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The Social Mobility and Status Attainment Reader Prepared for the course, „Comparative Social Inequality” From: http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O88-mobilitysocial.html The movement–usually of individuals but sometimes of whole groups–between different positions within the system of social stratification in any society. It is conventional to distinguish upward and downward mobility (that is, movement up or down a hierarchy of privilege), and intergenerational from intragenerational or career mobility (the former referring to mobility between a family of origin and one's own class or status position, the latter to the mobility experienced during an individual career, such as respondent's first job compared to his or her present job). The status-attainment programme sees the principal interest of mobility studies as being an attempt to specify those attributes which are characteristic of individuals who end up in the more desirable rather than the less desirable jobs. Characteristically, these studies investigate the extent to which the present occupational status of individuals is associated with the status of their family of origin, rather than individual achievements such as educational attainment. One virtue of this approach, as compared to earlier crosstabulations of father's occupation by son's occupation, was that it disentangled at least some of the processes that linked the generations. For example, researchers explored the effects of father's education on son's occupational attainment, and showed that these were distinct from the effects of father's occupation. Most studies maintained that son's education was the crucial link between family background and occupational success, arguing that as much as half of the association between the two was mediated via education, with children from more privileged family backgrounds being higher educational achievers than their poorer peers. Later researchers extended the field of interest to include data on income, with most concluding that the impact of family background on earnings is substantial, but operates entirely indirectly through educational and occupational attainment. Most of these studies employed the statistical techniques of regression analysis (and in particular path analysis). Most were also underpinned by a tacit adherence to a liberal model of industrial societies as increasingly homogeneous, middle class, meritocratic, and open. Typically, therefore, they tended to conclude that structural shifts in advanced industrial economies (especially the expansion of managerial, professional, and administrative occupations) created more ‘room at the top’ and so increased the opportunities for upward social mobility of individuals from working-class origins. This increasing social fluidity was reinforced by a progressive shift from ascriptive to achievement criteria as the dominant factors determining status attainment, a movement towards meritocratic selection that, together with the prevailing high rates of social mobility, undermined the potential for class formation and class conflict in industrial societies. Peter M. Blau and Otis D. Duncan's The American Occupational Structure (1967) is generally held to be the paradigmatic example of a study of social mobility within the status-attainment tradition. The Blau-Duncan model prompted an enormous number of related and derivative studies. Whatever their differences and similarities, however, they all rested upon the assumption that occupations can be ranked within a status hierarchy about which there is a wide degree of consensus within and between societies. In some studies this social hierarchy was conceptualized narrowly as being one of occupational prestige most commonly, how people rate the relative ‘general standing’ of different occupations. In others, it was extended to include additional aspects of socio-economic status, such as income and years of schooling. Rather than dispute the details of the occupational hierarchy, however, European class analysis came increasingly to challenge the basic premise of the status attainment research programme; namely, that social mobility was most appropriately viewed as a matter of hierarchical occupational attainment among competing individuals. The class analysis tradition starts from the rather different assumption that individuals are born into distinct social classes, membership of which has clear consequences for life-chances, values, norms, life-styles, and 1 patterns of association. Representatives of this tradition argue that the socio-economic status scales at the heart of the status-attainment perspective display many unresolved methodological weaknesses. Most importantly, because these scales are a composite measure of popular judgments about the relative prestige or social standing of the various occupations, they rank alongside each other, as having similar levels of socio-economic status, occupations which have quite different structural locations. For example, skilled manual workers may have the same prestige score as routine clerical workers and self-employed shopkeepers, or office supervisors may be ranked alongside farmers and schoolteachers. In other words, the synthetic categories of the scale typically contain occupational groupings that are subject to different structural forces: because of sectoral and other changes in the occupational structure, some occupations will be in expansion, others in contraction, and some will be static. Such heterogeneity merely muddies the water of mobility: it is impossible to distinguish adequately the various structural influences on mobility from those which originate in other factors, and impossible also therefore to isolate hierarchical effects (family background, educational attainment, or whatever) from other effects of a non-hierarchical kind (such as changes in the occupational division of labour, industrial or sectoral growth and decline, government policies of protection, and so forth). During the 1980s, and in response to criticism by proponents of the new structuralism, researchers examining occupational outcomes within the explanatory framework of status attainment attempted to incorporate structural limitations as well as socialization processes within their explanations. That is, they moved away from the question of how family of origin and educational attainment affect occupational placement, towards analysis of the impact on occupational outcomes of variation in labour-market structures and processes. This change of emphasis was an attempt to overcome the perceived failure of statusattainment research to consider how structural effects impact upon educational and occupational attainment. The result was something of a hybrid between the status-attainment and class analysis traditions From: http://www.sv.uio.no/forskerskole/Breen%202005%20ARS.pdf Research in social stratification is a very lively area within sociology, being so near the heart of the discipline itself. A common distinction within this area is between inequality of opportunity and inequality of condition. The former has its origin in the liberal goal that a person’s chances to get ahead (attain an education, get a good job) should be unrelated to ascribed characteristics such as race, sex, or class (or socioeconomic) origin. The latter, inequality of condition, is concerned with the distribution of differential rewards and living conditions, either in the simple form of distributions of scarce goods or in relation to different inputs (such as effort and time) or rights (such as citizenship or employment). Of course, the distinction between inequality of opportunity and of condition is not clear cut, but it is a useful tool for organizing a review of the literature. In the social sciences, studies of inequality of opportunity typically are about attainments of educational qualifications and social positions (occupations, social class, etc.) and how these attainments are associated with ascribed characteristics. Studies of inequality of condition, in contrast, are concerned with income differences or differential rewards in the labor market or in the larger distributional system, including the welfare state. Much research shows that characteristics of the family of origin (such as parental socioeconomic status and education, cultural assets, social networks, and parental motivation) are associated with educational outcomes (e.g., de Graaf et al. 2000, Duncan & Brooks-Gunn 1997, Gamoran 2001). These resource differences have their effects both via socialization and educational choice, and one of the most significant trends in the study of inequalities in educational attainment in the past decade has been the resurgence of rational choice models focusing on educational decision making (Breen & Goldthorpe 1997; Erikson & Jonsson 1996a; Esser 1999; Morgan 1998, 2002; for earlier work of this kind, see Boudon 1974 and Gambetta 1987). 2 The topic of contextual effects on educational attainment attracted growing attention during the 1990s. One important context is the school: Studies not only focus on characteristics of schools such as efficacy in instruction and resource differences, but also examine endogenous social interaction effects that influence school climate, norms, and educational aspirations (see reviews by Mortimer 1997, Sampson et al. 2002, Small & Newman 2001). Studies support the view that there are additional effects of social context on educational attainment, beyond the school, such as growing up in a poor neighborhood, thus boosting the influence of social origin (Erikson 1994, Garner & Raudenbush 1991, contributions to Brooks- Gunn et al. 1997, Mayer 2002). Studies of contextual effects are plagued with problems of endogeneity, or population sorting: Much of what looks like effects of an individual environment may be due to a selection of people with certain characteristics into certain neighborhoods and schools (e.g., Manski 2000). For example, this would be the case if parents who are very motivated and best able to support their children’s schooling also actively choose neighborhoods and schools where the socioeconomic context is more privileged. However, even studies that have attempted to solve the endogeneity problem have concluded that the socioeconomic environment has an impact on children’s educational success (Erikson 1994, Hanushek et al. 2003, Harding 2003). But environmental effects are probably of a rather modest magnitude: Between 80% and 90% of the variation in school achievement, for example, appears to be between families within schools or neighborhoods (Entwisle et al. 1997, Erikson 1994, Garner & Raudenbush 1991, Mortimer 1997; compare also Solon et al. (2000) for an equally low estimate comparing neighborhood and sibling resemblance in earnings). From: http://www.dwp.gov.uk/asd/asd5/rports2007-2008/rrep450.pdf The concept of social mobility Social mobility can be thought of in absolute and relative terms. The former refers to processes of adjustment in the income or occupational structure of the economy. The latter, sometimes called social fluidity, is associated with an individual’s opportunities for progression within the social hierarchy. Social mobility can also be thought of as intra-generational (chances for social progression within an individual’s own life time) and inter-generational (a comparison of achieved social position with that of one’s parents). Further, the study of social mobility can be differentiated into two distinct traditions: a sociological tradition and an economic tradition. The sociological tradition is based on an understanding of the structure of society defined by an occupational hierarchy, while the economic tradition tends to focus on income groups. Both of these approaches have significant merits for the study of social mobility. However, in terms of informing the development of policy responses within the remit of the DWP, an alternative social structure is suggested, based upon the quality of participation in the labour market (Section 3.4). There is some debate about the importance of social mobility and its relationship with inequality and economic growth. On the one hand, high levels of inequality might be thought to constrain the potential for movement within the social hierarchy, leading to a double-bind of high inequality and low mobility. On the other, high levels of inequality and mobility might be thought to be good bedfellows, suggesting that sufficient incentives are built into the social structure to allow the economy to make the best use of its resources, allocating talented labour to high value jobs. To the extent that it is available, the evidence appears to favour the former argument, with those countries with higher levels of mobility also having lower inequality. There is also some evidence of causal linkages between inequality and low levels of mobility. Trends in social mobility Sociologists suggest that the social structure of the population did alter between the 1970s and the 1990s in relation to economic and industrial change as what had previously been described as middle-class occupations expanded and working class occupations contracted. However, the majority of work in the sociological tradition suggests that relative social mobility did not increase during that period despite significant expansions in the state education system. On this point, studies in the economic tradition largely 3 concur and even suggest that levels of relative social mobility may have fallen for those in the lowest income groups. Additionally, international comparisons suggest that the UK compares unfavourably with several other European countries and Canada in terms of social mobility, and while the United States (US) has similar levels of social mobility to the UK, the UK’s position relative to the US has declined over recent decades. Caution needs to be exercised when interpreting these trends. There is a significant time lag in the data, due to reliance on data for people who have achieved a final position in the social hierarchy. It is, therefore, inappropriate to draw firm causal conclusions about the impact of policy trends over the last decade on these longer-term social trends. Factors influencing social mobility The review suggests that social mobility is a complex and multi-faceted concept. Exploration of the range of factors influencing social mobility reveals some important themes, but the complex relationship between these means that it is inappropriate to make firm judgments about the relative importance of one or another of them. In reality, they work in overlapping ways and in different combinations for different individuals. The factors involved are: • Social capital – there is some evidence that traditional working class social capital has declined, which may have weakened its assumed negative effects on social mobility, while other ‘negative’ forms of social capital have emerged such as cultures of worklessness, anti-social behaviour and drug abuse. A lack of positive role models, peer pressure, poverty of ambition and risk aversion may serve as barriers to social mobility. By contrast middle-class families tend to have access to a wider range of social networks that are more advantageous from the point of view of enabling upward mobility and protecting against downward mobility. • Cultural capital – can also help middle-class families to confer social advantages on their children, increasing their potential to move upwards and protecting them from downwards movement in the social hierarchy. • Early years influences – are seen as key to influencing later life chances. Convincing evidence shows that early experiences such as the quality of the home environment, family structure, pre-school care and relationships with caring adults produce a pattern of development in later life that is hard to reverse even through schooling. • Education – appears to be one of the most important factors influencing social mobility. However, there is considerable evidence that the introduction and expansion of universal education systems in the UK and Western Europe have not led to increasing levels of relative social mobility. This is due to a range of factors including the ability of middle-class families to take advantage of educational opportunities. • Employment and labour market experiences – recent decades have seen the emergence of important labour market trends with implications for social mobility. First, substantial levels of worklessness and long-term economic inactivity have emerged in some areas and/or among specific population groups. Second, research has identified the emergence of a prominent ‘low-pay – no-pay’ cycle for some groups. There is also evidence that specific groups face particular disadvantages in the labour market and that women who take career breaks often have difficulty re-entering the labour market in the same position and therefore, frequently experience downward social mobility after having children. • Health and wellbeing – ill-health results from social and environmental factors identified with lower socioeconomic status, and ill-health and caring responsibilities can lead to declining socio-economic status. 4 • Area-based influences – localised environmental problems appear to combine with socio-economic disadvantage to produce negative area-based influences on potential for social mobility. For example, inequalities in access to private transport combined with poorer quality provision in some important public services in deprived areas may mean that lower socio-economic classes are unable to exercise effective choices over access to these services. From: http://www.sv.uio.no/forskerskole/Breen%202005%20ARS.pdf A fundamental question for understanding macrolevel variation in inequality of opportunity, or societal openness, is which countries should be classified as most open and which most rigid. Many scholars have assumed that persistent egalitarian policies should make for greater openness, for example, but, equally, scholars have long thought that the United States is an exceptional case, showing less rigidity than European countries. Aranking of countries according to degree of openness must be approached cautiously because of data incomparability, conceptual problems, and measurement error. Furthermore, to the extent that countries differ in their patterns of fluidity, ranking them in any unidimensional way is unrealistic. Nevertheless, some characteristics appear to stand out in the reviewed literature. According to Breen & Luijkx (2004a,b), Germany, France, and Italy tend to represent the rigid pole in such a ranking.7 The Scandinavian countries (particularly Sweden and Norway) together with Hungary and Poland appear to be consistently among the most open countries, as does Israel, whereas the Netherlands has become considerably more open over the past quarter century. England, on the other hand, has, over the same period, gone from being among one of the more open to one of the less open countries because, as noted above, it does not seem to have shared in the widespread trend toward greater fluidity. An interesting issue is the ranking of the United States. In an attempt to make a comparison with European societies, Erikson & Goldthorpe (1992) concluded that the United States is fairly similar to them; the somewhat higher degree of fluidity they found was attributed to problems of comparability, stemming from lack of precision in the American occupational codings.8 In a direct comparison between educational inequality in the United States and Sweden (one of the most equal countries in the existing literature), Hout & Dohan (1996) found the two to be very similar. 5