Imagine two very wealthy people- one inherited the richness from his forefathers and the other worked hard and took some right decisions at the right time and acquired wealth. Which one of them is deserves the wealth? Well, you answer doesn’t matter. Sociologically different societies at different point of time and place had different answer to it. It is a matter of social stratification which decides what it means to hold wealth, power or success.
Social stratification is all about inequality. It is a hierarchy created by the society which ranks the people. Every aspect of our social life is affected by social stratification- the job you do, the social status, the income, your prestige. Social stratification is a universal phenomenon and is variable as well and is prevalent in every corner of the world. Just, how it works vary from society to society. It is not a matter of individual differences but something larger. Children of wealth families are more likely to get better education, have more status and live longer than their poor counterpart. Stratification categorizes and ranks members of the society based on certain parameters. But society also allows some social mobility, moving from one level to another in the hierarchy.
A small portion of the population moves upwards or downwards in social mobility, more of a vertical movement. But there is something as horizontal mobility also. It is like changing positions without a change in the stand in the hierarchy. When someone changes job with around similar pay, but a slightly variable prestige. Then we have the structural social mobility. This happens when a large number of people have a change in social hierarchy due to a major structural change in society. Example of it can be found in the current situation where a large number of people lost their jobs and moved down in the structural social mobility.
But social stratification is not all about the economic aspect or jobs or social inequalities. It is also based on the beliefs. The cultural beliefs of the society also categorizes people and it also defines these categorization as normal and even fair. If people did not believe in this stratification then this system would not have lasted so long. This belief dictates who deserves wealth and prestige and power in the society.
One way this stratification is defined is that of closed and open. The closed stratification is a rigid one where social mobility is extremely difficult and it is decided on the basis of certain ascribed standards. The open one allows more mobility both ways, upward and downward and it is more of an achievement rather that what is ascribed by the society. One of the best examples can be found in the Indian caste system which is probably the oldest example of social stratification.
It is based on four levels, the Brahmins (priests and scholars), Kshatriyas (warriors and administrators) vaishyas (merchant and business class) and Shudras (the working class of laborer's and service providers). It is an example of a closed stratification with no room for vertical mobility. It determined the power, wealth and position. Marriages were within the caste only. This system also determined the contact control between the various castes. All these were based on the bedrock of a strong cultural and religious belief. The birth caste decided the place and opportunities available in the society.
Some aspects of closed society can also be found in the early European feudal society- the nobility, the clergy and the commoner and this was too based on the birth. This whole system was also justified as being ordained by God. A diversity of this closed system was followed in South Africa during the apartheid period which legally divided the white and black people.
Now the variations of the caste system are slowly shifting to class system especially in modern societies of America and Europe. Class system is not based on the rigid closed structure as in a caste system but is open to mobility based on the ascribed status and personal achievement. An ‘under class’ In US is not the same as shudras of the Indian system. The class system is based on the idea that on the basis of your hard work and achievement you can move up or down in the class standing. It is more about merit than the birth.
But is this stratification on the basis of meritocracy fully justified? This type of class system creates a belief that anyone who is unable to move up the hierarchy deserves to be poor. This type of merit based class system gives advantage to those who are already in an advantageous position. The benefit of this class system is that it is not a part of the law or taken as being ordained by religion.
This class system can also create some status inconsistencies. It is when a person’s social position can affect his social status both in a positive and negative way. An example can be of that a teacher or professor- he earns comparatively lower income but is comparatively higher educated. This inconsistency can happen if we take only the income, education and occupational prestige into consideration.
Now of course things are changing and it is not a question of either caste or class system any more. Both of them can works as a fusion in a society. The British system is an example of it where the some element nobility of the feudal system is maintained but the common society is more class based. On the other hand the revolution on 1917 in USSR created a theoretical classless society but still some amount of friction remained in the form of the government officials, the intelligentsia, the industrial workers and the peasantry.
So as I mentioned before this is universal but variable from place to place and time to time.
good job bro..keep it up