Class Counts: Comparative Studies in Class Analysis (Studies in Marxism and Social Theory)
Cambridge University Press, 11/28/1996
EAN 9780521553872, ISBN10: 0521553873
Hardcover, 618 pages, 22.9 x 15.2 x 3.8 cm
Language: English
Class Counts combines theoretical discussions of the concept of class with a wide range of comparative empirical investigations of class and its ramifications in developed capitalist societies. What unites the topics is not a preoccupation with a common object of explanation, but rather a common explanatory factor: class. Four broad themes are explored: class structure and its transformations; the permeability of class boundaries; class and gender; class consciousness. The specific empirical studies include such diverse topics as the sexual division of labour in housework, gender differences in managerial authority, friendship networks in the class structure, the expansion of self-employment in the United States in the past two decades, and the class consciousness of state and private-sector employees. The results of these studies are then evaluated in terms of how they confirm certain expectations within the Marxist tradition of class analysis and how they pose challenging surprises.
1. Class analysis
Part I. The Class Structure of Capitalism and its Transformations
2. Class structure in comparative perspective
3. The transformation of the American class structure, 1960–90
4. The fall and rise of the petty bourgeoisie
Part II. The Permeability of Class Boundaries
5. Class-boundaries permeability
conceptual and methodological issues
6. Permeability of class boundaries to intergenerational mobility
7. Cross-class friendships
8. Cross-class families
Part III. Class and Gender
9. Conceptualizing the interaction of class and gender
10. Individuals, families and class analysis
11. The non-effects of class on the gendered division of labor in the home
12. The gender gap in workplace authority
Part IV. Class Structure and Class Consciousness
13. A general framework for studying class consciousness and class formation
14. Class consciousness and class formation in Sweden, the United States and Japan
15. Class, state employment and consciousness
16. Temporality, class structure and class consciousness
Part V. Conclusion
17. Confirmations, surprises and theoretical reconstructions
Index.