Prepared by H-M-ZAKRIA
Lecturer GDC Parova, D.I.KHAN
PAKISTANI SOCIETY AND CULTURE
Unit # 3. Social Stratification:
Social class: Other social science disciplines such as anthropology and sociology have shown that social class is indeed a basic contrast among people with far-reaching consequences for how we think, feel, and act.
Social class is more than just how much money you have. It's also the clothes you wear, the music you like, the school you go to -- and has a strong influence on how you interact with others. People from lower classes have fundamentally different ways of thinking about the world than people in upper classes. Generally speaking, social class discriminates the individuals of a society from one another and s creates a distance among them.
Social class attaches a specific status with an individual of the society which may be achieved status or ascribed status.
Status represents another form of inequality – standing, esteem, respect, prestige, may involve physical ability, intelligence, beauty, occupations that are ranked in order of prestige– doctors, corporate lawyers, financial experts … to garbage collectors and janitors.
Social class status has long been thought to influence the members' behavior. Casual observation of different social classes leads to the intuitive belief that behavior patterns differ from one class to the next, and several studies have actually detected such differences. Yet there are many confusing issues surrounding both the theoretical construct of social class and the behavior patterns that are supposed to be affected by social status. There is general agreement that social class membership is determined by a person's status on several socioeconomic variables but no clear consensus about what variables must be included or what weight should be placed on each. There are also problems in identifying the behavioral effects of class membership. Even though preferences may differ by social class, the individual's actions may be constrained by situational factors that are not related to social status. The objective of this project was to measure the effect of four variables related to social class on people's leisure behavior.
Social Class and Consumer Behavior
Attempts to relate social class differences to specific consumer behaviors have resulted in less than conclusive results. Martineau (1958) presented information supporting his contention that social class affects perceived risk, choice making, and store selection, among other factors. Levy (1966) has demonstrated differences between classes in respect to values, interpersonal attitudes, shopping behaviors, and media selection, among others. Mathews and Slocum (1969) established social class differences in respect to credit card usage. Rich and Jain (1968), on the other hand, noted little, if any differences between classes in respect to fashion interests, sources of shopper information, interpersonal influences, or other factors influencing shopping behavior.
A number of hypotheses can be formulated to account for the lack of consistent findings of these studies, as well as many others attempting to differentiate behavior patterns on the basis of social class. Inconsistent definitions of social class, confounding influences such as status inconsistency, and the changing structure of American society are but a few factors that may intervene in these studies. This study incorporates a measure of self-rated social class membership with educational status, family income, and two methods of categorizing occupational status, together with the demographic variables of age, sex, marital status, and family life cycle stage. This permits a comparison of the relative potency of the different variables in shaping behavior. The recency of the study may also account for the changing social class structure.
Class structure of Pakistani Society
A social class is a homogeneous group of people in a society formed on the combined basis of
1. Education
2. Occupation
3. Income
4. Place of residence
And have who have similar social values similar interest in life and they behave a like have approximately equal position of respect or status in a society.
The social classes of Pakistan.
1. Upper social class2. Middle social class3. Working social class
1. Upper social class.
The upper social class which generally have high level of income and belong to be most high paying profession and they live in most cleanest place of the country and money will be no problem for them and their size is 2% of the total society and approximately 3.7 million they have 60% to 65% of money of the country. They are actually
1. High status leadership
2. Big business man
3. Top management of the company
2. Middle Social Class The USC and MSC education are met different like USC study in foreign country like oxford university and MSC are study in local university of their country but income size will found more different theirhouses are different their house are not huge and not think for a huge house of defence and think a house of Gulshan-e-iqbal their population is 28% out of the total population their population is 53 to54 million of the total population They are actually
1. They are small to medium size business man.
2. Middle management
3. Low ranking govt. office And the big difference in USC and MSC is house concentration they focus more to their house but USC not so much home focus they are less and MSC lot home focus.
3. Working social class
The working class is those minimally educated people who engage in “manual labor” with little or no prestige. Unskilled workers in the class—dishwashers, cashiers, maids, and waitresses—usually are underpaid and have no opportunity for career advancement. They are often called the working poor. Skilled workers in this class—carpenters, plumbers, and electricians—are often called blue collar workers. They may make more money than workers in the middle class—secretaries, teachers, and computer technicians; however, their jobs are usually more physically taxing, and in some cases quite dangerous.
What is social mobility?
Social mobility describes the movement or opportunities for movement between different social groups and the advantages and disadvantages that go with this in terms of income, security of employment, opportunities for advancement etc. The academic literature draws a distinction between several different kinds of social mobility : - the sociological literature takes a definition of social mobility defined in terms of movements between social classes or occupational groups whereas the economics literature generally focuses on income and income mobility. Income has advantages as a direct measure of command over resources (at least at a point in time) but social class may be a better measure of life chances; - social mobility can be examined both intergenerationally (how far the opportunities open to children are determined by the social class or income of their parents) and intragenerationally (to what extent individuals’ social position or income changes over their own lifetime). Sociologists generally focus on intergenerational mobility and economists on intragenerational mobility (reflecting the nature of the data sets they use).
Why is social mobility important?
High rates of social mobility may be desirable for a number of reasons : - politically, because equality of opportunity is an aspiration of politicians across the political spectrum; - economically, because it is inefficient to waste the talents of even one single person. Economic growth depends on the extent to which everyone’s talents can be fully utilised; and - socially, because social cohesion and inclusion may be more likely to be achieved in a society where people believe they can improve themselves through their abilities, talents and effort than in a society where opportunities and quality of life depend on social background.
Over the past 20 years, income inequalities have widened significantly. Between 1979 and 1998/9, the real incomes of those in the bottom decile of the income distribution rose by 6% in real terms whereas the real incomes of those in the top 10% rose by 82%. Mean incomes rose by 55% (also in real terms). 8. These figures are not compiled from a sample of people whose incomes have been tracked in each and every year for 20 years. Rather, a new sample is taken each year and the incomes of each decile of the population compared. The figures are therefore potentially consistent both with large numbers of people remaining at the bottom end of the income distribution for long periods or with large numbers of people permanently moving out of spells of low income. Large and growing income inequalities may be more acceptable if there are significant opportunities for social mobility, which allow individuals and their families to change their position in the income and wider social distribution.
Social mobility is not without potential disadvantages, however : - social mobility can be downward as well as upward i.e. there are potential losers as well as gainers. A society with a lot of upward and downward social mobility could be characterised by considerable variation in individual and household income. Significant change in individual and household incomes, especially over short periods, could create economic instability and social tensions unless there were economic and social policy interventions which helped individuals and households to cope with such income fluctuation; - a society characterised by high levels of social mobility in which the greatest rewards go to those with the greatest merit (however defined) might not be an attractive one. Those individuals with certain abilities or talents might scoop all the rewards (the “winner takes all” society). By contrast, the downwardly mobile (whose expectations and aspirations about their social position and economic status will have been shaped by the social position and economic status of their parents and peers) are likely to be unhappy and resentful. This could threaten social cohesion; and - there is a danger that focusing on social mobility will lead to the circumstances of the socially immobile being ignored. Improving living standards may depend as much on increasing opportunities for the immobile as breaking down barriers to social mobility.
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