Showing papers in "The Sociological Review in 1975"

Sociological Models of the Mining Community

Abstract: The similarities between mining settlements irf (different types in different societies at difFerent stages of e(»nomic development have often been commented upon by sociologists and anthrope)logists. E. T. Thompson, fe>r example, remarked on the basic fact diat underground mines are fixed in location by the nature of minerals, while specaalising in the production of a (x>mmodity which is sold in a wide (often a world-wide) market. Like the plantation, the mine has to import its labour. 'The special dependence which imponed labour has upon the providence of the employer subjects it, perhaps even in the face of liberal legislation, to some degree of compiilsion greater than that applied to tiative or \"free\" labour. All the way from slavery to vaguely felt and undefined 'forced\" labour, the mine and the plantation tend to get similar reputations with respect to the statiis of their labour forces.'^

Three Models of Scientific Development

Abstract: In this paper I am going to discuss three generalised accounts, or 'me)dels', of the processes by which sdence develops.' I shall call these the 'me)del of openness', the 'model of dewure', and the 'irujdel of branching'. The central concern of each is to show how social factors operating within the pure research communitycontribute to the developtnent of scientific knowledge. I shall argue that the third mexlel provides a more satisfacteny solution to this problem than either of the other two.

Hermeneutics and the critique of ideology

Abstract: The work of the Frankfurt School has become increasitigly wellknoflm in this country over the last few years as translations of the writings of Adorno, Horkheimer, Benjamin (connected with the Institut undl his deadi in 1940) and H^)ennas have proliferated. Marcuse was accessible to English and American readers earlier; much of his most important work was written in English after he emigrated, and a collection of his essays from the 1930s appeared in translation in 1968.' There have also been several secondary works, in particular Martin Jay's excellent study,and these have increased our acquaintance with critical theory and its exponents. But there are diffictilties with translations. There is, of course, the problem of bad translation—and Habennas, in particular, has certainly suffered from this. But more subtle, and perhaps inevit^e, problems occur with the introduction of a 'school' to a foreign audience. It is not simply a question of understanding the text or texts (with the usual glossary of central concepts and their translation provided—or sometimes provided—by the translator, presumably to allow us to check whether he or she has taken any liberti« with the intention

The modern corporate economy: interlocking directorships in britain, 1906–1970

Abstract: In this paper, we wish to make a preliminary contribution to what might be called the anatomy of the modem corporate economy, by analysing patterns of interlocking directorships between very large companies in Britain over the period 1906 to 1970. The significance of interlocking directorships is a pwint of some dispute. Mills, for instance, argues that they are a usefiU index of corporate consolidation:

The Politics of Discreditability: Disarming Complaints against the Police:

Abstract: Sociological studies on the admimstration of justice tend to edio the popular suspicion that 'there is one law for the lidn and another for the poor'. For example, they show that \\rfulst there exist different rates and types of criminal hehaviour between sodal classes, these are exaggerated and ultimately distorted by the judicial process. This distortion does not appear to occur at any single stage in this process—police surveillance, apprehension, discretionary onthe-street decisions, arrest, pre-trial bargaining or bail, prosecution, defence facilities, verdict, sentence and parole—but rather it seems to occur at every stage.' Each addition may in itself be insignificant, but the effect is cumulative, so that there finally emerges the vision of a criminal dass, which happens to be the economically less fortunate. One lacuna in this body of research is any attempt to understand the sodal processes which comprise 'complaints against ± e police'.^ Although these are a very minor aspect of the administration of justice, they nonetheless concern a very fundamental democratic rigjit to have redress against 'deviants' in the police force. It would be serious, although not more so than elsewhere in the judidal process, if it were found that the sodal organisation of the complaints procedures resulted in this right being systematically twisted out of shape when it was exerdsed by die less privileged or 'marginal' members of our sodety. From a strictly legal viewpoint, the complaints procedures have been widely discussed and criddsed, and now reforms are imminent.^ But sodologists have dther shied away from, or failed to gain co-operation for, illuminating the various processes which make up the complaints procedures. Consequently, there is no guarantee that the reforms now

On the study of urban social movements

Abstract: The article makes a critical assessment of the approach to urban protest developed by Manuel Castells and colleagues. Problems are identified in the definition of the term urban social movement, the identifation of their effects and the theoretical assumptions made about the central and local state. The approach is shown to neglect the mobilization process, and to ignore effects obtained by conventional institutional methods of demand-making. The advantages of a social network approach to mobilization are shown.

The professionalization process: a study of an aspiring occupational organization*

Abstract: T here has been considerable discussion in the literature relating to professions and professionalization, as to the utility or disutility of using these concepts in obtaining a greater understanding of the nature and implications of the emergence oi new occupational groupings. Vollmer and Mills,' for example, suggest that discussion of whether a group is or is not a profession is not helpful in this respect, and Goldner and Ritti\" go somewhat furdier in casting doubts about the relevance of the concept cS a professionalization process. Gross, ̂ too, has suggested that a clear cut distinction between types of occupational groupings is not possible, and that placing occupations on a continuum according to their attributes would be more helpful. All these views reflert the problem of distinguishing in a meaningful way between the myriad of occupational interest groupings, both well established and emergent. It is not the intention of this paper to become heavily involved in the definitional problem, but in discussing this example (rf one occupational grouping aspiring to professional status it is important to delineate sonK of the boundaries for contextual purposes and to highligjit some of the directions which studies of professions and professionalization have taken. One of the major distinctions, of course, is between those organizations termed trade unions and those termed professional associations. Reynaud,* for example, hsis di^inguished between them in terms ol their contrasting forms of organization and action, and concludes that 'die contrast rests upon differences in social prestige of a traditional kind rather than on differences of a fundamental nature'. He is basically implying that die differences are related to the presence or absence of cdlecdve action, the importance of status protection

Landlords in Edinburgh: Some Preliminary Findings:

Abstract: A the present time there are in Britain comparatively few studies of those who own privately rented housing. Occasionally, as in the mid-sixties, a scandal involving gross forms of exploitation c^ poor tenants may prompt an facial enquiry' as to the workings oi a local housing market, but typically it does comparatively little to change widely held images of landlords as peculiarly rapacious profit seekers; and indeed press treatment oi the events which lead to such enquiries positively encourage stereotyping of 'the landlord'. Purely academic interest in landlords is mnarkably limited,' partly no doubt because, at least within sociology, a certain sjrmpathy with the underdog constrains researchers to look mostly at tenants (and of course the largest number of these are found not in private but in public accommodation) and partly because research on landlords is surrounded by some awkward methodolc^ical problems. The most obvious of these is the lack of good sampling frames, but even if difSculties in that quarter are overcome there remains the fact that many property owners are elusive or reticent about their activities. Thus when we look at work in urban sociology, whether at the classic studies in Chicago or the most recent eflfrats in Britain, we discover remarkably little about those who actually own the stocks of privately rented housir^. And this situation both reflects and contributes to a general imbalance in our efforts to describe and comprehend the social structure of contemporary societies, for it seems that in many ways we have amassed a good deal of information on the relatively poor or powerless but very little on the rich or influential.\" Within urban sociology we find a long tradition of interest in the housing conditions of the urban workers (from Charles Booth to Coates and Silbum); we have no problem in finding studies of so called 'traditional working dass' areas; reports on public housing estates abound and certaitily in all the

Professional/bureaucratic conflict: the case of the medical profession in the National Health Service.

Abstract: This research was conducted in Scotland and the aim was to consider the utility of professional/bureaucratic conflict theory for understanding the position of the medical profession in the hospital service. To indicate the relevance of the theory, the administrative struaure of the service and the nature of the medical profession will be examined. The areas of coniict suggested will be looked at in relation to the characteristics of the hospital service, in order to determine the likely problem areas, and the results of fieldwork will be presented. Finally, the use of professional/bureaucratic conflict theory in relation to this case and the wider implications for this theory will be assessed. At the time of the research the administrative structure of the health service was laid down by the 1947 Act.̂ The hospital service was administered from the Scottish Home and Health Department and at the next level there were five Regional Hospital Boards, under each of these were a number of Boards of Management which directly administered one or more hospitals, including teaching hospitals. We must first, therefore, examine the hospital service structure in relation to 'bureaucracy', in order to assess the suitability of the theory.

Religion and social status in rural wales: ‘buchedd’ and its lessons for concepts of stratification in community studies

Abstract: It has become part of the conventional wisdom of conanunity sociology that during the nineteenth century Welsh society produced 3 distinrt and f>ersistit^ variety of social stratification, central to which were values derived from Welsh nonconformity and in which all non-religious criteria of stratification were either irrelevant or subordinate. The distinctiveness is summed up in a recent textbook on Rurd Life in terms of the 'old Welsh concept, Bucbedd'.' It is taken by Plowman and his associates, in a major review of the varieties of local stratification system, as a reflection of an 'indigenous Welsh culture',^ while according to Davies and Rees it 'represents a fundamental social division which is more or less evident in all Welsh rural communities'.' The noticm has gained so wide a currency that the absence oi dear differences of bucheddau can be taken as prima facie evidence of sodal change: thus Gareth Lewis, in his research on Bow Street, contends that 'a Welsh rural community in transition is one in which the traditional buchedd system is being replaced by newer sodo-econotnic values'.* These values are those of a class divided sodety, which are treated as an intrusion into a sodety which was previously dassless. Yet this retnarkable edifice has been built on the slenderest oi foundations, and involves unproven assumptions, inadequate delineation of causal lintoiges, along with terminology and measures which are so idiosyncratic as to make evaluation d the underlying theory extremely difficult. The interest which attaches to the alleged tradition stems from the daim that there has existed in Wales a form of stratification vMch is essentially independent of economic foundatiotis. In order to assess the validity of this daim it seems appropriate first to darify the terms in whidi the problem ^auld be approached, and this means establishing a terminology of stratification. The basic terms required are dass, status, and esteem.

The Political Contradiction in Adorno's Critical Theory

Abstract: A dorno's intellectual biography is marked throughout and right into / \\ its aesthetic abstractioDS by the experience d fascism. The mode of reflection of this experience, whidi reads in die creations of an the indissoluble unity of critique and suffering, constitutes the relentlessness of the claim to negate ttnd at the same time confines this claim within its limits. In refiection on the f^dst vidence brou^t forth by the uncontrollable economic disasters of capitalist production, the 'impaired life' knows that it cannot extricate itself from the entanglement in the contradictions of bourgeois individuality whose irrevocable decomposition it has recognised. \"Hie fascist terror does not only reveal the airtight coerciveness of highly industrialised class societies, it also injures the subjectivity of the theoretician and reinforces the class barriers to his ability of theoretical percepdon. Adorno articulates the consciousness of this problem in tiie introduction to Minima Moralia:

The parish ministry as a semi‐profession*

Abstract: The ministry per se has traditionally heen regarded as a profession. Cogan defines a profession as 'a vocation whose practice is founded upon an understanding of a theoretical structure d some department of learning or science.\" Goode^ has referred to the ministry as one of the four great person professions; die odiers being law, medicine, and university teaching. His approach contains at least three presuppositions whidi may not pass unchallen^d: viz. that the concept of profession is unitary; that the minktry is a single occupational group; and that it is a profession. This paper seeks to show, from an analysis of the present situation (rf the parish ministry, the fallacy underlying diese presuppositions and to demonstrate diat structurally die parish ministry approximates to a semi-professional model. Initially some of the typologies erf profession are examined to demonstrate the confusion of the current situation in the sociology of professions, sub-divisions of the ministry are then discussed, and the roles of the parish minister are reviewed. Finally, it is argued ihat the parish ministry tends to conform to the structural diaracteristics d a semi-profession, although certain differezKes in occupational structure between the parish ministries of difFerent denominations raises doubts about even the parish ministry being regarded as a single occupation.

Marx and welfare

Abstract: The aim of this paper is two-fold: to present an outline of Marx's theory erf welfare, that is his sociology and social philosophy in so far as it relates to the norms and institutions concerned with the recognition and satisfaction of human needs;' and to offer a tentative appraisal of this theory. Needless to say, Marx's works do not offer an explicit theory of welfare. In Marx's life-time the institutions of welfare—in any modem sense of the term—hardly existed. In England the Poor Law, reorganised in 1834 on the principles of a laissez-faire bourgeois economy, was essentially an 'anti-welfare' measure. In this respect it was to remain largely undianged until the beginning of the twentieth century. In Germany, tex), the Bismarckian social legislation was only just getting under way at the time of Marx's death.^ In any case, with the notable exception erf the FactCHy Acts, Marx paid little attention to the various forms of social regulation and provision (e.g. concerning public health and education) enacted by the British Pariiamem during his lifetime. His focus erf interest lay elsewhere. Marx was concerned with the critique of the capitalist social system in toto and devoted his energies towards explicating the fundamental economic contradictions of capitalism. All the same, it can be argued that of all major sociological theorists of the past and present it is Marx whose intellectual and moral concern lay closest to the area of welfare. The problem (rf poverty and degradation erf the vast majority of the people under the regime of unrestrained capitalism, and its definitive solution, was at the heart of Marx's intellectual and moral enterprise. By contrast, other major s(x;iede^ists, for example. Spencer, DtirMieim and Weber, showed no comparaUe concern with poverty and social reconstruction, even though during dieir life-time state intervention had developed furtiier, and Weber indeed lived in the most advanced 'welfare state' of his time.\" However, this is not to imply diat the theoretical models, concepts and insights of these sociologists are not relevant to the understanding of welfare. Qearly they are, just as Marx's own sociology is in a general way. Where Marx remains unique is in his direct concern with the

Organization, ideology and recruitment: the structure of the watch tower movement

Abstract: There seems to be agreemetit among sodologists of religion io the West that, secularization notwithstatiding, conservative diurches in the Protestant tradition are continuing to recruit new members.' The reasons for this phenomencm deserve careful study in themselves, but the more modest aim of this paper is to examine some of the sociological reasons wby one particular sect has managed to overcome some of die difficulties besetting religious groups at the present time. The paper will focus on the Watch Tower movement and, more specifically, will seek to explain its recruiting fortunes in the ligjit of its hig^y distinctive and unusual organizational structure. Evidence to support the argument is drawn from material collected in the course (rf a lengthy study of Jehovah's Witnesses in Britain.^

Pre-Trial Procedures and the Construction of Conviction

Abstract: I Criminal procedure and the construction if conviction In the revived sociology oflaw the procedures of the legal structure have been curiously ignored. Research has concentrated on either the power structure behind legislation or the day to day dramas of the courtroom so beloved and belaboured by the ethnomethodologists. The result is that two distinct lines have developed in the sociology of law with different methodologies and problems why the substance oflaw takes the shape it does and how the routine outcomes of the law are achieved. This is what makes the failure to analyse procedureso curious. For legal procedures in criminal law, the rules of investigation, trial and sentence, the establishment of rights and duties (and the lack of them) bridge this gap. On the one hand they are part ofthe substance of the law and thus the product ofdecisions at the top of the legal and political structure, and on the other hand, one of the influences on how the law is routinely enforced. Legal procedure thus provides a clear link between the ethnomethodological concern with the law in action and the structuralist concern with the law in the books and the power structure behind it. It opens the way to an explanation of courtroom practices that goes far beyond the courtroom walls. The criminal court determines innocence or guilt. It is the central point in the penal process described by Bottomley as:

The jury in the legal system

Abstract: Introduction We are once again witnessing a controversy over the proper place and function ofjury trials in the English legal system. In some respects there is nothing very new about the present concern; recurrent 'panics' about the jury in the legal system have been one of the features of English legal history. The two quotations, both well-worn by now, which we use to introduce our paper, serve as a reminder of what are commonly regarded as the extreme positions on either side of the debate over the efficacy of the so-called 'jury system'. On the face of it there does, indeed, appear to be a world of difference between them. Thus Devlin's words seem plain enough and in need ofno further elaboration. Griswold, too, comes over as bluntly spoken. His is the voice of anguished expertise. According to this tradition the jury has to go because it is no longer fit for its task, ifindeed it was ever fitted for it. The jury job, so the argument runs, can (and should) be better done by lawyers, or perhaps by a panel ofother experts. It is a call for a coalition of excellence and for the expulsion of the 'ignorant' and the 'unskilled' layman from the legal process. We shall suggest later that these disagreements represent a false polarity. False, that is, in the sense that it is often forgotten that both protagonists are reaching out for the same objective. Both sides are entirely absorbed with the question how can the existing law be more efficiently applied, how might it be made better? Devlin, as we have

Method and dogma in historical materialism

Abstract: T his paper takes up a series of related issues arising out of the work of Karl Marx. The first two sections consist of a discussion of the premises and methodology of Marxist analysis. I then go on to explore the implications of this discussion for two central features of Marx's legacy: the concept of class, and the base/superstructure distinction. In both cases I argue that undue faithfulness to the letter of some of Marx's texts has distracted attention from the methodology implicit in his analytic and historical work, and thereby has contributed to an overly sterile Marxism. The final section of the paper is devoted to a critique of a particular vulgar historidst view of Marxism, whidi is in fact rarely espoused today by Marxists. It is induded for two reasons. First, this interpretation is occasionally presented by Marx's critics as Marxism, and it is therefore worth destroying this illusion. Secondly, and far more significantly, elements of this view can be found buried within the work of Marxists whose Marxism is, when taken as a whole, far from vulgar. Many of the points made here have been made before. Such originality as this paper has, therefore, rests mainly in the way I have sought to relate them. I hope to show that what have often been treated as iscdated problems, in fact rest on a common failure to grasp how Marx conceived and analysed production; and that, conversdy, it is in the methodological principles which are embedded in these substantive analyses that the distinctiveness of Marx's historical materialism is to be found.

Dichotomy is contradiction: on ‘society’ as constraint and construction. remarks on the doctrine of the ‘two sociologies’

Abstract: 'We shall, of course, not take the trouble to enlighten our wise philosophers by explaining to them that the \"liberation\" of \"roan\" is not advanced a single step by reducing philosophy, theology, substance and all the trash to \"self-consciousness\" and by liberating nian from the dotmnation of these phrases, which have never held him in thrall . . . \"Liberation\" is a historical and not a mental action . . . ' ' 'Can people obviously incapable of taking serious problems seriously, themselves be taken seriously? It is difficult to do so, comrades, very difficcdt! But the question which certain people cannot treat seriously is in itself so serious that it will do no harm to exatnine even patently frivolous replies to it.'^ 'The opposites in a contradiction both unite and struggle with each other, and it is this which forces things to move and change. Socialist society is no exception . . . Classes and class struggle continue to exist in this society, and the struggle still goes on between the road of socialism and the road of capitalism . . . ' '

THE DEFINITION OF PUBLIC IDENTITY: Managing Marginality in Outport Newfoundland Following Confederation*

Abstract: It is perhaps ironic that Canada should witness simtiltaneously the apparent retiaissance of tiationalism amongst her intellectuals and politicians, and the inexorable eradication of die culttual diflerences exhibited by her various ethnic and regional groups which they parade in lip-service to the richness of Canada's cultural heritage. It is almost as if the obsessive search for a Canadian identity can only bear fniit in a sodety whewe previously disparate populations have now been rendered homogeneous through common subjection to the bureaucrat's decree and the adman's universal formulae. It is not the grand and gross contrasts which are threatened here, such as those between Bast and West, French and English, Indian and White; but rather those which do not find expression in sectional confrontatioti because, though different from each other, they are subsumed by a single sectional category. It is a threat which overpowers the margin in its rdation to the metropdis; it is the reduction erf all the varying identities of the members of a peripheral region to a single, gross and unrepresentative identity approximating a cultural stereotype. Occasionally tbe marginal group has responded by trying to remain distinctive. Mcwe frequently, though, it has sought the appearance of

Perspectives in the Sociology of Law

Abstract: 1. The Theoretical Roots of the Sociology of Law THEfocus of any area of academic enq uiry may be identified by the way in which the 'importance' of the social phenomenon under examination is presented. In order to understand the distinctive character of sociology of law it is essential to recognise that the location of this importance has been expressed in a number of different ways. The significance of these alternative positions is that each one constitutes a different statement of the 'importance' oflaw. This may be expressed in a slightly different way by contending that each statement of the importance of law contains a designation of a problematic. A problematic is contained in every statement ofa frame of reference or a theoretical proposition; it is more than the statement of a problem or a question in that the selection of a particular focus excludes or relegates other foci and thereby presents a potential solution within itself. The sociological movement in law takes as its starting point the lawsociety relationship. The problematic is extremely under-developed; it provides little explicit direction to study within the field. Within this orientation may be detected a number of other problematics which are concerned with providing a skeletal formulation of the nature of the law-society relationship. It will be through an examination of these alternative problematics that we can arrive at a characterisation of the major trends within the sociological movement. Further, their elucidation will facilitate a statement as to the present state of development of the field currently designated as 'sociology oflaw'. The present concern is with the general tradition which underlies the sociological movement in law. For this reason the 'critical' or 'radical' development within the sociology oflaw and in deviancy theory is not considered in any detail. These developments are of sufficient importance to require independent treatment.l It is necessary to stress that the alternative problematics to be discussed are pure types. They are 'pure types' not in the sense that they are not found in the real world (in so far as the realm of the theoretical basis of the sociological movement in law can be regarded as part of the real world), but in the sense that they rarely appear complete and uncontaminated. More frequently they appear in combination with other elements and in this form constitute the specific or distinctive

Max Weber's Sociology of Law: A Critique:

Abstract: WEBER'S sociology oflaw has as its framework a comparative study of the development and nature of legal institutions in England and the Continent. Alongside this focus there occurs theoretical developments in his political sociology which are fed into and also derive from his work on the sociology oflaw. Weber's larger work was characterised by an almost obsessive search for the manner in which developments in Western civilisation differ from and are similar to the fate ofother great historical powers. His central concern, however, is with the peculiarity of the West. Weber's work on law-is probably best understood by grasping this and the fact that much ofhis work rests upon an unspoken and unacknowledged dialogue with the ghost of Marx. This dialogue takes varying forms in Weber's work, but its symptoms are a constant throughout. Weber rejects 'materialist' explanations in favour of those that stress an interaction between material and ideal forces; he avoids direct causal analysis. The outcome of much of Weber's work is to reveal a stress which seems concerned with the never-ending complexity of the interaction of social and cultural forces. His covert claim seems to be that the rationalism of the West is the outcome of a convergence of factors which cannot be explained via materialism, no matter how sophisticated it be. It is the contention of this article and forthcoming work,2 that Weber's bitter desire to avoid and refute materialistic approaches to the past, present, and future led him to accept the inevitability of (a) domination, (b) permanent injustice in law, and (c) the supposed independent nature of law. In Max Weber's view, the dynamic of western civilisation is not, as with Marx, found to reside in its mode ofproduction and its relations of production; rather it resides in the rationalisation process. For Weber rationalisation is the predictable destiny of the Western world. The effect of rationalisation is not the humanistic socialism of Marx, but

‘the ages of faith’—romance or reality?*

Abstract: This article aims to point out the kind of assumptions sometimes made about the position of religion in the pre-industrial past for which historical evidence is not always readily forthcoming. These assumptions can frequently be found in the writings erf sociologists, but historians are not always exempt either. One danger which historians can easily create for sociologists seems to be the characterisation of historical times through the behaviour of elite groups of the period. This is an understandaUe tendency as documentation on elites and their way al life has always been much more plentiful than that on groups lower on the social stratification scales. A second danger often implicit in historical writing is the characterisation erf past epochs through the behaviour of geographically localised groups. This tendency may be easily explained by the fact that it is frequently easier to find documentation about one part erf a country, rather than to fiad the same de)aunentation few all the regions erf the territory in questioti. One must hasten, too, to note the dat]gers of die reverse prexess, where statements are made about a sewiety, generalising from a number erf superficial cases, and \\diere local investigation in depth might well reveal different perspectives. Sexnologists ought obviously to be wary of these potential biases in their attempts to reconstrue:t and understand se>cial reality, which may also quite easily creep into historical writings. The study of the pre-industrial past erf western E u r c ^ is much more prcme to such semrces erf bias than, for example, more recent historyThis article also has two mote specific aims. First, I want to question the underlying assumptiotis about the past of those socicjogists of religion who suggest that, by ce>nq>arison with the past, particularly the pre-industrial past, 'rdigion—seen as a way erf thinking, as the performane:e erf particular prae:tic:es, and die institutionalization and e>rganization of these patterns erf thou^t and action—^has lost influ-

Max weber and the concept of social class

Abstract: If social class is often regarded as fundan^atal for sociology, then the treatment of this concept is widely influenced by the writings of Max Weber. More specifically, Weber's conjunction of class with his own notion of status is influential in die numerous commentaries upon the 'problem' of social dass, or, as it is more generally considered, the problem of 'stratification'. Much discussion of the issue (A dass and status takes the rather simplistic position that Weber broadened the Marxist concept of class, taken to mean 'objective' economic criteria, by the addition of a subjective element in the fonn of status groups, which exist by virtue of the values, attitudes and beliefs that they hdd about such groups and their life style. In a recent book Giddens' has criticised this objective-subjective distinction, yet the precise value of the differentiation still seems to be unclear. Giddens's treatment of the question gives an indication that there is indeed a fundamental contradiction between the concept of class and that of status. He sees an inadequacy in Weber's preservation of dass, since, unlike status, it appears to prohibit a presentation of collective, conscious sodal action. In particular, Giddens adheres to the rather simplistic distinction of da^es as being conditioned by the use and acquisition of objeas of economic production on the one hand, and general consumption patterns and life styles as determining status groups.' The root of Giddens's misformutations, however, does not lie in these definitional charaaeristics. Despite his rejection of a sim^de d i ^ equals o^ective conditions; status equals subjective conditions polarity, Giddens fails to see the nature of the inter-rdationship between the two concepts and consequetitly the true limitations to the Weberian notion of sodal dass. Weber is taken to task for not suffidently daborating the concept of dass: 'If he (Weber) had developed further the notion of \"sodal dass\", he might perhaps have been able to establish a more satisfactory analysis

Law as an instrument of oppression or reform

Abstract: 'LAW, order and authority mustbe upheld' is the cry ofthose who would repress demands which threaten their own position and especially those demands which are supported by any sort of physical action however pacific. Yet often those against whom the law is thus invoked are themselves seeking the support and help of the law. The treatment of the Suffragette Movement is an illustration. Seldom, if ever, has the law been so ruthlessly employed against a movement that was' itselfseeking a reform in the law the franchise for women by means ofwhich other reforms could be obtained. Both those who resist and those who seek reform (or change) invoke the law, the former wishing to maintain existing law and the latter demanding new laws. Many reforms and many changes are directly dependent on changes in the law and cannot be obtained without such changes. Other reforms can be greatly aided by changes in the law. It is not the purpose of this article to define what is meant by reform, to enter into the semantics of whether law when used to repress undesirable actions is an instrument of reform, or to consider the niceties of the distinction between oppression and repression. It is sufficient here to make certain assumptions about what constitutes reform and to examine how law can achieve these ends. Not all will agree with these assumptions. Law as an instrument of reform can be seen as a means ofsecuring a more equal balance of power between different groups in the community and different individuals acting in different capacities. The attempt at equalisation is made, in general, either by restraining certain actions and providing remedies when such actions are committed, or by providing facilities intended to benefit some individuals or groups more than others, thereby tending to equalise the facilities and consequent opportunities available to all individuals. The intended results are not always achieved. Some of the factors in the legal system which limit the use of law as an instrument of reform will be considered in this article. Anti-discrimination legislation in Britain and the United States is the example chosen to illustrate some of the difficulties and possibilities. Such legislation provides an exacting test ofthe effectiveness oflaw as an instrument of reform, because it is law which is concerned with behaviour based on prejudices which are often unconscious and irrational.