Marxism and Class Theory: A Bourgeois Critique

ISBN: 0231048815

Author: Frank Parkin

Condition: New

In sociology, Frank Parkin is best known for his contribution to the theory of social closure, most fully laid out in his Marxism and class A bourgeois critique. In quite sharp tone, Parkin argues that Marxist theories of social class were marked by fundamental deficiencies, particularly associated with the ambiguous status of their central explanatory concept, mode of production. He attacks the Marxists' overemphasis on deep levels of structure, at the expense of social actors, and suggests a radical recasting of the theory of class and stratification. He proposes to do this by centering theory around the concept of social closure. Parkin follows Weber in understanding closure as the process by which social collectives seek to maximize rewards by restricting access to resources and opportunities to a limited circle of eligibles. This entails the singling out of certain social or physical attributes as the justificatory basis of exclusion. Weber suggests that virtually any group attribute - race, language, social origin, religion- may be seized upon provided it can be used for "the monopolization of specific, usually economic opportunities". This monopolization is directed against competitors who share some positive or negative characteristic; its purpose is always the closure of social and economic opportunities to outsiders. The nature of these exclusionary practices, and the completeness of social closure, determine the general character of the distributive system.