Classes (Paperback)

Erik Olin Wright

ISBN 10: 1804290483 / ISBN 13: 9781804290484

Published by Verso Books, London, 2023

About this Item

Paperback. Questions of class, power and distribution have reemerged as central concerns in the public discourse. When we talk about class, we don't always know what is meant. Is class about income or affect or the ownership of the means of production? Perhaps it is about authority or autonomy? But what happens when, as is often the case in complex advanced economies, people can occupy social and economic roles that seem to indicate membership in more than one class? And what does this mean for the supposed relationship between class and potential political capacity and affinity?In Classes, Erik Olin Wright, the greatest American Marxist sociologists, rises to the twofold challenge of both clarifying the abstract, structural account of class implicit in Marx, and of applying and refining the account in the light of contemporary developments in advanced capitalist societies. What Wright calls "contradictory class locations" can make the class landscape appear much more complex than the simple model presented in Marx. Despite this complexity, common interests and therefore political alliances can still be found. In a society, like the US, characterized by extreme inequality, Classes provides not just a useful descriptive account of the operation of class but also the tools to understand the interplay of class interests and political (re)alignment. The foundational sociological text on class in a modern capitalist economy Shipping may be from multiple locations in the US or from the UK, depending on stock availability.

Seller Inventory # 9781804290484

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Classes (Paperback)
• Publisher: Verso Books, London
• Publication Date: 2023
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1804290483
• ISBN 13: 9781804290484
• Binding: Paperback
• Condition: new

About this title

Synopsis

Class analysis and class struggle are central concepts in Marx’s social theory yet, notoriously, Marx never wrote a systematic exposition of these terms during his lifetime, and succeeding generations have had to piece together interpretations from his many scattered references and discussions. The problem of trying to develop a Marxist class analysis on this basis has been made all the more acute by changes in the class structure of advanced capitalism, for these have thrown up a bewildering range of new social strata which seem to be difficult to reconcile with the many traditional understandings of class.

In Classes, Erik Olin Wright, one of the foremost Marxist sociologists and class theorists, rises to the twofold challenge of both clarifying the abstract, structural account of class implicit in Marx, and of applying and refining the account in the light of contemporary developments in advanced capitalist societies. Recentering the concept of class on the process of exploitation, Wright discusses his famous notion of “contradictory class locations” in relation to the empirical complexities of the middle class, and he provides an analysis of class structure in “post-capitalist” societies. Wright then goes on to draw out the implications of his approach and to submit it to detailed empirical testing with the use of a trans-national survey of class structure and consciousness.

About the Author

Erik Olin Wright (1947–2019) was Vilas Distinguished Professor of Sociology at the University of Wisconsin and former president of the American Sociological Association. He authored many books, including Classes, Interrogating Inequality, Class Counts, Deepening Democracy (with Archon Fung), and Envisioning Real Utopias.