scholarly journals Američka srednja klasa kao nosilac neokonzervativnih ideja u SAD

Author(s):  
Erma Ivoš

Conservatism is the dominant political theory in many capitalist countries of the West. In the U. S. A. the conservative wing of the Republican party was victorious in the presidental elections of 1980. Since then the neo-conservatives have held political power, supported by the widest section of the American society. In recent history there is no other example of such a wide coalition within the otherwise heterogeneous social stratum that the American middle class is. Neo- -conservatism has brought together, on the economic and political levels, their different sets of values but very similar economic interests. The coalition comprisses three segments of the American society the old middle class, the rich middle class, and the new middle class. The old middle class is recruited from the ranks of owners of small production firms, shops, or farms; the rich middle class is composed of industrialists who became rich trading in real estate or investing in oil industry and agriculture; and the new middle class is composed of industrial workers whose class status is dependent on education, occupation, and income. Structural changes in the American society have caused uncertainty to all the three segments of the middle class. In order to preserve their interests, all the three segments have resorted to neo-conservatism as the political expression of their vision of the American society-economically- morally, and politically. Their primary purpose is to provide opportunities of free enterprise on the basis of neo-liberalism, to establish the traditional moral order, and to restore the economic and military prestige both internally and internationally.

2007 ◽  
Vol 21 (4) ◽  
pp. 704-725 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ibrahim Kaya

This article aims to answer the question whether identity-based movements are free from economic interests. By analyzing the actions and orientations of the Islamists in Turkey, I show that new social movements based on cultural identities are far from representing the demands of groups for recognition. Rather, these movements aim at establishing hegemony by controlling the intellectual life of society by cultural means. It is insisted that we need a Gramscian view of culture in order to understand the so-called identity politics. Identity-based movements do not refer to the end of social classes, but to the emergence of a new middle class. And against the advocating perspectives on identity politics, I argue that the possible solution to the question of fragmentation could be found in the idea of republic that does not prioritize any culture but seeks a central element that makes it meaningful to talk about such a collective arrangement as society.


2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alex Huynh ◽  
Igor Grossmann

Ever since social scientists became interested in understanding intergroup dynamics, the topic of the “middle class” and its distinction from other groups in society became the central feature of a theoretical and empirical research enterprise. In this overview essay we discuss the beliefs, values and behavioral tendencies attributed to American middle class beliefs, and discuss their implications for understanding class-related norms and values. We end with a reflection over the historical trends that impact societal norms and the definition of middle class in the American society.


Author(s):  
Sunil Bhatia

This chapter analyzes how call center workers, who are mostly middle- and working-class youth, create narratives that are described as expressing modern forms of “individualized Indianness.” The chapter demonstrates how call center workers produce narratives of individualized Indianness by engaging in practices of mimicry, accent training, and consumption; by going to public spaces such as bars and pubs; and by having romantic relationships that are largely hidden from their families. The narratives examined in this chapter are created out of an asymmetrical context of power as young Indians work as “subjects” of a global economy who primarily serve “First World” customers. The interviews with Indian youth reflect how tradition and modernity, mimicry and authenticity, collude with each other to dialogically create new middle-class subjectivities.


1989 ◽  
Vol 37 (2) ◽  
pp. 205-223 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robyn Eckersley

The predominantly new middle-class social composition of the green movement has become a matter of increasing interest in the wake of the success of green parties and the growth of an international green movement. This paper considers the concept of the ‘new class' in relation to two explanations for the social composition of the green movement. The class-interest argument seeks to show that green politics is a means of furthering either middle-class or new-class interests while the ‘new childhood’ argument claims that the development of the green movement is the result of the spread of post-material values, the main bearers of which are the new class. Against these arguments a more comprehensive explanation is presented, which focuses on the education of the new class and its relative structural autonomy from the production process.


2011 ◽  
Vol 9 (3) ◽  
pp. 659-662 ◽  
Author(s):  
Brian Waddell

Jacob S. Hacker and Paul Pierson's Winner-Take-All Politics: How Washington Made the Rich Richer—And Turned Its Back on the Middle Class is both a work of political science and a contribution to broad public discussion of distributive politics. Its topic could not be more relevant to a US polity wracked by bitter partisan disagreements about taxes, social spending, financial regulation, social insecurity, and inequality. The political power of “the rich” is a theme of widespread public attention. The headline on the cover of the January–February 2011 issue of The American Interest—“Inequality and Democracy: Are Plutocrats Drowning Our Republic?”—is indicative. Francis Fukuyama's lead essay, entitled “Left Out,” clarifies that by “plutocracy,” the journal means “not just rule by the rich, but rule by and for the rich. We mean, in other words, a state of affairs in which the rich influence government in such a way as to protect and expand their own wealth and influence, often at the expense of others.” Fukuyama makes clear that he believes that this state of affairs obtains in the United States today.Readers of Perspectives on Politics will know that the topic has garnered increasing attention from political scientists in general and in our journal in particular. In March 2009, we featured a symposium on Larry Bartels's Unequal Democracy: The Political Economy of the New Gilded Age. And in December 2009, our lead article, by Jeffrey A. Winters and Benjamin I. Page, starkly posed the question “Oligarchy in the United States?” and answered it with an equally stark “yes.” Winner-Take-All Politics thus engages a broader scholarly discussion within US political science, at the same time that it both draws upon and echoes many “classic themes” of US political science from the work of Charles Beard and E. E. Schattschneider to Ted Lowi and Charles Lindblom.In this symposium, we have brought together a group of important scholars and commentators who offer a range of perspectives on the book and on the broader themes it engages. While most of our discussants are specialists on “American politics,” we have also sought out scholars beyond this subfield. Our charge to the discussants is to evaluate the book's central claims and evidence, with a focus on three related questions: 1) How compelling is its analysis of the “how” and “why” of recent US public policy and its “turn” in favor of “the rich” and against “the middle class”? 2) How compelling is its critique of the subfield of “American politics” for its focus on the voter–politician linkage and on “politics as spectacle” at the expense of an analysis of “politics as organized combat”? 3) And do you agree with its argument that recent changes in US politics necessitate a different, more comparative, and more political economy–centered approach to the study of US politics?—Jeffrey C. Isaac, Editor


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