Cognitive Structure of Social Mobility: Moral Sentiments and Hidden Injuries of Class

2011 ◽  
Vol 16 (1) ◽  
pp. 54-65 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yi-Lee Wong
Keyword(s):  
Social Mobility ◽  
Upward Mobility ◽  
Cognitive Structure ◽  
Class Identity ◽  
Class Inequality ◽  
Moral Sentiments ◽  
New Class ◽  
Class Society ◽  
Post War ◽  
Social Fluidity

Drawing on the mobility accounts of eighty-nine respondents who perceived themselves as socially mobile in post-war Hong Kong, I devise a typology of four biographies – normal, choice, special, and emotional biographies – to examine the cognitive structure of their accounts in order to make sense of moral sentiments of class. Three tentative conclusions are drawn. First, class feelings could be seen as better class markers than self-reported class identity. Second, upward mobility does not simply complicate class feelings but could lead to a distorted class sentiment that justifies rather than challenges class inequality; yet four biographies show a variety of its operation. Third, upward mobility does not necessarily treat previous class injuries; instead, it could bring new class injuries. In sum, social fluidity of a class society does not make class inequality less arbitrary or more just nor does it necessarily render class feelings and moral sentiments of class as irrelevant.

scholarly journals Education and intergenerational social mobility in the US and four European countries

2019 ◽  
Vol 35 (3) ◽  
pp. 445-466 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Breen
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Structural Change ◽  
Social Mobility ◽  
Upward Mobility ◽  
Second World War ◽  
Educational Expansion ◽  
Downward Mobility ◽  
The Us ◽  
Social Fluidity ◽  
Second World

Abstract I draw on the findings of a recently completed comparative research project to address the question: how did intergenerational social mobility change over cohorts of men and women born in the first two-thirds of the twentieth century, and what role, if any, did education play in this? The countries studied are the US, France, Germany, the Netherlands, and Sweden. Notwithstanding the differences between them, by and large they present the same picture. Rates of upward mobility increased among cohorts born in the second quarter of the century and then declined among those born later. Among earlier born cohorts, social fluidity increased (that is, the association between the class a person was born into and the class he or she came to occupy as an adult declined) and then remained unchanged for those born after mid-century. The association between class origins and educational attainment followed much the same trend as social fluidity. This suggests that growing equalization in education may have contributed to the increase in social fluidity. In our analyses we find that this is so, but educational expansion also led to greater fluidity in some countries. There is also a strong link between upward mobility and social fluidity. Upward mobility was mostly driven by the expansion of higher-level white-collar jobs, especially in the 30 years after the end of the Second World War. This facilitated social fluidity because people from working class and farming origins could move into the service or salariat classes without reducing the rate at which children born into those classes could remain there. Educational expansion, educational equalization, and rapid structural change in the economies of the US and Europe all contributed to greater social fluidity among people born in the second quarter of the twentieth century. For people born after mid-century, rates of downward mobility have increased: however, despite the lack of further educational equalization and less pronounced structural change, social fluidity has remained unchanged.

scholarly journals Social Mobility from a Comparative Perspective Between Europe and Latin America

2020 ◽  
pp. 203-234
Author(s):  
Sandra Fachelli ◽  
Ildefonso Marqués-Perales ◽  
Marcelo Boado ◽  
Patricio Solís
Keyword(s):  
Latin America ◽  
Data Processing ◽  
Social Mobility ◽  
Upward Mobility ◽  
Industrialized Countries ◽  
Relative Mobility ◽  
The Family ◽  
Social Fluidity ◽  
Invariance Theory ◽  
The Relationship

AbstractThis chapter presents a review of the analysis of social mobility in the international sphere (Europe and Latin America), with a particular focus on the partner countries of the INCASI network. To date, few studies have linked nations whose economic and social aspects are so dissimilar.As is usual in the specialized literature, the relationship between social origin and class destination is addressed. This is done by noting the comparisons made across the geographical areas. We review the analyses that have been made of the evolution of social fluidity as well as the distance between social classes within each country and the comparisons made between them.We compare the main theories that have inspired the study of social mobility to date: modernization theory, which predicts an increase in relative mobility rates, and invariance theory, which postulates the constancy of social fluidity. Special attention is devoted to the role played by the family, the state and the market in late industrialized countries.We study the difficulties for social change, i.e. upward mobility from one class to another, as well as the likelihood of reproduction in comparative terms. To do so, we link these mechanisms with the AMOSIT model. The advances in methodology, techniques, theory and data processing are highlighted.

How Mobile Is India?

Uneven Odds ◽  
2018 ◽  
pp. 121-170
Author(s):  
Divya Vaid
Keyword(s):  
Structural Change ◽  
Social Mobility ◽  
Upward Mobility ◽  
Indian Society ◽  
Relative Mobility ◽  
Opportunity Structures ◽  
The World ◽  
Low Levels ◽  
Social Fluidity

Social mobility includes absoulte mobility, that is, raw numbers of people who move up, down, or remain stable; and relative mobility, that is, mobility controlling for structural change. This chapter draws out the importance of both types of mobility. Further, the intriguing pattern for women’s mobility, where women display more stability than men intergenerationally, contrary to research in most of the world, is deconstructed. While we observe an enduring trend, preceding ‘liberalization’, of the expansion of the higher salariat, and a retrenchment in agriculture leading to some amount of net upward mobility in absolute terms, we also observe low levels of social fluidity which provide an indicator of the unequal opportunity structures in Indian society.

Is Hong Kong no Longer a Land of Opportunities after the 1997 Handover?

2016 ◽  
Vol 44 (4-5) ◽  
pp. 516-545 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yi-Lee Wong ◽  
Anita Koo
Keyword(s):  
Hong Kong ◽  
Social Mobility ◽  
Structural Changes ◽  
Upward Mobility ◽  
Class Structure ◽  
Relative Mobility ◽  
Class Background ◽  
1997 Handover ◽  
Social Fluidity

A belief that Hong Kong is a land of opportunities for the talented and the hardworking makes many speculate that an increasing involvement of younger generations in politics in recent years results from their blocked social mobility. What remains unclear is whether new generations are indeed deprived of mobility opportunities in nowadays Hong Kong. We seek to address this issue empirically by analysing two datasets collected in 1989 and 2007. Situating our discussion against the context of the study of social mobility, we discuss our analysis from two perspectives of social mobility: absolute mobility (mobility due to structural changes) and relative mobility (mobility due to changes in social fluidity). Against a changing class structure over the set period, structural opportunities for upward mobility are actually available to the younger generations; but, seemingly, whether they could grasp such opportunities to get ahead has become more strongly dependent on their class background.

scholarly journals EDUCATING THE NATION: III. SOCIAL MOBILITY

2016 ◽  
Vol 26 ◽  
pp. 1-23 ◽  
Author(s):  
Peter Mandler
Keyword(s):  
Gender Differences ◽  
Income Inequality ◽  
Labour Market ◽  
Social Mobility ◽  
Upward Mobility ◽  
Educational Opportunities ◽  
Market Opportunities ◽  
Compositional Effects ◽  
Post War ◽  
Large Sections

ABSTRACTThis address asks how much has education contributed to social mobility in post-war Britain and considers other factors that may have contributed as much or more: labour-market opportunities, trends in income inequality, gender differences and ‘compositional effects’ deriving from the shape of the occupational hierarchy. Even where these other factors proved much more powerful – especially labour-market opportunities and compositional effects – democratic discourse both among politicians and among the electorate remained fixated on educational opportunities and outcomes, especially after the decline of the Croslandite critique of ‘meritocracy’. That fixation has if anything been reinforced by the apparent end to a ‘golden age’ of absolute upward mobility for large sections of the population, not necessarily because education is an effective antidote but because the alternative political solutions are so unpalatable both to politicians and to voters.

Moving Up without Losing Your Way

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jennifer Morton
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
College Students ◽  
Social Mobility ◽  
Low Income ◽  
Upward Mobility ◽  
Ethical Dilemmas ◽  
Sense Of Self ◽  
College Experience ◽  
Career Opportunities ◽  
Community Finding

Upward mobility through the path of higher education has been an article of faith for generations of working-class, low-income, and immigrant college students. While we know this path usually entails financial sacrifices and hard work, very little attention has been paid to the deep personal compromises such students have to make as they enter worlds vastly different from their own. Measuring the true cost of higher education for those from disadvantaged backgrounds, this book looks at the ethical dilemmas of upward mobility—the broken ties with family and friends, the severed connections with former communities, and the loss of identity—faced by students as they strive to earn a successful place in society. The book reframes the college experience, factoring in not just educational and career opportunities but also essential relationships with family, friends, and community. Finding that student strivers tend to give up the latter for the former, negating their sense of self, the book seeks to reverse this course. It urges educators to empower students with a new narrative of upward mobility—one that honestly situates ethical costs in historical, social, and economic contexts and that allows students to make informed decisions for themselves. The book paves a hopeful road so that students might achieve social mobility while retaining their best selves.

scholarly journals Deflecting Privilege: Class Identity and the Intergenerational Self

Sociology ◽  
2021 ◽  
pp. 003803852098222
Author(s):  
Sam Friedman ◽  
Dave O’Brien ◽  
Ian McDonald
Keyword(s):  
Middle Class ◽  
Working Class ◽  
Lived Experience ◽  
Long Range ◽  
Upward Mobility ◽  
Extended Family ◽  
Class Identity ◽  
Origin Stories ◽  
Class Privilege ◽  
Privileged Class

Why do people from privileged class backgrounds often misidentify their origins as working class? We address this question by drawing on 175 interviews with those working in professional and managerial occupations, 36 of whom are from middle-class backgrounds but identify as working class or long-range upwardly mobile. Our findings indicate that this misidentification is rooted in a self-understanding built on particular ‘origin stories’ which act to downplay interviewees’ own, fairly privileged, upbringings and instead forge affinities to working-class extended family histories. Yet while this ‘intergenerational self’ partially reflects the lived experience of multigenerational upward mobility, it also acts – we argue – as a means of deflecting and obscuring class privilege. By positioning themselves as ascending from humble origins, we show how these interviewees are able to tell an upward story of career success ‘against the odds’ that simultaneously casts their progression as unusually meritocratically legitimate while erasing the structural privileges that have shaped key moments in their trajectory.

scholarly journals Guilds, Social Mobility and Status in Sixteenth-Century Ghent

1998 ◽  
Vol 43 (1) ◽  
pp. 31-78 ◽  
Author(s):  
Johan Dambruyne
Keyword(s):  
Sixteenth Century ◽  
Social Mobility ◽  
Upward Mobility ◽  
Social Promotion ◽  
Social Position ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Situation ◽  
Democratic Character ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
The City

This article investigates the relationship between social mobility and status in guilds and the political situation in sixteenth-century Ghent. First, it argues that Ghent guilds showed neither a static picture of upward mobility nor a rectilinear and one-way evolution. It demonstrates that the opportunities for social promotion within the guild system were, to a great extent, determined by the successive political regimes of the city. Second, the article proves that the guild boards in the sixteenth century had neither a typically oligarchic nor a typically democratic character. Third, the investigation of the houses in which master craftsmen lived shows that guild masters should not be depicted as a monolithic social bloc, but that significant differences in status and wealth existed. The article concludes that there was no linear positive connection between the duration of a master craftsman's career and his wealth and social position.

Is Age the New Class? Economic Crisis and Demographics in European Politics

2016 ◽  
Vol 43 (1) ◽  
pp. 59-71 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jan Erk
Keyword(s):  
Age Groups ◽  
The Political ◽  
Economic Downturn ◽  
New Class ◽  
Political Landscape ◽  
Younger Age ◽  
Material Interests ◽  
Post War ◽  
The Welfare State

As the crisis turns into long-term economic downturn, younger age-groups in Europe seem to be hit with higher levels of unemployment while the welfare state is steadily shrinking. The young have suddenly become a social group united by collective material interests, but does this translate into a sense of a collective political interest? The paper examines to what extent the dominant class-based social science of the post-war years can help us understand the politics of age-groups. The analysis highlights four changes since post-war years: the workplace has changed, impacting socialization; modern media has changed, impacting mobilization; the political landscape is fairly institutionalized, tempering the possibilities for new political concerns to find voice; and those who would define and articulate the political priorities of the young are leaving the Old Continent.

A Culture of Immediatism

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jon Schubert
Keyword(s):  
Economic Growth ◽  
Upward Mobility ◽  
Post War ◽  
Oil Wealth ◽  
Economic Boom

This chapter looks at the desires produced by Angola’s oil wealth and analyses the material and symbolic effects of the post-war economic boom on the lives of Luandans. It does so by exploring the often-cited emic notion of a ‘culture of immediatism’ to show how the dynamics of economic growth and the commodification of politics are perceived and utilized by the population. Contrary to popular interpretation the idea that regime critics are simply ‘co-opted’ falls short; instead, the chapter demonstrates how these processes are much more ambiguous, fluid and reciprocal, and represent avenues for agency and strategies for upward mobility, thereby complicating ideas of ‘corruption’ and balancing the standard ‘clientelist’ account of contemporary Angola

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