Reproduction Of Inequality Research Articles

Upward Mobility in Education: The Role of Personal Networks Across the Life Course

How do individuals achieve upward mobility in education despite the well‐documented mechanisms that foster reproduction of inequalities? This question presents a fundamental puzzle for social science researchers and has generated an increasing body of research. The present article tackles the puzzle using a life course and personal network lens. Studying educational trajectories in Germany of students whose parents have low educational degrees, it asks: What paths did students take through the education system, what personal network factors were important for their educational attainment, and how did these factors change over students’ life courses? In contrast to most studies that zoom in on a specific transition or time period, the article uses data from 36 retrospective in‐depth interviews that allow a sweeping view of respondents’ educational careers. Thanks to a systematic case selection scheme, the data also enables comparisons between students who became upwardly mobile and those who replicated their parents’ low educational degrees. Findings suggest four types of trajectories: direct upward mobility, indirect upward mobility, direct non‐mobility, and indirect non‐mobility. I discuss four personal network factors that seem to drive these trajectories: support with academic efforts, encouragement, support with solving problems, and role models. Upwardly mobile students showed combinations of two or more of these four factors that established higher education as the students’ goal, and provided them with tools and support to reach that goal. With these findings, the article contributes to literature on inclusion in education, social inequality and mobility, personal networks, and the life course.

Dignity in Red Envelopes: Disreputable Exchange and Cultural Reproduction of Inequality in Informal Medical Payment

Disreputable exchanges are morally disapproved and often legally prohibited exchanges that exacerbate and reproduce social inequality but remain ubiquitous. Although previous literature explains the phenomenon by material interests and structural relations, we propose a cultural approach based on three major conceptions of culture: culture in relations, culture in interactions, and culture in inequality. We illustrate this approach by a case study of China’s hongbao (the red envelope) exchange, a typical disreputable exchange through informal medical payment. Drawing on interviews with doctors and patients, we find that participants of the exchange mobilize items from their cultural repertoires, such as professional ethics, face, power, fairness, and affection, to redefine different situations of interactions and project positive self–images to render their problematic exchanges morally acceptable to each other. Moreover, as the participants’ responses to our vignettes show, they negatively evaluate the exchanges in general moral terms, such as equality and fairness, but culturally justify their own involvement. This discrepancy between saying and doing tends to legitimize the disreputable exchange amid enduring public outrage and institutional prohibition. These cultural processes contribute to the reproduction of unequal access to scarce health care resources. Findings of this research not only offer insights into understanding disreputable exchanges but also contribute to research on other cases of social problems in which deviant behaviors are morally and culturally justified.

Feeling Like a Fetish: Racialized Feelings, Fetishization, and the Contours of Sexual Racism on Gay Dating Apps

ABSTRACT Whom we date and are intimate with is structured by race and racism. Recent research has focused on “personal preference” discourse and sexual stereotyping to highlight how and why race and racism affect online and offline interactions. Yet relatively less work focuses on racial fetishization – race-based fixation on a bodily part or characteristic that involves both idolization and demonization of racial difference. Drawing on recent theorizing around racialized feelings, we investigated how racial fetishization materializes and makes men of color feel. We used two sources of data: 858 unique profile screenshots and 26 in-depth interviews with users of Grindr, Scruff, and Jack’d – three popular dating apps for sexual minority men. We found that while instances of racial fetishization were rare in public profiles, a majority of men of color discussed its prevalence. As a result of racial fetishization, men of color described feeling: (1) objectified; (2) that it hindered the formation of platonic or intimate connections; and (3) boxed in and minimized to a stereotype. Our results suggest that racial fetishization induces particular racialized feelings in men of color, and we suggest ways that these racialized feelings might be connected to the reproduction of racial and sexual inequality.

Diversity as the new normal and persistent constructions of the immigrant other – Discourses on multicultural education among teacher educators

The aim of this study was to explore the role of social justice in multicultural education taught in teacher education. The study investigated discourses on multicultural education among Finnish teacher educators, and the subject positions constructed in them. Discourse theory analysis revealed six discourses on multicultural education, ranging from conservative to liberal and critical, with liberal discourses having the most articulations. Although Finnish teacher education has taken steps towards social justice, the results also highlight racialisation and the subject position of the immigrant Other as themes that need to be challenged to prevent the reproduction of inequalities in teacher education.

Constructing the “Competent” Pupil: Optimizing Human Futures Through Testing?

In the last decade, the German transition system has witnessed the large‐scale introduction of so‐called “analysis of potentials” (<em>Potenzialanalysen</em>) in secondary compulsory schooling. In most German Länder, 8th graders must participate in a two‐day assessment center which combines psychometric testing with observations of their social and professional competencies in pre‐specified tasks. The programmatic aim of these assessments is to “introduce pupils early to choosing a job” (Bundesministerium für Bildung und Forschung [BMBF], 2017, p. 2) as well as to enhance the propensity of pupils to “take responsibility for their own future” (BMBF, 2017, p. 9). In the context of the German school‐to‐work system, the introduction of these new forms of diagnostics bear witness to a new preventive political rationality that aims at reducing the entry age into upper secondary education, reduce the recourse to so‐called “transition measures” and optimizing transitions into an apprenticeship market that is characterized by structural inequalities and “mismatch” between pupils’ job aspirations and the offers in apprenticeship places. However, little is known on the role of competency testing devices for the construction of further trajectories and aspirations and their role in the reproduction of inequalities in transitions from school to work. Based on an in‐depth analysis of policy documents and competency profiles (the documents handed out to the pupils after undergoing testing), the article reconstructs the political rationale for the introduction of the so‐called <em>Potenzialanalysen</em>. Based on a Foucauldian framework, we show how pupils are constructed as “competent” subjects. We show that competency assessments are part and parcel of a political rationality that aims at the promotion of a specific (future‐oriented, optimized, self‐regulated) relation to one’s own biographical future on the side of the pupils. Our results demonstrate that competency profiles construct the process of choosing a job as an individualized project of the self and that they invisibilize structural barriers and power relations. In doing so, competency assessments potentially contribute to the reproduction of inequalities in post‐secondary education through delegating “cooling out” processes from institutional gatekeepers to the interiority of persons.

Students’ Differences, Societal Expectations, and the Discursive Construction of (De)Legitimate Students in Germany

At higher education institutions (HEI), which for centuries served only to educate the elite, the composition of the student body is increasingly changing towards greater social and cultural diversity. Students’ differences are also the focus of this article, but not with a specific emphasis on preselected categories. Instead, the article asks how students in teaching in higher education (HE) are represented in the print media and professional discourse in Germany, i.e., which categories of difference are constructed as relevant in HE teaching contexts, which are normalized and (de)legitimized, and what is expected of HEI concerning these differences. Second, to what extent does this change over time, particularly concerning the new circumstances of Corona‐based digital teaching in 2020? The contribution is based on a combination of discourse theory and neo‐institutional organizational sociology. Discourses are a place where social expectations towards organizations are negotiated and constructed. Simultaneously, the discourses construct a specific understanding of HE, making visible openings and closures concerning different groups of students. Which students are constructed as legitimate, desirable, at risk of dropping out, or a risk for HE quality? Based on qualitative content analysis, the article shows that it is less the traditional socio‐structural categories such as gender, social or ethnic origin, or impairments, that are discussed to be relevant in HE teaching contexts. The reproduction of inequality and the associated discrimination is hardly discussed. The focus is instead on the students’ differences concerning individualizable characteristics, competencies, or study practices. Even though many of these individualized differences are conveyed via socio‐structural categories, this connection is often not considered in the discourses.

Structured inequalities and authors’ positionalities in academic publishing: The case of Philippine international migration scholarship

This article examines structured inequalities and authors’ positionalities in the academic publishing field. It uses Bourdieu’s insights in explaining the reproduction of publishing inequality and mobility through cultural capital and habitus modification. The article elaborates ‘positionality’ to constitute structure and agency through position and positioning, and situates academics in varying positionalities (insider, outsider, hybrid) in the global publishing field. Focusing on Filipino international migration scholarship, the article examines 392 journal articles from 1989 to 2018, and tracks the first authors’ ethnicity, institutional affiliation, and university where they received their PhD. The findings show that authors institutionally affiliated in the Global North (insiders) dominate the field (publication count and citations), while homeland-based Filipino scholars are in the periphery (outsiders). With their insider-leaning hybrid positionality, overseas Filipino scholars in the Global North accrue network-mediated benefits. They have respectable representation in publication count and are the most frequently cited authors. Positionality is examined as cultural capital accumulation and adoption of the dominant habitus that enable academics to shift positionality from outsider to insider and derive benefits in research and publishing. The article contributes to the literature on positionality-based inequalities in knowledge production and a periphery standpoint in the discourse on academic publishing inequality.

Transgender Possibilities and the Cisgendering of Family among Cisgender Women

In this article, we examine vocabularies of motive concerning the possibility of transgender partners and children. Data from 20 in‐depth interviews with (mostly white) cisgender college‐aged women in the southeastern United States were analyzed to determine how they construct familial ideals predicated upon cisgender norms and assumptions. Participants respond to the possibility of transgender family members by mobilizing vocabularies of (1) claiming exemptions and (2) emphasizing difficulty. We draw out implications for understanding vocabularies of cisgendering family that create the conditions for transgender marginalization within families, and the consequences cisgendering family has for the reproduction of inequality.

The Road Less Travelled: Using Administrative Data To Understand Inequalities By Sexual Orientation

Understanding the processes contributing to equality of opportunity and outcomes in contemporary societies is at the core of the discipline of sociology. This paper illustrates the value of administrative data to underpin research aimed at identifying, monitoring, and addressing socio-economic disparities between population groups. To accomplish this, I draw on three case studies of recent empirical research leveraging administrative data to examine processes contributing to the (re)production of inequalities by sexual orientation. Collectively, the three case studies exemplify how data sources that fall within the broad category of ‘administrative data’ can help social researchers generate new, policy-relevant knowledge on socio-economic inequalities, as well as robust information to contextualize public and legislative debate. The paper concludes with a discussion of the promises and challenges of using administrative data to understand inequalities by sexual orientation, as well as inequalities between other minority and majority groups.

Colorblind Spots in Qualitative Methods Training

Academia, like many other institutions, is experiencing a racial reckoning. As part of this reckoning, members of institutions of higher education are reflecting on how their structures and cultures reproduce racial inequality and how to disrupt the cycle. One aspect of this conversation that has escaped scrutiny has been methodological training, which can be central to the reproduction of inequality via the marginalization of researchers of color. Qualitive methods guidance and instruction has been criticized for leaving scholars of color unprepared to navigate the complex racial dynamics they confront in the field. In this article we build on these conversations by discussing colorblind spots that surfaced in our graduate-level qualitative methods course in Sociology related to one-time field exercises and fieldwork in a continuous site. We conclude with reflections and recommendations for ethnographic training courses.

The Who? Didactics, differentiation and the biopolitics of inequality

The three didactic questions – what?, how? and why? – are increasingly supplemented with a fourth: who? Drawing on Therborn’s distinction between difference and inequality, as well as on biopolitical theory, the present paper engages critically with the didactic who?-question. The paper situates the who?-question in broader discussions of educational differentiation, suggesting that it encompasses a tension between the recognition of difference and (re)production of inequality. Arguably, this tension becomes visible, and possibly more navigable, when we pose “Therbornian questions”. The paper further suggests that the who?-question can be understood, in biopolitical terms, as a technique for constructing various student populations as appropriate for different kinds of education. Such management of difference, the paper warns, can easily slip into a biopolitics of inequality. Despite our critical observations, we conclude that there might still be radical potential in the who?-question, provided that it is handed over to the students and that careful attention is paid to societal relations.

Comparative perspectives on educational inequalities in Europe: an overview of the old and emergent inequalities from a bottom-up perspective

ABSTRACT Educational inequalities remain a major challenge to the social cohesion of modern societies. They affect the younger generations in the society throughout their development and are also becoming more varied and entrenched. Although most inequalities are linked to socio-economic factors such as income, access to material resources, educational attainment, and social class, new emergent types of inequalities are developing rapidly: spatial segregation, residence status (native-born or immigrant) (Barnes, J. (2007). Down our way: The relevance of neighbourhoods for parenting and child development. Chichester: Wiley. ISBN 9780470030721; Lareau, A. (2014). Schools, housing and the reproduction of inequality. In A. Lareau & K. A. Goyette (Eds.), Choosing homes, choosing schools (pp. 169–206). New York: Russell Sage Foundation; Lareau, A. (2015). Cultural knowledge and social inequality. American Sociological Review 2015, 80(1), 1–27. doi:10.117/0003122414565814); and the digital divide (Bynner, J., & Heinz, W. R. (2021). Youth prospects in the digital society: Identities and inequalities in an unravelling Europe. Bristol: Policy Press; Melhuish, E. (2019). House of commons education committee (2019). Tackling disadvantage in the early years. London: HMSO. Tackling disadvantage in the early years (parliament.uk)). The use of in-depth evidence about the nature and variations in experiences of inequalities by individuals, families, communities within and across European countries is an effective way to provide up-to-date insights into evolving inequalities and the social problems that arise. This paper shifts the focus of the debate about the changing nature of inequalities in modern societies by drawing upon qualitative and mixed methods advances in studying socially disadvantaged groups. Their chances to integrate into society through the educational channels are not likely to be fully achieved without significant change in the current social environment and re-organisation of education systems. The paper draws its conclusions based on recent research and analytical reports with a focus on Europe.

Equalization of disputes or reproduction of inequalities? The use of Facebook by female candidates for federal deputy from Sao Paulo in 2018

Resumo Neste artigo, analisamos o uso de ferramentas do Facebook em campanhas eleitorais de candidatas ao cargo de deputado federal por São Paulo com o objetivo de avaliar se esse uso mitiga ou reproduz desigualdades socioeconômicas estruturais que elas vivenciam em sociedade. Acompanhamos o uso do Facebook durante a campanha eleitoral de 2018 visando entender especificamente se e como essa rede social foi utilizada por essas candidatas. A partir de uma base de dados com mais de 55 mil postagens de 465 candidatas, incorporamos um olhar interseccional sobre as múltiplas identidades dessas mulheres e correlacionamos seus marcadores sociais (estrato sócio-ocupacional, grau de instrução, idade e raça/cor) com o uso do Facebook durante a campanha eleitoral. Os resultados das análises quantitativas apontam que, em vez de mitigar as desigualdades socioeconômicas preexistentes, essa rede social acabou por reproduzi-las ao longo da campanha.

Caste Work in Management Studies: How are Historical Stigma and Inequality Reproduced?

Socio-economic discrimination based on class, race, and gender has been a subject of exploration for scholars of organization studies for many years (Amis, Mair & Munir, 2020; Bapuji, Ertug & Shaw, 2020). However, ‘caste’, a means of exploitation, subjugation and discrimination for centuries within and beyond the Indian subcontinent (Bapuji & Chrispal, 2020), has been overlooked and underexamined almost entirely in management research. In contrast, research in other disciplines has provided substantial evidence of both the prevalence and scale of caste-based discrimination, affecting individuals’ social status and interactions as well as occupational choices and positioning in organizational life (Thorat & Joshi, 2015; Siddiqui, 2011). Caste is different from other forms of discrimination like race and class. For example, while discrimination based on race is embodied in colour and ethnic-origin, and discrimination based on class emerges from occupational and economic status, caste is deeply rooted in religious scriptures, traditions, and rituals, providing sacred justification for seeing and treating members of lower caste as ‘untouchables’, ‘impure’ and ‘lesser than’ (Chrispal, Bapuji & Zietsma, 2020). Overtime, caste has become a taken for granted institution restricting social and economic mobility of low-caste individuals. Given the perennial and widespread impact of caste, it is important to examine (a) ‘caste’ as an institution in itself exemplifying systemic power structures, social hierarchies, and suppression of agency of the lower caste individuals; and (b) practices that individuals use to reproduce, maintain or resist caste-based discrimination, which we refer to as ‘caste work’. The series of papers presented in the symposium enables disentangling the concept of ‘caste work’ and its uniqueness, while also shedding light on the institution of caste. Collectively, these papers build toward a model of caste work that reifies a distinction between in-groups – the unsullied, who are deemed desirable and reliable by a particular community – and out-groups – the stigmatized, who are considered tainted, undesirable, and unreliable interaction partners. All of this works together in that low caste actors are the product of sanctified social evaluation by upper-caste actors, which creates and defends social structures. There are also stories of resistance by lower caste actors (e.g., Jagannathan, Bawa & Rai, 2020; Vikas, Varman & Belk, 2015). Research on caste work in organizations is only beginning to emerge. No systematic unpacking of distinct practices performed to maintain, reproduce or resist the institution of caste and its impact on inequalities at individual, organizational and societal levels, has yet emerged (Bapuji et al., 2020a; Chrispal et al., 2020; Haq, Klarsfeld, Kornau & Ngunjiri, 2020). The symposium is put together to bring emerging scholarship that attempts to address this gap. The Violence and Reprieve of Silence: Caste Work in an Indian Business School Presenter: Devi Vijay; Indian Institute of Management, Calcutta Presenter: Vivek G. Nair; IIT Delhi How is Social Inequality Maintained in Conceptualizing Dirty Work? Presenter: Ghazal Zulfiqar; Lahore U. of Management Sciences Presenter: Ajnesh Prasad; CMS Negotiating dirtiness through identity work: Experiences of cleaners in India Presenter: Avina Jenifa Mendonca; Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad Presenter: Premilla D'Cruz; Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad Presenter: Ernesto Noronha; Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad Tackling Grand Challenges Locally: Institutional Work of Disruption through Power, Place & Pratice Presenter: Roscoe Conan DSOUZA; - Presenter: Ignasi Lanuza Martí; ESADE Business School-Ramon Llull U. It’s not Caste! It’s Culture! MNC Reproduction of Local Inequalities at a Global Level. Presenter: Snehanjali Ashish Chrispal; PhD Student at U. of Melbourne Presenter: Hari Bapuji; U. of Melbourne

The unequal consequences of family structures for infant health

Rapid changes in American families have reshaped inequalities in child well-being. This paper examines the unequal consequences of family structures for infant health, focusing on birthweight. Existing studies mainly address the average association between marriage (versus singlehood) and birthweight. I extend the literature by 1) explicitly considering cohabitation and 2) exploring the heterogeneous associations based on mother's likelihood of union formation at conception. Pooling nationally representative data from the National Survey of Family Growth 2011-17, I analyze a sample of recent births (N = 4,376) born to mothers aged between 20 and 49 years. Propensity score methods are used to address selections. Results show that 1) compared to single mothers, married mothers reap birthweight benefits, while cohabiting mothers do not; 2) married mothers with a higher likelihood to marry at conception (i.e., more advantaged) reap even larger birthweight benefits than their low-likelihood counterparts (i.e., less advantaged). Overall, the findings reveal important and nuanced roles of family structure in the reproduction of intergenerational inequality through infant health.

“Splendid Isolation”: The reproduction of music industry inequalities in Spotify’s recommendation system

In this article, we argue that offline inequalities, such as core–periphery relations of the music industry, are reproduced by streaming platforms. First, we offer an overview of the reproduction of inequalities and core–periphery dynamics in the music industry. Then we illustrate this through a small-scale network analysis case study of Hungarian metal bands’ connections on Spotify. We show that the primary determinant of a given band’s international connectedness in Spotify’s algorithmic ecosystem is their international label connections. Bands on international labels have more reciprocal international connections and are more likely to be recommended based on actual genre similarity. However, bands signed with local labels or self-published tend to have domestic connections and to be paired with other artists by Spotify’s recommendation system according to their country of origin.

Social class inequalities in attitudes towards mathematics and achievement in mathematics cross generations: a quantitative Bourdieusian analysis.

Drawing on Bourdieu’s theory of social and cultural reproduction, this article utilizes the conceptual tools of habitus and cultural capital to examine intergenerational inequalities in attitudes towards mathematics and mathematics learning in three secondary schools in England. Data from 1079 students aged 14–16 included mathematics achievement, survey measures of attitudes towards mathematics, perceived parental attitudes towards mathematics, newly developed scales for cultural capital and habitus, and social class. There was a very strong relationship between student’s attitudes towards mathematics and students’ perceptions of their parents’ attitudes towards mathematics. Middle-class students reported more positive attitudes towards mathematics, more positive perceived parental attitudes towards mathematics, and had higher mathematics achievement than working-class students. Cultural capital had a significant positive effect on students’ attitudes towards mathematics but a minor effect on their achievement in mathematics. However, cultural capital’s effect on students’ attitudes and achievement in mathematics faded when habitus was included in the model. We suggest that habitus may play a more central role than cultural capital in the reproduction of mathematics inequalities. School quality had a modest but significant impact on mathematics outcomes in this study, so we argue that challenges to mathematics inequalities will require changes both within and outside of mathematics classrooms.Supplementary InformationThe online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s10649-021-10078-5.

Toward a (Re)Integrated Application of Bourdieuan Theory

Bourdieu’s critical analysis of capital (BCAC) is a useful tool for unmasking how schools legitimate class structure and identifying the institutional, societal, and cultural forces that structure class reproduction and oppression. In this paper, we examine the ways educational researchers have constrained the critical application of Bourdieu’s concepts. We highlight the utility of BCAC for exposing the symbolic violence that educational systems enact upon students and families who are unfamiliar with the “culture of power.” Our purpose is to engage in a revitalized critique against the reproduction of educational inequalities and explicate how BCAC is useful toward these ends.

(Re)production of Inequalities in Retirement Practices and Meanings Assigned to the Term 'Retiree' in the Post-Communist Context.

In the institutionalized life course transition from work to retirement is the transition that culturally defines the beginning of later life. However, there is no universal way of experiencing retirement or understanding retirees’ social roles. Especially in the context of the post-communist, liquid modern reality in Poland. The social role of the retiree, defined as a set of rules and expectations generated for individuals occupying particular positions in the social structure, is constructed at the intersection of what is culturally defined and individually negotiated. Therefore, the way in which individuals (re)define term “retiree” and “do retirement” reflects not only inequalities in individual resources and attitudes, but also in social structure in a given place and at a given time. In this contribution, I draw upon data from 68 qualitative interviews with retirees from Poland to analyze retirement practices and meanings assigned to the term “retiree.” Applying practice theory, I explore the inequalities they (re)produce, mirror and reinforce at the same time. Results show that there are four broad types of retirement practices: caregiving, working, exploring and disengaging. During analysis of meanings assigned by participants to the term “retiree,” two definitions emerged: one of a “new wave retiree” and the other of a “stagnant retiree.” Results suggest that in the post-communist context, retirement practices and meanings assigned to the term “retiree” are in the ongoing process of (re)negotiation and are influenced on the one hand by the activation demands resulting from discourses of active and productive aging, and on the other by habitus and imaginaries of retirement formed in the bygone communist era. Retirement practices and definitions of the term “retiree” that emerged from the data reflect structural and individual inequalities, highlighting intersection of gender, age and socioeconomic status in the (re)production of inequalities in retirement transition in the post-communist context.

Controversies in an information technology startup: A critical actor-network analysis of the entrepreneurial process

This article critically investigates the controversies involved in the entrepreneurial process of an IT venture using the Actor-Network Theory (ANT). While ANT and other processual approaches have been used to assess entrepreneurship, little emphasis has been placed on addressing the controversies involved in the entrepreneurial process. To overcome this bias, we used the Cartography of Controversies (CC), an ANT's applied method, to highlight the impacts of conflictual relationships on the organizing process of an IT venture. We based our analysis on a pluralistic corpus of primary data, including interviews, focus groups, field journals, and other documents. We found five main critical issues related to the entrepreneurial process, being them: sociodemographic biases, reproduction of economic and cultural inequalities, conflicts among organizational elites, disputes between owners and workers, and overdependence of startups on larger technological firms. In line with the ‘ANT and After’ literature, we demonstrated how the critical use of ANT sociological approach avoids excessively aggregated categories often present on other critical studies. Finally, we conclude that the critical use of ANT can contribute to more sophisticated and well-built forms of criticism, orienting the research empirically and considering the critical capacities of the actants themselves.