The Dilemma of Accountability in Modern Government: Independence Versus Control and Class Inequality and Political Order: Social Stratification in Capitalist and Communist Societies

Abstract This article explores the patterns of class inequality and capital accumulation in Brazil, showing the drivers and limits of the decline in inequality that occurred during the Workers’ Party governments. It proposes that minimum wage hikes and greater social security changed the demand pattern and kick-started a cumulative causation process. Growth and redistribution thus reinforced each other for a period, and then spelled their own limits. As growth accelerated in the 2000s, a Gini decomposition indicates that class inequality decreased, but confined to changes between workers—capitalist income and social stratification were preserved. This also endogenously led to a regressive structural change, as low-productivity, labour-intensive services grew and international trade patterns worsened. This created a medium-term dependence on commodity prices for balance-of-trade solvency, and heightened cost-push inflation, which could not be overcome under the limited policy framework in place. The constrained basis for reducing inequality and the regressive structural change underscore that developmental strategies requires broad, multi-dimensional inequality-reducing measures and an encompassing catching-up project.

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Trajectories of social justice within social stratification: towards a Bourdieusian reading of social class for social workers

Critical and Radical Social Work ◽

10.1332/204986021x16114103576454 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Susan Flynn

Keyword(s):

Social Sciences ◽

Social Justice ◽

Social Class ◽

Social Workers ◽

Social Stratification ◽

Class Inequality ◽

Conceptual Frame ◽

The Social ◽

Just Society ◽

Social Class Inequality

Vies towards social justice in the social work academy and elsewhere have too frequently been imprecise, rhetorical and definitionally opaque. This article pursues a rigorous and theoretically exact treatment of the matter of social class for social workers, towards presenting set parameters for operationalising social justice. The research base of the article is social stratification scales drawn from the social sciences, upon which a bespoke and composite conceptual frame is applied. Within this, the Bourdieusian theory of capital, extended and applied within Bonnycastle’s relational illustrative model of social justice, supports both an economic and non-materialist reading of class. The intention is to assist social workers in understanding and therefore contesting social class inequality, towards creating a more egalitarian and socially just society.

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Review of Political Order and Inequality: Their Foundations and Their Consequences by Carles Boix

Journal of Economic Literature ◽

10.1257/jel.20151366 ◽

2016 ◽

Vol 54 (3) ◽

pp. 935-941 ◽

Cited By ~ 1

Author(s):

Alberto Alesina

Keyword(s):

Industrial Revolution ◽

Institutional Development ◽

Political Order ◽

The Other ◽

Recent History ◽

Ruling Class ◽

Class Inequality ◽

Enormous Amount ◽

Book Covers

Political Order and Inequality: Their Foundations and Their Consequences argues that geography, technology, and wars determined the formation of a ruling class, inequality, and institutional development, rather than the other way around. Institutions are not a cause but a consequence. This relatively short book covers an enormous amount of material. I have sympathy for the basic idea of the book, but in some parts I would have liked to see more detailed evidence, especially on the more recent history and the Industrial Revolution. (JEL D02, D63, D72, H11, O43)

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