Our Shared Shelf discussion

Okay, in case I get a bit too much scientific there, apologies in advance...
And I have to say I haven't read the book yet, so I look forward to reading it.


Stratification is the state of having many layers... thus, social stratification is the state of being divided into social classes.

Marx' definition of class(he thought so much about the term I couldn't omit him) is:
a group of people with shared economic interests. What distinguishes the classes, according to Marx, is the possession or lack of possession of means of production...
I wouldn't say that today this definition is meaningless, but...

It's just that... nowadays there is another means of stratification that is being used, and I don't wanna say that class is not relevant anymore, no, not at all, but this other one actually gives you more information.
It's called Sinus Milieu. Well, actually Sinus Milieus, as there is more than one milieu that all together make up the whole society then. You still have class in there, but, and that is the really cool thing in my eyes, you also have "orientations", or with another word "values". What values do people hold, are they traditionalist, or want to reform more? It basically looks like a co-ordinate system, with a horizontal and a vertical axis, and on the horizontal axis you have the class, and on the vertical the orientation. And the area that the two axis span, is where the milieus are applied.

And, since this all sounds a bit dry, with so much theory, here you can have a look at one for Austria (in English), with an explanation as well:
http://www.integral.co.at/en/sinus/mi...

I think it's always important to look at stratification models when a whole society is being analysed and talked about.

The concept of classes in itself changed since Marx wrote about them. It's clear that most societies (except maybe in some developing countries) are not as stratified as his anymore. Actually, classes appear to have more "social" aspects than the Marxist concept. I also think these social aspects can be more related to mentality and education than economic wealth nowadays. Some people are economically rich but it doesn't necessarily mean they own the cultural heritage of the aristocracy like at the time of Marx. The contrary also exists, moreover there are other criterion that define groups of affiliations such as ideologies and conceptions of society like in the graph you presented.

Robin wrote: "The concept of classes in itself changed since Marx wrote about them. It's clear that most societies (except maybe in some developing countries) are not as stratified as his anymore. Actually, clas..."

Which is why it is used in nowadays sociology... as you said, it's not about money alone anymore, but much more about lifestyles...
You can bring together all kinds of information in Sinus Milieus, and thus they hold more information than just class alone.
Btw, class is by far not the only form of social stratification, but the most common one nowadays around the world.

Well, I checked the website and I think this approach is VERY problematic. The Sinus Milieu approach is nothing more than market "research". Its only aim is to help private companies to make profit by selling their products. That's why they do what they do.

So it's something completely different from every real scientific approach which aims at knowledge and education adressing social issues and at best contributing to solve social problems . It's also very different from Marx' approach which comes from economic research and has also some political implications as Marx wanted the working class to liberate itself from capitalism and aims for a society with equality and social justice.

Having said all that, I think it may be of course an interesting issue to look at the connection of ideology and attitudes with social class. And some research, especially in the marxist tradition, is focusing on that exact issue. But market "research" can contribute nothing relevant or important in this context as it aims, as I have said, at nothing else than making profit and selling stuff.