Marx & Durkheim
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A classless society would represent a social order with no economic base. Many doubt that a modern society that is classless can exist, as the failed experiment of the Soviets with communism demonstrates-not that social inequality between individuals ever ceased to exist in the former Soviet Union. Karl Marx and Emile Durkheim both wrote about the stratification of society into classes. Marx argues that the economic base of society has enormous impact on the shape of all aspects of culture and social structure. This includes race, gender, law, religion, education, and government. While Marx and Durkheim both deal with division of labor, they view it as resulting in different outcomes. Durkheim felt the inequalities of division of labor could be overcome its inherent conflicts through increased social consensus of norms. Marx felt it was through struggle only that these inequalities of class stratification could be righted. Still, both Marx and Durkheim felt that class stratification reinforced the status quo and exerted enormous influence on beliefs regarding race and gender. This analysis will compare and contrast the views of Marx and Durkheim with respect to class, race, and gender. There are comparisons and contrasts we can make between Marx and Durkheim on a broad level. For example, Durkheim’s theories are more those of idealism, arguing social norms constitute society, than are those o
. . .
ltural diversity creates confusion over norms and values and leaves people without clear moral guidelines. Individuals who are in a condition of anomie lack rules for behavior, for they feel little sense of social discipline over their personal desires and acts.
(Robertson 1987: 195)
Anyone living in modern America understands how class stratification can impact such aspects of culture as race and gender. There was a time when social institutions empowered by the ruling class in American society reinforced the inferior status of women to men, prevented women from economic independence, or from having the right to vote. So, too, there was a time in the not too distant past when African Americans were used as slaves in the economic order, were segregated from whites, and had no right to vote or gain a voice through political office. Further, views on gender and race are often adopted by members of each social class because Marx argued that our membership in the class gives us our ideas, convictions, reasoning, and esthetic preferences. As Marx wrote:
Upon the different forms of property, upon the social conditions of existence rises an entire superstructure of distinct and characteristically formed sentiments, illusions, mod
. . .
Some common words found in the essay are:
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Approximate Word count = 2299
Approximate Pages = 9 (250 words per page)
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