Social Stratification and Education in Industrial Countries

Abstract

ATTENTION TO SOCIAL STRATIFICATION and the way it intersects with education in industrial countries has had to be expressed in recent years in quantitative terms in line with the general thrust of research in the social sciences. Rates of social mobility had to be assessed, compared, and related to the functioning of educational systems. Manpower flow through education had to be traced and tallied with the intake of the occupational market. Elements of school success had to be defined, broken into components, and related to social origin of students. Data on social provenance, methods of recruitment, and the type of training received by teachers and students had to be assembled in order to evaluate the impact of educators as a profession and as a social group. This essay will review the intersection of stratification and schools in qualitative terms without reviewing these deservedly meritorious quantitative advances. Two decades of effort have produced much insight but have not been sufficiently definitive to serve as guides to policy. The methodological doubts about comparability of the assembled bodies of empirical data continue to plague the researchers and to agitate the critics. Recent rumblings that some of the crucial measurements have been falsified have added to the confusion. We shall not know how stratification shows up in education until we can convincingly measure its many-sided impact. Until we can act from such knowledge we must rely on descriptive insight. Qualitative formulations may be more hunches than proof, but all scientific advances have derived their impetus from inspired qualitative guesswork. In such analysis the persistence of class advantage can be deduced from the fact that stratification issues are dealt with piecemeal, but are not appraised or attacked on the general front. In spite of these piecemeal efforts the hereditary reproduction of the elite from generation to generation has maintained itself, efforts at democratization notwithstanding. The egalitarian impact of mass education has been, nevertheless, effective at the level of primary education and indirectly at higher levels. In primary education universal attendance and unified curriculum have removed class tensions in this sector. Industrial countries also have a greatly enlarged intake into secondary schools and colleges. The result is the enlarged middle class. While not substantially affecting the position of the top elite the impact of that class is to shift the power of decisionmaking from the leaders to the second level management. This alters and perhaps lessens the burdens of stratification.