The Moral Significance of Class by Andrew Sayer

by Andrew Sayer

Class affects not only our material wealth but our access to relationships and practices which we have reason to value, including the esteem or respect of others and hence our sense of self-worth. It determines the kind of people we become and our chances of living a fulfilling life. Applying concepts from moral philosophy and social theory to empirical studies of class, this accessible study demonstrates how people are valued in a context of the lottery of birth class, or forces having little to do with moral qualities or other merits.

Paperback

First published January 1, 2005

Reviews

[szymborskalyte · Rating 2 out of 5]

Unilluminating. The absence of empirics is also disappointing.

[John Carter McKnight · Rating 4 out of 5]

Theoretical sociology isn't a usual genre of mine, so this was a bit of a challenge. Largely the work is a thorough schooling of Bourdieu, at the same time rigorously logical and grounded in the empirical work of others in the field. Sayer's precision and clarity is a joy, if not a breeze, to read. It was a delight to see theory manipulated deftly in the service of clarification, rather than obfuscation, of difficult social phenomena. Sayer never loses his way, returning frequently to touchstones of gender and race in his analysis of class, and carefully slices between positive and normative claims, including a very nice section on how to engage with young students for whom discussions of class are a complex and unexamined bundle of normative and positive concepts.

The only reason I didn't give this a fifth star is that it's sufficiently afield for me that it's of a bit less utility in my work than I'd hoped, and I don't feel qualified enough to rate it within a genre I just don't know that well.