be maxed out, the sports cars in danger of being repossessed, and the mortgage payment “past due.” Typically, however, wealth and income go together.

A mere one-half percent of Americans owns over a quarter of the entire nation’s wealth. Very few minorities are numbered among this 0.5 percent. An exception is Oprah Winfrey, who has had an ultra-successful career in entertainment and investing. Worth $2.7 billion, she is the 215th richest person in the United States. Winfrey has given millions of dollars to help minority children.

How do most sociologists define social class? What is the difference between wealth and income?

What Is Social Class? 213

Distribution of Property. Who owns the property in the United States? One answer, of course, is “everyone.” Although this statement has some merit, it overlooks how the nation’s property is divided among “everyone.”

Overall, Americans are worth a hefty sum, about $49 trillion (Statistical Abstract 2012:Table 723). This includes all real estate, stocks, bonds, and business assets in the entire country. Figure 8.1 shows how highly concentrated this wealth is. Most wealth, 75 percent, is owned by only 10 percent of the nation’s families. As you can also see from this figure, 1 percent of Americans own more than one-third of all the U.S. assets. As you can also see from this figure, 1 percent of Americans own one-third of all the U.S. assets.

Distribution of Income. How is income distributed in the United States? Economist Paul Samuelson (Samuelson and Nordhaus 2005) put it this way: “If we made an income pyramid out of a child’s blocks, with each layer portraying $500 of income, the peak would be far higher than Mount Everest, but most people would be within a few feet of the ground.”

Actually, if each block were 11⁄2-inches tall, the typical American would be just 10 feet off the ground, for the average per capita income in the United States is about $41,000 per year. (This average income includes every American, even children.) The typical family climbs a little higher, for most families have more than one worker, and together they average about $60,000 a year. Compared with the few families who are on the mountain’s peak, the average U.S. family would find itself only 15 feet off the ground. Figure 8.2 portrays these differences.

The fact that some Americans enjoy the peaks of Mount Everest while most—despite their efforts—make it only 10 to 15 feet up the slope presents a striking image of income inequality in the United States. Another picture emerges if we divide the U.S. population into five equal groups and rank them from highest to lowest income. As Figure 8.3 on the next page shows, the top 20 percent of the population receive half (50.3 percent) of all income in the United States. In contrast, the bottom 20 percent of Americans receive only 3.4 percent of the nation’s income.

Two features of Figure 8.3 are outstanding. First, notice how little change there has been in the distribution of income through the years. Second, look at how income inequality decreased from 1935 to 1970. Since 1970, the richest 20 percent of U.S. families have grown richer, while the poorest 20 percent have grown poorer. Despite numerous

FIGURE 8.1 Distribution of the Property of Americans

...own 75 percent of the nation's wealth

The wealthiest 10 percent of Americans...

10%

90%90%

10%

25%

75%

1%

...owns 36 percent of the nation's wealth

The wealthiest 1 percent of Americans...

99%

36%

64%

99%

1%

Source: By the author. Based on Allegretto 2011: Table 2.

Some U.S. families have incomes that exceed the height of Mt. Everest, 29,028 feet

Average U.S. individual income $41,000 or 10 feet

Average U.S. family income $60,000 or 15 feet

If a 1½-inch child’s block equals $500 of income, the average individual’s annual income of $41,000 would represent a height of 10 feet, and the average family’s annual income of $60,000 would represent a height of 15 feet. The income of some families, in contrast, would represent a height greater than that of Mt. Everest.

FIGURE 8.2 Distribution of the Income of Americans

Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 2012:Tables 681, 696.

How are property and income distributed in the United States?

214 CHAPTER 8 Social Class in the United States

Can you summarize the trends in income distribution in the United States?

government antipoverty programs, the poorest 20 percent of Americans receive less of the nation’s income today than they did decades ago. The richest 20 percent, in contrast, are receiving more, about as much as they did in 1935.

The chief executive officers (CEOs) of the nation’s largest corporations are especially affluent. The Wall Street Journal surveyed the 350 largest U.S. companies to find out what they paid their CEOs (Lublin 2011). Their median compensation (including salaries, bonuses, and stock options) came to $9,300,000 a year. (Median means that half received more than this amount, and half less.)

The CEOs’ income is 225 times higher than the average pay of U.S. workers (Statistical Abstract 2012:Table 681). This does not include their income from inter- est, dividends, or rents. Nor does it include the value of company-paid limousines and chauffeurs, airplanes and pilots, and private boxes at the symphony and sporting events. To really see the disparity, consider this:

Let’s suppose that you started working the year Jesus was born and that you worked full time every year from then until now. Let’s also assume that you earned today’s average per capita income of $41,000 every year for all those years. You would still have to work another 100 years or so to earn the amount received by the highest-paid executive listed in Table 8.1.

Imagine how you could live with an income like this. And this is precisely the point. Beyond these cold numbers lies a dynamic reality that profoundly affects people’s lives. The difference in wealth between those at the top and those at the bottom of the U.S. class structure means that people experience vastly different lifestyles. For example,

a colleague of mine who was teaching at an exclusive Eastern university piqued his students’ curiosity when he lectured on poverty in Latin America. That weekend, one of the students borrowed his parents’ corporate jet and pilot, and in class on Monday, he and his friends related their personal observations on poverty in Latin America.

Few of us could ever say, “Mom and Dad, I’ve got to do a report for my soc class, so I need to borrow the jet—and the pilot—to run down to South America for the weekend.” What a lifestyle! Contrast this with Americans at the low end of the income ladder who lack

1 Earliest year available. 2 No data for 1940.

Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 1960:Table 417; 1970:Table 489; 2012:Table 694.

FIGURE 8.3 The More Things Change, the More They Stay the Same: P

e rc

e n ta

g e

50%

40%

30%

20%

10%

1935 1941 1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 2010

The top 5th The bottom 5th The fourth 5th

The second 5th The third 5th

1 2

Dividing the Nation’s Income

TABLE 8.1 The Five Highest-Paid CEOs

Source: Lublin 2011.

Executive Company Compensation

Philippe Dauman Viacom $84 million Lawrence Ellison Oracle $69 million Leslie Moonves CBS $54 million Martin Franklin Jarden $45 million Michael White DIRECTV $33 million

Note: Compensation includes salary, bonuses, and stock options.

What Is Social Class? 215

How does income lead to people’s views of life? How do the super-rich live?

the funds to travel even to a neighboring town for the weekend. For parents in poverty, choices may revolve around whether to spend the little they have at the laundromat or on milk for the baby. The elderly might have to choose between purchasing the medi- cines they need or buying food. In short, divisions of wealth represent not “mere” num- bers, but choices that make vital differences in people’s lives. Let’s explore this topic in the Down-to-Earth Sociology box below.

Down-to-Earth Sociology

How the Super-Rich Live

It’s good to see how other people live. It gives us a different perspective on life. Let’s take a glimpse at the life of John Castle (his real name). After earning a degree in physics at MIT and an MBA at Harvard, John went into banking and securities, where he made more than $100 million (Lublin 1999).

Wanting to be connected to someone famous, John bought President John F. Kennedy’s “Winter White House,” an ocean- front estate in Palm Beach, Florida. John spent $11 million to remodel the 13,000-square-foot house so that it would be more to his liking. Among those changes: adding bathrooms numbers fourteen and fifteen. He likes to show off John F. Kennedy’s bed and also the dresser that has the drawer labeled “black underwear,” carefully hand-lettered by Rose Kennedy.

At his beachfront estate, John gives what he calls “refined feasts” to the glitterati (“On History . . .” 1999). If he gets tired of such activities—or weary of swimming in the Olympic-size pool where JFK swam the weekend before his assassination— John entertains himself by riding one of his thoroughbred horses at his nearby 10-acre ranch. If this fails to ease his boredom, he can relax aboard his custom- built 42-foot Hinckley yacht.

The yacht is a real source of diversion. John once boarded it for an around-the-world trip. He didn’t stay on board, though— just joined the cruise from time to time. A captain and crew kept the vessel on course, and whenever John felt like it he would fly in and stay a few days. Then he would fly back to the States to direct his business. He did this about a dozen times, flying per- haps 150,000 miles. An interest- ing way to go around the world.

How much does a custom-built Hinckley yacht cost? John can’t tell you. As he says, “I don’t want to know what any- thing costs. When you’ve got enough money, price doesn’t make a difference. That’s part of the freedom of being rich.”

Right. And for John, being rich also means paying $1,000,000 to charter a private jet to fly Spot, his Appaloosa horse, back and forth to the vet. John didn’t want Spot to

have to endure a long trailer ride. Oh, and of course, there was the cost of Spot’s medical treatment, another $500,000.

Other wealthy people spend extravagantly, too. Lee Tachman threw a four-day party for three friends. They had massages; ate well; took rides in a helicopter, a fighter jet, Ferraris, and Lamborghinis; and did a little paintballing—all for the bargain price of $50,000. At the 1Oak Lounge in New York City, some customers pay $35,000 for a bottle of champagne (Haughney and Konigsberg 2008). Of course, it is a large bottle.

Parties are fun, but what if you want privacy? You can buy that, too. Wayne Huizenga, the founder of Blockbuster, who sold a half ownership in the Miami Dolphins for $550 million (“Builder Stephen . . .” 2008), bought a 2,000-acre country club, complete with an 18-hole golf course, a 55,000-square-foot-clubhouse, and 68 slips for visiting vessels. The club is so exclusive that its only members are Wayne and his wife (Fabrikant 2005).

Withdrawing into gated estates is fine, but Microsoft co- founder Paul Allen has found another way to gain privacy. He had a 414-foot yacht built. On the Octopus are two helicopters,

a swimming pool, and a subma- rine (Freeland 2011).

While the length of Allen’s yacht creates an envy among the plutocracy that would make Freud break into a sweat, some might say that Charles Simonyi has even outdone this. He bought a $25 million ticket for a rocket ride to the International Space Station. Simonyi liked the experience so much that he bought a second ticket (Leo 2008). No frequent flyer miles included. But at the rate prices are increasing, $50 million isn’t worth what it used to be anyway.

For Your Consideration↑

What effects has social class had on your life? (Go beyond possessions to values, orientations, and outlooks on life.) How do you think you would see the world differently if you were John Castle, Lee Tachman, Paul Allen, Charles Simonyi, or Mrs. Wayne Huizenga?

To paraphrase F. Scott Firzgerald, the super-rich are not like you or I. The 414-foot long yacht of Paul Allen, the co-founder of Microsoft, has a swimming pool, two helicopters, and two submarines (one remote controlled for exploring the ocean floor).

216 CHAPTER 8 Social Class in the United States

What are Mills’ and Domhoff’s view on a power elite in the United States?

Power Let’s look at the second component of social class: Power. The Democratic Facade. Like many people, you may have said to yourself, “I don’t agree with many of the big decisions, like sending soldiers to Afghanistan or Iraq, or launching missiles into Pakistan. I don’t decide to raise taxes, lower interest rates, or spend $700 billion to bail out Wall Street fools and felons.”

And then another part of you may say, “But I do participate in these decisions through my representatives in Congress, and by voting for president.” True enough—as far as it goes. The trouble is, it just doesn’t go far enough. Such views of being a par- ticipant in the nation’s “big” decisions are a playback of the ideology we learn at an early age—an ideology promoted by the elites to legitimate and perpetuate their power. Sociologists Daniel Hellinger and Dennis Judd (1991) call this the “democratic facade” that conceals the real source of power in the United States.

Let’s try to get a picture of where that power is located. The Power Elite. Back in the 1950s sociologist C. Wright Mills (1956) was criticized for insisting that power—the ability to get your way despite resistance—was concentrated in the hands of a few, for his analysis contradicted the dominant ideology of equality. As was discussed in earlier chapters, Mills coined the term power elite to refer to those who make the big decisions in U.S. society.

Mills and others have stressed how wealth and power coalesce in a group of people who look at the world in the same way—and view themselves as a special elite. They belong to the same private clubs, vacation at the same exclusive resorts, and even hire the same bands for their daughters’ debutante balls (Domhoff 2006, 2010). This elite wields extraordinary power in U.S. society, so much so that most U.S. presidents have come from this group— millionaire white men from families with “old money” (Baltzell and Schneiderman 1988).

Continuing in the tradition of Mills, sociologist William Domhoff (2006, 2010) argues that this group is so powerful that the U.S. government makes no major decision without its approval. He analyzed how this group works behind the scenes with elected officials to determine both foreign and domestic policy—from setting Social Security taxes to imposing tariffs on imported goods. Although Domhoff ’s conclusions are controversial—and alarming—they certainly follow logically from the principle that wealth brings power, and extreme wealth brings extreme power.

Prestige The third component of social class is occupational prestige. Occupations and Prestige. What are you thinking about doing after college? Chances are, you don’t have the option of lolling under palm trees at the beach. Almost all of us have to choose an occupation and go to work. Look at Table 8.2 to see how the career you are considering stacks up in terms of prestige (respect or regard). Because we are moving toward a global society, this table also shows how the rankings given by Americans compare with those of the residents of sixty other countries.

Why do people give more prestige to some jobs than to others? If you look at Table 8.2, you will notice that the jobs at the top share four features:

1. They pay more. 2. They require more education. 3. They involve more abstract thought. 4. They offer greater autonomy (independence, or self-direction).

Now look at the bottom of the list. You can see that people give less prestige to jobs with the opposite characteristics: These jobs pay little, require less education, involve more physical labor, and are closely supervised. In short, the professions and the white- collar jobs are at the top of the list, the blue-collar jobs at the bottom.

One of the more interesting aspects of these rankings is how consistent they are across countries and over time. For example, people in every country rank college professors higher than nurses, nurses higher than social workers, and social workers higher than janitors.

What Is Social Class? 217

Similarly, the occupations that were ranked high 25 years ago still rank high today—and likely will rank high in the years to come. Displaying Prestige. People want others to acknowl- edge their prestige. In times past, in some countries only the emperor and his family could wear purple—for it was the royal color. In France, only the nobility could wear lace. In England, no one could sit while the king was on his throne. Some kings and queens required that subjects walk backward as they left the room—so that they would not “turn their back” on the “royal presence.”

Concern with displaying prestige has not let up. Military manuals specify who must salute whom. The U.S. president enters a room only after everyone else attending the function is present (to show that the president isn’t waiting for others). Everyone must also be standing when the president enters. In the court- room, bailiffs, sometimes armed, make certain that everyone stands when the judge enters.

Status symbols vary with social class. Clearly, only the wealthy can afford certain items, such as yachts and huge estates—or the $35,000 bottle of champagne mentioned in the box on page 215. But beyond afford- ability lies a class-based preference in status symbols. For example, people who are striving to be upwardly mobile flaunt labels on their clothing or conspicuously carry shopping bags from prestigious stores to show that they have “arrived.” The wealthy, who regard the symbols of the “common” classes as cheap and showy, flaunt their own status symbols, such as $75,000 Rolex watches and $50,000 diamond earrings. Like the other classes, they, too, try to outdo one another. They boast about the length of their yacht or casually mention that they have a helicopter fly them to their golf game (Fabrikant 2005)—or that they stayed at the $30,000-a-night room at the Four Seasons in New York City (Feuer 2008).

Do you try to display prestige? Think about your clothing. How much more are you willing to pay for clothing that bears some hot “designer” label? Purses, shoes, jeans, and shirts—many of us pay more if they have some little symbol than if they don’t. As we wear them proudly, aren’t we actually proclaiming, “See, I had the money to buy this particular item!”? For many of us, prestige is a primary factor in deciding which college to attend. Everyone knows how the prestige of a generic sheepskin from Regional State College compares with a degree from Harvard, Princeton, Yale, or Stanford.

Status Inconsistency Ordinarily, we have a similar rank on all three dimen- sions of social class—property, power, and prestige. The homeless men in the opening vignette are an example of these three dimensions lined up. Such people are status consistent. Some people, however, have a mixture of high and low ranks. This condition, called status incon- sistency, leads to some interesting situations.

Occupation United States Average of 60 Countries

Physician 86 78 Supreme Court judge 85 82 College president 81 86 Astronaut 80 80 Lawyer 75 73 College professor 74 78 Airline pilot 73 66 Architect 73 72 Biologist 73 69 Dentist 72 70 Civil engineer 69 70 Clergy 69 60 Psychologist 69 66 Pharmacist 68 64 High school teacher 66 64 Registered nurse 66 54 Professional athlete 65 48 Electrical engineer 64 65 Author 63 62 Banker 63 67 Veterinarian 62 61 Police officer 61 40 Sociologist 61 67 Journalist 60 55 Classical musician 59 56 Actor or actress 58 52 Chiropractor 57 62 Athletic coach 53 50 Social worker 52 56 Electrician 51 44 Undertaker 49 34 Jazz musician 48 38 Real estate agent 48 49 Mail carrier 47 33 Secretary 46 53 Plumber 45 34 Carpenter 43 37 Farmer 40 47 Barber 36 30 Store sales clerk 36 34 Truck driver 30 33 Cab driver 28 28 Garbage collector 28 13 Waiter or waitress 28 23 Bartender 25 23 Lives on public aid 25 16 Bill collector 24 27 Factory worker 24 29 Janitor 22 21 Shoe shiner 17 12 Street sweeper 11 13

Sources: Treiman 1977:Appendices A and D; Nakao and Treas 1990, 1994:Appendix D.

Note. For five occupations not located in the 1994 source, the 1991 ratings were used: Supreme Court judge, astronaut, athletic coach, lives on public aid, and street sweeper.

Occupational Prestige: How the United States Compares with 60 Countries

TABLE 8.2

How is the display of prestige related to social class?

218 CHAPTER 8 Social Class in the United States

How do you set yourself apart in a country so rich that of its 4.6 million people 79,000 are millionaires? Saeed Khouri (on the right), at an auction in Abu Dhabi paid $14 million for the license plate “1.” His cousin was not as fortunate. His $9 million was enough to buy only “5.”

Sociologist Gerhard Lenski (1954, 1966) analyzed how people try to maximize their status, their position in a social group. Individuals who rank high on one dimension of social class but lower on others want people to judge them on the basis of their highest status. Others, however, are also trying to maximize their own positions, so they may respond according to these people’s lowest rankings.

A classic study of status inconsistency was done by sociologist Ray Gold (1952). After apartment-house janitors unionized in Chicago, they made more money than some of the tenants whose garbage they carried out. Tenants became upset when they saw their janitors driving more expensive cars than they did. Some attempted to “put the janitor in his place” by making “snotty” remarks to him. For their part, the janitors took delight in finding “dirty” secrets about the tenants in their garbage.

People who are status inconsistent, then, are likely to confront one frustrating situation after another (Dogan 2011). They claim the higher status, but are handed the lower one. This is so frustrating that the resulting tension can affect people’s health. Researchers who studied the health of thousands of Europeans over a decade found that men who are status inconsistent are twice as likely to have heart attacks as men who are status consistent. For reasons that no one knows, status inconsistent women do not have a higher risk of heart attacks (Braig et al. 2011).

There are other consequences as well. Lenski (1954) found that people who are status inconsistent tend to be more politically radical. An example is college profes- sors. Their prestige is very high, as we saw in Table 8.2, but their incomes are rela- tively low. Hardly anyone in U.S. society is more educated, and yet college profes- sors don’t even come close to the top of the income pyramid. In line with Lenski’s prediction, the politics of most college professors are left of center. This hypothesis may also hold true among academic departments; that is, the higher a depart- ment’s average pay, the more conservative are the members’ politics. Teachers in departments of business and medicine, for example, are among the most highly paid in the university—and they also are the most politically conservative.

Instant wealth, the topic of the Down-to-Earth Sociology box on page 219, provides an interesting case of status inconsistency.

Sociological Models of Social Class The question of how many social classes there are is a matter of debate. Sociologists have proposed several models, but no single one has gained universal support. There

are two main models: one that builds on Marx, the other on Weber.

Updating Marx As Figure 8.4 on page 220 illustrates, Marx argued that there are just two classes—capitalists and workers—with membership based solely on a person’s relationship to the means of produc- tion. Sociologists have criticized this view, saying that these categories are too broad. For example, because executives, managers, and supervisors don’t own the means of production, they would be classified as workers. But what do these peo- ple have in common with assembly-line workers? The category of “capitalist” is also too broad. Some people, for example, employ a thousand workers, and their decisions directly affect a thousand families.

Compare these individuals with a man I know in Godfrey, Illinois, who used to fix cars in his

What is status consistency? How is status inconsistency related to political views?

How does status inconsistency explain why instant wealth is upsetting?

Sociological Models of Social Class 219

Down-to-Earth Sociology

“If I just win the lottery, life will be good. These problems I’ve got, they’ll be gone. I can just see myself now.”

So goes the dream. And many Americans shell out mega- bucks every week, with the glimmering hope that “Maybe this week, I’ll hit it big.”

Most are lucky to get $20, or maybe just win another scratch-off ticket.

But some do hit it big. What happens to these winners? Are their lives all wine, roses, and chocolate afterward?

We don’t have any systematic studies of the big winners, so I can’t tell you what life is like for the average winner. But several themes are apparent from reporters’ interviews.

The most common consequence of hitting it big is that life becomes topsy-turvy (Bernstein 2007). All of us are rooted somewhere. We have con- nections with others that provide the basis for our orientations to life and how we feel about the world. Sudden wealth can rip these moorings apart, and the resulting status inconsistency can lead to a condition sociologists call anomie.

First comes the shock. As Mary Sand- erson, a telephone operator in Dover, New Hampshire, who won $66 million, said, “I was afraid to believe it was real, and afraid to believe it wasn’t.” Mary says that she never slept worse than her first night as a multimillionaire. “I spent the whole time crying—and throwing up” (Tresniowski 1999).

Reporters and TV crews appear on your doorstep. “What are you going to do with all that money?” they demand. You haven’t the slightest idea, but in a daze you mumble something.

Then come the calls. Some are welcome. Your Mom and Dad call to congratulate you. But long-forgotten friends and distant relatives suddenly remember how close they really are to you—and strangely enough, they all have emergencies that your money can solve. You even get calls from strangers who have ailing mothers, terminally ill kids, sick dogs . . .

You have to unplug the phone and get an unlisted number. You might be flooded with marriage proposals. You cer-

tainly didn’t become more attractive or sexy overnight—or did you? Maybe money makes people sexy.

You can no longer trust people. You don’t know what their real motives are. Before, no one could be after your money because you didn’t have any. You may even fear kidnappers.

Before, this wasn’t a problem—unless some kidnapper wanted the ransom of a seven-year-old car.

The normal becomes abnormal. Even picking out a wedding gift is a problem. If you give the usual fancy juicer, everyone will think you’re stingy. But should you write a check for $25,000? If you do, you’ll be invited to every wedding in town—and everyone will expect the same.

Here is what happened to some lottery winners:

When Michael Klinebiel of Rahway, New Jersey, won $2 million, his mother, Phyllis, said that half of it was hers, that she and her son had pooled $20 a month for years to play the lottery. He said they had done this—

but he had bought the winning ticket on his own. Phyllis sued her son (“Sticky Ticket” 1998).

Mack Metcalf, a forklift operator in Corbin, Kentucky, hit the jackpot for $34 million. To fulfill a dream, he built and moved into a replica of George Wash- ington’s Mount Vernon home. Then his life fell apart—his former wife sued him, his current wife divorced him, and his new girlfriend got $500,000 while he was drunk. Within three years of his “good” fortune, Metcalf had drunk himself to death (Dao 2005).

When Abraham Shakespeare, a dead-broke truck driver’s assistant, won $31 million in the Florida lottery, he bought a million-dollar home in a gated community. He lent money to friends to start businesses, even paid for funerals. This evidently wasn’t enough. His body was found buried in the yard of a “friend” (Lush 2010; McShane 2010).

Winners who avoid anomie seem to be people who don’t make sudden changes in their lifestyle or their behavior. They hold onto their old friends and routines— the anchors in life that give them identity and a sense of be- longing. Some even keep their old jobs—not for the money, of course, but because the job anchors them to an identity with which they are familiar and comfortable.

Sudden wealth, in other words, poses a threat that has to be guarded against.

And I can just hear you say, “I’ll take the risk!”

For Your Consideration↑

How do you think your life would change if you won a lottery jackpot of $10 million?

The Big Win: Life after the Lottery

Chris Shaw of Jefferson City, Missouri, shown here, won $256 million. He said he would pay the $1,000 he owes on his truck, take his kids to Disneyworld, and get his teeth fixed. How do you think status inconsistency will affect his life?

220 CHAPTER 8 Social Class in the United States

backyard. As Frank gained a following, he quit his regular job, and in a few years he put up a building with five bays and an office. Frank is now a capitalist, for he employs five or six mechanics and owns the tools and the building (the “means of production”). But what does he have in common with a factory owner who controls the lives of one thou- sand workers? Not only is Frank’s work different but so are his lifestyle and the way he looks at the world.

To resolve this problem, sociologist Erik Wright (1985) suggests that some people are members of more than one class at the same time. They occupy what he calls con- tradictory class locations. By this, Wright means that a person’s position in the class structure can generate contradictory interests. For example, the automobile mechanic- turned-business owner may want his mechanics to have higher wages because he, too, has experienced their working conditions. At the same time, his current interests— making profits and remaining competitive with other repair shops—lead him to resist pressures to raise their wages.

Because of such contradictory class locations, Wright modified Marx’s model. As summarized in Table 8.3, Wright identifies four classes: (1) capitalists, business own- ers who employ many workers; (2) petty bourgeoisie, small business owners; (3) man- agers, who sell their own labor but also exercise authority over other employees; and (4) workers, who simply sell their labor to others. As you can see, this model allows finer divisions than the one Marx proposed, yet it maintains the primary distinction between employer and employee.

Updating Weber Sociologists Joseph Kahl and Dennis Gilbert (Gilbert and Kahl 1998; Gilbert 2008) developed a six-tier model to portray the class structure of the United States and other capitalist countries. Think of this model, illustrated in Figure 8.5 on the next page, as a ladder. Our discussion starts with the highest rung and moves downward. In line with Weber, on each lower rung you find less property (wealth), less power, and less prestige. Note that in this model education is also a primary measure of class.

The Capitalist Class. Sitting on the top rung of the class ladder is a powerful elite that consists of just 1 percent of the U.S. population. As you saw in Figure 8.1 on page 213, this capitalist class is so wealthy that it owns one-third of all the nation’s wealth. This tiny 1 percent is worth more than the entire bottom 90 percent of the country (Beeghley 2008).

Power and influence cling to this small elite. They have direct access to top politi- cians, and their decisions open or close job opportunities for millions of people. They even help to shape the consciousness of the nation: They own our major media and entertainment outlets—newspapers, magazines, radio and television stations, and sports franchises. They also control the boards of directors of our most influential colleges and universities. The super-rich perpetuate themselves in privilege by passing on their assets and social networks to their children.

The capitalist class can be divided into “old” and “new” money. The longer that wealth has been in a family, the more it adds to the family’s prestige. The children of “old” money seldom mingle with “common” folk. Instead, they attend exclusive private schools where they learn views of life that support their privileged position. They don’t work for wages; instead, many study business or become lawyers so that they can man- age the family fortune. These old-money capitalists (also called “blue-bloods”) wield vast power as they use their extensive political connections to protect their economic empires (Sklair 2001; Domhoff 1990, 1999, 2006).

At the lower end of the capitalist class are the nouveau riche, those who have “new money.” Although they have made fortunes in business, the stock market, inventions, entertainment, or sports, they are outsiders to the upper class. They have not attended the “right” schools, and they don’t share the social networks that come with old money.

FIGURE 8.4

Source: By the author.

Marx’s Model of the Social Classes

Capitalists (Bourgeoisie, those who own

the means of production)

Workers (Proletariat, those who work for the capitalists)

Inconsequential Others (beggars, etc.)

What problem does Wright find with Marx’s view of social class? How does he resolve it?

Read

Media Magic: Making Class Invisible

by Gregory Mantsios

on mysoclab.com

TABLE 8.3

1. Capitalists 2. Petty bourgeoisie 3. Managers 4. Workers

Wright’s Modification of Marx’s Model of the Social Classes

Source: By the author.

Sociological Models of Social Class 221

Not blue-bloods, they aren’t trusted to have the right orientations to life. Even their “taste” in clothing and status symbols is suspect (Fabrikant 2005). Donald Trump, whose money is “new,” is not listed in the Social Register, the “White Pages” of the blue-bloods that lists the most prestigious and wealthy one-tenth of 1 percent of the U.S. population. Trump says he “doesn’t care,” but he reveals his true feelings by adding that his heirs will be in it (Kaufman 1996). He is probably right, for the children of the new-moneyed can ascend into the top part of the capitalist class—if they go to the right schools and marry old money.

Many in the capitalist class are philanthropic. They establish foundations and give huge sums to “causes.” Their motivations vary. Some feel guilty because they have so much while others have so little. Others seek pres- tige, acclaim, or fame. Still others feel a responsibility—even a sense of fate or purpose—to use their money for doing good. Bill Gates, who has given more money to the poor and to medical research than anyone else in history, seems to fall into this latter category.

The Upper Middle Class. Of all the classes, the upper middle class is the one most shaped by education. Almost all members of this class have at least a bachelor’s degree, and many have post- graduate degrees in business, management, law, or medicine.

Capitalist

Upper Middle

Lower Middle

Working

Working Poor

Underclass

Social Class Education Income Percentage of

Population

Prestigious university

College or university, often with postgraduate study

High school or college; often apprenticeship

High school

High school and some high school

Some high school

Occupation

Investors and heirs, a few top executives

Professionals and upper managers

Semiprofessionals and lower managers, craftspeople, foremen

Factory workers, clerical workers, low-paid retail sales, and craftspeople

Laborers, service workers, low-paid salespeople

Unemployed and part-time, on welfare

$1,000,000+

$125,000+

About $60,000

About $36,000

About $19,000

Under $12,000

1%

15%

34%

30%

15%

5%

Source: By the author. Based on Gilbert and Kahl 1998 and Gilbert 2008; income estimates are modified from Duff 1995.

FIGURE 8.5 The U.S. Social Class Ladder

With a fortune of $56 billion, Bill Gates, a cofounder of Microsoft Corporation, is the second wealthiest person in the world.

His 40,000-square-foot home (sometimes

called a “technopalace”) in Seattle, Washington, was appraised at $110 million.

Figure 8.5 and the text are an application of Weber’s view of social class. Can you compare these six social classes?

222 CHAPTER 8 Social Class in the United States

These people manage the corporations owned by the capitalist class, operate their own businesses, or pursue professional careers. As Gilbert and Kahl (1998) say,

[These positions] may not grant prestige equivalent to a title of nobility in the Germany of Max Weber, but they certainly represent the sign of having “made it” in contempo- rary America. . . . Their income is sufficient to purchase houses and cars and travel that become public symbols for all to see and for advertisers to portray with words and pictures that connote success, glamour, and high style.

Consequently, parents and teachers push children to prepare for upper-middle-class jobs. About 15 percent of the population belong to this class.

The Lower Middle Class. About 34 percent of the U.S. population are in the lower middle class. Their jobs require that they follow orders given by members of the upper middle class. With their technical and lower-level management positions, they can afford a mainstream lifestyle, although they struggle to maintain it. Many anticipate being able to move up the social class ladder. Feelings of insecurity are common, however, with the threat of inflation, recession, and job insecurity bringing a nagging sense that they might fall down the class ladder (Kefalas 2007).

The distinctions between the lower middle class and the working class on the next rung below are more blurred than those between other classes. In general, however, members of the lower middle class work at jobs that have slightly more prestige, and their incomes are generally higher.

The Working Class. About 30 percent of the U.S. population belong to this class of relatively unskilled blue-collar and white-collar workers. Compared with the lower middle class, they have less education and lower incomes. Their jobs are also less secure, more routine, and more closely supervised. One of their greatest fears is that of being laid off during a recession. With only a high school diploma, the average member of the working class has little hope of climbing up the class ladder. Job changes usually bring “more of the same,” so most concentrate on getting ahead by achieving seniority on the job rather than by changing their type of work. They tend to think of themselves as having “real jobs” and regard the “suits” above them as paper pushers who have no practical experience and don’t do “real work” (Morris and Grimes 2005).

The Working Poor. Members of this class, about 15 percent of the population, work at unskilled, low-paying, temporary and seasonal jobs, such as sharecropping, migrant farm work, housecleaning, and day labor. Most are high school dropouts. Many are functionally illiterate, finding it difficult to read even the want ads. They are not likely to vote (Beeghley 2008), for they believe that no matter what party is elected to office, their situation won’t change.

Sociologists use income, education, and occupational prestige to measure social class. For most people, this works well, but not for everyone, especially entertainers. To what social class do DiCaprio, James, Lopez, and Lady Gaga belong? Leonardo DiCaprio makes about $78 million a year, Lebron James $43 million, Jennifer Lopez $25 million, and Lady Gaga $90 million.

Why do highly successful celebrities present a challenge to this sociological model of social class?

Consequences of Social Class 223

Although they work full time, millions of the working poor depend on food stamps and local food banks to survive on their meager incomes (O’Hare 1996b; Bello 2011). It is easy to see how you can work full time and still be poor. Suppose that you are married and have a baby 3 months old and another child 3 years old. Your spouse stays home to care for them, so earning the income is up to you. But as a high-school dropout, all you can get is a minimum wage job. At $7.25 an hour, you earn $290 for 40 hours. In a year, this comes to $15,080—before deductions. Your nagging fear—and recurring nightmare—is of ending up “on the streets.”

The Underclass. On the lowest rung, and with next to no chance of climbing anywhere, is the underclass. Concentrated in the inner city, this group has little or no connection with the job market. Those who are employed—and some are—do menial, low-paying, temporary work. Welfare, if it is available, along with food stamps and food pantries, is their main support. Most members of other classes con- sider these people the “ne’er-do-wells” of society. Life is the toughest in this class, and it is filled with despair. About 5 percent of the population fall into this class.

The homeless men described in the opening vignette of this chapter, and the women and children like them, are part of the underclass. These are the people whom most Americans wish would just go away. Their presence on our city streets bothers passersby from the more privileged social classes—which includes just about everyone. “What are those obnoxious, dirty, foul-smelling people doing here, cluttering up my city?” appears to be a common response. Some people react with sympathy and a desire to do something. But what? Almost all of us just shrug our shoulders and look the other way, despairing of a solution and somewhat intimidated by their presence.

The homeless are the “fallout” of our postindustrial economy. In another era, they would have had plenty of work. They would have tended horses, worked on farms, dug ditches, shoveled coal, and run the factory looms. Some would have explored and set- tled the West. The prospect of gold would have lured others to California, Alaska, and Australia. Today, however, with no frontiers to settle, factory jobs scarce, and farms that are becoming technological marvels, we have little need for unskilled labor.

Consequences of Social Class The man was a C student throughout school. As a businessman, he ran an oil com- pany (Arbusto) into the ground. A self-confessed alcoholic until age forty, he was arrested for drunk driving. With this background, how did he become president of the United States?

Accompanying these personal factors was the power of social class. George W. Bush was born the grandson of a wealthy senator and the son of a businessman who, after serving as a member of the House of Representatives and director of the CIA, became president of the United States. For high school, George W. Bush went to an elite private prep school, Andover; to Yale for his bachelor’s degree; and for his MBA to Harvard. He was given $1 million to start his own business. When that business (Arbusto) failed, Bush fell softly, landing on the boards of several corporations. Taken care of even further, he was made the managing director of the Texas Rangers baseball team and allowed to buy a share of the team for $600,000, which he sold for $15 million.

When it was time for him to get into politics, Bush’s connections financed his run for governor of Texas and then for the presidency.

Does social class matter? And how! Think of each social class as a broad subculture with distinct approaches to life, so significant that it affects our health, family life,

A primary sociological principle is that people’s views are shaped by their social location. Many people from the middle and upper classes cannot understand how anyone can work and still be poor.

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224 CHAPTER 8 Social Class in the United States

How does social class affect people’s physical and mental health?

education, religion, politics, and even our experiences with crime and the criminal jus- tice system. Let’s look at how social class affects our lives.

Physical Health If you want to get a sense of how social class affects health, take a ride on Washington’s Metro system. Start in the blighted Southeast section of downtown D.C. For every mile you travel to where the wealthy live in Montgomery County in Maryland, life expectancy rises about a year and a half. By the time you get off, you will find a twenty-year gap between the poor blacks where you started your trip and the rich whites where you ended it. (Cohen 2004)

The principle is simple: As you go up the social-class ladder, health increases. As you go down the ladder, health decreases (Hout 2008). Age makes no difference. Infants born to the poor are more likely to die before their first birthday, and a larger percentage of poor

people in their old age—whether 75 or 95—die each year than do the elderly who are wealthy.

How can social class have such dramatic effects? While there are many reasons, here are three. First, social class opens and closes doors to medical care. People with good incomes or with good medical insurance are able to choose their doctors and pay for whatever treatment and medications are prescribed. The poor, in contrast, don’t have the money or insurance to afford this type of medical care. How much difference the new health reform will make is yet to be seen.

A second reason is lifestyle, which is shaped by social class. People in the lower classes are more likely to smoke, eat a lot of fats, be overweight, abuse drugs and alcohol, get little exercise, and practice unsafe sex (Chin et al. 2000; Dolnick 2010). This, to understate the matter, does not improve people’s health.

There is a third reason, too. Life is hard on the poor. The persistent stresses they face cause their bodies to wear out faster (Geronimus et al. 2010). The rich find life better. They have fewer problems and more resources to deal with the ones they have. This gives them a sense of control over their lives, a source of both physical and mental health.

Mental Health Sociological research from as far back as the 1930s has found that the mental health of the lower classes is worse than that of the higher classes (Faris and Dunham 1939; Srole et al. 1978; Peltham 2009). Greater mental problems are part of the higher stress that accompanies poverty. Compared with middle- and upper-class Americans, the poor have less job security and lower wages. They are more likely to divorce, to be the victims of crime, and to have more physical illnesses. Couple these conditions with bill collectors and the threat of eviction, and you can see how they can deal severe blows to people’s emotional well-being.

People higher up the social class ladder experience stress in daily life, of course, but their stress is generally less, and their coping resources are greater. Not only can they afford vacations, psychiatrists, and counselors, but their class position also gives them greater control over their lives, a key to good mental health.

As is starkly evident from the following Thinking Critically section, social class is also important when it comes to the medical care people receive for their mental problems.

With tough economic times, a lot of people have lost their jobs—and their homes. If this happens, how can you survive? Maybe with a smile and a sense of humor to tap the kindness of strangers. I took this photo outside Boston’s Fenway Park.

Consequences of Social Class 225

Family Life Social class also makes a significant difference in our choice of spouse, our chances of getting divorced, and how we rear our children.

Choice of Husband or Wife. Members of the capitalist class place strong emphasis on family tradition. They stress the family’s history, even a sense of purpose or destiny in life (Baltzell 1979; Aldrich 1989). Children of this class learn that their choice of husband or wife affects not just them, but the entire family, that it will have an impact on the “family line.” These background expectations shrink the field of “eligible” mar- riage partners, making it narrower than it is for the children of any other social class. As a result, parents in this class play a strong role in their children’s mate selection.

Divorce. The more difficult life of the lower social classes, especially the many ten- sions that come from insecure jobs and inadequate incomes, leads to higher marital friction and a greater likelihood of divorce. Consequently, children of the poor are more likely to grow up in broken homes.

Child Rearing. As discussed on page 360, lower-class parents focus more on getting their children to follow rules and obey authority, while middle-class parents focus more on developing their children’s creative and leadership skills (Lareau and Weininger 2008). Sociologists have traced this difference to the parents’ occupations (Kohn 1977). Lower-class parents are closely supervised at work, and they anticipate that their children will have similar jobs. Consequently, they try to teach their children to defer to authority. Middle-class parents, in contrast, enjoy greater independence at work. Anticipating similar jobs for their children, they encourage them to be more creative.

What impact does social class have on family life?

THINKING CRITICALLY Mental Illness and Inequality in Medical Care

Standing among the police, I watched as the elderly, naked man, looking confused, struggled to put on his clothing. The man had ripped the wires out of the home-less shelter’s main electrical box and then led the police on a merry chase as he ran from room to room.

I asked the officers where they were going to take the man, and they replied, “To Malcolm Bliss” (the state hospital). When I commented, “I guess he’ll be in there for quite a while,” they said, “Probably just a day or two. We picked him up last week—he was crawling under cars at a traffic light—and they let him out in two days.”

The police explained that the man must be a danger to himself or to others to be admitted as a long-term patient. Visualizing this old man crawling under cars in traffic and thinking about the possibility of electrocution as he ripped out electrical wires with his bare hands, I marveled at the definition of “danger” that the hospital psychiatrists must be using.

Stripped of its veil, the two-tier system of medical care is readily visible. The poor— such as this confused, naked man—find it difficult to get into mental hospitals. If they are admitted, they are sent to the dreaded state hospitals. In contrast, private hospitals serve the wealthy and those who have good insurance. The rich are likely to be treated with “talk therapy” (forms of psychotherapy), the poor with “drug therapy” (tranquil- izers to make them docile, sometimes called “medicinal straitjackets”).

For Your Consideration↑

How can we improve the treatment of the mentally ill poor? Take into consideration that the country is in debt and the public does not want higher taxes. What about the more fundamental issue—that of inequality in health care? Should medical care be a commodity that is sold to those who can afford it? Or do all citizens possess a fundamental right to high-quality health care? !

226 CHAPTER 8 Social Class in the United States

Out of these contrasting orientations arise different ways of disciplining children; lower- class parents are more likely to use physical punishment, while the middle classes rely more on verbal persuasion.

Education As you saw in Figure 8.5 on page 221, education increases as one goes up the social class ladder. It is not just the amount of education that changes, but also the type of education. Children of the capitalist class bypass public schools. They attend exclusive private schools where they are trained to take a commanding role in society. These schools teach upper-class values and prepare their students for prestigious universities (Beeghley 2008; Stevens 2009).

Keenly aware that private schools can be a key to upward social mobility, some upper- middle-class parents do their best to get their children into the prestigious preschools that feed into these exclusive prep schools. Although some preschools cost $37,000 a year, they have a waiting list (Anderson 2011). Not able to afford this kind of tuition, some parents hire tutors to train their 4-year-olds in test-taking skills so they can get into public kindergartens for gifted students. They even hire experts to teach these preschoolers to look adults in the eye while they are being interviewed for these limited positions (Banjo 2010). You can see how such parental involvement and resources make it more likely that children from the more privileged classes go to college—and graduate.

Religion One area of social life that we might think would not be affected by social class is reli- gion. (“People are just religious, or they are not. What does social class have to do with it?”) As we shall see in Chapter 13, however, the classes tend to cluster in different denominations. Episcopalians, for example, are more likely to attract the middle and upper classes, while Baptists draw heavily from the lower classes. Patterns of worship also follow class lines: The lower classes are attracted to more expressive worship services and louder music, while the middle and upper classes prefer more “subdued” worship.

Politics As I have stressed throughout this text, people perceive events from their own corner in life. Political views are no exception to this symbolic interactionist principle, and the rich and the poor walk different political paths. The higher that people are on the social class ladder, the more likely they are to vote for Republicans (Hout 2008). In contrast, most members of the working class believe that the government should intervene in the economy to provide jobs and to make citizens financially secure. They are more likely

What impact does social class have on education, religion, and politics?

Donald Trump arriving in Scotland on his private jet. To the right is a middle-aged couple who live in an old motor home parked in Santa Barbara, one of the wealthiest communities in California.

Social Mobility 227

to vote for Democrats. Although the working class is more liberal on economic issues (policies that increase government spending), it is more conservative on social issues (such as opposing abortion and the Equal Rights Amendment) (Houtman 1995; Hout 2008). People toward the bottom of the class structure are also less likely to be politically active—to campaign for candidates or even to vote (Gilbert 2003; Beeghley 2008).

Crime and Criminal Justice If justice is supposed to be blind, it certainly is not when it comes to one’s chances of being arrested (Henslin 2012). In Chapter 6 (pages 164–167), we discussed how the social classes commit different types of crime. The white-collar crimes of the more privileged classes are more likely to be dealt with outside the criminal justice system, while the police and courts deal with the street crimes of the lower classes. One consequence of this class standard is that members of the lower classes are more likely to be in prison, on probation, or on parole. In addition, since those who com- mit street crimes tend to do so in or near their own neighborhoods, the lower classes are more likely to be robbed, burglarized, or murdered.

Social Mobility No aspect of life, then—from work and family life to politics—goes untouched by social class. Because life is so much more satisfying in the more privileged classes, people strive to climb the social class ladder. What affects their chances?

Three Types of Social Mobility Janice’s mom, a single mother, sold used cars at a Toyota dealership. Janice worked summers and part time during the school year, earned her BA, and then her MBA. After college, she worked at IBM, but she missed her home town. When her mom’s boss retired, Janice grabbed the opportu- nity to put a down payment on the Toyota dealership. She has since paid the business off, and has opened another at a second location.

When grown-up children like Janice end up on a different rung of the social class ladder from the one occupied by their parents, it is called intergenerational mobility. You can go up or down, of course. Janice experienced upward social mobility. If she had been a child of the dealership’s owner, dropped out of college, and ended up selling cars, she would have experienced downward social mobility.

We like to think that individual efforts are the reason people move up the class ladder—and their faults the reason they move down. In this example, we can identify intelligence, hard work, and ambition. Although individual factors such as these do underlie social mobility, we must place Janice in the context of structural mobility. This second basic type of mobility refers to changes in society that allow large num- bers of people to move up or down the class ladder.

Janice grew up during a boom time of easy credit and business expansion. Opportunities were abundant, and colleges were looking for women from working-class backgrounds. It would have been far different for her—and for millions of others—if she had grown up during an economic bust when opportunities were shrinking. As sociologists point out, in analyzing social mobility we must always look at structural mobility, how changes in society (its structure) make opportunities plentiful or scarce.

The third type of social mobility is exchange mobility. This occurs when large numbers of people move up and down the social class ladder, but, on balance, the proportions of the social classes remain about the same. Suppose that a million or so working-class people are trained in some new technology, and they move up the class ladder. Suppose also that

This young woman is being “introduced” to society at a debutante ball in Laredo, Texas. Like you, she has learned from her parents, peers, and education, a view of where she belongs in life. How do you think her view is different from yours?

What are the three types of social mobility?

228 CHAPTER 8 Social Class in the United States

The term structural mobility refers to changes in society that push large numbers of people either up or down the social class ladder. A remarkable example was the stock market crash of 1929 when thousands of people suddenly lost their wealth. People who once “had it made” found themselves standing on street corners selling apples or, as depicted here, selling their possessions at fire-sale prices. The crash of 2008 brought similar problems to untold numbers of people.

How do women fit into studies of social mobility?

because of a surge in imports, about a million skilled workers have to take lower-status jobs. Although

millions of people change their social class, there is, in effect, an exchange among them. The net result more or less balances out, and the class system remains basically untouched.

No matter what type it is, as discussed in the Cultural Diversity box on the next page, social mobility always comes at a cost.

Women in Studies of Social Mobility About half of sons pass their fathers on the social class ladder, about one-third stay at the same level, and about one-sixth fall down the ladder. (Blau and Duncan 1967; Featherman 1979)

“Only sons!” said feminists in response to these classic studies on social mobility. “Do you think it is good science to ignore daugh-

ters? And why do you assign women the class of their husbands? Do you think that wives have no social class position of their own?” (Davis and Robinson 1988). The male sociologists brushed off these objections, reply- ing that there were too few women in the labor force to make a difference.

These sociologists simply hadn’t caught up with the times. The gradual but steady increase of women working for pay had caught them unprepared. Although sociologists now include women in their samples, research on the social class of married women is still in its infancy (Beller 2009).

Upwardly mobile women report how important their parents were in their success, how they encouraged them to achieve when they were just children. For upwardly mobile African American women, strong mothers are especially significant (Robinson and Nelson 2010). In their study of women from working-class backgrounds who became managers and professionals, sociologists Elizabeth Higginbotham and Lynn Weber (1992) found this recurring theme: parents encouraging their girls to postpone marriage and get an education. To these understandings from the micro approach, we need to add the macro level. Had there not been a structural change in society, the millions of new positions that women occupy would not exist.

Poverty Many Americans find that the “limitless possibilities” of the American dream are quite elusive. As illustrated in Figure 8.5 on page 221, the working poor and underclass together form about one-fifth of the U.S. population. This translates into a huge num- ber, about 60 million people. Who are these people?

Drawing the Poverty Line To determine who is poor, the U.S. government draws a poverty line. This measure was set in the 1960s, when poor people were thought to spend about one-third of their incomes on food. On the basis of this assumption, each year the government computes a low-cost food budget and multiplies it by 3. Families whose incomes are less than this amount are classified as poor; those whose incomes are higher—even by a dollar—are determined to be “not poor.”

This official measure of poverty is grossly inadequate. Poor people actually spend only about 20 percent of their income on food, so to determine a poverty line, we ought to mul- tiply their food budget by 5 instead of 3 (Uchitelle 2001). Another problem is that mothers

Poverty 229

who work outside the home and have to pay for child care are treated the same as moth- ers who don’t have this expense. The poverty line is also the same for everyone across the nation, even though the cost of living is much higher in New York than in Alabama. On the other hand, much of the income of the poor is not counted: food stamps, rent assistance, subsidized child care, and the earned income tax credit (DeNavas-Walt et al. 2010). In the face of these criticisms, the Census Bureau has developed alternative ways to measure pov- erty lines. These show higher poverty, but the official measure has not changed.

That a change in the poverty line can instantly make millions of people poor—or take away their poverty—would be laughable, if it weren’t so serious. (The absurdity has not been lost on Parker and Hart, as you can see from their cartoon on the next page).

The overview of social class presented in this chapter doesn’t apply equally to all the groups that make up U.S. society. Consider geography: What constitutes the upper class of a town of 5,000 people will differ from that of a city of a million. With fewer extremes of wealth and occupation, in small towns family background and local reputation are more significant.

So it is with racial–ethnic groups. All racial–ethnic groups are marked by social class, but what constitutes a particular social class can differ from one group to another—as well as from one historical period to another. Consider social class among African Americans (Landry and Marsh 2011).

The earliest class divisions can be traced to slavery—to slaves who worked in the fields and those who worked in the “big house.” Those who worked in the plantation home were exposed more to the customs, manners, and forms of speech of wealthy whites. Their more privileged position— which brought with it better food and clothing, as well as lighter work—was often based on skin color. Mulattos, lighter-skinned slaves, were often chosen for this more desir- able work. One result was the develop- ment of a “mulatto elite,” a segment of the slave population that, proud of its distinctiveness, distanced itself from the other slaves. At this time, there also were free blacks. Not only were they able to own property but some even owned black slaves.

After the War Between the States (as the Civil War is known in the South), these two groups, the mulatto elite and the free blacks, formed an upper class. Proud of their earlier status, they distanced themselves from other blacks. From these groups came most of the black profes- sionals. After World War II, the black middle class expanded as African Americans entered a wider range of occupations. Today, more than half of all African American adults work at white-collar jobs, about 22 percent at the professional or managerial level (Beeghley 2008).

Social Class and the Upward Social Mobility of African Americans

Cultural Diversity in the United States

An unwelcome cost greets many African Americans who move up the social class ladder: an uncomfortable distancing from their roots, a separation from significant others—parents, siblings, and childhood friends (hooks 2000; Lacy 2007). The upwardly mobile enter a world unknown to those left behind, one that demands not only different appearance and speech, but also different values, aspirations, and ways of viewing the world. These are severe challenges to the self and often rupture relation- ships with those left behind.

An additional cost is a subtle racism that lurks beneath the surface of some work settings, poisoning what could be easy, mutu- ally respectful interaction. To be aware that white co-workers perceive you as different—as a stranger, an intruder, or “the other”—engenders frustration, dissatisfaction, and cynicism. To cope, many nourish their racial identity and stress the “high value of black culture and being black” (Lacy and Harris 2008). Some move to neighborhoods of upper-middle-class African Ameri- cans, where they can live among like-

minded people who have similar experiences (Lacy 2007).

For Your Consideration↑

In the box on upward social mobility on page 83, we discussed how Latinos face a similar situation. Why do you think this is? What connections do you see among upward mobility, frustration, and racial–ethnic identity? How do you think that the upward mobility of whites is different? Why?

U.S.A.U.S.A.

Why is the poverty line inadequate? Can you review the social mobility of African Americans?

Watch

American Outrage

on mysoclab.com

230 CHAPTER 8 Social Class in the United States

High rates of rural poverty have been a part of the United States from its origin to the present. This 1937 photo shows a 32-year-old woman in California who had seven children and no food.

Although this line is arbitrary, because it is the official measure of poverty, we’ll use it to see who in the United States is poor. Before we do this, though, compare your ideas of the poor with the stereotypes explored in the Down-to-Earth Sociology box on page 231.

Who Are the Poor? The Geography of Poverty. The Social Map on the next page illustrates how poverty varies by region. Note especially the clustering of pov- erty in the South, a pattern that has prevailed for more than 150 years.

Poverty 231

States with the least poverty: 7.6% to 11.3%

States with average poverty: 11.4% to 13.6%

States with the most poverty: 14.4% to 21.2%

Percentage of the population in poverty

st 1.3%

e 3.6%%

st 21.22%

UT 9.6

OH 13.4

SC 15.7

NC 14.6

VA 10.2

WA 11.3

OR 13.6

CA 13.3

NV 11.3

ID 12.6

MT 14.8

WY 9.4

AZ 14.7

NM 17.1

CO 11.4

ND 12.0

SD 12.5

NE 10.8

KS 11.3

OK 15.9

TX 15.8

MN 9.6

IA 11.5

MO 13.4

AR 17.3

LA 17.3

WI 10.4

IL 12.2

KY 17.3

TN 15.5

MS 21.2

AL 15.7

GA 14.7

FL 13.2

IN 13.1

MI 14.4

WV 17.0

PA 12.1

NY 13.6

ME 12.3

NH 7.6 MA 10.0 RI 11.7

CT 9.3 NJ 8.7

DE 10.0

MD 8.1

AK 8.4

VT 10.6

HI 9.1

CT 9.3 ..77

0.0

8.1

Highest Poverty

1. Mississippi (21.2%) 2. Louisiana (17.3%); Kentucky (17.3%);

Arkansas (17.3%) 3. New Mexico (17.1%)

Lowest Poverty

1. New Hampshire (7.6%)

2. Maryland (8.1%) 3. Alaska (8.4%)

Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 2011:Table 708.

FIGURE 8.6 Patterns of Poverty

Down-to-Earth Sociology

Do you hold any of these stereotypes? Can you tell which of these statement are true?

Most poor people are lazy. They are poor because they do not want to work. False. Half of the poor are too old or too young to work: About 40 percent are under age 18, and another 10 percent are 65 or older. About 30 percent of the working-age poor work at least half the year.

Most of the poor are trapped in a cycle of poverty that few escape. Long-term poverty is the exception. Most poverty lasts less than a year (Lichter and Crowley 2002). Only 12 percent remain in poverty for five or more consecutive years (O’Hare 1996a). Most children who are born in poverty are not poor as adults (Ruggles 1989; Corcoran 2001).

There is more poverty in rural than in urban areas. True. We’ll review this in the following section.

Most African Americans are poor. False. This one was easy. We just reviewed some statistics in the box on upward mobility on page 229.

Most of the poor are African Americans. False. Look at the second part of Figure 8.7 on page 232. There are more

poor whites than any other group. The combined total of poor African Americans, Latinos, and Native Americans, however, is larger than the total of poor whites.

Most of the poor are single mothers and their children. False. About 38 percent of the poor match this stereo- type, but 34 percent of the poor live in married-couple families, 22 percent live alone or with nonrelatives, and 6 percent live in other settings.

Most of the poor live on welfare. False. Only about 25 percent of the income of poor adults comes from welfare. About half comes from wages and pensions, and about 22 percent from Social Security.

On a percentage basis, more children than adults are poor. True. (Okay, no one holds this stereotype. I just want to make this point. We’ll come back to it shortly.)

Sources: O’Hare 1996a, 1996b, with other sources as indicated.

For Your Consideration↑

What stereotypes of the poor do you (or people you know) hold? How would you test these stereotypes?

Taking Another Fun Quiz: Exploring Stereotypes about the Poor

What does geography have to do with poverty? What are some overarching facts about poverty?

1 The source does not break this total down by age.

Note: Only these groups are listed in the source. The poverty line is $22,025 for a family of four.

Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 2011:Tables 709 and 712.

FIGURE 8.7 Race–Ethnicity and U.S. Poverty

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10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

40%

45%

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Part 2 Of all the U.S. poor, what percentages are from these groups?

Part 1 Of these groups, what percentage is poor?

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Overall The elderly age 65 and over

Children under age 18

All racial– ethnic groups White Americans Asian Americans Latinos African Americans Native Americans

Beyond the awareness of most Americans are the rural poor such as this family in Maine. With low education and few good jobs available, life is hardscrabble. What do you think the future holds for these children?

A second aspect of geography is rural poverty. At 16 percent, rural poverty is higher than the national average of 13 percent. Helping to maintain this higher rate are the lower education of the rural poor and the scarcity of rural jobs (Latimer and Woldoff 2010).

A third aspect of geography is the suburbanization of poverty. With the extensive migration from the cities to suburbs and the collapse of the housing market, poverty has hit the suburbs—so hard that most of the nation’s poor now live in the suburbs (Kneebone and Garr 2010). This major change is not likely to be temporary.

Geography, however, is not the main factor in poverty. The greatest predictors of poverty are race– ethnicity, education, and the sex of the person who heads the family. Let’s look at these factors.

Race–Ethnicity. One of the strongest factors in poverty is race–ethnicity. As Figure 8.7 shows, 12 percent of whites are poor, followed closely by Asian Americans at 13 percent. In contrast, 25 percent of Latinos live in poverty, while the total jumps even higher, to 26 percent for African Americans and 27 percent for Native Americans. Because whites are, by far, the largest group in the United States, their lower rate of poverty translates into larger numbers. As a result, there are many more poor whites than poor people of any other racial–ethnic group. As Part 2 of Figure 8.7 shows, close to half (46 percent) of all the poor are whites.

Education. You are aware that education is a vital factor in poverty, but you may not know just how powerful it is. Look at Figure 8.8. You can see that 1 of every 4 people who drop out of high school is poor but only 3 of 100 people who finish college end up in poverty. As you can see, the chances that someone will be poor become less with each higher level of education. Although this principle applies regardless of race–ethnicity, the figure shows that at every level of education, race–ethnicity makes an impact.

How are race–ethnicity and education related to poverty?

Poverty 233

The Feminization of Poverty. One of the best indicators of whether or not a fam- ily is poor is family structure. Families headed by both a mother and father are the least likely to be poor, and families headed by only a mother are the most likely to be poor (Statistical Abstract 2012:Table 716). The reason for this can be summed up in this one statistic: Women average only 72 percent of what men earn. (If you want to jump ahead, go to Figure 10.7 on page 294.) With our high rate of divorce combined with our high number of births to single women, mother-headed families have become more common. Sociologists call this association of poverty with women the feminization of poverty. Old Age. As Figure 8.7 on page 232 shows, the elderly are less likely than the general population to be poor. This is quite a change. It used to be that growing old increased people’s chances of being poor, but government policies to redistribute income—Social Security and subsidized housing, food stamps, and medical care—slashed the rate of pover- ty among the elderly. Figure 8.7 also shows how the prevailing racial–ethnic patterns carry over into old age. You can see how much more likely elderly African Americans, Latinos, or Native Americans are to be poor than elderly whites. The exception is elderly Asian Americans, who show an unexplained jump in poverty.

Children of Poverty Children are more likely to live in poverty than are adults or the elderly. This holds true regardless of race–ethnicity, but from Figure 8.7 on page 232, you can see how much greater poverty is among Latino, African American, and Native American children. That millions of U.S. children are reared in poverty is shocking when one considers the wealth of this country and the supposed concern for the well-being of children. This tragic aspect of poverty is the topic of the following Thinking Critically section.

Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 2007:Table 694. Table dropped in later editions.

FIGURE 8.8 Who Ends Up Poor? Poverty by Education

0

5%

10%

15%

20%

25%

30%

35%

40%

P e rc

e n ta

g e in

P o

ve rt

y

All Racial–Ethnic Groups

White Americans

Asian Americans

Latinos African Americans

College graduate College dropout High school graduate High school dropout

7

10

25

3 5

8

22

3

9 10

16

4

9

16

31

7

16

24

37

7

and Race–Ethnicity

What is the feminization of poverty? What causes the poverty of children?

Explore

Living Data

on mysoclab.com

THINKING CRITICALLY The Nation’s Shame: Children in Poverty

One of the most startling statistics in sociology is shown in Figure 8.7. Look at the rate of childhood poverty: For Asian Americans, 1 of 7 children is poor; for whites, 1 of 6; for Latinos and African Americans, an astounding 1 of 3. These percentages translate into incredible numbers—approximately 21 million children.

234 CHAPTER 8 Social Class in the United States

The Dynamics of Poverty Some have suggested that the poor get trapped in a culture of poverty (Lewis 1966; Cohen 2010). They assume that the values and behaviors of the poor “make them fundamentally different from other Americans, and that these factors are largely responsible for their continued long-term poverty” (Ruggles 1989:7).

Lurking behind this concept is the idea that the poor are lazy people who bring poverty on themselves. Certainly, some individuals and families match this stereotype— many of us have known them. But is a self-perpetuating culture—one that poor people transmit across generations and that locks them in poverty—the basic reason for U.S. poverty?

Researchers who began following 5,000 poor U.S. families in 1968 uncovered some surprising findings. Contrary to stereotypes, most poverty is short-lived, lasting only a year or less. Most poverty comes about because of poverty triggers, some dramatic life change such as divorce, the loss of a job, or even the birth of a child (O’Hare 1996a). As Figure 8.10 shows, only 12 percent of poverty lasts five years or longer. Contrary to the stereotype of lazy people content to live off the government, few poor people enjoy poverty—and they do what they can to avoid being poor.

Yet from one year to the next, the number of poor people remains about the same. This means that the people who move out of poverty are replaced by people who move into poverty. Most of these newly poor will also move out of poverty within a year. Source: Gottschalk et al. 1994:89.

FIGURE 8.10 How

17%

8% 5%

59%

12%

One year or less

2 years

Up to 3 years

Five years or more

Up to 4 years

Long Does Poverty Last?

Why do so many U.S. children live in poverty? A major reason is the large number of births to women who are not married, about 1.7 million a year. This number has increased sharply. In 1960, 1 of 20 U.S. children was born to a single woman. Today that total is eight times higher, and single women now account for 8 of 20 (41 percent) of all U.S. births (Statistical Abstract 2012:Table 86).

But do births to single women actually cause poverty? Consider the obvious: Children born to wealthy single women aren’t reared in poverty. Then consider this: In some industrialized countries, the birth rate of single women is higher than ours, yet our rate of child poverty is higher than theirs (Garfinkel et al. 2010). Their poverty rate is lower because their governments provide extensive support for rearing these children—from providing day care to health checkups. As the cause of the poverty of children born to single women, then, why can’t we point to the lack of gov- ernment support for children?

Apart from the matter of government policy, births to single women follow patterns that have a negative impact on their children’s welfare. The less education a single woman has, the more likely she is to bear children. As you can see from Figure 8.9, births to single women drop with each gain in education. As you know, people with lower education earn less, so this means that the single women who can least afford children are those most likely to give birth. Their children are likely to face the obstacles to building a satisfying life that poverty brings. They are more likely to die in infancy, to go hungry, to be mal- nourished, to develop more slowly, and to have more health problems. They also are more likely to drop out of school, to become involved in crime, and to have children while still in their teens—thus perpetuating a cycle of poverty.

For Your Consideration With education so important to obtain jobs that pay well, in light of Figure 8.9, what programs would you suggest for helping women attain more education? What policies would you suggest for reducing child poverty? Be specific and practical. !

Note: Based on a national sample of all U.S. births in the preceding 12 months.

Source: Dye 2005.

FIGURE 8.9 Births to Single Mothers

Unmarried Married

0 100%80%60%40%20%

Graduate or professional degree

Bachelor’s degree

Associate’s degree

Some college, no degree

High school graduate

Not a high school graduate

Of women with this education who give birth, what percentages are single and married?

How is age related to poverty? What is meant by the “dynamics” of poverty?

Poverty 235

Some people even bounce back and forth, never quite making it securely out of poverty. Poverty, then, is dynamic, touching a lot more people than the official totals indicate. Although 13 percent of Americans may be poor at any one time, about half of the U.S. population will experience poverty at some point before they turn 65 (Cellini et al. 2008).

Why Are People Poor? Two explanations for poverty compete for our attention. The first, which sociologists prefer, focuses on social structure. Sociologists stress that features of society deny some people access to education or training in job skills. They emphasize racial–ethnic, age, and gender discrimination, as well as changes in the job market—fewer unskilled jobs, businesses closing, and manufacturing jobs moving overseas. In short, some people find their escape route from poverty to a better life blocked.

A competing explanation focuses on the characteristics of individuals. Sociologists reject explanations such as laziness and lack of intelligence, viewing these as worth- less stereotypes. Individualistic explanations that sociologists reluctantly acknowledge include dropping out of school and bearing children in the teen years. Most sociologists are reluctant to speak of such factors in this context, for they appear to blame the vic- tim, something that sociologists bend over backward not to do.

A third explanation is the poverty triggers that were just mentioned. People can be living on the edge of poverty, but managing to stay above it, when an unexpected event pushes them over the edge. The main poverty triggers are the loss of a job, pregnancy and the birth of a child, family breakup, and a disabling accident or illness (Cellini et al. 2008).

Welfare Reform Reforming Welfare. After decades of criticism, the U.S. welfare system was restruc- tured in 1996. A federal law—the Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act—requires states to place a lifetime cap on welfare assistance and compels welfare recipients to look for work and to take available jobs. The maximum length of time that someone can collect welfare is five years. In some states, it is less. Unmarried teen parents who receive assistance must attend school and live at home or in some other adult-supervised setting.

When this law was passed, it set off a storm of criticism. Critics called it an attack on the poor. Defenders replied that the new rules would rescue people from poverty. They would transform welfare recipients into self-supporting and hard-working citizens—and reduce welfare costs. National welfare rolls plummeted, dropping by about 60 percent, but 3 out of 5 who left welfare remained in poverty (Hofferth 2002; Urban Institute 2006). Since the economic crisis that began in 2008, the economy has hemorrhaged millions of jobs. We don’t have complete studies yet, but with the lifetime limitations on welfare assistance, one in five low-income single mothers now has no earnings and no cash government assistance (Loprest and Nichols 2011). In both cities and suburbs, you can see people picking through garbage.

Of the former welfare recipients who have kept their jobs, some receive such low pay that they remain in poverty. Consider one of the “success stories”:

JoAnne Sims, 37, lives in Erie, New York, with her 7-year-old daughter Jamine. JoAnne left welfare, and now earns $7.25 an hour as a cook for Head Start. Her 37-hour week brings $268 before deductions. With the help of medical benefits and a mother who provides child care, JoAnne “gets by.” She says, “From what I hear, a lot of us who went off welfare are still poor . . . let me tell you, it’s not easy.” (Peterson 2000; earnings updated)

The Conflict View. Conflict theorists have an interesting interpretation of welfare. They say that the purpose of welfare is not to help people, but, rather, to maintain a reserve labor force. It is designed to keep the unemployed alive during economic downturns until their labor is needed during the next economic boom. The 1996

What are three explanations for why people are poor? What are some results of welfare reform?

236 CHAPTER 8 Social Class in the United States

law that reduced the welfare rolls fits this model, as it was passed during the longest economic boom in U.S. history. In line with conflict theory, during our current recession some states have softened welfare rules (Eckholm 2009)—as conflict theorists say, in order to keep the reserve labor force ready for the next time it is needed.

Where Is Horatio Alger? The Social Functions of a Myth In the late 1800s, Horatio Alger was one of the country’s most popular authors. The rags-to-riches exploits of his fictional boy heroes and their amazing successes in overcoming severe odds motivated thousands of boys of that period. Although Alger’s characters have disappeared from U.S. literature, they remain alive and well in the psyche of Americans. From real-life examples of people of humble origin who climbed the social class ladder, Americans know that anyone who really tries can get ahead. In fact, they believe that most Americans, including minorities and the working poor, have an average or better-than-average chance of getting ahead—obviously a statistical impossibility (Kluegel and Smith 1986).

The accuracy of the Horatio Alger myth is less important than the belief that surrounds it—that limitless possibilities exist for everyone. Functionalists would stress that this belief is func- tional for society. On the one hand, it encourages people to compete for higher positions, or, as the song says, “to reach for the highest star.” On the other hand, it places blame for failure squarely on the individual. If you don’t make it—in the face of ample opportunities to get ahead—the fault must be your own. The Horatio Alger myth helps to stabilize society: Since the fault is viewed as the individual’s, not society’s, current social arrange-

ments can be regarded as satisfactory. This reduces pressures to change the system. As Marx and Weber pointed out, social class penetrates our consciousness, shaping

our ideas of life and our “proper” place in society. When the rich look at the world around them, they sense superiority and anticipate control over their own destiny. When the poor look around them, they are more likely to sense defeat and to anticipate that unpredictable forces will batter their lives. Both rich and poor know the dominant ideology, that their particular niche in life is due to their own efforts, that the reasons for success—or failure—lie solely with the self. Like fish that don’t notice the water, people tend not to perceive the effects of social class on their own lives.

A society’s dominant ideologies are reinforced throughout the society, including its literature. Horatio Alger provided inspirational heroes for thousands of boys. The central theme of these many novels, immensely popular in their time, was rags to riches. Through rugged determination and self-sacrifice, a boy could overcome seemingly insurmountable obstacles to reach the pinnacle of success. (Girls did not strive for financial success, but were dependent on fathers and husbands.)

1970

41% NOW

50% 1960

1in20 NOW

8in20 1970

6% NOW

3%

The richest 20% of Americans receive this percentage of

the nation’s income

The poorest 20% of Americans receive this percentage of

the nation’s income

Frequency of births outside of marriage

How does the Horatio Alger myth shape views of poverty and success? Help does it help stabilize society?

Summary and Review 237

Thinking Critically about Chapter 8 1. The belief that the United States is the land of oppor-

tunity draws millions of legal and illegal immigrants to the United States each year. How do the materials in this chapter support or undermine this belief?

2. What three ways is social class having an ongoing impact on your life?

3. What social mobility has your own family experienced? In what ways has this affected your life?

What Is Social Class? What is meant by the term social class? Most sociologists have adopted Weber’s definition of social class: a large group of people who rank closely to one another in terms of property (wealth), power, and prestige. Wealth—consisting of the value of property and income—is concentrated in the upper classes. From the 1930s to the 1970s, the trend in the distribution of wealth in the United States was toward greater equality. Since that time, it has been toward greater inequality. Pp. 212–216.

Power is the ability to get one’s way even though others resist. C. Wright Mills coined the term power elite to refer to the small group that holds the reins of power in business, government, and the military. Prestige is linked to occupational status. People’s rankings of occupational prestige have changed little over the decades and are similar from country to country. Globally, the occupations that bring greater prestige are those that pay more, require more education and abstract thought, and offer greater independence. Pp. 217–218. What is meant by the term status inconsistency? Status is social position. Most people are status consistent; that is, they rank high or low on all three dimensions of social class. People who rank higher on some dimensions than on others are status inconsistent. The frustrations of status incon- sistency tend to produce political radicalism. Pp. 217–218.

Sociological Models of Social Class What models are used to portray the social classes? Erik Wright developed a four-class model based on Marx: (1) capitalists (owners of large businesses), (2) petty bourgeoisie (small business owners), (3) managers, and (4) workers. Kahl and Gilbert developed a six-class model based on Weber. At the top is the capitalist class. In descending order are the upper middle class, the lower middle class, the working class, the working poor, and the underclass. Pp. 218–223.

Consequences of Social Class How does social class affect people’s lives? Social class leaves no aspect of life untouched. It affects our chances of benefiting from the new technology,

dying early, becoming ill, receiving good health care, and getting divorced. Social class membership also affects child rearing, educational attainment, religious affiliation, political participation, the crimes people commit, and contact with the criminal justice system. Pp. 223–227.

Social Mobility What are three types of social mobility? The term intergenerational mobility refers to changes in social class from one generation to the next. Struc- tural mobility refers to changes in society that lead large numbers of people to change their social class. Exchange mobility is the movement of large numbers of people from one social class to another, with the net result that the relative proportions of the population in the classes remain about the same. Pp. 227–230.

Poverty Who are the poor? Poverty is unequally distributed in the United States. Racial–ethnic minorities (except Asian Americans), children, households headed by women, and rural Ameri- cans are more likely than others to be poor. The poverty rate of the elderly is less than that of the general popula- tion. Pp. 230–235.

Why are people poor? Some social analysts believe that characteristics of indi- viduals cause poverty. Sociologists, in contrast, stress the structural features of society, such as employment opportu- nities, to find the causes of poverty. Sociologists generally conclude that life orientations are a consequence, not the cause, of people’s position in the social class structure. Pp. 235–236.

How is the Horatio Alger myth functional for society? The Horatio Alger myth—the belief that anyone can get ahead if only he or she tries hard enough—encourages people to strive to get ahead. It also deflects blame for failure from society to the individual. P. 236.

Summary and Review8CHAPTE R

Race and Ethnicity9CHAPTE R

Imagine that you are an African American man living in Macon County, Alabama, during the Great Depression of the 1930s. Your home is a little country shack with a dirt floor. You have no electricity or running water. You never finished grade school, and you make a living, such as it is, by doing odd jobs. You haven’t been feeling too good lately, but you can’t afford a doctor.

Then you hear incredible news. You rub your eyes in disbe- lief. It is just like winning the lottery! If you join Miss Rivers’ Lodge (and it is free to join), you will get free physical exami- nations at Tuskegee University for life. You will even get free rides to and from the clinic, hot meals on examination days, and a lifetime of free treatment for minor ailments.

You eagerly join Miss Rivers’ Lodge. After your first physical examination, the doctor gives you

the bad news. “You’ve got bad blood,” he says. “That’s why you’ve been feeling bad. Miss Rivers will give you some medicine and schedule you for your next exam. I’ve got to warn you, though. If you go to another doctor, there’s no more free exams or medicine.”

You can’t afford another doctor anyway. You are thank- ful for your treatment, take your medicine, and look forward to the next trip to the university.

What has really happened? You have just become part of what is surely slated to go down in history as one of the most callous experiments of all time, outside of the infamous World War II Nazi and Japanese experiments. With heartless disregard for human life, the U.S. Public Health Service told 399 African American men that they had joined a social club and burial society called Miss Rivers’ Lodge. What the men were not told was that they had syphilis, that there was no real Miss Rivers’ Lodge, that the doctors were just using this term so they could study what happened when syphilis went untreated. For forty years, the “Public Health Service” allowed these men to go without treatment for their syphilis—and kept testing them each year—to study the progress of the disease. The “public health” officials even had a control group of 201 men who were free of the disease (Jones 1993).

By the way, the men did receive a benefit from “Miss Rivers’ Lodge,” a free autopsy to determine the ravages of syphilis on their bodies.

“You have just become part of one of the most callous experiments of all time.”

New Mexico

240 CHAPTER 9 Race and Ethnicity

Laying the Sociological Foundation As unlikely as it seems, this is a true story. Rarely do race and ethnic relations degener- ate to this point, but reports of troubled race relations surprise none of us. Today’s newspapers and TV and Internet regularly report on racial problems. Sociology can contribute greatly to our understanding of this aspect of social life—and this chapter may be an eye-opener for you. To begin, let’s consider to what extent race itself is a myth.

Race: Myth and Reality The Reality of Human Variety. With its 7 billion people, the world offers a fascinat- ing variety of human shapes and colors. Skin colors come in all shades between black and white, heightened by reddish and yellowish hues. Eyes come in shades of blue, brown, and green. Lips are thick and thin. Hair is straight, curly, kinky, black, blonde, and red—and, of course, all shades of brown.

As humans spread throughout the world, their adaptations to diverse climates and other living conditions resulted in this profusion of colors, hair textures, and other physical variations. Genetic mutations added distinct characteristics to the peoples of the globe. In this sense, the concept of race—a group of people with inherited physical characteristics that distinguish it from another group—is a reality. Humans do, indeed, come in a variety of colors and shapes.

The Myth of Pure Races. Humans show such a mixture of physical characteris- tics—in skin color, hair texture, nose shape, head shape, eye color, and so on—that there are no “pure” races. Instead of falling into distinct types that are clearly separate from one another, human characteristics flow endlessly together. The mapping of the human genome system shows that humans, despite their many visible differences, are strikingly homogenous. The so-called racial groups differ from one another only once in a thousand subunits of the genome (Angler 2000; Frank 2007). As you can see from the example of Tiger Woods, discussed in the Cultural Diversity box on the next page, these minute gradations make any attempt to draw lines of pure race purely arbitrary.

The Myth of a Fixed Number of Races. Although large groupings of people can be classified by blood type and gene frequencies, even these classifications do not uncover “race.” Rather, race is so arbitrary that biologists and anthropologists cannot even agree on how many “races” there are (Smedley and Smedley 2005). Ashley Montagu (1964, 1999), a physical anthropologist, pointed out that some scientists have classified humans into only two “races,” while others have found as many as two thousand. Montagu (1960) himself classified humans into forty “racial” groups.

“Race” is so fluid that even a plane ride can change someone’s race. If you want to see how, read the Down-to-Earth Sociology box on page 243.

The Myth of Racial Superiority. Regardless of what anthropologists, biologists, and sociologists say, however, people do divide one another into races, and we are stuck with this term. People also tend to see some races (mostly their own) as superior and others as inferior. As with language, however, no race is better than another. All races have their geniuses—and their idiots. Yet the myth of racial superiority abounds, a myth that is particularly dangerous. Adolf Hitler, for example, believed that the Aryans were a superior race, destined to establish an advanced culture and a new world order. This destiny required them to avoid the “racial contamination” that would come from breeding with inferior races. The Aryans, then, had the “cultural duty” to isolate or destroy races that threatened their racial purity and culture.

Put into practice, Hitler’s views left an appalling legacy—the Nazi slaughter of those they deemed inferior: Jews, Slavs, gypsies, homosexuals, and people with mental and physical disabilities. Horrific images of gas ovens and emaciated bodies stacked like cordwood have haunted the world’s nations. At Nuremberg, the Allies, flush with victory, put the top Nazis on trial, exposing their heinous deeds to a shocked world. Their public executions, everyone assumed, marked the end of such grisly acts.

Humans show remarkable diversity. Shown here is just one example—He Pingping, from China, who at 2 feet 4 inches, was the world’s shortest man, and Svetlana Pankratova, from Russia, who, according to the Guinness Book of World Records, is the woman with the longest legs. Race–ethnicity shows similar diversity.

Why is “race” a myth? What are the dangers of the myth of racial superiority?

Tiger Woods: Mapping the Changing Ethnic Terrain

Cultural Diversity in the United States

Tiger Woods, perhaps the top golfer of all time, calls himself Cablinasian. Woods invented this term as a boy to try to explain to himself just who he was—a combination of Caucasian, Black, Indian, and Asian (Leland and Beals 1997; Hall 2001). Woods wanted to embrace all sides of his family.

Like many of us, Tiger Woods’ heritage is difficult to specify. Analysts who like to quantify ethnic heritage put Woods at one-quarter Thai, one-quarter Chinese, one-quarter white, an eighth Native American, and an eighth African American. From this chapter, you know how ridiculous such computations are, but the sociological question is why many people consider Tiger Woods an African American. The U.S. racial scene is indeed complex, but a good part of the reason is that Woods has dark skin and this is the label the media placed on him. “Everyone has to fit somewhere” seems to be our attitude. If they don’t, we grow uncomfortable. And for Tiger Woods, the media chose African American.

The United States once had a firm “color line”—barriers between racial–ethnic groups that you didn’t dare cross, especially in dating or marriage. This invisible barrier has broken down, and today such marriages are common (Statistical Abstract 2012:Table 60). Several college campuses have interracial student organizations. Harvard has two, one just for students who have one African American parent (Leland and Beals 1997).

As we enter unfamiliar ethnic terrain, our classifications are bursting at the seams. They simply cannot keep pace with our rapid social change. As Kwame Appiah, of Harvard’s Philosophy and Afro-American Studies Departments, pointed out, our classifications lead to ridiculous situations. Appiah’s sisters are married to men from Norway and Ghana, so his nephews range from light-skinned, blond-haired kids to very black kids. Yet they all are classified as black (Wright 1994).

I marvel at what racial experts the U.S. census takers once were. When they took the census, which is done every ten years, they looked at people and assigned them a race. At various points, the census contained these categories: mulatto, quadroon, octoroon, Negro, black, Mexican, white, Indian, Filipino, Japanese, Chinese, and Hindu. Quadroon (one-fourth black and three-fourths white) and octoroon (one-eighth black and seven-eighths white) proved too difficult to “measure,” and these categories were used only in 1890. Mulatto appeared

in the 1850 census, and lasted until 1920. The Mexican government complained about Mexicans being treated as a race, and this category was used only in 1930. I don’t know whose idea it was to make Hindu a race, but it lasted for three censuses, from 1920 to 1940 (Bean et al. 2004; Tafoya et al. 2005).

Continuing to reflect changing ideas about race–ethnicity, censuses have become flexible, and we now have many

choices. In the 2010 census, we were first asked to declare whether we were or were not “Spanish/

Hispanic/Latino.” After this, we were asked to check “one or more races” that we “consider ourselves to be.” We could choose from White; Black, African Ameri- can, or Negro; American Indian or Alaska Native; Asian Indian, Chinese, Filipino, Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese, Native Hawaiian, Guamanian or Chamorro, and Samoan. There were boxes for Other Asian and Other Pacific Islander, with examples that listed Hmong, Pakistani, and Fijian as races. If these didn’t do it, we could check a box called “Some Other Race” and then write whatever we wanted.

Perhaps the census should list Cablinasian, after all. We could also

have ANGEL for African-Norwegian- German-English-Latino Americans, DEVIL for

those of Danish-English-Vietnamese-Italian-Lebanese descent, and STUDENT for Swedish-Turkish-Uruguayan- Danish-English-Norwegian-Tibetan Americans. As you read farther in this chapter, you will see why these terms make as much sense as the categories we currently use.

For Your Consideration↑

Just why do we count people by “race” anyway? Why not eliminate race from the U.S. census? (Race became a factor in 1790 during the first census. To determine the number of representatives from each state, slaves were counted as three-fifths of whites!) Why is race so important to some people? Perhaps you can use the materials in this chapter to answer these questions.

Tiger Woods as he answers questions at a news conference.

Based on this box, what is race?

Laying the Sociological Foundation 241

242 CHAPTER 9 Race and Ethnicity

Obviously, they didn’t. In the summer of 1994 in Rwanda, Hutus slaughtered about 800,000 Tutsis—mostly with machetes (Gettleman and Kron 2010). In the same decade, Serbs in Bosnia massacred Muslims, giving us a new term, ethnic cleans- ing. As these events sadly attest, genocide, the attempt to destroy a group of people because of their presumed race or ethnicity, remains alive and well. Although more recent killings are not accompanied by swastikas and gas ovens, the perpetrators’ goal is the same.

The Myth Continues. The idea of race, of course, is far from a myth. Firmly embed- ded in our culture, it is a powerful force in our everyday lives. That no race is superior and that even biologists cannot decide how people should be classified into races is not what counts. “I know what I see, and you can’t tell me any different” seems to be the common attitude. As was noted in Chapter 4, sociologists W. I. and D. S. Thomas (1928) observed, “If people define situations as real, they are real in their consequences.” In other words, people act on perceptions and beliefs, not facts. As a result, we will always have people like Hitler and, as illustrated in our opening vignette, officials like those in the U.S. Public Health Service who thought that it was fine to experiment with people whom they deemed inferior. While few people hold such extreme views, most people appear to be ethnocentric enough to believe that their own race is—at least just a little—superior to others.

Ethnic Groups In contrast to race, which people use to refer to supposed biological characteristics that distinguish one group of people from another, ethnicity and ethnic refer to cul- tural characteristics. Derived from the word ethnos (a Greek word meaning “people” or “nation”), ethnicity and ethnic refer to people who identify with one another on the basis of common ancestry and cultural heritage. Their sense of belonging may center on their nation or region of origin, distinctive foods, clothing, language, music, religion, or family names and relationships.

People often confuse the terms race and ethnic group. For example, many people, including many Jews, consider Jews a race. Jews, however, are more properly considered an ethnic group, for it is their cultural characteristics, especially their religion, that bind them together. Wherever Jews have lived in the world, they have intermarried. Consequently, Jews in China may have Chinese features, while some Swedish Jews are blue-eyed blonds. The confusion of race and ethnicity is illustrated in the photo on page 244.

The reason I selected these photos is to illustrate how seriously we must take all preaching of hatred and of racial supremacy, even though it seems to come from harmless or even humorous sources. The strange-looking person with his hands on his hips, who is wearing lederhosen, traditional clothing of Bavaria, Germany, is Adolf Hitler. He caused this horrific scene at the Landsberg concentration camp, which, as shown here, the U.S. military forced German civilians to view.

What is the difference between ethnicity and race?

Down-to-Earth Sociology

Can a Plane Ride Change Your Race?

At the beginning of this text (pages 22–24), I mentioned that common sense and sociology often differ. This is especially so when it comes to race. According to common sense, our racial classifications represent biological differences between people. Sociologists, in contrast, stress that what we call races are social classifications, not biological categories.

Sociologists point out that our “race” depends more on the society in which we live than on our biological charac- teristics. For example, the racial categories common in the United States are only one of numerous ways by which people around the world classify physical appearances. Although various groups use different categories, each group assumes that its categories are natural, merely a response to visible biology.

To better understand this essential socio- logical point—that race is more social than it is biological—consider this: In the United States, children born to the same parents are all of the same race. “What could be more natural?” Americans assume. But in Brazil, children born to the same parents may be of different races—if their appearances differ. “What could be more natural?” assume Brazilians.

Consider how Americans usually clas- sify a child born to a “black” mother and a “white” father. Why do they usually say that the child is “black”? Wouldn’t it be equally as logical to classify the child as “white”? Similarly, if a child has one grandmother who is “black,” but all her other ancestors are “white,” the child is often considered “black.” Yet she has much more “white blood” than “black blood.” Why, then, is she considered “black”? Certainly not because of biology.

Such thinking is a legacy of slavery. In an attempt to preserve the “purity” of their “race” in the face of the many children whose fathers were white slave masters and whose mothers were black slaves, whites classified anyone with even a “drop of black blood” as black. They actually called this the “one-drop” rule.

Even a plane trip can change a person’s race. In the city of Salvador in Brazil, people classify one another by color of skin and eyes, breadth of nose and lips, and color and curliness of

hair. They use at least seven terms for what we call white and black. Consider again a U.S. child who has

“white” and “black” parents. If she flies to Brazil, she is no longer “black”; she now belongs to one of their several “whiter” categories (Fish 1995).

If the girl makes such a flight, would her “race” actually change? Our common sense revolts at this, I know, but it actually would. We want to argue that because her biological char- acteristics remain unchanged, her race remains unchanged. This is because we think of race as biological, when race is actually a label we use to describe perceived biological characteristics. Simply put, the race we “are” depends on our social location—on who is doing the classifying.

“Racial” classifications are also fluid, not fixed. Even now, you can see change occurring in U.S. classifications. The category “multiracial,” for example, indicates changing thought and perception.

For Your Consideration↑

How would you explain to someone that race is more a social classification than a biological one?

Can you come up with any arguments to refute this state- ment? How do you think our racial–ethnic categories will change in the future?

What “race” are these two Brazilians? Is the child’s “race” different from her mother’s “race”? The text explains why “race” is such an unreliable concept that it changes even with geography.

Minority Groups and Dominant Groups Sociologist Louis Wirth (1945) defined a minority group as people who are singled out for unequal treatment and who regard themselves as objects of collective discrimi- nation. Worldwide, minorities share several conditions: Their physical or cultural traits are held in low esteem by the dominant group, which treats them unfairly, and they tend to marry within their own group (Wagley and Harris 1958). These conditions tend to create a sense of identity among minorities (a feeling of “we-ness”). In some instances, even a sense of common destiny emerges (Chandra 1993b).

Surprisingly, a minority group is not necessarily a numerical minority. For example, before India’s independence in 1947, a handful of British colonial rulers dominated tens of millions of Indians. Similarly, when South Africa practiced apartheid, a smaller group of Afrikaners, primarily Dutch, discriminated against a much larger number of blacks. Accordingly, sociologists refer to those who do the discriminating not as the

Laying the Sociological Foundation 243

How is it possible that a plane ride could change someone’s race?

Watch

Multiracial Identity

on mysoclab.com

244 CHAPTER 9 Race and Ethnicity

This photo, taken in Ashkelon, Israel, illustrates the difficulty that assumptions about race and ethnicity posed for Israel. The Ethiopian Jews look so different from other Jews that it took several years for Israeli authorities to acknowledge their “true Jewishness” and allow them to immigrate.

majority, but, rather, as the dominant group, for regardless of their numbers, this is the group that has the greater power and privilege.

Possessing political power and unified by shared physical and cultural traits, the dominant group uses its position to discriminate against those with different—and sup- posedly inferior—traits. The dominant group considers its privileged position to be the result of its own innate superiority.

Emergence of Minority Groups. A group becomes a minority in one of two ways. The first is through the expansion of political boundaries. With the excep- tion of females, tribal societies contain no minority groups. Everyone shares the same culture, including the same language, and belongs to the same group. When a group expands its political boundaries, however, it produces minority groups if it incorporates people with different customs, languages, values, or physical charac- teristics into the same political entity and discriminates against them. For example, in 1848, after defeating Mexico in war, the United States took over the Southwest. The Mexicans living there, who had been the dominant group prior to the war, were transformed into a minority group, a master status that has influenced their lives ever since. Referring to his ancestors, one Latino said, “We didn’t move across the border—the border moved across us.”

A second way in which a group becomes a minority is by migration. This can be volun- tary, as with the millions of people who have chosen to move from Mexico to the United States, or involuntary, as with the millions of Africans who were brought in chains to the United States.

Ethnic Work: Constructing Our Racial-Ethnic Identity Some of us have a greater sense of ethnicity than others, and we feel firm boundaries between “us” and “them.” Others of us have assimilated so extensively into the main- stream culture that we are only vaguely aware of our ethnic origins. With interethnic marriage common, some do not even know the countries from which their families originated—nor do they care. If asked to identify themselves ethnically, they respond with something like “I’m Heinz 57—German and Irish, with a little Italian and French thrown in—and I think someone said something about being one-sixteenth Indian, too.”

Why do some people feel an intense sense of ethnic identity, while others feel hardly any? Figure 9.1 portrays four factors, identified by sociologist Ashley Doane, that heighten or reduce our sense of ethnic identity. From this figure, you can see that the keys are relative size, power, appearance, and discrimination. If your group is rela- tively small, has little power, looks different from most people in society, and is an

object of discrimination, you will have a heightened sense of ethnic identity. In contrast, if you belong to the dominant group

that holds most of the power, look like most people in the society, and feel no discrimination, you are likely

to experience a sense of “belonging”—and to wonder why ethnic identity is such a big deal.

We can use the term ethnic work to refer to the way we construct our ethnicity. For people who have a strong ethnic identity, this term refers to how they enhance and maintain their group’s distinctions—from clothing, food, and language to religious practices and holidays. For people whose ethnic identity is not as firm, it refers to attempts to recover their ethnic heri- tage, such as trying to trace family lines or visiting the country or region of their family’s origin. As illustrated by the photo essay on page 246 many Americans do ethnic work. This has confounded the experts, who thought that the United States would be a melting pot, with most of its groups blending into a sort of

What are minority and dominant groups? What is ethnic work?

Prejudice and Discrimination 245

This photo, taken in Birmingham, Alabama, provides a glimpse into the intensity and bravery of the civil rights demonstrators of the 1960s.

ethnic stew. Because so many Americans have become fasci- nated with their “roots,” some analysts have suggested that “tossed salad” is a more appropriate term than “melting pot.”

Prejudice and Discrimination With prejudice and discrimination so significant in social life, let’s consider the origin of prejudice and the extent of discrimination.

Learning Prejudice Distinguishing Between Prejudice and Discrimination. Prejudice and discrimination are common throughout the world. In Mexico, Mexicans of Hispanic descent discrimi- nate against Mexicans of Native American descent; in Israel, Ashkenazi Jews, primarily of European descent, discriminate against Sephardic Jews, from the Middle East; in China, the Han and the Uighurs discriminate against each other. In some places, the elderly discriminate against the young; in others, the young discriminate against the elderly. And all around the world, men discriminate against women.

Discrimination is an action—unfair treatment directed against someone. Discrimination can be based on many characteristics: age, sex, height, weight, skin color, clothing, speech, income, education, marital status, sexual orientation, disease, disability, religion, and politics. When the basis of discrimination is someone’s perception of race, it is known as racism. Discrimination is often the result of an attitude called prejudice—a prejudging of some sort, usually in a negative way. There is also positive prejudice, which exaggerates the virtues of a group, as when people think that some group is superior to others. Most prejudice, however, is negative and involves prejudging a group as inferior.

Learning from Associating with Others. As with our other attitudes, we are not born with prejudice. Rather, we learn prejudice from the people around us. You proba- bly know this, but here is a twist that sociologists have found. Michael Kimmel (2007), who interviewed neo-Nazi skinheads in Sweden, found that young men were attracted mostly by the group’s tough masculinity, not its hatred of immigrants. Kathleen Blee (2005, 2011), who interviewed female members of the KKK and Aryan Nations in the

Source: By the author. Based on Doane 1997.

FIGURE 9.1 A Sense of Ethnicity

A Low Sense

A Heightened Sense

Part of the majority Greater power Similar to the “national identity” No discrimination

Smaller numbers Lesser power Different from the “national identity” Discrimination

How does prejudice differ from discrimination? What is the origin of prejudice?

Ethnic Work

Wearing traditional clothing and participating in a parade help to maintain the ethnic identity

of these Americans who trace their origin to the Philippines.

Many Native Americans have maintained continuous identity with their tribal roots. You can see the blending of cultures in this photo taken at the March Pow Wow in Denver, Colorado.

Many European Americans are also involved in ethnic work, attempting to maintain an identity more precise than “from Europe.” These women of Czech ancestry are performing for a Czech community in a small town in Nebraska.

The Cinco de Mayo celebration is used to recall roots and renew ethnic identities. This

one was held in Los Angeles, California.

Explorations in Cultural Identity Ethnic work refers to the ways that people establish, maintain, and transmit their ethnic identity. As shown here, among the techniques people use to forge ties with their roots are dress, dance, and music.

Many African Americans are trying to get in closer contact with their roots. To do this, some use musical performances, as with this group in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.

Prejudice and Discrimination 247

United States, found something similar. They were attracted to the hate group because someone they liked belonged to it. They learned to be racists after they joined the group. Both Blee and Kimmel found that the members’ racism was not the cause of their joining but, rather, joining was the cause of their racism.

The Far-Reaching Nature of Prejudice. It is amazing how much prejudice people can learn. In a classic article, psychologist Eugene Hartley (1946) asked people how they felt about several racial–ethnic groups. Besides Negroes, Jews, and so on, he included the Wallonians, Pireneans, and Danireans—names he had made up. Most people who expressed dislike for Jews and Negroes showed similar contempt for these three fictitious groups.

Hartley’s study shows that prejudice does not depend on negative experiences with others. It also reveals that people who are prejudiced against one racial or ethnic group also tend to be prejudiced against other groups. People can be, and are, prejudiced against people they have never met—and even against groups that do not exist!

The neo-Nazis and the Ku Klux Klan base their existence on prejudice. These groups believe that race is real, that white is best, and that beneath society’s surface is a murky river of mingling conspiracies (Ezekiel 1995). What would happen if a Jew attended their meetings? Would he or she survive? In the Down-to-Earth Sociology box on page 249, sociologist Raphael Ezekiel reveals some of the insights he gained during his remarkable study of these groups.

Internalizing Dominant Norms. People can even learn to be prejudiced against their own group. A national survey found that African Americans think that lighter-skinned African American women are more attractive than those with darker skin (Hill 2002). Participant observation in the ghetto also reveals a preference for lighter skin (Jones 2011). Sociologists call this internalizing the norms of the dominant group.

To study the internalization of dominant norms, psychologists Mahzarin Banaji and Anthony Greenwald created the Implicit Association Test. In one version of this test, good and bad words are flashed on a screen along with photos of African Americans and whites. Most subjects are quicker to associate positive words (such as “love,” “peace,” and “baby”) with whites and negative words (such as “cancer,” “bomb,” and “devil”) with blacks. Here’s the clincher: This is true for both whites and blacks (Dasgupta et al. 2000; Greenwald and Krieger 2006). Apparently, we all learn the ethnic maps of our culture and, along with them, their route to biased perception.

Individual and Institutional Discrimination Sociologists stress that we should move beyond thinking in terms of individual discrimination, the negative treatment of one person by another. Although such behavior creates problems, it is primarily an issue between individuals. With their focus on the broader picture, sociologists encourage us to examine institutional discrimination, that is, to see how discrimination is woven into the fabric of society. Let’s look at two examples.

Home Mortgages. Bank lending provides an excellent illustration of institutional discrimination. Earlier studies using national samples showed that bankers were more likely to reject the loan applications of minorities. When bankers defended themselves by saying that whites had better credit history, researchers retested their data. They found that even when applicants had identical credit, African Americans and Latinos were 60 percent more likely to be rejected (Thomas 1991, 1992).

The subprime debacle that threw the stock market into a tailspin brought new revela- tions. Look at Figure 9.2 on the next page. You can see that minorities are still more likely to be turned down for a loan—whether their incomes are below or above the median income of their community. Beyond this hard finding lies another just as devastating. In the credit cri- sis that caused so many to lose their homes, African Americans and Latinos were hit harder than whites. The last set of bars on Figure 9.2 shows a major reason for this: Banks purposely targeted minorities to charge higher interest rates. Over the lifetime of a loan, these higher monthly payments can come to an extra $100,000 to $200,000 (Powell and Roberts 2009).

What does “internalizing dominant norms” mean?

248 CHAPTER 9 Race and Ethnicity

Would nice bankers really do this? After checking data like these, the Justice Department accused Countrywide Financial, a major mortgage lender, of discriminating against 200,000 Latino and African American borrowers. Countrywide agreed to pay a fine of $335 million, the largest fair-lending settlement in history (Savage 2011).

Health Care. Losing your home is devastating. Losing your mother or baby is even worse. Look at Table 9.1. You can see that institutional discrimination can be a life-and- death matter. In childbirth, African American mothers are almost three times as likely to die as white mothers, while their babies are more than twice as likely to die during their first year of life. This is not a matter of biology, as though African American mothers and children are more fragile. It is a matter of social conditions, primarily nutrition and medical care.

It is important to understand that discrimination does not have to be deliberate. In some unintentional discrimination, no one is aware of it—neither those being discrimi- nated against nor those doing the discriminating (Harris et al. 2011). Consider knee replacements and coronary bypass surgery. White patients are more likely than either

Can you summarize insititutional discrimination in mortgages and health care?

20%

5%

30%

10%

15%

25%

35%

40%

45%

Applicants whose income was below the median income

Applicants whose income was above the median income

These Applicants Were Charged Higher Interest (given subprime loans)

Applicants who had 100% to 120% of the median income

Whites Latinos African Americans

15

25

30

11

26

30

14

36

43

These Applicants Were Denied a Mortgage

Source: By the author. Based on Kochbar and Gonzalez-Barrera 2009.

This figure, based on a national sample, illustrates institutional discrimination. Rejecting the loan applications of minorities and gouging them with higher interest rates are a nationwide practice, not the acts of a rogue banker here or there. Because the discrimination is part of the banking system, it is also called systemic discrimination.

Buying a House: Institutional Discrimination and Predatory Lending

FIGURE 9.2

Note: The national database used for this table does not list these totals for other racial–ethnic groups. White refers to non-Hispanic whites. Infant deaths refers to the number of deaths per year of infants under 1 year old per 1,000 live births. Maternal deaths refers to the number of deaths per 100,000 women who give birth in a year.

TABLE 9.1 Race–Ethnicity and Mother/Child Deaths

Infant Deaths Maternal Deaths

White Americans 5.6 10.0 African Americans 13.2 26.5

Source: Statistical Abstract of the United States 2012:Table 115.

Latino or African American patients to receive these procedures (Skinner et al. 2003; Popescu 2007). Treatment after a heart attack follows a similar pattern: Whites are more likely than blacks to be given cardiac catheterization, a test to detect blockage of blood vessels. This study of 40,000 patients holds a surprise: Both black and white doctors are more likely to give this preventive care to whites (Stolberg 2001).

Researchers do not know why race–ethnicity is a factor in medical decisions. With both white and black doctors involved, we can be certain that physicians do not intend to discriminate. Apparently, the implicit bias that comes with the internalization of dominant norms becomes a subconscious motivation for giving or denying access to advanced medical procedures.

Prejudice and Discrimination 249

How does implicit bias underlie unintentional discrimination? How do hard-core members of hate groups see the world?

Down-to-Earth Sociology

Sociologist Raphael Ezekiel wanted to get a close look at the racist mind. The best way to study racism from the inside is to do participant observation (see page 30). But Ezekiel is a Jew. Could he study these groups by participant observation? To find out, Ezekiel told Ku Klux Klan and neo- Nazi leaders that he wanted to interview them and attend their meetings. He also told them that he was a Jew. Surprisingly, they agreed. Ezekiel published his path-breaking research in a book, The Racist Mind (1995). Here are some of the insights he gained during his fascinating sociological adventure:

[The leader] builds on mass anxiety about economic in- security and on popular tendencies to see an Establishment as the cause of economic threat; he hopes to teach people to identify that Establishment as the puppets of a conspiracy of Jews. [He has a] belief in exclusive categories. For the white racist leader, it is profoundly true . . . that the socially defined collections we call races represent fundamental categories. A man is black or a man is white; there are no in-be- tweens. Every human belongs to a racial cat- egory, and all the members of one category are radically different from all the members of other categories. Moreover, race represents the essence of the person. A truck is a truck, a car is a car, a cat is a cat, a dog is a dog, a black is a black, a white is a white. . . . These axioms have a rock-hard quality in the leaders’ minds; the world is made up of racial groups. That is what exists for them.

Two further beliefs play a major role in the minds of leaders. First, life is war. The world is made of distinct racial groups; life is about the war between these groups. Second, events have secret causes, are never what they seem superficially. . . . Any myth is plausible, as long as it involves intricate plotting. . . . It does not matter to him what others say. . . . He lives in his ideas and in the little world he has created where they are taken seriously. . . . Gold can be made from the tongues

of frogs; Yahweh’s call can be heard in the flapping swastika banner. (pp. 66–67)

Who is attracted to the neo-Nazis and Ku Klux Klan? Here is what Ezekiel discovered:

[There is a] ready pool of whites who will respond to the racist signal. . . . This population [is] always hungry for activity—or for the talk of activity—that promises dignity and meaning to lives that are working poorly in a highly competitive world. . . . Much as I don’t want to believe it, [this] movement brings a sense of meaning— at least for a while—to some of the discontented. To

struggle in a cause that transcends the individual lends meaning to life, no matter how ill-founded or narrowing the cause. For the young men in the neo-Nazi group . . . membership was an alternative to atomization and drift; within the group they worked for a cause and took direct risks in the company of comrades. . . .

When interviewing the young neo-Nazis in De- troit, I often found myself driving with them past the closed factories, the idled plants of our shrink- ing manufacturing base. The fewer and fewer plants that remain can demand better educated and more highly skilled workers. These fatherless Nazi youths, these high-school dropouts, will find little place in the emerging economy . . . a perma-

nently underemployed white underclass is taking its place alongside the permanent black underclass. The struggle over race merely diverts youth from confronting the real is- sues of their lives. Not many seats are left on the train, and the train is leaving the station. (pp. 32–33)

For Your Consideration↑

Use functionalism, conflict theory, and symbolic interaction to explain how the leaders and followers of these hate groups view the world. Use these same perspectives to explain why some people are attracted to the message of hate.

The Racist Mind

Raphael Ezekiel

250 CHAPTER 9 Race and Ethnicity

How can scapegoats, frustration, and prejudice be related? What is the theory of the authoritarian personality?

Theories of Prejudice Social scientists have developed several theories to explain prejudice. Let’s first look at psychological explanations, then at sociological ones.

Psychological Perspectives Frustration and Scapegoats.

“Why are we having a depression? The Jews have taken over the banking system, and they want to suck every dollar out of us.”

This was a common sentiment in Germany in the 1930s during the depression that helped bring Hitler to power. People often unfairly blame their troubles on a scape- goat—often a racial–ethnic or religious minority. Why do they do this? Psychologist John Dollard (1939) suggested that prejudice is the result of frustration. People who are unable to strike out at the real source of their frustration (such as unem- ployment) look for someone to blame. This person or group becomes a target on which they vent their frustrations. Gender and age are also common targets of scapegoating.

Prejudice and frustration often are related. A team of psychologists led by Emory Cowen (1959) measured the prejudice of a group of students. They then gave the students two puzzles to solve, making sure the students did not have enough time to finish. After the students had worked furiously on the puzzles, the experimenters shook their heads in disgust and expressed disbelief that students couldn’t complete such a simple task. They then retested the students. The results? Their scores on prejudice increased. The students had directed their frustrations outward, transferring them to people who had nothing to do with the contempt they had experienced.

The Authoritarian Personality.

“I don’t like Swedes. They’re too rigid. And I don’t like the Italians. They’re always talk- ing with their hands. I don’t like the Walloneans, either. They’re always smiling at some- thing. And I don’t like librarians. And my job sucks. Hitler might have had his faults, but he put people to work during the Great Depression.”

Have you ever wondered whether some people’s personality makes them more inclined to be prejudiced, and others more fair-minded? For psychologist Theodor Adorno, who had fled from the Nazis, this was no idle speculation. With the horrors he had observed still fresh in his mind, Adorno wondered whether there might be a certain type of per- son who is more likely to fall for the racist spewings of people like Hitler, Mussolini, and those in the Ku Klux Klan.

To find out, Adorno gave three tests to about two thousand people, ranging from college professors to prison inmates (Adorno et al. 1950). He measured their ethnocentrism, anti-Semitism (bias against Jews), and support for strong, authori- tarian leaders. People who scored high on one test also scored high on the other two. For example, people who agreed with anti-Semitic statements also said that governments should be authoritarian and that foreign customs pose a threat to the “American” way.

Adorno concluded that highly prejudiced people have deep respect for authority and are submissive to authority figures. He termed this the authoritarian personality. These people believe that things are either right or wrong. Ambiguity disturbs them, especially in matters of religion or sex. They become anxious when they confront norms and values that are different from their own. To view people who differ from themselves as inferior assures them that their own positions are right.

Adorno’s research stimulated more than a thousand research studies. In general, the researchers found that people who are older, less educated, less intelligent, and from a lower social class are more likely to be authoritarian. Critics say that this doesn’t

Theories of Prejudice 251

indicate a particular personality, just that the less educated are more prejudiced—which we already knew (Yinger 1965; Ray 1991). Nevertheless, researchers continue to study this concept (McFarland 2010).

Sociological Perspectives Sociologists find psychological explanations inadequate. They stress that the key to understanding prejudice cannot be found by looking inside people, but, rather, by examining conditions outside them. For this reason, sociologists focus on how social environments influence prejudice. With this background, let’s compare functionalist, conflict, and symbolic interactionist perspectives on prejudice.

Functionalism.

In a television documentary, journalist Bill Moyers interviewed Fritz Hippler, a Nazi who at age 29 was put in charge of the entire German film industry. When Hitler came to power, Hippler said, the Germans were no more anti-Semitic than the French. Hippler was told to increase anti-Semitism in Germany. Obediently, he produced movies that contained vivid scenes comparing Jews to rats—with their breeding threatening to infest the population.

Why was Hippler told to create hatred? Prejudice and discrimination were functional for the Nazis. Defeated in World War I and devastated by fines levied by the victors, Germany was on its knees. Runaway inflation was destroying its middle class. To help unite this fractured Germany, the Nazis created a scapegoat to blame for their troubles. In addition, the Jews owned businesses, bank accounts, fine art, and other property that the Nazis could confiscate. Jews also held key positions (as university professors, reporters, judges, and so on), which the Nazis could give as prizes to their followers. In the end, hatred also showed its dysfunctional face, as the Nazi officials hanged at Nuremberg discovered.

Prejudice becomes practically irresistible when state machinery is used to advance the cause of hatred. To produce prejudice, the Nazis harnessed government agencies, the schools, police, courts, and mass media. The results were devastating. Recall the identi- cal twins featured in the Down-to-Earth Sociology box on page 66. Jack and Oskar had been separated as babies. Jack was brought up as a Jew in Trinidad, while Oskar was reared as a Catholic in Czechoslovakia. Under the Nazi regime, Oskar learned to hate Jews, unaware that he himself was a Jew.

That prejudice is functional and is shaped by the social environment was demon- strated by psychologists Muzafer and Carolyn Sherif (1953). In a boys’ summer camp, the Sherifs assigned friends to different cabins and then had the cabin groups compete in sports. In just a few days, strong in-groups had formed. Even lifelong friends began to taunt one another, calling each other “crybaby” and “sissy.”

The Sherif study teaches us several important lessons about social life. Note how it is possible to arrange the social environment to generate either positive or negative feel- ings about people, and how prejudice arises if we pit groups against one another in an “I win, you lose” situation. You can also see that prejudice is functional, how it creates in-group solidarity. And, of course, it is obvious how dysfunctional prejudice is, when you observe the way it destroys human relationships.

Conflict Theory.

“The Japanese have gone on strike? They’re demanding a raise? And they even want a rest period? We’ll show them who’s boss. Hire those Koreans who’ve been trying to get work.”

This did happen. When Japanese workers in Hawaii struck, owners of plantations hired Koreans (Jeong and You 2008). The division of workers along racial–ethnic and gen- der lines is known as a split labor market (Du Bois 1935/1992; Roediger 2002). Although today’s exploitation of these divisions is more subtle, whites are aware that

What is the functionalist view of prejudice? What is a split labor market?

252 CHAPTER 9 Race and Ethnicity

other racial–ethnic groups are ready to take their jobs, African Americans often perceive Latinos as competitors (Cose 2006), and men know that women are eager to get pro- moted. All of this helps to keep workers in line.

Conflict theorists, as you will recall, focus on how groups compete for scarce resources. Owners want to increase profits by holding costs down, while workers want better food, health care, housing, education, and leisure. Divided, workers are weak, but united, they gain strength. The split labor market is one way that owners divide workers so they can’t take united action to demand higher wages and better working conditions.

Another tactic that owners use is the reserve labor force. This is simply another term for the unemployed. To expand production during economic booms, companies hire those who don’t have jobs. When the economy contracts and they no longer need these workers, they lay them off. That there are people without jobs who are desper- ately looking for work is a lesson not lost on workers who have jobs. They fear eviction and worry about having their cars and furniture repossessed. Many know they are just one or two paychecks away from ending up “on the streets.”

Just like the boys in the Sherif experiment, African Americans, Latinos, whites, and others see themselves as able to make gains only at the expense of other groups. Sometimes this rivalry shows up along very fine racial–ethnic lines, such as that in Miami between Haitians and African Americans, who distrust each other as competitors. Divisions among workers deflect anger and hostility away from the power elite and direct these powerful emotions toward other racial and ethnic groups. Instead of recog- nizing their common class interests and working for their mutual welfare, workers learn to fear and distrust one another.

Symbolic Interactionism.

“I know her qualifications are good, but yikes! She’s ugly. I don’t want to have to see her every day. Let’s hire the one with the nice curves.”

While conflict theorists focus on the role of the owner (or capitalist) class in exploiting racial and ethnic divisions, symbolic interactionists examine how labels affect perception and create prejudice.

How Labels Create Prejudice. Symbolic interactionists stress that the labels we learn affect the ways we perceive people. Labels cause selective perception; that is, they lead us to see certain things while they blind us to others. If we apply a label to a group, we tend to perceive its members as all alike. We shake off evidence that doesn’t fit (Simpson and Yinger 1972). Shorthand for emotionally charged stereotypes, some racial and ethnic labels are especially powerful. As you know, the term nigger is not neutral. Nor are honky, cracker, spic, mick, kike, limey, kraut, dago, guinea, or any of the other scornful words people use to belittle ethnic groups. As in the little vignette above, ugly can work in a similar way. Such words overpower us with emotions, blocking out ratio- nal thought about the people to whom they refer (Allport 1954).

Labels and Self-Fulfilling Stereotypes. Some stereotypes not only justify preju- dice and discrimination but also produce the behavior depicted in the stereotype. We examined this principle in Chapter 4 in the box on beauty (p. 111). Let’s consider Group X. According to stereotypes, the members of this group are lazy, so they don’t deserve good jobs. (“They are lazy and wouldn’t do the job well.”) Denied the better jobs, most members of Group X do “dirty work,” the jobs few people want. (“That’s the right kind of work for that kind of people.”) Since much “dirty work” is sporadic, members of Group X are often seen “on the streets.” The sight of their idleness rein- forces the original stereotype of laziness. The discrimination that created the “laziness” in the first place passes unnoticed.

To apply these three theoretical perspectives and catch a glimpse of how amazingly dif- ferent things were in the past, read the Down-to-Earth Sociology box on the next page.

What are the conflict and symbolic interactionist views of prejudice?

Global Patterns of Intergroup Relations 253

Global Patterns of Intergroup Relations In their studies of racial–ethnic relations around the world, sociologists have found six basic ways that dominant groups treat minority groups. These patterns are shown in Figure 9.3 on the next page. Let’s look at each.

Down-to-Earth Sociology

The Bronx Zoo in New York City used to keep a 22-year- old pygmy in the Monkey House. The man—and the orangutan he lived with—became the most popular exhibit at the zoo. Thousands of visitors would arrive daily and head straight for the Monkey House. Eyewitnesses to what they thought was a lower form of human in the long chain of evolution, the visitors were fascinated by the pygmy, especially by his sharpened teeth.

To make the exhibit even more alluring, the zoo director had animal bones scattered in front of the man.

I know it sounds as though I must have made this up, but this is a true story. The World’s Fair was going to be held in St. Louis in 1904, and the Department of Anthropology wanted to show villages from different cul- tures. They asked Samuel Verner, an explorer, if he could bring some pygmies to St. Louis to serve as live exhibits. Verner agreed, and on his next trip to Africa, in the Bel- gian Congo he came across Ota Benga (or Otabenga), a pygmy who had been enslaved by another tribe. Benga, then about age 20, said he was willing to go to St. Louis. After Verner bought Benga’s freedom for some cloth and salt, Benga recruited another half dozen pygmies to go with them.

After the World’s Fair, Verner took the pygmies back to Africa. When Benga found out that a hostile tribe had wiped out his vil- lage and killed his family, he asked Verner if he could return with him to the United States. Verner agreed.

When they returned to New York, Verner ran into finan- cial trouble and wrote some bad checks. No longer able to care for Benga, Verner left him with friends at the American Museum of Natural History. After a few weeks, they grew tired of Benga’s antics and turned him over to the Bronx Zoo. The zoo officials put Benga on display in the Monkey House, with this sign:

The African Pygmy, ’Ota Benga.’ Age 23 years. Height 4 feet 11 inches. Weight 103 pounds. Brought from the Kasai River, Congo Free State, South Central Africa by Dr. Samuel P. Verner. Exhibited each afternoon during September

Exhibited with an orangutan, Benga became a sensation. An article in the New York Times said it was fortunate that Benga couldn’t think very deeply, or else living with monkeys might bother him.

When the Colored Baptist Ministers’ Conference protested that exhibiting Benga was degrading, zoo officials replied that they were “taking excellent care of the little fellow.” They

added that “he has one of the best rooms at the primate house.” (I wonder what animal had the best room.)

Not surprisingly, this reply didn’t satisfy the min- isters. When they continued to protest, zoo officials decided to let Benga out of his cage. They put a white shirt on him and let him walk around the zoo. At

night, Benga slept in the monkey house. Benga’s life became even more miserable.

Zoo visitors would follow him, howling, jeering, laughing, and poking at him. One day, Benga found a knife in the feeding room of the Mon- key House and flourished it at the visitors. Unhappy zoo officials took the knife away.

Benga then made a little bow and some arrows and began shooting at the obnoxious visitors. This ended the fun for the zoo of- ficials. They decided that Benga had to leave.

After living in several orphanages for African American children, Benga ended up working as a laborer in a tobacco factory in Lynchburg, Virginia.

Always treated as a freak, Benga was desperately lonely. In 1916, at about the age

of 32, in despair that he had no home or family to return to in Africa, Benga ended his misery by shooting himself in the heart. Source: Based on Bradford and Blume 1992; Crossen 2006; Richman 2006.

For Your Consideration↑

1. See what different views emerge as you apply the three theoretical perspectives (functionalism, symbolic interactionism, and conflict theory) to exhibiting Benga at the Bronx Zoo.

2. How does the concept of ethnocentrism apply to this event?

3. Explain how the concepts of prejudice and discrimina- tion apply to what happened to Benga.

The Man in the Zoo

Ota Benga, 1906, on exhibit in the Bronx Zoo.

Can you explain how a human could have ever been a zoo exhibit?

254 CHAPTER 9 Race and Ethnicity

Genocide When gold was discovered in northern California in 1849, the fabled “Forty-Niners” rushed in. In this region lived 150,000 Native Americans. To get rid of them, the white govern- ment put a bounty on their heads. It even reimbursed the whites for their bullets. The result was the slaughter of 120,000 Native American men, women, and children. (Schaefer 2004)

Could you ever participate in genocide? Don’t be too quick in answering. Gaining an understanding of how ordinary people take part in genocide will be our primary goal in this section. In the events depicted in the little vignette above, those who did the kill- ing were regular people—people like you and I. The killing was promoted by calling the Native Americans “savages,” making them appear inferior, as somehow less than human. Killing them, then, didn’t seem the same as killing whites in order to take their property.

It is true that most Native Americans died not from bullets, but from the diseases the whites brought with them. Measles, smallpox, and the flu came from another continent, and the Native Americans had no immunity against them (Dobyns 1983; Schaefer 2012). But to accomplish the takeover of their resources, the settlers and sol- diers destroyed the Native Americans’ food supply (crops and buffalos). From all causes, about 95 percent of Native Americans died (Thornton 1987; Churchill 1997). Ordinary, “good” people were intent on destroying the “savages.”

Now consider last century’s two most notorious examples of genocide. In Germany during the 1930s and 1940s, Hitler and the Nazis attempted to destroy all Jews. In the 1990s, in Rwanda, the Hutus tried to destroy all Tutsis. One of the horrifying aspects of these two slaughters is that the killers did not crawl out from under a rock some- place. In some cases, it was even the victims’ neighbors and friends who did the killing. Their killing was facilitated by labels that marked the victims as enemies who deserved to die (Huttenbach 1991; Browning 1993; Gross 2001).

In Sum: Labels are powerful; dehumanizing ones even more so. They help people to compartmentalize—to separate their acts of cruelty from their sense of being good and decent people. To regard members of some group as inferior opens the door to treating them inhumanely. In some cases, these labels help people to kill—and to still retain a good self-concept (Bernard et al. 1971). In short, labeling the targeted group as inferior or even less than fully human facilitates genocide.

Population Transfer There are two types of population transfer: indirect and direct. Indirect transfer is achieved by making life so miserable for members of a minority that they leave “voluntarily.” Under the bitter conditions of czarist Russia, for example, millions of Jews made this “choice.” Direct transfer occurs when a dominant group expels a minority. Examples include the

Source: By the author.

FIGURE 9.3 Global Patterns of Intergroup Relations: A Continuum

The dominant group structures the social institu- tions to maintain minimal contact with the minority group (e.g., the

U.S. South before the 1960s)

The dominant group tries to destroy the

minority group (e.g., Germany and Rwanda)

The dominant group exploits

the minority group (e.g., low-paid, menial work)

The dominant group expels the minority group

(e.g., Native Americans forced onto reservations)

The dominant group absorbs

the minority group (e.g., American

Czechoslovakians)

The dominant group encourages racial and ethnic variation; when

successful, there is no longer a

dominant group (e.g., Switzerland)

Genocide Population

Transfer Internal

Colonialism Segregation Assimilation Multiculturalism

(Pluralism)

INHUMANITY

REJECTION

HUMANITY

ACCEPTANCE

Can you give examples of genocide and population transfer in the United States?

U.S. government relocating Native Americans to reservations and transferring Americans of Japanese descent to internment camps during World War II.

Internal Colonialism In Chapter 7, the term colonialism was used to refer to one way that the Most Industrialized Nations exploit the Least Industrialized Nations (p. 199). Conflict theorists use the term internal colonialism to describe how a country’s dominant group exploits minority groups for its economic advantage. The dominant group manipulates the social institutions to sup- press minorities and deny them full access to their society’s benefits. Slavery, reviewed in Chapter 7, is an extreme example of internal colonialism, as was the South African system of apartheid. Although the dominant Afrikaners despised the minority, they found its presence necessary. As Simpson and Yinger (1972) put it, who else would do the hard work?

Segregation Internal colonialism is often accompanied by segregation—the separa- tion of racial or ethnic groups. Segregation allows the dominant group to maintain social distance from the minority and yet to exploit their labor as cooks, cleaners, chauffeurs, nannies, factory workers, and so on. In the U.S. South until the 1960s, by law African Americans and whites had to use separate public facilities—hotels, schools, swimming pools, bathrooms, and even drinking fountains. In thirty-eight states, laws prohibited marriage between blacks and whites. Violators could be sent to prison (Mahoney and Kooistra 1995). The last law of this type was repealed in 1967 (Spickard 1989). In the villages of India, an ethnic group, the Dalits (untouchables), is forbidden to use the village pump. Dalit women must walk long distanc- es to streams or pumps outside of the village to fetch their water (author’s notes).

Assimilation Assimilation is the process by which a minority group is absorbed into the main- stream culture. There are two types. In forced assimilation, the dominant group refuses to allow the minority to practice its religion, to speak its language, or to follow its customs. Before the fall of the Soviet Union, for example, the dominant group, the Russians, required that Armenian children attend schools where they were taught in Russian. Armenians could celebrate only Russian holidays, not Armenian ones. Permissible assimilation, in contrast, allows the minority to adopt the dominant group’s patterns in its own way and at its own speed.

Multiculturalism (Pluralism) A policy of multiculturalism, also called pluralism, permits or even encourages racial– ethnic variation. The minority groups are able to maintain their separate identities, yet participate freely in the country’s social institutions, from education to politics. Switzerland provides an outstanding example of multiculturalism. The Swiss population includes four ethnic groups: French, Italians, Germans, and Romansh. These groups have kept their own languages, and they live peacefully in political and economic unity. Multiculturalism has been so successful that none of these groups can properly be called a minority.

Racial–Ethnic Relations in the United States

Writing about race–ethnicity is like stepping onto a minefield: One never knows where to expect the next explosion. Serbian students have written to me, saying that I have been unfair to their group. So have American whites. Even basic terms are controver- sial. Some people classified as African Americans reject this term because they identify

Amid fears that Japanese Americans were “enemies within” who would sabotage industrial and military installations on the West Coast, in the early days of World War II Japanese Americans were transferred to “relocation camps.” To make sure they didn’t get lost, the children were tagged like luggage.

Can you give examples of internal colonization, segregation, assimilation, and multiculturalism in the United States?

256 CHAPTER 9 Race and Ethnicity

USA—the land of diversity.

Why are racial–ethnic terms problematic? What are the major racial–ethnic groups in the United States?

themselves as blacks. Similarly, some Latinos prefer the term Hispanic American, but others reject it, saying that it ignores the Native American side of their heritage. Some would limit the term Chicanos—commonly used to refer to Americans from Mexico—to those who have a sense of eth- nic oppression and unity; they say that it does not apply to those who have assimilated.

No term that I use here, then, will satisfy everyone. Racial–ethnic identity is fluid, constantly changing, and all terms carry a risk as they take on politi- cally charged meanings. Nevertheless, as part of everyday life, we classify ourselves and one another as belonging to distinct racial–ethnic groups. As Figures 9.4 and 9.5 show, on the basis of these self-identities, whites make up 65 percent of the U.S. population, minorities (African Americans, Asian Americans, Latinos, and Native Americans) 33 percent. Between 1 and 2 percent claim membership in two or more racial–ethnic groups.

Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 2010:Table 10; 2011:Table 52.

FIGURE 9.5 U.S. Racial–Ethnic Groups

Americans of European Descent a

199,491,000 65%

Americans of African, Asian, North, Central, and South American, and Pacific Island Descent

104,743,000 33%

Claim Two or More Race–Ethnicities 2%

Overall Total: 309,401,000

12%0 8%4% 16% 20%

Percentage of Americans

46,944,000 15.4%

39,059,000 12.8%

13,549,000 4.5%

3,083,000 1.0%

5,167,000 1.7%

50,272,000 16.5%German

36,278,000 11.9%Irish b

28,630,000 9.4%English/British

17,749,000 5.8%Italian

11,526,000 3.8%French c

9,365,000 3.1%Scottish d 9,887,000 3.25%Polish

4,929,000 1.6%Dutch

4,643,000 1.5%Norwegian

4,390,000 1.4%Swedish

3,130,000 1.0%Russian

1,914,000 0.5%Czech

1,539,000 0.5%Hungarian

1,419,000 0.5%Portuguese

1,980,000 0.6%Welsh

1,459,000 0.5%Danish

1,351,000 0.4%Greek

997,000 0.3%Swiss

839,300 0.2%Others

Latino e

Asian American f

African American

Native American g

1,546,000 0.5%Arab

aThis figure, which follows convention and lists Latinos as a separate category, brings into focus the problem of counting “racial– ethnic” groups. Because Latinos can be of any racial–ethnic group, I have reduced the total of the groups with which they self-identify by the number of Latinos who identify with those groups. bInterestingly, this total is six times higher than all the Irish who live in Ireland. cIncludes French Canadian. dIncludes “Scottish-Irish.” eMost Latinos trace at least part of their ancestry to Europe. fIn descending order, the largest groups of Asian Americans are from China, the Philippines, India, Korea, Vietnam, and Japan. See Figure 9.9 on page 265. Also includes those who identify themselves as Native Hawaiian or Pacific Islander. gIncludes Native Alaskans.

Source: By the author. See Figure 9.5.

FIGURE 9.4 Race–Ethnicity of the U.S. Population

Whites 65%

Latinos 15%

Asian Americans 4%

African Americans 13%

Native Americans 1% Claim two or more races 2%

Racial–Ethnic Relations in the United States 257

As you can see from the Social Map, the distribution of dominant and minority groups among the states seldom comes close to the national average. This is because minority groups tend to be clustered in regions. The extreme distributions are represented by Maine and Vermont, each of which has only 5 percent minority, and by Hawaii, where minori- ties outnumber whites 75 percent to 25 percent. With this as background, let’s review the major groups in the United States, going from the largest to the smallest.

European Americans Benjamin Franklin said, “Why should the Palatine boors (Germans) be suffered to swarm into our settlements and by herding together establish their language and manners to the exclusion of ours? Why should Pennsylvania, founded by the English, become a colony of aliens, who will shortly be so numerous as to germanize us instead of our anglifying them?” (in Alba and Nee 2003:17)

At the founding of this nation, White Anglo Saxon Protestants (WASPs) held deep prejudices against other whites. There was practically no end to their disdainful stereo- types of white ethnics—immigrants from Europe whose language and other customs differed from theirs. The English despised the Irish, viewing them as dirty, lazy drunk- ards, but they also painted Poles, Jews, Italians, and others with similar disparaging brushstrokes. From the little vignette, you can see that they didn’t like Germans either.

The political and cultural dominance of the WASPs placed intense pressure on immigrants to assimilate into the mainstream culture. The children of most immigrants embraced the new way of life and quickly came to think of themselves as Americans rather than as Germans, French, Hungarians, and so on. They dropped their distinctive customs, especially their language, often viewing them as symbols of shame. This sec- ond generation of immigrants was sandwiched between two worlds: “the old country” of their parents and their new home. Their children, the third generation, had an easier adjustment, for they had fewer customs to discard. As white ethnics assimilated into this Anglo-American culture, the meaning of WASP expanded to include them.

At the founding of the United States, what was the relationship of WASPs and white ethnics?

FIGURE 9.6 The Distribution of Dominant and Minority Groups

Less than average: 5.1% to 18.8%

Average: 19.1% to 33.7%

Higher than average: 34.8% to 75.0%

e:

SC 35.1

NC 33.2

VA 33.7

WA 25.4

OR 20.4

CA 58.3

NV 44.2

ID 15.6

MT 12.4

WY 13.8

AZ 42.7

NM 59.1

CO 29.3

ND 11.0

SD 14.3

NE 16.6

KS 20.1

OK 29.2

TX 53.3

MN 15.2

IA 10.2

MO 18.2

AR 24.9

LA 38.6

WI 15.4

IL 35.4

KY 12.8

TN 23.5

MS 41.7

AL 32.0

GA 42.5

FL 40.5

IN 17.3

MI 22.6

WV 25.4

PA 19.1

NY 40.1

ME 5.1

NH 7.2 MA 21.3 RI 21.7

CT 26.8 NJ 38.9

DE 32.4

MD 43.2

DC 66.5

OH 17.8

UT 18.8

AK 34.8

VT 5.1

HI 75.0

Percentage Minority

JJ 38.9

E 4

D 2

Highest percentage of minority groups

1. Hawaii (75%) 2. California (58.3%) 3. New Mexico (59.1%)

Lowest percentage of minority groups

2. New Hampshire (7.2%)

1. Maine (5.1%); Vermont (5.1%)

3. Iowa (10.2%)

Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 2011:Table 19.

And for those who weren’t white? Perhaps the event that best illustrates the racial view of the nation’s founders occurred when Congress passed the Naturalization Act of 1790, declaring that only white immigrants could apply for citizenship. Relationships between the various racial–ethnic groups since the founding of the nation has, at best, been a rocky one.

In Sum: Because Protestant English immigrants settled the colonies, they estab- lished the culture—from the dominant language to the dominant religion. Highly ethnocentric, they regarded as inferior the customs of other groups. Because white Europeans took power, they determined the national agenda to which other ethnic groups had to react and conform. Their institutional and cultural dominance still sets the stage for current ethnic relations.

Latinos (Hispanics) A Note on Terms. Before reviewing major characteristics of Latinos, it is impor- tant to stress that Latino and Hispanic refer not to a race but to ethnic groups. Latinos may identify themselves as black, white, or Native American. Some Latinos who have an African heritage refer to themselves as Afro-Latinos (Navarro 2003).

Numbers, Origins, and Locations. When birds still nested in the trees that would be used to build the Mayflower, Latinos had already established settlements in Florida and New Mexico (Bretos 1994). (As the folks in St. Augustine, Florida, like to say, “When Plymouth Colony was founded, St. Augustine was undergoing urban renewal.”)

Today, Latinos are the largest minority group in the United States. As shown in Figure 9.7, about 32 million people trace their origin to Mexico, 4 million to Puerto

Rico, almost 2 million to Cuba, and about 8 million to Central and South America.

Although Latinos are officially tallied at 47 million, another 9 million Latinos are living here illegally. About 7 million are from Mexico, and the rest from Central and South America (Statistical Abstract 2012:Table 45). Most Latinos are citizens or legal residents, but before our economic crisis each year about 700,000 Latinos were arrested, most as they crossed the border (Statistical Abstract 2012:Table 531). With this vast migration, about 20 million more Latinos live in the United States than Canadians (34 million) live in Canada. As Figure 9.8 shows, two-thirds live in just four states: California, Texas, Florida, and New York.

Our economic crisis, accompanied by sanctions against employers for hiring undocumented workers, has turned the river of migration into a trickle. Now about the same number of people are returning home to Mexico as are coming here to find work (Jordan 2012). The unauthorized entry into the United States aroused pubic concern. One response was the plan to construct a wall along the 2,000-mile border between Mexico and the United States. After building just 53 miles of the wall at the horrendous cost of $1 billion, the wall was cancelled (Preston 2011). Civilian groups such as the Minutemen also patrol the border, but unofficially. To avoid conflict with the U.S. Border Patrol, the Minutemen do not carry guns. A second unofficial group, the Techno Patriots, patrols the border as well, using computers and thermal imag- ing cameras. When they confirm illegal crossings, they call the Border Patrol, whose agents make the arrests (Archibold and Preston 2008; Marino 2008).

FIGURE 9.7 Geographical Origins of

Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 2011:Table 37.

Mexico 31,550,000

66%

Central and South America 7,583,000 16%

Puerto Rico 4,224,000 9%

Cuba 1,647,000 4% Other countries 2,481,000 5%

U.S. Latinos

FIGURE 9.8 Where U.S. Latinos Live

Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 2011:Table 19.

California 28%

Texas 19%

Other States 22%

New York 7%

Illinois 4%

Arizona 4% New Jersey 3%

Colorado 2% New Mexico 2%

Florida 8%

How extensive is illegal immigration? What are some reactions to it?

As immigrants assimilate into a new culture, they learn and adapt new customs. These Muslim girls at an elementary school in Dearborn, Michigan, are in the process of assimilating into U.S. culture.

Racial–Ethnic Relations in the United States 259

Despite walls and patrols, as long as there is a need for unskilled labor and millions of Mexicans live in poverty, undocumented workers will continue to come to the United States. To gain insight into why, see the Cultural Diversity box on the next page.

Spanish Language. The Spanish language distinguishes most Latinos from other U.S. eth- nic groups. With 35 million people speaking Spanish at home, the United States has become one of the largest Spanish-speaking nations in the world (Statistical Abstract 2012:Table 53).

The Illegal Travel Guide

Cultural Diversity in the United States

trip, for wealth beckoned on the other side. He knew people who had been to the United States and spoke glowingly of its opportunities. Manuel, of course, the salesman he was,

stoked the fires of hope. Looking up from the children playing on the dirt floor with chickens peck- ing about them, I saw a man who loved his family. In order to make the desperate bid for a better life, he would suffer an enforced ab- sence, as well as the uncertainties of a foreign culture whose language he did not know.

Juan opened his billfold, took something out, and slowly handed it to me. I looked at it curiously. I felt tears as I saw the tenderness with which he handled this piece of paper. It was his passport to the

land of opportunity: a Social Secu- rity card made out in his name, sent

by a friend who had already made the trip and who was waiting for Juan on the other side of the border.

It was then that I realized that the thousands of Manuels scurrying about Mexico and the millions of Juans they are transporting can never be stopped, for only the United States can fulfill their dreams of a better life.

For Your Consideration↑

The vast stream of immigrants illegally crossing the Mexican–U.S. border has become a national issue. What do you think is the best way to deal with this issue? Why?

How does your social location affect your view?

Manuel was a drinking buddy of Jose, a man I had met in Colima, Mexico. At 45, Manuel was friendly, outgoing, and enterprising.

Manuel, who had lived in the United States for seven years, spoke fluent English. Preferring to live in his home- town in Colima, where he palled around with his childhood friends, Manuel always seemed to have money and free time.

When Manuel invited me to go on a business trip with him, I accepted. I never could figure out what he did for a living or how he could afford a car, a luxury that none of his friends had. As we traveled from one remote village to another, Manuel would sell used cloth- ing that he had heaped in the back of his older-model Ford station wagon.

At one stop, Manuel took me into a dirt-floored, thatched-roof hut. While chickens ran in and out, Manuel whispered to a slen- der man who was about 23 years old. The poverty was overwhelming. Juan, as his name turned out to be, had a partial grade school educa- tion. He also had a wife, four hungry children under the age of 5, and two pigs—his main food supply. Although eager to work, Juan had no job, for there was simply no work available in this remote village.

As we were drinking a Coke, which seems to be the national beverage of Mexico’s poor, Manuel explained to me that he was not only selling clothing—he was also lining up migrants to the United States. For a fee, he would take a man to the border and introduce him to a “wolf,” who would help him cross into the promised land.

When I saw the hope in Juan’s face, I knew nothing would stop him. He was borrowing every cent he could from every friend and relative to scrape the money together. Although he risked losing everything if apprehended and he would be facing unknown risks, Juan would make the

A “coyote” leads two people across the Rio Grande into Texas.

Why has there been extensive illegal immigration from Mexico and South America?

260 CHAPTER 9 Race and Ethnicity

For millions of people, the United States represents a land of opportunity and freedom from oppression. Shown here are Cubans who reached the United States by transforming their 1950s truck into a boat.

Because about half of Latinos are unable to speak English, or can do so only with difficulty, many millions face a major obstacle to getting good jobs.

The growing use of Spanish has stoked controversy (Fund 2007). Perceiving the preva- lence of Spanish as a threat, Senator S. I. Hayakawa of California initiated an “English-only” movement in 1981. The constitutional amendment that he sponsored never got off the ground, but thirty states have passed laws that declare English their official language.

Diversity. For Latinos, country of origin is highly significant. Those from Puerto Rico, for example, feel that they have little in common with people from Mexico, Venezuela, or El Salvador—just as earlier immigrants from Germany, Sweden, and England felt they had little in common with one another. A sign of these divisions is that many refer to themselves in terms of their country of origin, such as puertorrique- ños or cubanos, rather than as Latino or Hispanic.

As with other ethnic groups, Latinos are separated by social class. The half-million Cubans who fled Castro’s rise to power in 1959, for example, were mostly well- educated, well-to-do professionals or businesspeople. In contrast, the “boat people” who fled later were mostly lower-class refugees, people with whom the earlier arrivals would not have associated in Cuba. The earlier arrivals, who are firmly established in Florida and who control many businesses and financial institutions, distance themselves from the more recent immigrants.

With 15.4 percent of the U.S. population, the potential political power of Latinos is remarkable. Several Latinos have been elected governors, and in 2010 Susana Martinez became the first Latina to govern a state (New Mexico). In the Senate, we might expect fifteen U.S. senators to be Latino. But there are only four. In addition, Latinos hold only 5 percent of the seats in the U.S. House of Representatives (Statistical Abstract 2012:Table 413).

As Latinos have become more visible in U.S. society and more vocal in their demands for equality, they have come face to face with African Americans who fear that Latino gains in employment and at the ballot box come at their expense (Hutchinson 2008). This rivalry even shows up in prison, where hostility between Latino and African American gangs some- times escalates into violence (Thompson 2009). (To better understand why, review the experiment with boys at a summer camp on page 251.) If Latinos and African Americans were to work together—since combined they make up more than one-fourth of the U.S. population—their unity would produce an unstoppable political force.

Comparative Conditions. To see how Latinos are doing on major indicators of well-being, look at Table 9.2 on the next page. As you can see, compared with white Americans and Asian Americans, Latinos have less income, higher unemployment,

and more poverty. They are also less likely to own their homes. We get another view if we focus on educa-

tion. In Table 9.3 on the next page, you can see that Latinos are the most likely to drop out of high school and the least likely to graduate from college. In a postindustrial society that increas- ingly requires advanced skills, these totals indicate that huge numbers of Latinos will be left behind.

The umbrella term of Latino (or Hispanic) con- ceals as much as it reveals. To understand compar- ative conditions, we need to also look at people’s country of origin, which remains highly significant not only for self-identity but also for determining life chances. As you can see from Table 9.2, Latinos who trace their roots to Cuba have less poverty and are more likely to own their homes. In contrast, those who trace their origin to Puerto Rico score lower on these indicators of well-being.

How do Latinos rank on major indicators of well-being?

Racial–Ethnic Relations in the United States 261

African Americans It was 1955, in Montgomery, Alabama. As specified by law, whites took the front seats of the bus, and blacks went to the back. As the bus filled up, blacks had to give up their seats to whites.

When Rosa Parks, a 42-year-old African American woman and secretary of the Montgomery NAACP, was told that she would have to stand so that white folks could sit, she refused (Bray 1995). She stubbornly sat there while the bus driver raged and whites felt insulted. Her arrest touched off mass demonstrations, led 50,000 blacks to boycott the city’s buses for a year, and thrust an otherwise unknown preacher into a historic role.

Reverend Martin Luther King, Jr., who had majored in sociology at Morehouse College in Atlanta, Georgia, took control. He organized car pools and preached nonvio- lence. Incensed at this radical organizer and at the stirrings in the normally compliant black community, segregationists also put their beliefs into practice—by bombing the homes of blacks and dynamiting their churches.

TABLE 9.2 Race–Ethnicity and Comparative Well-Being

Income Unemployment Poverty Home Ownership

Racial–Ethnic Group

Median Family Income

Compared to Whites

Percentage Unemployed

Compared to Whites

Percentage Below Poverty Line

Compared to Whites

Percentage Who Own Their Homes

Compared to Whites

Whites $70,835 — 7.3% — 9.3% — 73% — Latinos $43,437 39% lower 10.5% 31% higher 21.3% 129% higher 49% 33% lower Cuba NA1 NA 5.0% 32% higher 16.8% 81% higher 58% 21% lower Central/South America

NA NA NA NA 18.9% 103% higher 40% 45% lower

Mexico NA NA 8.4% 14% higher 24.8% 166% higher 49% 33% lower Puerto Rico NA NA 8.6% 16% higher 25.2% 171% higher 38% 48% lower

African Americans

$41,874 41% lower 12.3% 41% higher 24.1% 159% higher 46% 37% lower

Asian Americans2

$80,101 13% higher 6.6% 10% lower 10.5% 13% higher 60% 14% lower

Native Americans

$43,190 39% lower NA NA 24.2% 160% higher 55% 25% lower

Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 2011:Tables 36, 37, 626.

1Not Available 2Includes Pacific Islanders

TABLE 9.3 Race–Ethnicity and Education

Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 2011:Tables 36, 37, 296, and Figure 9.5 of this text.

Education Completed Doctorates

Racial–Ethnic Group

Less Than High School

High School

Some College

College (BA or Higher)

Number Awarded

Percentage of all U.S. Doctorates1

Percentage of U.S. Population

Whites 9.9% 29.3% 30.0% 19.3% 26,908 57.1 65.6 Latinos 39.2% 25.9% 21.8% 8.9% 2,267 3.6 15.4 African Americans 19.3% 31.4% 31.7% 11.5% 2,604 6.1 12.8 Asian Americans 14.9% 16.0% 19.5% 29.8% 2,734 5.7 4.5 Native Americans 24.3% 30.3% 32.5% 8.7% 127 0.4 1.0

1Percentage after the doctorates awarded to nonresidents are deducted from the total.

How do the racial-ethnic groups compare on indicators of well-being, including education?

262 CHAPTER 9 Race and Ethnicity

Until the 1960s, the South’s public facilities were segregated. Some were reserved for whites, others for blacks. This apartheid was broken by blacks and whites who worked together and risked their lives to bring about a fairer society. Shown here is a 1963 sit-in at a Woolworth’s lunch counter in Jackson, Mississippi. Sugar, ketchup, and mustard are being poured over the heads of the demonstrators.

After slavery was abolished, the Southern states passed legislation (Jim Crow laws) to segregate blacks and whites. In 1896, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in Plessy v. Ferguson that it was a reasonable use of state power to require “separate but equal” accommodations for blacks. Whites used this ruling to strip blacks of the political power they had gained after the Civil War. Declaring political primaries to be “white,” they prohibited blacks from voting in them. Not until 1944 did the Supreme Court rule that political primaries weren’t “white” and were open to all voters. White politicians then passed laws that only people who could read could vote—and they determined that most African Americans were illiterate. Not until 1954 did African Americans gain the legal right to attend the same public schools as whites, and, as recounted in the vignette on page 261, even later to sit where they wanted on a bus.

Rising Expectations and Civil Strife. The barriers came down, but they came down slowly. In 1964, Congress passed the Civil Rights Act, making it illegal to discriminate on the basis of race. African Americans were finally allowed in “white” restaurants, hotels, theaters, and other public places. Then in 1965, Congress passed the Voting Rights Act, banning the fraudulent literacy tests that the Southern states had used to keep African Americans from voting.

African Americans then experienced what sociologists call rising expectations. They expected that these sweeping legal changes would usher in better conditions in life. In contrast, the lives of the poor among them changed little, if at all. Frustrations built up, exploding in Watts in 1965, when people living in that ghetto of central Los Angeles

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Racial–Ethnic Relations in the United States 263

In 2009, Barack Obama was sworn in as the 44th president of the United States. He is the first minority to achieve this political office.

took to the streets in the first of what were termed the urban revolts. When a white supremacist assassinated King on April 4, 1968, inner cities across the nation erupted in fiery violence. Under threat of the destruction of U.S. cities, Congress passed the sweeping Civil Rights Act of 1968.

Continued Gains. Since then, African Americans have made remarkable gains in politics, education, and jobs. At 9 percent, the number of African Americans in the U.S. House of Representatives is two to three times what it was a generation ago (Statistical Abstract 1989:Table 423; 2012:Table 413). As college enrollments increased, the middle class expanded, and today 40 percent of all African American families make more than $50,000 a year. One in four earns more than $75,000, and one in eight over $100,000 (Statistical Abstract 2012:Table 696).

African Americans have become prominent in politics. Jesse Jackson (another sociology major) competed for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1984 and 1988. In 1989, L. Douglas Wilder was elected governor of Virginia, and in 2006 Deval Patrick became governor of Massachusetts. These accomplishments, of course, pale in comparison to the election of Barack Obama as president of the United States in 2008.

Current Losses. Despite these remarkable gains, African Americans continue to lag behind in politics, economics, and education. Only one U.S. senator is African American, many fewer than the twelve or thirteen we would expect based on the per- centage of African Americans in the U.S. population. As Tables 9.2 and 9.3 on page 261 show, African Americans average only 59 percent of white income, experience much more unemployment and poverty, and are less likely to own their homes or to have college educations. That two of five of African American families have incomes over $50,000 is only part of the story. Table 9.4 shows the other part—that one of every five or six African American families makes less than $15,000 a year.

The upward mobility of millions of African Americans into the middle class has created two worlds of African American experience—one educated and affluent, the other uneducated and poor. Concentrated among the poor are those with the least hope, the most despair, and the violence that so often dominates the evening news. Although homicide rates have dropped to their lowest point in thirty-five years, African Americans are six times more likely to be murdered than whites (Statistical Abstract 2012:Table 312).

Race or Social Class? A Sociological Debate. This division of African Americans into “haves” and “have-nots” has fueled a sociological controversy (Landry and Marsh 2011). Sociologist William Julius Wilson (1978, 2000, 2007) argues that social class has become more important than race in determining the life chances of African Americans. Before civil rights legislation, he says, the African American experience was domi- nated by race. Throughout the United States, African Americans were excluded from avenues of

What are current gains and losses of African Americans? What is the debate on race or social class?

Source: By the author: Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 2012:Table 695.

TABLE 9.4 Race–Ethnicity and Income Extremes

Less than $15,000 Over $100,000

Asian Americans 6.9% 37.7% Whites 7.2% 27.0% African Americans 17.9% 12.1% Latinos 15.3% 12.4%

Note: These are family incomes. Only these groups are listed in the source.

264 CHAPTER 9 Race and Ethnicity

economic advancement: good schools and good jobs. When civil rights laws opened new opportunities, African Americans seized them. Just as legislation began to open doors to African Americans, however, manufacturing jobs dried up, and many blue-collar jobs were moved to the suburbs. As better-educated

African Americans obtained white-collar jobs, they moved out of the inner city. Left behind were those with poor education and few skills.

Wilson stresses how significant these two worlds of African American experience are. The group that is stuck in the inner city lives in poverty,

attends poor schools, and faces dead-end jobs or welfare. This group is filled with hopelessness and despair, combined with apathy or hostil- ity. In contrast, those who have moved up the social class ladder live in comfortable homes in secure neighborhoods. Their jobs provide decent incomes, and they send their children to good schools. With

middle-class experiences shaping their views on life, their aspirations and values have little in common with those of African Americans who

remain poor. According to Wilson, then, social class—not race—is the more significant factor in the lives of African Americans.

Some sociologists reply that this analysis overlooks the discrimination that continues to underlie the African American experience. They note that African Americans who do the same work as whites average less pay (Willie 1991; Herring 2002) and even receive fewer tips (Lynn et al. 2008). This, they argue, points to racial discrimination, not to social class.

What is the answer to this debate? Wilson would reply that it is not an either-or question. My book is titled The Declining Significance of Race, he would say, not The Absence of Race. Certainly racism is still alive, he would add, but today social class is more central to the African American experience than is racial discrimination. He stresses that we need to provide jobs for the poor in the inner city—for work pro- vides an anchor to a responsible life (Wilson 1996, 2007).

Racism as an Everyday Burden.

Researchers sent out 5,000 résumés in response to help wanted ads in the Boston and Chicago Sunday papers. The résumés were identical, except some applicants had white- sounding names, such as Emily and Brandon, while others had black-sounding names, such as Lakisha and Jamal. Although the qualifications of these supposed job applicants were identical, the white-sounding names elicited 50 percent more callbacks than the black-sounding names (Bertrand and Mullainathan 2002).

Certainly racism continues as a regular feature of society, often something that whites, not subjected to it, are only vaguely aware of. But for those on the receiving end, racism can be an everyday burden. Here is how an African American professor describes his experiences:

[One problem with] being black in America is that you have to spend so much time thinking about stuff that most white people just don’t even have to think about. I worry when I get pulled over by a cop. . . . I worry what some white cop is going to think when he walks over to our car, because he’s holding on to a gun. And I’m very aware of how many black folks accidentally get shot by cops. I worry when I walk into a store, that someone’s going to think I’m in there shoplifting. . . . And I get resentful that I have to think about things that a lot of people, even my very close white friends whose politics are similar to mine, simply don’t have to worry about. (Feagin 1999:398)

Asian Americans I have stressed in this chapter that our racial–ethnic categories are based more on social factors than on biological ones. This point is again obvious when we examine the cate- gory Asian American. As Figure 9.9 shows, those who are called Asian Americans came to the United States from many nations. With no unifying culture or “race,” why should

How is racism an everyday burden for African Americans? Why is “Asian American” a diverse category?

Sociologists disagree about the relative significance of race and social class in determining social and economic conditions of African Americans. William Julius Wilson, shown here, is an avid proponent of the social class side of this debate.

Racial–Ethnic Relations in the United States 265

China 23%

India 19%

Philippines 18%

Korea 10% Vietnam

11%

Japan 5%

Other Countries

14%

Source: By the author. Based on U.S. Census Bureau 2010.

FIGURE 9.9 Countries of Origin of Asian Americans

What is the background of discrimination of Asian Americans? What are the reasons for their success?

people from so many backgrounds be clustered together and assigned a single label? Think about it. What culture or race–ethnicity do Samoans and Vietnamese have in common? Or Laotians and Pakistanis? Or people from Guam and those from China? Those from Japan and those from India? Yet all these groups—and more—are lumped together and called Asian Americans. Apparently, the U.S. government is not satisfied until it is able to pigeonhole everyone into some racial–ethnic category.

Since Asian American is a standard term, however, let’s look at the characteristics of the 14 million people who are lumped together and assigned this label.

A Background of Discrimination.

Lured by gold strikes in the West and an urgent need for unskilled work- ers to build the railroads, 200,000 Chinese immigrated between 1850 and 1880. When the famous golden spike was driven at Promontory, Utah, in 1869 to mark the completion of the railroad to the West Coast, white workers prevented Chinese workers from being in the photo—even though Chinese made up 90 percent of Central Pacific Railroad’s labor force (Hsu 1971).

After the railroad was complete, the Chinese competed with whites for other jobs. Anglos then formed vigilante groups to intimidate them. They also used the law. California’s 1850 Foreign Miners Act required Chinese (and Latinos) to pay $20 a month in order to work—when wages were a dollar a day. The California Supreme Court ruled that Chinese could not testify against whites (Carlson and Colburn 1972). In 1882, Congress passed the Chinese Exclusion Act, suspending all Chinese immigration for ten years. Four years later, the Statue of Liberty was dedicated. The tired, the poor, and the huddled masses it was intended to welcome were obviously not Chinese.

When immigrants from Japan arrived, they encountered spillover bigotry, a stereotype that lumped Asians together, depicting them as sneaky, lazy, and untrustworthy. After Japan attacked Pearl Harbor in 1941, conditions grew worse for the 110,000 Japanese Americans who called the United States their home. U.S. authorities feared that Japan would invade the United States and that the Japanese Americans would fight on Japan’s side. They also feared that Japanese Americans would sabotage military installations on the West Coast. Although no Japanese American had been involved in even a single act of sabotage, on February 19, 1942, President Franklin D. Roosevelt ordered that everyone who was one-eighth Japanese or more be confined in detention centers (called “internment camps”). These people were charged with no crime, and they had no trials. Japanese ancestry was sufficient cause for being imprisoned.

Diversity. As you can see from Tables 9.2 and 9.4 on pages 261 and 263, the income of Asian Americans has outstripped that of all groups, including whites. This has led to the stereotype that all Asian Americans are successful. Are they? Their poverty rate is actu- ally higher than that of whites, as you can also see from Table 9.2. As with Latinos, country of origin is significant: Poverty is unusual among Chinese and Japanese Americans, but it clusters among Americans from Southeast Asia. Altogether, between 1 and 2 million Asian Americans live in poverty.

Reasons for Success. The high average incomes of Asian Americans can be traced to three major factors: family life, educational achieve- ment, and assimilation into mainstream culture. Of all ethnic groups,

Of the racial–ethnic groups in the United States, Asian Americans have the highest rate of intermarriage.

266 CHAPTER 9 Race and Ethnicity

This depiction breaks stereotypes, but is historically accurate. Shown here is an Iroquois fort. Can you guess who the attackers are?

including whites, Asian American children are the most likely to grow up with two parents and the least likely to be born to either a teenaged or single mother (Statistical Abstract 2012:Tables 69, 86). Common in these families is a stress on self-discipline, thrift, and hard work (Suzuki 1985; Bell 1991). This early socialization provides strong impetus for the other two factors.

The second factor is their unprecedented rate of college graduation. As Table 9.3 on page 261 shows, 50 percent of Asian Americans complete college. To realize how stunning this is, compare their rate with those of the other groups shown on this table. Educational achievement, in turn, opens doors to economic success.

The most striking indication of the third factor, assimilation, is a high rate of inter- marriage. Of Asian Americans who graduate from college, about 40 percent of the men and 60 percent of the women marry a non–Asian American (Qian and Lichter 2007). The intermarriage of Japanese Americans is so extensive that two of every three of their children have one parent who is not of Japanese descent (Schaefer 2012). The Chinese are close behind (Alba and Nee 2003).

Asian Americans are becoming more prominent in politics. With more than half of its citizens being Asian American, Hawaii has elected Asian American governors and sent several Asian American senators to Washington, including the two now serving there (Lee 1998; Statistical Abstract 2012:Table 413). The first Asian American governor outside of Hawaii was Gary Locke, who served from 1997 to 2005 as governor of Washington, a state in which Asian Americans make up less than 6 percent of the population. In 2008 in Louisiana, Piyush Jindal became the first Indian American governor.

Native Americans “I don’t go so far as to think that the only good Indians are dead Indians, but I believe nine out of ten are—and I shouldn’t inquire too closely in the case of the tenth. The most vicious cowboy has more moral principle than the average Indian.”

—Teddy Roosevelt, 1886 (President of the United States 1901–1909)

Diversity of Groups. This quote from Teddy Roosevelt provides insight into the rampant racism of earlier generations. Yet, even today, thanks to countless grade B Westerns, some Americans view the original inhabitants of what became the United States as uncivilized savages, a single group of people subdivided into separate tribes.

The European immigrants to the colonies, however, encountered diverse groups of people who spoke over 700 languages. Their variety of cultures ranged from nomadic hunters and gatherers to farm- ers who lived in wooden houses (Schaefer 2004). Each group had its own norms and values—and the usual ethnocentric pride in its own culture.

Native Americans, who numbered about 10 million, had no immunity to the diseases the Europeans brought with them. With deaths due to disease—and warfare, a much lesser cause—their population plummeted. The low point came in 1890, when the cen- sus reported only 250,000 Native Americans. If the census and the estimate of the original population are accurate, Native Americans had been reduced to about one-fortieth their original size. The population has never recov- ered, but Native Americans now number

Why is the term Native American (or Indian), like the term Latino, an umbrella term (refers to diverse peoples)?

Racial–Ethnic Relations in the United States 267

about 3 million (see Figure 9.5 on p. 256). Native Americans, who today speak 150 different languages, do not think of themselves as a single people who fit neatly within a single label (McLemore 1994).

From Treaties to Genocide and Population Transfer. At first, the Native Americans tried to accommodate the strangers, since there was plenty of land for both the few newcomers and themselves. Soon, however, the settlers began to raid Indian villages and pillage their food supplies (Horn 2006). As wave after wave of settlers arrived, Pontiac, an Ottawa chief, saw the future—and didn’t like it. He convinced several tribes to unite in an effort to push the Europeans into the sea. He almost succeeded, but failed when the English were reinforced by fresh troops (McLemore 1994).

A pattern of deception evolved. The U.S. government would make treaties to buy some of a tribe’s land, with the promise to honor forever the tribe’s right to what it had not sold. European immigrants, who continued to pour into the United States, would then disregard these boundaries. The tribes would resist, with death tolls on both sides. The U.S. government would then intervene—not to enforce the treaty it had made, but to force the tribe off its lands. In its relentless drive westward, the U.S. government embarked on a policy of genocide. It assigned the U.S. cavalry the task of “pacifica- tion,” which translated into slaughtering Native Americans who “stood in the way” of this territorial expansion.

The acts of cruelty perpetrated by the Europeans against Native Americans appear endless, but two are especially notable. The first is the Trail of Tears. The U.S. gov- ernment adopted a policy of population transfer (see Figure 9.3 on p. 254), which it called Indian Removal. The goal was to confine Native Americans to specified areas called reservations. In the winter of 1838–1839, the U.S. Army rounded up 15,000 Cherokees and forced them to walk a thousand miles from the Carolinas and Georgia to Oklahoma. Conditions were so brutal that about 4,000 of those who were forced to make this midwinter march died along the way. The second, the symbolic end of Native American resistance to the European expansion, took place in 1890 at Wounded Knee, South Dakota. There, the U.S. cavalry gunned down 300 men, women, and children of the Dakota Sioux tribe. After the massacre, the soldiers threw the bodies into a mass grave (Thornton 1987; Lind 1995; DiSilvestro 2006).

The Invisible Minority and Self-Determination. Native Americans can truly be called the invisible minority. Because about half live in rural areas and one-third in just three states—Oklahoma, California, and Arizona—most other Americans are hardly aware of a Native American presence in the United States. The isolation of about half of Native Americans on reservations further reduces their visibility (Schaefer 2012).

The systematic attempts of European Americans to destroy the Native Americans’ way of life and their forced resettlement onto reservations continue to have deleterious effects. The rate of suicide among Native Americans is high, and their life expectancy is lower than that of the nation as a whole (Murray et al. 2006; Crosby et al. 2011). Table 9.3 on page 261 shows that their educational attainment also lags behind most groups: Only 13 percent graduate from college.

Native Americans are experiencing major changes. In the 1800s, U.S. courts ruled that Native Americans did not own the land on which they had been settled and had no right to develop its resources. They made Native Americans wards of the state, and the Bureau of Indian Affairs treated them like children (Mohawk 1991; Schaefer 2012). Then, in the 1960s, Native Americans won a series of legal victories that gave them control over reservation lands. With this legal change, many Native American tribes have opened businesses—ranging from fish canneries to industrial parks that serve metropolitan areas. The Skywalk, opened by the Hualapai, which offers breath- taking views of the Grand Canyon, gives an idea of the varieties of businesses to come (Lacey 2011).

What major issues do Native Americans face?

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268 CHAPTER 9 Race and Ethnicity

©Sidney Harris, SciencecartoonsPIus.com

What is pan-Indianism? What is the immigration debate?

It is the casinos, though, that have attracted the most attention. In 1988, the federal government passed a law that allowed Native Americans to operate gambling establish- ments on reservations. Now over 200 tribes have casinos. They bring in $26 billion a year, more than all the casinos in Las Vegas (Pratt 2011; Statistical Abstract 2012:Table 1258). The Oneida tribe of New York, which has only 1,000 members, runs a casino that nets $232,000 a year for each man, woman, and child (Peterson 2003). This huge amount, however, pales in comparison with that of the Mashantucket Pequot tribe of Connecticut. With only 700 members, the tribe brings in more than $2 million a day just from slot machines (Rivlin 2007). Incredibly, one tribe has only one member: She has her own casino (Bartlett and Steele 2002).

One of the most significant changes for Native Americans is pan-Indianism. This emphasis on common elements that run through their cultures is an attempt to devel- op an identity that goes beyond the tribe. Pan-Indianism (“We are all Indians”) is a remarkable example of the plasticity of ethnicity. It embraces and substitutes for individ- ual tribal identities the label “Indian”—originally imposed by Spanish and Italian sail- ors who thought they had reached the shores of India. As sociologist Irwin Deutscher (2002:61) put it, “The peoples who have accepted the larger definition of who they are, have, in fact, little else in common with each other than the stereotypes of the domi- nant group which labels them.”

Looking Toward the Future Back in 1903, sociologist W. E. B. Du Bois said, “The problem of the twentieth cen- tury is the problem of the color line—the relation of the darker to the lighter races.” Incredibly, over a hundred years later, the color line remains one of the most volatile topics facing the United States. From time to time, the color line takes on a different complexion, as with the war on terrorism and the corresponding discrimination directed

against people of Middle Eastern descent. In another hundred years, will yet another sociologist lament that the

color of people’s skin still affects human relationships? Given our past, it seems that although racial–ethnic walls will diminish, some even crumbling,

the color line is not likely to disappear. Let’s close this chapter by look- ing at two issues we are currently grappling with, immigration and affirmative action.

The Immigration Debate Throughout its history, the United States has both welcomed immigration and feared its consequences. The gates opened wide (numerically, if not in attitude) for waves of immigrants in the 1800s and early 1900s. During the past twenty years, a new wave of immigration has brought close to a million new resi- dents to the United States each year. Today, more immigrants

(38 million) live in the United States than at any other time in the country’s history (Statistical Abstract 2007:Table 5; 2012:Table 40).

In contrast to earlier waves, in which immigrants came almost exclusively from western Europe, the current wave of immigrants is so diverse that it is changing the U.S. racial– ethnic mix. If current trends in immigration (and birth) persist, in about fifty years the “average” American will trace his or her ancestry to Africa, Asia, South America, the Pacific Islands, the Middle East—almost anywhere but white Europe. This change is discussed in the Cultural Diversity box on the next page.

Looking Toward the Future 269

In some states, the future is arriving much sooner than this. In California, racial– ethnic minorities have become the majority. California has 21 million minorities and 15 million whites (Statistical Abstract 2012:Table 18). Californians who request new telephone service from Pacific Bell can speak to customer service representatives in Spanish, Korean, Vietnamese, Mandarin, Cantonese—or English.

During the next twenty-five years, the population of the United States is expected to grow by about 22 percent. To see what the U.S. population will look like at that time, can we simply add 22 percent to our current racial–ethnic mix? The answer is a resounding no. As you can see from Figure 9.10, some groups will grow much more than others, giving us a different-looking United States. Some of the changes in the U.S. racial–ethnic mix will be dramatic. In twenty-five years, one of every nineteen Americans is expected to have an Asian background, and in the most dramatic change, almost one of four is expected to be of Latino ancestry.

The basic causes of this fundamental shift are the racial–ethnic groups’ different rates of immigration and birth. Both will change the groups’ proportions of the U.S. population, but immigration is by far the more important. From Figure 9.10, you can see that the proportion of non-Hispanic whites is expected to shrink, that of Native Americans and African Americans to remain about the same, and that of Latinos to increase sharply.

For Your Consideration↑

This shifting racial–ethnic mix is one of the most significant events occurring in the United States. To better understand its implications, apply the three theoretical perspectives.

Glimpsing the Future: The Shifting U.S. Racial–Ethnic Mix

Cultural Diversity in the United States

Use the conflict perspective to identify the groups that are likely to be threatened by this change. Over what resources are struggles likely to develop? What impact do you think this changing mix might have on European Americans? On Latinos? On African Americans? On Asian Americans? On Native Americans? What changes in immigration laws (or their enforcement) can you anticipate?

To apply the symbolic interactionist perspective, con- sider how groups might perceive one another differently as their proportions of the population change. How do you think that these changed perceptions will affect people’s behavior?

To apply the functionalist perspective, try to determine how each racial–ethnic group will benefit from this chang- ing mix. How will other parts of society (such as businesses) benefit? What functions and dysfunctions can you anticipate for politics, economics, education, or religion?

European descent Latinos African Americans Asian Americans Native Americans Claim membership in two or more groups

Year 2000 281 million

69.4%

12.5% 12.1%

3.7% 0.7% 1.6%

Year 2025 357 million

59.3%

20.2% 12.4% 5.1%

0.8% 5.9%

2.1%

Year 2050 439 million

49.9%

27.8%

12.2%

0.8% 3.2%

Source: By the author. Based on U.S. Census Bureau 2009; Statistical Abstract of the United States 2012:Table 12. I modified the projections based on the new census category of membership in two or more groups and trends in interethnic marriage.

FIGURE 9.10 Projections of the Racial–Ethnic Makeup of the U.S. Population

What changes in the U.S. racial–ethnic mix are in process? Why?

270 CHAPTER 9 Race and Ethnicity

As in the past, there is concern that “too many” immigrants will change the char- acter of the United States. “Throughout the history of U.S. immigration,” write sociologists Alejandro Portés and Rubén Rumbaut (1990), “a consistent thread has been the fear that the ‘alien element’ would somehow undermine the institutions of the country and would lead it down the path of disintegration and decay.” A hundred years ago, the widespread fear was that the immigrants from southern Europe would bring communism with them. Today, some fear that Spanish-speaking immigrants threaten the primacy of the English language. In addition, the age-old fear that immigrants will take jobs away from native-born Americans remains strong. Finally, minority groups that struggled for political representation fear that newer groups will gain political power at their expense.

Affirmative Action Affirmative action in our multicultural society lies at the center of a national debate about racial–ethnic relations. In this policy, initiated by President Kennedy in 1961, goals based on race (and sex) are used in hiring, promotion, and college admission. Sociologist Barbara Reskin (1998) examined the results of affirmative action. She concluded that although it is difficult to separate the results of affirmative action from economic booms and busts and the greater numbers of women in the work- force, affirmative action has had a modest impact.

The results may have been modest, but the reactions to this program have been anything but modest. Affirmative action has been at the center of controversy for two generations. Liberals, both white and minority, say that this program is the most direct way to level the playing field of economic opportunity. If whites are passed over, this is an unfortunate cost that we must pay if we are to make up for past discrimination. In contrast, conservatives, both white and minority, agree that opportunity should be open to all, but claim that putting race (or sex) ahead of an individual’s training and ability to perform a job is reverse discrimination. Because

of their race (or sex), qualified people who had nothing to do with past inequality are discriminated against. They add that affir- mative action stigmatizes the people who benefit from it, because it suggests that they hold their jobs because of race (or sex), rather than merit.

This national debate crystallized with a series of controversial rulings. One of the most significant was Proposition 209, a 1996 amendment to the California state constitution. This amendment made it illegal to give preference to minorities and women in hiring, promotion, and college admissions. Despite appeals by a coalition of civil rights groups, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld this California law.

A second significant ruling was made by the U.S. Supreme Court in 2003. White students who had been denied admission to the University of Michigan claimed that they had been discriminated against because less qualified applicants had been admitted on the basis of their race. The Court ruled that universities can give minorities an edge in admissions, but there must be a meaningful review

The United States is the most racially– ethnically diverse society in the world. This can be our central strength, with our many groups working together to build a harmonious society, a stellar example for the world. Or it can be our Achilles heel, with us breaking into feuding groups, a Balkanized society that marks an ill-fitting end to a grand social experiment. Our reality will probably fall somewhere between these extremes.

What is affirmative action? Why is it controversial?

Looking Toward the Future 271

of individual applicants. Mechanical systems, such as giving extra points because of race, are unconstitutional. This murky message, which satisfied no one, as no one knew what it really meant, is being challenged (Liptak 2010).

To remove ambiguity, opponents of affirmative action put amendments to several state constitutions on the ballot. The amendments, which make it illegal for public institutions to even consider race or sex in hiring, in awarding contracts, or in college admissions, failed in some states, such as Colorado, but became law in Michigan and Nebraska (Lewin 2007; Kaufman and Fields 2008).

With constitutional battles continuing and people feeling that they are being discrimi- nated against (Norton and Sommers 2011), the issue of affirmative action in a multicultural society is likely to remain center stage for quite some time.

Toward a True Multicultural Society The United States has the potential to become a society in which racial–ethnic groups not only coexist, but also respect one another—and thrive—as they work together for mutually beneficial goals. In a true multicultural society, the minor- ity groups that make up the United States would participate fully in the nation’s social institutions while maintaining their cultural integrity. Reaching this goal will require that we understand that “the biological differences that divide one race from another add up to a drop in the genetic ocean.” For a long time, we have given racial categories an importance they never merited. Now we need to figure out how to reduce them to the irrelevance they deserve. In short, we need to make real the abstraction called equality that we profess to believe (Cose 2000).

Percentage of Americans who claim membership in these groups:

European descent

NOW

65% 2000

69% 2050

50%

Latino descent

2000

13% NOW

15% 2050

28%

African descent

NOW

13% 2000

12% 2050

12%

Asian descent

2050

5.9% 2000

3.7% NOW

4.5%

Native American descent

2000

0.7% NOW

1.0% 2050

0.8%

What is needed to have a true multicultural society?

272 CHAPTER 9 Race and Ethnicity

Laying the Sociological Foundation How is race both a reality and a myth? In the sense that different groups inherit distinctive physical traits, race is a reality. There is no agreement regarding what constitutes a particular race, however, or even how many races there are. In the sense of one race being superior to another and of there being pure races, race is a myth. The idea of race is powerful, shaping basic relationships among people. Pp. 240–242.

How do race and ethnicity differ? Race refers to inherited biological characteristics; ethnicity, to cultural ones. Members of ethnic groups identify with one another on the basis of common ancestry and cultural heritage. Pp. 242–243.

What are minority and dominant groups? Minority groups are people who are singled out for un- equal treatment by members of the dominant group, the group with more power and privilege. Minorities originate with migration or the expansion of political boundaries. Pp. 243–244.

What heightens ethnic identity, and what is “ethnic work”? A group’s relative size, power, physical characteristics, and amount of discrimination heighten or reduce ethnic identity. Ethnic work is the process of constructing and maintaining an ethnic identity. For people without a firm ethnic identity, ethnic work is an attempt to recover one’s ethnic heritage. For those with strong ties to their culture of origin, ethnic work involves enhancing group distinctions. Pp. 244–245.

Prejudice and Discrimination Why are people prejudiced? Prejudice is an attitude, and discrimination is an action. Like other attitudes, prejudice is learned in association with others. Prejudice is so extensive that people can show preju- dice against groups that don’t even exist. Minorities also internalize the dominant norms, and some show prejudice against their own group. Pp. 245–247.

How do individual and institutional discrimination differ? Individual discrimination is the negative treatment of one person by another, while institutional discrimination is negative treatment that is built into social institutions. Institutional discrimination can occur without the aware- ness of either the perpetrator or the object of discrimination. Discrimination in health care is one example. Pp. 247–249.

Theories of Prejudice How do psychologists explain prejudice? Psychological theories of prejudice stress the authoritarian personality and frustration displaced toward scapegoats. Pp. 250–251. How do sociologists explain prejudice? Sociological theories focus on how different social environ- ments increase or decrease prejudice. Functionalists stress the benefits and costs that come from discrimination. Con- flict theorists look at how the groups in power exploit racial– ethnic divisions in order to control workers and maintain power. Symbolic interactionists stress how labels create selec- tive perception and self-fulfilling prophecies. Pp. 251–253.

Global Patterns of Intergroup Relations What are the major patterns of minority and dominant group relations? Beginning with the least humane, they are genocide, population transfer, internal colonialism, segregation, assimilation, and multiculturalism (pluralism). Pp. 253–255.

Racial–Ethnic Relations in the United States What are the major racial–ethnic groups in the United States? From largest to smallest, the major groups are European Americans, Latinos, African Americans, Asian Americans, and Native Americans. Pp. 255–257.

Summary and Review9CHAPTE R

Summary and Review 273

Thinking Critically about Chapter 9 1. How many races do your friends or family think there

are? Do they think that one race is superior to the others? What do you think their reaction would be to the socio- logical position that racial categories are primarily social?

2. A hundred years ago, sociologist W. E. B. Du Bois said, “The problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color line—the relation of the darker to the lighter

races.” Why do you think that the color line remains one of the most volatile topics facing the nation?

3. If you were appointed head of the U.S. Civil Service Commission, what policies would you propose to reduce racial–ethnic strife in the United States? Be ready to explain the sociological principles that might give your proposals a higher chance of success.

What are some issues in racial–ethnic relations and characteristics of minority groups? Latinos are divided by social class and country of origin. African Americans are increasingly divided into middle and lower classes, with two sharply contrasting worlds of experience. On many measures, Asian Americans are bet- ter off than white Americans, but their well-being varies with their country of origin. For Native Americans, the primary issues are poverty, nationhood, and settling treaty

obligations. The overarching issue for minorities is over- coming discrimination. Pp. 257–268.

Looking Toward the Future What main issues dominate U.S. racial–ethnic relations? The main issues are immigration, affirmative action, and how to develop a true multicultural society. The answers affect our future. Pp. 268–271.

Gender and Age10CHAPTE R

In Tunis, the capital of Tunisia, on Africa’s north- ern coast, I met some U.S. college students and spent a couple of days with them. They wanted to see the city’s red light district, but I wondered whether it would be worth the trip. I already had seen other red light districts, including the unusual one in Amsterdam where a bronze statue of a female prostitute lets you know you’ve entered the area; the state licenses the women and men, requiring that they have medical checkups (certificates must be posted); and the prostitutes add sales tax to the receipts they give customers. The prostitutes sit behind lighted picture windows while customers stroll along the nar- row canal side streets and do “window shopping” from the out- side. Tucked among the brothels are day care centers, bakeries, and clothing stores. Amsterdam itself is an unusual place—in cafes, you can smoke marijuana but not tobacco.

I decided to go with them. We ended up on a wharf that extended into the Mediterranean. Each side was lined with a row of one-room wooden shacks, crowded one against the next. In front of each open door stood a young woman. Peering from outside into the dark inte- riors, I could see that each door led to a tiny room with an old, well-worn bed.

The wharf was crowded with men who were eyeing the women. Many of the men wore sailor uniforms from countries that I couldn’t identify.

As I looked more closely, I could see that some of the women had runny sores on their legs. Incredibly, with such vis- ible evidence of their disease, customers still sought them out.

With a sick feeling in my stomach and the desire to vomit, I kept a good distance between the beckoning women and myself. One tour of the two-block area was more than sufficient.

Somewhere nearby, out of sight, I knew that there were men whose wealth derived from exploiting these women who were condemned to live short lives punctuated by fear and misery.

The prostitutes sit behind lighted picture windows while cus- tomers stroll along the narrow canal side streets and do “win- dow shopping” from the outside.

Afghanistan

276 CHAPTER 10 Gender and Age

Differences in how we display gender often lie below our awareness. How males and females use social space is an example. In this unposed photo from Grand Central Station in New York City, you can see how males tend to sprawl out, females to enclose themselves. Why do you think this difference exists? Biology? Socialization? Both?

In the previous chapter, we considered how race–ethnicity affects people’s well-being and their position in society. In this chapter, we examine gender stratification—males’ and females’ unequal access to property, power, and prestige.

We also explore the prejudice and discrimination directed to people because of their age. Gender and age are especially significant because, like race–ethnicity, they are master statuses; that is, they cut across all aspects of social life. We all are labeled male or female and are assigned an age category. These labels are powerful, because they convey images and expectations about how we should act and serve as a basis of power and privilege.

Inequalities of Gender Let’s begin by considering the distinctions between sex and gender.

Issues of Sex and Gender When we consider how females and males differ, the first thing that usually comes to mind is sex, the biological characteristics that distinguish males and females. Primary sex characteristics consist of a vagina or a penis and other organs related to reproduction. Secondary sex characteristics are the physical distinctions between males and females that are not directly connected with reproduction. These characteristics become clearly evident at puberty when males develop larger muscles, lower voices, more body hair, and greater height, while females develop breasts and form more fatty tissue and broader hips.

Gender, in contrast, is a social, not a biological, characteristic. Gender consists of whatever behaviors and attitudes a group considers proper for its males and females. Sex refers to male or female, and gender refers to masculinity or femininity. In short, you inherit your sex, but you learn your gender as you learn the behaviors and attitudes your culture asserts are appropriate for your sex.

As the photo montage on the next page illustrates, the expectations associated with gender differ around the world. They vary so greatly that some sociologists suggest that we replace the terms masculinity and femininity with masculinities and femininities.

The Sociological Significance of Gender. The sociological significance of gender is that it is a device by which society controls its members. Gender sorts us, on the basis of sex, into different life experiences. It opens and closes doors to property, power, and prestige. Like social class, gender is a structural feature of society.

Before examining inequalities of gender, let’s consider why the behaviors of men and women differ.

Gender Differences in Behavior: Biology or Culture? Why are most males more aggressive than most females? Why do women enter “nurturing” occupations, such as teach- ing young children and nursing, in far greater numbers than men? To answer such questions, many people respond with some variation of “They’re just born that way.”

Is this the correct answer? Certainly biology plays a signifi- cant role in our lives. Each of us begins as a fertilized egg. The egg, or ovum, is contributed by our mother, the sperm that fertilizes the egg by our father. At the very instant the egg is fer- tilized, our sex is determined. Each of us receives twenty-three chromosomes from the ovum and twenty-three from the sperm. The egg has an X chromosome. If the sperm that fertilizes the egg also has an X chromosome, the result is a girl (XX). If the sperm has a Y chromosome, the result is a boy (XY).

How do sex and gender differ?

Read

Night to His Day: The Social

Construction of Gender by

Judith Lorber on mysoclab.com

Issues of Sex and Gender 277

Standards of Gender

Each human group determines its ideas of “maleness” and “femaleness.” As you can see from these photos of four women and four men, standards of gender are arbitrary and vary from one culture to another. Yet, in its ethno centrism, each group thinks that its preferences refl ect what gender “really” is. As indicated here, around the world men and women try to make them selves appealing by aspiring to their group’s standards of gender. Jordan

Kenya

Tibet

Ethiopia

India

Mexico

New Guinea

Brazil

How does gender depend on culture?

278 CHAPTER 10 Gender and Age

The Dominant Position in Sociology. That’s the biology. Now, the sociological question is, Does this biological difference control our behavior? Does it, for example, make females more nurturing and submissive and males more aggressive and domineer- ing? Here is the quick sociological answer: The dominant sociological position is that social factors, not biology, are the reasons people do what they do.

Let’s apply this position to gender. If biology were the principal factor in human behavior, all around the world we would find women behaving in one way and men in another. Men and women would be just like male spiders and female spiders, whose genes tell them what to do. In fact, however, ideas of gender vary greatly from one cul- ture to another—and, as a result, so do male–female behaviors.

Despite this, to see why the door to biology is opening just slightly in sociology, let’s consider a medical accident and a study of Vietnam veterans.

Opening the Door to Biology A Medical Accident.

In 1963, 7-month-old identical twin boys were taken to a doctor for a routine circumci- sion. The physician, not the most capable person in the world, was using a heated needle. He turned the electric current too high and accidentally burned off the penis of one of the boys.

You can imagine the parents’ disbelief—and then their horror—as the truth sank in. What could they do? After months of soul-searching and tearful consultations with experts, the parents decided that their son should have a sex-change operation (Money and Ehrhardt 1972). When he was 22 months old, surgeons castrated the boy, using the skin to construct a vagina. The parents then gave the child a new name, Brenda, dressed him in frilly clothing, let his hair grow long, and began to treat him as a girl. Later, physicians gave Brenda female steroids to promote female puberty (Colapinto 2001).

At first, the results were promising. When the twins were 4 years old, the mother said (remember that the children are biologically identical):

One thing that really amazes me is that she is so feminine. I’ve never seen a little girl so neat and tidy. . . . She likes for me to wipe her face. She doesn’t like to be dirty, and yet my son is quite different. I can’t wash his face for anything. . . . She is very proud of herself, when she puts on a new dress, or I set her hair. . . . She seems to be daintier. (Money and Ehrhardt 1972)

If the matter were this clear-cut, we could use this case to conclude that gender is determined entirely by nurture. Seldom are things in life so simple, however, and a twist occurs in this story.

Despite this promising start and her parents’ coaching, Brenda did not adapt well to femininity. She preferred to mimic her father shaving, rather than her mother putting on makeup. She rejected dolls, favoring guns and her brother’s toys. She liked rough- and-tumble games and insisted on urinating standing up. Classmates teased her and

called her a “cavewoman” because she walked like a boy. At age 14, she was expelled from school for beating up a girl who teased her. Despite estrogen treatment, she was not attracted to boys. At age 14, when despair over her inner turmoil brought her to the brink of suicide, her father, in tears, told Brenda about the accident and

her sex change. “All of a sudden everything clicked. For the first time, things made sense, and I understood who and what I was,” the twin said of this revelation. David (his new

name) was given testosterone shots and, later, had surgery to partially recon- struct a penis. At age 25, David married a woman and adopted her children (Diamond and Sigmundson 1997; Colapinto 2001). There is an unfortunate end to this story, however. In 2004, David committed suicide.

David Reimer, whose story is recounted here.

Why is the door to biology slowly opening in sociology?

Gender Inequality in Global Perspective 279

Sociologists study the social factors that underlie human behavior, the experiences that mold us, funneling us into different directions in life. The research on Vietnam veterans discussed in the text indicates how the sociological door is opening slowly to also consider biological factors in human behavior. This March 31, 1967, photo shows soldiers of the 1st Cavalry Division carrying a buddy who had just been shot.

From research on Vietnam veterans: How do social factors of human behavior override biological ones?

The Vietnam Veterans Study. Time after time, researchers have found that boys and men who have higher levels of testosterone tend to be more aggressive. In one study, researchers compared the testosterone levels of college men in a “rowdy” fraternity with those of men in a fraternity that had a reputation for academic achievement. Men in the “rowdy” fraternity had higher levels of testosterone (Dabbs et al. 1996). In another study, researchers found that prisoners who had committed sex crimes and other crimes of violence had higher levels of testosterone than those who had com- mitted property crimes (Dabbs et al. 1995). The samples were small, however, leaving the nagging uncertainty that these findings might be due to chance.

Then in 1985, the U.S. government began a health study of Vietnam veterans. To be certain that the study was representative, the researchers chose a random sample of 4,462 men. Among the data they collected was a measurement of testosterone. This sample supported the earlier studies. When the veterans with higher testosterone levels were boys, they were more likely to get in trouble with parents and teachers and to become delinquents. As adults, they were more likely to use hard drugs, to get into fights, to end up in lower-status jobs, and to have more sexual partners. Those who married were more likely to have affairs, to hit their wives, and, it follows, to get divorced (Dabbs and Morris 1990; Booth and Dabbs 1993).

This makes it sound like biology is the basis for behavior. Fortunately for us soci- ologists, there is another side to this research, and here is where social class, the topic of Chapter 8, comes into play. The researchers compared high-testosterone men from higher and lower social classes. The men from lower social classes were more likely to get in trouble with the law, do poorly in school, and mistreat their wives (Dabbs and Morris 1990). You can see, then, that social factors such as socialization, subcultures, life goals, and self-definitions were significant in these men’s behavior. In Sum: Sociologists acknowledge that biological factors are involved in some human behavior other than reproduction and childbearing (Udry 2000). Alice Rossi, a feminist soci- ologist and former president of the American Sociological Association, suggested that women are better prepared biologically for “mothering” than are men. Rossi (1977, 1984) said that women are more sensitive to the infant’s soft skin and to their nonverbal communications.

Perhaps Rossi expressed it best when she said that the issue is not either biology or society. Instead, whatever biological predispositions nature provides are overlaid with culture. A task of sociologists is to discover how social factors modify biology, especially as sociologist Janet Chafetz (1990:30) said, to determine how “different” becomes translated into “unequal.”

Gender Inequality in Global Perspective

Around the world, gender is the primary division between people. To catch a glimpse of how remarkably gender expectations differ with culture, look at the photo essay on the next two pages. Every society sorts men and women into separate groups and gives them different access to property, power, and prestige. These divisions always favor men-as-a-group. After reviewing the historical record, historian and feminist Gerda Lerner (1986) concluded that “there is not a single society known where women-as-a-group have decision-making power over men (as a group).” Consequently, sociologists classify females as a minority group. Because females outnumber males, you may find this strange. The term minority group applies, however, because it refers to people who are discriminated against on the basis

traditional Western

expectations, and som e

diverge sharply from o ur gender

stereotypes. Although women in India

remain subservient to men —with the

women’s movement ha rdly able to break

the cultural surface — women’s occupations

are hardly limited to t he home. I was

surprised at some of the hard, heavy labor

that Indian women d o.

Indian women are highly visible in public places. A storekeeper is as likely to be a woman as a man. This woman is selling glasses of water at a beach on the Bay of Bengal. The structure on which her glasses rest is built of sand.

I visited quarries in different parts of India, where I found men, women, and children hard at work in the tropical sun. This woman works 8½ hours a day, six days a week. She earns 40 rupees a day (about 90 cents). Men make 60 rupees a day (about $1.35). Like many quarry workers, this woman is a bonded laborer. She must give half of her wages to her master.

Women also take care of livestock. It looks as though this woman dressed up and

posed for her photo, but this is what she was wearing

and doing when I saw her in the fi eld and stopped to talk to her. While the

sheep are feeding, her job is primarily to “be” there, to make certain the sheep

don’t wander off or that no one steals them.

The villages of India have

no indoor

plumbing. In stead, each v

illage has

a well with a hand pump,

and it is

the women’s job to fetch

the water.

This is backb reaking work

, for, after

pumping the water, the w

omen

wrestle the h eavy buckets

onto their

heads and ca rry them hom

e. This

was one of th e few occupa

tions I

saw that was limited to w

omen.

Work and Gender: W omen at Work in Ind

ia

Traveling through Ind ia was both a

pleasant and an eye-op ening experience.

The country is incredib ly diverse, the

people friendly, and th e land culturally

rich. For this photo ess ay, wherever I

went —whether city, vill age, or country-

side —I took photos of women at work.

From these photos, yo u can see that

Indian women work in a wide variety of

occupations. Some of their jobs match

© Jim Henslin, all photos

Sweeping the house is tra ditional work for Western

women. So it is in India, b ut

the sweeping has been ex tended to areas outside th

e home. These women

are sweeping a major inte rsection in Chennai. When

the traffi c light changes

here, the women will cont inue sweeping, with the d

rivers swerving around

them. This was one of the few occupations that seem

s to be limited to women.

When I saw this unusual sight, I had to stop and talk to the workers. From historical pictures, I knew that belt-driven machines were common on U.S. farms 100 years ago. This one in Tamil Nadu processes sugar cane. The woman feeds sugar cane into the machine, which disgorges the stalks on one side and sugar cane juice on the other.

A common sight in India is women working on construction crews. As they work on buildings and on highways, they mix cement, unload trucks, carry rubble, and, following Indian culture, carry loads of bricks atop their heads. This photo was taken in Raipur, Chhattisgarh.

As in the West, food preparation in India is traditional women’s work. Here, however, food preparation takes an unexpected twist. Having poured rice from the 60-pound sack onto the fl oor, these women in Chittoor search for pebbles or other foreign objects that might be in the rice.

This woman belongs to the Dhobi subcaste, whose occupation is washing clothes. She stands waist deep at this same spot doing the same thing day after day. The banks of this canal in Hyderabad are lined with men and women of her caste, who are washing linens for hotels and clothing for more well-to-do families.

282 CHAPTER 10 Gender and Age

of physical or cultural characteristics, regardless of their numbers (Hacker 1951). Women around the world struggle against gender discrimination. For an extreme case, see the Mass Media in Social Life box on the next page.

How Did Females Become a Minority Group? Have females always been a minority group? Some analysts speculate that in hunting and gathering societies, women and men were social equals (Leacock 1981; Hendrix 1994) and that horticultural societies also had less gender discrimination than is common today (Collins et al. 1993). In these societies, women may have contributed about 60 percent of the group’s total food. Yet, around the world, gender is the basis for discrimination.

How, then, did it happen that women became a minority group? The main theory that has been proposed to explain the origin of patriarchy—men dominating society— centers on human reproduction (Lerner 1986; Friedl 1990). In early human history, life was short. Because people died young, if the group were to survive, women had to give birth to many children. This brought severe consequences for women. To survive, an infant needed a nursing mother. If there were no woman to nurse the child, it died. With a child at her breast or in her uterus, or one carried on her hip or on her back, women were not able to stay away from camp for as long as the men could. They also had to move slower. Around the world, then, women assumed the tasks that were associated with the home and child care, while men hunted the large animals and did other tasks that required both greater speed and longer absences from the base camp (Huber 1990).

This led to men becoming dominant. When the men left the camp to hunt animals, they made contact with other tribes. They traded with them, gaining new possessions—and they also quarreled and waged war with them. It was also the men who

Why do sociologists call women a minority group? What theory, based on reproduction, explains how women became a minority group?

Men’s work? Women’s work? Customs in other societies can blow away stereotypes. As is common throughout India, these women are working on road construction.

Gender Inequality in Global Perspective 283

made and controlled the instruments of power and death, the weapons that were used for hunting and warfare. The men heaped prestige upon themselves as they returned to the camp triumphantly, leading captured prisoners and displaying their new possessions or the large animals they had killed to feed the women and children.

Contrast this with the women. Their activities were rou- tine, dull, and taken-for-granted. The women kept the fire going, took care of the children, and did the cooking. There was nothing triumphant about what they did—and they were not perceived as risking their lives for the group. The women were “simply there,” awaiting the return of their men, ready to acclaim their accomplishments.

Men, then, took control of society. Their sources of power were their weapons, items of trade, and the knowl- edge they gained from their contacts with other groups. Women did not have access to these sources of power, which the men enshrouded in secrecy. The women became second-class citizens, subject to whatever the men decided.

Mass Media in Social Life

Women in Iran: The Times Are Changing, Ever So Slowly A woman’s testimony in court is worth half that of a man’s

testimony. A woman may inherit from her parents only half what her

brother inherits. A woman who has sex with a man who is not her husband

can be stoned to death. A woman who refuses to cover her hair in public can

receive 80 lashes with a whip.

Not exactly equality. As you would expect, Iranian women

don’t like it. Until now, though, there was little that they could do. Controlled by their fathers until they marry and afterward by their husbands, women for the most part didn’t know that life could be different.

Now the mass media along with a new literacy are spearheading change in gender relations. Iranian women are logging onto the Internet, and they are reading books. Those who watch satellite television, which is illegal, are seeing pictures of other ways of life, an unfamiliar equality and mutual respect between women and men.

Thanks to the mass media, their eyes are being opened to the fact that not all the women in the world live under the thumbs of men. From this awareness is coming the realization that they don’t have to live like this either, that there is a potential for new relationships.

This awareness and the glimmer of hope that another way of life can be theirs have stimulated a women’s movement. The move- ment is small—and protest remains dangerous. Some women have

been fined, and for others it is worse. Women are being arrested for being “feminists.” Punishment is fines and prison. Security forces sometimes rape these offenders. Other protestors find brutality at home, from their husbands, fathers, or brothers.

Despite the danger, women are continuing to protest. They are even pressing for new rights in the Iranian courts. They are demand- ing divorce from abusive husbands—and some are getting it.

Not much has changed yet. A man can still divorce his wife whenever he wants, while a woman who wants to divorce a hus- band must go through a lengthy procedure and never can be

sure she will be granted the divorce. A husband also gets automatic custody of any children over the age of 7.

But as women continue their struggle, change will come. One sign of hope: Iraninan politicians, embarrassed by the international outcry, are allowing fewer women to be stoned to death. But women continue to be buried up to their necks in the ground and then stoned.

That there are fewer stonings, though, is at least a beginning. Sources: Based on Fathi 2009; Semple 2009; U.S. Department of State 2011.

For Your Consideration↑

What do you think gender relations will be like in Iran ten years from now? Why?↑

If the women’s movement in Iran becomes popular and effective, do you think that relationships between men and women will be about the same as in the United States? Why or why not?

A sign of fundamental change is Iranian women protesting in public. Can the genie be put back in the bottle? Unlikely.

A theory of how patriarchy originated centers on childbirth. Because only

women give birth, they assumed tasks associated with home

and child care, while men hunted and performed other survival tasks that required greater strength, speed, and absence from home. Following

in the steps of her female ancestors, this woman

in Yangshou, China, while she works, takes care of her grandchild.

What background factors underlie the women’s movement in the Arab world?

284 CHAPTER 10 Gender and Age

Foot binding was practiced in China until about 1900. Tiny feet were a status symbol. Making it difficult for a woman to walk, small feet indicated that a woman’s husband did not need his wife’s labor. To make the feet even smaller, sometimes the baby’s feet were broken and wrapped tightly. Some baby’s toes were cut off. This photo was taken in Hubel Province, China. The woman getting the pedicure is reportedly 105 years old.

Global Violence Against Women A global human rights issue is violence against women. Historical examples include foot binding in China, witch burning in Europe, and suttee (burning the living widow with the body of her dead husband) in India. Today we have rape, wife beating, female infanticide, and the kidnapping of women to be brides. There is also forced prostitution, which was probably the case in our opening vignette. Another notorious example is female circumcision, the topic of the Cultural Diversity box on the next page.

“Honor killings” are another form of violence against women (Yardley 2010a). In some societies, such as India, Jordan, Kurdistan, and Pakistan, a woman who is thought to have brought disgrace on her family is killed by a male relative—usually a brother or her husband, but sometimes her father or uncles. What threat to a family’s honor can be so severe that men kill their own daughters, wives, or sisters? The usual reason is sex outside of marriage. Virginity at marriage is so prized in these societies that even a woman who has been raped is in danger of becoming the victim of an honor killing (Zoepf 2007; Falkenberg 2008). Killing the girl or woman—even one’s own sister or mother—removes the “stain” she has brought to the family and restores its honor in the community. Sharing this view, the police in these countries generally ignore honor

killings, viewing them as private family matters.

In Sum: Inequality is not some accidental, hit-or-miss affair. Rather, each society’s institutions work together to maintain the group’s particular forms of inequality. Customs, often venerated throughout history, both justify and maintain these arrange- ments. In some cases, the prejudice and discrimination directed at females are so extreme they result in their enslavement and death.

Gender Inequality in the United States As we review gender inequality in the United States, let’s begin by taking a brief look at how change in this vital area of social life came about. Before we do so, though, you might enjoy the historical snapshot presented in the Down-to-Earth Sociology box on page 286.

Fighting Back: The Rise of Feminism In the nation’s early history, the second-class status of women was taken for granted. A husband and wife were legally one person—him (Chafetz and Dworkin 1986). Women could not vote, buy property in their own names, make legal contracts, or serve on juries. How could things have changed so much in the last hundred years that these examples sound like fiction?

A central lesson of conflict theory is that power yields privilege. Like a magnet, power draws society’s best resources to the elite. Because men tenaciously held onto their privileges and used social institutions to maintain their dominance, basic rights for women came only through prolonged and bitter struggle.

Feminism—the view that biology is not destiny and that stratification by gender is wrong and should be resisted—met with strong opposition, both by men who had priv- ilege to lose and by women who accepted their status as morally correct. In 1894, for example, Jeannette Gilder said that women should not have the right to vote: “Politics is too public, too wearing, and too unfitted to the nature of women” (Crossen 2003).

Feminists, then known as suffragists, struggled against such views. In 1916, they founded the National Woman’s Party, and in 1917 they began to picket the White House. After picketing for six months, the women were arrested. Hundreds were sent to prison,

How is gender inequality related to violence? Who were the suffragists?

Gender Inequality in the United States 285

Cultural Diversity around the World

Female Circumcision “Lie down there,” the excisor suddenly said to me

[when I was 12], pointing to a mat on the ground. No sooner had I laid down than I felt my frail, thin legs grasped by heavy hands and pulled wide apart. . . . Two women on each side of me pinned me to the ground . . . I underwent the ablation of the labia minor and then of the clitoris. The operation seemed to go on forever. I was in the throes of agony, torn apart both physically and psychologically. It was the rule that girls of my age did not weep in this situation. I broke the rule. I cried and screamed with pain . . . !

Afterwards they forced me, not only to walk back to join the other girls who had already been excised, but to dance with them. I was doing my best, but then I fainted. . . . It was a month before I was completely healed. When I was better, everyone mocked me, as I hadn’t been brave, they said. (Walker and Parmar 1993:107–108)

Worldwide, about 140 million females have been circum- cised, mostly in Muslim Africa and in some parts of Malaysia and Indonesia (Lazaro 2011). In Egypt and Indonesia, between 90 and 97 percent of the women have been circumcised (Slackman 2007; Leopold 2012). In some cultures, the surgery occurs seven to ten days after birth, but in others it is not performed until girls reach adolescence. Among most groups, it takes place between the ages of 4 and 8. Because the surgery is usually done without an- esthesia, the pain is so excruciating that adults hold the girl down. In urban areas, physicians sometimes perform the operation; in rural areas, a neighborhood woman usually does it.

In some cultures, only the girl’s clitoris is cut off; in oth- ers, more is removed. In Sudan, the Nubia cut away most of the girl’s genitalia, then sew together the remaining outer edges. They bind the girl’s legs from her ankles to her waist for several weeks while scar tissue closes up the vagina. They leave a small opening the diameter of a pencil for the passage of urine and menstrual fluids. When a woman mar- ries, the opening is enlarged further. After birth, the vagina is again sutured shut; this cycle of surgically closing and opening begins anew with each birth.

What are the reasons for circumcising girls? Some groups believe that it reduces female sexual desire, making it more likely that a woman will be a virgin at marriage and, afterward, remain faithful to her husband. Others think that women can’t bear children if they aren’t circumcised.

The surgery has strong support among many women. Some mothers and grandmothers even insist that the cus- tom continue. Their concern is that their daughters marry well, and in some of these societies uncircumcised women are considered impure and are not allowed to marry.

Feminists respond that female circumcision is a form of ritual torture to control female sexuality. They point out that men dominate the societies that practice it.

Change is on its way: A social movement to ban female circumcision has developed, and the World

Health Organization has declared that female circumcision is a human rights issue. Fifteen African countries have now banned the circumcision of females. Without sanctions, though,

these laws accomplish little. In Egypt, which prohibited female circumcision in 1996, almost all girls continue to be circumcised (Leopold 2012).

Health workers have hit upon a strategy that is meeting some success. To overcome resistance to change, they begin teaching village women about germs and hygiene. They then trace current health prob- lems such as incontinence to female circumcision. When enough support

has been gained, an entire village will publicly abandon the practice. As other villages do the same, the lack of circumcision no longer remains an obstacle to marriage. Sources: As cited, and Lightfoot-Klein 1989; Merwine 1993; Chalkley 1997; Collymore 2000; Tuhus-Dubrow 2007; UNIFEM 2008; Lazaro 2011.

For Your Consideration↑

Do you think the members of one culture have the right to interfere with the customs of another culture? If so, under what circumstances? What makes us right and them wrong? What if some African nation said that the U.S. custom of circumcising males is wrong—and wanted the United Nations to take action?

Finally, how would you respond to this Somali woman who said, “The Somali woman doesn’t need an alien woman telling her how to treat her private parts”?

An excisor (cutter) in Uganda holding the razor blades she is about to use to circumcise teenage girls.

How is female circumcision part of gender inequality?

286 CHAPTER 10 Gender and Age

Down-to-Earth Sociology

Women and Smoking: Let’s Count the Reasons (A humorous, but serious, look at historical changes in gender)

Why Women Shouldn’t Smoke 1. Smoking turns a woman into a tramp.

“A man may take out a woman who smokes for a good time, but he won’t marry her, and if he does, he won’t stay married.”

Editorial in The Washington Post, 1914

2. Women who smoke drive men wild. They break up families and even make men kill.

“Young fellows go into our res- taurants to find women folks sucking cigarettes. The . . . next thing you know the young fellows, vampired by these smoking women, desert their homes, their wives and children, rob their employers and even commit murder so that they can get money to lavish on these smoking women.”

A New York City alderman

3. Smoking ruins women’s sleep—and it is bad for their skin.

“The cigarette habit indulged by women tends to cause nervousness and insomnia and ruins the com- plexion. This is one of the most evil influences in American life today.”

Hugh S. Cumming, surgeon general of the U.S., 1920

4. Women just aren’t as good as men at smoking.

“Women really don’t know how to smoke. One woman smoking one cigarette at a dinner table will stir up more smoke than a whole tableful of men smoking cigars. Neither do they know how to hold their cigarettes properly.”

The manager of a Manhattan hotel, 1920s

Why Women Should Smoke 1. Smoking prevents fat ankles.

“You can’t hide fat, clumsy ankles. When tempted to overindulge, reach for a Lucky.”

The American Tobacco Company, 1930s

Challenging Gender Opposition to women smoking was so strong that the

police in New York City warned women not to light up—even in their own cars. Women’s colleges also got into the act. Smith College students who were seen smoking, even off campus, were given a demerit. This was serious—three demer- its and a woman would be kicked out of college.

Why do you think there was such strong opposition to women smoking in the early 1900s? Men were free to smoke wherever they wanted—in hotels and restaurants, in the street and at work, and in bars, which at that time were off limits to women.

Smoking was part of how women were breaking out of their traditional roles, a gender change that threatened the privileged position of men. Despite the strong opposition, more and more women began to smoke. As they contin- ued to challenge the privileges of men in this and other areas of social life, they ushered in the gender relations that we have today.

For Your Consideration↑

Today if a woman in Saudi Arabia drives a car, she is arrested. How is this a parallel to men’s reaction to U.S. women smoking in the early 1930s?

An ad from 1929

(And with cancer, you’ll lose even more weight!)

including Lucy Burns, a leader of the National Woman’s Party. The extent to which these women had threatened male privilege is demonstrated by how they were treated in prison.

Two men brought in Dorothy Day [the editor of a periodical that promoted women’s rights], twisting her arms above her head. Suddenly they lifted her and brought her body down twice over the back of an iron bench. . . . They had been there a few minutes when Mrs. Lewis, all doubled over like a sack of flour, was thrown in. Her head struck the iron bed and she fell to the floor senseless. As for Lucy Burns, they handcuffed her wrists and fastened the handcuffs over [her] head to the cell door. (Cowley 1969)

In the early 1900s, men were offended by women smoking. Why?

Gender Inequality in the United States 287

The “first wave” of the U.S. women’s movement met enormous opposition. The women in this 1920 photo had just been released after serving two months in jail for picketing the White House. Lucy Burns, mentioned on page 286, is the second woman on the left. Alice Paul, who was placed in solitary confinement and is a subject of this 1920 protest, is featured in the photo circle of early female sociologists in Chapter 1, page 10.

This first wave of the women’s movement had a radical branch that wanted to reform all the institutions of society and a conservative branch whose concern was to win the vote for women (Freedman 2001). The conservative branch dominated, and after win- ning the right to vote in 1920, the movement basically dissolved.

The second wave began in the 1960s. Sociologist Janet Chafetz (1990) points out that up to this time most women thought of work as a temporary activity intended to fill the time between completing school and getting married. For an example of how children’s books reinforced such thinking, see Figure 10.1 on the next page. As more women took jobs and began to regard them as careers, however, they compared their working con- ditions with those of men. This shift in their reference group changed the way women viewed their conditions at work. The result was a second wave of protest against gender inequalities. The goals of this second wave (which continues today) are broad, ranging from raising women’s pay to changing policies on violence against women.

A third wave of feminism has emerged. It has many divisions, but three main aspects are apparent. The first is a greater focus on the problems of women in the Least Industrialized Nations (Spivak 2000; Hamid 2006). Some are fighting battles against conditions long since overcome by women in the Most Industrialized Nations. The second is a criticism of the values that dominate work and society. Some feminists argue that competition, toughness, calloused emotions, and independence represent “male” qualities and need to be replaced with cooperation, connection, openness, and inter- dependence (England 2000). A third aspect is an emphasis on women’s sexual pleasure (Swigonski and Reheim 2011).

Sharp disagreements among feminists have emerged regarding male–female rela- tionships. Some, for example, defend their use of “erotic capital,” women’s sexual

Can you contrast the three waves of feminism?

288 CHAPTER 10 Gender and Age

attractiveness and seductiveness, to get ahead at work. Others deplore this as a denial of ability and betrayal of equality (Hakim 2010).

Although U.S. women enjoy fundamental rights today, gender inequality continues to play a central role in social life. Let’s first consider gender inequality in health care.

Gender Inequality in Health Care Medical researchers were perplexed. Reports were coming in from all over the country: Women were twice as likely as men to die after coronary bypass surgery. Researchers at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles checked their own records. They found that of 2,300 coronary bypass patients, 4.6 percent of the women died as a result of the surgery, compared with 2.6 percent of the men.

These findings presented a sociological puzzle. To solve it, researchers first turned to biology (Bishop 1990). In coronary bypass surgery, a blood vessel is taken from one part of the body and stitched to an artery on the surface of the heart. Perhaps the surgery was more difficult to do on women because of their smaller arteries. To find out, researchers measured the amount of time that sur- geons kept patients on the heart-lung machine while they operated. They were surprised to learn that women spent less time on the machine than men. This indicated that the surgery was not more difficult to perform on women.

As the researchers probed, a surprising answer unfolded: unintended sexual discrimination. When women complained of chest pains, their doctors took them only one-tenth as seriously as when men made the same complaints. How do we know this? Doctors were ten times more likely to give men exercise stress tests and radioactive heart scans. They also sent men to surgery on the basis of abnormal stress tests, but they waited until women showed clear-cut symptoms of heart disease before sending them to surgery. Patients with more advanced heart disease are more likely to die during and after heart surgery.

Source: From Dick and Jane: Fun with Our Family, Illustrations © copyright 1951, 1979, and Dick and Jane: We Play Outside, copyright © 1965, Pearson Education, Inc., published by Scott, Foresman and Company. Used with permission.

FIGURE 10.1 Teaching Gender

The “Dick and Jane” readers were the top selling readers in the United States in the 1940s and 1950s. In addition to reading, they taught “gender messages.” What gender message do you see here?

Housework is “women’s work,” a lesson girls should learn early in life.

Besides learning words like “pigs” (relevant at that historical period), boys and girls also learned that rough outside work was for men.

What does this page teach children other than how to read the word “Father”? (Look to the left to see what Sally and Jane and Mother are doing.)

As women accomplish more in areas traditionally dominated by men, do you think that the definition of femininity will change? If so, how?

How is gender inequality in health care a life-or-death matter?

Gender Inequality in the United States 289

Although these findings have been publicized among physicians, the problem contin- ues (Jackson et al. 2011). Perhaps as more women become physicians, the situation will change, since female doctors are more sensitive to women’s health problems. For exam- ple, they are more likely to order Pap smears and mammograms (Lurie et al. 1993). In addition, as more women join the faculties of medical schools, we can expect women’s health problems to receive more attention in the training of physicians. Even this might not do it, however, as no one knows how stereotyping of the sexes produces this deadly discrimination, and women, too, hold our cultural stereotypes.

In contrast to unintentional sexism in heart surgery, there is a type of surgery that is a blatant form of discrimination against women. This is the focus of the Down-to-Earth Sociology box below.

How does gender inequality show up in surgery?

Down-to-Earth Sociology

Cold-Hearted Surgeons and Their Women Victims

While doing participant observation in a hospital, sociologist Sue Fisher (1986) was surprised to hear surgeons recommend total hysterectomy (removal of both the uterus and the ovaries) when no cancer was present. When she asked why, the male doctors explained that the uterus and ovaries are “potentially disease producing.” They also said that these organs are unnecessary after the childbearing years, so why not remove them? Doctors who reviewed hysterectomies confirmed this gender- biased practice. Ninety percent of hysterectomies are avoidable. Only ten percent involve cancer (Costa 2011).

Greed is a power- ful motivator in many areas of social life, and it rears its ugly head in surgical sexism (Domingo and Pellicer 2009). Surgeons make money when they do hys- terectomies, and the more of them that they do, the more money they make. Since women, to understate the matter, are reluctant to part with these organs, surgeons find that they have to “sell” this operation. As you read how one resident explained the “hard sell” to sociologist Diana Scully (1994), you might think of a used car salesperson:

You have to look for your surgical procedures; you have to go after patients. Because no one is crazy enough to come and say, “Hey, here I am. I want you to operate on me.” You have to sometimes convince the patient that she is really sick—if she is, of course [laughs], and that she is better off with a surgical procedure.

Used-car salespeople would love to have the powerful sales weapon that these surgeons have at their disposal: To “convince” a woman to have this surgery, the doctor puts on a serious face and tells her that the examination has turned up fibroids in her uterus—and they might turn into cancer. This

statement is often suf- ficient to get the woman to buy the surgery. She starts to picture herself lying at death’s door, her sorrowful family gathered at her death bed. Then the used car salesperson—I mean, the surgeon—moves in to clinch the sale. Keeping a serious face and emitting an “I-know- how-you-feel” look, the surgeon starts to make arrangements for the surgery. What the surgeon withholds is the rest of the truth—that a lot of women have

fibroids, that fibroids usually do not turn into cancer, and that the patient has several alternatives to surgery.

In case it is difficult for someone to see how this is sexist, let’s change the context just a little. Let’s suppose that the in- come of some female surgeons depends on selling a special- ized operation. To sell it, they systematically suggest to older men the benefits of castration—since “those organs are no longer necessary, and might cause disease.”

For Your Consideration↑

Hysterectomies are now so common that one of three U.S. women eventually has her uterus surgically removed (White- man et al. 2008). Why do you think that surgeons are so quick to operate? How can women find alternatives to surgery?

290 CHAPTER 10 Gender and Age

Gender Inequality in Education What a contrast with today. Until 1832, women were not allowed to attend college with men. When women did start to attend college with men, they had to wash the men’s clothing, clean their rooms, and serve them their meals (Flexner 1971/1999).

How the times have changed. So much so that this quote sounds like a joke. Gradually, like out-of-fashion clothing, such ideas were discarded. As Figure 10.2 shows, by 1900 one-third of college students were women, and today more women than men attend college. The overall average differs with racial–ethnic groups, as you can see from Figure 10.3 on page 291. African Americans have the most women relative to men, and Asian Americans the least. Another indication of how extensive the change is: Women now earn 57 percent of all bachelor’s degrees and 60 percent of all master’s degrees (Statistical Abstract 2012:Table 299).

Figure 10.4 on the next page illustrates another major change—how women have increased their share of professional degrees. The greatest change is in dentistry: In 1970, across the entire United States, only 34 women earned degrees in dentistry. Today, that total has jumped to 2,300 a year. As you can also see, almost as many women as men now become dentists, lawyers, and physicians. It is likely that women will soon outnumber men in earning these professional degrees.

Gender Tracking. With such extensive changes, it would seem that gender equality has been achieved, or at least almost so, and in some instances—as with the changed sex ratio in college—we have a new form of gender inequality. If we look closer, however, we find something beneath the surface. Underlying these degrees is gender tracking; that is, college degrees tend to follow gender, which reinforces male–female

Explore

Living Data

on mysoclab.com

* This sharp drop in female enrollment occurred when large numbers of male soldiers returned from World War II and attended college under the new GI Bill of Rights.

** Author’s estimate. Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 1938:Table 114; 1959:Table 158; 1991:Table 261; 2012:Table 277.

FIGURE 10.2 Changes in College Enrollment, by Sex

What percentages of U.S. college students are female and male?

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

50%

60%

P e rc

e n ta

g e

70%

1900

65

35

1910

65

35

1920

62

38

1930

59

41

1940

52 48

1950*

70

30

1960

60

40

1970

58

42

58

42

1980

48 52

1990

45

55

2000

44

56

2010

43

57

2020**

WomenMen

How did gender inequality in education show up in the 1800s?

Gender Inequality in the United States 291

Note: This figure can be confusing. To read it, ask: What percentage of a particular group in college are men or women? (For example, what percentage of Asian American college students are men or women?)

Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 2012:Table 279.

FIGURE 10.3 College Students, by Sex and Race–Ethnicity

0%

10%

20%

30%

50%

40%

60% P

e rc

e n ta

g e

70%

Whites Latinos African Americans

Asian Americans

Native Americans

WomenMen

54

46

56

44

58

42

60

40

65

35

Source: By the author. Based on Digest of Education Statistics 2007:Table 269; Statistical Abstract of the United States 2012:Table 303.

FIGURE 10.4 Gender Changes in Professional Degrees

Men Women

0

20%

40%

60%

80%

100%

90%

70%

50%

30%

10%

P e rc

e n ta

g e

1970

Dentistry (D.D.S., D.M.D.)

1

99

1970

Medicine (M.D.)

8

92

2008

4951

2009

46

54

1970

Law (L.L.B., J.D.)

5

95

2009

46

54

distinctions. Here are two extremes: Men earn 95 percent of the associate degrees in the “masculine” field of construction trades, while women are awarded 96 percent of the associate degrees in the “feminine” field of “family and consumer sciences” (Statistical Abstract 2012:Table 301). Because gender socialization gives men and

How does gender inequality in education show up today?

292 CHAPTER 10 Gender and Age

women different orientations to life, they enter college with gender-linked aspirations. Socialization—not some presumed innate characteristic—channels men and women into different educational paths.

Gender Inequality in the Workplace To examine the work setting is to make visible basic relations between men and women. Let’s begin with one of the most remarkable areas of gender inequality at work, the pay gap.

The Pay Gap After college, you might like to take a few years off, travel around Europe, sail the oceans, or maybe sit on a beach in some South American paradise and drink piña cola- das. But chances are, you are going to go to work instead. Since you have to work, how would you like to make an extra $700,000 on your job? If this sounds appealing, read on. I’m going to reveal how you can make an extra $1,465 a month between the ages of 25 and 65.

Historical Background. First, let’s get a broad background to help us understand today’s situation. One of the chief characteristics of the U.S. workforce is the steady growth in the numbers of women who work for wages outside the home. Figure 10.5 shows that in 1890 about one of every five paid workers was a woman. By 1940, this ratio had grown to one of four; by 1960 to one of three; and today it is almost one of two. As shown in this figure, during the next few years we can expect that the ratio will remain 53 percent men and 47 percent women.

Geographical Factors. Women who work for wages are not distributed evenly throughout the United States. From the Social Map on the next page, you can see that where a woman lives makes a difference in how likely she is to work outside the home. Why is there such a clustering among the states? The geographical patterns that you

Note: Pre-1940 totals include women 14 and over: totals for 1940 and after are for women 16 and over. Broken lines are the author’s projections.

Sources: By the author. Based on Women’s Bureau of the United States 1969:10; Manpower Report to the President, 1971:203, 205; Mills and Palumbo 1980:6, 45; Statistical Abstract of the United States 2012: Table 587.

FIGURE 10.5 Women’s and Men’s Proportion of the U.S.

80%

70%

60%

50%

40%

30%

20%

10%

0

P e rc

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Men

Women

1890 1900 1910 1920 1930 1940 1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 20202010

Year

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Labor Force

How has the proportion of women and men in the U.S. workforce changed over time?

Gender Inequality in the Workplace 293

see on this map reflect regional subcultural differences about which we currently have little understanding.

The “Testosterone Bonus”. Now, back to how you can make an extra $700,000 at work—and maybe even more. You might be wondering if this is hard to do. Actually, it is simple for some and impossible for others. As Figure 10.7 on the next page shows, all you have to do is be born a male. If we compare full-time workers, based on current differences in earnings, this is how much more money the average male can expect to earn over the course of his career. Now if you want to boost that annual difference to $30,600 for a whopping career total of $1,225,000, be both a male and a college graduate. Hardly any single factor pinpoints gender discrimination better than these totals. As you can see from Figure 10.7, the pay gap shows up at all levels of education.

For college students, the gender gap in pay begins with the first job after graduation. You might know of a particular woman who was offered a higher salary than most men in her class, but she would be an exception. On average, employers start men out at higher salaries than women, and although women advance in salary at roughly the same rate as men, they never catch up from the men’s starting “testosterone bonus” (Carter 2010; Weinberger 2011; Smith 2012). Depending on your sex, then, you will either benefit from the pay gap or be victimized by it.

The pay gap is so great that U.S. women who work full time average only 72 percent of what men are paid. As you can see from Figure 10.8 on page 295, the pay gap used to be even worse. A gender gap in pay occurs not only in the United States but also in all industrialized nations.

Reasons for the Gender Pay Gap. What logic can underlie the gender pay gap? As we just saw, college degrees are gender linked, so perhaps this gap is due to career choices. Maybe women are more likely to choose lower-paying jobs, such as teach- ing grade school, while men are more likely to go into better-paying fields, such as business and engineering. Actually, this is true, and researchers have found that about half of the gender pay gap is due to such factors. And the balance? It consists of a

FIGURE 10.6 Women in the Workforce

Less than average: 49.2% to 57.9%

Average: 58.2% to 62.6%

More than average: 62.9% to 68.8%

e:

e:

NH 65.5 MA 61.9 RI 62.6

CT 63.9 NJ 60.8

DE 59 MD 64

DC 64.4

AK 65.6

UT 60.4

OH 61.1

SC 56.5

NC 57.9

VA 63.3

WA 62.9

OR 59.9

CA 57.7

NV 60.4

ID 57.9

MT 60.9

WY 64.2

AZ 56.2 NM

56.2

CO 63.5

ND 67.7

SD 68.3

NE 67.6

KS 65.9

OK 57.8

TX 57

MN 67.4

IA 68

MO 61.7

AR 55.9

LA 54.7

WI 66.5

IL 60.6

KY 55.8

TN 56.2

MS 52.1

AL 53.1

GA 58.2

FL 56.8

IN 59.8

MI 57.4

WV 49.2

PA 58.6

NY 57.3

ME 60.6

HI 58.3

What percentage of women are in the workforce?

NJNJ 60.8 EE 99 D 4

4

Most women in the work force

1. Vermont (68.8%)

2. South Dakota (68.3%)

3. Iowa (68.0%)

Fewest women in the work force

1. West Virginia (49.2%)

2. Mississippi (52.1%)

3. Alabama (53.1%)

VT 68.8

Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 2011:Table 593.

What is the “testoserone bonus”? Why is there a gender pay gap?

294 CHAPTER 10 Gender and Age

0

$10,000

$20,000

$30,000

$40,000

$50,000

$60,000

$70,000

$80,000

$90,000

$100,000

E ar

n in

g s

p e r

ye ar

Average of All Workers

$62,445

$44,857

72%

High School Dropouts

$33,194

$23,478

High School Graduates

$43,140

$32,227

Some College, No Degree

$52,580

$36,553

Associate Degree

$55,631

$42,307

College Graduates

$92,815

$62,198

2

71% 75% 70% 76% 67%

Women Men

1Full-time workers in all fields. The percentage at the bottom of each purple bar indicates the women’s average percentage of the men’s income. 2Bachelor’s and all higher degrees, including professional degrees. Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 2012:Table 703.

FIGURE 10.7 The Gender Pay Gap, by Education1

combination of gender discrimination (Jacobs 2003; Roth 2003) and what is called the “child penalty”—women missing out on work experience and opportunities while they care for children (Hundley 2001; Wilde et al. 2010).

The CEO Gap. As a final indication of the extent of the U.S. gender pay gap, consider this. Of the nation’s top 500 corporations (the so-called Fortune 500), only twelve are headed by women (VenderMey 2011).

I examined the names of the CEOs of the 350 largest U.S. corporations, and I found that your best chance to reach the top is to be named (in this order) John, Robert, James, William, or Charles. Edward, Lawrence, and Richard are also advantageous names. Amber, Katherine, Leticia, and Maria apparently draw a severe penalty. Naming your baby girl John or Robert might seem a little severe, but it could help her reach the top. (I say this only slightly tongue-in-cheek. One of the few women to head a Fortune 500 company—before she was fired and given $21 million severance pay—had a man’s first name: Carleton Fiorina of Hewlett-Packard. Carleton’s first name is actually Cara, but knowing what she was facing in the highly competitive business world, she dropped this feminine name to go by her masculine middle name.)

Is the Glass Ceiling Cracking? “First comes love, then comes marriage, then comes flex time and a baby carriage.” —Said by a supervisor at Novartis who refused to hire women (Carter 2010)

This supervisor’s statement reflects blatant discrimination. Most gender discrimination in the workplace, however, seems to be unintentional, with much of it based on gender stereotypes.

Apart from cases of overt discrimination, then, what keeps women from breaking through the glass ceiling, the mostly invisible barrier that prevents women from reaching the executive suite? The “pipelines” that lead to the top of a company are its marketing,

How does the gender pay gap differ by education?

Gender Inequality in the Workplace 295

sales, and production positions, those that directly affect the corporate bottom line (Hymowitz 2004; DeCrow 2005). Men, who dominate the executive suite, stereotype women as being good at “support” but less capable than men of leadership (Belkin 2007). They steer women into human resources or public relations. In these positions, success- ful projects are not appreciated in the same way as those that bring corporate profits— and bonuses for their managers.

Another reason for the strength of the glass ceiling is that women lack mentors— successful executives who take an interest in them and teach them the ropes. Lack of a mentor is no trivial matter, for mentors can provide opportunities to develop lead- ership skills that open the door to the executive suite (Hymowitz 2007; Yakaboski and Reinert 2011).

Sexual Harassment—and Worse Sexual harassment—unwelcome sexual attention at work or at school, which may affect job or school performance or create a hostile environment—was not recognized as a problem until the 1970s. Before this, women considered unwanted sexual comments, touches, looks, and pressure to have sex as a personal matter, something between her and some “turned on” man—or an obnoxious one.

With the prodding of feminists, women began to perceive unwanted sexual advances at work and school as part of a structural problem. That is, they began to realize that the issue was more than a man here or there doing obnoxious things

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

$80

70

1960 1965 1970 1975 1980 1985 1990 1995 2000 2005 2010 2015

In co

m e in

T h o

u sa

n d

s

Year

$40,367

$62,445

$50,241

$44,857

$32,940

72%

Men

$19,173

$24,999

$28,979

$11,159

$16,252

$20,591

$26,547

60%

65%

71%

66%

66%

Women

$5,434 $6,598

$9,184

$12,934

$3,296 $3,816 $5,440

$7,719 61% 58%

59% 60%

Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 1995:Table 739; 2002:Table 666; 2012:Table 703, and earlier years. Broken lines indicate the author’s estimate.

FIGURE 10.8 The Gender Gap over Time: What Percentage of Men’s Income Do Women Earn?

As the glass ceiling slowly cracks, women are gradually gaining entry into the top positions in society. Shown here is Virginia Rometty, the first woman to head IBM.

Is the glass ceiling cracking? What keeps women from breaking through it?

296 CHAPTER 10 Gender and Age

because he was attracted to a woman; rather, men were using their positions of authority to pressure women for sex.

Effects on Perception. As symbolic interactionists stress, labels affect the way we see things. Because we have the term sexual harassment, we perceive actions in a different light than people used to. We are now more apt to perceive a supervisor who makes sexual advances to a worker not as sexual attraction but as a misuse of authority. It is important to add that this is not just a “man thing.” Unlike the 1970s, many women today are in posi- tions of authority. In those positions they, too, sexually harass subordinates (Settles et al. 2011). With most authority still vested in men, however, most of the sexual harassers are men.

Sexual Orientation. Originally, sexual desire was an element of sexual harassment, but no longer. This changed when the U.S. Supreme Court considered the lawsuit of a homosexual who had been tormented by his supervisors and fellow workers. The Court ruled that sexual desire is not necessary—that sexual harassment laws also apply to homosexuals who are harassed by heterosexuals while on the job (Felsenthal 1998). By extension, the law applies to heterosexuals who are sexually harassed by homosexuals.

Violence Against Women Around the world, one of the consistent characteristics of violence is its gen- der inequality. That is, females are more likely to be the victims of males, not the other way around. Let’s see how this almost-one-way street in gender violence applies to the United States.

Forcible Rape. The fear of rape is common among U.S. women, a fear that is far from groundless. The U.S. rate is 0.52 per 1,000 females (Statistical Abstract 2012:Table 314). If we exclude the very young and women over 50, those who are the least likely rape victims, the rate comes to about 1 per 1,000. This means that 1 of every 1,000 U.S. girls and women between the ages of 12 and 50 is raped each year. Despite this high number, women are safer now than they were ten and twenty years ago. The rape rate then was much higher than today.

Although any woman can be a victim of sexual assault—and victims include babies and elderly women—the typical victim is 16 to 19 years old. As you can see from Table 10.1, sexual assault peaks at those ages and then declines.

Women’s most common fear seems to be an attack by a stranger—a sudden, violent abduction and rape. However, contrary to the stereotypes that underlie these fears, most victims know their attackers. As you can see from Table 10.2, about one of three rapes is committed by strangers.

Males are also victims of rape, which is every bit as devastating for them as it is for female victims (Choudhary et al. 2010). Rape in prison is a special problem, sometimes tolerated by prison guards, at times even encouraged as punishment for prisoners who have given them problems (Donaldson 1993; Buchanan 2010).

Date (Acquaintance) Rape. What has shocked so many about date rape (also known as acquaintance rape) are studies showing how common it is (Littleton et al. 2008). Researchers who used a nationally representative sample of women enrolled in U.S. col- leges and universities with 1,000 students or more found that 1.7 percent had been raped during the preceding six months. Another 1.1 percent had been victims of attempted rape (Fisher et al. 2000).

With 11 million women enrolled in college, 2.8 percent (1.7 plus 1.1) means that over a quarter of a million college women were vic- tims of rape or of attempted rape in just the past six months. (This

Although crassly put by the cartoonist, behind the glass ceiling lies this background assumption.

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Why is sexual harassment a structural problem, not just a personal problem? What are the typical ages of rape victims?

TABLE 10.1 Age of Rape Victims

Age Rate per 1,000 Females

12–15 1.9 16–19 3.3 20–24 2.3 25–34 1.3 35–49 0.8 50–64 0.3 65 and Older 0.09

Sources: By the author. A ten-year average, based on Statistical Abstract of the United States; 2002:Table 303; 2003:Table 295; 2004:Table 322; 2005:Table 306; 2006:Table 308; 2007:Table 312; 2008:Table 316; 2009:Table 305; 2010:Table 305; 2012:Table 316.

The Changing Face of Politics 297

conclusion assumes that the rate is the same in colleges with fewer than 1,000 students, which has not been verified.) Most of the women told a friend what happened, but only 5 percent reported the crime to the police (Fisher et al. 2003).

Murder. All over the world, men are more likely than women to be killers. Figure 10.9 illustrates this gender pattern in U.S. murders. Note that although females make up about 51 percent of the U.S. population, they don’t even come close to making up 51 percent of the nation’s killers. As you can see from this figure, when women are murdered, about 9 times out of 10 the killer is a man.

Violence in the Home. In the family, too, women are the typical victims. Spouse bat- tering, marital rape, and incest are discussed in Chapter 12, pages 375–376. Two forms of violence against women—honor killings and genital circumcision—are discussed on pages 284 and 285.

Feminism and Gendered Violence. Feminist sociologists have been especially effective in bringing violence against women to the public’s attention. Some use symbolic interactionism, pointing out that to associate strength and virility with violence—as is done in many cultures—is to promote violence. Others use conflict theory. They argue that men are losing power, and that some men turn violently against women as a way to reassert their declining power and status (Reiser 1999; Meltzer 2002; Xie et al. 2011).

Solutions. There is no magic bullet for this problem of gendered violence, but to be effective, any solution must break the connection between violence and masculinity. This would require an educational program that encompasses schools, churches, homes, and the media. Given the gunslinging heroes of the Wild West and other American icons, as well as the violent messages that are so prevalent in the mass media, includ- ing video games, it is difficult to be optimistic that a change will come any time soon.

Our next topic, women in politics, however, gives us much more reason for optimism.

The Changing Face of Politics Women could take over the United States! Think about it. There are eight million more women than men of voting age. But look at Table 10.3 on the next page. Although women voters greatly outnumber men voters, men greatly outnumber women in political office. The remarkable gains women have made in recent elections can take our eye off the broader picture. Since 1789 almost 2,000 men have served in the U.S. Senate. And how many women? Only 38, including 17 current senators. Not

TABLE 10.2 Relationship of Victims and Rapists

Relationship Percentage

Relative 7% Known Well 33% Casual Acquaintance 23% Stranger 34% Not Reported 2%

Sources: By the author. A ten-year average, based on Statistical Abstract of the United States; 2002:Table 296; 2003:Table 323; 2004–2005:Table 307; 2006:Table 311; 2007: Table 315; 2008:Table 316; 2009:Table 306; 2010:Table 306; 2011:Table 313.

The most common drug used to facilitate date rape is alcohol, not GHB.

0

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23

77

The Killers

11

89

Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 2012:Tables 311, 324.

FIGURE 10.9 Killers and Their Victims

What is the relationship of victims and rapists? What is the pattern of gender and murder?

298 CHAPTER 10 Gender and Age

until 1992 was the first African American woman (Carol Moseley-Braun) elected to the U.S. Senate. No Latina or Asian American woman has yet been elected to the Senate (National Women’s Political Caucus 1998, 2011; Statistical Abstract 2012:Table 413).

We are in the midst of fundamental change. In 2002, Nancy Pelosi was the first woman to be elected by her colleagues as minority leader of the House of Representatives. Five years later, in 2007, they chose her as the first female Speaker of the House. These posts made her the most powerful woman ever in Congress. Another significant event occurred in 2008 when Hillary Clinton came within a hair’s breadth of becoming the presidential nominee of the Democratic party. That same year, Sarah Palin was chosen as the Republican vice-presidential candidate. We can also note that more women are becoming corporate executives, and, as indicated in Figure 10.4 (on page 291), more women are also becoming lawyers. In these positions, women are traveling more and making statewide and national contacts. Along with other societal changes allowing women more freedom, such as the increasing view of child care as a responsibility of both mother and father, it is only a matter of time until a woman occupies the Oval Office.

Glimpsing the Future—with Hope Women’s fuller participation in the decision-making processes of our social institutions has shattered stereotypes that tended to limit females to “feminine” activities and push

males into “masculine” ones. As structural barriers continue to fall and more activities are degendered, both males and

females will have greater freedom to pursue activities that are more compatible with their abilities and desires as

individuals. As females and males develop a new conscious-

ness both of their capacities and of their potential, relationships will change. Distinctions between the sexes will not disappear, but there is no reason for biological differences to be translated into social inequalities. Our potential, as sociologist Alison Jaggar (1990) observed, is for gender equality to become less a goal than a background condition for living in society.

TABLE 10.3 U.S. Women in Political Office

Percentage of Offices Held by Women

Number of Offices Held by Women

National Office U.S. Senate 17% 17 U.S. House of Representatives

17% 73

State Office Governors 12% 6 Lt. Governors 18% 9 Attorneys General 8% 4 Secretaries of State 24% 12 Treasurers 20% 10 State Auditors 16% 8 State Legislators 24% 1,800

Source: Center for American Women and Politics 2010.

Hillary Clinton broke through the glass ceiling in politics when she was elected senator from New York: She also came close to being the Democratic nominee for president. She is shown here in her position as Secretary of State, meeting with Arab leaders in Morocco.

How are gender and politics changing? Are we close to gender equality in politics? What support do you have for your answer?

Aging in Global Perspective 299

Inequalities of Aging In 1928, Charles Hart, who was working on his Ph.D. in anthropology, did fieldwork with the Tiwi people, who live on an island off the northern coast of Australia. Because every Tiwi belongs to a clan, they assigned Hart to the bird (Jabijabui) clan and told him that a particular woman was his mother. Hart described the woman as “toothless, almost blind, withered.” He added that she was “physically quite revolting and mentally rather senile.” He then recounted this remarkable event:

Toward the end of my time on the islands an incident occurred that surprised me because it suggested that some of them had been taking my presence in the kinship system much more seriously than I had thought. I was approached by a group of about eight or nine senior men. . . . They were the senior members of the Jabijabui clan and they had decided among themselves that the time had come to get rid of the decrepit old woman who had first called me son and whom I now called mother. . . . As I knew, they said, it was Tiwi custom, when an old woman became too feeble to look after herself, to “cover her up.” This could only be done by her sons and brothers and all of them had to agree beforehand, since once it was done, they did not want any dissension among the broth- ers or clansmen, as that might lead to a feud. My “mother” was now completely blind, she was constantly falling over logs or into fires, and they, her senior clansmen, were in agreement that she would be better out of the way. Did I agree?

I already knew about “covering up.” The Tiwi, like many other hunting and gather- ing peoples, sometimes got rid of their ancient and decrepit females. The method was to dig a hole in the ground in some lonely place, put the old woman in the hole and fill it in with earth until only her head was showing. Everybody went away for a day or two and then went back to the hole to discover to their great surprise, that the old woman was dead, having been too feeble to raise her arms from the earth. Nobody had “killed” her; her death in Tiwi eyes was a natural one. She had been alive when her relatives last saw her. I had never seen it done, though I knew it was the custom, so I asked my brothers if it was necessary for me to attend the “covering up.”

They said no and that they would do it, but only after they had my agreement. Of course I agreed, and a week or two later we heard in our camp that my “mother” was dead, and we all wailed and put on the trimmings of mourning. (C. W. M. Hart in Hart and Pilling 1979:125–126)

Aging in Global Perspective We won’t deal with the question of whether it was moral or ethical for Hart to agree that the old woman should be “covered up.” What is of interest for our purposes is how the Tiwi treated their frail elderly—or, more specifically, their frail female elderly. You probably noticed that the Tiwi “covered up” only old women. As was noted earlier, females are discriminated against throughout the world. As this incident makes evident, in some places that discrimination extends even to death.

Every society must deal with the problem of people growing old, and of some becoming frail. Although few societies choose to bury old people alive, all societies must decide how to allocate limited resources among their citizens. With the percentage of the population that is old increasing in many nations, these decisions are generating tensions between the generations.

The Social Construction of Aging The way the Tiwi treated frail elderly women reflects one extreme of how societies cope with aging. Another extreme, one that reflects an entirely different attitude, is illus- trated by the Abkhasians, an agricultural people who live in Georgia, a republic of the former Soviet Union. The Abkhasians pay their elderly high respect and look to them

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What is the “covering up” ceremony of the Tiwi? Why did they practice it?

This 104-year old woman in Bama Yao, China, has slowed down but has not retired. As in her earlier years, she still does spinning and remains an active member of her community.

Except for interaction within families, age groups in Western culture are usually kept fairly separate. The idea of having a day care center in the same building as a nursing home breaks this tradition. This photo was taken in Seattle, Washington.

for guidance. They would no more dispense with their elderly by “covering them up” than we would “cover up” a sick child in our culture.

The Abkhasians may be among the longest-lived people on earth. Many claim to live past 100—some beyond 120 and even 130 (Benet 1971; Robbins 2006). Although researchers have concluded that the extreme claims are bogus (Young et al. 2010), government records do indicate that many Abkhasians do live to a very old age.

Three main factors appear to account for their long lives. The first is their diet, which consists of little meat, much fresh fruit, vegetables, garlic, goat cheese, cornmeal, buttermilk, and wine. The second is their lifelong physi- cal activity. They do slow down after age 80, but even after the age of 100 they still work about four hours a day. The third factor—a highly developed sense of community—lies at the very heart of the Abkhasian culture. From childhood, each individual is integrated into a primary group and remains so throughout life. There is no such thing as a nursing home, nor do the elderly live alone. Because they continue to work and contribute to the group’s wel- fare, the elderly aren’t a burden to anyone. They don’t vegetate, nor do they feel the need to “fill time” with bingo and shuffleboard. In short, the elderly feel no sudden rupture between what they “were” and what they “are.”

The examples of the Tiwi and the Abkhasians reveal an important socio- logical principle: Like gender, aging is socially constructed. That is, noth- ing in the nature of aging summons forth any particular viewpoint. Rather, attitudes toward the aged are rooted in society and, therefore, differ from one social group to another. As we shall see, even the age at which people are considered old depends not on biology, but on culture.

Industrialization and the Graying of the Globe As was noted in previous chapters, industrialization is occurring worldwide. With indus- trialization comes a higher standard of living, including more food, a purer water supply, and more effective ways of fighting the diseases that kill children. As a result, when a country industrializes, more of its people reach older ages. The Social Map on the next page illustrates this principle.

From this global map, you can see that the industrialized countries have the high- est percentage of elderly. The range among nations is broad, from just 1 of 45 citizens in nonindustrialized Uganda to nine times more—1 of 5—in postindustrial Japan (Statistical Abstract 2012:Table 1334). In just two decades, half the population of Italy and Japan will be older than 50 (Kinsella and Phillips 2005). The graying of the globe

is so new that two-thirds of all people who have ever passed age 50 in the history of the world are alive today (Zaslow 2003).

As the numbers of elderly continue to grow, analysts have become alarmed about future liabilities for their care. This issue is especially troubling in western Europe and Japan, which have the largest percentage of citizens over age 60. The basic issue is, How can nations provide high-quality care for their growing numbers of elderly without burdening future generations with impossible taxes? Although more and more nations around the world are confronting this issue, no one has found a solution yet.

The Graying of America As Figure 10.11 on the next page illustrates, the United States is part of this global trend. This figure shows how U.S. life expectancy, the number of years people can expect to live, has increased since 1900. To me, and perhaps to you, it is startling to realize that a hundred years ago the average U.S. man didn’t make it to his 50th birthday, while the average U.S. woman died

What does “the social construction of aging” mean? Can you give an example?

Aging in Global Perspective 301

What indicators are there that the globe is “graying”?

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51.8 53.6 54.6

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Sources: By the author. Based on Historical Statistics of the United States, Colonial Times to 1970, Bicentennial Edition, Part I, Series B, 107–115; Statistical Abstract of the United States 2012:Table 104.

FIGURE 10.11 U.S. Life Expectancy by Year of Birth

Highest percentage of population age 65 and older

1. Japan (22.6%)

2. Germany (20.4%)

3. Italy (20.3%)

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Lowest percentage of population age 65 and older

1. Uganda (2.1%)

2. Niger (2.3%)

3. Afghanistan (2.4%)

The least: 2.1% to 3.9%

The middle range: 4.1% to 9.9%

The most: 10.0% to 22.6%

Percentage unknown

Percentage of a Country’s Population Age 65 and Older

North America

South America

Africa

Europe

Asia

Australia

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FIGURE 10.10 The Graying of the Globe

302 CHAPTER 10 Gender and Age

shortly after her 50th birthday. Since then, we’ve added about 30 years to our life expec- tancy, and Americans born today can expect to live into their 70s or 80s.

The term graying of America refers to this growing percentage of older people in the U.S. population. Look at Figure 10.12 above. In 1900 only 4 percent of Americans were age 65 and older. Today 13 percent are. The average 65-year-old can expect to live another 19 years (Statistical Abstract 2012:Table 107). U.S. society has become so “gray” that, as Figure 10.13 shows, the median age has almost doubled since 1850. Today, there are 8 million more elderly Americans than there are teenagers.

As anyone who has ever visited Florida knows, the elderly population is not distributed evenly around the country. (As Jerry Seinfeld sardonically noted, “There’s a law that when you get old, you’ve got to move to Florida.”) The Social Map on the next page shows how uneven this distribution is.

Although more people are living to old age, the maximum length of life possible, the life span, has not increased. No one knows, however, just what that maximum is. We do know that it is at least 122, for this was the well-documented age of Jeanne Louise Calment of France at her death in 1997. If the birth certificate of Tuti Yusupova in Uzbekistan proves to be genuine, her age of 130 would indicate that the human life span may exceed even this number by a comfortable margin. It is also likely that advances in genetics will extend the human life span—perhaps to hundreds of years.

Let’s see the different pictures of aging that emerge when we apply the three theo- retical perspectives.

The Symbolic Interactionist Perspective At first, the audience sat quietly as the developers explained their plans to build a high- rise apartment building. After a while, people began to shift uncomfortably in their seats. Then they began to show open hostility.

“That’s too much money to spend on those people,” said one. “You even want them to have a swimming pool?” asked another incredulously. Finally, one young woman put their attitudes in a nutshell when she asked, “Who

wants all those old people around?”

When physician Robert Butler (1975, 1980) heard these complaints about plans to build apartments for senior citizens, he began to realize how deeply antagonistic feelings toward

1900 20001950 2050

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Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 2012:Table 9, and earlier years.

FIGURE 10.12 The Graying of America: Americans Age 65 and Older

Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 2000:Table 14; 2012:Table 9, and earlier years.

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of the U.S. Population FIGURE 10.13 The Median Age

What does “graying of America” mean? Why is this term accurate?

When does old age begin? And what activities are appropriate for the elderly? From this photo that I took of Munimah, a 65-year-old bonded labor- er in Chennai, India, you can see how culturally relative these questions are. No one in Chennai thinks it is extraor- dinary that this woman makes her liv- ing by carrying heavy rocks all day in the burning, tropical sun. Working next to her in the quarry is her 18-year-old son, who breaks the rocks into the size that his mother carries.

The Symbolic Interactionist Perspective 303

The younger states: 10.1% to 14.2%

The average states: 14.4% to 15.7%

The grayer states: 15.8% to 19.5%

ates: %

ates: %

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UT

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Least elderly

1. Utah (10.1%)

2. Alaska (10.2%)

3. Georgia (11.6%)

Most elderly

1. Florida (19.5%)

2. West Virginia (18.1%)

3. Maine (18%)

Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 2011:Table 18. Projections to 2015.

FIGURE 10.14 As Florida Goes, So Goes the Nation

the elderly can run. He coined the term ageism to refer to prejudice and discrimination directed against people because of their age. Let’s see how ageism developed in U.S. society.

Shifting Meanings of Growing Old As we have seen, there is nothing inherent in old age to produce any particular atti- tude, negative or not. Some historians point out that in early U.S. society old age was regarded positively (Cottin 1979; Fleming et al. 2003). In colonial times, growing old was seen as an accomplishment because so few people made it to old age. With no pensions, the elderly continued to work at jobs that changed little over time. They were viewed as storehouses of knowledge about work skills and sources of wisdom about how to live a long life.

The coming of industrialization eroded these bases of respect. The better sanitation and medical care allowed more people to reach old age, and no longer was being elderly an honorable distinction. Industrialization’s new forms of mass production also made young workers as productive as the elderly. Coupled with mass education, this stripped away the elderly’s superior knowledge (Cowgill 1974; Hunt 2005).

A basic principle of symbolic interactionism is that we perceive both ourselves and others according to the symbols of our culture. When the meaning of old age changed from an asset to a liability, not only did younger people come to view the elderly dif- ferently but the elderly also began to perceive themselves in a new light. This shift in meaning is demonstrated in the way people lie about their age: They used to say that they were older than they were, but now claim to be younger than their true ages (Clair et al. 1993).

However, once again, the meaning of old age is shifting—and this time in a posi- tive direction. This is largely because most of today’s U.S. elderly can take care of themselves financially, and many are well-off. As the vast numbers of the baby boom generation enter their elderly years, their better health and financial strength will contribute to still more positive images of the elderly. If this symbolic shift contin- ues, the next step—now in process—is to celebrate old age as a time of renewal.

How have Americans’ ideas about the elderly changed over time?

304 CHAPTER 10 Gender and Age

Old age will be viewed not as a period that precedes death, but, rather, as a new stage of growth.

Even theories of old age have taken a more positive tone. A theory that goes by the mouthful gerotranscendence was developed by Swedish sociologist Lars Tornstam. The thrust of this theory is that as people grow old they transcend their limited views of life. They become less self-centered and begin to feel more at one with the universe. Coming to see things as less black and white, they develop subtler ways of viewing right and wrong and tolerate more ambiguity (Manheimer 2005; Hyse and Tornstam 2009). However, this theory seems to miss the mark. I have seen some elderly people grow softer and more spiritual, but I have also seen others turn bitter, close up, and become even more judgmental of others. The theory’s limitations should become apparent shortly.

The Influence of the Mass Media In Chapter 3 (pp. 77, 79–80), we noted that the mass media help to shape our ideas about both gender and relationships between men and women. As a powerful source of symbols, the media also influence our ideas of the elderly, the topic of the Mass Media box on the next page.

In Sum: Symbolic interactionists stress that old age has no inherent meaning. There is nothing about old age to automatically summon forth responses of honor and respect, as with the Abkhasians, or any other response. Culture shapes how we perceive the elderly, including the ways we view our own aging. In short, the social modifies the biological.

Read

Growing Old in an Arab American

Family by Hani Fakhouri

on mysoclab.com

How is the meaning of “old age” changing today?

Stereotypes, which play such a profound role in social life, are a basic area of sociological investigation. In contemporary society, the mass media are a major source of stereotypes.

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The Functionalist Perspective Functionalists analyze how the parts of society work together. Among the components of society are age cohorts—people who were born at roughly the same time and who pass through the life course together. Age cohorts might seem to be merely an abstract term, but they have a huge impact on your life. When you finish college, for example, if the age cohort nearing retirement is large (a “baby boom” generation), more jobs will be available to you and your peers. In contrast, if it is small (a “baby bust” generation), fewer jobs will be open.

Let’s consider people who are about to retire or who have retired recently. We will review theories that focus on how people adjust to retirement.

Disengagement Theory Think about how disruptive it would be if the elderly left their jobs only when they died or became incompetent. How does society get the elderly to leave their positions so younger people can take them? According to disengagement theory, developed by Elaine Cumming and William Henry (1961), this is the function of pensions.

The Functionalist Perspective 305

Pensions get the elderly to disengage from their positions and hand them over to younger people. Retirement, then, is a mutually beneficial arrangement between two parts of society.

Evaluation of the Theory. Certainly pensions do entice the elderly to leave their jobs so a younger generation can step in. I think we all know this, so it isn’t much of a theory. Critics have also pointed out that the elderly don’t really “disengage.” People who quit their jobs don’t sit in rocking chairs and watch the world go by. Instead of disengaging, the retired exchange one set of roles for another (Jerrome 1992). They find these new ways of conducting their lives, which often center on friendship, no less satisfying than their earlier roles. In addition, the meaning of retirement has changed since this “theory” was developed. Less and less does retirement mean an end to work. Millions slow down, staying at their jobs, but putting in fewer hours. Others work as consultants part-time. Some switch careers, even in their 60s, some even in their 70s. If disengagement theory is ever resurrected, it must come to grips with our new patterns of retirement.

Activity Theory Are retired people more satisfied with life? (All that extra free time and not having to kowtow to a boss must be nice.) Are intimate activities more satisfying than formal ones? Such questions are the focus of activity theory. Although we could consider this theory from other perspectives, we are examining it from the functionalist perspective because its focus is how disengagement is functional or dysfunctional.

What is disengagement theory? What are its criticisms?

Mass Media in Social Life

The Cultural Lens: Shaping Our Perceptions of the Elderly The mass media profoundly influence our perception of people. What we hear and see on television and in the movies, the songs we listen to, the books and magazines we read—all become part of the cultural lens through which we view the world. The media shape our images of minorities and dominant groups; men, women, and children; people with dis- abilities; those from other cultures—and the elderly.

The shaping of our images and perception of the elderly is subtle, so much so that it usu- ally occurs without our awareness. The elderly, for example, are underrepresented on television and in most popular magazines. This leaves a covert message—that the elderly are of little consequence and can be safely ignored.

The media also reflect and reinforce stereotypes of gender age. Older male news anchors are likely to be retained, while female anchors who turn the same age are more likely to be transferred to less visible positions. Similarly, in movies older men are more like- ly to play romantic leads—and to play them opposite much younger rising stars.

The message might be subtle, but it is not lost. The more television that people watch, the more they perceive the elderly in negative terms. The elderly, too,

internalize these negative images, which, in turn, influences the ways they view themselves. These images are so powerful that they affect the elderly’s health, even the way they walk

(Donlon et al. 2005). We become fearful of growing old, and we

go to great lengths to deny that we are losing our youth. Fear and denial play into the hands of advertisers, of course, who exploit our con- cerns. They help us deny this biological reality by selling us hair dyes, skin creams, and other products that are designed to conceal even the appearance of old age. For these same rea- sons, plastic surgeons do a thriving business as they remove telltale signs of aging.

The elderly’s growing numbers and affluence translate into economic clout and political power. It is inevitable, then, that the media’s images of the elderly will change. An indication of that change is shown in the photo at left.

For Your Consideration↑

What other examples of fear and denial of growing old are you familiar with? What examples of older men playing romantic leads with younger women can you give?

Of older women and younger men? Why do you think we have gender age?

Aging is more than biology. In some cultures, Mariah Carey, 43, would be considered elderly. Carey is shown here with her husband, Nick Cannon, 31.

Evaluation of the Theory. A study of retired people in France found that some people are happier when they are more active, but others prefer less involvement (Keith 1982). Similarly, most people find informal, inti- mate activities, such as spending time with friends, to be more satisfying than formal activities. But not everyone does. In one study, 2,000 retired U.S. men reported formal activities to be as important as informal ones. Even solitary tasks, such as doing home repairs, had about the same impact as intimate activities on these men’s life satisfaction (Beck and Page 1988). It is the same for spending time with adult children. “Often enough” for some parents is “not enough” or even “too much” for others. In short, researchers have discovered the obvious: What makes life satisfying for one person doesn’t work for another. (This, of course, can be a source of intense frustration for retired couples.)

Continuity Theory Another theory of aging called continuity theory focuses, as its name implies, on how the elderly continue ties with their past (Wang and Shultz 2010). When they retire, many people take on new roles that are simi- lar to the ones they gave up. For example, a former CEO might serve as a consultant, a retired electrician might do small electrical repairs, or a pensioned banker might take over the finances of her church. Researchers have found that people who are active in multiple roles (wife, author, mother, intimate friend, church member, etc.) are better equipped to handle the changes that come with growing old. Social class is also signifi- cant: With their greater resources, people from higher social classes adjust better to the challenges of aging.

Evaluation of the Theory. The basic criticism of continuity theory is that it is too broad (Hatch 2000). We all have anchor points based on our particular experiences in life, and we all rely on them to make adjustments to the changes we encounter. This applies to peo- ple of all ages beyond infancy. This theory is really a collection of loosely connected ideas, with no specific application to the elderly.

In Sum: The broader perspective of the functionalists is how society’s parts work together to keep society running smoothly. If the younger workers had to fight to take over the jobs of the elderly, it would be disruptive to society. To make this process work smoothly, the elderly are offered pensions, which entice them to leave their posi- tions. Functionalists also use a narrower perspective, focusing on how individuals adjust to their retirement. The findings of this narrower perspective are too mixed to be of much value—except that people who have better resources and are active in multiple roles adjust better to old age (Crosnoe and Elder 2002).

Because U.S. workers do not have to retire by any certain age, it is also important to study how people decide to keep working or to retire in the first place. After they retire, how do they reconstruct their identities and come to terms with their changed lives? As the United States grows even grayer, these should prove productive areas of sociological theory and research.

For a unique view of continuity into old age, one I think you will enjoy, read the Down-to-Earth Sociology box on the next page.

The Conflict Perspective As you know, the conflict perspective’s guiding principle is how social groups struggle to control power and resources. How does this apply to society’s age groups? Regardless of whether the young and old recognize it, say conflict theorists, they are opponents in a struggle that threatens to throw society into turmoil. Let’s look at how the passage of Social Security legislation fits the conflict view.

Researchers are exploring factors that can make old age an enjoyable period of life, those conditions that increase people’s mental, social, emotional, and physical well-being. As research progresses, do you think we will reach the point where the average old person will be in this woman’s physical condition?

What is activity theory? Continuity theory?

The Conflict Perspective 307

Fighting for Resources: Social Security Legislation In the 1920s, before Social Security provided an income for the aged, two-thirds of all citizens over 65 had no savings and could not support themselves (Holtzman 1963; Crossen 2004). Destitution in old age loomed even larger for workers during the Great Depression, and in 1930 Francis Townsend, a physician, started a move- ment to rally older citizens. He soon had one-third of all Americans over age 65 enrolled in his Townsend Clubs. They demanded that the federal government impose a national sales tax of 2 percent to provide $200 a month for every person over 65 ($2,100 a month in today’s money). In 1934, the Townsend Plan went before Congress. Because it called for such high payments and many were afraid that it would destroy people’s incentive to save for the future, members of Congress looked for a way to reject the plan without appearing to oppose the elderly. When President Roosevelt announced his own, more modest Social Security plan in 1934, Congress embraced it (Schottland 1963; Amenta 2006).

Down-to-Earth Sociology

Feisty to the End: Gender Roles among the Elderly

This image of my father makes me smile—not because he was arrested as an old man, but, rather, because of the events that led to his arrest. My dad had always been a colorful character, ready with endless ribald jokes and a hearty laugh. He carried these characteristics into his old age.

In his late 70s, my dad was living in a small apartment in a complex for the elderly in Minnesota. The adjacent building was a nursing home, the next destination for the residents of these apartments. None of them liked to think about this “home,” because no one survived it—yet they all knew that this would be their destination. Under the watchful eye of these elderly neighbors, care in the nursing home was fairly good. Until they were transferred to this unwelcome last stopping-place, life for them went on “as usual” in the complex for the elderly.

According to the police report and my dad’s account, here is what happened:

Dad was sitting in the downstairs lounge with other residents, waiting for the mail to arrive, a daily ritual that the residents looked forward to. For some reason known only to him, my dad hooked his cane under the dress of an elderly woman, lifted up her skirt, and laughed. Understandably, this upset her, as well as her husband, who was standing next to her. Angry, the man moved toward my father, threatening him.

I say “moved,” rather than “lunged,” because this man was using a walker. My dad started to run away from this threat. Actually, “run” isn’t quite the right word. “Hobbled” would be a better term.

My dad fled as fast as he could using his cane, while the other man pursued him as fast as he could using his walker.

Wheezing and puffing, the two went from the lounge into the long adjoining hall, pausing now and then to catch their breath. Tiring the most, the other man gave up the pursuit. He then called the police.

When the police officer arrived, he said, “Uncle Marv, I’m sorry, but I’m going to have to arrest you.” (This event occurred in a small town, and the officer assigned this case

turned out to be Dad’s nephew.) Dad went before a judge, who could

hardly keep a straight face. He gave Dad a small fine and warned him to behave himself. The apartment manager also gave Dad a warning: One more incident, and he would have to move out of the complex.

Dad’s wife wasn’t too happy about the situation, either.

This event was brought to mind by a newspaper account of a fight that broke out at the food bar of a retirement home (“Melee Breaks . . .” 2004). It seems that one elderly man criticized the way another man was picking through the salad. When a fight broke out between the two, several elderly people were hurt as they tried either to intervene or to flee.

For Your Consideration↑

People carry their personalities, values, and other traits into old age. Among these characteristics are gender roles. What examples of gender roles do you see in the events related here? Are you familiar with how old people continue to show their femininity or masculinity?

During their elderly years, men and women continue to exhibit aspects of the gender roles that they learned and played in their younger years.

How do the elderly continue “doing gender”?

308 CHAPTER 10 Gender and Age

To provide jobs for younger people, the new Social Security law required that workers retire at age 65. It did not matter how well people did their work, or how much they needed the pay. For decades, the elderly protested. Finally, in 1986, Congress eliminated mandatory retire- ment. Today, almost 90 percent of Americans retire by age 65, but most do so voluntarily. No longer can they be forced out of their jobs simply because of age.

Let’s look at what has happened to this groundbreaking legislation since it was passed.

Intergenerational Competition and Conflict Social Security came about not because the members of Congress had generous hearts, but out of a struggle between competing interest groups. As conflict theorists stress, equilibrium between competing groups is only a temporary balancing of oppositional forces, one that can be upset at any time. Following this principle, could conflict between the elderly and the young be in our future? Let’s consider this possibility.

If you listen closely, you can hear ripples of grumbling— complaints that the elderly are getting more than their fair share of society’s resources. The huge costs of Social Security and Medicare are a special concern. As incredible as it may seem, three of every five tax dollars (60 percent) is spent on these two programs (Statistical Abstract 2012:Tables 474, 475). (Total U.S. government receipts are $2,173,000,000, and the total outlay for Medicare and Social Security is

$1,307,000,000.) As Figure 10.15 shows, Social Security payments were $781 million in 1950; now they run 950 times higher. Now look at Figure 10.16 on the next page, which shows the nation’s huge—and growing—medical bill to care for the elderly. Like gasoline poured on a bonfire, these soaring costs may well fuel an intergenerational showdown.

Figure 10.17 on the next page shows another area of concern that can fuel an intergenerational conflict. You can see how greatly the condition of the elderly improved as the government transferred resources to them. But look also at the matching path of children’s poverty. You can see that it is higher now than it was in 1967—and in all the years in between. Our economic crisis is having a severe toll on the nation’s children.

Did the decline in the elderly’s rate of poverty come at the expense of the nation’s children? Of course not. Congress could have decided to finance the welfare of children just as it did that of the elderly. It chose not to. Why? Following conflict theorists, the reason is that the elderly, not the children, launched a broad assault on Congress. The lobbyists for the elderly put a lot of grease in the political reelection machine.

Figure 10.17 could indicate another reason for coming intergenerational conflict. If we take a 9 percent poverty rate as a goal for the nation’s children—to match what the government has accomplished for the elderly—where would the money come from? If the issue gets pitched as a case of taking money from the elderly to give it to children, it can divide the generations. To get people to think that they must choose between pathetic children and suffering old folks can splinter voters into opposing groups. Would improving the welfare of children ever be presented in such a crass way? Ask yourself this: Do politicians ever try to manipulate the emotions of voters to get elected?

In Sum: Age groups are one of society’s many groups that are competing for scarce resources. At some point, this competition may break into conflict.

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FIGURE 10.15 to Beneficiaries

Social Security Payments

Why might Social Security lead to conflict between the generations?

The Conflict Perspective 309 P

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FIGURE 10.17 Age and Trends in Poverty

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FIGURE 10.16 Health Care Costs for the Elderly and Disabled

Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States various years, and 2012:Tables 144, 151. Broken lines indicate the author’s projections.

Why might Medicare and Medicaid lead to conflict between the generations?

Explore

Living Data

on mysoclab.com

310 CHAPTER 10 Gender and Age

More and more, the goal of the elderly is to enjoy themselves—and with more resources at their disposal, more and more are able to do so. The goal of the Red Hat Society, with chapters around the nation, is simply for women to have fun.

What new views of aging are developing?

Looking toward the Future Let’s not lose sight of one of the major changes stressed in this chapter—that for the first time in human history huge numbers of people are becoming elderly. It is inevitable that such a fundamental change will have a powerful impact on societies around the world, so much so that it might even transform them. We don’t have space to explore such potential transformations, which are only speculative at the moment, so let’s try to catch a glimpse of a new approach to aging.

New Views of Aging As huge numbers of Americans move into old age, the elderly have begun not only to challenge the demeaning stereotypes of the aged but also to develop new perspectives of aging. These new approaches build on the idea that old age should not be viewed as “a-time-close-to-death,” but, rather, as a new period of life, one with its specific chal- lenges, to be sure, but also one to be enjoyed, even celebrated. This new time of life provides unique opportunities to pursue interests, to develop creativity, and to enhance the appreciation of life’s beauty and one’s place in it.

This approach to aging is new, so we don’t know the directions it will take. But if this emphasis continues, it will change how younger people view the elderly—as well as how the elderly view themselves. Negative stereotypes of weak old people living out their last years while they get ready to die might even be replaced with stereotypes of robust, engaged, thriving older adults (Manheimer 2005). No stereotype will encom- pass the reality of the elderly, of course, as the aged differ among themselves as much as younger people differ.

Looking toward the Future 311

Percentage of college students who are women

1970

42% NOW

57%

Percentage of dental school graduates who are women

1970

1% NOW

46%

Percentage of medical school graduates who are women

1970

8% NOW

49%

Women make up this percentage of the U.S. labor force

1970

38% 1890

18% NOW

47%

Percentage of men’s salary earned by women

1970

59% NOW

72%

OTHER NUMBERS Number of U.S.

senators since 1789

MEN

2,000 WOMEN

38

Number of workers paying into Social Security

for each beneficiary

1950

16 NOW

4

Life expectancy of the average

American

1900

47 YEARS

NOW

78 YEARS

Annual Social Security payments

to beneficiaries

NOW

BILLION

$720 1950

MILLION

$781

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NOW

37 1900

23 2050

39

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NOW

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4% 20% 2050

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NOW

20% 1970

16% NOW

9% 1970

25%

312 CHAPTER 10 Gender and Age

Summary and Review10CHAPTE R

Issues of Sex and Gender What is gender stratification? The term gender stratification refers to unequal access to property, power, and prestige on the basis of sex. Each society establishes a structure that, on the basis of sex and gender, opens and closes doors to its privileges. P. 276.

How do sex and gender differ? Sex refers to biological distinctions between males and females. It consists of both primary and secondary sex characteristics. Gender, in contrast, is what a society con- siders proper behaviors and attitudes for its male and female members. Sex physically distinguishes males from females; gender refers to what people call “masculine” and “femi- nine.” P. 276.

Why do the behaviors of males and females differ? The “nature versus nurture” debate refers to whether dif- ferences in the behaviors of males and females are caused by inherited (biological) or learned (cultural) character- istics. Almost all sociologists take the side of nurture. In recent years, however, sociologists have begun to cau- tiously open the door to biology. Pp. 276–279.

Gender Inequality in Global Perspective How did females become a minority group? Patriarchy, or male dominance, appears to be universal. The origin of discrimination against females is lost in history, but the primary theory of how females became a minority group in their own societies focuses on the physical limitations imposed by childbirth. Pp. 279–283.

What are some forms of global violence against females? The major forms discussed are honor killings and female circumcision. Pp. 284.

Gender Inequality in the United States Is the feminist movement new? In what is called the “first wave,” feminists made political demands for change in the early 1900s—and were met

with hostility, and even violence. The “second wave” began in the 1960s and continues today. A “third wave” has emerged. Pp. 284–288.

What forms do gender inequality in health care and education take? Physicians don’t take women’s health complaints as seri- ously as those of men, and they exploit women’s fears, performing unnecessary hysterectomies. More women than men attend college, and each tends to select fields that are categorized as “feminine.” Pp. 288–292.

How does gender inequality show up in the workplace? All occupations show a gender gap in pay. For college graduates, the lifetime pay gap runs over a million dollars in favor of men. Sexual harassment also continues to be a reality of the workplace. Pp. 292–296.

What is the relationship between gender and violence? Overwhelmingly, the victims of rape and murder are females. Conflict theorists point out that men use violence to maintain their power and privilege. Pp. 296–297.

What is the trend in gender inequality in politics? Women continue to be underrepresented in politics, but the trend toward greater political equality is firmly in place. Pp. 297–298.

Aging in Global Perspective How are the elderly treated around the world? There is no single set of attitudes, beliefs, or policies regard- ing the aged. Rather, they vary around the world, from exclusion and killing to integration and honor. The global trend is for more people to live longer. Pp. 299–302.

The Symbolic Interactionist Perspective What does the social construction of aging mean? Nothing in the nature of aging produces any particular set of attitudes. Rather, attitudes toward the elderly are

Summary and Review 313

rooted in society and differ from one social group to another. Pp. 302–304.

The Functionalist Perspective How is retirement functional for society? Functionalists focus on how the withdrawal of the elderly from positions of responsibility benefits society. Disengagement theory examines retirement as a device for ensuring that a society’s positions of responsibility are passed smoothly from one generation to the next. Activity theory examines how people adjust when they retire. Continuity theory focuses on how people adjust to growing old by continuing their roles and coping techniques. Pp. 304–306.

The Conflict Perspective Is there conflict among different age groups? Social Security legislation is an example of one genera- tion making demands on another generation for limited resources. As the number of retired people grows, there are relatively fewer workers to support them. The mushrooming costs of social security, Medicare, and Medicaid are growing concerns. Pp. 306–310.

Looking toward the Future What trends indicate the future for gender and aging? The trends are positive: Increasing equality and political par- ticipation for women and, for the elderly, longer lives, less poverty, and the development of creative aging. P. 310.

Thinking Critically about Chapter 10 1. What is your position on the “nature versus nurture”

(biology or culture) debate? What materials in this chap- ter support your position?

2. Why do you think that the gender gap in pay exists all over the world?

3. How does culture influence our ideas about the elderly?

Politics and the Economy11CHAPTE R

In 1949, George Orwell wrote 1984, a book about a time in the future when a government known as “Big Brother” dominates society, dictating almost every aspect of each individual’s life. Even loving someone is considered sinister—a betrayal of the supreme love and total allegiance that all citizens owe Big Brother.

Despite the danger, Winston and Julia fall in love. They delight in each other, but they must meet furtively, always with the threat of discovery hanging over their heads. When informers turn them in, interrogators separate Julia and Winston and try to destroy their affection and restore their loyalty to Big Brother.

Winston’s tormentor is O’Brien, who straps Winston into a chair so tightly that he can’t even move his head. O’Brien explains that inflicting pain is not always enough to break a person’s will, but everyone has a breaking point. There is some worst fear that will push anyone over the edge.

O’Brien tells Winston that he has discovered his worst fear. Then he sets a cage with two starving giant sewer rats on the table next to Winston. O’Brien picks up a hood connected to the door of the cage and places it over Winston’s head. He then explains that when he presses the lever, the door of the cage will slide up, and the rats will shoot out like bullets and bore straight into Winston’s face. Winston’s eyes, the only part of his body that he can move, dart back and forth, revealing his ter- ror. Speaking so quietly that Winston has to strain to hear him, O’Brien adds that the rats sometimes attack the eyes first, but sometimes they burrow through the cheeks and devour the tongue. When O’Brien places his hand on the lever, Winston realizes that the only way out is for someone else to take his place. But who? Then he hears his own voice screaming, “Do it to Julia! . . . Tear her face off. Strip her to the bones. Not me! Julia! Not me!”

Orwell does not describe Julia’s interrogation, but when Julia and Winston see each other later, they realize that each has betrayed the other. Their love is gone. Big Brother has won.

Winston’s and Julia’s misplaced loyalty had made them political heretics, a danger to the state, for every citizen had the duty to place the state above all else in life. To preserve the state’s dominance over the individual, their allegiance to one another had to be stripped from them. As you see, it was.

Even loving some- one is considered sinister—a betrayal of the supreme love and total allegiance that all citizens owe Big Brother.

South Africa

316 CHAPTER 11 Politics and the Economy

The ultimate foundation of any political order is violence, never more starkly demonstrated than when a government takes a human life. This iconic photo from the war in Vietnam shows the chief of the national police shooting a suspected Viet Cong officer.

Politics: Establishing Leadership Although seldom as dramatic as the interrogations of Winston and Julia, politics is always about power and authority. Let’s explore this topic that is so significant for our lives.

Power, Authority, and Violence To exist, every society must have a system of leadership. Some people must have power over others. As Max Weber (1913/1947) pointed out, we perceive power as either legitimate or illegitimate. Legitimate power is called authority. This is power that people accept as right. In contrast, illegitimate power—called coercion—is power that people do not accept as just.

Imagine that you are on your way to buy the hot new cell phone that is on sale for $250. As you approach the store, a man jumps out of an alley and shoves a gun in your face. He demands your money. Frightened for your life, you hand over your $250. After filing a police report, you head back to college to take a sociology exam. You are running late, so you step on the gas. As you hit 85, you see flashing blue and red lights in your rearview mirror. Your explanation about the robbery doesn’t faze the officer—or the judge who hears your case a few weeks later. She first lectures you on safety and then orders you to pay $50 in court costs plus $10 for every mile over 65. You pay the $250.

The mugger, the police officer, and the judge—all have power, and in each case you part with $250. What, then, is the difference? The difference is that the mugger has no author- ity. His power is illegitimate—he has no right to do what he did. In contrast, you acknowl- edge that the officer has the right to stop you and that the judge has the right to fine you. They have authority, or legitimate power.

Authority and Legitimate Violence As sociologist Peter Berger observed, it makes little difference whether you willingly pay the fine that the judge levies against you or refuse to pay it. The court will get its money one way or another.

There may be innumerable steps before its application [of violence], in the way of warnings and reprimands. But if all the warnings are disregarded, even in so slight a matter as pay- ing a traffic ticket, the last thing that will happen is that a couple of cops show up at the door with handcuffs and a Black Maria [paddy wagon]. Even the moderately courteous cop who hands out the initial traffic ticket is likely to wear a gun—just in case. (Berger 1963)

What is the difference between authority and coercion?

Power, Authority, and Violence 317

One of the best examples of charismatic authority is Joan of Arc, shown here mounted and armored.

The government, then, also called the state, claims a monopoly on legitimate force or violence. This point, made by Max Weber (1946, 1922/1978)—that the state claims both the exclusive right to use violence and the right to punish everyone else who uses violence—is crucial to our understanding of politics. If someone owes you $100, you cannot take the money by force, much less imprison that person. The state, in contrast, can. The ultimate proof of the state’s authority is that you cannot kill someone because he or she has done something that you consider absolutely horrible—but the state can. As Berger (1963) summarized this matter, “Violence is the ultimate foundation of any political order.”

But just why do people accept power as legitimate? Max Weber (1922/1978) identified three sources of authority: traditional, rational–legal, and charismatic. Let’s examine each.

Traditional Authority Throughout history, the most common basis for authority has been tradition. Traditional authority, which is based on custom, is the hallmark of tribal groups. In these societies, custom dictates basic relationships. For example, birth into a particular family makes an individual the chief, king, or queen. As far as members of that society are concerned, this is the right way to determine who shall rule because “We’ve always done it this way.”

Although traditional authority declines with industrialization, it never dies out. Even though we live in a postindustrial society, parents continue to exercise authority over their children because parents always have had such authority. From generations past, we inherit the idea that parents should discipline their children, choose their doctors and schools, and teach them religion and morality.

Rational–Legal Authority The second type of authority, rational–legal authority, is based not on custom but on written rules. Rational means reasonable, and legal means part of law. Thus rational– legal refers to matters that have been agreed to by reasonable people and written into law (or regulations of some sort). The matters that are agreed to may be as broad as a constitution that specifies the rights of all members of a society or as narrow as a con- tract between two individuals. Because bureaucracies are based on written rules, rational–legal authority is also called bureaucratic authority.

Rational–legal authority comes from the position that someone holds, not from the person who holds that position. In the United States, for example, the presi- dent’s authority comes from the legal power assigned to that office, as specified in a written constitution, not from custom or the individual’s personal characteristics. In rational–legal authority, everyone—no matter how high the office held—is subject to the organization’s written rules. In governments based on traditional authority, the ruler’s word may be law; but in those based on rational–legal authority, the ruler’s word is subject to the law.

Charismatic Authority Joan of Arc is an example of charismatic authority, the third type of author- ity Weber identified. (Charisma is a Greek word that means a gift freely and graciously given [Arndt and Gingrich 1957].) People are drawn to a charismatic individual because they believe that individual has been touched by God or has been endowed by nature with exceptional qualities (Lipset 1993). The armies did not follow Joan of Arc because it was the custom to do so, as in traditional authority. Nor did they risk their lives fighting alongside her because she held a position defined by written rules, as in rational–legal authority. Instead, people followed her because they were attracted by her outstanding traits. They saw her as a messenger of God, fighting on the side of justice, and they accepted her leadership because of these appealing qualities.

How is the state based on violence? Can you contrast traditional, rational–legal, and charismatic authority?

318 CHAPTER 11 Politics and the Economy

The Threat Posed by Charismatic Leaders. Kings and queens owe allegiance to tradition, and presidents to written laws. To what, however, do charismatic lead- ers owe allegiance? Their authority resides in their ability to attract followers, which is often based on their sense of a special mission or calling. Not tied to tradition or the regulation of law, charismatic leaders pose a threat to the established political order. Following their personal inclination, charismatic leaders can inspire followers to disregard—or even to overthrow—traditional and rational–legal authorities.

This threat does not go unnoticed, and traditional and rational–legal authorities often oppose charismatic leaders. If they are not careful, however, their opposi- tion can arouse even more positive sentiment in favor of the charismatic leader, who might be viewed as an underdog persecuted by the powerful. Occasionally the Roman Catholic Church faces such a threat, as when a priest claims miraculous powers that appear to be accompanied by amazing healings. As people flock to this individual, they bypass parish priests and the formal ecclesiastical structure. This transfer of allegiance from the organization to an individual threatens the church hierarchy. Consequently, church officials may encourage the priest to withdraw from the public eye, perhaps to a monastery, to rethink matters. This defuses the threat, reasserts rational–legal authority, and maintains the stability of the organization.

The Transfer of Authority The orderly transfer of authority from one leader to another is crucial for social stability. Under traditional authority, people know who is next in line. Under

rational–legal authority, people might not know who the next leader will be, but they do know how that person will be selected. South Africa provides a remarkable example of the orderly transfer of authority under a rational–legal organization. This country had been ripped apart by decades of racial–ethnic strife, including horrible killings commit- ted by each side. Yet, by maintaining its rational–legal authority, the country was able to transfer power peacefully from the dominant group led by President de Klerk to the minority group led by Nelson Mandela.

Charismatic authority has no rules of succession, making it less stable than either tra- ditional or rational–legal authority. Because charismatic authority is built around a single individual, the death or incapacitation of a charismatic leader can mean a bitter struggle for succession. To avoid this, some charismatic leaders make arrangements for an orderly transition of power by appointing a successor. This step does not guarantee orderly succes- sion, for the followers may not have the same confidence in the designated heir as did the charismatic leader. A second strategy is for the charismatic leader to build an organization. As the organization develops rules or regulations, it transforms itself into a rational–legal organization. Weber used the term routinization of charisma to refer to the transition of authority from a charismatic leader to either traditional or rational–legal authority.

The transfer of authority in Cuba after Fidel Castro became ill is a remarkable exam- ple of the routinization of charisma. Castro was charismatic, attracting enough followers to overthrow Cuba’s government. He ruled through a combination of personal charisma and bureaucratic machinery. Castro set up an organized system to transfer authority to his non-charismatic brother, Raul, who, in turn, made certain that authority was trans- ferred in an orderly manner to the state bureaucracies (Hoffman 2011).

Types of Government How do the various types of government—monarchies, democracies, dictatorships, and oligarchies—differ? As we compare them, let’s also look at how the state arose and why the concept of citizenship was revolutionary.

Monarchies: The Rise of the State Early societies were small and needed no extensive political system. They operated more like an extended family. As surpluses developed and societies grew larger, cities evolved— perhaps around 3500 B.C. (Fischer 1976). City-states then came into being, with power

Charismatic authorities can be of any morality, from the saintly to the most bitterly evil. Like Joan of Arc, Adolf Hitler attracted throngs of people, providing the stuff of dreams and arousing them from disillusionment to hope. This poster from the 1930s, titled Es Lebe Deutschland (“Long Live Germany”), illustrates the qualities of leadership that Germans of that period saw in Hitler.

Why is charismatic authority often seen as a threat? What is the routinization of charisma?

Types of Government 319

radiating outward from the city like a spider’s web. Although the ruler of each city con- trolled the immediate surrounding area, the land between cities remained in dispute. Each city-state had its own monarchy, a king or queen whose right to rule was passed on to the monarch’s children. If you drive through Spain, France, or Germany, you can still see evi- dence of former city-states. In the countryside, you will see only scattered villages. Farther on, your eye will be drawn to the outline of a castle on a faraway hill. As you get closer, you will see that the castle is surrounded by a city. Several miles farther, you will see another city, also dominated by a castle. Each city, with its castle, was once a center of power.

City-states often quarreled, and wars were common. The victors extended their rule, and eventually a single city-state was able to wield power over an entire region. As the size of these regions grew, the people slowly began to identify with the larger region. That is, they began to see distant inhabitants as “we” instead of “they.” What we call the state—the political entity that claims a monopoly on the use of violence within a territory—came into being.

Democracies: Citizenship as a Revolutionary Idea The United States had no city-states. Each colony, however, was small and independent like a city-state. After the American Revolution, the colonies united. With the greater strength and resources that came from political unity, they conquered almost all of North America, bringing it under the power of a central government.

What are city-states? How are they related to “the rise of the state”?

This classic painting, “Siege at Yorktown” by Louis Coulder, depicts George Washington and Jean de Rochambeau giving the final orders for the attack on Yorktown in 1781. This turned out to be the decisive battle of the American Revolution, allowing the fledgling U.S. democracy to proceed.

The government formed in this new country was called a democracy. (Derived from two Greek words—demos [common people] and kratos [power]—democracy literally means “power to the people.”) Because of the bitter antagonisms associated with the revolution against the British king, the founders of the new country were distrustful of monarchies. They wanted to put political decisions into the hands of the people.

This was not the first democracy the world had seen, but such a system had been tried before only with smaller groups. Athens, a city-state of Greece, practiced democracy 2,500 years ago, with each free male above a certain age having the right to be heard and to vote. Members of some Native American tribes, such as the Iroquois, also elected their chiefs, and in some, women were

able to vote and to hold the office of chief. (The Incas and Aztecs of Mexico and Central America had monarchies.)

Because of their small size, tribes and cities were able to practice direct democracy. That is, they were small enough for the eligible voters to meet together, express their opinions, and then vote publicly—much like a town hall meeting today. As populous and spread out as the United States was, however, direct democracy was impossible, and the founders invented representative democracy. Certain citizens (at first only white male landowners) voted for men to represent them in Washington. Later, the vote was extended to men who didn’t own property, to African American men, and, finally, to women.

Today we take the concept of citizenship for granted. What is not evident to us is that this idea had to be envisioned in the first place. There is nothing natural about citi- zenship; it is simply one way in which people choose to define themselves. Throughout most of human history, people were thought to belong to a clan, to a tribe, or even to a ruler. The idea of citizenship—that by virtue of birth and residence people have basic rights—is quite new to the human scene.

The concept of representative democracy based on citizenship—perhaps the great- est gift the United States has given to the world—was revolutionary. Power was to be vested in the people themselves, and government was to flow from the people. That this concept was revolutionary is generally forgotten, but its implementation meant the reversal of traditional ideas. It made the government responsive to the people’s will, rather than the people being responsive to the government’s will. To keep the govern- ment responsive to the needs of its citizens, people were expected to express dissent. In a widely quoted statement, Thomas Jefferson observed:

A little rebellion now and then is a good thing. . . . It is a medicine necessary for the sound health of government. . . . God forbid that we should ever be twenty years without such a rebellion. . . . The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants. (In Hellinger and Judd 1991)

The idea of universal citizenship—of everyone having the same basic rights by virtue of being born in a country (or by immigrating and becoming a naturalized citizen)—flowered slowly, and came into practice only through fierce struggle. When the United States was founded, for example, this idea was still in its infancy. Today, it seems inconceivable to Americans that sex or race–ethnicity should be the basis for denying anyone the right to vote, hold office, make a contract, testify in court, or own property. For earlier generations of property-owning white American men, however, it seemed just as inconceivable that women, racial–ethnic minorities, and the poor should be allowed such rights.

Dictatorships and Oligarchies: The Seizure of Power If an individual seizes power and then dictates his will to the people, the government is known as a dictatorship. If a small group seizes power, the government is called an oligarchy. The occasional coups in Central and South America and Africa, in which military leaders seize control of a country, are often oligarchies. Although one indi- vidual may be named president, often it is military officers, working behind the scenes,

Democracy (or “democratization”) is a global social movement. People all over the world yearn for the freedoms that are taken for granted in the Western democracies. Shown here is a man in a remote village in Indonesia, where democracy has gained a foothold.

Why is citizenship called a “revolutionary idea”? What is a dictatorship? An oligarchy?

The U.S. Political System 321

who make the decisions. If their designated president becomes uncooperative, they remove him from office and appoint another.

Monarchies, dictatorships, and oligarchies vary in the amount of control they wield over their citizens. Totalitarianism is almost total control of a people by the govern- ment. In Nazi Germany, Hitler organized a ruthless secret police force, the Gestapo, which searched for any sign of dissent. Spies even watched how moviegoers reacted to newsreels, reporting those who did not respond “appropriately” (Hippler 1987). Saddam Hussein acted just as ruthlessly toward Iraqis. The lucky ones who opposed Hussein were shot; the unlucky ones had their eyes gouged out, were bled to death, or were buried alive (Amnesty International 2005). The punishment for telling a joke about Hussein was to have your tongue cut out.

People around the world find great appeal in the freedom that is inherent in citi- zenship and representative democracy. Those who have no say in their government’s decisions, or who face prison or even death for expressing dissent, find in these ideas the hope for a brighter future. With today’s electronic communications, people no longer remain ignorant of whether they are more or less politically privileged than others. This knowledge produces pressure for greater citizen participation in government—and for governments to respond to their citizens’ concerns. As electronic communications develop further, this pressure will increase.

The U.S. Political System With this global background, let’s examine the U.S. political system. We shall con- sider the two major political parties and examine voting patterns and the role of lobbyists and PACs.

Political Parties and Elections After the founding of the United States, numerous political parties emerged. By the time of the Civil War, however, two parties dominated U.S. politics: the Democrats, who in the public mind are associated with the working class, and the Republicans, who are associated with wealthier people (Burnham 1983). In pre-elections, called primaries, the voters decide who will represent their party. The candidates chosen by each party then campaign, trying to appeal to the most voters. The Social Map on the next page shows how Americans align themselves with political parties.

Slices from the Center. Although the Democrats and Republicans have somewhat contrasting philosophical principles, each party represents slightly different slices of the center. Each party may ridicule the other and promote different legislation—and they do fight hard battles—but they both firmly support such fundamentals of U.S. political philosophy as free public educa- tion; a strong military; freedom of religion, speech, and assembly; and, of course, capitalism—especially the private ownership of property. This makes it difficult to distinguish a conservative Democrat from a liberal Republican.

The extremes are easy to see, however. Deeply committed Democrats support legislation that transfers income from those who are richer to those who are poorer or that controls wages, working conditions, and competition. Deeply committed Republicans, in contrast, oppose such legislation.

Those who are elected to Congress may cross party lines. That is, some Democrats vote for legislation proposed by Republicans, and vice versa. This happens because officeholders support their party’s philosophy, but not neces- sarily its specific proposals. When it comes to a particular bill, such as raising the minimum wage, some conservative Democrats may view the measure as unfair to small employers and vote with the Republicans against the bill. At the same time, liberal Republicans—feeling that the proposal is just, or sensing a domi- nant sentiment in voters back home—may side with its Democratic backers.

Although the Democrats and the Republicans represent slightly different slices of the center, those differences arouse extreme emotions, pandered to by both parties. Occasionally, voters get tired of the constant posing.

What is totalitarianism? Why are the Democrats and Republicans called “slices from the center”?

322 CHAPTER 11 Politics and the Economy Fr

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T he

W al

l S tr

ee t

Jo ur

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Third Parties. Third parties sometimes play a role in U.S. politics, but to gain power, they must also support these centrist themes. Any party that advocates radical change is doomed to a short life. Because most Americans consider votes for them as wasted, third parties do not do well at the polls. Two exceptions are the Bull Moose party, whose

candidate, Theodore Roosevelt, won more votes in 1912 than William Howard Taft, the Republican presidential candidate, and the United We Stand (Reform)

party, founded by billionaire Ross Perot, which won 19 percent of the vote in 1992. Amidst internal bickering, the Reform Party declined

rapidly and fell off the political map (Bridgwater 1953; Statistical Abstract 1995:Table 437; 2012:Table 403).

Voting Patterns Year after year, Americans show consistent voting patterns. From Table 11.1 on the next page, you can see that the percentage of people who vote increases with age. This table also shows how significant race–ethnicity is. Non-Hispanic whites are more likely to vote than are African Americans, although when Barack Obama ran for president in 2008, their totals were almost identical. You can also see that both whites and African Americans are much more likely to vote than are Latinos and Asian Americans.

Look at education on Table 11.1. Notice how voting increases with each level of education. Education is so significant that college graduates are twice as likely to vote as are high school dropouts. You can also see how much more

Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 2011:Table 411.

FIGURE 11.1 Which Political Party Dominates?

Democrat States

Republican States

AK

SC

NC

VA

WA

OR

CA

NV

ID

MT

WY

AZ NM

CO

ND

SD

NE

KS

OK

TX

MN

IA

MO

AR

LA

WI

IL

KY

TN

MS AL GA

FL

IN

MI

WV

PA

NY

ME

NH MA RI

CT NJ

DE MD DC

HI

VT

UT OH

Note: Domination by a political party does not refer to votes for president or Congress. This social map is based on the composition of the states’ upper and lower houses. When different parties dominate a state’s houses, the total number of legislators was used. In Nebraska, where no parties are designated, the percentage vote for president was the determining factor.

Why do third parties have little chance of success in the United States?

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The U.S. Political System 323

likely the employed are to vote. And look at how powerful income is in determining vot- ing. At each higher income level, people are more likely to vote. Finally, note that women are more likely than men to vote.

Social Integration. How can we explain these voting patterns? It is useful to look at the extremes. You can see from this table that those who are most likely to vote are the older, more educated, affluent, and employed. Those who are least likely to vote are the younger, less educated, poor, and unemployed. From these extremes, we can draw this principle: The more that people feel they have a stake in the political system, the more likely they are to vote. They have more to protect, and they feel that voting can make a

TABLE 11.1 Who Votes for President?

1988 1992 1996 2000 2004 2008

Overall Americans Who Voted 57% 61% 54% 55% 58% 58%

Age 18–20 33% 39% 31% 28% 41% 41% 21–24 46% 46% 33% 35% 43% 47% 25–34 48% 53% 43% 44% 47% 49% 35–44 61% 64% 55% 55% 57% 55% 45–64 68% 70% 64% 64% 67% 65% 65 and older 69% 70% 67% 68% 69% 68%

Sex Male 56% 60% 53% 53% 56% 56% Female 58% 62% 56% 56% 60% 60%

Race–Ethnicity Whites 64% 70% 56% 56% 60% 60% African Americans 55% 59% 51% 54% 56% 61% Asian Americans NA 54% NA 25% 30% 32% Latinos 48% 52% 27% 28% 28% 32%

Education High school dropouts 41% 41% 34% 34% 35% 34% High school graduates 55% 58% 49% 49% 52% 51% Some college 65% 69% 61% 60% 66% 65% College graduates 78% 81% 73% 72% 74% 73%

Marital Status Married NA NA 66% 67% 71% 70% Divorced NA NA 50% 53% 58% 59%

Labor Force Employed 58% 64% 55% 56% 60% 60% Unemployed 39% 46% 37% 35% 46% 49%

Income 1

Under $20,000 NA NA NA NA 48% 52% $20,000 to $30,000 NA NA NA NA 58% 56% $30,000 to $40,000 NA NA NA NA 62% 62% $40,000 to $50,000 NA NA NA NA 69% 65% $50,000 to $75,000 NA NA NA NA 72% 71% $75,000 to $100,000 NA NA NA NA 78% 76% Over $100,000 NA NA NA NA 81% 92%

Sources: By the author. Based on Casper and Bass 1996; Jamieson et al. 2002; Holder 2006; File and Crissey 2010:Table 1; Statistical Abstract of the United States 1991:Table 450; 1997:Table 462; 2012:Table 399.

1The primary source changed the income categories in 2004, making the data from earlier presidential election years incompatible.

What are some major voting patterns? How is social integration related to voting patterns in U.S. presidential elections?

324 CHAPTER 11 Politics and the Economy

difference. In effect, people who have been rewarded more by the political and economic system feel more socially integrated. They vote because they perceive that elections make a difference in their lives, including the type of society in which they and their children live.

Alienation. In contrast, those who gain less from the system—in terms of education, income, and jobs—are more likely to feel alienated from politics. Perceiving themselves as outsiders, many feel hostile toward the government. Some feel betrayed, believing that politicians have sold out to special-interest groups. They ask, “How can you tell if politicians are lying?” and reply, “Whenever you see their lips moving.”

Apathy. But we must go beyond this. From Table 11.1, you can see that many highly educated people with good incomes stay away from the polls. They are not alienated, but many do not vote because of voter apathy, or indifference. Their view is that “next year will just bring more of the same, regardless of who is in office.” A common atti- tude of those who are apathetic is “What difference will my one vote make when there are millions of voters?” Many also see little difference between the two major political parties. Only about half of the nation’s eligible voters cast ballots in presidential elec- tions (Statistical Abstract 2012:Table 398).

The Gender and Racial–Ethnic Gaps in Voting. Historically, men and women voted the same way, but now we have a political gender gap. That is, men and women are some- what more likely to vote for different presidential candidates. As you can see from Table 11.2, men are more likely to favor the Republican candidate, while women are more likely to vote Democratic. This table also illustrates the much larger racial–ethnic gap in politics. Note how few African Americans vote for a Republican presidential candidate.

As we saw in Table 11.1, voting patterns reflect life experiences, especially people’s economic conditions. On average, women earn less than men, and African Americans earn less than whites. As a result, at this point in history, women and African Americans tend to look more favorably on government programs that redistribute income, and they are more likely to vote for Democrats. As you can see in this table, Asian American voters, with their higher average incomes, are an exception to this pattern. Attempted

TABLE 11.2 How the Two-Party Presidential Vote Is Split

1988 1992 1996 2000 2004 2008

Women Democrat 50% 61% 65% 56% 53% 57% Republican 50% 39% 35% 44% 47% 43%

Men Democrat 44% 55% 51% 47% 46% 52% Republican 56% 45% 49% 53% 54% 48%

African Americans Democrat 92% 94% 99% 92% 90% 99% Republican 8% 6% 1% 8% 10% 1%

Whites Democrat 41% 53% 54% 46% 42% 44% Republican 59% 47% 46% 54% 58% 56%

Latinos Democrat NA NA NA 61% 58% 66% Republican NA NA NA 39% 42% 34%

Asian Americans Democrat NA NA NA 62% 77% 62% Republican NA NA NA 38% 23% 38%

Sources: By the author. Based on Gallup Poll 2008; Statistical Abstract of the United States 1999:Table 464; 2002:Table 372; 2012:Table 404.

What are alienation and apathy? What gender and racial–ethnic gaps show up in voting for U.S. presidents?

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The U.S. Political System 325

What are lobbyists? Special-interest groups? PACs? What role do they play in U.S. elections?

explanations are far from satisfactory (Wong et al. 2011), but the reason could be a lesser emphasis on individualism in the Asian American subculture.

Lobbyists and Special-Interest Groups Suppose that you are president of the United States, and you want to make milk more affordable for the poor. As you check into the matter, you find that part of the reason prices are high is because the government is paying farmers billions of dollars a year in price supports. You propose to eliminate these subsidies.

Immediately, large numbers of people leap into action. They contact their senators and representatives and hold news confer- ences. Your office is flooded with calls, faxes, and e-messages.

Reuters and the Associated Press distribute pictures of farm families—their Holsteins grazing contentedly in the background— and inform readers that your harsh proposal will destroy these hard-working, healthy, happy, good Americans who are struggling to make a living. President or not, you have little chance of getting your legislation passed.

Lobbying by Special-Interest Groups. What happened? The dairy industry went to work to protect its special interests. A special-interest group consists of people who think alike on a particular issue and can be mobilized for political action. The dairy industry is just one of thousands of such groups that employ lobbyists, people who are paid to influence legislation on behalf of their clients. Members of Congress who want to be reelected must pay attention to them, for they represent blocs of voters who share an interest in some proposed legislation. Well financed and able to contribute huge sums, lobbyists can deliver votes to you— or to your opponent.

Lobbying has led to a revolving door. People who served as assistants to the presi- dent or to powerful senators are sought after as lobbyists (Vidal et al. 2010). With their contacts swinging open the doors of the powerful, some even go to work for the same companies they regulated when they worked for the president (Delaney 2010).

To try to reign in some of this influence peddling, Congress made it illegal for former senators to lobby for two years after they leave office. Yet senators do lobby immediately after leaving office. How do you suppose they get around this law? It’s all in the name. They hire themselves out to lobbying firms as strategic advisors. They then lobby—excuse me—“strategically advise” their former colleagues (“It’s So Much Nicer . . .” 2008).

The Money. Buying votes is what especially bothers people. In response to public- ity, Congress passed laws that limit the amount that corporations and individuals can give to candidates. To get around this law, special-interest groups form political action committees (PACs) to solicit contributions from many, and then hand over huge sums to politicians. The amounts are mind-boggling. Each year, about 4,500 PACs shell out almost a half billion dollars to politicians (Statistical Abstract 2012:Tables 422, 423). A few PACs represent broad social interests such as environmental protection. Most, however, represent the financial interests of specific groups, such as the banking, dairy, defense, and oil industries.

In a surprise decision in 2010, the Supreme Court opened the floodgates to bank- rolling politicians. In Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, the Court ruled that laws that limit the amount corporations can contribute to politicians violate the First Amendment, which guarantees the right to political speech (Liptak 2010). By extension, individuals should have the same right, but until a case comes before the Court regarding the limits on giving by individuals, corporations have more constitu- tional rights to fund candidates than individuals do.

326 CHAPTER 11 Politics and the Economy

Who Rules the United States? With lobbyists and PACs wielding such influence, just whom do U.S. senators and rep- resentatives really represent? This question has led to a lively debate among sociologists.

The Functionalist Perspective: Pluralism Functionalists view the state as having arisen out of the basic needs of the social group. To protect themselves from oppressors, people formed a government and gave it the monop- oly on violence. The risk is that the state can turn that force against its own citizens. To return to the example used earlier, states have a tendency to become muggers. Thus, peo- ple must find a balance between having no government—which would lead to anarchy, a condition of disorder and violence—and having a government that protects them from violence, but that also may turn against them. When functioning well, then, the state is a balanced system that protects its citizens both from one another and from government.

What keeps the U.S. government from turning against its citizens? Functionalists say that pluralism, a diffusion of power among many special-interest groups, prevents any one group from gaining control of the government and using it to oppress the people (Bentley 1908; Dahl 1961, 1982; Lemann 2008). To keep the government from com- ing under the control of any one group, the founders of the United States set up three branches of government: the executive branch (the president), the judiciary branch (the courts), and the legislative branch (the Senate and House of Representatives). Each is sworn to uphold the Constitution, which guarantees rights to citizens, and each can nullify the actions of the other two. This system, known as checks and balances, was designed to ensure that no one branch of government dominates the others.

In Sum: Our pluralist society has many parts—women, men, racial–ethnic groups, farmers, factory and office workers, religious organizations, bankers, bosses, the unem- ployed, the retired—as well as such broad categories as the rich, middle class, and poor. No group dominates. Rather, as each group pursues its own interests, it is balanced by other groups that are pursuing theirs. To attain their goals, groups must make com- promises and work together. Because these groups have political muscle to flex at the polls, politicians try to design policies that please as many groups as they can. This, say

functionalists, makes the political system responsive to the people, and no one group rules.

The Conflict Perspective: The Power Elite If you focus on the lobbyists scurrying around Washington, stress conflict theorists, you get a blurred image of superficial activities. What really counts is the big picture, not its fragments. The important question is, Who holds the power that determines the country’s overarching policies? For example, who determines interest rates—and their impact on the price of our homes? Who sets policies that encourage the transfer of jobs from the United States to countries where labor costs less? And the ultimate ques- tion of power: Who is behind the decision to go to war?

Sociologist C. Wright Mills (1956) took the position that the country’s most important matters are not decided by lobbyists or even by Congress. Rather, the decisions that have the greatest impact on the lives of Americans— and people across the globe—are made by a power elite. As depicted in Figure 11.2, the power elite consists of the top leaders of the largest corporations, the most powerful generals and admirals of the armed forces, and certain elite

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The masses of people— unorganized, exploited, and mostly uninterested

Congress Other legislators Interest-group leaders Local opinion leaders

Corporate Political Military

The top leaders

The middle level

Most Power

Least Power

Source: Based on Mills 1956.

FIGURE 11.2 Power in the United States: The Model Proposed by C. Wright Mills

What is the functionalist (pluralistic) view of power in the United States?

War and Terrorism: Implementing Political Objectives 327

politicians—the president, the president’s cabinet, and senior members of Congress who chair the major committees. It is they who wield power, who make the decisions that direct the country and shake the world.

Are the three groups that make up the power elite—the top business, political, and military leaders—equal in power? Mills said that they were not, but he didn’t point to the president and his staff or even to the generals and admirals as the most powerful. Instead, he said that the corporate leaders are the most dominant. Because all three seg- ments of the power elite view capitalism as essential to the welfare of the country, Mills said that business interests take center stage in setting national policy.

Sociologist William Domhoff (1990, 2006) uses the term ruling class to refer to the power elite. He focuses on the 1 percent of Americans who belong to the super-rich, the powerful capitalist class analyzed in Chapter 8 (pp. 220–221). Members of this class con- trol our top corporations and foundations, even the boards that oversee our major univer- sities. It is no accident, says Domhoff, that from this group come most members of the president’s cabinet and the ambassadors to the most powerful countries of the world.

In Sum: Conflict theorists take the position that a power elite dominates the United States. With connections that extend to the highest centers of power, this ruling class determines the economic and political conditions under which the rest of the country operates (Domhoff 1990, 1998, 2007). They say that we should not think of the power elite (or ruling class) as some secret group that meets to agree on specific matters. Rather, the group’s unity springs from the members having similar backgrounds and orientations to life. All have attended prestigious private schools, belong to exclusive clubs, and are millionaires many times over. Their behavior stems not from some grand conspiracy to control the country but from a mutual interest in solving the problems that face big business.

Which View Is Right? The functionalist and conflict views of power in U.S. society cannot be reconciled. Either competing interests block any single group from being dominant, as functional- ists assert, or a power elite oversees the major decisions of the United States, as conflict theorists maintain. The answer may have to do with the level you look at. Perhaps at the middle level of power depicted in Figure 11.2, the competing groups do keep each other at bay, and none can dominate. If so, the functionalist view would apply to this level. But which level holds the key to U.S. power? Perhaps the functionalists have not looked high enough, and activities at the peak remain invisible to them. On that level, does an elite dominate? To protect its mutual interests, does a small group make the major decisions of the United States?

Sociologists passionately argue this issue, but with mixed data, we don’t yet know the answer. We await further research.

War and Terrorism: Implementing Political Objectives

Some students wonder why I include war and terrorism as topics of politics. The reason is that war and terrorism are tools used to try to accomplish political goals. The Prussian military analyst Carl von Clausewitz, who entered the military at the age of twelve and rose to the rank of major-general, put it best when he said “War is merely a continua- tion of politics by other means.”

Let’s look at this aspect of politics.

Why Countries Go to War War, armed conflict between nations (or politically distinct groups), is simply one option that politicians choose for dealing with disagreements. Why do they choose this option? As usual, sociologists answer this question not by focusing on factors within humans, such as aggressive impulses, but by looking for social causes—conditions in society that encourage or discourage combat between nations.

What is the conflict view of power in the United States? Why are war and terrorism topics of politics?

Sociologist Nicholas Timasheff (1965) identified three essential conditions of war. The first is an antagonistic situation in which two or more states confront incompatible objectives. For example, each may want the same land or resources. The second is a cultural tradition of war. Because their nation has fought wars in the past, the leaders of a group see war as an option for dealing with serious disputes with other nations. The third is a “fuel” that heats the antagonistic situation to a boiling point, so that politicians cross the line from thinking about war to actually waging it.

Timasheff identified seven such “fuels.” He found that war is likely if a coun- try’s leaders see the antagonistic situation as an opportunity to achieve one or more of these objectives:

1. Revenge: settling “old scores” from earlier conflicts 2. Power: dominating a weaker nation 3. Prestige: defending the nation’s “honor” 4. Unity: uniting rival groups within their country 5. Position: protecting or exalting the leaders’ positions 6. Ethnicity: bringing under their rule “our people” who are living in another country 7. Beliefs: forcibly converting others to religious or political beliefs

You can use these three essential conditions and seven fuels to analyze any war. They will help you understand why politicians choose this political action called war.

The Flesh and Blood of War. Sociological analysis can be cold and dispassionate. These “fuels” of war are like this: accurate and insightful, but cold. Throughout this book, I’ve tried to bring you the flesh and blood of topics, to help you see the ways that people experience life. So let’s do this again.

Behind these “fuels” are politicians who make the bloody choice to go to war. They do not fight the war themselves, of course. They sit back and watch it from the comfort of their homes and offices. Some even profit from the war by making investments in compa- nies that produce weapons. For most politicians, the deaths are bloodless affairs. It is young men, and increasingly young women, who do the killing—and dying—for them. Some sol- diers are killed on the battlefield; others survive but are mutilated for the rest of their lives. Many who survive with their bodies intact suffer emotionally. Some of my students have

shared their suffering with me, but let me close this section with one of the most powerful statements I have come across. A soldier from California wrote this just before he put a bullet through his brain (Smith 1980):

I can’t sleep anymore. When I was in Vietnam, we came across a North Vietnamese soldier with a man, a woman, and a three- or four-year-old girl. We had to shoot them all. I can’t get the little girl’s face out of my mind. I hope that God will forgive me . . . I can’t.

Terrorism Mustafa Jabbar, in Najaf, Iraq, is proud of his first born, a baby boy. Yet he said, “I will put mines in the baby and blow him up.” (Sengupta 2004)

Can feelings really run so deep that a father would sacrifice his only son? Some groups nourish hatred, endlessly chronicling the injustices and atroci- ties of their archenemy. Stirred in a cauldron of bitter hatred, antagonism can span generations, its embers sometimes burning for centuries. The combina- tion of perceived injustice and righteous hatred fuels the desire to strike out— but what can a group do if it is weaker than its enemy? Unable to meet its more powerful opponent on the battlefield, one option is terrorism, violence intended to create fear in order to bring about political objectives. And, yes, if the hatred is strong enough, that can mean blowing up your only child.

Suicide terrorism, a weapon sometimes chosen by the weaker group, captures headlines around the world. Among the groups that have used suicide terrorism are the Palestinians against the Israelis and the Iraqis and

Few want to say that we honor war, but we do. Its centrality in the teaching of history and the honoring of the patriots who founded a country are two indications. A third is the display of past weapons in parks and museums. Shown here are children playing in a park in Poland, where an instrument of war has become a toy for children.

The hatred and vengeance of adults become the children’s heritage. The headband of this 4-year-old Palestinian boy reads: “Friends of Martyrs.”

Why do countries go to war? Why do some groups choose terrorism as an instrument of war?

War and Terrorism: Implementing Political Objectives 329

Down-to-Earth Sociology

Who Are the Suicide Terrorists? Testing Your Stereotypes

S ome events in life leave us perplexed, not knowing what to make of things. For most of us, suicide terrorism is like this. We don’t know any suicide bombers, so it is hard to imagine someone becoming one.

Let’s see if we can flesh out our mental files a bit. Sociologist Marc Sageman (2008a,b) wondered about

terrorists, too. Finding that his mental files were inadequate to understand them, he decided that research might provide the answer. Sageman had an unusual advantage for gaining access to data—he had been in the CIA. Through his contacts, he studied 400 al-Qaeda terrorists who had targeted the United States. He was able to examine thousands of pages of their trial records.

So let’s use Sageman’s research to test some common ideas. I think you’ll find that the data blow away stereotypes of terrorists.

come from backgrounds of poverty. Cunning leaders take advantage of their frustration and direct it toward striking out at an enemy.

Not true. Three-quarters of the terrorists came from the middle and upper classes.

deranged loner? We carry around images like this concerning serial and mass murderers. It is a sort of catch-all stereotype that we have. These people can’t get along with anyone; they stew in their loneliness and misery; and all this bubbles up in misapplied violence. You know, the workplace killer sort of image, loners “going postal.”

Not this one, either. Sageman found that 90 percent of the terrorists came from caring, intact families. On top of this, 73 percent were married, and most of them had children.

people, so those cunning leaders can manipulate them easily.

We have to drop this one, too. Sageman found that 63 percent of the terrorists had gone to college. Three-quarters worked in professional and semi-professional occupations. Many were scientists, engineers, and architects.

What? Most terrorists are intelligent, educated, family- oriented, professional people? How can this be? Sageman found that these people had gone through a process of radicalization. Here was their trajectory:

1. Moral outrage. They became angry, even enraged, about something that they felt was terribly wrong.

2. Ideology. They interpreted their moral outrage within a radical, militant inter- pretation of Islamic teachings.

3. Shared outrage and ideology. They found like-minded people, often on the Internet, especially in chat rooms.

4. Group decision: They decided that an act of terrorism was called for.

In one sense, however, the image of the loner does come close. Seventy percent of these terrorists committed themselves to extreme acts while they were living away from the country where they grew up. They became homesick, sought out people like themselves, and ended up at radical mosques where they learned a militant script.

Constantly, then, sociologists seek to understand the relationship between the individual and the group. This fascinating endeavor sometimes blows away stereotypes.

For Your Consideration

↑

1. How do you think we can reduce the process of radical- ization that turns people into terrorists?

2. Sageman concludes that this process of radicalization has produced networks of homegrown, leaderless ter- rorists, ones that don’t need al-Qaeda to direct them. He also concludes that this process will eventually wear itself out. Do you agree? Why or why not?

What does a suicide bomber look like? This young married mother of two little children blew herself up at the Erez crossing in the Gaza Strip, killing four Israelis. She had this photo taken at home before her death.

Afghanistanis against U.S. troops. The suicide terrorism that has had the most profound effects on our lives is the attack on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon under the direction of Osama bin Laden. What kind of sick people become suicide terrorists? This is the topic of the Down-to-Earth Sociology box below.

The suicide attacks on New York and Washington are tiny in comparison with the threat of weapons of mass destruction. If terrorists unleash biological, nuclear, or chemical weap- ons, the death toll could run in the millions. We’ve had a couple of scares. A shipment of

How do research findings on suicide terrorists contradict stereotypes of who they are?

330 CHAPTER 11 Politics and the Economy

Down-to-Earth Sociology

Child Soldiers

W hen rebels entered 12-year-old Ishmael Beah’s village in Sierra Leone, they lined up the boys (Beah 2007). One of the rebels said, “We are going to initiate you by killing these people. We will show you blood and make you strong.”

Before the rebels could do the killing, shots rang out and the rebels took cover. In the confusion, Ishmael escaped into the jungle. When he returned, he found his family dead and his village burned.

With no place to go and rebels attacking the villages, killing, looting, and raping, Ishmael continued to hide in the jungle. As he peered out at a village one day, he saw a rebel car- rying the head of a man, which he held by the hair. With blood dripping from where the neck had been, Ishmael said that the head looked as though it were still feeling its hair being pulled.

Months later, government soldiers found Ishmael. The “rescue” meant that he had to become a soldier—on their side, of course.

Ishmael’s indoctrination was short but to the point. Hatred is a strong motivator.

“You can revenge the death of your fam- ily, and make sure that more children do not lose their parents,” the lieutenant said. “The rebels cut people’s heads off. They cut open preg- nant women’s stomachs and take the babies out and kill them. They force sons to have sex with their mothers. Such people do not deserve to live. This is why we must kill every single one of them. Think of it as destroying a great evil. It is the highest service you can perform for your country.”

Along with thirty other boys, most of whom were ages 13 to 16, with two just 7 and 11, Ishmael was trained to shoot and clean an AK-47.

Banana trees served for bayonet practice. With thoughts of disemboweling evil rebels, the boys would slash at the leaves.

The things that Ishmael had seen, he did. Killing was difficult at first, but after a while, as Ishmael

says, “killing became as easy as drinking water.” The corporal thought that the boys were sloppy with their

bayonets. To improve their performance, he held a contest.

He chose five boys and placed them opposite five prison- ers with their hands tied. He told the boys to slice the men’s throats on his command. The boy whose prisoner died the quickest would win the contest.

“I stared at my prisoner,” said Ishmael. “He was just another rebel who was responsible for the death of my

family. The corporal gave the signal with a pistol shot, and I grabbed the man’s head and sliced his throat in one fluid motion. His eyes rolled up, and he looked me straight in the eyes before they suddenly stopped in a frightful glance. I dropped him on the ground and wiped my bayonet on him. The corporal, who was holding a timer, proclaimed me the winner. The other boys clapped at my achievement.”

“No longer was I running away from the war,” adds Ishmael. “I was in it. I would scout for villages that had food, drugs, ammunition, and the gasoline we needed. I would report my findings to the corporal, and the entire squad would attack the village. We would kill every- one.”

Ishmael was one of the lucky ones. Of the approximately 300,000 child soldiers world-

wide, Ishmael is one of the few who has been rescued and given counseling at a UNICEF rehabilitation center. Ishmael has also had the remarkable turn of fate of graduating from college in the United States and becoming a permanent U.S. resident. Source: Based on Beah 2007; quotations are summaries.

For Your Consideration↑

1. Why are there child soldiers? 2. What can be done to prevent the recruitment of child

soldiers? Why don’t we just pass a law that requires a minimum age to serve in the military?

3. How can child soldiers be helped? Which agencies should be involved, taking what actions?

A boy soldier in Somalia.

enriched uranium that was being smuggled out of Europe was intercepted just before it landed in terrorist hands (Sheets and Broad 2007a,b). This chilling possibility was brought home to Americans in 2001 when anthrax powder was mailed to a few select victims.

It is sometimes difficult to tell the difference between war and terrorism. This is especially so in civil wars when the opposing sides don’t wear uniforms and attack civilians. Africa is embroiled in such wars. In the Down-to-Earth Sociology box below, we look at one aspect of these wars, that of child soldiers.

Why are there child soldiers? How can this problem be solved?

The Transformation of Economic Systems 331

The Economy: Work in the Global Village

If you are like most students, you are wondering how changes in the economy are going to affect your chances of getting a good job. Let’s see if we can shed some light on this question. We’ll begin with this story:

The sound of her alarm rang in Kim’s ears. “Not Monday already,” she groaned. “There must be a better way of starting the week.” She pressed the snooze button on the clock (from Germany) to sneak another ten minutes’ sleep. In what seemed like just thirty seconds, the alarm once again shrilly insisted that she get up and face the week.

Still bleary-eyed after her shower, Kim peered into her closet and picked out a silk blouse (from China), a plaid wool skirt (from Scotland), and leather shoes (from Italy). She nodded, satisfied, as she added a pair of simulated pearls (from Taiwan). Running late, she hurriedly ran a brush (from Mexico) through her hair. As Kim wolfed down a bowl of cereal (from the United States) topped with milk (from the United States), bananas (from Costa Rica), and sugar (from the Dominican Republic), she turned on her kitchen television (from Korea) to listen to the weather forecast.

Gulping the last of her coffee (from Brazil), Kim grabbed her briefcase (from India), purse (from Spain), and jacket (from Malaysia), left her house, and quickly climbed into her car (from Japan). As she glanced at her watch (from Switzerland), she hoped that the traffic would be in her favor. She muttered to herself as she pulled up at a stop- light (from Great Britain) and eyed her gas gauge. She muttered again when she pulled into a station and paid for gas (from Saudi Arabia), for the price had risen over the weekend. “My paycheck never keeps up with prices,” she moaned.

When Kim arrived at work, she found the office abuzz. Six months ago, New York head- quarters had put the company up for sale, but there had been no takers. The big news was that both a German company and a Canadian company had put in bids over the weekend. No one got much work done that day, as the whole office speculated about how things might change.

The Transformation of Economic Systems Although this vignette may be slightly exaggerated, many of us are like Kim: We use a multitude of products from around the world, and yet we’re concerned about our coun- try’s ability to compete in global markets. Today’s economy—our system of producing and distributing goods and services—differs radically from past economies. The products that Kim uses make it apparent that today’s economy knows no national boundaries. To better understand how global forces affect the U.S. economy—and your life—let’s begin by summarizing the sweeping historical changes we reviewed in Chapter 4.

Preindustrial Societies: The Birth of Inequality The earliest human groups, hunting and gathering societies, had a subsistence economy. In small groups of about twenty-five to forty, people lived off the land. They gathered plants and hunted animals in one location and then moved to another place as these sources of food ran low. Because these people had few possessions, they did little trad- ing with one another. With no excess to accumulate, as was mentioned in Chapter 4, everybody owned as much (or, really, as little) as everyone else.

Then people discovered how to breed animals and cultivate plants. The more dependable food supply in what became pastoral and horticultural societies allowed humans to settle down in a single place. Human groups grew larger, and for the first time in history, it was no longer necessary for everyone to work at producing food.

What does “we live in a global market” mean? What in your life reflects a global market?

332 CHAPTER 11 Politics and the Economy

Some people became leather workers, others weapon makers, and so on. This new division of labor produced a surplus, and groups traded items with one another. The primary sociological significance of surplus and trade is this: They fostered social inequality, for some people accumulated more possessions than others. The effects of that change remain with us today.

The plow brought the next major change, ushering in agricultural societies. Plowing the land made it more productive, allowing even more people to specialize in activities other than producing food. More specialized divisions of labor followed, and trade expanded. Trading centers then developed, which turned into cities. As power passed from the heads of families and clans to a ruling elite, social, political, and eco- nomic inequalities grew.

Industrial Societies: The Birth of the Machine The steam engine, invented in 1765, ushered in industrial societies. Based on machines powered by fuels, these societies created a surplus unlike anything the world had seen. This, too, stimulated trade among nations and brought even greater social inequality. A handful of individuals opened factories and exploited the labor of many.

Then came more efficient machines. As the surpluses grew even greater, the emphasis gradually changed—from producing goods to consuming them. In 1912, sociologist Thorstein Veblen coined the term conspicuous consumption to describe this fundamental change in people’s orientations. By this term, Veblen meant that the Protestant ethic identified by Weber—an emphasis on hard work,

savings, and a concern for salvation (discussed on pages 8–9)—was being replaced with an eagerness to show off wealth by the “elaborate consumption of goods.”

Postindustrial Societies: The Birth of the Information Age In 1973, sociologist Daniel Bell noted that a new type of society was emerging. This new society, which he called the postindustrial society, has six characteristics: (1) a service sector so large that most people work in it, (2) a vast surplus of goods, (3) even more extensive trade among nations, (4) a wider variety and quantity of goods available to the average person, (5) an information explosion, and (6) a global village—that is, the world’s nations are linked by fast communications, transportation, and trade.

To see why analysts use the term postindustrial society to describe the United States, look at Figure 11.3. The change in work shown in this figure is without parallel in human history. In the 1800s, most U.S. workers were farmers. Today, farmers make up about 1 percent of the workforce. With the technology of the 1800s, a typical farmer produced enough food to feed five people. With today’s powerful machinery and hybrid seeds, a farmer now feeds about eighty. In 1940, about half of U.S. workers wore a blue collar; then changing technology shrank the market for blue-collar jobs. White- collar work continued its ascent, reaching the dominant position it holds today.

Biotech Societies: The Merger of Biology and Economics As we discussed in Chapter 4, we may be on the verge of yet another new type of soci- ety. This one is being ushered in by advances in biology, especially the deciphering of the human genome system. Although the specifics of this new society have yet to unfold, the marriage of biology and economics should yield even greater surpluses and more extensive trade. The technological advances that will emerge in this new society may allow us to lead longer and healthier lives. Its effects on inequality between the nations are likely to be spotty. Some poorer nations may be able to import the new technology and develop their economies, while others remain in poverty.

Implications for Your Life The broad changes in societies that I have just sketched may seem to be abstract matters, but they are far from irrelevant to your life. Whenever society changes, so do our lives. Consider the information explosion. When you graduate from college, you will most likely

The commonsense meaning of market is a place where people exchange or buy and sell goods. Such old-fashioned markets remain common in the Least Industrialized Nations, such as this floating one in Bangkok, Thailand. Here people find the social interaction every bit as rewarding as the goods and money that they exchange.

As societies changed from preindustrial to industrial, how did economies change?

World Economic Systems 333

do some form of “knowledge work.” Instead of working in a factory, you will manage information or design, sell, or service products. The type of work you do has profound implications for your life. It produces social networks, nurtures attitudes, and even affects how you view yourself and the world. To better understand this, consider how vastly different your outlook on life would be if you were one of the children discussed in the Cultural Diversity box on the next page.

It is the same with the global village. Think of the globe as being divided into three neighborhoods—the three worlds of industrialization and postindustrialization that we reviewed in Chapter 7. Some nations are located in the poor part of the village. Their citizens do menial work and barely eke out a living. Life is so precarious that some even starve to death, while their fellow villagers in the rich neighborhood feast on steak and lobster, washed down with vintage Chateau Lafite Rothschild. It’s the same village, but what a difference the neighborhood makes.

Now visualize any one of the three neighborhoods. Again you will see gross inequalities. Not everyone who lives in the poor neighborhood is poor, and some areas of the rich neigh- borhood are packed with poor people. The United States is the global economic leader, occupying the most luxurious mansion in the best neighborhood, and is spearheading the new biotech society.

World Economic Systems Now that we have sketched the main historical changes in world economic systems, let’s compare capitalism and socialism, the two main economic systems in force today. This will help us to understand where the United States stands in the world economic order.

Capitalism People who live in a capitalist society may not understand its basic tenets, even though they see them reflected in their local shopping malls and fast-food chains. Table 11.3 distills the many businesses of the United States down to their basic components. As you can see, capitalism has three essential features: (1) private ownership of the means of production (individuals own the land, machines, and factories); (2) market competition (competing with one another, the owners decide what to produce and set the prices for their products); and (3) the pursuit of profit (the owners try to sell their products for more than they cost).

What State Capitalism Is. No country has pure capitalism. Pure capitalism, known as laissez-faire capitalism (literally “hands off ” capitalism), means that the government doesn’t interfere in the market. The current form of U.S. capitalism is state (or welfare)

0

10

20

30

40

50

60

70

80

P e rc

e n ta

g e

90

100

1920 1940 1960 1980 2000 20201900

Year

White-collar Blue-collar Farming

Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States, various years, and 2012:Tables 616, 620.

FIGURE 11.3 The Revolutionary Change in the U.S. Workforce

TABLE 11.3 Comparing Capitalism and Socialism

Capitalism Socialism

1. Individuals own the means of production. 1. The public owns the means of production. 2. Based on competition, the owners

determine production and set prices. 2. Central committees plan production and set

prices; no competition. 3. The pursuit of profit is the reason for

distributing goods and services. 3. No profit motive in the distribution of goods

and services.

What are the three main characteristics of capitalism?

Source: By the author.

334 CHAPTER 11 Politics and the Economy

capitalism. Private citizens own the means of production and pursue profits, but they do so within a vast system of laws designed to protect the welfare of the population and—not incidentally—ensure that the government can collect taxes.

Consider this example:

Suppose that you discover what you think is a miracle tonic: It will grow hair, erase wrinkles, and dissolve excess fat. If your product works, you will become an overnight sensation—not only a multimillionaire, but also the toast of television talk shows and the darling of Hollywood.

How are ideas about employing children related to a country’s type of economy?

Cultural Diversity around the World

The Child Workers In Afghanistan, Zar Muhammad expresses guilt and sorrow that his 7- and 8-year-old sons have to work 12 hours a day making bricks in the mud. Zar borrowed 10,000 rupees to get married. He now owes 150,000 rupees. The children have to work alongside him to try to pay the debt. But the debt continues to grow: rent to the kiln owner for their mud house, electricity, and food, and sometimes emergency medicine for the children. They are locked in a cycle that makes Zar and his sons servants/slaves forever (Kamber 2011).

Does the government know about this situation? Of course, it knows. When asked about the 5,000 children that work in the kilns in his area, the district governor said, “I know this is not good for kids, but we have to build our buildings, build our country. The work provides income for the children’s families” (Kamber 2011).

In Zambia, nine-year- old Alone Banda works in an abandoned quarry. Using a bolt, he breaks rocks into powder. In a week, he makes enough powder to fill half a cement bag. Alone gets $3 for the half bag.

It is still a slow death for Alone. Robbed of his child- hood and breathing rock dust continuously, Alone is likely to come down with what the quarry workers call a “heavy chest,” an early sign of silicosis.

The amount Alone makes is pitiful, but without it he and his grandmother would starve to death. As one mother said, “If I feel pity for them, what are they going to eat?” (Wines 2006).

As with the photo I took of an 8-year-old girl in India (page 186), some children work in construction, others in factories.

Children work as miners, pesticide sprayers, street vendors, and household servants. They weave carpet in India, race camels in the Middle East, and, all over the world, work as prostitutes. In the poverty-stricken ar-

eas of some of these countries, people live on less than $1 a day. The

few dollars the children earn make the difference

between life and death. Besides poverty, there

is also a cultural factor. In many parts of the world, people view children dif- ferently than we do in the West. The idea that chil- dren have the right to be educated and to be spared from adult burdens is fairly new in history. A major fac- tor shaping our views of life is economics, and when prosperity comes to these other countries, so will this new perspective.

For Your Consideration↑

How do you think the wealthier nations can help allevi- ate the suffering of child workers? Before industrialization, and for a period afterwards, having children work was also common in the West. Just because our economic system has changed, bringing with it different ideas of childhood and of the rights of children, do we have the right to impose our changed ideas on other nations?

The answer to “What is the proper role of children in an economy?” varies by social class, culture, economic development, and historical period. On the left is a boy working in a Pennsylvania coal mine about 1880. On the right is a four-year-old boy pounding stones in a quarry in Benin.

World Economic Systems 335

But don’t count on your money or fame yet. You still have to reckon with market restraints, the laws and regulations of welfare capitalism that limit your capacity to produce and sell. First, you must comply with local and state laws. You must obtain a business license and a state tax number that allows you to buy your ingredients with- out paying sales taxes. Then come the federal regulations. You cannot simply take your product to local stores and ask them to sell it; you first must seek approval from federal agencies that monitor compliance with the Pure Food and Drug Act. This means that you must prove that your product will not cause harm to the public. Your manufactur- ing process is also subject to federal, state, and local laws concerning fraud, hygiene, and the disposal of hazardous wastes.

Suppose that you overcome these obstacles, and your business prospers. Other federal agencies will monitor your compliance with laws concerning minimum wages, Social Security taxes, and discrimination on the basis of race, gender, religion, or disability. State agencies will examine your records to see whether you have paid unemployment and sales taxes. Finally, as your shadowy but ever-present business partner, the Internal Revenue Service will look over your shoulder and demand about 35 percent of your profits.

In short, the U.S. economic system is highly regulated and is far from an example of laissez-faire capitalism.

Socialism What Socialism Is. As Table 11.3 on page 333 shows, socialism also has three essential components: (1) public ownership of the means of production, (2) central planning, and (3) the distribution of goods without a profit motive.

In socialist economies, the government owns the means of production—not only the factories but also the land, railroads, oil wells, and gold mines. Unlike capitalism, in which market forces—supply and demand—determine both what will be produced and the prices that will be charged, a central committee decides that the country needs X number of toothbrushes, Y toilets, and Z shoes. The committee decides how many of each will be produced, which factories will produce them, what price will be charged for the items, and where they will be distributed.

Socialism is designed to eliminate competition, for goods are sold at predetermined prices regardless of the demand for an item or the cost of producing it. The goal is not to make a profit, nor is it to encourage the consumption of goods that are in low demand (by lowering the price) or to limit the consumption of hard-to-get goods (by raising the price). Rather, the goal is to produce goods for the general welfare and to distribute them according to people’s needs, not their ability to pay.

In a socialist economy everyone in the economic chain works for the government. The members of the central committee who set production goals are government employees, as are the supervisors who implement their plans, the factory work- ers who produce the merchandise, the truck drivers who move it, and the clerks who sell it. Those who buy the items may work at different jobs—in offices, on farms, or in day care centers—but they, too, are govern- ment employees.

Socialism in Practice. Just as capitalism does not exist in a pure form, neither does socialism. Although the ideology of socialism calls for resources to be distributed according to need and not the ability to pay, socialist countries found it necessary to pay higher salaries for some jobs in order to entice people to take on greater responsibilities. Factory managers, for example, always earned more than factory workers. These differences in pay follow the functionalist argument of social stratification presented in Chapter 7 (pp. 191–192). By nar- rowing the huge pay gaps that characterize capitalist nations, however, socialist nations established considerably greater equality of income.

The wealthy, whether capitalist or socialist, can buy most anything, including trophy spouses. It is usually successful men who marry

women much younger than themselves, such as Nicolas Cage, age 48, shown here with his wife, Alice, age 25. This pattern will continue, but with changing norms we can expect more financially successful women to marry younger men.

What are the three main characteristics of socialism?

336 CHAPTER 11 Politics and the Economy

Democratic Socialism. Dissatisfied with the greed and exploitation of capitalism and the lack of freedom and individuality of socialism, Sweden and Denmark developed democratic socialism (also called welfare socialism). In this form of socialism, both the state and individuals produce and distribute goods and services. The government owns and runs the steel, mining, forestry, and energy concerns, as well as the country’s tele- phones, television stations, and airlines. Remaining in private hands are the retail stores, farms, factories, and most service industries.

Ideologies of Capitalism and Socialism Not only do capitalism and socialism have different approaches to producing and dis- tributing goods but they also represent opposing belief systems. Capitalists believe that market forces should determine both products and prices. They also believe that profits are good for humanity. The potential to make money stimulates people to produce and distribute goods, as well as to develop new products. Society benefits, as the result is a more abundant supply of goods at cheaper prices.

Socialists take an opposite view of profits. They consider profits to be immoral. An item’s value is based on the work that goes into it, said Karl Marx. The only way there can be profit, he stressed, is by paying workers less than the value of their labor. Profit, he said, is the excess value that has been withheld from workers. Socialists believe that the government should protect workers from this exploitation. To do so, the govern- ment should own the means of production, using them not to generate profit but to produce items that match people’s needs, not their ability to pay.

Capitalists and socialists paint each other in such stark colors that each perceives the other system as one of exploitation. Capitalists believe that socialists violate people’s basic right to make their own decisions and to pursue opportunity. Socialists believe that capi- talists violate people’s basic right to be free from poverty. With each side claiming moral superiority while viewing the other as a threat to its very existence, the last century wit- nessed the world split into two main blocs. In what was known as the Cold War, the West armed itself to defend and promote capitalism, the East to defend and promote socialism.

Criticisms of Capitalism and Socialism In India, an up-and-coming capitalist giant, the construction of a 27-story building is almost complete (Yardley 2010). It comes with a grand ballroom, nine elevators, a fifty-seat theater, a six-story garage, and three helipads on the roof.

The occupants are ready to move in—all five of them—a husband, wife, and their three children. From their perch, they will be able to view the teeming mass of destitute people below.

The primary criticism leveled against capitalism is that it leads to social inequality. Capitalism, say its critics, produces a tiny top layer of wealthy people who exploit an immense bottom layer of poorly paid workers. Another criticism is that the tiny top layer wields vast political power. Those few who own the means of production reap huge profits, accrue power, and get legislation passed that goes against the public good.

The first criticism leveled against socialism is that it does not respect individual rights. Others (in the form of some government agency) control people’s lives. They decide where people will live, work, and go to school. In China, they even determine how many children women may bear (Mosher 1983, 2006). Critics make a second point—that central planning is grossly inefficient and that socialism is not capable of producing much wealth. They say that its greater equality really amounts to giving almost everyone an equal chance to be poor.

The Convergence of Capitalism and Socialism Regardless of the validity of these mutual criticisms, as nations industrialize they come to resemble one another. They urbanize, encourage higher education, and produce simi- lar divisions of labor (such as professionals and skilled technicians; factory workers and factory managers). Similar values also emerge (Kerr 1983). By itself, this tendency would make capitalist and socialist nations grow more alike, but another factor also brings them

Can you contrast the ideologies of capitalism and socialism? Can you summarize the criticisms of each?

World Economic Systems 337

What events indicate that convergence theory is right?

closer to one another: Despite their incompatible ideologies, both capitalist and socialist systems have adopted features from the other (Form 1979).

That capitalism and socialism are growing similar is known as convergence theory. Fundamental changes in socialist countries give evidence for this coming hybrid, or mixed, economy. For example, Russians suffered from shoddy goods and shortages, and their standard of living lagged severely behind that of the West. To try to catch up, in the 1980s and 1990s the rulers of Russia made the private ownership of property legal and abandoned communism. Making a profit—which had been a crime—was encour- aged. China joined the change, but kept a communist government. In its converged form of “capunism,” capitalists joined the Communist Party. The convergence is so great that when the Western governments instituted stimulus plans to counter the economic crisis, China joined in with a huge stimulus plan of its own (Batson 2009). Even Western banks are now welcome in China. Among other things, they provide specialized services to China’s 960,000 new millionaires (Yenfang 2011)—and, of course, to China’s 115 new billionaires (Flannery 2011). The change is so remarkable that some textbooks in China now give more space to Bill Gates than to Mao (Guthrie 2008). The Cultural Diversity box on the next page provides a glimpse of the new capitalism in China.

Changes in capitalism also support this theory. The United States has adopted many socialist practices. One of the most obvious is that the government collects money from some individuals to pay for benefits given to others. It had none of these when the country was founded: unemployment compensation (taxes paid by workers are distrib- uted to those who no longer produce a profit); subsidized housing, food, and medical care (paid for by the many and given to the poor and elderly with no motive of profit); welfare (taxes from the many are distributed to the needy); a minimum wage (the gov- ernment, not the employer, determines the minimum that workers receive); and Social Security (the retired do not receive what they paid into the system, but, rather, money that the government collects from current workers).

Convergence is continuing. In 2008, when Wall Street and auto firms started to buckle, the U.S. government stepped in to shore up these businesses. In some cases, the government even bought the companies, fired CEOs, and set salary limits. Such an extended embrace of socialist principles indicates that the United States has produced its own version of a mixed economy.

For about 60 years, the capitalist and socialist (communist) countries were locked in a life-death struggle called the Cold War. Each used propaganda to promote its economic-political system. The 1920 anticapitalist poster from Russia depicts Lenin cleansing the world of the rich and privileged (called “filth” in the Russian caption). Even private enterprise got involved, as you can see from this anticommunist U.S. comic book from the 1950s.

338 CHAPTER 11 Politics and the Economy

Can you make an argument that there is or is not capitalism in communist China?

The Globalization of Capitalism Capitalism has made the world’s countries part of the same broad economic unit. When the economic crisis hit the United States, it spread quickly around the world. To decide what they should do, the leaders of the top 20 producers of consumer goods met in Washington. The Chinese leaders said that no one should worry about them not being a team player; they knew that their actions would affect other nations. (Yardley and Brasher 2008)

Cultural Diversity around the World

Beijing

Hong Kong

China Shanghai

Beijing

Hong Kong

China Shanghai

The New Competitor: The Chinese Capitalists Socialism has the virtue of making people more equal. Socialism’s equality, however, translates into distributing pov- erty throughout a society. Under socialism, almost everyone becomes equally poor.

Capitalism, in contrast, has the virtue of producing wealth. A lot of people remain poor, however, leaving deep gaps between wealth and poverty, one that produces envy and sometimes creates social unrest.

Chinese leaders realized the wealth-producing capacity of capitalism and wanted that for their people (Karon 2011). In the Chinese version they produced—capitalism directed by communists—wealth has increased at an astonishing rate. In all the world’s history, this new capitalism has lifted the largest number—a half billion—of people out of poverty in the shortest time. The poor who are left behind, however, aren’t happy when their land is taken from them to help make others wealthy. The anger and re- sentment have kept the Party busy sending out the army to squelch riots.

In Beijing, the capital of China, stands a mansion built by Zhang Yuchen. This is no ordinary mansion, like those built by China’s other newly rich. This impos- ing building is a twin of the Chateau de Maisons-Laffitte, an architectural landmark on the Seine River outside Paris. At a cost of $50 million, the Beijing replica matches the original edifice detail for detail. The archi- tects even used the original blueprints of the French chateau, and the building features the same Chantilly stone (Kahn 2004, 2007).

Building the chateau and its housing development of luxury homes made eight hundred farmers landless. But if they get angry, the spiked fence, the moat, and the armed guards—looking sharp in their French-style uniforms com- plete with capes and kepis—will keep the peasants out of the chateau.

In most places, you need connections to become wealthy. In China, this means connections with the

Communist Party, for this group still holds the power. Yuchen has those connections. As a member of the Party, it was his job to direct Beijing’s construction projects. With his

deep connections, Yuchen was able to get the wheat fields farmed by the peasants rezoned from farmland to a “conservation area.” He was even able to divert a river so he could build the moat around the chateau, one of the finishing touches on his architectural wonder.

Beneath such ostentatious examples of capitalistic excess lies this irony: China is doing capitalism better than

the capitalist countries. Using the state machinery, their leaders have proven

themselves more nimble in reacting to competition, in seizing opportunities for profit, and for accumulating vast amounts of capital. The capitalist nations have be- come envious, especially as the Chinese model of capitalism—at least at this historical point—is proving competitively superior (Bremmer 2011; Karon 2011).

For Your Consideration↑

When China has completed its transition to capitalism, what do you think the final version will look like (that is, what characteristics do you think it will have)? Where will the top Party leaders fit in the class system that is emerging? Why? (To answer this, consider the connections and resources of the elite.)

Like a debutante being introduced to society, the Chinese capunists presented themselves on the world stage at the Beijing Olympics. This photo is from the games’ closing ceremonies.

The Globalization of Capitalism 339

What are the world’s main trading blocs? What is meant by “stagnant paychecks”?

The globalization of capitalism is so significant that its impact on our lives may rival that of the Industrial Revolution. As Louis Galambos, a historian of business, says, “This new global business system will change the way everyone lives and works” (Zachary 1995).

Let’s look, then, at how capitalism is changing the face of the globe.

A New Global Structure and the Displacement of Workers The globalization of capitalism has forged a new world structure. Three primary trading blocs (groups of countries) have emerged: North and South America, dominated by the United States; Europe, dominated by Germany; and Asia, dominated by China and Japan. Functionalists stress that this new global division benefits not only the multinational giants but also the citizens of the world.

Consider free trade. Free trade increases competition, which, in turn, drives the search for greater productivity. This lowers prices and brings a higher standard of liv- ing. Free trade also has dysfunctions. As production moves to countries where labor costs are lower, millions of U.S., U.K., French, and Spanish workers have lost their jobs. Functionalists point out that this is a temporary dislocation, that as the Most Industrialized Nations lose factory jobs, their workers shift into service and high-tech jobs. Perhaps. But the millions of workers searching in vain for jobs that no longer exist would disagree.

Certainly the adjustment has been anything but easy. As the U.S. steel industry lost out to global competition, for example, the plant closings created “rust belts” in the north- ern states. The globalization of capitalism has also brought special challenges to small towns across the country, which already were suffering long-term losses because of urbaniza- tion. Their struggle to survive is the topic of the photo essay on the next two pages.

Stagnant Paychecks With extensive automation, the productivity of U.S. workers has increased year after year, making them some of the most productive in the world (Statistical Abstract 2012:Tables 1353, 1355). One might think, therefore, that their pay would be increasing. This brings us to a dis- turbing trend, one that bothers Americans and is an underly- ing reason that so many workers have lost their homes to foreclosure.

Look at Figure 11.4. The gold bars show current dollars. These are the dollars the average worker finds in his or her paycheck. You can see that since 1970 the average pay of U.S. workers has soared from just over $3 an hour to over $19 an hour. Workers today are bringing home about six times as many dollars as workers used to.

But let’s strip away the illusion. Look at the purple bars, which show the dollars adjusted for inflation, the buying power of those paychecks. You can see how inflation has surppressed the value of the dollars that workers earn. Today’s workers, with their $19 an hour, can buy little more than workers in 1970 could with their “measly” $3 an hour. The question is not “How could workers live on just $3 an hour back then?” but, rather, “How can workers get by on a 62-cent-an-hour raise that

Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 1992:Table 650; 1999:Table 698; 2012:Table 644.

FIGURE 11.4 Average Hourly Earnings

$7.98

1970 19901980 20102000

Current dollars

Constant dollars

$19

$18

$20

$17

$16

$15

$14

$13

$12

$11

$10

$9

$8

$7

$6

$5

$4

$3

$2

$1

$0

D o

lla rs

p e r

H o

u r

Year

$3.23

$8.29

$6.66

$10.20

$7.91

$14.02

$8.30 $8.91

$19.07

of U.S. Workers in Current and Constant Dollars

Note: Constant dollars are dollars adjusted for inflation with 1982–1984 as the base.

road Wal-Mart sells the same

products for about what you

pay for them—and offer s much

greater variety. There are exceptions: So

me small towns are

located close to a city, a nd they receive the city's

spillover. A few possess a rare treasure—some

unique historical event or a natural attraction---

-that draws visitors with m oney to spend . Most

of the others, though, are drying up, left in a time

warp as history shifts aro und them . This photo

essay tells the story.

Small Town USA: St ruggling to Survive

All across the nation, sm all towns are strug-

gling to survive. Parents and town offi cials

are concerned because s o few young adults

remain in their home tow n . There is little to

keep them there, and wh en they graduate

from high school, most m ove to the city.

With young people leavin g and old ones

dying, the small towns ar e shriveling .

How can small towns con tend with cut-

throat global competition when workers in

some countries are paid a couple of dollars

a day? Even if you open a store, down the

The small towns are fi lled with places like this— small businesses, locally owned, that have enough clientele for the owner and family to eke out a living. They have to offer low prices because there is a fast-food chain down the road. Fixing the sign? That’s one of those “I’ll get-to-its.”

I was struck by the grandiosity of people’s dreams, at least

as refl ected in the names that some small-towners give their businesses. Donut Palace has

a nice ring to it—inspiring thoughts of wealth and royalty

(note the crowns). Unfortunately, like so many others, this business didn’t make it.

People do whatever they ca n to survive. This enterprisi

ng

proprietor uses the building for an unusual combination

of

purposes: a “plant world,” along with the sale of milk,

eggs,

bread, and, in a quaint sou thern touch, cracking pecan

s.

In striking contrast to the grandiosity of some small-town business names is the utter simplicity of others. Cafe tells everyone that some type of food and drinks are served here. Everyone in this small town knows the details.

© James M. Henslin, all photos

One of the few buildings cons istently in good repair in the s

mall

towns is the U.S. Post Offi ce. A lthough its importance has de

clined

in the face of telecommunicat ions, for “small towners” the p

ost

offi ce still provides a vital link with the outside world.

With little work available, it is diffi cult to afford adequate housing. This house, although cobbled together and in disrepair, is a family’s residence.

This general store used to be the mai

n business in the a rea: It even

has a walk-in safe. It has been owned

by the same family since the

1920s, but is no lon ger successful. To g

et into the building , I had to

fi nd out where the owner (shown here

) lived, knock on he r door, and

then wait while she called around to fi

nd out who had th e keys.

This is a successful business. The store goes back to the early 1900s, and the proprietors have capitalized on the “old timey” atmosphere.

There is no global competition for this home-grown business. Shirley

has located her sign on a main highway just outside Niceville,

Florida. By the looks of the building, business could be better.

342 CHAPTER 11 Politics and the Economy

took 40 years to get?” That’s less than two cents an hour per year! Incredibly, despite workers having more college and more technical training, despite the use of computers, and much higher productivity, their purchasing power increased just 62 cents an hour between 1970 and 2010. What can you buy with those 62 cents?

Actually, after taxes and Social Security, we should ask, What can you do with the 40 cents.

The New Economic System and the Old Divisions of Wealth

Suppose that you own a business that manufactures widgets. You are paying your workers an average $152 a day ($19 an hour including vacation pay, sick pay, unemployment benefits, Social Security, and so on). Widgets similar to yours are being manufactured in Thailand, where workers are paid $8 a day. Those imported widgets are being sold in the same stores that feature your widgets.

We are in the midst of the globalization of capitalism. The explosion that is sending products around the world brings new ways of thinking to people in the Least Industrialized Nations. Many ideas are subtle, such as what refreshing drinks are.

How does the globalization of capitalism increase competition and lower prices?

The Globalization of Capitalism 343

How does the globalization of capitalism influence business decisions? How does it affect workers?

What happens when oil tankers wear out? They go to Bangladesh, where they are turned into scrap. These workers, an expendable part of the global economic system that we are all a part of, are exposed to PCBs, asbestos, and other toxins. For this, they earn $1–$2 a day.

How long do you think you could stay in business? Even if your workers were willing to drop their pay in half—which they aren’t willing to do—you still couldn’t compete.

What do you do? Your choices are simple. You can continue as you are and go broke, try to find some other product to manufacture (which, if successful, will soon be made in Thailand or India or China)—or you can close up your plant here and manufacture your widgets in Thailand.

These are not easy times for workers. One disruption after another. High insecurity with layoffs, plant closings, and the prospect of more of the same. The insecurity is especially hard-hitting on the most desperate of workers, the less-skilled and those who live from paycheck to paycheck. How can they compete with people overseas who work for peanuts? They suffer the wrenching adjustments that come from having their jobs pulled out from under them, looking for work and finding only jobs that pay lower wages—if that, watching their savings go down the drain, post- poning their retirement, and seeing their children disillusioned about the future. The photo above indicates some of the consequnces for workers in the Least Industrialized Nations.

What about the wealthy? In these tough economic times, aren’t they being hurt, too? Some rich individuals do get on the wrong side of investments and lose their collective shirts. In general, though, the wealthy do just fine in these challenging economic times. How can I be so sure, you might be wondering. Take a look at Figure 11.5 on the next page.

Each rectangle on the left of this figure represents a fifth of the U.S. population, about 62 million people. The rectangles of the inverted pyramid on the right show the per- centage of the nation’s income that goes to each fifth of the population. You can see that half of the entire country’s income goes to the richest fifth of Americans. Only 3 percent goes to the poorest fifth.

This gap has been growing over the years, and it now is greater than it has been in generations. The transition to a postindustrial economy and the globalization of capitalism has increased our income inequalities. The common folk saying that the rich are getting richer and the poor are getting poorer is certainly an apt observation,

344 CHAPTER 11 Politics and the Economy

well supported by social research. What implications of this division of the nation’s wealth do you see for our future?

The Global Superclass At the top of the multinational corporations is an overlapping membership; that is, people serve on the boards of several corporations. The leaders of the globe’s top multinational companies overlap to such a degree that they form a small circle, one that we can call the global superclass (Rothkopf 2008). The superclass is not only extremely wealthy, as we reviewed in Chapter 7 (see Figure 7.1, p. 189), but it is also extremely powerful. These people have access to the top circles of political power around the globe. With their multiple layers of security to ensure their privacy and safety, it is difficult to do research on the super class. But how would you like to listen to a member of this superclass describe their tight connections? Here is your chance.

Every country has its large financial institutions that are central to the development of that country, and everyone else in finance knows somebody who will know the head of one of those companies. That person knows a senior person in their gov- ernment that could be useful in a situation. . . . the key is the network. . . . it is twenty, thirty, fifty people worldwide who ultimately drive the decisions. (Rothkopf 2008:129–130)

Twenty to fifty individuals who make the world’s major decisions! Could this possibly be true? The individual who said this, Stephen Schwarzman, is an insider who is worth about $9 billion (Freeland 2011). Pay attention to this real-life example of how this interconnected global power works out in practice:

When Schwarzman, a co-founder of Blackstone, an investment company, had a problem with some policy of the German government, he called a German friend. The friend arranged for Schwarzman to meet with the Chancellor of Germany. After listening to Schwarzman, the Chancellor agreed to support a change in Germany’s policy.

Do you see the power that is concentrated in this small group? The U.S. mem- bers can call the U.S. president, the English members can ring up the British prime minister, and so on. They know how to get and give favors, to move vast amounts of

How does the global superclass represent concentrated power?

Percentage of the U.S. population Percentage of the nation's income receivedPercentage of the U.S. population

20%

20%

20%

20%

20%

50%

23%

15%

9%

3%

Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 2012:Table 694.

FIGURE 11.5 The Inverted Income Pyramid: The Proportion of Income Received by Each Fifth of the U.S. Population

A New World Order? 345

capital from country to country, and to open and close doors to investments around the world.

This concentration of power is new to the world scene. Working behind the scenes, the global superclass affects our present and our future. To close this chapter, let’s look at this aspect of our changing political and economic order.

A New World Order? So far, the use of war and terrorism to try to dominate the globe has failed. A New World Order, however, might be on its way, ushered in not by violence, but by changing economic-political conditions.

Trends toward Unity Perhaps the key political event in our era is the globalization of capitalism. Why the term political? Because politics and economics are twins, with each setting the stage for the other. Look at the economic-political units being developed. The United States, Canada, and Mexico have formed a North American Free-Trade Agreement (NAFTA). Ten Asian countries with a combined population of a half billion people have formed a regional trading partnership called ASEAN (Association of South East Asian Nations). Struggling for dominance is an even more encompassing group called the World Trade Organization. These coalitions of trading partners are making national borders increas- ingly insignificant.

The European Union (EU) may indicate the future. Transcending their national boundaries, twenty-seven European countries (with a combined population of 450 million) formed this economic and political unit. These nations adopted a single, cross-national currency, the euro, which replaced their marks, francs, liras, pesetas, and lats. The EU also established a military staff in Brussels, Belgium.

Could this process continue until there is just one state (or empire) that envelops the earth? It is possible. The United Nations is striving to become the legislative

What trends or events indicate that a new global order may be on its way?

All governments—all the time—use propaganda to influence public opinion. During times of war, the propaganda becomes more obvious. Note how ugly Hitler and Tojo are depicted on the World War II poster from the United States—and this is just an ad to prevent forest fires! The second poster was produced by the Nazis, letting the Germans know that the United States and the Soviet Union were run by Jews. It reads “Behind the enemy, the Jew.”

346 CHAPTER 11 Politics and the Economy

body of the world, wanting its decisions to supersede those of any individual nation. The UN operates a World Court (formally titled the International Court of Justice). It also has a small multinational army and has sent “peacekeeping” troops to several nations. And there is also now a World Bank.

Strains in the Global System Although the globalization of capitalism and its encompassing trade organizations could lead to a single world government, the developing global system is experiencing strains that threaten to rip the system apart. Unresolved items constantly rear up, demand- ing realignments of the current arrangements of power. Although these pressures are resolved on a short-term basis, over time their cumulative weight leads to a gradual shift in global stratification.

The economic crisis that exposed a debt-ridden global financial system teetering on the edge of global disaster also laid bare some of the interconnections that unite its elements. In 2012, when the crisis threatened to tear the European Union apart, sending its individual members sulking back into their solitary units, the United States stepped in. By pouring billions of dollars into the European Central Bank and the International Monetary Fund, the United States helped European banks to keep credit flowing and hold the economic-political union together. No longer are economic-political problems limited to local areas, to regions, or even to continents. Larger and larger Band-Aids are needed to prop the tattered union together.

If we take a broad historical view, we see that a particular group or culture can dominate only so long. Its dominance always comes to an end, to be replaced by another group or culture. The process of decline is usually slow and can last hundreds of years (Toynbee 1946). Life today, though, is so speeded-up that the future looms into the present at a furious pace. The decline of U.S. dominance—like that of Great Britain—could come fairly quickly, although certainly not without resistance and bloodshed. The shape of the new political arrangements of world power is anyone’s guess, but it certainly will include an ascendant China (Kissinger 2011).

As the economic and political arrangements of the present give way, future gen- erations will face a new world. Whatever the particular shape of future stratification, it is likely that a super-dominant group of more-or-less integrated economic-political elites will be directing it. This super class will not belong to any single nation, and the alliances that forge its dominance in the new global scheme of things will pay little attention to international borders. This process may well lead to a one-world government, perhaps to a dictatorship or an oligarchy that controls the world’s resources and people. If so, we could end up with living under a government like that of Winston and Julia in our opening vignette.

Only time will tell.

What strains are showing up in the global financial system?

A New World Order? 347

Purchasing power of the U.S. dollar

1941 $1.00

NOW $0.05

Average hourly earnings of workers, in current

U.S. dollars

1970 $3.23

NOW $19.07

Average hourly earnings of workers, in constant

(1984) U.S. dollars

1970 $8.29

NOW $8.91

Percentage of U.S. workforce made up of white-collar workers

1900

20% NOW

80%

Percentage of U.S. workforce made up of

blue-collar workers

1900

40% NOW

19%

Percentage of U.S. workforce made up by farmers

1900

30% NOW

1%

The average U.S. farmer produces enough food

to feed this many people

1800

5 NOW

80

Men who voted in the

presidential election

1988

56% 2008

56%

Women who voted in the

presidential election

1988

58% 2008

60%

High school drop-outs who voted in the

presidential election

1988

41% 2008

34%

College graduates who voted in the

presidential election

1988

78% 2008

73%

Latinos who voted in the

presidential election

1988

48% 2008

32%

African Americans who voted in the

presidential election

1988

55% 2008

61%

348 CHAPTER 11 Politics and the Economy

Power, Authority, and Violence How are authority and coercion related to power? Authority is power that people view as legitimately exercised over them, while coercion is power they consider unjust. The state is a political entity that claims a monopoly on violence over some territory. Pp. 316–317.

What kinds of authority are there? Max Weber identified three types of authority. In traditional authority, power is derived from custom—patterns set down in the past serve as rules for the present. In rational–legal authority (also called bureaucratic authority), power is based on law and written rules. In charismatic authority, power is derived from loyalty to an individual to whom people are attracted. Charismatic authority, which under- mines traditional and rational–legal authority, has built-in problems in transferring authority to a new leader. Pp. 317–318.

Types of Government How are the types of government related to power? In a monarchy, power is based on hereditary rule; in a democracy, power is given to the ruler by citizens; in a dictatorship, power is seized by an individual; and in an oligarchy, power is seized by a small group. Pp. 318–321.

The U.S. Political System What are the main characteristics of the U.S. political system? The U.S. political system is dominated by the Democratic and Republican parties, which represent slightly different centrist positions. The differences are most obvious in those who take extreme positions. Pp. 321–322.

Voter turnout is higher among people who are more socially integrated—those who sense a greater stake in the outcome of elections, such as the more educated and well- to-do. Lobbyists and special-interest groups, such as political action committees (PACs), play a significant role in U.S. politics. Pp. 322–325.

Who Rules the United States? Is the United States controlled by a ruling class? In a view known as pluralism, functionalists say that no one group holds power, that the country’s many competing interest groups balance one another. Conflict theorists, who focus on the top level of power, say that the United States is governed by a power elite, a ruling class made up of the top corporate, political, and military leaders. At this point, the matter is not settled. Pp. 326–327.

War and Terrorism: Implementing Political Objectives How are war and terrorism related to politics? War and terrorism are both means of attempting to accom- plish political objectives. Timasheff identified three essential conditions of war and seven fuels that bring about war. His analysis can be applied to terrorism. Nuclear, biological, and chemical terrorism are major threats. Pp. 327–331.

The Transformation of Economic Systems How are economic systems linked to types of societies? In early societies (hunting and gathering), small groups lived off the land and produced little or no surplus. Economic systems grew more complex as people discov- ered how to domesticate animals and grow plants (pastoral and horticultural societies), farm (agricultural societies), and manufacture (industrial societies). As people produced a surplus, trade developed. Trade, in turn, brought social inequality as some people accumulated more than others. Service industries dominate the postindustrial societies. If a biotech society is emerging, its consequences, too, will be far reaching. Pp. 331–333.

World Economic Systems How do the major economic systems differ? The world’s two major economic systems are capitalism and socialism. In capitalism, private citizens own the means of production and pursue profits. In socialism, the state

Summary and ReviewCH A

P T

E R

11

Summary and Review 349

Thinking Critically about Chapter 11 1. What are the three sources of authority, and how do they

differ from one another? 2. Apply the three essential conditions of war and its seven

fuels to a recent (or current) war that the United States has been (or is) a part of.

3. What global forces are affecting the U.S. economy? What consequences are they having? How might they affect your own life?

owns the means of production and has no goal of profit. Adherents of each have developed ideologies that defend their own systems and paint the other as harmful or even evil. As expected from convergence theory, each system has adopted features of the other. Pp. 333–338.

The Globalization of Capitalism What is the new global structure? The world’s nations are forming major trading blocs. As multinational corporations seek the lowest costs of pro- duction, millions of jobs are transferred to nations where workers are paid little. This is causing great suffering to workers who are losing their jobs and to those whose pay

is stagnant. At the same time, an ultrawealthy and powerful global superclass has risen. Pp. 338–345.

A New World Order? Is humanity headed toward a world political system? The globalization of capitalism and the trend toward regional economic and political unions may indicate that a world economic-political system is developing. Competing interests and internal contradictions might prevent a New World Order from developing, but if one does emerge, the consequences for human welfare could be calamitous. Pp. 345–346.

Marriage and Family12CHAPTE R

I was living in a remote village in the state of Colima, Mexico. I had chosen this nondescript town a few kilometers from the ocean because it had no other Americans, and I wanted to immerse myself in the local culture.

The venture was successful. I became friends with my neigh- bors, who were curious about why a gringo was living in their midst. After all, there was nothing about their drab and dusty town to attract tourists. So why was this gringo there, this guy who looked so different from them and who had the unusual custom of jogging shirtless around the outskirts of town and among the coconut and banana trees? This was their burning question, while mine was “What is your life like?”

We satisfied one another. I explained to them what a soci- ologist is. Although they never grasped why I would want to know about their way of life, they accepted my explanation. And I was able to get my questions answered. I was invited into their homes—by the men. The women didn’t talk to men outside the presence of their husbands, brothers, or other women. The women didn’t even go out in public unless they were accompanied by someone. Another woman would do, just so they weren’t alone. The women did the cooking, cleaning, and child care. The men worked in the fields.

I was culturally startled one day at my neighbor’s house. The man had retired from the fields, and he and his wife, as the custom was, were being supported by their sons who worked in the fields. When I saw the bathroom, with a homemade commode made of clay—these were poor people—I asked him about the used toilet paper thrown into a pile on the floor. He explained that the sewer system couldn’t handle toilet paper. He said that I should just throw mine onto the pile, adding that it was his wife’s job to pick up the used toilet paper and throw it out.

I became used to the macho behavior of the men. This wasn’t too unlike high-school behavior—a lot of boisterous man-to-man stuff—drinking, joking, and bragging about sexual conquests. The sex was vital for proving manhood. When the men took me to a whorehouse (to help explain their culture, they said), they couldn’t understand why I wouldn’t have sex with a prostitute. Didn’t I find the women attractive? Yes, they were good looking. Weren’t they sexy? Yes, very much so. Was I a real man? Yes. Then why not? My explanation about being married didn’t faze them one bit. They were married, too—and a real man had to have sex with more women than just his wife.

Explanations of friendship with a wife and respect for her fell on deaf cultural ears.

It was his wife’s job to pick up the used toilet paper.

Florida

352 CHAPTER 12 Marriage and Family

Marriage and Family in Global Perspective These men and I were inhabiting the same physical space, but our cultural space—which we carry in our heads and show in our behavior—was worlds apart. My experiences with working-class men in this remote part of Mexico helped me understand how marriage and family can vastly differ from one culture to another. To broaden our perspective for understanding this vital social institution, let’s look at how marriage and family customs differ around the world.

What Is a Family? Every human group in the world organizes its members in families. The world’s cultures, though, display so much variety that the term family is difficult to define. Although the Western world regards a family as a husband, wife, and children, other groups have family forms in which men have more than one wife (polygyny) or women more than one husband (polyandry). How about the obvious? Can we define the family as the approved group into which children are born? That would be overlooking the Banaro of New Guinea. In this group, a young woman must give birth before she can marry—and she cannot marry the father of her child (Murdock 1949).

Such remarkable variety means that we have to settle for a broad definition. A fam- ily consists of people who consider themselves related by blood, marriage, or adoption. A household, in contrast, consists of people who occupy the same housing unit—a house, apartment, or other living quarters.

We can classify families as nuclear (husband, wife, and children) and extended (including people such as grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins in addition to the nuclear unit). Sociologists also refer to the family of orientation (the family in which an individual grows up) and the family of procreation (the family that is formed when a couple has its first child).

What Is Marriage? We have the same problem here. For just about every element you might regard as essential to marriage, some group has a different custom.

Consider the sex of the bride and groom. Until recently, opposite sex was taken for granted. Then in the 1980s and 1990s, several European countries legalized same-sex marriages. Canada and several U.S. states soon followed.

At least one thing has to be universal in marriage: We can at least be sure that the bride and groom are alive. So you would think. But even for this there is an exception. On the Loess Plateau in China, if a son dies without a wife, his parents look for a dead woman to be his bride. After buying one—from the parents of a dead unmarried daughter—the dead man and woman are married and then buried together. Happy that their son will have intimacy in the after- life, the parents throw a party to celebrate the marriage (Fremson 2006).

With such encompassing cultural variety, we can define marriage this way—a group’s approved mating arrangements, usually marked by a ritual of some sort (the wedding) to indicate the couple’s new public status.

Common Cultural Themes Despite this diversity, several common themes run through marriage and family. As Table 12.1 illustrates, all societies use marriage and family to establish patterns of mate selection, descent, inheritance, and authority. Let’s look at these patterns. Mate Selection. Each human group establishes norms to govern who mar- ries whom. If a group has norms of endogamy, it specifies that its members must marry within their group. For example, some groups prohibit interracial marriage. In contrast, norms of exogamy specify that people must marry outside

Often one of the strongest family bonds is that of mother–daughter. The young artist, an eleventh grader, wrote: “This painting expresses the way I feel about my future with my child. I want my child to be happy and I want her to love me the same way I love her. In that way we will have a good relationship so that nobody will be able to take us apart. I wanted this picture to be alive; that is why I used a lot of bright colors.”

What is a family? What is marriage? Why are they so difficult to define?

Marriage and Family in Global Perspective 353

TABLE 12.1 Common Cultural Themes: Marriage in Traditional and Industrialized Societies

Characteristic Traditional Societies Industrial (and Postindustrial) Societies

What is the structure of marriage? Extended (marriage embeds spouses in a large kinship network of explicit obligations)

Nuclear (marriage brings fewer obligations toward the spouse’s relatives)

What are the functions of marriage? Encompassing (see the six functions listed on page 355)

More limited (many functions are fulfilled by other social institutions)

Who holds authority? Patriarchal (authority is held by males) Although some patriarchal features remain, authority is divided more equally

How many spouses at one time? Most have one spouse (monogamy), while some have several (polygamy)

One spouse

Who selects the spouse? Parents, usually the father, select the spouse Individuals choose their own spouses

Where does the couple live? Couples usually reside with the groom’s family (patrilocal residence), less commonly with the bride’s family (matrilocal residence)

Couples establish a new home (neolocal residence)

How is descent figured? Usually figured from male ancestors (patrilineal kinship), less commonly from female ancestors (matrilineal kinship)

Figured from male and female ancestors equally (bilineal kinship)

How is inheritance figured? Rigid system of rules; usually patrilineal, but can be matrilineal

Highly individualistic; usually bilineal

Source: By the author.

their group. The best example of exogamy is the incest taboo, which prohibits sex and marriage among designated relatives.

As you can see from Table 12.1, how people find mates varies around the world, from fathers selecting them, with no input from those who are to marry, to the highly individualistic, personal choices common in Western cultures. Changes in mate selection are the focus of the Sociology and the New Technology box on the next page.

Descent. How are you related to your father’s father or to your mother’s mother? You would think that the answer to this question would be the same all over the world—but it isn’t. Each society has a system of descent, the way people trace kinship over generations. We use a bilineal system, for we think of ourselves as related to both our mother’s and our father’s sides of the family. “Doesn’t everyone?” you might ask. Ours, however, is only one logical way to reckon descent. Some groups use a patrilineal system, tracing descent only on the father’s side; they don’t think of children as being related to their mother’s relatives. Others follow a matrilineal system, trac- ing descent only on the mother’s side, and not considering children to be related to their father’s relatives. The Naxi of China don’t even have a word for father (Hong 1999).

Inheritance. Marriage and family are also used to determine rights of inheritance. In a bilineal system, property is passed to both males and females, in a patrilineal system only to males, and in a matrilineal system (the rarest form), only to females. No system is nat- ural. Rather, each matches a group’s ideas of justice and logic.

Authority. Some form of patriarchy, a social system in which men-as-a-group dominate women-as-a-group, runs through all societies. Contrary to what some think, there are no historical records of a true matriarchy, a society in which women- as-a-group dominate men-as-a-group. Although U.S. family patterns are becoming more egalitarian, or equal, some of today’s customs still reflect their patriarchal ori- gin. One of the most obvious is the U.S. naming pattern: Despite some changes, the typical bride still takes the groom’s last name, and children usually receive the father’s last name.

What common cultural themes run through marriage? How does marriage differ in traditional and industrialized societies?

354 CHAPTER 12 Marriage and Family

Marriage and Family in Theoretical Perspective

As we have seen, human groups around the world have many forms of mate selec- tion, ways to trace descent, and ways to assign authority. Although these patterns are arbitrary, each group perceives its own forms of marriage and family as natural. Now let’s see what pictures emerge when we view marriage and family theoretically.

The Functionalist Perspective: Functions and Dysfunctions Functionalists stress that to survive, a society must fulfill basic functions (that is, meet its basic needs). When functionalists look at marriage and family, they examine how they are related to other parts of society, especially the ways that marriage and family contribute to the well-being of society.

How is the Internet changing dating for some?

Sociology and the New Technology

Finding a Mate: Not the Same as It Used to Be Things haven’t changed entirely. Boys and girls still get inter- ested in each other at their neighborhood schools, and men and women still meet at college. Friends still serve as match- makers and introduce friends, hoping they might click. People still meet at churches and bars, at the mall and at work.

But the Internet has intruded on these traditional arrange- ments. Dating sites offer thousands of potential companions, lovers, or spouses. For a low monthly fee, you can meet the person of your dreams—or so they promise.

The photos on these sites are fascinating. Some seem to be lovely people, warm, attractive, and vivacious. Others seem okay, although perhaps a bit needy. Then there are the pitiful, and one wonders whether they will ever find a mate, or even a hookup, for that matter. Some are desperate, begging for someone—anyone— to contact them: women trying to look sexy, their exposed flesh suggesting the promise of a good time, and men trying to look like hulks, their muscular presence promising the same.

With Internet postings having lost much of their stigma, elec- tronic matchmaking is changing the way we find mates. A fifth of heterosexual couples now meet online. For homosexuals, the total swells to three-fifths of couples (Rosenbloom 2011).

If you want to meet a mate online, though, you can expect to be fed a few lies. Researchers have found that to “put their best foot forward” women say that they weigh less than they do. And men? They say they are taller than they are (Rosenbloom 2011). But this seems to be in line with what you could expect in meeting someone at a bar, or wherever you would meet some- one for the first time. To make a good impression, most people stretch the truth. (Do they really scuba dive, or is that something they would just like to do?)

Are there dangers? The Craigslist rapists and all that. Certainly there are, and you have to watch out for shady characters lurk- ing on the Net. How do you know that the engaging person you are corresponding with is not already married, does not have a dozen kids, or is not a child molester or a rapist? But what makes

such concerns unique to Internet dating? Aren’t those the same kind of issues you need to be concerned about when meeting someone at school, a party, or even in the supermarket?

Even though the form is changing, the substance appears to be about the same. Maybe Internet dating is just tradition dressed up in different clothing.

For Your Consideration↑

Have you used an electronic dating site? Would you consider using one? Why or why not?

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Marriage and Family in Theoretical Perspective 355

Why the Family Is Universal. Although the form of marriage and family varies from one group to another, the family is universal. The reason for this, say functionalists, is that the family fulfills six needs that are basic to the survival of every society. These needs, or functions, are (1) economic production, (2) socialization of children, (3) care of the sick and aged, (4) recreation, (5) sexual control, and (6) reproduction. To make certain that these functions are performed, every human group has adopted some form of the family.

Functions of the Incest Taboo. Functionalists note that the incest taboo helps fami- lies to avoid role confusion. This, in turn, helps parent socialize children. For example, if father–daughter incest were allowed, how should a wife treat her daughter—as a daughter or as a second wife? Should the daughter consider her mother as a mother or as the first wife? Would her father be a father or a lover? And would the wife be the husband’s main wife or the “mother of the other wife”? And if the daughter had a child by her father, what relationships would everyone have? Maternal incest would also lead to complications every bit as confusing as these.

The incest taboo also forces people to look outside the family for marriage partners. Anthropologists theorize that exogamy was especially functional in tribal societies, for it forged alliances between tribes that otherwise might have killed each other off. Today, exogamy still extends both the bride’s and the groom’s social networks by adding and building relationships with their spouse’s family and friends.

The Conflict Perspective: Struggles between Husbands and Wives Anyone who has been married or who has seen a marriage from the inside knows that—despite a couple’s best intentions—conflict is a part of marriage. Conflict inevi- tably arises between two people who live intimately and who share most everything in life—from their goals and checkbooks to their bedroom and children. At some point, their desires and approaches to life clash, sometimes mildly, at other times quite harshly. Conflict among married people is so common that it is the grist of soap operas, movies, songs, and novels.

Power is the source of such conflict in marriage. Who has it? And who resents not having it? Throughout history, husbands have had more power, and wives have resented it. In the United States, as I’m sure you know, wives have gained more and more power in marriage. Do you think that one day wives will have more power than their husbands?

You probably are saying that such a day will never come. But maybe wives have already reached this point. From time to time, you’ve seen some surprising things in this book. Now look at Figure 12.1. Based on a national sample, this figure shows who makes decisions concerning the family’s finances and purchases, what to do on the weekends, and even what to watch on television. As you can see, wives now have more control over the family purse and make more of these decisions than do their husbands. These findings are such a surprise that we await confirmation by future studies.

The Symbolic Interactionist Perspective: Gender, Housework, and Child Care Changes in Traditional Gender Orientations. The chapter’s opening vignette gave you a glimpse into extreme traditional gender roles. Apart from the specifics mentioned there, throughout the generations housework and child care have been regarded as “women’s work.” As women put in more hours at paid work, men gradually did more housework and took more responsibility for the care of their children. Ever so slowly, cultural ideas shifted, with housework, care of children, and paid labor coming to be regarded as the responsibilities of both men and women. Let’s examine this shift.

What six functions do marriage and family perform? What is the conflict perspective on marriage?

Source: Morin and Cohn 2008.

Husband makes more decisions

Wife makes more decisions

Couples divide decisions equally

26%

43%

31%

Note: Based on a nationally representative sample, with questions on who chooses weekend activities, buys things for the home, decides what to watch on television, and manages household finances.

FIGURE 12.1 Who Makes the Decisions at Home?

356 CHAPTER 12 Marriage and Family

Who Does What? Figure 12.2 illustrates several significant changes that have taken place in U.S. families. The first is likely to surprise you. If you look closely at this figure, you will see that not only are husbands spending more time taking care of the children but so are wives. This is fascinating: How can children be getting more attention from their parents than they used to? Both husbands and wives are spending more time in child care?

This flies in the face of our mythical past, the Leave-It-to-Beaver images that color our perception of the present. We know that families are not leisurely lolling through their days as huge paychecks flow in, so if parents are spending more time with their

children, just where is the time coming from? Today’s parents are squeezing out more hours for their children by spending

less time on social activities and by participating less in organizations. But this accounts for only some of the time. To get the rest of the answer, look again at Figure 12.2. This time focus on the hours that husbands and wives spend doing

housework. You can see that men are doing more housework than they used to, but women are spending so much less time on housework that the total hours that hus-

bands and wives spend on housework have dropped from 38.9 to 29.1 hours a week. This leaves a lot more time to spend with the children.

Finally, from Figure 12.2, you can see that husbands and wives spend their time differ- ently. In what sociologists call a gendered division of labor, husbands still take the primary responsibility for earning the income and wives the primary responsibility for taking care of the house and children. You can also see that a shift is taking place in this traditional gender orientation: Wives now spend more time than they used to earning the family income, while husbands are spending more time on housework and child care. In light of these trends and with changing ideas of gender—of what is considered appropriate for husbands and wives—we can anticipate greater marital equality in the future.

In Hindu marriages, the roles of husband and wife are firmly established. Neither this woman, whom I photographed in Chittoor, India, nor her husband question whether she should carry the family wash to the village pump. Women here have done this task for millennia. As India industrializes, as happened in the West, who does the wash will be questioned—and may eventually become a source of strain in marriage.

Source: By the author. Based on Bianchi et al. 2006. Housework hours are from Table 5.1, child care from Table 4.1, and work hours and total hours from Table 3.4. Other services is derived by subtracting the hours for housework, child care, and paid work from the total hours.

FIGURE 12.2 In Two-Paycheck Marriages, How Do

Housework Child care Other services Paid work

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30

40

50

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H o

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Wives 1965 1975 1985 1995 2000 1965 1975 1985 1995 2000

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47.8

4.4

Husbands and Wives Divide Up Their Responsibilities?

What is a symbolic interactionist perspective on marriage and family? What are some implications of Figure 12.2?

The Family Life Cycle 357

Why does romantic love so captivate us? One reason may be because it is addictive.

The Family Life Cycle We have seen how the forms of marriage and family vary widely, looked at marriage and family theoretically, and examined major changes in family relationships. Now let’s dis- cuss love, courtship, and the family life cycle.

Love and Courtship in Global Perspective Have you ever been sick over love? Some people can’t eat, and they are obsessed with thoughts of the one they love. When neuroscientists decided to study “love sickness,” they found that it is real: Love feelings light up the same area of the brain that lights up when cocaine addicts are craving coke (Fisher et al. 2010).

Evidently, then, love can be an addiction. From your own experience, you prob- ably know the power of romantic love—mutual sexual attraction and idealized feel- ings about one another. Because romantic love plays such a significant role in Western life—and often is regarded as the only proper basis for marriage—social scientists have probed this concept with the tools of the trade: experiments, questionnaires, inter- views, and observations. In a fascinating experiment, psychologists Donald Dutton and Arthur Aron discovered that fear can produce romantic love (Rubin 1985). Here’s what they did.

About 230 feet above the Capilano River in North Vancouver, British Columbia, a rickety footbridge sways in the wind. It makes you feel like you might fall into the rocky gorge below. A more solid footbridge crosses only ten feet above the shallow stream.

The experimenters had an attractive woman approach men who were crossing these bridges. She told them she was studying “the effects of exposure to scenic attractions on creative expression.” She showed them a picture, and they wrote down their associations. The sexual imagery in their stories showed that the men on the unsteady, frightening bridge were more sexually aroused than were the men on the solid bridge. More of these men also called the young woman afterward—supposedly to get information about the study.

You may have noticed that this research was really about sexual attraction, not love. The point, however, is that romantic love usually begins with sexual attraction. Finding ourselves sexually attracted to someone, we spend time with that person. If we discover mutual interests, we may label our feelings “love.” Apparently, then, romantic love has two components. The first is emotional, a feeling of sexual attraction. The second is cognitive, a label that we attach to our feelings. If we attach this label, we describe ourselves as being “in love.”

Marriage Ask Americans why they married, and they will say that they were “in love.” Contrary to folklore, whatever love is, it certainly is not blind. That is, love does not hit us willy- nilly, as if Cupid had shot darts blindly into a crowd. If it did, marital patterns would be unpredictable. When we look at who marries whom, however, we can see the social channels that love follows.

The Social Channels of Love and Marriage. The most highly predictable social channels are age, education, social class, and race–ethnicity. For example, a Latina with a college degree whose parents are both physicians is likely to fall in love with and marry a Latino slightly older than herself who has graduated from college. Similarly, a girl who drops out of high school and whose parents are on welfare is likely to fall in love with and marry a man who comes from a background similar to hers.

Sociologists use the term homogamy to refer to the tendency of people who have similar characteristics to marry one another. Homogamy occurs largely as a result of propinquity, or spatial nearness. This is a sociological way of saying that we tend to “fall in love” with and

What are the two components of romantic love? What is meant by the “social channels” of love and marriage?

358 CHAPTER 12 Marriage and Family

marry someone who lives near us or someone we meet at school, church, work, or a neighborhood bar. The people with whom we associate are far from a random sample of the population, for social filters produce neighborhoods, schools, and places of worship that follow racial–ethnic and social class lines.

As with all social patterns, there are exceptions. Although 93 percent of married Americans choose someone of their same racial–ethnic background, 7 percent do not. Seven percent doesn’t sound like much, but with 60 million married couples in the United States, this comes to over 4 million couples (Statistical Abstract 2012:Table 60).

One of the more dramatic changes in U.S. marriage is the increase in marriages between African Americans and whites. Today it is difficult to realize how norm-shattering such marriages used to be, but they were once illegal in 40 states (Staples 2008). In Mississippi, the penalty for interracial marriage was life in prison (Crossen 2004b). Despite the risks, a few couples crossed the “color line,” but it took the social upheaval of the 1960s to break this barrier permanently. In 1967, the U.S. Supreme Court struck down the state laws that prohibited such marriages.

Figure 12.3 shows this change. Look at the race–ethnicity of the husbands and wives in these marriages, and you will see that here, too, Cupid’s arrows don’t hit random targets. Why do you think this particular pattern exists? Why do you think it is changing?

Childbirth Ideal Family Size. The number of children that Americans consider ideal has changed over the years. As you can see from Figure 12.4, preferences have moved to having fewer children. The research shows an interesting religious divide, not between

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Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 1990:Table 53; 2012:Table 60.

FIGURE 12.3 Marriages between Whites and African Americans: The Race–Ethnicity of the Husbands and Wives

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Source: By the author, based on Gallup Poll 2011.

FIGURE 12.4 The Number of Children Americans Think Are IdealExplore Living Data

on mysoclab.com

How has the ideal U.S. family size changed over time?

The Family Life Cycle 359

Protestants and Roman Catholics, who give the same answers, but by church attendance. Those who attend services more often prefer larger families than those who attend less often. The last couple of polls reveal an unexpected change: Younger Americans (ages 18 to 34) prefer larger families than do those who are older than 34 (Gallup Poll 2011).

If they had their way, some couples would specify not just the number of children but also their characteristics, the topic of the Sociology and the New Technology box below.

Child Rearing With mothers and fathers spending so many hours away from home at work, we must ask: Who’s minding the kids while the parents are at work?

Married Couples and Single Mothers. Figure 12.6 on page 360 compares the child care arrangements of single and married mothers. As you can see, their overall arrange- ments are similar. A main difference, though, is that when married women are at work the child is more likely to be under the father’s care or in day care. For single mothers,

Sociology and the New Technology

What Color Eyes? How Tall? Designer Babies on the Way

You can’t carry a tune, but you want your daughter to be musical? You’re short, but you want to make sure that your son is tall? You want your child to be a basketball star or a scientist?

Welcome to the world of Designer Baby Clinics, where you can put in your order. Not like fast food, of course, for it will still take the usual nine months. But you will get what you ordered.

Or at least this is the promise. A few technical details must still be worked out, but these hurdles are falling rapidly.

The allure of designer babies is apparent. To pick superior qualities for your child—this is sort of like being able to pick a superior college. To be able to do so much good for your child!

But with this allure come moral dilemmas. Let’s suppose that a couple wants a green-eyed blond girl. As Figure 12.5 shows, the technicians will fertilize several eggs, test the embryos, and plant the one(s) with the desired characteris- tics in a uterus. And the ones that are not used? They will be flushed down the drain. Some people find this objectionable.

Others are concerned that selecting certain characteristics represents a bias against people who have different character- istics. To order a tall designer baby, for example, is this a bias against short people?

If this isn’t quite clear, perhaps this will help. If there is a preference for boys, a lot of female embryos will be discarded.

There is also the issue of a super race. If we can produce peo- ple who are superior physically and intellectually, should we?

Or here is another issue. Two deaf parents want their child to share their subculture, not to be a part of the hearing world, which they fear will drive a wedge between them and their child (Naik 2009). Would it be moral or immoral to produce a deaf child?

Oh, the moral dilemmas our technologies bring!

For Your Consideration↑

What are your answers to the questions raised in this box? On what do you base your answers?

A single cell is removed from each embryo, and then tested for biomarkers associated with females, green eyes, and blond hair.

A woman’s eggs are fertilized with sperm in a lab, creating several embryos.

Only embryos with the biomarkers for the required traits are placed in the woman’s womb.

The procedure virtually guarantees that the child will be female and increases the probability it will have green eyes and blond hair.

FIGURE 12.5 On the Way to Designer Babies

Source: Adapted from Naik 2009. Reproduced with permission.

What pattern of child preference (breaking at age 34) has emerged? What moral or social issues do “designer babies” raise?

360 CHAPTER 12 Marriage and Family

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One of the most demanding, exasperating— and also fulfilling—roles in life is that of parent. To really appreciate this cartoon, perhaps one has to have experienced this part of the life course.

MARRIED COUPLES

SINGLE MOTHERS

Other relatives 3%

Organized child care facility a

17%

Other nonrelatives b 10%

Kindergarten and grade

school 42%

Mother cares for child at work 3% Father

14% Grand- parents

12%

Kindergarten and grade

school 40%

Mother cares for child at work 3%

Father 11% Grand-

parents 18%

Other relatives 8%Organized

child care facility a

13%

Other nonrelatives b 9%

aIncludes day care centers, nursery schools, preschools, and Head Start programs. bIncludes in-home babysitters and other nonrelatives providing care in either the child’s or the provider’s home.

Source: America’s Children in Brief 2010:Table FAM3A.

FIGURE 12.6 Who Takes Care of Preschoolers while Their Mothers Are at Work?

What patterns of child rearing has research on working class and middle class families revealed?

grandparents and other relatives are more likely to fill in for the absent father.

Day Care. From Figure 12.6, you can see that about one of six or seven children is in day care. The broad conclusions of research on day care were reported in Chapter 3 (p. 82). Apparently only a minority of U.S. day care centers offer high-quality care as measured by whether they provide stimulating learning activities, emotional warmth, and attentiveness to children’s needs (Bergmann 1995; Blau 2000; Belsky 2009). A primary reason for this dismal situation is the low salaries paid to day care workers, who average only about $17,000 a year (“Career Guide. . .” 2011).

It is difficult for parents to judge the quality of day care, since they don’t know what takes place when they are not there. If you ever look for day care, two factors best pre- dict that children will receive quality care: staff who have taken courses in early childhood development and a low ratio of children per staff member (Blau 2000; Belsky et al. 2007). If you have nagging fears that your children might be neglected or even abused, choose a center that streams live webcam images on the Internet. While at work, you can “visit” each room of the day care center via cyberspace and monitor your toddler’s activities and care.

Social Class. Do you think that social class makes a dif- ference in how people rear their children? If you answered “yes,” you are right. But what difference? And why? Sociologists have found that working-class parents tend to think of children as wild flowers that develop naturally, while in the middle-class mind children are like wild flowers that need a lot of nurturing if they are to bloom (Lareau 2002). These contrasting views make a world of difference in how people rear their children. Working- class parents are more likely to set limits for their children and then let them choose their own activities, while

middle-class parents are more likely to try to push their children into activities that they think will develop their thinking and social skills.

Sociologist Melvin Kohn (1963, 1977; Kohn and Schooler 1969) also found that the type of work that parents do has an impact on how they rear their children. Because members of the working class are closely supervised on their jobs, where they are expected to follow explicit rules, their concern is less with their children’s motivation and more with their outward conformity. These parents are more apt to use physical punishment— which brings about outward conformity without regard for internal attitude. Middle-class workers, in contrast, are expected to take more initiative on the job. Consequently, middle-class parents have more concern that their children develop curiosity and self-expression. They are also more likely to withdraw privileges or affection than to use physical punishment.

Diversity in U.S. Families 361

Read

Women and Men in the Caregiving

Role by Rhonda J. V. Montgomery and

Mary McGlinn Datwyler

on mysoclab.com

Family Transitions The later stages of family life bring their own pleasures to be savored and problems to be solved. Let’s look at two transitions—children staying home longer and adults adjust- ing to widowhood.

“Adultolescents” and the Not-So-Empty Nest. Adolescents, especially the young men, used to leave home after finishing high school. (My high school graduation pres- ent was a suitcase.) When the last child left home at about age 17 to 19, the husband and wife were left with what was called an empty nest. Today’s nest is not as empty as it used to be. With prolonged education and the higher cost of establishing a household, U.S. children are leaving home later. Many stay home during college, while others who strike out on their own find the cost or responsibility too great and return home. Much to their own disappointment, some even leave and return to the parents’ home several times. As a result, 18 percent of all U.S. 25- to 29-year-olds are living with their parents. About 15 percent of this still-at-home group have children (U.S. Census Bureau 2010:Table A2).

This major historical change in how people become adults is playing out before our eyes. With the path to adulthood changing abruptly, its contours—its roadmap—are still being worked out. Although “adultolescents” enjoy the protection of home, they have to work out issues about turf, authority, and responsibilities—items that both the children and parents thought were long ago resolved.

Widowhood. As you know, women are more likely than men to become widowed. There are two reasons for this: On average, women live longer than men, and they usu- ally marry men older than they are. For either women or men, the death of a spouse tears at the self, clawing at identities that had merged through the years. With the one who had become an essential part of the self gone, the survivor, as in adolescence, once again confronts the perplexing question “Who am I?”

The death of a spouse produces what is called the widowhood effect: The impact of the death is so strong that surviving spouses tend to die earlier than expected. The “widowhood effect” is not even across the board, however, and those who have gone through anticipatory grief suffer fewer health consequences (Elwert and Christakis 2008). Apparently learning that their spouse was going to die gave them time to make preparations that smoothed the transition—from arranging finances to preparing them- selves psychologically for being alone. You can see how saying goodbye and cultivating treasured last memories would help people adjust to the impending death of an intimate companion. Sudden death, in contrast, rips the loved one away, offering no chance for this predeath healing.

Diversity in U.S. Families It is important to note that there is no such thing as the American family. Rather, family life varies widely throughout the United States. In several contexts, we have seen how significant social class is in our lives. Its significance will continue to be evident as we examine diversity in U.S. families.

African American Families Note that the heading reads African American families, not the African American family. There is no such thing as the African American family any more than there is the white family or the Latino family. The primary distinction is not between African Americans and other groups, but between social classes (Willie and Reddick 2003). Because African Americans who are members of the upper class follow the class interests reviewed in Chapter 8—preservation of privilege and family fortune—they are especially concerned about the family background of those whom their children marry (Gatewood 1990). To them, marriage is viewed as a merger of family lines. Children of this class marry later than children of other classes.

What are “adultolescents”? What problems do they and their parents face? What identity crisis does widowhood bring?

Middle-class African American families focus on achievement and respectability. Both husband and wife are likely to work outside the home. A central concern is that their children go to college, get good jobs, and marry well—that is, marry people like themselves, respectable and hardworking, who want to get ahead in school and pursue a successful career.

African American families in poverty face all the problems that cluster around poverty (Wilson 2007; Bryant et al. 2010). Because the men are likely to be unemployed with few mar- ketable skills, it is difficult for them to fulfill the cultural roles of husband and father. Consequently, these families are likely to be headed by a woman and to have a high rate of births to single women. Divorce and desertion are also more com- mon than among other classes. Sharing scarce resources and “stretching kinship” are primary survival mechanisms. People

who have helped out in hard times are considered brothers, sisters, or cousins to whom one owes obligations as though they were blood relatives; and men who are not the biological fathers of their children are given fatherhood status (Stack 1974; Hall 2008). Sociologists use the term fictive kin to refer to this stretching of kinship.

From Figure 12.7 you can see that, compared with other groups, African American fami- lies are the least likely to be headed by married couples and the most likely to be headed by women. Because African American women tend to go farther in school than African American men, they are more likely than women in other racial–ethnic groups to marry men who are less educated than themselves (Eshleman 2000; Harford 2008).

Latino Families As Figure 12.7 shows, the proportion of Latino families headed by married couples and women falls in between that of whites and Native Americans. The effects of social

There is no such thing as the African American family, any more than there is the Native American, Asian American, Latino, or Irish American family. Rather, each racial–ethnic group has different types of families, with the primary determinant being social class.

Both parents

Mothers

Fathers 59%

30%

11%

African AmericansNative Americans

Whites LatinosAsian Americans

78%

16%

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8%

50%

4%

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2% 2%

10%

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26%

FIGURE 12.7 Family Structure: U.S. Families with Children under Age 18 Headed by Mothers, Fathers, and Both Parents

Note: Because of rounding, the individual percentages sometimes total 101%.

Sources: By the author. For Native Americans, Kreider and Elliott 2009:Table 1. For other groups, Statistical Abstract of the United States 2012:Table 69.

How do middle-class African American families and those in poverty differ?

Diversity in U.S. Families 363

class on families, which I just sketched, also apply to Latinos. In addition, families differ by country of origin. Families from Mexico, for example, are more likely to be headed by a married couple than are families from Puerto Rico (Statistical Abstract 2012:Table 37). The lon- ger that Latinos have lived in the United States, the more their families resemble those of middle-class Americans (Falicov 2010).

With such wide variety, experts disagree on what is distinctive about Latino families (Falicov 2010). Some researchers have found that Latino husbands–fathers play a stronger role than husbands–fathers in white and African American families (Vega 1990; Torres et al. 2002). Others point to the Spanish language, the Roman Catholic religion, and a strong family orientation coupled with a disapproval of divorce. But such characteristics are limited, as there are Latino families who are Protestants, don’t speak Spanish, and so on. Still others emphasize loyalty to the extended family, with an obligation to support the extended family in times of need (Cauce and Domenech-Rodriguez 2002), but this, too, is hardly unique to Latino families.

With such diversity among Latino families, you can see how difficult it is to draw generalizations. The sociological point that runs through all studies of Latino families, however, is this: Social class is more important in determining family life than is either being Latino or a family’s country of origin.

Asian American Families As you can see from Figure 12.7 on the previous page, Asian American children are more likely than children in other racial–ethnic groups to grow up with both parents. As with the other groups, family life also reflects social class. In addition, because Asian Americans emigrated from many different coun- tries, their family life reflects those many cultures (Jeong and You 2008). As with Latino families, the more recent their immigration, the more closely their family life reflects the patterns in their country of origin (Glenn 1994; Jeong and You 2008).

Despite such differences, sociologist Bob Suzuki (1985) identified several distinctive characteristics of Asian American families. They tend to retain Confucian values that provide a framework for family life: humanism, collectivity, self-discipline, hierarchy, respect for the elderly, moderation, and obligation. Obligation means that each member of a family owes respect to other family members and has a responsibility never to bring shame on the family. Conversely, a child’s success brings honor to the family (Zamiska 2004). To control their children, Asian American parents are more likely to use shame and guilt than physical punishment.

Seldom does the ideal translate into the real, and so it is here. The children born to Asian immigrants confront a bewildering world of incompatible expectations—those of the new culture and those of their parents. As a result, they experience more family conflict and mental problems than do children of Asian Americans who are not immigrants (Meyers 2006; Ying and Han 2008).

Native American Families Perhaps the most significant issue that Native American families face is whether to follow traditional values or to assimilate into the dominant culture (Frosch 2008). This primary distinction creates vast differences among families. The traditionals speak native languages and emphasize distinctive Native American values and beliefs. Those who have assimi- lated into the broader culture do not.

As with other groups, there is no such thing as the Latino family. Some Latino families speak little or no English, while others have assimilated into U.S. culture to such an extent that they no longer speak Spanish.

What is distinctive about Latino families? About African American families?

To search for the Native American family would be fruitless. There are rural, urban, single-parent, extended, nuclear, rich, poor, traditional, and assimilated Native American families, to name just a few. Shown here is a family from the Comanche tribe in New Mexico.

Figure 12.7 on page 362 depicts the structure of Native American families. You can see that it is closer to Latinos than to any other group. In general, Native American parents are permissive with their children and avoid physical punishment. Elders play a much more active role in their children’s families than they do in most U.S. families: Elders, especially grandparents, not only provide child care but also teach and discipline children. Like others, Native American families differ by social class.

In Sum: From this brief review, you can see that race–ethnicity signifies little for understanding family life. Rather, social class and culture hold the keys. The more resources a family has, the more it assumes the characteristics of a middle-class nuclear family. Compared with the poor, middle-class families have fewer children and fewer unmarried mothers. They also place greater emphasis on educational achievement and deferred gratification.

One-Parent Families An indication of how extensively U.S. families are changing is the increase in one-parent families. From Figure 12.8 on the next page, you can see that the percentage of U.S. children who live with two parents (not necessarily their biological parents) has dropped sharply. Divorce is not the only reason. Another is that single women who give birth are taking longer to get married (Gibon-Davis 2011). The concerns—even alarm—that are expressed about one-parent families may have more to do with their poverty than with

What is distinctive about Native American families? What are some research findings on one-parent families?

Diversity in U.S. Families 365

children being reared by one parent. Because women head most one-parent families, these families tend to be poor. Although most divorced women earn less than their former husbands, four of five (81 percent) children of divorce live with their mothers (U.S. Census Bureau 2010:Table C3).

To understand the typical one-parent family, then, we need to view it through the lens of poverty, for this is its primary source of strain. The results are serious, not just for these parents and their children but also for society. Children from one-parent families are more likely to have behavioral prob- lems in school, to drop out of school, to get arrested, to have physical and emotional health problems, and to get divorced (McLanahan and Sandefur 1994; McLanahan and Schwartz 2002; Amato and Cheadle 2005; Wen 2008; Waldfogel et al. 2010). If female, they are more likely to have sex at a younger age and to bear children while still unmarried teenagers.

As you know, whether a child has one or two parents makes a vital difference in that child’s life, but recent research has brought a surprise. For the child’s adjust- ment, it does not matter if those parents are a man and a woman, a man and a man or a woman and a woman. Two women or two men who rear children together apparently do as well as a husband and wife (Farr et al. 2010).

Couples without Children While most married women give birth, about one of five does not (Livingston and Cohn 2010). This is double what it was thirty years ago. As you can see from Figure 12.9, childlessness varies by racial–ethnic group, with whites and Asian Americans representing the extremes. From this figure, you can also see that except for women with Ph.D.s, the more education women have, the less likely they are to have children.

Some couples are infertile, but most childless couples have made a choice to not have children—and they prefer the term childfree rather than childless. Some decide before marriage that they will never have children, often to attain a sense of freedom—to pursue a career, to travel, and to have less stress (Letherby 2002; Koropeckyj-Cox 2007). In many cases, the couple simply postponed the date they were going to have their first child until either it was too late to have children or it seemed too uncomfortable to add a child to their lifestyle.

With trends firmly in place—more education and careers for women, advances in contraception, legal abortion, the high cost of rearing children, and an emphasis on possessing more material things—the proportion of women who never bear children is likely to increase. Consider this state- ment in a newsletter:

We are DINKS (Dual Incomes, No Kids). We are happily married. I am 43; my wife is 42. We have been married for almost twenty years. . . . Our investment strategy has a lot to do with our personal philosophy: “You can have kids—or you can have everything else!”

Blended Families The blended family, one whose members were once part of other families, is an increasingly sig- nificant type of family in the United States. Two

*Author’s estimate. 2010 is based on slight increases since 2000.

Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 1995:Table 79; 2012:Table 69.

FIGURE 12.8 The Decline of

0

20%

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60%

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100%

85%

1970 1980 1990 2000

78% 72%

69%

2010 2020*

67% 70%

The percentage of children under 18 who live with both parents

Two-Parent Families

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By Race–Ethnicity By Education

Source: By the author. Based on Livingston and Cohn 2010.

FIGURE 12.9 What Percentage of U.S. Married Women Ages 40–44 Have Never Given Birth?

Why can we expect the percentage of U.S. women who never give birth to increase? What are blended families?

366 CHAPTER 12 Marriage and Family

divorced people who marry and each bring their children into a new family unit form a blended family. With divorce common, millions of children spend some of their child- hood in blended families. I’ve never seen a better explanation of how blended families can complicate family relationships than what one of my freshman students wrote:

I live with my dad. I should say that I live with my dad, my brother (whose mother and father are also my mother and father), my half sister (whose father is my dad, but whose mother is my father’s last wife), and two stepbrothers and stepsisters (children of my father’s current wife). My father’s wife (my current stepmother, not to be confused with his second wife who, I guess, is no longer my stepmother) is pregnant, and soon we all will have a new brother or sister. Or will it be a half brother or half sister?

If you can’t figure this out, I don’t blame you. I have trouble myself. It gets very com- plicated around Christmas. Should we all stay together? Split up and go to several other homes? Who do we buy gifts for, anyway?

Gay and Lesbian Families Although a handful of U.S. states allow people of the same sex to marry, 41 states have laws that prohibit same-sex marriages (Dematteis 2011). Walking a fine conceptual tightrope, some states avoid the term marriage but give legal status to same-sex unions by recogniz- ing “registered domestic partnerships.” Most gay and lesbian couples lack the legal rights— either marriage or civil unions—that support their relationship.

What are same-sex relationships like? Like everything else in life, these couples can- not be painted with a single brush stroke. Sociologists Philip Blumstein and Pepper Schwartz (1985), who interviewed same-sex couples, found their main struggles to be housework, money, careers, problems with relatives, and sexual adjustment. If these sound familiar, they should be, as they are the same problems that heterosexual couples face. A major difference is that many of these couples face a stigma, sometimes accom-

panied by discrimination, because they are of the same sex. As you can imagine, this complicates the relationship.

As with heterosexual couples, same-sex relationships also sour, and for all the same reasons—disagreements about sex, how to spend money, how to rear chil- dren, romantic triangles, and so on. Since about thirty percent of lesbian couples and seventeen percent of gay couples are rearing children, break-ups bring the usual problems of custody and visitation (Gartrell et al. 2011.)

If this sounds like “more of the same,” it is. Except for the sex of the individuals, same-sex and heterosexual relationships are quite similar. A major difference is that only in the few states that allow same-sex marriages or civil unions do same-sex couples have to confront a legal system when they break up.

Adoption by Gay and Lesbian Couples. Adoption by gay and lesbian couples has been a hot-button issue across the United States. A primary fear of hetero- sexuals is that children reared by homosexuals will somehow be pressured into becoming homosexuals (Lewin 2009). With this concern in mind and following their professional curiosity, sociologists and psychologists have compared the children adopted by heterosexual and gay and lesbian couples. The results are consistent: The children reared by homosexual parents have about the same adjustment as children reared by heterosexual parents (Gelderen et al. 2012). Their children are not more likely to have a gay or lesbian sexual orientation (Farr et al. 2010; Tasker 2010).

Why do gay and lesbian couples want to adopt children? To explore this ques- tion, anthropologist Ellen Lewin (2009) interviewed homosexual couples in San Francisco and Chicago who had adopted children. The reasons they gave are about the same as you would expect of heterosexual couples: to establish a family, love of children, wanting to give parentless children a home, to feel more adult, and to give meaning to one’s life.

Being fought in U.S. courts is whether or not marriage should be limited to heterosexual couples. Passions on both sides are deep, as illustrated by the two sides of the issue shown here.

How are the problems that same-sex couples face similar to those heterosexual couples face? How do they differ?

Trends in U.S. Families 367

Trends in U.S. Families As is apparent from this discussion, marriage and family life in the United States is undergoing fundamental change. Let’s look at some of the major trends.

The Changing Timetable of Family Life: Marriage and Childbirth Figure 12.10 illustrates one of the most significant changes in U.S. marriages. As you can see, the average age of first-time brides and grooms declined from 1890 to about 1950. In 1890, the typical first-time bride was 22, but by 1950, she had just left her teens. For about twenty years, there was little change. Then in 1970, the average age started to increase sharply. Today’s average first-time bride and groom are older than at any other time in U.S. history.

Since postponing marriage is today’s norm, it may surprise you to learn that most U.S. women used to be married before they turned 24. To see this remark- able change, look at Figure 12.11 on the next page. This change is so engrained in our culture that the percentage of women between 20 and 24 who are married is now less than a fourth of what it was in 1970. For men, it is less than a third. Just as couples are postponing marriage, so they are putting off having children. Today’s average U.S. woman now has her first child at age 25, the highest age in U.S. history (Mathews and Hamilton 2009).

Why have these changes occurred? The primary reason is cohabitation. Although Americans have postponed the age at which they first marry, they have not postponed the age at which they first set up housekeeping with someone of the opposite sex. Let’s look at this trend.

Source: By the author. Based on U.S. Census Bureau 2010.

A g

e

19 1890 1900 1910 1920 1930 1940 1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2010

21

22

23

24

25

26

27

28

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2000 2020

30

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Year

Women

Men

FIGURE 12.10 When Do Americans Marry? The Changing Age at First Marriage

Note: This is the median age at first marriage. The broken lines indicate the author’s estimate.

Watch

Motherhood Manifesto

on mysoclab.com

What are the historical trends in age at first marriage? In being single for Americans ages 20–24? For age at first child?

368 CHAPTER 12 Marriage and Family

Cohabitation Figure 12.12 shows the increase in cohabitation, adults living together in a sexual relationship without being married. This figure is one of the most remarkable in sociology. I know of no other social trend that increases this steeply and consis- tently. Cohabitation is twelve times more common than it was in the 1970s. From a furtive activity, cohabitation has moved into the mainstream, and today about two- thirds of couples who marry have cohabited (Huang et al. 2011). Cohabitation has become so common that about 44 percent of U.S. children will spend some time in a cohabiting family (Kennedy and Bumpass 2011).

Commitment is the essential difference between cohabitation and marriage. In marriage, the assumption is permanence; in cohabitation, couples agree to remain together for “as long as it works out.” For marriage, individuals make public vows that legally bind them as a couple; for cohabitation, they simply move in together. Marriage requires a judge to authorize its termination, but if a cohab- iting relationship sours, the couple separates, telling friends and family that “it didn’t work out.” In the Down-to-Earth Sociology box on the next page, let’s explore what cohabitation means to the people who are living this experience.

Does Cohabitation Make Marriage Stronger? If couples set up housekeep- ing before they marry, are they less likely to divorce than couples who did not live together before marriage? It would seem that cohabitation would make marriage stronger. Cohabiting couples have the chance to work out so many real-life problems before marriage—and they marry only after sharing these experiences. To find out, sociologists compared divorce rates. It turns out that couples who cohabit before marriage were more likely to divorce (Osborne et al. 2007; Lichter and Qian 2008).

This went directly against what we would expect. Sociologists suggested this reason: People are less picky about choosing someone to live with than choos- ing someone to marry (Dush et al. 2003). After couples cohabit, however, many experience a “push” toward marriage—from having common possessions, pets, and children to the subtle and not-so-subtle hints of family and friends. As a result, many end up marrying someone they would not otherwise have chosen as a spouse.

Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 1993:Table 60; 2002:Table 48; 2012:Table 57.

FIGURE 12.11 Americans Ages 20–24 Who Are Married

0%

10%

20%

30%

40%

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g e

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1990

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21%

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27%

16%

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21%

11%

WomenMen

Why was the divorce rate higher among those who cohabited before marriage?

Note: Broken line indicates author’s estimate.

Source: By the author. Based on U.S. Census Bureau 2007 and Statistical Abstract of the United States 1995:Table 60; 2012:Table 63.

FIGURE 12.12 Cohabitation

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Trends in U.S. Families 369

Down-to-Earth Sociology

“You Want Us to Live Together? What Do You Mean by That?”

Source: Recomputed by the author from Bianchi and Casper 2000.

TABLE 12.2 The Meaning of Cohabitation: What a Difference It Makes

After 5 to 7 Years

Of Those Still Together What Cohabitation Means

Percent of Couples

Split Up

Still Together Married Cohabitating

Substitute for Marriage 10% 35% 65% 37% 63% Step Toward Marriage 46% 31% 69% 73% 27% Trial Marriage 15% 51% 49% 66% 34% Coresidential Dating 29% 46% 54% 61% 39%

What has led to the surge of cohabitation in the United States? Let’s consider two fundamental changes in U.S. culture. The first is changed ideas of sexual morality. It is difficult

for today’s college students to grasp the sexual morals that prevailed before the 1960’s sexual revolution. Almost every- one used to consider sex before marriage to be immoral. Pre- marital sex existed, to be sure, but it took place furtively and often with guilt. To live together before marriage was called “shacking up,” and the couple was said to be “living in sin.” A double standard prevailed: It was the woman’s responsibil- ity to say no to sex before marriage, so she was considered to be the especially sinful one in cohabitation.

And today—with premarital sex socially acceptable, and loads of sexual partners around—why rush into marriage? For those inclined to “settle down” somewhat, cohabitation offers a fairly safe alternative. It provides both sexual and emotional satisfactions within an ongoing relationship that does not require the long-term commitment of marriage.

Cohabitation also provides protection from divorce. Mar- riage sometimes seems so fragile and risky, as if it isn’t going to last no matter how hard you try to make it work. Cohabita- tion removes this threat by offering an intimate relationship in which divorce is impossible. You can break up, but you can’t get divorced.

And cohabitation is cheaper. You can set up housekeeping without the cost of a wedding—those expensive announce- ments, booking the church or hall, the reception, the honey- moon. You don’t even have to fork over for a license.

From the outside, all cohabitation may look the same, but not to the people who are living together. As you can see from

Table 12.2, for about 10 percent of couples, cohabitation is a substitute for marriage. These couples consider themselves married but for some reason don’t want a marriage certificate. Some object to marriage on philosophical grounds ("What dif- ference does a piece of paper make?”); others do not yet have a legal divorce from a spouse. Almost half of cohabi- tants (46 percent) view cohabitation as a step on the path to marriage. For them, cohabitation is more than “going steady” but less than engagement. Another 15 percent of couples are simply “giving it a try.” They want to see what marriage to one another might be like. For the least committed, about 29 percent, cohabitation is a form of dating. It provides a dependable source of sex and emotional support.

If you look at these couples a half dozen years after they began to live together, you can see how important these different levels of commitment are. As you can see from Table 12.2, couples who view cohabitation as a substitute for marriage are the least likely to marry and the most likely to continue to cohabit. For couples who see cohabitation as a step toward marriage, the outcome is just the opposite: They are the most likely to marry and the least likely to still be cohabiting. Couples who are the most likely to break up are those who “tried” cohabitation and those for whom cohabita- tion was a form of dating.

For Your Consideration↑

Can you explain why the meaning of cohabitation makes a difference in whether couples marry? Can you classify cohab- iting couples you know into these four types? Do you think there are other types? If so, what?

What different meanings does cohabitation have? What differences do those meanings make for getting married?

370 CHAPTER 12 Marriage and Family

As cohabitation has developed into a more essential part of the courtship/mating process, the initial findings of higher divorce are washing out. The latest research shows that of the recently married the divorce rate of those who did and did not cohabit before marriage is about the same (Manning and Cohen 2011). If this finding holds, we can conclude that cohabitation neither weakens nor strengthens marriage.

Children of Cohabiting Parents: A Surprising Finding. Kammi Schmeer (2011), a sociologist who compared the health of children of married and cohabiting parents, found something that surprised her. It likely will surprise you, too. On average, the children of cohabiting parents aren’t as healthy as the children of married parents. Schmeer suggests that one possibility for this finding is that there is more conflict in cohabiting relationships. But this is just a guess, and no one yet knows the reason. As this is just a single study, we must be cautious about drawing conclusions. We’ll see what further research shows.

Divorce and Remarriage The topic of family life would not be complete without considering divorce. Let’s first try to determine how much divorce there is.

Ways of Measuring Divorce You probably have heard that the U.S. divorce rate is 50 percent, a figure that is popular with reporters. The statistic is true in the sense that each year about half as many divorces are granted as there are marriages performed. The totals are

roughly 2 million marriages and 1 million divorces (Statistical Abstract 2012:Table 133).

What is wrong, then, with saying that the divorce rate is about 50 percent? Think about it for a moment. Why should we compare the number of divorces and marriages that take place during the same year? The couples who divorced do not—with rare exceptions—come from the group that married that year. The one number has nothing to do with the other, so in no way do these two statistics reveal the divorce rate.

What figures should we compare, then? Couples who divorce come from the entire group of married people in the country. Since the United States has 60 million married couples, and about 1 million of them get divorced in a year, the divorce rate for any given year is less than 2 percent. A couple’s chances of still being married at the end of a year are over 98 percent—not bad odds—and certainly much better odds than the mass media would have us believe. As the Social Map on the next page shows, the “odds”—if we want to call them that—depend on where you live.

Over time, of course, each year’s small percentage adds up. A third way of measuring divorce, then, is to ask, “Of all U.S. adults, what percentage are divorced?” Figure 12.14 on answers this question. You can see how divorce has increased over the years and how race–ethnicity makes a difference for the likelihood that couples will divorce.

Figure 12.14 shows us the percentage of Americans who are currently divorced, but we get yet another answer if we ask the question, “What percentage of Americans has ever been divorced?” This percentage increases with each age group, peaking when people reach their 50s (“Marital History . . .” 2004). Overall, about 43 to 46 percent of marriages end in divorce (Amato 2010), so a divorce rate of 50 percent is actually fairly accurate.

National statistics are fine, but you probably want to know if sociologists have found anything that will tell you about your chances of divorce. This is the topic of the Down-to-Earth Sociology box on page 372.

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This fanciful depiction of marital trends may not be too far off the mark.

What is the surprising finding about the children of cohabiting parents? What are different ways to measure divorce?

Children of Divorce Emotional Problems. Children whose parents divorce are more likely than children reared by both parents to experience emotional problems and to become juvenile delinquents (Amato and Sobolewski 2001; Wallerstein et al. 2001). They are less likely

Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 1995:Table 149; 2002:Table 111; 2010:Table 126.

FIGURE 12.13 The “Where” of U.S. Divorce

Lower than average: 2.2 to 3.1

Annual divorces per 1,000 people

Average: 3.3 to 4.1

Higher than average: 4.3 to 6.5

AK

SC

NC

VA

WA

OR

CA

NV

ID

MT

WY

AZ NM

CO

ND

SD

NE

KS

OK

TX

MN

IA

MO

AR

LA

WI

IL

KY

TN

MS AL GA

FL

IN

MI

WV

PA

NY

ME

NH MA RI

CT NJ

DE MD DC

HI

VT

UT OH DE

MDMD DCC

Highest divorce rate

1. Nevada (6.5)

2. Arkansas (5.9)

3. Wyoming (5.5)

Lowest divorce rate

1. Massachusetts (2.2)

2. North Dakota (2.4)

3. Illinois (2.6)

Note: Data for California, Georgia, Hawaii, Indiana, Louisiana, and Minnesota, based on the earlier editions in the source, have been decreased by the average decrease in U.S. divorce.

What patterns of divorce do you see in Figure 12.13? In Figure 12.14?

FIGURE 12.14 What Percentage of Americans Are Divorced?

0%

5%

10%

15%

P e rc

e n ta

g e

20%

1970

4.4 3.1

3.9

1980

8.4

6.0 5.8

1990

10.6

8.1 7.0

2000

11.5

9.8

7.6

2010

13.2 12.1

9.9

5.4

African Americans Whites Latinos Asian Americans

Note: This figure shows the percentage who are divorced and have not remarried, not the percentage who have ever divorced. Only these racial–ethnic groups are listed in the source. The source only recently added data on Asian Americans.

Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 1995:Table 58; 2012:Table 56.

Divorce and Remarriage 371

372 CHAPTER 12 Marriage and Family

What are your chances of getting divorced?

Down-to-Earth Sociology

“What Are Your Chances of Getting Divorced?” factors reduce the risk of divorce for groups of people, not for any particular individual.

Three other factors increase the risk for divorce, but for these, sociologists have not computed percentages:

The first will probably strike you as strange—if a couple’s firstborn

child is a girl (Ananat and Michaels 2007; Dahl and Moretti 2008). Apparently, men prefer sons, and if the firstborn is a boy, the father is more likely to stick around. The second factor is more obvious: The more co-workers you have who are of the opposite sex, the more likely you are to get divorced (McKinnish 2007). (I’m sure you can figure out why.) No one knows the reason for the third factor: working with people who are recently

divorced (Aberg 2003). It could be that divorced people are more likely to “hit” on their fellow workers—and human nature being what it is. . . .

As you have seen, over a lifetime about half of all marriages fail. If you have that 50 percent figure dancing in your head while you are getting married, you might as well make sure that you have an escape door open even while you’re saying “I do.”

Not every group carries the same risk of divorce. For some, the risk is much higher; for others, much lower. Let’s look at some factors that reduce people’s risk. As Table 12.3 shows, sociologists have worked out percentages that you might find useful. As you can see, people who go to college, participate in a religion, wait to get married before having chil- dren, and earn higher incomes have a much better chance that their marriages will last. You can also see that having parents who did not divorce is significant. If you reverse these factors, you will see how the likelihood of divorce increases for people who have a baby before they marry, who marry in their teens, and so on. It is important to note, however, that these

For Your Consideration↑

Why do you think that people who go to college have a lower risk of divorce? How would you explain the other fac- tors shown in Table 12.3 or discussed in this box?

Why can’t you figure your own chances of divorce by start- ing with some percentage (say 14 percent less likelihood of divorce if your parents are not divorced, another 13 percent for going to college, and so on)? To better understand this, you might want to read the section on the misuse of statistics on page 377.

Divorces are often messy. To settle the question of who gets the house, a couple in Cambodia sawed their house in half.

What Reduces the Risk of Divorce?

Factors That Reduce People’s Chances of Divorce

How Much Does This Decrease the Risk of Divorce?

Some college (vs. high-school dropout)

–13%

Affiliated with a religion (vs. none) –14% Parents not divorced –14% Age 25 or over at marriage (vs. under 18)

–24%

Having a baby 7 months or longer after marriage (vs. before marriage)

–24%

Annual income over $25,000 (vs. under $25,000)

–30%

Source: Whitehead and Popenoe 2004.

Note: These percentages apply to the first ten years of marriage.

TABLE 12.3

Divorce and Remarriage 373

What helps children adjust to divorce? Why are children of divorce more likely to divorce?

to complete high school and to graduate from college (McLanahan and Schwartz 2002). Finally, their children are more likely to divorce, perpetuating a marriage– divorce cycle (Cui and Fincham 2010).

Is the greater maladjustment of the children of divorce a serious problem? This question initiated a lively debate between two psychologists. Judith Wallerstein claims that divorce scars children, making them depressed and leaving them with insecurities that follow them into adulthood (Wallerstein et al. 2001). Mavis Hetherington replies that 75 to 80 percent of children of divorce function as well as children who are reared by both of their parents (Hetherington and Kelly 2003).

Without meaning to weigh in on either side of this debate, it doesn’t seem to be a simple case of the glass being half empty or half full. If 75 to 80 percent of children of divorce don’t suffer long-term harm, this leaves one-fourth to one-fifth who do. Any way you look at it, one-fourth or one-fifth of a million children each year is a lot of kids who are having a lot of problems.

What helps children adjust to divorce? Children of divorce who feel close to both parents make the best adjustment, and those who don’t feel close to either parent make the worst adjustment (Richardson and McCabe 2001). Other studies show that children adjust well if they experience little conflict, feel loved, live with a parent who is making a good adjustment, and have consistent routines. It also helps if their family has adequate money to meet its needs. Children also adjust better if a second adult can be counted on for support (Hayashi and Strickland 1998). Sociologist Urie Bronfenbrenner (1992) said this person is like the third leg of a stool, giving stability to the smaller family unit. Any adult can be the third leg, he says—a relative, friend, or even a former mother-in-law—but the most powerful stabilizing third leg is the father, the ex-husband.

Perpetuating Divorce. When the children of divorce grow up and marry, they are more likely to divorce than are adults who grew up in intact families. Have researchers found any factors that increase the chances that the children of divorce will have suc- cessful marriages? Actually, they have. They are more likely to have a lasting marriage if they marry someone whose parents did not divorce. These marriages have more trust and less conflict. If both husband and wife come from broken families, however, it is not good news. Those marriages tend to have less trust and more conflict, leading to a higher chance of divorce (Wolfinger 2011).

It is difficult to capture the anguish of the children of divorce, but when I read these lines by the fourth-grader who drew these two pictures, my heart was touched:

Me alone in the park . . .

All alone in the park.

My Dad and Mom are divorced

that’s why I’m all alone.

This is me in the picture with my son.

We are taking a walk in the park.

I will never be like my father.

I will never divorce my wife and kid.

374 CHAPTER 12 Marriage and Family

Grandchildren of Divorce Paul Amato and Jacob Cheadle (2005), the first sociologists to study the grandchildren of people who had divorced, found that the effects of divorce continue across generations. Using a national sample, they compared grandchildren—those whose grandparents had divorced with those whose grandparents had not divorced. Their findings are astound- ing. The grandchildren of divorce have weaker ties to their parents, don’t go as far in school, and don’t get along as well with their spouses. As these researchers put it, when parents divorce, the consequences ripple through the lives of children who are not yet born.

Fathers’ Contact with Children after Divorce With most children living with their mothers after divorce, how often do fathers see their children? As you can see from Table 12.4, researchers have found four main patterns. The most com- mon pattern is for fathers to see their children frequently after the divorce, and to keep doing so. But as you can see, a similar number of fathers have little contact with their children both right after the divorce and during the following years.

Which fathers are more likely to see and talk often to their chil- dren? It is men who were married to the mothers of the children, especially those who are older, more educated, and have higher incomes. In contrast, men who were cohabiting with the mothers, as well as younger, less educated men with lower incomes, tend to have less contact with their children. If their former wife marries, the fathers tend to see their children less (Berger et al. 2012).

The Ex-Spouses Women are more likely than men to feel that divorce is giving them a “new chance” in life. A few couples manage to remain friends through it all—but they are the exception. The spouse who initiates the divorce usually gets over it sooner (Kelly 1992; Wang and Amato 2000) and remarries sooner (Sweeney 2002).

Divorce does not necessarily mean the end of a couple’s relationship. Many divorced couples maintain contact because of their children. For others, the continuities, as sociologists call them, represent lingering attachments (Vaughan 1985; Masheter 1991; author’s file 2005). The former husband may help his former wife paint a room or move furniture; she may invite him over for a meal or to watch television. They might even go to dinner or to see a movie together. Some couples even continue to make love after their divorce.

Remarriage As Figure 12.15 shows, most divorced people marry other divorced people. You may be surprised that the women who are most likely to remarry are young mothers and those with less education (Glick and Lin 1986; Schmiege et al. 2001). Apparently women who are more educated and more independent (no children) can afford to be more selective. Men are more likely than women to remarry, perhaps because they have a larger pool of potential mates.

How do remarriages work out? The divorce rate of remarried people without children is the same as that of first marriages. Those who bring children into a new marriage, however, are more likely to divorce again (MacDonald and DeMaris 1995). Certainly remarriages with children are more complicated and stressful. A lack of clear norms to follow may also play a role (Coleman et al. 2000). As sociologist Andrew Cherlin (1989) noted, we lack satisfactory names for stepmothers, stepfathers,

TABLE 12.4 Fathers’ Contact with

Frequent1 Minimal2 Decreased3 Increased4

38% 32% 23% 8%

1Maintains contact once a week or more through the years 2Little contact after the divorce, maybe 2 to 6 times a year 3Frequent contact after the divorce but less through the years 4Has little contact after the divorce but increases it through the years. Sometimes called the “divorce activated” father.

Their Children after Divorce

Source: By the author: Based on Cheadle et al. 2010.

P e rc

e n ta

g e

10%

0

20%

30%

40%

50%

60% 54

23

11 11

First marriage of bride and groom

Remarriage of bride and groom

First marriage of bride, remarriage of groom

First marriage of groom, remarriage of bride

Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 2000:Table 145. Table dropped in later editions.

FIGURE 12.15 The Marital History of U.S. Brides and Grooms

What patterns show up: Of divorced fathers’ with their children? Of ex-spouses? In how remarriages work out?

Two Sides of Family Life 375

stepbrothers, stepsisters, stepaunts, stepuncles, stepcousins, and stepgrandparents. At the very least, these awkward terms to use, but they also represent ill-defined relationships.

Two Sides of Family Life Let’s first look at situations in which marriage and family have gone seriously wrong and then try to answer the question of what makes marriage work.

The Dark Side of Family Life: Battering, Child Abuse, Marital Rape, and Incest The dark side of family life involves events that people would rather keep in the dark. We shall look at spouse battering, child abuse, rape, and incest.

Spouse Battering. From his own research and his review of the research of oth- ers, sociologist Murray Straus concludes that wives attack their husbands as often as husbands attack their wives (Straus and Gelles 1988; Straus 1992; Straus 2011). Gender equality may exist in initiating marital violence, but it certainly vanishes when it comes to the effects of violence. As you know, women are much more likely to be injured. You also know that the primary reason is that most husbands are bigger and stronger than their wives, putting women at a physical disadvantage in this literal battle of the sexes.

Gender equality in initiating violence goes against the dominant idea of our soci- ety, which generally lays the blame at the feet of men. This is another of the surpris- ing findings in sociology. And it has serious implications: If we want to curb violence, we should not concentrate on men, but, instead, on both men and women.

The basic sociological question, then, is how to socialize both males and females to handle frustration and disagreements without resorting to violence. We do not yet have this answer.

Child Abuse. I answered an ad about a lakeside house in a middle-class neighborhood that was for sale by owner. As the woman showed me through her immaculate house, I was sur- prised to see a plywood box in the youngest child’s bedroom. About 3 feet high, 3 feet wide, and 6 feet long, the box was perforated with holes and had a little door with a padlock. Curious, I asked what it was. The woman replied matter-of-factly that her son had a behavior problem, and this was where they locked him for “time out.” She added that other times they would tie him to a float, attach a line to the dock, and put him in the lake.

I left as soon as I could. With thoughts of a terrorized child filling my head, I called the state child abuse hotline.

As you can tell, what I saw upset me. Most of us are bothered by child abuse— helpless children being victimized by their parents and other adults who are supposed to love, protect, and nurture them. The most gruesome of these cases make the eve- ning news: The 4-year-old girl who was beaten and raped by her mother’s boyfriend, passed into a coma, and three days later passed out of this life; the 6- to 10-year-old children whose stepfather videotaped them engaging in sex acts. Unlike these cases, which made headlines in my area, most child abuse is never brought to our attention: the children who live in filth, who are neglected—left alone for hours or even days at a time—or who are beaten with extension cords—cases like the little boy I learned about when I went house hunting.

Child abuse is extensive. Each year, U.S. authorities receive about 2 million reports of children being abused or neglected. About 800,000 of these cases are substantiated (Statistical Abstract 2012:Table 343). The excuses that parents make are incredible.

To reduce marital violence, why should the focus be on both husbands and wives? Why don’t abused wives “just leave”?

376 CHAPTER 12 Marriage and Family

Of those I have read, the most fantastic is what a mother said to a Manhattan judge: “I slipped in a moment of anger, and my hands accidentally wrapped around my daughter’s windpipe” (LeDuff 2003).

Incest. Sexual relations between certain relatives (for example, between brothers and sisters or between parents and children) constitute incest. Incest is most likely to occur in families that are socially isolated (Smith 1992). Sociologist Diana Russell (n.d.) found that incest victims who experience the greatest trauma are those who were victimized the most often, whose assaults occurred over longer periods of time, and whose incest was “more intrusive”—for example, sexual intercourse as opposed to sexual touching.

Incest can occur between any family members, but apparently the most common form is sex between children. An analysis of 13,000 cases of sibling incest showed that in three-fourths of the cases the sex is initiated by a brother who is five years older than his sister (Krienert and Walsh 2011). In one-fourth of the cases, the vic- tim is a younger brother, and in 13 percent of the cases it is the sister who is the offender. Most offenders are between the ages of 13 and 15, and most victims are age 12 or younger. In most cases, the parents treat the incest as a family matter to be dealt with privately.

The Bright Side of Family Life: Successful Marriages Successful Marriages. After examining divorce and family abuse, one could easily conclude that marriages seldom work out. This would be far from the truth, however, for about three of every five married Americans report that they are “very happy” with their marriages (Whitehead and Popenoe 2004). (Keep in mind that each year divorce eliminates about a million unhappy marriages.) To find out what makes marriage suc- cessful, sociologists Jeanette and Robert Lauer (1992) interviewed 351 couples who had been married fifteen years or longer. Fifty-one of these marriages were unhappy, but the couples stayed together for religious reasons, because of family tradition, or “for the sake of the children.”

Of the others, the 300 happy couples, all

1. Think of their spouses as best friends 2. Like their spouse as a person 3. Think of marriage as a long-term commitment 4. Believe that marriage is sacred 5. Agree with their spouses on aims and goals 6. Believe that their spouses have grown more interesting over the years 7. Strongly want the relationship to succeed 8. Laugh together

Sociologist Nicholas Stinnett (1992) used interviews and questionnaires to study 660 families from all regions of the United States and parts of South America. He found that happy families

1. Spend a lot of time together 2. Are quick to express appreciation 3. Are committed to promoting one another’s welfare 4. Do a lot of talking and listening to one another 5. Are religious 6. Deal with crises in a positive manner

Here are three more important factors: Marriages are happier when the partners get along with their in-laws (Bryant et al. 2001), find leisure activities that they both enjoy (Crawford et al. 2002), and agree on how to spend money (Bernard 2008).

What incest victims have the most difficult adjustment? What are some patterns of sibling incest?

The Future of Marriage and Family 377

Symbolic Interactionism and the Misuse of Statistics Many students are concerned that divorce statistics mean they won’t have a successful marriage. Because sociology is not just about abstract ideas, but is really about our lives, it is important to stress that you are an individual, not a statistic. That is, if the divorce rate were 33 percent or 50 percent, this would not mean that if you marry, your chances of getting divorced are 33 percent or 50 percent. This is a misuse of statistics—and a common one at that. Divorce statistics represent all marriages and have absolutely nothing to do with any individual marriage. Our own chances depend on our own situations—especially the way we approach marriage.

To make this point clearer, let’s apply symbolic interactionism. From a symbolic interactionist perspective, we create our own worlds. That is, because our experiences don’t come with built-in meanings, we interpret our experiences and act accordingly. As we do so, we can create a self-fulfilling prophecy. For example, if we think that our marriage might fail, we are more likely to run when things become difficult. If we think that our marriage is going to work out, we are more likely to stick around and to do things to make the marriage successful. The folk saying “There are no guarantees in life” is certainly true, but it does help to have a vision that a good marriage is possible and that it is worth the effort to achieve.

The Future of Marriage and Family What can we expect of marriage and family in the future? Despite its many problems, then, marriage is in no danger of becoming a relic of the past. Marriage is so functional that it exists in every society. Consequently, the vast majority of Americans will continue to find marriage vital to their welfare.

Certain trends are firmly in place: cohabitation, births to single women, and age at first marriage. As more married women join the workforce, wives will continue to gain marital power. In the midst of changing marriage and family, our culture will continue to be haunted by distorted images of marriage and family: the bleak ones portrayed in the mass media and the rosy ones perpetuated by cultural myths. Sociological research can help to correct these distortions and allow us to see how our own family experiences fit into the patterns of our culture. Sociological research can also help to answer the big question: How do we formulate social policies that will support and enhance family life?

What makes marriages successful? Why is it wrong to apply sociological statistics to yourself?

378 CHAPTER 12 Marriage and Family

Americans who want 3 or more children

1936

64% NOW

33%

Americans who want 0, 1, or 2 children

1936

34% NOW

58%

Number of marriages with a white wife and an

African American husband

1970

41,000 NOW

390,000

Number of hours per week husbands

do housework

1965

4.4 NOW

9.7

Number of hours per week wives do housework

1965

34.5 NOW

19.4

Number of cohabitating couples

1970

523,000 NOW

6,500,000

Women ages 20–24 who are married

1970

65% NOW

21%

Men ages 20–24 who are married

1970

45% NOW

11%

Children who live with both parents

1970

85% NOW

70%

Average age of first-time groom

1970

23 NOW

28

Number of marriages with an African American wife

and a white husband

1970

24,000 NOW

168,000

Average age of first-time bride

1970

20 NOW

26

White Americans divorced

1970

3.1% NOW

10.3

African Americans divorced

1970

4.4% NOW

11.4%

Marriage and Family in Global Perspective What is a family—and what themes are universal? Family is difficult to define. There are exceptions to every element that one might consider essential. Consequently,

family is defined broadly—as people who consider them- selves related by blood, marriage, or adoption. Universally, marriage and family are mechanisms for governing mate selection, reckoning descent, and establishing inheritance and authority. Pp. 352–354.

Summary and ReviewCH A

P T

E R

12

Summary and Review 379

Marriage and Family in Theoretical Perspective What is a functionalist perspective on marriage and family? Functionalists examine the functions and dysfunctions of family life. Examples include the incest taboo and how weakened family functions increase divorce. Pp. 354–355. What is a conflict perspective on marriage and family? Conflict theorists focus on inequality in marriage, especially unequal power between husbands and wives. P. 355. What is a symbolic interactionist perspective on marriage and family? Symbolic interactionists examine the contrasting experiences and perspectives of men and women in marriage. They stress that only by grasping the perspectives of wives and husbands can we understand their behavior. Pp. 355–356.

The Family Life Cycle What are the major elements of the family life cycle? The major elements are love and courtship, marriage, child- birth, child rearing, and the family in later life. Most mate selection follows predictable patterns of age, social class, race–ethnicity, and religion. Child-rearing patterns vary by social class. Pp. 357–361.

Diversity in U.S. Families How significant is race–ethnicity in family life? The primary distinction is social class, not race–ethnicity. Families of the same social class are likely to be similar, regardless of their race–ethnicity. Pp. 361–364. What other diversity do we see in U.S. families? Also discussed are one-parent, childless (childfree), blended, and gay and lesbian families. Each has its unique

characteristics, but social class is important in determining their primary characteristics. Poverty is especially significant for single-parent families, most of which are headed by women. Pp. 364–367.

Trends in U.S. Families What major changes characterize U.S. families? Two changes are postponement of first marriage and child- birth and an increase in cohabitation. Pp. 367–370.

Divorce and Remarriage What is the current divorce rate? Depending on what numbers you choose to compare, you can produce almost any rate you wish, from 50 percent to less than 2 percent. Pp. 370–371. How do children and their parents adjust to divorce? Divorce is difficult for children, who as adults are also more likely to divorce. Divorce even affects the grandchildren of divorced parents. Most divorced fathers do not maintain ongoing relationships with their children. Pp. 371–374.

Two Sides of Family Life What are the two sides of family life? The dark side is abuse—spouse battering, child abuse, and incest, all of which revolve around the misuse of family power. The bright side is that most people find marriage and family to be rewarding. Pp. 375–377.

The Future of Marriage and Family What is the likely future of marriage and family? We can expect cohabitation, births to unmarried women, and age at first marriage to increase. The growing numbers of women in the workforce are likely to continue to shift the balance of marital power. P. 377.

Thinking Critically about Chapter 12 1. Functionalists stress that the family is universal because it

provides basic functions for individuals and society. What functions does your family provide? Hint: In addition to the section “The Functionalist Perspective,” also con- sider the section “Common Cultural Themes.”

2. Explain why social class is more important than race–ethnicity in determining a family’s characteristics.

3. Apply this chapter’s contents to your own experience with marriage and family. What social factors affect your family life? In what ways is your family life different from that of your grandparents when they were your age?

Education and Religion13CHAPTE R

Kathy Spiegel was upset. Horace Mann, the school principal in her hometown in Oregon, had asked her to come to his office. He explained that Kathy’s 11-year-old twins had been acting up in class. They were disturbing other children and the teacher—and what was Kathy going to do about this?

Kathy didn’t want to tell Mr. Mann what he could do with the situation. That would have gotten her kicked out of the office. Instead, she bit her tongue and said she would talk to her daughters.

* * * * * On the other side of the country, Jim and Julia Attaway

were pondering their own problem. When they visited their son’s school in the Bronx, they didn’t like what they saw. The boys looked like they were little gangsta wannabes, and the girls dressed and acted as though they were sexually active. Their own 13-year-old son had started using street language at home, and it was becoming increasingly difficult to talk to him.

* * * * * In Minneapolis, Denzil and

Tamika Jefferson were facing a much quieter crisis. They found life frantic as they hur- ried from one school activity to another. Their 13-year-old son attended a private school, and the demands were so intense that it felt like the junior year in high school. They no longer seemed to have any relaxed family time together.

* * * * * In Atlanta, Jaime and Maria Morelos were upset at the ideas

that their 8-year-old daughter had begun to express at home. As devout first-generation Protestants, Jaime and Maria felt moral issues were a top priority, and they didn’t like what they were hearing.

* * * * * Kathy talked the matter over with her husband, Bob. Jim

and Julia discussed their problem, as did Denzil and Tamika and Jaime and Maria. They all came to the same conclusion: The problem was not their children. The problem was the school their children attended. All four sets of parents also came to the same solution: home schooling for their children.

“The boys looked like they were junior gang members, and the girls . . .”

Bangladesh

382 CHAPTER 13 Education and Religion

Home schooling might seem to be a radical solution to today’s education problems, but it is one that the parents of 1½ million U.S. children have chosen. We’ll come back to problems in education, and possible solutions, but, first, let’s take a broad look at education.

Education: Transferring Knowledge and Skills

Education in Global Perspective Have you ever wondered why people need a high school diploma to sell cars or to join the U.S. Marines? You will learn what you know on the job. Why do employers insist on diplomas and degrees? Why don’t they simply use on-the-job training?

In some cases, job skills must be mastered before you are allowed to do the work. On-the-job training was once adequate to become an engineer or an airline pilot, but with changes in information and technology it is no longer sufficient. This is precisely why doctors display their credentials so prominently. Their framed degrees declare that an institution of higher learning has certified them to work on your body.

But testing in algebra or paragraph construction to sell gizmos at Radio Shack? Sociologist Randall Collins (1979) observed that industrialized nations have become credential societies. By this, he means that employers use diplomas and degrees as sort- ing devices to determine who is eligible for a job. Because employers don’t know poten- tial workers, they depend on schools to weed out the incapable. For example, when you graduate from college, potential employers will presume that you are a responsible person—that you have shown up for numerous classes, have turned in scores of assign- ments, and have demonstrated basic writing and thinking skills. They will then graft their particular job skills onto this foundation, which has been certified by your college.

Education and Industrialization In the early years of the United States, there was no free public education. Parents with an average income could not afford to send their children even to grade school. As the country industrialized during the 1800s, political and civic leaders recognized the need for an educated workforce. They also feared the influx of “foreign” values, for this was

a period of high immigration. They looked on public education as a way to reach two major goals: producing

more educated workers and “Americanizing” immigrants (Hellinger and Judd 1991).

As industrialization progressed and fewer people made their living from farming, formal education came to be regarded as essential to the well-being of society. With the distance to the nearest college too far and the cost of tuition and lodging too great, few high school graduates were able to attend college. As is discussed in the Down-to-Earth Sociology box on page 384, this predicament gave birth to community colleges. As you can see from Figure 13.1 on the next page, receiving a bachelor’s degree in the United

States is now twice as common as completing high school used to be.

To place our own educational system in perspective, let’s look at education in three countries at different

levels of industrialization. This will help us see how education is related to a nation’s culture and its economy.

What is a credential society? Why do they exist?

In this photo from the 1890s in Washington, D.C., you can catch a glimpse of public schools in their infancy. As with the present, students then were also taught skills useful for their adult lives. The specific skills taught in schools have certainly changed.

Education in Global Perspective 383

Education in the Most Industrialized Nations: Japan The yells of children pierce the night, belting out the elements—“Lithium! Magnesium!”—as an instructor displays abbreviations from the periodic table. Next, two dozen flags stream by as the ten-year-olds shout out the names of the corresponding countries. Later they identify 20 constellations they have committed to memory. Timers on desks push older students as they practice racing through different tests. The scene at this juku (cram school) on the edge of Tokyo, repeats itself nightly at 50,000 cram schools across Japan. (“Testing Times” 2011)

What an emphasis on education. Japanese parents pay over $3,000 a year to enroll a child in a cram school. Even one in five first-graders is enrolled in these schools, which opearate after the regular school day. In grade school, children work as a group, all mastering the same skills and materials. On any one day, children all over Japan even study the same page from the same textbook (“Less Rote . . .” 2000). This uniformity is accompanied by a personal touch: Teachers are required to visit each student’s home once a year (Yamamoto and Brinton 2010).

A central sociological principle of education is that a nation’s education reflects its culture. Working as a group reflects the core Japanese value of soli- darity with the group. In the workforce, people who are hired together are not expected to compete with one another for promotions; instead, they work as a team and are promoted as a group (Ouchi 1993). Japanese education reflects this group-centered approach to life.

In a fascinating cultural contradiction, college admission in Japan is highly competitive (Yamamoto and Brinton 2010). The Scholastic Assessment Test (SAT), taken by college-bound high school students in the United States, is voluntary, but Japanese seniors who want to attend college must take a national test. U.S. students who perform poorly on their tests can usually find some college to attend—as long as their parents can pay the tuition. Until recently, in Japan only the top scorers—rich and poor alike—were admitted to college. Because of Japan’s low birth rate, this is changing. The pool of students has shrunk, and Japan’s colleges have begun to compete for students (McNeill 2008).

Sources: By the author. Based on National Center for Education Statistics 1991:Table 8; Statistical Abstract of the United States 2012:Table 229.

FIGURE 13.1 Educational Achievement in the United States

0%

60%

50%

40%

30%

20%

10%

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1910 1920 1930 1940 1950 1960 1970 1980 1990 2000 2010 2020*

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School is over—but not for these students. After the regular school day, hundreds of thousands of students in Japan attend 50,000 cram (juku) schools.

Can you give a brief history of U.S. educational achievement?

384 CHAPTER 13 Education and Religion

Why were community colleges started? What are their current challenges?

Down-to-Earth Sociology

Community Colleges: Facing Old and New Challenges

Iattended a junior college in Oakland, California. From there, with fresh diploma in hand, I transferred to a senior college—a college in Fort Wayne, Indiana, that had no freshmen or sophomores.

I didn’t realize that my experimental college matched the vision of some of the founders of the community college movement. In the early 1900s, they foresaw a system of local colleges that would be accessible to the average high school graduate—a system so extensive that it would be unneces- sary for universities to offer courses at the freshman and sophomore levels (Manzo 2001).

A group with an equally strong opinion questioned whether preparing high school graduates for entry to four-year colleges and universities should be the goal of junior colleges. They insisted that the purpose of junior colleges should be vocational prep- aration, to equip people for the job market as elec- tricians and other techni- cians. In some regions, where the proponents of transfer dominated, the admissions requirements for junior colleges were higher than those of Yale (Pedersen 2001). This debate was never won by either side, and you can still hear its echoes today (Hanson 2010).

The name junior college also became a problem. Some felt that the word junior made their institution sound as though it weren’t quite a real college. A struggle to change the name fol- lowed, and several decades ago community college won out.

The name change didn’t settle the debate about whether the purpose was preparing students to transfer to universities or training them for jobs, however. Community colleges continue to serve this dual purpose.

Community colleges have become such an essential part of the U.S. educational system that 37 percent of all undergraduates in the United States are enrolled in them (Statistical Abstract 2012:Table 279). They have become the major source of the nation’s emergency medical technicians, firefighters, nurses, and police officers. Most students are

nontraditional students: Many are age 25 or older, come from the working class, have jobs and children, and attend college part-time (Panzarella 2008; Osterman 2010).

To help students who are not seeking occupational cer- tificates transfer to four-year colleges and universities, many community colleges work closely with four-year public and private universities (College Board 2011b). Some provide admissions guidance on how to enter flagship state schools. Others coordinate courses, making sure that they match the university’s title and numbering system, as well as its rigor of instruction and grading. More than a third offer honors programs that prepare talented students to transfer with ease into these schools (Padgett 2005).

An emerging trend is for com- munity colleges to become four-year colleges without changing their names. Some are now granting work-related baccalaureate degrees in such areas as teaching, nursing, and public safety (Hanson 2010). This raises the ques- tion: Will these community colleges eventually develop into full four-year colleges. If so, will this create the need to establish community colleges to replace them?

Community colleges face the challenges of securing adequate budgets in the

face of declining resources, adjusting to changing job

markets, and maintaining quality instruction. Other chal- lenges include offering effective

remedial courses; meeting the shifting needs of students, such as

teaching students for whom English is a second language; and providing on-campus day care for parents. To help students succeed, community colleges need to improve their orientation programs and find better ways to monitor their students’ progress (Panzarella 2008; Osterman 2010).

For Your Consideration↑

Do you think the primary goal of community colleges should be to prepare students for jobs or to prepare them to transfer to four-year colleges and universities? Why?

As with this college in Maine, community colleges have opened higher education to millions of students who would not otherwise have access to college because of cost or distance.

Education in Global Perspective 385

As in the United States, children from the richer families score higher on college admission tests and are more likely to go to college (Yamamoto and Brinton 2010). In each country, to be born into a richer family means to inherit privileges that help you in life. Among these privileges, which sociologists call social capital, are having more highly educated parents, encouragement and pressure to bring home top grades, and cultural experiences that translate into higher test scores.

Education in the Industrializing Nations: Russia After the Russian Revolution of 1917, the Soviet Communist Party changed the nation’s educational system. At that time, as in most countries, education was limited to children of the elite. The communists expanded the educational system until eventually it encompassed all children. Following the sociological principle that education reflects culture, the new government made certain that socialist values dominated its schools, for it saw education as a means to undergird the new political system. As a result, schoolchildren were taught that capitalism was evil and that communism was the salva- tion of the world. Every classroom was required to prominently display photographs of Lenin and Stalin.

Education, including college, was free. Just as the economy was directed from central headquarters in Moscow, so was education. Schools stressed mathematics and the natural sciences. Each school followed the same state-prescribed curriculum, and all students in the same grade used the same textbooks. To prevent critical thinking, which might lead to criticisms of communism, there were few courses in the social sciences. Students memorized course materials, repeating lectures on oral exams (Deaver 2001).

Russia’s switch from communism to capitalism brought a change in culture— especially new ideas about profit, private property, and personal freedom. This, in turn, meant that the educational system had to adjust to the country’s changing values and views of the world. Not only did the photos of Lenin and Stalin come down, but also, for the first time, private, religious, and even foreign-run schools were allowed. For the first time as well, teachers were able to encourage students to think for themselves.

The problems that Russia confronted in “reinventing” its educational system are mind-boggling. Tens of thousands of teachers who had been teaching students to memorize Party-dictated political answers had to learn new methods of instruction. As the economy faltered during Russia’s early transition to capitalism, school budgets dwindled. Some teachers went unpaid for months; instead of money, at one school teachers were given toilet paper and vodka (Deaver 2001). Teachers are now paid regularly (and in money), but the salaries are low. University professors average only about $500 a month (Nemtsova 2008). Abysmal salaries have encouraged corruption, and some students pay for good grades and for admission to the better schools (“Russia Sets Out to . . .” 2007).

During this transition to the new education, the president of Russia, Vladimir Putin, declared that the new history books did not do justice to Russia’s glorious past. Educational bureaucrats immediately jumped into action, and now officials inspect the content of history books to make certain they are sufficiently patriotic (Rapoport 2009). We can confidently predict that Russia’s educational system will continue to glorify Russia’s historical exploits and reinforce its values and world views—no matter how they might change.

Education in the Least Industrialized Nations: Egypt Education in the Least Industrialized Nations stands in sharp contrast to that in the industrialized world. Because most of the citizens of these nations work the land or take care of families, there is little emphasis on formal schooling. Mandatory atten- dance laws are not enforced. As we saw in Figure 7.3 (pp. 198–199), many people

Can you summarize education in Japan and Russia?

386 CHAPTER 13 Education and Religion

The poverty of the Least Industrialized Nations carries over to their educational systems. This primary school in Khatta Village, Pakistan, is better off than some, which have no books, paper, or even buildings, just a blackboard on the street.

in the Least Industrialized Nations live on less than $1,000 a year. Consequently, in some of these nations few children go to school beyond the first couple of grades. As was once common around the globe, it is primarily the wealthy in the Least Industrialized Nations who have the means and the leisure for formal education—especially anything beyond the basics. As an example, let’s look at education in Egypt.

Although the Egyptian constitution guarantees six years of free school for all children, many poor children receive no education at all. For those who do attend school, qualified teachers are few, and classrooms are crowded. As a result, one-third to one-half of Egyptians are illiterate, with more men than women able to read and write (UNESCO 2011). After the six years of grade school, students are

tracked. Most study technical subjects for three years, and are then done with school, while others follow these three

years with two years of academic subjects: arts, science, or mathematics (“Egyptian Overview” 2010).

The emphasis is on memorizing facts to pass national tests. With concerns that this approach leaves minds less capable of evaluating life and opens the door to religious extremism, Egyptian educators have pressed for critical thinking to be added to the curriculum (Gauch 2006). To become more competitive in the global economy, the government has requested independent evaluation of its educational system (“Reviews of National Policies . . .” 2010). So far little has changed. But as Egypt industrializes as part of the globalization of capitalism, this will likely forge educational reforms.

The Functionalist Perspective: Providing Social Benefits

A central position of functionalism is that when the parts of society are working prop- erly, each contributes to the well-being or stability of that society. The positive things that people intend their actions to accomplish are known as manifest functions. The positive consequences they did not intend are called latent functions. Let’s look at the functions of education.

Teaching Knowledge and Skills Education’s most obvious manifest function is to teach knowl- edge and skills—whether the traditional three R’s or their more contemporary counterparts, such as computer literacy. Each generation must train the next to fill the group’s significant positions. Because our postindustrial society needs highly educated people, the schools supply them.

Cultural Transmission of Values Another manifest function of education is the cultural transmis- sion of values, a process by which schools pass on a society’s core values from one generation to the next. Consequently, schools in a socialist society stress values that support socialism, while schools in a capitalist society teach values that support capi- talism. U.S. schools, for example, stress the significance of private property, individualism, and competition.©

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Can you summarize education in Egypt? What is the “cultural transmission of values?”

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The Functionalist Perspective: Providing Social Benefits 387

Regardless of a country’s economic system, loyalty to the state is a cultural value, and schools around the world teach patriotism. U.S. schools—as well as those of Russia, France, China, and other countries around the world—extol the society’s founders, their struggle for freedom from oppression, and the goodness of the coun- try’s social institutions. Seldom is this function as explicit as it is in Japan, where the law requires that schools “cultivate a respect for tradition and culture, and love for the nation and homeland” (Nakamura 2006).

To visualize what the functionalists mean, consider how differently a course in U.S. history would be taught in Cuba; Iran; and Muncie, Indiana.

Social Integration Schools also bring about social integration. They promote a sense of national identity by having students salute the flag and sing the national anthem. One of the best examples of how U.S. schools promote political integration is the teaching of mainstream ideas and values to tens of millions of immigrants. Coming to regard themselves as Americans, the immigrants give up their earlier national and cultural identities (Carper 2000; G. Thompson 2009).

This integrative function of education goes far beyond making people similar in their appearance, speech, or even ways of thinking. To forge a national identity is to stabilize the political system. If people identify with a society’s institutions and perceive them as the basis of their own welfare, they have no reason to rebel. This function is especially significant when it comes to the lower social classes, from which most social revolutionaries emerge. The wealthy already have a vested interest in maintaining the status quo, but getting the lower classes to identify with a social system as it is goes a long way toward preserving the system in its current state.

People with disabilities often have found themselves left out of the mainstream of society. To overcome this, U.S. schools have added a manifest function, mainstreaming, or inclusion. As in the photo at the right, this means that educators try to incorporate students with disabilities into regular school activities. Wheelchair ramps are provided for people who cannot walk; interpreters who use sign language may attend classes with students who cannot hear. Exceptions include most blind students, who attend special schools, as well as people with severe learning disabilities. Most inclusion goes fairly smoothly, but mainstreaming students with emotional and behavioral problems disrupts classrooms, frustrates teachers, and increases teacher turnover (Tomsho and Golden 2007). The disruption is so serious that the other children learn less, as measured by their scores in math and reading (Fletcher 2010).

Gatekeeping (Social Placement) Sociologists Talcott Parsons (1940), Kingsley Davis, and Wilbert Moore (Davis and Moore 1945) pioneered a view called social placement, more commonly known as gatekeeping. They pointed out that some jobs require few skills and can be performed by people of lesser intelligence. Other jobs, such as that of physician, require high intelligence and advanced education. It is up to the schools to sort the capable from the incapable. They do this, say the functionalists, on the basis of merit, the students’ abilities and ambitions.

To open the doors of opportunity for some is to close them to others. The ques- tion is what opens and closes those doors. Is it merit, as the functionalists argue? To accomplish gatekeeping, schools use some form of tracking, sorting students into dif- ferent educational “tracks” or programs on the basis of their perceived abilities. Some U.S. high schools funnel students into one of three tracks: general, college prep, or honors. Students on the lowest track are likely to go to work after high school, or to take vocational courses. Those on the highest track usually attend prestigious colleges. Those in between usually attend a local college or regional state university.

You can also see that the impact of gatekeeping is lifelong. Tracking affects people’s opportunities for jobs, income, and lifestyle. When tracking was challenged—that it is based more on social class than merit, which perpetuates social inequality—schools

Children with disabilities used to be sent to special schools. In a process called mainstreaming or inclusion, they now attend regular schools. Shown here is a 10-year-old girl with a rare genetic defect attending classes in Boiling Springs, Pennsylvania.

What is gatekeeping? How do schools perform this function?

388 CHAPTER 13 Education and Religion

Conflict theorists stress that education reproduces a country’s social class system. In the United States, the social classes attend separate schools—private capitalist class, middle class, and inner city. In each of these types of schoools, children learn perspectives of the world that match their place in it. Shown here is a student at The Andrews School in Willoughby, Ohio. What do you think the hidden curriculum is at this school?

retreated from formal tracking. Placing students in “ability groups” and “advanced” classes, however, serves the same purpose (Catsambis et al. 2012).

Replacing Family Functions Over the years, the functions of U.S. schools have expanded, and they now rival some family functions. Child care is an example. Grade schools do double duty as babysitters for families in which both parents work, or for single working mothers. Child care has always been a latent function of formal education, for it was an unintended consequence. Now, however, with two wage earners in most families, child care has become a manifest function, and some schools offer child care both before and after the school day. Some high schools even provide nurseries for the children of their teenaged students (Bosman 2007).

Another function is providing sex education, and, as in 500 school-based health cen- ters, birth control (Elliott 2007). This has stirred controversy, for some families resent schools taking this function away from them. Disagreement over values has fueled the social movement for home schooling, featured in the chapter’s opening vignette.

In Sum: Functionalists analyze the functions, the benefits, that schools provide society. Not only do the schools teach the knowledge and skills needed by the next generation, but they also stabilize society by forging a national identity. A controversial function is gatekeeping, sorting students for various levels of jobs. Schools have expanded their domain, taking over some functions formerly performed by families.

The Conflict Perspective: Perpetuating Social Inequality

Unlike functionalists, who look at the benefits of education, conflict theorists examine how the educational system reproduces the social class structure. By this, they mean that schools perpetuate the social divisions of society and help members of the elite maintain their dominance.

Let’s look, then, at how education is related to social classes, how it helps people inherit social capital, the life opportunities that were laid down before they were born.

The Hidden Curriculum: Reproducing the Social Class Structure The term hidden curriculum refers to the attitudes and the unwritten rules of behavior that schools teach in addition to the formal curriculum. Examples are obedience to author- ity and conformity to mainstream norms. Conflict theorists stress that the hidden curricu-

lum helps to perpetuate social inequalities. To understand this central point, consider the way

English is taught. Schools for the middle class—whose teachers know where their students are headed—stress “proper” English and “good” manners. In contrast, the teachers in inner-city schools—who also know where their students are headed—allow ethnic and street language in the classroom. Each type of school is helping to reproduce the social class structure. That is, each is preparing students to work in positions similar to those of their parents. The social class of some children destines them for higher positions. For these jobs, they need “refined” speech and manners. The social destiny of others is low-status jobs. For this type of work, they need only to obey rules (Bowles and Gintis 1976, 2002). Teaching these students “refined” speech and manners would be wasted effort. In other words, even the teaching of English and manners helps keep the social classes intact across generations.

How are schools replacing family functions? What does “reproducing the social class structure” mean? What is the “hidden curriculum”?

The Conflict Perspective: Perpetuating Social Inequality 389

For a humorous but serious account of how teachers perpetuate social classes even though they do not intend to do so, read the Down-to-Earth Sociology box below.

Tilting the Tests: Discrimination by IQ Even intelligence tests help to keep the social class system intact. Let’s look at an example. How would you answer this question?

A symphony is to a composer as a book is to a(n) ___ ___ paper ___ sculptor ___ musician ___ author ___ man

You probably had no difficulty coming up with “author” as your choice. Wouldn’t any intelligent person have done so?

How do “ability groups” help to perpetuate social class?

Down-to-Earth Sociology

How I Became a Fairy: Education and the Perpetuation of Social Inequality

Iwas excited about going to school. With its recess, scissors, and coloring, kindergarten turned out to be fun. Like the other boys, recess and rough-and- tumble games on the playground were my favorite activities.

First grade whizzed by, and I looked forward to second grade. Those big second graders had told me about how they were learning to read. How magical to be able to make out words from those strange marks on paper.

My second-grade teacher took her job seriously. She taught us how to sound out each letter. I couldn’t figure out how s-a-i-d could be pronounced sed. It didn’t seem to fit with what I was being taught, but I ac- cepted it.

I liked learning. Each lesson seemed to unfold a different part of the world.

I tried my very best. And I learned and did well.

Then my teacher divided our class into two groups. She called the slower readers Elves, and the better readers Fairies. (These were simpler times.)

I was an elf. Disappointment flooded over

me! I knew that I should be a fairy. In the fairy group were my friends, the boys I played with during recess and after school—the lawyers’ son, Jerry, the doctor’s son, Jon, and the principal’s son, Jacky. Roseau was a small town on the Canadian border in Minnesota, and we all lived just a few blocks from one another.

The teacher took turns teaching each group. She would go around the circle, having each student read aloud. As I heard the fairies read, I knew that my reading was just as good as theirs, actually better than some. I had to get this across to the teacher. But how?

When my turn came, I decided to read loudly and deliberately. She had no or few corrections for me, and would then move on to other elves, explaining to them over and over how to attach the right sounds to the letters, and from there how to form words.

After several reading lessons, with me continuing the loud reading, she looked at me and said, “I think you belong in the other group.” She then allowed me to move my chair into their little circle.

And I went home, triumphantly announcing to my mother, “I’m a fairy!”

For Your Consideration↑

Please don’t get lost in the humor of this homely story. My parents were ill-educated and poor, farmers’ children who had moved into town. Everyone in this little town knew precisely how everyone else ranked. Hidden within the teacher’s awareness was this perception of social class. She thought that the students from advantaged homes—the children of professionals and those who had more money (there were no really wealthy

people in town) could read better—and for the most part, she was right. She pegged the poorer students as poor readers, and for the most part, she was right.

But not entirely. What had happened was a misclassification of ability based on social class. This same process—occurring in a myriad of ways from well-meaning teachers throughout the U.S. school system—continues today. It is an essential part of, as we sociologists are fond of saying, how the educational system perpetuates the social class structure.

Did you see anything like this in your grade school?

From your experiences in grade school, can you tell if or how your teachers unintentionally helped perpetuate social class divisions?

390 CHAPTER 13 Education and Religion

In point of fact, this question raises a central issue in intelligence testing. Not all intelligent people would know the answer. This question contains cultural biases. Children from some backgrounds are more familiar with the concepts of symphonies, composers, and sculptors than are other children. This tilts the test in their favor.

To make the bias clearer, try to answer this question:

If you throw two dice and “7” is showing on the top, what is facing down? ___ seven ___ snake eyes ___ box cars ___ little Joes ___ eleven

Adrian Dove (n.d.), a social worker in Watts, a poor area of Los Angeles, suggested this question. Its cultural bias should be obvious—that it allows children from some social backgrounds to perform better than others. Unlike the first question, this one is not tilted to the middle-class experience. In other words, IQ (intelligence quotient) tests measure not only intelligence but also acquired knowledge.

You should now be able to perceive the bias of IQ tests that use such words as com- poser and symphony. A lower-class child may have heard about rap, rock, gangsta, or jazz, but not about symphonies. One consequence of this bias to the middle-class expe- rience is that the children of the poor score lower on IQ tests. Then, to match their supposedly inferior intelligence, these children are assigned to less demanding courses. Their inferior education helps them reach their social destiny, their lower-paying jobs in adult life. As conflict theorists view them, then, IQ tests are another weapon in an arsenal designed to maintain the social class structure across the generations.

Stacking the Deck: Unequal Funding Conflict theorists stress that the way schools are funded stacks the deck against the poor. Because public schools are supported largely by local property taxes, the richer communi- ties (where property values and incomes are higher) have more to spend on their chil- dren, and the poorer communities have less to spend on theirs. Consequently, the richer communities can offer higher salaries and take their pick of the most highly qualified and motivated teachers. They can also afford to buy the latest textbooks, computers, and soft- ware, as well as offer courses in foreign languages, music, and the arts. This, stress conflict theorists, means that in all states the deck is stacked against the poor.

The Bottom Line: Family Background Reproducing the Social Class Structure. The end result of unequal funding, IQ tests, and the other factors we have discussed is this: Family background is more impor-

tant than test scores in predicting who attends college. In a classic study, sociologist Samuel Bowles (1977) compared the college attendance of high school students who were the most and least intellectually prepared for college. Figure 13.2 shows the results. Of the students who scored the highest on tests, 90 percent of those from affluent homes went to college, but only half of the high-scorers from low-income homes went to col- lege. Of the least prepared, those who scored the lowest, 26 percent from affluent homes went to college, while only 6 percent from poorer homes did so.

Other sociologists have confirmed this classic research (Carnevale and Rose 2003; Bailey and Dynarski 2011). Regardless of personal abilities, children from more well-to-do families are more likely not only to go to college but also to attend the nation’s most elite schools. This, in turn, piles advantage upon advantage, because they get higher-paying and more prestigious jobs when they graduate. The elite colleges are the icing on the cake of these students’ more privileged birth.

Reproducing the Racial–Ethnic Structure. Conflict theorists point out that the educational system reproduces not only the U.S. social class struc- ture but also its racial–ethnic divisions. From Figure 13.3 on the next page,

Read

How Corporations Are Buying

Their Way into America’s

Classrooms by Steven Manning

on mysoclab.com

How do IQ tests help “stack the deck” against the poor? And school funding?

Students’ Test Scores

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High

90%Rich

Poor

Low

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FIGURE 13.2 Who Goes to

Source: Bowles 1977.

College? Comparing Social Class and Ability in Determining College Attendance

The Symbolic Interactionist Perspective: Teacher Expectations 391

you can see that, compared with whites, African Americans and Latinos are much less likely to complete high school and, of those who do, much less likely to go to college. Because adults with only high school diplomas usually end up with low- paying, dead-end jobs, you can see how this supports the conflict view—that edu- cation is helping to reproduce the racial–ethnic structure for the next generation.

In Sum: U.S. schools closely reflect the U.S. social class system. They equip the children of the elite with the tools they need to maintain their dominance, while they prepare the children of the poor for lower-status positions. Because educa- tion’s doors of opportunity swing wide open for some but have to be pried open by others, conflict theorists say that the educational system perpetuates social inequality across generations (or, as they often phrase it, helps to reproduce the social class structure). In fact, they add, this is one of its primary purposes.

The Symbolic Interactionist Perspective: Teacher Expectations

As you have seen, functionalists look at how education benefits society, and conflict theorists examine how education perpetuates social inequality. Symbolic interaction- ists, in contrast, study face-to-face interaction in the classroom. They have found that what teachers expect of their students has profound consequences for how students do in school.

The Rist Research Why do some people get tracked into college prep courses and others into vocational ones? There is no single answer, but in what has become a classic study, sociologist Ray Rist came up with some intriguing findings. Rist (1970, 2007) did participant observation in an African American grade school with an African American faculty. He found that after only eight days in the classroom, the kindergarten teacher felt that she knew the children’s abilities well enough to assign them to three separate worktables. To Table 1, Mrs. Caplow assigned those she considered to be “fast learners.” They sat at the front of the room, closest to her. Those whom she saw as “slow learners,” she assigned to Table 3, located at the back of the classroom. She placed “average” students at Table 2, in between the other tables.

This seemed strange to Rist. He knew that the children had not been tested for abil- ity, yet their teacher was certain that she could identify the bright and slow children. Investigating further, Rist found that social class was the underlying basis for assigning the children to the different tables. Middle-class students were separated out for Table 1, and children from poorer homes were assigned to Tables 2 and 3. The teacher paid the most attention to the children at Table 1, who were closest to her, less to Table 2, and the least to Table 3. As the year went on, children from Table 1 perceived that they were treated better and came to see themselves as smarter. They became the leaders in class activities and even called children at the other tables “dumb.” Eventually, the children at Table 3 disengaged themselves from many classroom activities. At the end of the year, only the children at Table 1 had completed the lessons that prepared them for reading.

This early tracking stuck. Their first-grade teacher looked at the work these students had done, and she placed students from Table 1 at her Table 1. She treated her tables much as the kindergarten teacher had, and the children at Table 1 again led the class.

The children’s reputations continued to follow them. The second-grade teacher reviewed their scores and also divided her class into three groups. The first she named the “Tigers” and, befitting their name, gave them challenging readers. Not surprisingly, the Tigers came from the original Table 1 in kindergarten. The second group she called the “Cardinals.” They came from the original Tables 2 and 3. Her third group consisted of children she had failed the previous year, whom she called the “Clowns.” The Cardinals and Clowns were given less advanced readers.

70%

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50%

40%

30%

20%

10%

0

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90%

How many complete high school?

Of those who complete high school, how many go to college?

82

73

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Whites African Americans Latinos68

42

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Source: By the author. Based on Statistical Abstract of the United States 2012:Table 273.

FIGURE 13.3 Funneling Effects of Education: Race–Ethnicity

Note: The source gives totals only for these three groups.

The

How does the Rist research illustrate the effects of social class in education?

392 CHAPTER 13 Education and Religion

How do teacher expectations work?

Rist concluded that each child’s journey through school was determined by the eighth day of kindergarten! As we saw with the Saints and Roughnecks, in Chapter 4, labels can be so powerful that they can set people on courses of action that affect the rest of their lives.

What occurred was a self-fulfilling prophecy. This term, coined by sociologist Robert Merton (1949/1968), refers to a false assumption of some- thing that is going to happen but which then comes true simply because it was predicted. For example, if people believe an unfounded rumor that a credit union is going to fail because its officers have embezzled their money, they all rush to the credit union to demand their money. The prediction— although originally false—is now likely to come true.

How Do Teacher Expectations Work? Sociologist George Farkas (Farkas et al. 1990a;

Farkas et al. 1990b; Farkas 1996) became interested in how teacher expectations affect grades. Using a stratified sample of students in a large school district in Texas, he found that teacher expectations produced gender and racial–ethnic biases. On the gender level: Even though boys and girls had the same test scores, girls on average were given higher course grades. On the racial–ethnic level: Asian Americans who had the same test scores as the other groups averaged higher grades.

At first, this may sound like more of the same old news—another case of discrimi- nation. But this explanation doesn’t fit, which is what makes the finding fascinating. Look at who the victims are. It is most unlikely that the teachers would be prejudiced against boys and whites. To interpret these unexpected results, Farkas used symbolic interactionism. He observed that some students “signal” to their teachers that they are “good students.” They show an eagerness to cooperate, and they quickly agree with what the teacher says. They also show that they are “trying hard.” The teach- ers pick up these signals and reward these “good students” with better grades. Girls and Asian Americans, the researcher concluded, are better at giving these signals so coveted by teachers.

We do not have enough information on how teachers communicate their expecta- tions to students. Nor do we know much about how students “signal” messages to teachers. Perhaps you will become the educational sociologist who will shed more light on this significant area of human behavior.

Problems in U.S. Education—and Their Solutions

Now that we’ve looked at some of the dynamics within the classroom, let’s turn to three problems facing U.S. education—mediocrity, cheating, and violence—and consider potential solutions.

Mediocrity The Rising Tide of Mediocrity. Since I know you love taking tests, let’s see how you do on these three questions:

1. How many goals are on a basketball court? a. 1 b. 2 c. 3 d. 4 2. How many halves are in a college basketball game? a. 1 b. 2 c. 3 d. 4 3. How many points does a three-point field goal account for in a basketball game?

a. 1 b. 2 c. 3 d. 4

Education can be a dangerous thing. Socrates, who taught in Greece about 400 years before the birth of Christ, was forced to take poison because his views challenged those of the estab- lishment. Usually, however, educators reinforce the perspectives of the elite, teaching students to take their place within the social structure. This 1787 painting, “The Death of Socrates,” is by J. L. David (1748–1825).

Problems in U.S. Education—and Their Solutions 393

I know this sounds like a joke, but it isn’t. Sociologist Robert Benford (2007) got his hands on a copy of a twenty-question final examination given to basketball players who took a credit course on coaching principles at the University of Georgia. It is usu- ally difficult to refer to athletes, sports, and academics in the same breath, but this is about as mediocre as mediocrity can get.

Let’s move to a broader view of the mediocrity that plagues our educational system like pollution plagues gasoline engines:

Arizona officials gave their high school sophomores a math test that covered the math that sophomores should know. One of ten passed. New York City officials, in contrast, were so pleased at their test results that they called a press conference. They boasted that 80 percent of their students were proficient at math—and they had the test results to prove it. When the students took a federal test, the results dropped just a bit—to 34 percent (Medina 2009). Pennsylvania officials figured out a solution to their students’ miserable test results: Students who can’t pass their exit exam can do “projects” instead. Not to be outdone in this race to the bottom, Arkansas dropped its passing score in math to 24 out of 100 (Urbina 2010).

The SAT Tests. How are we doing on our SAT tests? The news is mixed. First the good news. Look at Figure 13.4. You can see how the scores dropped from the 1960s to 1980. At that point, educators sounded an alarm—and even Congress expressed concern. School officials decided that they had better do something if they didn’t want to lose their jobs. They raised their standards, and the SAT scores started to climb. The recovery in math is encouraging. Today’s high school seniors score the same in math as seniors did in the 1960s. Administrators are requiring more of math teachers, and teachers are requiring more of students. Each is performing according to these higher expectations.

But then there is the bad news. Look at the verbal scores on Figure 13.4. Their drop from the 1960s is even larger than the drop in math, and they are continuing to go down. No one knows why these scores remain so low, but the usual suspects have been rounded up: “dummied down” textbooks, less rigorous teaching, and less reading because of television, videos, and computer games.

The news is actually worse than what you see on this figure. To accomodate today’s less prepared students, those who develop the SAT made it easier. They shortened the test, dropped the section on analogies and antonyms, and gave students more time to take the test. The test makers then “rescored” the totals of previous years to match the easier test. This “dummying down” of the SAT is a form of grade inflation, the topic to which we shall now turn.

Grade Inflation, Social Promotion, and Functional Illiteracy. The letter grade C used to indicate average, and since more students are average than superior, high school teachers used to give about twice as many C ’ s as A’ s. Now they give more A’ s than C ’ s. Students aren’t smarter—grading is just easier. Grades have become so inflated that some of today’s A’s are the C ’s of years past. Grade inflation is so pervasive that 47 percent of all college freshmen have an overall high school grade point average of A. This is more than twice what it was in 1970 (Statistical Abstract 2012:Table 286). Grade inflation has also hit the Ivy League. At Harvard University, half of the course grades are A’ s and A–’ s. Ninety percent of Harvard students graduate with honors. To rein in “honor inflation,” the Harvard faculty voted to limit the number of students who graduate with honors to 60 percent of a class (Hartocollis 2002; Douthat 2005).

550

530

500

490

510

520

540

S co

re

Year

1967 1970 1980 1990 2000 2010 2020

Math

Verbal

Sources: By the author. Based on College Board 2011a; Statistical Abstract of the United States 2012:Table 267.

National Results of the Scholastic Assessment Test (SAT)

Note: Possible scores range from 200 to 800.

FIGURE 13.4

Why does the word mediocre apply to the average U.S. high school? What is grade inflation?

394 CHAPTER 13 Education and Religion

On average, students in Roman Catholic schools score higher on national tests than students in public schools. Is it because Roman Catholic schools have better students, or because they do better teaching? The text reports the sociological findings.

Easy grades and declining standards have been accompanied by social promotion, passing students from one grade to the next even though they have not learned the basic materials. One result is functional illiteracy, high school graduates who never mastered even things they should have learned in grade school. Some have difficulty with reading and writing. Others can’t fill out job applications. Some can’t even figure out whether they get the right change at the grocery store.

Raising Standards for Teachers. It is one thing to identify problems, quite another to find solutions for them. How can we solve mediocrity? To offer a quality education, we need quality teachers. Don’t we already have them? Most teachers are qualified and, if motivated, can do an excellent job. But a large number of teachers are not qualified. Consider what happened in California, where teachers must pass an educational skills test. The teachers did so poorly that to fill the classrooms officials had to drop the passing grade to the tenth-grade level. These teachers are college graduates—and they are expected to perform at the tenth-grade level (Schemo 2002). I don’t know

about you, but I think this situation is a national disgrace. If we want to improve teaching, we need to insist that teachers meet high standards.

Raising Standards for Students. What else can we do to improve the quality of educa- tion? An older study by sociologists James Coleman and Thomas Hoffer (1987) provides helpful guidelines. They wanted to see why the test scores of students in Roman Catholic schools average 15 to 20 percent higher than those of students in public schools. Is it because Catholic schools attract better students, while public schools have to put up with everyone? To find out, they tested 15,000 students in public and Catholic high schools.

Their findings? From the sophomore through the senior years, students at Catholic schools pull ahead of public school students by a full grade in verbal and math skills. The superior test performance of students in Catholic schools, they concluded, is not due to better students, but to higher standards. Catholic schools have not watered down their curricula as have pub- lic schools. The researchers also underscored the importance of parental involvement. Parents and teachers in Catholic schools reinforce each other’s commitment to learning.

These findings support the basic principle reviewed earlier about teacher expecta- tions: Students perform better when they are expected to meet higher standards. To this, you might want to reply, “Of course. I knew that. Who wouldn’t?” Somehow, however, this basic principle is lost on many teachers, who expect little of their stu- dents and have supervisors who accept low student performance. The reason, actually, is probably not their lack of awareness of such basics, but, rather, the organization that entraps them, a bureaucracy in which ritual replaces performance. To understand this point better, you may want to review Chapter 5.

A Warning about Higher Standards. If we raise standards, we can expect to upset students and their parents. It is soothing to use low standards and to pat students on the head and tell them they are doing well. But it upsets people if you do rigorous teach- ing and use high standards to measure performance. When Florida decided that its high school seniors needed to pass an assessment test in order to receive a diploma, 13,000 students failed the test. Parents of failed students protested. Did they demand better teaching? Or that bad teachers be fired? No. They wanted the state to drop the new test. In their anger, they asked people to boycott Disney World and to not buy Florida orange juice (Canedy 2003). What positive steps to improve their children’s learning!

Let’s look at a second problem in education.

Cheating The cheating I’m referring to is not what you saw in your social studies or mathematics class in high school. I’m referring to cheating by teachers and school administrators. Listen to this:

The state school board of Georgia ordered an investigation after computer scanners showed that teachers in 191 schools had erased students’ answers on reading and math

How will higher standards for teachers raise standards for students? Why would higher educational standards upset parents?

The Need for Educational Reform 395

tests and penciled in correct ones (Gabriel 2010). The cheating was apparently led by the superintendant of Atlanta’s school system (Severson 2011).

The school district was facing pressure to show that their teaching had improved, and this was a quick way to do it. It is not far-fetched to think that these same teachers cheated on tests when they were students.

Now look at how states fake their high school graduation rates:

Mississippi keeps two sets of books: The one sent to Washington reports the state’s gradua- tion rate at 87 percent. The other, which the state keeps, reports that 63 percent of its stu- dents graduate. Other states do the same. California reports its totals at 83 percent and 67 percent (Dillon 2008).

Why do high school administrators across the nation fake their graduation rates? The reason is that federal agencies publish these reports, and states don’t want to look bad. Also, Washington might reduce the money it gives them. It’s like a girl telling her par- ents that she received a B in English when she really received a D. She didn’t want to look bad, and her allowance might be cut.

School administrators can be quite creative in producing fake numbers. Some count the number of students who begin their senior year, and report the percentage of these seniors who graduate. This conveniently overlooks all those who drop out in the fresh- man, sophomore, and junior years. Some even encourage high school students who are doing poorly to drop out before they reach their senior year. This way, they won’t be counted as dropouts (Dillon 2008).

The Solution to Cheating. The solution to this problem is fairly simple. Zero tol- erance. Develop a straightforward measurement of high school graduation and require all states to follow it. A simple measure is to compare the number of those who grad- uate from high school with the number who entered high school in the ninth grade four years earlier, minus those who died and those who transferred out plus those who transferred in. Federal officials can spot-check records across the nation. With loss of job the punishment, we could expect honesty in reporting to jump immediate- ly. Real graduation rates would help pinpoint where the problems are, helping us to know where to focus solutions. If you don’t know where it’s broken, you don’t know where to fix it.

Let’s turn to the third problem.

Violence Some U.S. schools have deteriorated to the point that safety is an issue. In these schools, uniformed guards and metal detectors have become permanent fixtures. Everywhere, school officials fear that “it could happen here.” In an era of bomb threats and armed sociopaths, some states now require lockdown, or “Code Blue,” drills: The classrooms— each equipped with a phone—are locked, the windows are locked, and the shades are drawn. The students are told to remain absolutely silent, while a school official wanders the halls, like an armed intruder, listening for the slightest sound that would indicate that someone is in a classroom (Kelley 2008).

School shootings are a national concern. For a surprising analysis of deaths at school, read the Mass Media box on the next page.

The Need for Educational Reform Most of the changes in education are merely minor adjustments to a flawed system: giving this test instead of that test, requiring more memorizing or less memorizing, measuring progress this way instead of that way, tinkering with the curriculum, or motivating teachers and students by this carrot or that carrot. Each might be important in its own way, but each is but a minute adjustment to the details of a system that needs to be overhauled from top to bottom.

We are unlikely to do this.

How do some school administrators cheat? How can we stop it?

396 CHAPTER 13 Education and Religion

How has school violence (deaths at U.S. schools) changed in recent years?

Mass Media in Social Life

School Shootings: Exploding a Myth A headline like “Schools Safer Than Ever!” simply doesn’t get much attention—nor bring in much advertising revenue.

This is one reason that we need sociology: to quietly, dispassionately search for facts so we can better understand the events that shape our lives. The first requirement for solving any problem is accurate data, for how can we create rational solutions that are based on hysteria? The information presented in this box may not make for sensational headlines, but it does serve to explode one of the myths that the media have created.

For Your Consideration↑

How do you think we can reduce school shootings? How about school violence of any sort?

This frame from a home video shows Eric Harris (on the left) and Dylan Klebold (on the right) as they pretend that they are searching for victims. They put their desires into practice in the infamous Columbine High School shootings.

The media sprinkle their reports of school shootings with such dramatic phrases as “alarming proportions,” “out- break of violence,” and “out of control.” They give us the impression that wackos walk our hallways, ready to spray our schools with gunfire. Parents used to consider schools safe havens, but no longer. Those naïve thoughts have been shattered by the bullets that have ripped through schools—or at least by the media’s portrayal of growing danger and violence in our schools.

Have our schools really become war zones, as the mass media would have us believe? Certainly events such as those at Columbine High School and Virginia Tech are disturbing, but we need to probe deeper than newspaper headlines and televised images.

When we do, we find that the media’s sensationalist reporting has created a myth. Contrary to “what everyone knows,” there is no trend toward greater school violence. In fact, the situation is just the opposite—the trend is toward greater safety at school. Despite the dramatic school shootings that make screaming headlines, as you can see from Table 13.1, shooting deaths at schools are decreasing. The average number of annual shooting deaths for 1992 to 2000 is twenty-eight, which is more than twice as high as the annual average of thirteen for 2000 to 2010.

This is not to say that school shootings are not a seri- ous problem. Even one student being wounded or killed is too many. But, contrary to the impression fostered by the media, school shooting deaths have dropped sharply. Source: By the author. Based on National School Safety Center 2012.

TABLE 13.1 Exploding a Myth: Deaths

Victims

School Year Shooting Deaths

Other Deaths

2 Boys Girls Total

1992–1993 45 11 49 7 56 1993–1994 41 12 41 12 53 1994–1995 16 5 18 3 21 1995–1996 29 7 26 10 36 1996–1997 15 11 18 8 26 1997–1998 36 8 27 17 44 1998–1999 25 6 24 7 31 1999–2000 16 16 26 6 32 2000–2001 19 5 20 4 24 2001–2002 4 2 6 0 6 2002–2003 14 8 16 6 22 2003–2004 29 13 37 5 42 2004–2005 20 8 20 8 28 2005–2006 5 0 4 1 5 2006–2007 16 4 13 7 20 2007-2008 3 0 3 0 3 2008-2009 10 3 11 2 13 2009-2010 5 2 4 3 7 Total 1992–2010 348 121 363 106 469 Mean 1992–2009 19.3 6.7 20.2 5.9 26.1

1Includes all school-related homicides, even those that occurred on the way to or from school. Includes suicides, school personnel killed at school by other adults, and even adults who had nothing to do with the school but who were found dead on school property. Source does not report on deaths at colleges, only K–12 (kindergarten through high school). 2Beating, hanging, jumping, stabbing, slashing, strangling, or heart attack.

at U.S. Schools1

What Is Religion? 397

What three elements of religion did Durkheim identify? What are “sacred” and “profane”?

When I visited a Hindu temple in Chattisgargh, India, I was impressed by the colorful and expressive statues on its roof. Here is a close-up of some of those figures, which represent some of the millions of gods that Hindus worship.

Religion: Establishing Meaning

Let’s look at the main characteristics of a second significant social institution.

What Is Religion? Sociologists who do research on religion analyze the relationship between society and religion and study the role that religion plays in people’s lives. They do not try to prove that one religion is better than another. Nor is it their goal to verify or disprove anyone’s faith. As was mentioned in Chapter 1, sociologists have no tools for deciding that one course of action is more moral than another, much less for determining that one religion is the “correct” one. Religion is a matter of faith—and sociologists deal with empirical matters, things they can observe or measure. When it comes to religion, then, sociologists study the effects of religious beliefs and practices on people’s lives. They also analyze how religion is related to stratification systems. Unlike theologians, however, sociologists do not try to evaluate the truth of a religion’s teachings.

Emile Durkheim was highly interested in religion, probably because he was reared in a mixed-religion family, by a Protestant mother and a Jewish father. Durkheim decided to find out what all religions have in common. After surveying religions around the world, in 1912 he published his findings in The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life. Here are Durkheim’s three main findings. The first is that the world’s religions are so varied that they have no specific belief or practice in common. The second is that all religions develop a community centering on their beliefs and practices. The third is that all religions separate the sacred from the profane. By sacred, Durkheim referred to aspects of life having to do with the supernatural that inspire awe, reverence, deep respect, even fear. By profane, he meant aspects of life that are not concerned with religion but, instead, are part of ordinary, everyday life.

Durkheim (1912/1965) summarized his conclusions by saying:

A religion is a unified system of beliefs and practices relative to sacred things, that is to say, things set apart and forbidden—beliefs and practices which unite into one single moral community called a Church, all those who adhere to them.

Religion, then, has three elements:

1. Beliefs that some things are sacred (forbidden, set apart from the profane) 2. Practices (rituals) centering on the things considered sacred 3. A moral community (a church) resulting from a group’s beliefs and

practices

Durkheim used the word church in an unusual sense, to refer to any “moral community” centered on beliefs and practices regarding the sacred. In Durkheim’s sense, church refers to Buddhists bow- ing before a shrine, Hindus dipping in the Ganges River, and Confucians offering food to their ancestors. Similarly, the term moral community does not imply morality in the sense familiar to most of us—of ethical conduct. Rather, a moral community is simply a group of people who are united by their religious practices— and that would include sixteenth-century Aztec priests who each day gathered around an altar to pluck out the beating heart of a virgin.

To better understand the sociological approach to religion, let’s see what pictures emerge when we apply the three theoretical perspectives.

398 CHAPTER 13 Education and Religion

The Functionalist Perspective Functionalists stress that religion is universal because it meets universal human needs. Let’s look at some of the functions—and dysfunctions—of religion.

Functions of Religion Questions about Ultimate Meaning. Around the world, religions provide answers to perplexing ques- tions about ultimate meaning—such as the purpose of life, why people suffer, and the existence of an afterlife. Those answers give followers a sense of pur- pose, a framework in which to live. Instead of seeing themselves buffeted by random events in an aimless existence, believers see their lives as fitting into a divine plan.

Emotional Comfort. The answers that religion provides about ultimate meaning bring comfort by assuring people that there is a purpose to life, even to suffering. The religious rituals that enshroud crucial events such as ill- ness and death assure the individual that others care.

Social Solidarity. Religious teachings and practices unite believers into a community that shares values and perspectives (“we Jews,” “we Christians,” “we Muslims”). The religious rituals that surround marriage, for example, link the bride and groom with a broader community that wishes them well. So do other religious rituals, such as those that celebrate birth and mourn death.

Guidelines for Everyday. The teachings of religion are not all abstractions. They also provide practical guidelines for everyday life. For example, four of the ten com- mandments delivered by Moses to the Israelites concern God, but the other six contain instructions for getting along with others, from how to avoid problems with parents and neighbors to warnings about lying, stealing, and having affairs.

One of the many functions of religion is providing emotional comfort. This photo was taken in a Wesleyan church in Williamsville, New York.

What are some of the functions of religion? Can you give examples?

Religion can promote social change, as was evident in the U.S. civil rights movement. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., a Baptist minister, shown here in his famous “I have a dream” speech, was the foremost leader of this movement.

The Symbolic Interactionist Perspective 399

What are some dysfunctions of religion?

The consequences for people who follow these guidelines can be measured. For example, people who attend church are more likely to exercise and less likely to abuse alcohol, nicotine, and illegal drugs than are people who don’t go to church (Gillum 2005; Wallace et al. 2007; Newport et al. 2012). In general, churchgoers follow a healthier lifestyle than people who don’t go to church—and they live longer.

Social Control. Although a religion’s guidelines for everyday life usually apply only to its members, nonmembers feel a spillover. Religious teachings, for example, are incor- porated into criminal law. In an earlier United States, people could be arrested for blas- phemy and adultery. Some states still have laws that prohibit the sale of alcohol before noon on Sunday, laws whose purpose was to get people out of the saloons and into the churches.

Social Change. Although religion is often so bound up with the prevailing social order that it resists social change, religion occasionally spearheads change. In the 1960s, for example, the civil rights movement, whose goals were to desegregate pub- lic facilities and abolish racial discrimination at Southern polls, was led by religious leaders, especially leaders of African American churches such as Martin Luther King, Jr. Churches also served as centers at which demonstrators were trained and rallies were organized. Other churches were centers for resisting this change.

Dysfunctions of Religion Functionalists also examine ways in which religion is dysfunctional, that is, how it can bring harmful results. Two dysfunctions are persecution and war and terrorism.

Religion as Justification for Persecution. Beginning in the 1100s and continu- ing into the 1800s, in what has become known as the Inquisition, special commissions of the Roman Catholic Church tortured accused heretics. In 1692, Protestant leaders in Salem, Massachusetts, executed twenty-one women and men who were accused of being witches. In 2001, in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, about 1,000 alleged witches were hacked to death (Jenkins 2002). In Angola, children who are accused of being witches are beaten and then killed or expelled (LaFraniere 2007). Similarly, it seems fair to say that the Aztec religion had its dysfunctions—at least for the virgins who were offered to appease angry gods. In short, religion has been used to justify oppres- sion and any number of brutal acts.

War and Terrorism. History is filled with wars based on religion—commingled with politics. Between the eleventh and fourteenth centuries, for example, Christian monarchs conducted nine bloody Crusades in an attempt to wrest control of the region they called the Holy Land from the Muslims. The suicide terrorists we focused on in Chapter 11 are a current example.

The Symbolic Interactionist Perspective Symbolic interactionists focus on the meanings that people give their experiences, espe- cially how they use symbols. Let’s apply this perspective to religious symbols, rituals, and beliefs to see how they help to forge a community of like-minded people.

Religious Symbols Suppose that it is about two thousand years ago and you have just joined a new religion. You have come to believe that a recently crucified Jew named Jesus is the Messiah, the Lamb of God offered for your sins. The Roman leaders are persecuting the followers of Jesus. They hate your religion because you and your fellow believers will not acknowledge Caesar as God.

Christians are few in number, and you are eager to have fellowship with other believ- ers. But how can you tell who is a believer? Spies are everywhere. The government has sworn to destroy this new religion, and you do not relish the thought of being fed to lions in the Colosseum.

400 CHAPTER 13 Education and Religion

You use a simple technique. While talking with a stranger, as though doodling absentmindedly in the sand or dust, you casually trace the outline of a fish. Only fellow believers know the meaning—that, taken together, the first letter of each word in the Greek sentence “Jesus (is) Christ the Son of God” spell the Greek word for fish. If the other person gives no response, you rub out the outline and continue the interaction as usual. If there is a response, you eagerly talk about your new faith.

All religions use symbols to provide identity and create social solidarity for their mem- bers. For Muslims, the primary symbol is the crescent moon and star; for Jews, the Star of David; for Christians, the cross. For members, these are not ordinary symbols, but sacred emblems that evoke feelings of awe and reverence. In Durkheim’s terms, religions use symbols to represent what the group considers sacred and to separate the sacred from the profane.

A symbol is a condensed way of communicating. Worn by a fundamentalist Christian, for example, the cross says, “I am a follower of Jesus Christ. I believe that He is the Messiah, the promised Son of God, that He loves me, that He died to take away my sins, that He rose from the dead and is going to return

to earth, and that through Him I will receive eternal life.” That is a lot to pack into one symbol—and it is only part of what the

symbol means to a fundamentalist believer. To people in other traditions of Christianity, the cross conveys somewhat different meanings—but to all Christians, the cross is a shorthand way of expressing many meanings. So it is with the Star of David, the crescent moon and star, the cow (expressing

How do religious symbols help to create community? What are rituals? Cosmology?

Symbolic interactionists stress that a basic characteristic of humans is that they attach meaning to objects and events and then use represen- tations of those objects or events to communicate with one another. Michaelangelo’s Pietà, depicting Mary tenderly holding her son, Jesus, after his crucifixion, is one of the most acclaimed symbols in the Western world. It is admired for its beauty by believ- ers and nonbe- lievers alike.

to Hindus the unity of all living things), and the various symbols of the world’s many other religions.

Rituals Rituals, ceremonies or repetitive practices, are also symbols that help to unite people into a moral community. Some rituals, such as the bar mitzvah of Jewish boys and the holy communion of Christians, are designed to create in devout believers a feeling of closeness with God and unity with one another. Rituals include kneeling and praying at set times; bowing; crossing oneself; singing; light- ing candles and incense; reading scripture; and following prescribed traditions at

processions, baptisms, weddings, and funer- als. The photo essay on pages 402–403 features annual rituals held in Spain during Holy Week (the week that leads into the Christian holiday of Easter).

Beliefs Symbols, including rituals, develop from beliefs. The belief may be vague (“God is”) or highly specific (“God wants us to prostrate ourselves and face Mecca five times each day”). Religious beliefs include not only values (what is considered good and desirable in life—how we ought to live) but also a cosmology, a uni- fied picture of the world. For example, the Jewish, Christian, and Muslim belief that there is only one God, the creator of the universe, who is concerned about the actions of humans and who will hold us accountable for what we do, is a cosmology. It presents a unifying picture of the universe.

Religions use rituals to create community—a sense of being connected with one another and, in this case, also a sense of being connected with God. Shown here is a Sikh temple in Penjab, India.

The Conflict Perspective 401

Religious Experience The term religious experience refers to a sudden awareness of the supernatural or a feeling of coming into contact with God. Some people undergo a mild version, such as feeling closer to God when they look at a mountain, watch a sunset, or listen to a certain piece of music. Others report a life-transforming experience. St. Francis of Assisi, for example, said that he became aware of God’s presence in every living thing.

Some Protestants use the term born again to describe people who have undergone such a life-transforming religious experience. These people say that they came to the realization that they had sinned, that Jesus had died for their sins, and that God wants them to live a new life. Their worlds become transformed. They look forward to the Resurrection and to a new life in heaven and they see relationships with spouses, par- ents, children, and even bosses in a new light. They also report a need to make changes in how they interact with others so that their lives reflect their new, personal commit- ment to Jesus as their “Savior and Lord.” They describe a feeling of beginning life anew; hence the term born again.

The Conflict Perspective In general, conflict theorists are highly critical of religion. They stress that religion supports the status quo and helps to maintain social inequalities. Let’s look at some of their analyses.

Opium of the People Karl Marx, an avowed atheist who believed that the existence of God was impossible, set the tone for conflict theorists with this statement: “Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the sentiment of a heartless world. . . . It is the opium of the people” (Marx 1844/1964). Marx meant that for oppressed workers religion is like a drug that helps addicts forget their misery. By diverting thoughts toward future hap- piness in an afterlife, religion takes the workers’ eyes off their suffering in this world, reducing the possibility that they will overthrow their chains by rebelling against their oppressors.

Legitimating Social Inequalities Conflict theorists stress that religion legitimates social inequalities. By this, they mean that religion teaches that the existing social arrange- ments represent what God desires. For example, during the Middle Ages, Christian theologians decreed the divine right of kings. This doctrine meant that God determined who would become king and set him on the throne. The king ruled in God’s place, and it was the duty of a king’s subjects to be loyal to him (and to pay their taxes). To disobey the king was to disobey God.

In what was perhaps the supreme technique of legitimating the social order (and one that went even a step farther than the divine right of kings), the religion of ancient Egypt held that the pharaoh himself was a god. The emperor of Japan was similarly declared divine. If this were so, who could ever question his decisions? Today’s politicians would give their right arms for such a religious teaching.

Conflict theorists point to many other examples of how religion legitimates the social order. In India, Hinduism supports the caste system by teaching that anyone who tries to change caste will come back in the next life as a member of a lower caste—or even as an animal. In the decades before the American Civil War, Southern ministers used scripture to defend slavery, saying that it was God’s will—while Northern ministers legitimated their region’s social structure by using scripture to denounce slavery as evil (Ernst 1988; Nauta 1993; White 1995).

In the 1700s, men and women sat in separate sections during their meetings. This one is a bit different, with the division by floors. Do you think sex-segregated seating supports the conflict perspective that religion reflects and legitimates social inequalities? Why or why not?

What is the conflict perspective on religion? What does “legitimating social inequalities” mean?

feature tronos that depic t

the biblical account of Je sus'

suffering, death, and res urrec-

tion. During the processi ons in

Malaga, the participants walk slowly for about

two minutes; then becaus e of the weight of the

tronos, they rest for abou t two minutes. They

repeat this process for ab out six hours a day.

Holy Week in Spain

Religious groups develop rituals designed to

evoke memories, create a we, inspire reverence,

and stimulate social solid arity. One of the

primary means by which g roups, religious and

secular, accomplish these goals is through the

display of symbols. I took these photos duri

ng Holy Week

in Spain—in Malaga and Almuñecar.

Throughout Spain, elabo rate processions

A group of participants exiting the Church of the Incarnation for Malaga‘s Easter procession.

Bands, sometimes several of them, are

part of the processions.

The procession in the

village was mo re informal.

This Roman so ldier has

an interesting way of

participating— and keeping

tabs—on his li ttle daughter.

The girl is distr ibuting candy.

Parents gave a lot of attention to their children both during the preparations and during the processions. This photo was taken during one of the repetitive two-minute breaks.

During the short breaks at the night processions, children from the audience would rush to collect dripping wax to make wax balls. This was one way that the audience made themselves participants in the drama.

Beneath the costum es

are townspeople an d

church members wh o

know one another w ell.

They enjoy themselv es

prior to the processi on.

This man is preparin g

to put on his hood.

For the Good Friday process

ion, I was fortu nate

to be able to p hotograph the

behind-the-sc enes

preparations, w hich are seldom

seen by visito rs.

Shown here ar e fi nishing tou

ches being giv en to

the Mary fi gure .

The village's town square was packed with people awaiting the procession. From one corner of the square, the trono of Jesus was brought in. Then from another, that of Mary (“reuniting” them, as I was told). During this climactic scene, the priest on the balcony on the left read a message.

Some tronos are so heavy that they require many men to carry them. (Some were carried by over 100 men.) This photo was taken in Malaga, on Monday of Holy Week.

© James M. Henslin, all photos

404 CHAPTER 13 Education and Religion

Religion and the Spirit of Capitalism

Max Weber disagreed with the conflict perspective. Religion, he said, does not merely reflect and legitimate the social order and impede social change. Rather, religion’s focus on the afterlife is a source of profound social change.

To explain his conclusions, Weber wrote The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism (1904–1905/1958). He said that:

1. Capitalism represents a fundamentally different way of thinking about work and money. Traditionally, people worked just enough to meet their basic needs, not so that they could have a surplus to invest. To accumulate money (capi- tal) as an end in itself, not just to spend it, was a radical departure from traditional thinking. People even came to consider it a duty to invest money so they could make prof- its. They reinvested these profits to make even more profits. Weber called this new approach to work and money the spirit of capitalism.

2. Why did the spirit of capitalism develop in Europe and not, for example, in China or India, where people had similar material resources and education? According to Weber, religion was the key. The religions of China and India, and indeed Roman Catholicism in Europe, encouraged a traditional approach to life, not thrift and investment. Capitalism appeared when Protestantism came on the scene.

3. What was different about Protestantism, especially Calvinism? John Calvin taught that God had predestined some people to go to heaven, and others to hell. Neither church membership nor feelings about your relationship with God could assure you that you were saved. You wouldn’t know your fate until after you died.

4. “Am I predestined to hell or to heaven?” Calvin’s followers wondered. As they wrestled with this question, they concluded that church members have a duty to live as though they are predestined to heaven—for good works are a demonstration of salvation.

5. This conclusion motivated Calvinists to lead moral lives and to work hard, to use their time productively, and to be frugal—for idleness and needless spending were signs of worldliness. Weber called this self-denying approach to life the Protestant ethic.

6. As people worked hard and spent money only on necessities (a pair of earrings or a second pair of dress shoes would have been defined as sinful luxuries), they had money left over. Because it couldn’t be spent, this capital was invested, which led to a surge in production.

7. Weber’s analysis can be summed up this way: The change in religion (from Catholi- cism to Protestantism, especially Calvinism) led to a fundamental change in thought and behavior (the Protestant ethic). The result was the spirit of capitalism. For this reason, capitalism originated in Europe and not in places where religion did not encourage capitalism’s essential elements: the accumulation of capital and its invest- ment and reinvestment.

Although Weber’s analysis has been influential, it has not lacked critics. Hundreds of scholars have attacked it, some for overlooking the lack of capitalism in Scotland (a Calvinist country), others for failing to explain why the Industrial Revolution was born in England (not a Calvinist country). Hundreds of other scholars have defended Weber’s argument, and sociologists continue to test Weber’s theory (Becker 2009; Basten and Betz 2008). Currently, sociologists are not in agreement on this matter.

At this point in history, the Protestant ethic and the spirit of capitalism are not confined to any specific religion or even to any one part of the world. Rather, they

According to Weber’s analysis, how did religion produce capitalism?

For some Americans, religion is an “easy-going, makes-little-difference” matter, as expressed in this cartoon. For others, religious matters are firmly held, and followers find even slight differences of faith to be significant.

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Types of Religious Groups 405

have become cultural traits that have spread to societies around the globe (Greeley 1964; Yinger 1970). U.S. Catholics have about the same approach to life as do U.S. Protestants. In addition, Hong Kong, Japan, Malaysia, Singapore, South Korea, and Taiwan—not exactly Protestant countries—have embraced capitalism. China, Russia, and Vietnam are in the midst of doing so.

Types of Religious Groups Sociologists have identified four types of religious groups: cult, sect, church, and eccle- sia. Why do some of these groups meet with hostility, while others tend to be accepted? For an explanation, look at Figure 13.5.

Let’s explore what sociologists have found about these four types of religious groups. The summary that follows is a modification of analyses by sociologists Ernst Troeltsch (1931), Liston Pope (1942), and Benton Johnson (1963).

Cult The word cult conjures up bizarre images—shaven heads, weird music, brainwashing— and even ritual suicide may come to mind. Cults, however, are not necessarily weird, and few practice “brainwashing” or bizarre rituals. In fact, all religions began as cults (Stark 1989). A cult is simply a new or different religion whose teachings and practices put it at odds with the dominant culture and religion. Because the term cult arouses such negative meanings in the public mind, however, some scholars prefer to use the term new religion instead. As is evident from the Cultural Diversity box on the next page, “new” can mean that an old religion is making its appearance in a culture that is not familiar with it.

Cults often originate with a charismatic leader, an individual who inspires people because he or she seems to have extraordinary gifts, qualities, or abilities. Charisma refers to an outstanding gift or to some exceptional quality. People feel drawn to both the person and the message because they find something highly appealing about the individual—in some instances, almost a magnetic charm.

Note: Any religious organization can be placed somewhere on this continuum, based on its having “more” or “less” of these characteristics and emphases. The varying proportions of the rectangles are intended to represent the group’s relative characteristics and emphases.

FIGURE 13.5 Religious Groups: From Hostility to Acceptance

Sources: By the author. Based on Troeltsch 1931; Pope 1942; and Johnson 1963.

The more that a group has these emphases, the less it is accepted:

Less acceptance by society

Cult

Sect

Church

Ecclesia

More acceptance by society

1. The need to reject society (the culture is a threat to true religion)

2. The group feels rejected by society (the group feels hostility)

3. Hostility toward other religions 4. Hostility from other religions 5. Personal salvation 6. Emotional expression of religious beliefs 7. Revelation (God speaks directly to people) 8. God intervenes in people’s lives

(such as healing or giving guidance) 9. A duty to spread the message (evangelism)

10. A literal interpretation of scripture 11. A literal heaven and hell 12. A conversion experience is necessary

The more that a group has these characteristics, the more the group is accepted:

1. The organization is large 2. The organization is wealthy 3. The members are well to do (”worldly success”) 4. The clergy are required to have years of

formal training

What is a cult? What is a charismatic leader?

406 CHAPTER 13 Education and Religion

How do the customs of voodoo and the Santeros test the limits of religious tolerance?

The most popular religion in the world began as a cult. Its handful of followers believed that an unschooled carpenter who preached in remote villages in a backwater country was the Son of God, that he was killed and came back to life. Those beliefs made the early Christians a cult, setting them apart from the rest of their society. Persecuted by both religious and political authorities, these early believers clung to one another for support. Many cut off associations with friends who didn’t accept the new message. To others, the early Christians must have seemed deluded and brainwashed.

So it was with Islam. When Muhammad revealed his visions and said that God’s name was really Allah, only a few people believed him. To others, he must have seemed crazy, deranged.

Most cults fail. Not many people believe the new message, and the cult fades into obscurity. Some, however, succeed and make history. Over time, large numbers of people may come to accept the message and become followers of the religion. If this happens, the new religion changes from a cult to a sect.

Human Heads and Animal Blood: The Toleration of Religion

Cultural Diversity in the United States

As the customs officials looked over the line of people who had just gotten off the plane from Haiti, there was nothing to make this particular woman stand out. She would have passed through without a problem, except for one thing: A routine search turned up something that struck the custom agents as somewhat unusual—a human head.

The head had teeth, hair, pieces of skin, and some dirt. It had evidently been dug up from some grave, probably in Haiti.

The 30-year-old woman, who lives in Florida, practiced voodoo. The head was for her religious rituals.

The woman was arrested. Her crime was not filing a report that she was carrying “organic material” (“Mujer con Cabeza . . .” 2006).

* * * * * The Santeros from Cuba who live

in Florida sacrifice animals. They meet in apartments, where, follow- ing a Yoruba religion, they kill goats and chickens. Calling on their gods, they first ask permission to sacrifice the animals. After sacrificing them, they pour out the animals’ blood, which opens and closes the doors of their destiny. They also cut off the animals’ heads and place them at locations in the city that represent the four directions of the compass. This is done to terrorize their enemies and give them safety. The heads also protect the city from hurricanes and other destructive forces.

When city officials in Hialeah, Florida, learned that the Santeros were planning to build a church in their city, they

passed a law against the sacrifice of animals within the city limits. The Santeros appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, claiming discrimination, because the law was directed against them. The Court ruled in their favor.

City officials of Euless, Texas, were shocked when they learned that Jose Merced was sacrificing goats in his home. They sent in the police (Associated Press 2009). Merced appealed to the federal circuit court, saying that the officials were violating his rights as a Santeria priest. He can now sacrifice goats at home.

For Your Consideration↑

What do you think the limitations on religious freedom should be? Should people be allowed to sacri- fice animals as part of their religious practices?

↑

If the Santeros can sacrifice animals, why shouldn’t people who practice voodoo be able to use human heads if they want to? (Assume that the relatives of the dead person have given their permission.)

A follower of Voodoo holding a chicken before it is sacrificed in a ceremony in Saut d’Eau, Haiti.

U.S.A.U.S.A.

What is a sect? Church? Ecclesia?

Sect A sect is larger than a cult, but its members still feel tension between their views and the prevailing beliefs and values of the broader society. A sect may even be hostile to the society in which it is located. At the very least, its members remain uncomfortable with many of the emphases of the dominant culture; in turn, nonmem- bers tend to be uncomfortable with members of the sect.

If a sect grows, its members tend to gradually make peace with the rest of society. To appeal to a broader base, the sect shifts some of its doctrines, redefining matters to remove some of the rough edges that create ten- sion between it and the rest of society. As the members become more respectable in the eyes of the society, they feel less hostility and little, if any, isolation. If a sect follows this course, as it grows and becomes more integrated into society, it changes into a church.

Church At this point, the religious group is highly bureaucratized—probably with national and inter- national headquarters that give direction to the local congregations, enforce rules about who can be ordained, and control finances. The relationship with God has grown less intense. The group is likely to have less emphasis on personal salvation and emotional expression. Worship services are likely to be more sedate, with formal sermons and written prayers read before the congregation. Rather than being recruited from the outside by personal evange- lism, most new members now come from within, from children born to existing members. Rather than joining through conversion—seeing the new truth—children may be baptized, circumcised, or dedicated in some other way. At some designated age, children may be asked to affirm the group’s beliefs in a ceremony, such as a confirmation or bar mitzvah.

Ecclesia Finally, some groups become so well integrated into a culture, and so strongly allied with their government, that it is difficult to tell where one leaves off and the other takes over. In these state religions, also called ecclesia, the government and religion work together to try to shape society. There is no recruitment of members, for citizenship makes everyone a member. For most people in the society, the religion is part of a cul- tural identity, not an eye-opening experience. Sweden provides a good example of how extensively religion and government intertwine in an ecclesia. In the 1860s, all citizens had to memorize Luther’s Small Catechism and be tested on it annually (Anderson 1995). Today, Lutheranism is still associated with the state, but most Swedes come to church only for baptisms, marriages, and funerals.

Unlike cults and sects, which perceive God as personally involved with and concerned about people, ecclesias envision God as more impersonal and remote. Reflecting this view of the supernatural, church services tend to be highly formal, directed by ministers or priests who, after undergoing training in approved schools or seminaries, follow prescribed rituals.

Variations in Patterns Obviously, not all religious groups go through all these stages—from cult to sect to church to ecclesia. Some die out because they fail to attract enough members. Others, such as the Amish, remain sects. And, as is evident from the few countries that have state religions, very few religions ever become ecclesias.

In addition, these classifications are not perfectly matched in the real world. For example, although the Amish are a sect, they place little or no emphasis on recruiting others. The early Quakers, another sect, shied away from emotional expressions of their beliefs. They would quietly meditate in church, with no one speaking, until God gave someone a mes- sage to share with others. Finally, some groups that become churches may retain a few char- acteristics of sects, such as an emphasis on evangelism or a personal relationship with God.

Although all religions began as cults, not all varieties of a particular religion begin that way. For example, some denominations—“brand names” within a major religion,

Like other aspects of culture, religion is filled with background assumptions that usually go unquestioned. In this photo, which I took in Amsterdam, what background assumption of religion is this woman violating?

408 CHAPTER 13 Education and Religion

such as Baptists or Reform Judaism—begin as splinter groups. Some members of a church disagree with particular aspects of the church’s teachings (not its main message), and they break away to form their own organization.

Religion in the United States To better understand religion in U.S. society, let’s first find out who belongs to religious groups and then look at the groups themselves.

Characteristics of Members About 65 percent of Americans belong to a church, synagogue, or mosque. What are the characteristics of people who hold formal membership in a religion?

Social Class. Religion in the United States is stratified by social class. As you can see from Figure 13.6 below, some religious groups are “top-heavy,” and others are “bottom-heavy.” The most top-heavy are Jews; the most bottom-heavy are Jehovah’s Witnesses. This figure provides further confirmation that churchlike groups tend to appeal to people who have more “worldly” success, while the more sectlike groups attract people who have less “worldly” success.

From this figure, you can see how status consistency (a concept we reviewed in Chapter 8) applies to religious groups. If a group ranks high (or low) on education, it is also likely to rank high (or low) on income and occupational prestige. Jews, for example, rank the highest on education, income, and occupational prestige, while Jehovah’s Witnesses rank the lowest on these three measures of social class. As you can see, the Mormons are status inconsistent. They rank second in income, fourth in education, and tie for sixth in occu- pational prestige. Even more status inconsistent is the Assembly of God. Their members tie for third in occupational prestige but rank only eighth in income and ninth in educa- tion. This inconsistency is so jarring that there could be a problem with the sample.

Explore

Living Data

on mysoclab.com

1

Since the income data were reported, inflation has run approximately 20 percent or so. 2

Higher numbers mean that more of the group’s members work at occupations that have higher prestige, generally those that require more education and pay more. For more information on occupational prestige, see Table 8.2 on page 217.

FIGURE 13.6 Social Class and Religious Affiliation

Source: By the author. Based on Smith and Faris 2005.

Education: Percent with College Degrees

0% 20% Percentage

40% 60%

60%

40%

28%

24%

22%

16%

10%

7%

46%

27%

Jewish

Episcopal

Presbyterian USA

Mormon

Lutheran (Missouri Synod)

Roman Catholic

Southern Baptist

Assembly of God

Jehovah’s Witness

Family Income1

$0 $20 Thousands

$40 $60

$52,000

$40,000

$44,000

$38,000

$36,000

$29,000

$30,000

$27,000

$43,000

United Methodist $34,000

0

Occupational Prestige 2

20 40 60

52

48

44

43

44

43

48

41

49

46

How is church membership related to social class?

Religion in the United States 409

Race–Ethnicity. All major religious groups draw from the nation’s many racial– ethnic groups. Like social class, however, race–ethnicity tends to cluster. People of Irish descent are likely to be Roman Catholics; those with Greek ancestors are likely to belong to the Greek Orthodox Church. African Americans are likely to be Protestants— more specifically, Baptists—or to belong to fundamentalist sects.

Although many churches are integrated, it is with good reason that Sunday morning between 10 and 11 A.M. has been called “the most segregated hour in the United States.” African Americans tend to belong to African American churches, while most whites see only whites in theirs. The segregation of churches is based on custom, not on law.

Characteristics of Religious Groups Let’s examine features of the religious groups in the United States.

Diversity. With its 300,000 congregations and hundreds of denominations, no religious group even comes close to being a dominant religion in the United States (Statistical Abstract 2012:Tables 75, 76). Table 13.2 illustrates some of this remarkable diversity.

Pluralism and Freedom. It is the U.S. government’s policy not to interfere with religions. The government’s position is that its obligation is to ensure an environ- ment in which people can worship as they see fit. Religious freedom is so extensive that anyone can start a church and proclaim himself or herself a minister, revelator, or any other desired term. The exceptions to this hands-off policy are startling. The most notorious exception in recent times occurred in Waco, Texas. When armed agents of the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, and Firearms attacked the compound of the Branch Davidians, an obscure religious group, eighty-two men, women, and children were

How is church membership related to race–ethnicity?

TABLE 13.2 How U.S. Adults Identify with Religion

Source: U.S. Religious Landscape Survey 2008:5.

Religious Group Number of Members Percentage of U.S. Adults

Christian 176,000,000 78.4% Protestant 115,000,000 51.3% Evangelical churches 59,000,000 26.3% Mainline churches 41,000,000 18.1% Historical black churches 16,000,000 6.9%

Roman Catholic 54,000,000 23.9% Mormon 3,800,000 1.7% Jehovah’s Witness 1,600,000 0.7% Orthodox, Greek, Russian 1,400,000 0.6% Other Christian 700,000 0.3% Other Religions 11,000,000 4.7% Jewish 3,800,000 1.7% Buddhist 1,600,000 0.7% Muslim 1,400,000 0.6% Hindu 900,000 0.4% Other faiths (Unitarians, New Age, Native American religions, Liberal)

2,700,000 1.2%

No Identity with a Religion

36,000,000 16.1%

Nothing in particular 27,000,000 12.1% Agnostic 5,400,000 2.4% Atheist 3,600,000 1.6% Don’t Know or Refused 1,800,000 0.8%

Note: Due to rounding, totals may not add to 100. Based on a sample of 35,000 of the 225 million Americans age 18 and over.

410 CHAPTER 13 Education and Religion

What is the likely future of religion in the United States?

burned to death. A second is the government’s infiltration of mosques to monitor the activities of Arab immigrants (Elinson 2004; ACLU 2010). Other limitations to this policy are discussed in the Cultural Diversity box on page 406.

Toleration. The general religious toleration of Americans can be illustrated by three prevailing attitudes: (1) “All religions have a right to exist—as long as they don’t try to brainwash or hurt anyone.” (2) “With all the religions to choose from, how can anyone tell which one—if any—is true?” (3) “Each of us may be convinced about the truth of our religion—and that is good—but don’t be obnoxious by trying to convince others that you have the exclusive truth.” (See the photo on page 405.)

The Electronic Church. What began as a ministry to shut-ins and those who do not belong to a church blossomed into its own type of church. Its preachers, called “televangelists,” reach millions of viewers and raise millions of dollars. Some of its most famous ministries are those of Kenneth Copeland, Creflo Dollar, Benny Hinn, Eddie Long, Joyce Meyers, Joel Osteen, and Pat Robertson (the 700 Club).

The Future of Religion Religion thrives in the most advanced scientific nations—and, as officials of Soviet Russia were disheartened to learn—even in the most ideologically hostile climate. Although the Soviet authorities threw believers into prison, people continued to practice their religions. Humans are inquiring creatures. As they reflect on life, they ask, What is the purpose of it all? Why are we born? Is there an afterlife? If so, where are we going? Out of these concerns arises this question: If there is a God, what does God want of us in this life? Does God have a preference about how we should live?

Science, including sociology, cannot answer such questions. By its very nature, science cannot tell us about four main concerns that many people have:

1. The existence of God. About this, science has nothing to say. No test tube has either isolated God or refuted God’s existence.

2. The purpose of life. Although science can provide a definition of life and describe the characteristics of living organisms, it has nothing to say about ultimate purpose.

3. An afterlife. Science can offer no information on life after death for it has no tests to prove or disprove a “hereafter.”

4. Morality. Science can demonstrate the consequences of behavior, but not the moral superiority of one action com- pared with another. This means—to use an extreme example—that science cannot even prove whether loving your family and neighbor is superior to hurting and killing them.

There is no doubt that religion will last as long as humanity lasts, for what could replace it? And if something did, and answered such questions, would it not be religion under a different name?

To close this chapter, let’s try to glimpse the cutting edge of religious change.

A basic principle of symbolic interactionism is that meaning is not inherent in an object or event, but is determined by people as they interpret the object or event. Does this dinosaur skeleton “prove” evolution? Does it “disprove” creation? Such “proof” and “disproof” lie in the eye of the beholder, based on the background assumptions by which it is interpreted.

The Future of Religion 411

Mass Media in Social Life

God on the Net: The Online Marketing of Religion You want to pray here at the Holy Land, but you can’t leave

home? No problem. Buy our special telephone card—now available at your local 7-11. Just record your prayer, and we’ll broadcast it via the Internet at the site you choose. Press 1 for the holy site of Jerusalem, press 2 for the holy site of the Sea of Galilee, press 3 for the birthplace of Jesus, press 4 for . . . (Rhoads 2007)

This service is offered by a company in Israel. No discrimination. Open to Jews and Christians alike. Maybe with expansion plans for Muslims. Maybe to anyone, as long as they can pay $10 for a two-minute card.

You left India and now live in Kansas but you want to pray in Chennai? No problem. Order your pujas (prayers), and we’ll have a priest say them in the temple of your choice. Just click how many you want. Food offerings for Vishnu included in the price. All major credit cards accepted (K. Sullivan 2007).

Erin Polzin, a 20-year-old college stu- dent, listens to a Lutheran worship service on the radio, confesses online, and uses PayPal to tithe. “I don’t like getting up early,” she says. “This is like going to church without really having to” (Bernstein 2003).

You can go to church in your pajamas, and you don’t even have to comb your hair.

Muslims in France download sermons and join an invis- ible community of worshippers at virtual mosques. Jews in Sweden type messages that fellow believers in Jerusalem download and insert in the Western Wall. Christians in the United States make digital donations to the Crystal Cathedral. Buddhists in Japan seek enlightenment online.

The Internet helps to level the pulpit: On the Net, the leader of a pagan group can com- pete directly with the Pope.

There are also virtual church services. Just choose an avatar, and you can walk around the virtual church. You can sing, kneel, pray, and listen to virtual sermons. You can talk to other avatars if you get bored (Feder 2004). And, of course, you can use your credit card— a real one, not the virtual kind.

Some say that the Net has put us on the verge of a religious reformation as big as the one set off by Gutenberg’s invention of the printing press. This sounds like an exaggera- tion, but perhaps it is true. We’ll see.

For Your Consideration↑

We are gazing into the future. How do you think that the Internet might change religion? Do you think it can replace the warm embrace of fellow believers? How can it bring comfort to someone who is grieving for a loved one?

Some people have begun to “attend” church as avatars.

How is technology likely to affect religion?

Percentage of U.S. population graduated

from high school

1960

42% NOW

87%

Percentage of U.S. population graduated

from college

1960

8% NOW

30%

SAT verbal scores, national average

1967

543 NOW

498

SAT math scores, national average

1967

516 NOW

515

Number of violent deaths at school, grades K-12

1992

56 NOW

7

Shooting deaths at school, annual average

1992–2000

28 2000–2010

13

412 CHAPTER 13 Education and Religion

Education in Global Perspective What is a credential society, and how did it develop? A credential society is one in which employers use diplo- mas and degrees to determine who is eligible for a job. One reason that credentialism developed is that large, anonymous societies lack the personal knowledge common to smaller groups. Educational certification is taken as evidence of a person’s ability. P. 382 How does education compare among the Most Industrialized, Industrializing, and Least Industrialized Nations? In general, formal education reflects a nation’s economy. Consequently, education is extensive in the Most Industrial- ized Nations, undergoing vast change in the Industrializing Nations, and spotty in the Least Industrialized Nations. Japan, Russia, and Egypt provide examples of education in countries at three levels of industrialization. Pp. 382–386.

The Functionalist Perspective: Providing Social Benefits What is the functionalist perspective on education? Among the functions of education are the teaching of knowl- edge and skills, providing credentials, cultural transmission of values, social integration, social placement (gatekeep- ing), and mainstreaming. Functionalists also note that education has replaced some traditional family functions. Pp. 386–388.

The Conflict Perspective: Perpetuating Social Inequality What is the conflict perspective on education? The basic view of conflict theorists is that education repro- duces the social class structure; that is, through such mecha- nisms as unequal funding and operating different schools for the elite and for the masses, education perpetuates a society’s basic social inequalities from one generation to the next. Pp. 388–391.

The Symbolic Interactionist Perspective: Teacher Expectations What is the symbolic interactionist perspective on education? Symbolic interactionists focus on face-to-face interaction. In examining what occurs in the classroom, they have found that student performance tends to conform to teacher expectations, whether they are high or low. Pp. 391–392.

Problems in U.S. Education— and Their Solutions What are the chief problems that face U.S. education? The major problems are mediocrity (low achievement as shown by SAT scores), grade inflation, social promotion, functional illiteracy, faked data reported by school adminis- trators, and violence. Pp. 392–395.

What are the potential solutions to these problems? To restore high educational standards will require that we expect more of both students and teachers; school administrators can be required to use a single reporting measure based on objective, verifiable data. Although we cannot prevent all school violence, for an effective learning environment we must provide basic security for students. Pp. 395–396.

What Is Religion? Durkheim identified three essential characteristics of religion: beliefs that set the sacred apart from the profane, rituals, and a moral community (a church). P. 396.

The Functionalist Perspective What are the functions and dysfunctions of religion? Among the functions of religion are answering questions about ultimate meaning; providing emotional comfort, social solidarity, guidelines for everyday life, social control, and social change. Among the dysfunctions of religion are religious persecution and war and terrorism. Pp. 398–399.

Summary and ReviewCH A

P T

E R

13

The Symbolic Interactionist Perspective What aspects of religion do symbolic interactionists study? Symbolic interactionists focus on the meanings of religion for its followers. They examine religious symbols, rituals, beliefs, and religious experiences. Pp. 399–401; 402–403.

The Conflict Perspective What aspects of religion do conflict theorists study? Conflict theorists examine the relationship of religion to so- cial inequalities, especially how religion reinforces a society’s stratification system. P. 401.

Religion and the Spirit of Capitalism What does the spirit of capitalism have to do with religion? Max Weber saw religion as a primary source of social change. He analyzed how Calvinism gave rise to the Protestant ethic, which stimulated what he called the spirit of capital- ism. The result was capitalism, which transformed society. Pp. 404–405.

Types of Religious Groups What types of religious groups are there? Sociologists divide religious groups into cults, sects, churches, and ecclesias. All religions began as cults. Those that survive tend to develop into sects and eventually into churches. Sects, often led by charismatic leaders, are unstable. Some are perceived as threats and are persecuted by the state. Ecclesias, or state religions, are rare. Pp. 405–408.

Religion in the United States What are the main characteristics of religion in the United States? Membership of religious groups varies by social class and race–ethnicity. Major characteristics are diversity, plu- ralism and freedom, tolerance, and the electronic church. Pp. 408–410.

The Future of Religion What can we anticipate in the future? Because science cannot answer questions about ultimate meaning, the existence of God or an afterlife, or provide guidelines for morality, the need for religion will remain. In any foreseeable future, religion will prosper. The Internet is likely to have far-reaching consequences on religion. P. 410.

Summary and Review 413

Thinking Critically about Chapter 13 1. How does education in the United States compare with

education in Japan, Russia, and Egypt? 2. Have your experiences in education (including teachers

and assignments) influenced your goals, attitudes, and

values? How have your classmates influenced you? Be specific.

3. Why is religion likely to remain a strong feature of U.S. life—and remain strong in people’s lives around the globe?

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