IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/akf/cafewp/2.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Social or Economic Class? False Dichotomies, Reductionism and Abstract Categories

Author

Listed:
  • Papagiannaki, Eleni
  • Philp, Bruce
  • Arntsen, Alexandra

Abstract

Against the backdrop of socio-economic conflict, this paper analyses a number of approaches to classes in the economics, political economy and sociology literatures. Our argument is structured into two themes which consider: (i) class and individualism; (ii) social and economic classes. We also consider deductive and inductive class analyses within these themes. This typology is used to classify the methodological approaches of scholars from a variety of traditions, thereby providing a basis for assessing their congruence, and the plausibility of developing an integrated perspective on class, spanning heterodox economics and sociology. Initial discussion considers classical political economy and its Marxian derivatives, including Lenin’s criteria for categorising classes, and relatively recent approaches derived from economics, political economy (in the Marxian tradition), and sociology. Based on our analysis of the two themes identified we argue that the abstract pairs of categories — class-individual, social-economic — should not be falsely dichotomised. In addition, we argue that a reductionist approach to class (be it economic or micro-reductionism) only provides a partial account, and fails to capture the complexity of class in relation to other forms of social stratification.

Suggested Citation

  • Papagiannaki, Eleni & Philp, Bruce & Arntsen, Alexandra, 2020. "Social or Economic Class? False Dichotomies, Reductionism and Abstract Categories," CAFE Working Papers 2, Centre for Accountancy, Finance and Economics (CAFE), Birmingham City Business School, Birmingham City University.
    • Handle: RePEc:akf:cafewp:2
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.open-access.bcu.ac.uk/8964/2/20200225_CAFE_WP2_Papagiannaki_Philp_Arntsen.pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Roberto Veneziani, 2013. "Exploitation, inequality and power," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 25(4), pages 526-545, October.
    2. John E. Roemer, 1994. "A Future for Socialism," Politics & Society, , vol. 22(4), pages 451-478, December.
    3. Humphries, Jane, 1990. "Enclosures, Common Rights, and Women: The Proletarianization of Families in the Late Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Centuries," The Journal of Economic History, Cambridge University Press, vol. 50(1), pages 17-42, March.
    4. Edward P. Lazear, 2000. "Economic Imperialism," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 115(1), pages 99-146.
    5. Robert Urquhart, 1993. "Adam Smith between Political Economy and Economics," Palgrave Macmillan Books, in: Ron Blackwell & Jaspal Chatha & Edward J. Nell (ed.), Economics as Worldly Philosophy, chapter 8, pages 189-240, Palgrave Macmillan.
    6. Roemer, John E, 1980. "A General Equilibrium Approach to Marxian Economics," Econometrica, Econometric Society, vol. 48(2), pages 505-530, March.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. A. Cetrulo & A. Sbardella & M. E. Virgillito, 2023. "Vanishing social classes? Facts and figures of the Italian labour market," Journal of Evolutionary Economics, Springer, vol. 33(1), pages 97-148, January.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Naoki Yoshihara & Roberto Veneziani, 2009. "Exploitation as the Unequal Exchange of Labour: An Axiomatic Approach," Working Papers 655, Queen Mary University of London, School of Economics and Finance.
    2. Roberto Veneziani & Naoki Yoshihara, 2017. "Globalisation and inequality in a dynamic economy: an axiomatic analysis of unequal exchange," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 49(3), pages 445-468, December.
    3. Roberto Veneziani & Luca Zamparelli & Naoki Yoshihara, 2017. "A Progress Report On Marxian Economic Theory: On The Controversies In Exploitation Theory Since Okishio (1963)," Journal of Economic Surveys, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 31(5), pages 1421-1448, December.
    4. Weikai Chen & Naoki Yoshihara, 2019. "Persistent Exploitation with Intertemporal Reproducible Solution in Pre-industrial Economies," UMASS Amherst Economics Working Papers 2019-10, University of Massachusetts Amherst, Department of Economics.
    5. Yoshihara, Naoki, 2014. "A Progressive Report on Marxian Economic Theory: On the Controversies in Exploitation Theory since Okishio (1963)," Discussion Paper Series 607, Institute of Economic Research, Hitotsubashi University.
    6. Roberto Veneziani & Naoki Yoshihara, 2015. "Exploitation in economies with heterogeneous preferences, skills and assets: An axiomatic approach," Journal of Theoretical Politics, , vol. 27(1), pages 8-33, January.
    7. Bazillier, Remi & Girard, Victoire, 2020. "The gold digger and the machine. Evidence on the distributive effect of the artisanal and industrial gold rushes in Burkina Faso," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 143(C).
    8. Robert Pollak, 2003. "Gary Becker's Contributions to Family and Household Economics," Review of Economics of the Household, Springer, vol. 1(1), pages 111-141, January.
    9. Chang, Yang-Ming & Sanders, Shane & Walia, Bhavneet, 2015. "The costs of conflict: A choice-theoretic, equilibrium analysis," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 131(C), pages 62-65.
    10. Casari, Marco & Lisciandra, Maurizio, 2015. "Gender Discrimination and Common Property Resources," IZA Discussion Papers 9601, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    11. Tadasu Matsuo, 2008. "Profit, Surplus Product, Exploitation And Less Than Maximized Utility: A New Equivalence Proposition On The Fundamental Marxian Theorem," Metroeconomica, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 59(2), pages 249-265, May.
    12. Oliveira, Livio Luiz Soares de, 2013. "A teoria econômica da religião: aspectos gerais [Economics of religion: general aspects]," MPRA Paper 52012, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    13. Bruno S. Frey & Stephan Meier, "undated". "Pro-Social Behavior, Reciprocity or Both?," IEW - Working Papers 107, Institute for Empirical Research in Economics - University of Zurich.
    14. Deschacht, Nick & Winter, Anne, 2015. "Rural crisis and rural exodus? Local migration dynamics during the crisis of the 1840s in Flanders (Belgium)," Explorations in Economic History, Elsevier, vol. 56(C), pages 32-52.
    15. Naoki Yoshihara & Soh Kaneko, 2016. "On the Existence and Characterization of Unequal Exchange in the Free Trade Equilibrium," Metroeconomica, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 67(2), pages 210-241, May.
    16. Peter Zweifel & H. E. Frech, 2016. "Why ‘Optimal’ Payment for Healthcare Providers Can Never be Optimal Under Community Rating," Applied Health Economics and Health Policy, Springer, vol. 14(1), pages 9-20, February.
    17. Astrid Agenjo‐Calderón & Lina Gálvez‐Muñoz, 2019. "Feminist Economics: Theoretical and Political Dimensions," American Journal of Economics and Sociology, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 78(1), pages 137-166, January.
    18. Cogliano, Jonathan F. & Kaneko, Soh & Veneziani, Roberto & Yoshihara, Naoki, 2020. "International Exploitation, Capital Export, and Unequal Exchange," Discussion Paper Series 718, Institute of Economic Research, Hitotsubashi University.
    19. Fine, Ben, 2002. "Economics Imperialism and the New Development Economics as Kuhnian Paradigm Shift?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 30(12), pages 2057-2070, December.
    20. Jonathan F Cogliano & Roberto Veneziani & Naoki Yoshihara, 2024. "The dynamics of international exploitation," Environment and Planning A, , vol. 56(5), pages 1420-1446, August.

    More about this item

    NEP fields

    This paper has been announced in the following NEP Reports:

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:akf:cafewp:2. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Research Publications Librarian (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/bsuceuk.html .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.