Davis & Moore argue that stratification makes an important contribution to social order, and therefore inequality is seen as “beneficial, positive and necessary”. A society must ensure that the most functionally important roles are filled by those most talented and efficient, with education and stratification allowing individuals to have an occupation that best suits their abilities. Whilst they claim that a meritocratic society gives high reward (financially and status-wise) to motivate the most gifted and inequality means those disadvantaged wish to improve on their position, there is much resentment over ‘fat-cat’ pay packets in today’s world. Davis & Moore neglect these dysfunction’s of stratification – for example reward possibly being due to

However, Marx goes further than explaining the concept of class by ownership and non-ownership, using the term ‘class’ for both analytical and historical concepts (Crompton, 1998). Engels described Marx’s concept of labour value as one of his greatest achievements – here Marx argues that in a capitalist society, labour is a commodity like any other except it is unique in the fact that it can create new values.

unjust economic and political power, and that poverty negatively impacts education and lifestyle.

Note : the key Marxist theory is based on industrial capitalism, and thus could be seen as somewhat outdated today. However, there is the important assertion made that the death of class does not mean the end of social division and conflict, with post-class societies possibly being even more crippling and destabilising than class societies, and certainly not necessarily meaning social harmony.

Marxist feminists claim that the “woman’s place is in the home” opinion is a capitalist ideology, and thus remains fairly strong in UK society. Women make up a reserve army of labour, hired when the economy is booming, then freely made redundant later with the ideology suggesting that they have gone back to their “proper job

Some topics in this essay:
Davis Moore, Political Economy, Century UK, Louis Bonaparte’, , Latin American, marx functionalism, davis moore, social inequality, labour force, social action, crompton 1998, industrial capitalism, capitalist society, sociological theories, behaviour social,