2022
Political cleavages in post-communist Poland
Time and place: Sep 2, 2022 13:15-15:00 Room 221, Harriet Holters hus
This talk has several aims. Its first goal is to present the structure of the Polish political scene and the historical origins of its main cleavages. Another goal is to place these divisions in a wider international context. One of the main arguments is that the specificity of political differences in Poland can be explained better if the peripheral status of the country in relation to Russia and Western Europe is taken into account. The classic Lipset-Rokkan model of political cleavages and their West European origins is used as a foundation for the centre/periphery based interpretation of current, as well as late 19th and early 20th century, Polish politics. I also propose a model of linkage between the historical Lipset-Rokkan approach and Kitschelt's 'universal' classification of political cleavages. By establishing a relationship between the universal and historical meanings of Polish political cleavages, we are able to determine the extent to which political cleavages in Poland can be connected to the standard Western model. Finally, I present general conclusions drawn from the analysis of the Polish case that might be applicable in the analysis of political divisions in other Central and East European countries. Zarycki offers an interpretation of the two main political cleavages in Poland from the perspective of the Lipset-Rokkan model, which in turn is used as a starting point for reflections on the historical roots of the Polish political scene.
Variable Geometry of Legal Legitimacy: The Polish Constitutional Court and the “Populist” Revolution
Time and place: May 5, 2022 13:15-15:00 Room 221, Harriet Holters hus
Organizer: The Classes and Elites Research Seminar
Studies of contemporary populism usually focus on either the ideological layer of this phenomenon, or on its social causes. In contrast, this study turns to populism in action with a focused analysis of the Polish Constitutional Court (CC), which was the first institution taken over by the “populist” and authoritarian party Law and Justice (Prawo i Sprawiedliwosc – PiS), the current ruling party in Poland. The detailed examination of the Polish CC, in both synchronic and diachronic dimensions and centering on the logic behind the selection of judges by respective political parties, provides a broader comparative perspective on what contemporary right-wing “populism” is in practice. By examining the changing forms of legitimization and the legitimizing effects of the Polish CC (from its first term, established prior to the fall of state socialism in 1989, to the contemporary term, marked by PiS’ rule), hidden relations are uncovered between politics, law and other expert institutions - under the conditions of liberal democracy and its authoritarian “populist” questioning. Geometric data analysis (multiple correspondence analysis) of the CC space reveals an outline of the logic of “populist” ruling, especially in the key context of the indirect forms of its legitimacy.
Anu Kantola, Jules Naudet and Bruno Cousin: How the wealthy feel and think about the rest
Time and place: Jan 20,2022 08:15-10:00
Organizer: The Classes and Elites Research Seminar
Anu Kantola: The politics of upper-class feelings: How the wealthy feel about the rest
Bruno Cousin & Jules Naudet: Upper-class neighborhoods and stigmatization of the poor in Paris, São Paulo and Delhi
2021
Anne Monier & Luna Glucksberg: Wealth and philanthropy
Time and place: Nov 4, 2021 13:15-15:00 Zoom
In this seminar, we bring together Anne Monier (ESSEC) and Luna Glucksberg (LSE) for a joint seminar on elite philanthropy.
Céline Bessière & Sibylle Gollac: The gender of capital. How families perpetuate wealth inequality
Time and place: Sep 16, 2021 13:15-15:00 Zoom
Organizer: The Classes and Elites Research Seminar
In this seminar, Céline Bessière (Paris Dauphine University) and Sibylle Gollac (CNRS) will present their work on wealth accumulation, class and gender. Their recent book, "Le Genre du capital: Comment la famille reproduit les inégalités" (Paris, La Découverte, 2020), draws on family monographs extending 15 years of ethnography. In combination with statistical material, this impressive work brings attention to the ways in which families perpetuate wealth inequalities.
The Working Class and Social Inequality in the 21st Century: Wendy Bottero & Shamus Khan
Time and place: May 27, 2021 14:15-16:00 Zoom
Organizer: The Classes and Elites Research Seminar
Unpacking the Modern Working Class & the Classes and Elites Research Seminar present two seminars on the Working Class and Social Inequality in the 21st Century.
In this second webinar, Wendy Bottero (University of Manchester) will discuss research on ordinary people’s understandings of inequality and Shamus Khan (Princeton University) will give a talk in which he argues that contemporary understandings of inequality are obscured by elite- and economic determinism.
The Working Class and Social Inequality in the 21st Century: Marianne Nordli Hansen & Mike Savage
Time and place: May 25, 2021 15:15-17:00 Zoom
Unpacking the Modern Working Class & the Classes and Elites Research Seminar present two seminars on the Working Class and Social Inequality in the 21st Century. In this first webinar, Marianne Nordli Hansen (University of Oslo) will give an introduction and present insights from studying the Norwegian working class. Mike Savage (London School of Economics) will be discussing themes from his recently published book The Return of Inequality.
Patrick Sachweh: Classes and Classifications. A Mixed Methods Perspective on Symbolic Boundaries in Germany
Time and place: Apr 29, 2021 13:15-15:00 zoom
Patrick Sachweh (University of Bremen) will present results from a large mixed-methods project on symbolic boundaries in Germany.
In recent years, important contributions to a culturally oriented sociological class analysis have been made. Specifically, a growing number of – mostly qualitative – studies have used the concept of “symbolic boundaries” to study how members of different social classes define themselves vis-à-vis others, and how class-specific social identities emerge in such processes of reciprocal classification. While this research has significantly enhanced our understanding of class-specific patterns of identification, attempts to map out symbolic boundaries for representative population samples have been rare. The talk presents findings from a mixed-methods project conducted in 2017 in Germany that combined focus groups and a representative survey in order to conceptualize and implement a standardized survey instrument for the measurement of symbolic boundaries. Whereas the quantitative analyses reveal a three-dimensional structure of economic, cultural and moral boundaries, the qualitative analyses reconstruct how distinct configurations of these boundaries form an ethos of moderation and planful realism in the lower-middle class and an ethos of cultivation and distinction in the upper-middle class.
Koen Damhuis: Roads to the radical Right
Time and place: March 25, 2021 13:15-15:00 Zoom
Organizer: The Classes and Elites Research Seminar and CEREX
Trump, Wilders, Salvini, Le Pen - during the last decades, radical right-wing leaders and their parties have become important political forces in most western democracies. Their growing appeal raises an increasingly relevant question: who are the voters that support them and why do they do so? Numerous and variegated answers have been given to this question, inside as well as outside academia. Yet, curiously, despite their quantity and diversity, these existing explanations are often based on a similar assumption: that of homogeneous electorates. Consequently, the idea that different subgroups with different profiles and preferences might coexist within the constituencies of radical right-wing parties has thus far remained underdeveloped, both theoretically and empirically.
This ground-breaking book is the first one that systematically investigates the heterogeneity of radical right-wing voters. Theoretically, it introduces the concept of electoral equifinality to come to grips with this diversity. Empirically, it relies on innovative statistical analyses and no less than 125 life-history interviews with voters in France and the Netherlands. Based on this unique material, the study identifies different roads to the radical right and compares them within a cross-national perspective. In addition, through an analysis of almost 1400 tweets posted by Geert Wilders and Marine Le Pen, the book shows how the latter are able to appeal to different groups of voters. Taken together, the book thus provides a host of important new insights into the heterogeneous phenomenon of radical right support.
Elisabeth Schimpfössl: Rich Russians’ Morality of Success
Time and place: March 3, 2021 13:15-15:00 zoom
Organizer: The Classes and Elites Research Seminar
In this seminar, I will discuss wealthy Russians’ vision of how society should be organised and the role they see for themselves. My research is based on interviews with 80 Russian multi-millionaires and billionaires, their spouses and their children. The interview analysis highlights the role of Soviet history and shows how it is integrated into, and harmonises with, contemporary upper-class Russians’ notions of meritocracy. Based on these Russian-specific findings, I argue that drawing on international sociological research could considerably advance our understanding of how Russian elites ideologically construe and morally legitimise the concentration of money and power in their own hands and how they model themselves as ‘good’ in their actions and ‘deserving’ of their fortunes. Conversely, I suggest that this new perspective on elites (in particular rich Russians’ references to their superior genes and their unwavering preference for private capital as a means to develop society, if necessary, to the detriment of democracy) has great potential to complement established scholarship on Western elites, which emphasise hard work but tend to gloss over biology. In this seminar, I will discuss wealthy Russians’ vision of how society should be organised and the role they see for themselves. My research is based on interviews with 80 Russian multi-millionaires and billionaires, their spouses and their children. The interview analysis highlights the role of Soviet history and shows how it is integrated into, and harmonises with, contemporary upper-class Russians’ notions of meritocracy. Based on these Russian-specific findings, I argue that drawing on international sociological research could considerably advance our understanding of how Russian elites ideologically construe and morally legitimise the concentration of money and power in their own hands and how they model themselves as ‘good’ in their actions and ‘deserving’ of their fortunes. Conversely, I suggest that this new perspective on elites (in particular rich Russians’ references to their superior genes and their unwavering preference for private capital as a means to develop society, if necessary, to the detriment of democracy) has great potential to complement established scholarship on Western elites, which emphasise hard work but tend to gloss over biology.
Erik Vestin: The Decline of Class Voting in Sweden: Reconsiderations, Explanations and the Role of the New Middle Class
Time and place: Jan 20, 2021 13:15-15:00
The presentation will deal with central issues in the study of class voting. One such issue is whether class voting is misleadingly seen to be in decline because of the class schemas used to measure it. In particular, it has been suggested the new class schema by Daniel Oesch, centered in a typology of work logics, would be increasingly powerful in accounting for class voting. However, the development in class voting according to the Oesch schema is remarkably similar to the one we see in a traditional class schema. In addition, the causal effects of work logics claimed by Oesch and others do not turn up: Individuals that change occupation do not change their political attitudes in accordance with the theoretical expectations. This raises questions about whether the theory of work logics and their impact on political preferences correctly explain the patterns uncovered by the Öesch scheme.
Daniel Gaxie: Class and the relationship to politics
Time and place: Jan 14, 2021 13:15-15:00
Organizer: The Classes and Elites Research Seminar
The attitudes of ordinary citizens towards the political realm are not only diverse and different, but they also beget political inequalities. First of all, there are different levels of involvement in politics. The higher their level of education and position in social space, the more likely "ordinary" citizens are to vote or participate in opinion polls, street protests, political parties, informal daily discussions on political issues in primary groups or in the activities of “participatory democracy” institutions. Members of the lower classes are not only more likely to stay away from all activities open to lay people (as opposed to specialized political actors), but they are also less equipped when, for various reasons to be discussed, they overcome their dispositions to stay away. For example, they are less able to identify and defend political interests when voting or when responding to opinion polls.
The presentation is based on various qualitative surveys, mainly in-depth semi-structured interviews, conducted over many years.
2020
Social Class in Europe
Time and place: Nov 18, 2020 10:15-12:00
Organizer: The Classes and Elites Research Seminar
Over the last ten years the issue of Europe has been placed at the centre of major political conflicts, revealing profound splits in society. These splits are represented in terms of an opposition between those countries on the losing and those on the winning sides of globalisation. Inequalities beyond those nations are critically absent from the debate. Cedric Hugrée, Etienne Penissat and Alexis Spire will join us to present their new work on social class inequalities.
Based on major European statistical surveys, the new research in this work presents a map of social classes inspired by Pierre Bourdieu’s sociology. It reveals the common features of the working class, the intermediate class and the privileged class in Europe. National features combine with social inequalities, through an account of the social distance between specific groups in nations in the north and in the countries of the south and east of Europe. The book ends with a reflection on the conditions that would be required for the emergence of a Europe-wide social movement.
Kevin Geay: Splitting Hairs? Theoretical and Methodological Lessons from Sociological Works on Rich People’s Problems
Time and place: Oct 15, 2020 10:15-12:00 Zoom
Organizer: The Classes and Elites Research Seminar
Drawing on both his own ethnography of the French bourgeoisie, as well as a number of contributions particularly from French sociology, Kevin Geay discusses important lessons for the sociology of elites.
We know what kind of obstacles encounter popular classes when it comes to voting, mobilizing, taking legal action, etc., but we know little of those encountered by the upper classes. Since the 2010s, such observation has led more social scientists to try and take «rich people’s problems» seriously. This approach opens avenues of research, but raises new methodological difficulties.
Kevin Geay: Laxity, Disinterest and Distaste. About the Upper Class’ Relationship with Politics.
Time and place: Oct 14, 2020 13:15-15:00 Zoom
Organizer: The Classes and Elites Research Seminar
A new ethnography paints a fresh picture of the Parisian bourgeoisie and their relationship to politics. In this talk, its author Kevin Geay presents some of its main findings.
Much research has found marked class differences in political interest, competence and mobilization, with the upper class being the most interested, competent and mobilized group. This talk starts with acknowledging cases where the French bourgeoisie deviates from this – distancing themselves from political mobilizations or failing to reproduce its worldview. By doing so, we hope to renew a sociological questioning that has become routine when it comes to describing the way the upper classes promote their interest. The issue is less how they maintain social order, but rather, how they manage to restore it when it is threatened.
2019
Hanna Kuusela: Top Earners and the Cultures of Wealth in Finland
Time and place: Nov 11, 2019 13:15-15:00 Zoom
Organizer: The Classes and Elites Research Seminar
Who are the Finnish top earners, where does their money come for, and what do they think of the society? In her talk, Academy Research Fellow Hanna Kuusela (Tampere University) discusses the different ways in which the Finnish top earners legitimise their own position at the top while undermining some of the basic characteristics of the Nordic model. The talk describes the different cultures of the rich inheritors, managers, and entrepreneurs belonging to the 0.1% of earners in Finland, and demonstrates how the top earners construct moral boundaries vis-à-vis their imagined others: the unemployed, the civil cervants, and the workers. Finally, the talk analyses how their processes of class-making are intertwined with the critique of the welfare state, its taxation, the tripartite cooperation, and also the entire democratic system.
The talk is based on Kuusela’s and Professor Anu Kantola’s 4-year research project on the top 0,1% of earners in Finland. In the project, Kantola and Kuusela collected statistical data and tax records on this top group and interviewed altogether 90 inheritors, entrepreneurs and managers who belong to the top earning 0,1% of Finns. Their Finnish monograph, Huipputuloiset (The Top Earners) was published in September 2019, and so far some of their findings in the project have been published in Sociology and Sociological Review.
David B. Grusky: A Sociology for the 21st Century
Time and place: Sep 27, 2019 13:15-15:00 Aud. 5 Eilert sunds hus
Organizer: The Classes and Elites Research Seminar
A Sociology for the 21st Century
It now comes off as quaint to suggest that social science can save the world. It wasn’t always that way. When was the social scientific mission hijacked? Who’s behind the hijacking? And how can a new social science be built that has the capacity to take on looming problems of the 21st century?
2018
Mats Lillehagen og Are Skeie Hermansen: Who’s Your Daddy?
Time and place: May 25,2018 14:15-15:00 Instituttstyrerommet 221 Harriet Holters hus
Organizer: The Classes and Elites Research Seminar
Who’s Your Daddy? Nepotism, Employer Inheritance, and the Intergenerational Persistence of Economic Advantage in Norway
Mats Lillehagen (ISS, UiO)
Are Skeie Hermansen (ISS, UiO)
Mike Savage: The geo-politics of global inequality
Time and place: March 9, 2018 13:15-15:00 Harriet Holters hus, rom 101
Organizer: The Classes and Elites Research Seminar
My paper is a comparative sociological analysis of global inequality trends, seeking to unravel how the decline of inequality between nations at the global level (as discussed by Milanovic) is associated with rising inequality within many nations (as discussed by Piketty and the World Wealth and Income database team). I will argue that much inequality research has over-fixated on national comparisons, which have obscured processes operating at different scales, and especially the revival of broader 'imperial fields'. I will pull out the implications of my argument by showing how we can understand the Brexit phenomenon in the UK as an imperialist, rather than nationalist current.
2017
Michael Grätz: Reinforcing at the Top or Compensating at the Bottom
Time and place: May 31, 2017 14:15 Harriet holters hus, rom 301
Reinforcing at the Top or Compensating at the Bottom?
Nonlinearities in the Association between Family Background and Academic Performance in Germany and Norway
Michael Grätz (Nuffield College, University of Oxford)
Øyvind Wiborg (UiO)
Wendy Bottero: Class subjectivities, everyday critique and constraint
Time and place: May 11, 2017 14:15-16:00 Eilert Sundts hus, A-blokka: Auditorium 6
Dieter Vandebroeck: Classifying bodies, classified bodies, class bodies
Time and place: May 3, 2017 14:15-16:00 Rom 301 Harriet Holters hus
Classifying bodies, classified bodies, class bodies. Body weight and the everyday justification of inequality.
Professor Dieter Vandebroeck (Free University of Brussels) is giving a public lecture on his research on how class divisions become inscribed in the body and how physical properties, in turn, contribute to naturalizing and legitimizing class divisions.
2016
Martin Hällsten: Family wealth and children's educational achievement in Sweden
Time and place: 30 Nov 2016, 14:15 Aud. 6, Eilert Sundts hus
The Classes and Elites Research Seminar, in collaboration with AKS, invites you to a seminar with Martin Hällsten (Stockholm University).
The seminar will discuss the significance of grandparents' wealth for children's educational prospects and is based on a collaboration with Fabian Pfeffer (University of Michigan).
Challenges to class analysis in the 21st century
Time and place: May 20 2016, 10:15-13:00
Social inequality currently gets a lot of attention, but sociologists appear less visible in discussions about inequality than what one would expect.
Has this something to do with the understanding of class or the use of the class concept in research? Can the sociological research on this topic be improved?
The classes and elites research seminar invites two prominent scholars of class analysis, Kim Weeden and Janne O. Jonsson, to address these questions based on the theoretical framework of micro classes.
Program:
Janne O. Jonsson (University of Oxford): "Micro-classes as a mechanism for intergenerational reproduction."
Kim Weeden (University of Cornell): "Why it's a good bet that our children will be professors, too."
2015
Mike Savage: Theorising Economic Capital with Bourdieu and Piketty: Accumulation and Capitals
Time and place: 5 May 2015, 14:15, Eilert Sundts hus, A-blokka: Auditorium 3
I this public lecture Savage will reflect on how a greater attentiveness to concepts of accumulation can help elaborate a more sophisticated sociological class analysis which is better able to grasp the dynamics of 'top end' class formation amongst the elite than more conventional occupational perspectives. Drawing on research using the Great British Class Survey, Savage will show how elites cannot usefully be seen as a throwback to an old aristocratic formation but are the product of new modes of corporate and financial accumulation, and he will elaborate the social and cultural characteristics which they exemplify.
Maria Törnqvist: The Making of an Egalitarian Elite: School Ethos and the Production of Privilege
Time and place: March 10, 2015, 14:15 Rom 221, Harriet Holters hus
Organizer: The Classes and Elites Research Seminar
The Classes and Elites Research Seminar invites you to a seminar on egalitarian values and social inequality in Scandinavia, featuring a presentation by Maria Törnqvist (Uppsala University).
Based on her fieldwork at a high school in Stockholm, Törnqvist will begin with "The Making of an Egalitarian Elite: School Ethos and the Production of Privilege."
2014
Sam Friedman: Comedy, distinction and cultural capital
Time and place: Nov 14, 2014, 10:15-12:00, Eilert Sundts hus, aud. 5
Organizer: The Classes and Elites Research Seminar
Welcome to another public lecture hosted by the Classes and Elites Research Seminar.
In this public lecture, Dr. Sam Friedman will explore how taste in comedy function as a expression of cultural capital. The ability to appreciate the "right" kinds of comedy, but also, crucially, to be able to appreciate comedy in the right way, is a shown to be a powerful distinction - also expressed in disdain for those who do not "get it".
Shamus Khan: Privilege
Time and place: 9 Oct 2014, 12:30-14:00, Helga Engs hus, aud. 2
In this lecture, based on his acclaimed book, Shamus Khan exposes the production of elites.
In search of the reflexive worker: Class, individualization and late modernity
Time and place: 13 May 2014, 11:15-13:00 Auditorium 2, Eilert Sundts hus
Are we in today's reflexive or liquid modernity freer and more reflective than our parents and grandparents? Does class matter for the choices we make about education, jobs, careers, and politics? Dr. Will Atkinson (University of Bristol) will open the discussion.
Constructing Classes: Operationalizing Bourdieu's 'social Space'
Time and place: 13 May 2014, 09:15-11:00, Rom 241 Harriet Holters hus
The Classes and Elites Research Seminar invites you to a seminar on new ways of measuring class. The seminar will be opened by Dr. Will Atkinson (University of Bristol).