lee harvey - critical social research

CRITICAL SOCIAL RESEARCH Lee Harvey

© Lee Harvey 1990 and 2011, last updated 9 May, 2011 Citation reference: Harvey, L., [1990] 2011, Critical Social Research, available at qualityresearchinternational.com/csr, last updated 9 May, 2011, originally published in London by Unwin Hyman, all rights revert to author.

Table of Contents 1.1 Introduction

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Table of Contents Table of Contents ................................................................................................................................. 2 1. Basics .................................................................................................................................................. 4

1.1 Introduction................................................................................................................................ 4 1.2 Criticism and knowledge .......................................................................................................... 5 1.3 Empirical study .......................................................................................................................... 8 1.4 Critical and conventional ethnography................................................................................... 9 1.5 The Critical Tradition.............................................................................................................. 13 1.6 Elements of Critical Social Research .................................................................................... 17

2. Class.................................................................................................................................................. 27 2.1 Introduction.............................................................................................................................. 27 2.2 Class, production and culture ................................................................................................ 28 2.3 Karl Marx: Capital .................................................................................................................... 31 2.4 C. Wright Mills: The Power Elite .............................................................................................. 38 2.5 J.H Goldthorpe, D. Lockwood et al.: The Affluent Worker ................................................. 44 2.6 Paul Willis: Learning to Labour............................................................................................. 50 2.7 Roger Grimshaw and Tony Jefferson: Interpreting Policework ............................................. 55 2.8 Judith Williamson: Decoding Advertisements .................................................................... 65 2.9 Will Wright: Six Guns and Society........................................................................................ 73 2.10 Conclusion .............................................................................................................................. 81

3. Gender ............................................................................................................................................. 83 3.1 Introduction.............................................................................................................................. 83 3.2 Perspectives .............................................................................................................................. 84 3.3. Ann Oakley: Sociology of Housework................................................................................ 89 3.4. Cynthia Cockburn: Brothers .................................................................................................... 95 3.5 Sallie Westwood—All Day Every Day............................................................................... 101 3.6 Khawar Mumtaz and Farida Shaheed—Women of Pakistan ......................................... 109 3.7 Joanna Liddle & Rama Joshi—Daughters of Independence.......................................... 112 3.8 Conclusion .............................................................................................................................. 117

4. Race ................................................................................................................................................ 120 4.1 Introduction............................................................................................................................ 120 4.3 Joyce Ladner—Tomorrow’s Tomorrow............................................................................ 123 4.4 Lois Weiss—Between Two Worlds .................................................................................... 129 4.5 Gideon Ben-Tovim, John Gabriel, Ian Law and Kathleen Stredder—The Local Politics of Race.............................................................................................................................................. 134 4.6 Mark Duffield—Black radicalism and the Politics of De-industrialisation. ................. 140 4.7 Conclusion .............................................................................................................................. 146

Lee Harvey – Critical Social Research

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5. Conclusion..................................................................................................................................... 149 5.1 Empirical enquiry................................................................................................................... 149 5.2 Getting beneath the surface ................................................................................................. 149 5.3 Contradiction.......................................................................................................................... 150 5.4 Myth......................................................................................................................................... 151 5.5 Knowledge as process........................................................................................................... 152 5.6 Critical case study................................................................................................................... 153 5.7 Radical historicism................................................................................................................. 153 5.8 Critical ethnography .............................................................................................................. 154 5.9 Structuralist techniques ......................................................................................................... 155 5.10 The critical social research process ................................................................................... 157 5.11 An ending.............................................................................................................................. 160

1. Basics 1.1 Introduction

This book is an illustrative guide to doing critical social research. It is not concerned with simply describing techniques of data collection that may be pertinent to a critical approach. Rather, through the exploration of a large number of case studies of critical social research it sets out and then explores the nature of critical social research methodology

Methodology is viewed as the interface between methodic practice, substantive theory and epistemological underpinnings. Epistemology is used here to refer to the presuppositions about the nature of knowledge and of science that inform practical enquiry. Critical social research is underpinned by a critical-dialectical perspective which attempts to dig beneath the surface of historically specific, oppressive, social structures. This is contrasted with positivistic concerns to discover the factors that cause observed phenomena or to build grand theoretical edifices, and with phenomenological attempts to interpret the meanings of social actors or attempt close analysis of symbolic processes. Method refers to the way empirical data is collected and ranges from asking questions, through reading documents, to observation of both controlled and uncontrolled situations. While some methods lend themselves more readily to certain epistemological perspectives, no method of data collection is inherently positivist, phenomenological or critical. Substantive theory refers to a set of propositions that offer a coherent account of aspects of the social world. These may be attempts to interpret, explain or understand phenomena, behaviour, events or practices. Again, such sets of propositions may suggest a preferred method or may imply an underlying epistemology but they do not prefigure it.

Methodology is thus the point at which method, theory and epistemology coalesce in an overt way in the process of directly investigating specific instances within the social world. Methodology, in grounding enquiry in empirical instances, thus makes explicit the presuppositions that inform the knowledge that is generated by the enquiry. This book is about the methodology appropriate to a critical-dialectical analysis of the social world.

There is no simple methodic recipe for doing critical social research. One must come to grips with the methodology. This is also true for phenomenological and positivistic approaches to social research although this is frequently ignored in the case of the latter where our ‘common-sense’ presuppositions about the nature of the ‘scientific method’ are substituted for an understanding of positivistic underpinnings. In such cases, methodology becomes transmuted into method. So familiar is this device that to actively disengage method from methodology seems both difficult and laborious. However, in order to understand a major tradition of social research, and ultimately to be able to carry it out, it is essential that the effort be made to disentangle the assumptions of substantive theory from methodic practices and from epistemological presuppositions. Only then is it possible to fully grasp the nature, implications and impact of critical social research. This book,

through its analysis of copious case studies attempts to generate this understanding in relation to specific realms of social enquiry.

At the heart of critical social research is the idea that knowledge is structured by existing sets of social relations. The aim of a critical methodology is to provide knowledge which engages the prevailing social structures. These social structures are seen by critical researchers, in one way or another, as oppressive structures. This book is divided into three sections each addressing a different form of oppression, those based on class, gender and race.


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The analysis of oppression in sociological literature has been dominated, until recently, by class oppression. There is a vast amount of material in general on the nature and functioning of class in societies of all kinds. More specifically, critical social research has a long history linked to class- based analyses of oppression. Many of the approaches to critical social research are grounded in class analyses and the balance of the book reflects this long tradition.

Approaches which consider gender as the central oppressive mechanism are much more recent. Despite notable precursors, gender-based analyses of oppression burgeoned with development of the women’s movement of the sixties but only became an established form of sociological enquiry with the development of feminism in the 1970s. A similar picture emerges in the case of race oppression. Again there is a long, but relatively hidden history, and again the explosion in analyses of race oppression have taken place in the context of the development of racial equality, black rights, black power and anti-apartheid movements. As with feminist perspectives black perspectives have been incorporated into sociology only very recently. In both areas, the development of critical social research leans heavily, although not exclusively, on adaptations of earlier class-based methodologies. However, critical social research grounded in both gender and race oppression offer unique perspectives on critical analyses.

Of course, oppression occurs in other forms. Linked to race oppression is imperialism and colonial oppression. Within nation states, national and religious oppression also occurs. While sociological analysis today tends to concentrate on class, race and gender, there is a significant body of work that addresses age, disability and sexuality as oppressive mechanisms. The latter has been a consistent concern of a number of sociologists since the 1970s who have attempted, despite considerable official disinterest and public hostility, to reveal and analyse the nature of heterosexual oppression.

Space considerations prohibit the specific exploration of oppressive mechanisms other than the general categories of race, class and gender. This book does not intend a comprehensive review of non-dominant perspectives. The aim of the book is to provide a text which indicates what is involved in doing critical social research and it draws upon published critical social research studies for illustration

1.2 Criticism and knowledge

To distinguish critical social research from other forms of research practice may, at first sight, seem to be creating an artificial distinction. For what research process does not embody some notion of criticism? A critical facility is, at least in theory, as important as an analytic facility when undertaking research. This is undeniable. The difference between critical approaches and non- critical approaches is not the difference between the presence and absence of critique, rather it is the difference between approaches in which critique is an integral part of the process and those in which it is peripheral.

Critical social research involves an epistemological perspective in which knowledge and critique are intertwined. Indeed, it is arguable that for a critical methodologist, knowledge is critique. A critical research process involves more than merely appending critique to an accumulation of ‘fact’ or ‘theory’ gathered via some mechanical process, rather it denies the (literally) objective status of knowledge and concerns itself with the processural nature of knowledge. Knowledge is a dynamic process not a static entity. Knowledge is not a bucket into which grains of information are dropped in the hope that they somehow coalesce into some kind of explanation of the world. For critical methodologists, knowledge is a process of moving towards an understanding of the world and of the knowledge which structures our perceptions of that world. Critical social research thus aims at an analysis of social processes, delving beneath ostensive and dominant conceptual frames, in order to reveal the underlying practices, their historical specificity and structural manifestations.

1. Basics 1.2 Criticism and knowledge

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Christine Delphy’s (1978) analysis of housework provides an illustrative example of this process of moving towards an understanding of a social process that is concealed in a taken-for-granted category. Delphy argues that housework is rarely defined and its character is assumed usually in terms of specific tasks undertaken in the home by the wife such as cooking, ironing, cleaning, etc. Delphy argues that this empirical definition reflects the theoretical interpretations applied to housework. Her intention is to begin with those universally agreed elements of the concept of housework, that it is work and that it is unpaid, and to determine its structural nature. She chooses the complex example of the wife working on an agricultural small holding, a considerable proportion of the product of which is for self-consumption. This example is taken because it highlights the problem of differentiating the so-called economic accountable production and non- accountable production aspects of a wife’s work in such settings.

Delphy regards as fatuous the argument that housework is free because, not passing through the market, it is not regarded as productive. National product accounting includes self-consumed production which does not pass through the market, such as some of the work done on smallholdings. This accounting is reasonable as national accounting includes all work which increases wealth. But only some of this work is included. Certain transformations that take place on farms are included others are not. Butchering a pig for self-consumption is included, cooking it is not. The latter is regarded as ‘housework’ and is excluded. It is also excluded from national accounting when done in all other households as well. So why is some ‘unpaid’ work included in national accounting and other ‘unpaid’ work excluded?

There are, Delphy argues, no conceptual definitions of ‘occupational’ work and ‘housework’. They are empirical categories. Housework is what is left when occupational work is subtracted, or vice versa. In the case of French national accounting, when dealing with smallholdings, there is no definition of ‘occupational work’ nor of the ‘holding’, as it is neither a place distinguishable from the home nor a business producing exclusively for the market. Empirically, ‘occupational’ work on a farm is that which is distinct from what would be carried out in a non-agricultural household. Thus housework, empirically, is that which is work for self-consumption common to all households. So the definition of occupational work depends on housework being defined as a common package of tasks.

Delphy reminds us that payment and remuneration are not the same. Productive work done for oneself (housework or any other kind) should not be regarded as something which requires payment. It is its own payment. If the work was not done then payment would have to be made to some other person to perform if the product was required. So while the product of self-consumed work is legitimately added to the national account, as something of use value was produced even if

it did not acquire an exchange value by entering the market, it is not legitimate to expect payment for this work. To do so would be to pay for the work twice. The consumption is the remuneration.4

4So not all ‘unpaid’ work is free work. Baking and consuming ones own bread, for example, may be uneconomic in terms of time spent on the labour but it is still remunerated work, in real terms, therefore not free work. The only free work, or really unpaid work, is that which is unremunerated. That is, work which receives neither payment in exchange nor payment in terms of self- consumption. This must be work done for someone else.

Unremunerated work takes two forms. That which is included in national accounting as ‘productive’ and that which is not accounted. Housework is excluded from accounting because it is done within the confines of the home (or household unit) rather than economic productive unit. This has nothing to do with the services which make up housework, they all appear on the market in other contexts. Nor is it a function of the people who do the housework as women who provide services for free in their own home get paid when they do it in someone else’s. It is the nature of the contract which ties the houseworker (wife) to the household (of her husband).


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As far as national accounting goes, the household is the accounting unit. It is the household which enters into economic relations. There is no concern with what goes on inside the unit. As far as national accounting goes there are no individuals, only household units where nothing is exchanged or extorted from anyone. This clearly obviates the whole nature of the processes of work and exchange or non-exchange which take place within the household. Thus, argues Delphy, the analysis of housework cannot begin until the notion of household unit is overturned.

The significance of this is that housework cannot be properly viewed as a number of tasks or even a complete set of tasks. Seeing housework as a totality of tasks misleads for housework must be seen as a particular work relationship. Delphy thus defines it as ‘all the work done unpaid for others within the confines of the household or the family’ (Delphy, [1978] 1984, p. 90). Thus there is no difference between the ‘housework’ and the other work done by wives, or other unpaid family members, whether it be in the homes of small farmers, businessmen, artisans, or wage earners. That farmers’ wives are unable to easily draw a distinction between the work they do for the ‘household’ and the work they do for the ‘occupation’ is not because of the similarity of the tasks but because they are performed within the same relations of production.

For Delphy, then, it is a contradiction to discuss the structural character of housework while defining it (implicitly) as a set of tasks. The empirical determination of the theoretical concept housework forecloses on the theoretical discourse and has, according to Delphy, severely limited the study of housework as a relation of production. Theoretical advances may be aided by thinking in terms of domestic work, or better still, familial work, rather than housework as the latter better represent the relationship of production.

This example illustrates how critical social research takes an empty abstract concept (housework) and reconstructs it as a historically specific idea which has its relevance within a structure of social relations. The reconstructed concept thus goes beyond the particular and is the basis for a critical analysis which reveals the nature of the structural relationships (of patriarchal exploitation) hidden behind the empty abstract concept.

Critical social research does not take the apparent social structure, social processes or accepted history for granted. It tries to dig beneath the surface of appearances. It asks how social systems really work, how ideology or history conceals the processes which oppress and control people. Critical social research is intrinsically critical. It assumes that a critical process informs knowledge. In its engagement with oppressive structures it questions the nature of prevailing knowledge and directs attention at the processes and institutions which legitimate knowledge. Critique of

oppressive structures involves a critique of the ‘scientific’ knowledge which sustain them and this is often a direct focus of attention for critical social research as, for example, in Marx’s engagement with positivist political economy throughout Capital and Oakley’s critique of the sexist nature of sociology in her Sociology of Housework.

This does not mean, however, that any research which deals with critical subjects or is critical of prevailing academic disciplines is necessarily critical social research. A straightforward ethnographic account of the formation and work of a feminist group, based on in-depth interviews with key participants, for example, would not of itself necessarily be critical. It is important that the account be located in a wider context which links the specific activities with a broader social structural and historical analysis of women’s oppression.

Conversely, critical social research is an evolving process. As it engages dominant ideological constructs and presuppositions about the nature of knowledge it is necessarily dynamic in the evolution of its critique. So, what may be a radical critique at one moment may, in a later context, appear to be superficial. Critical social research has to be located in its social milieu. What Marx had to say about capitalism has to be put in its Victorian context. Oakley’s analysis of housework has to be seen in terms of the embryonic feminist perspective emerging out of the activism of the Women’s Liberation Movement and Ladner’s account of the socialisation of Black ghetto women located in terms of a Black

1. Basics 1.3 Empirical study

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Power engagement with Women’s Liberation.1 Whatever reservations one may have in the late 1980s of this work it was all profoundly critical in its time, and even if critical social research in these fields is more ‘sophisticated’ today, these studies still offer a fundamental critique of oppressive social structures.

Essentially, critical social research asks substantive questions about existent social processes. For example, the substantive questions addressed in the empirical work examined below include: what is the mechanism by which capitalists accumulate and legitimate their wealth? Who runs America? Why do working class kids get working class jobs? What role does Islam play in restricting women in Pakistan? To what extent does the legal system structure the role of the police? What is the link between women’s seclusion and the caste and class system in India? and so on. Such questions are addressed in terms of historically specific sets of social relations and as such cannot avoid political issues. 1.3 Empirical study

Despite its long history and concern with material reality critical analysis of society has tended to be dominated by theoretical treatises. Empirical material is often taken-for-granted or even regarded as an encumbrance to the abstract theoretical analysis. There are, one suspects, a considerable number of critical commentators who regard empirical material with suspicion. The distancing of critical theorising from empirical material is understandable at one level. ‘Facts’ as descriptions of surface appearances are anathema to critical-dialectical thinking as they reify commonsense at the expense of deconstruction.

However, a theoretical analysis that fails to engage the material world through empirical material is itself limited. Such analysis is prone to detachment from historically specific social processes. It fails to bridge the gap between theory and praxis. At worst it is speculative. Since Marx, the tradition of critical sociology has rooted itself firmly in the ‘here and now’ and addressed details of the material reality directly. Marx was adamant that revealing the real state of affairs was dependent upon a thorough detailed analysis of actual social practices. Empirical analysis together with theoretical conjecture was essential for a dialectical analysis of inner connections.

Critical social research requires that empirical material is collected. It does not matter whether it is statistical material, anecdotes, directly observed behaviour, media content, interview responses, art works or anything else. Whatever provides insights is suitable. But whatever it is, it must not be taken at face value. That does not mean that all data used must be subject to conventional ‘reliability’ or ‘validity’ checks. Data is meaningful only in terms of its theoretical context, reliability and validity are functions of the context and the epistemological presuppositions that the researcher brings to the enquiry. So for critical social research data is important in order to ground the enquiry but data must not be treated as independent of their socio-historic context.

The concern of this book, then, is not with the adequacy of theoretical conjecture but with showing how empirical critical social research can be undertaken. The intention is not just to reassert the need for empirical critical enquiry but to show how it can be done without the data swamping the dialectical analysis.

Although this book is about doing critical social research this does not mean that it offers a set of methodic prescriptions. Critical social research is a way of approaching the social world in which critique is central. It is not bounded by a specific set of methods. Any methodic tool is permissible, it is the way the empirical evidence is approached and interpreted, the methodology not the method of data collection per se, which characterises 1 Joyce Ladner's book was a radical statement in the United States at the time, not least because of its positive assertion of a Black culture, its denial of the relevance of white middle-class norms for assessing Black culture and its claim that (working class) Black womanhood provided the model for the new liberated white middle-class women.


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critical social research. Critical social research encourages neither methodic monopoly, nor, more importantly, method-led research. Prescribing in advance how to collect data inhibits the research endeavour (Mills, 1959). Any combination of methods is acceptable to critical social research. Similarly, critical social research is not bounded by a single (grand) theoretical perspective. It is not (a version of) Marxism, or feminism, or anything else, for that matter.

This book, then, is not about what method or what ‘ism’ should be adopted for critical social research. Nor does it engage in internecine disputes about the ‘best’ form of critical research. It is not a treatise on critical thinking, nor a theoretical debate about the nature of sociology, nor a critique of other styles of research. The book is about how data has been obtained and how it has been used to critically address a substantive area of study and is organised around the themes of race, gender and class. While not the only basis for structural critique, the issues of class, gender and race have been the principle foci for critical social research. The illustrative studies provide examples of the different perspectives in practice and show how an epistemological perspective has been fused with an approach to empirical data to provide a methodology designed to engage substantive questions. The illustrative studies are designed to show how the data collection and interpretation are intrinsically linked to epistemological concerns about the nature of oppression and the development of knowledge. It is not the intention of the book to critique the theory or substantive findings of the studies. The intention is to show how different authors have adopted different critical ways of working.

1.4 Critical and conventional ethnography

1.4.1 Conventional approaches to ethnography Critical social research is a way of approaching the world. It involves locating methodic

concerns within an epistemological framework. In order to illustrate the difference in principle between critical and non-critical ways of working this section will briefly review the differing approaches to ethnographic work adopted by critical and conventional practitioners.2

Ethnography,3 in one form or another, has been an important method throughout the short history of institutionalised sociology. Current forms of conventional practice are derived from the

codification of the American experience since 1900 (Harvey, 1987), most of which has been brought together in three widely referenced readers published at the end of the 1960s, McCall and Simmons (1969), Filstead (1970) and Denzin (1970a). The accumulated and conventional wisdom of these collections was that participant observation, while not ‘objective’ in the sense used in discussing the reliability and validity of the social survey, was a set of methods directed towards an unbiased and accurate ‘analytic description of a complex social organization’ (McCall & Simmons, 1969, p. 3)

2 1 Apart from being a useful comparison, the discussion of critical ethnography serves as a useful outline of an approach that is fairly widely used by critical social researchers but little documented in standard texts on ethnography. 3 Ethnography generally refers to the detailed study of small groups of people (e.g. in factories, classrooms, hospitals, ‘deviant’ sub-cultures). Ethnography, as a style of research, uses a wide range of methods of data collection, including in-depth interviewing, personal document analysis, life histories, non-participant observation and especially participant observation. Indeed participant observation and ethnography are terms that sometimes get used interchangeably as some commentators see them as more-or-less synonymous. However, in most accounts, ethnography encompasses a wider range of methods than participant observation. The confusion arises because participant observation, in some usages of the term, itself includes all the above methods. The key difference is that ethnography does not necessarily have to include a participant observation element. Where a distinction is made between participant observation and ethnography, the former is often seen as the exemplary ethnographic method.

1. Basics 1.4 Critical and conventional ethnography

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This approach sees ethnography as a method which used prevailing theoretical concepts and propositions to guide the analysis through a systematic collection, classification and reporting of ‘facts’ in order to generate new empirical generalisations based on these data. As such, this inductive approach sees analytic description as primarily an empirical application and modification of theory. Only secondarily is ethnography able to test theory, and this is limited to a comparison of complex analytic descriptions of single cases as and when such cases are accumulated. Detailed empirical description to reveal social processes rather than causal generalisation is how the conventional approach projects ethnography.

However, for many ethnographers the strength of the approach is the insights it provides of social phenomena in their natural setting. For some, this is recast in phenomenological terms and ethnography has increasingly tended to be used as a procedure for gaining an understanding of social settings from the subjects’ point of view. Immersion in a field of study allows the ethnographer to gain an understanding of the processes operating in the subject group, institution or community. Thus, the emphasis for most ethnography is usually on forms of social interaction and the meanings which lie behind these.

None the less, ethnography, whether seeking subject’s meanings or settling for detailed analytic description has conventionally been characterised by microscopic studies4 and an explicit concern with validity and reliability. The exemplary method of ethnography, participant observation, has been particularly susceptible to criticism of its subjectivism and unverifiability.5 Participant observation, while receptive to subjects’ conceptions and useful in constructing an understanding of a social setting must nonetheless strive for ‘validity’, according to conventional accounts. In order to obtain an accurate and reasonably complete and valid description it is necessary for researchers to employ participant observation techniques ‘systematically, comprehensively and rigorously’, that is, with ‘adequate safeguards against the many potentially invalidating or contaminatory factors which threaten to diminish the interpretability of the resulting data’. (McCall & Simmons, 1969, p. 77). Contaminating factors are the ‘reactive effects’ of the observer’s presence or activities on the phenomena being observed; the ‘distorting effects of selective perception and interpretation on the observer’s part’; as well as the inability of the observer to witness all aspects of a given phenomenon.

It is crucial, according to the accumulated wisdom (Miller, 1952; Schwartz & Schwartz, 1955; Vidich, 1955) for the participant observer to maintain a balanced perspective. The researcher should be ‘hypersenstive’ to the various manifestations of ‘threats to interpretability’ in order that steps may be taken to reduce ‘contamination’ through the ‘modification of the observer’s role vis a! vis his [sic] subjects’ (McCall & Simmons, 1969, p. 104), for example, avoiding becoming too closely identified with one faction in the organisation or group being studied. Alternatively, direct ‘respondent interviewing of a suitably drawn sample’ can be used to check out the impressions of direct observation thereby exposing ‘systematic bias’ in order that previous interpretation of the motives and meanings of the participants can be tempered or revised. The conventional approach to

ethnography emphasises detachment, enabled by researchers’ reflexive accounts of their role. This is crucial for an ‘objective’, systematic and valid analysis of a social setting.6

4 There are a large number of different emphases among ethnographers as Hammersley & Atkinson (1982) point out. While most ethnographers aim at detailed patterns of social interaction, others attempt to reveal cultural knowledge and still others consider it an approach suitable to holistic analysis of societies. 5 As McCall & Simmons (1969) note, participant observation involves an ‘unusual research design in which hypothesis generation, data gathering and hypothesis testing are carried on simultaneously at every step of the research process’ (p. 27) with ‘no clean cut progression from exploratory work to description to hypothesis testing’ (p. 67) so that participant observation is a ‘perpetual reflexive cycle of conceptualization, sampling, data collection, data analysis, and write-up’ (p. 127). 6 There is no intention here to explore the detail of ethnographic practice let alone analyse the variety of ethnographic approaches or the plurality of underlying perspectives. This is extremely well covered in a number of fairly recent books. For a general overview of the ethnographic process see Hammersley & Atkinson (1982). Burgess, (1982) is a useful reader on ethnography with a selection of ‘classic’ and recent


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The scientistic rigours of the conventional approach have been mediated, to some extent, in more recent developments of ethnography. The current tendency is to see ethnographic work as providing detailed information on what people do and insights into what they think they are doing and why they are doing it. Watching what people do is useful as it provides a certain amount of direct data. But like any other data this only has meaning if put in some kind of context. If the researcher adopts an outsider view the data makes sense only in terms of the researcher’s frame of reference. This leads to the imposition of some external explanation onto the practices that operate within the group under study. In short the researcher has a view of social actions which do not make the same sense to him or her as they do to the people in the social group. Ethnography, thus goes one stage further and attempts to elicit the sense of the group. The researcher is required to become acquainted with meanings the actions have for the members of the group. The researcher, in one way or another, is expected to access members own self-accounting. Ethnography tries to generate an understanding of the group from their point of view.

Reflexivity is nowadays regarded as central to ethnographic research. This involves two things. First, it requires that researchers reflect upon the research process in order to assess the effect of their presence and their research techniques on the nature and extent of the data collected. Crudely put, researchers must consider to what extent respondents were telling them what they wanted to hear; did the researcher(s) inhibit respondents; did the format of the data collection restrict the kind of data being collected, and so on? Second, ethnographic reflexivity requires that researchers critically reflect upon the theoretical structures they have drawn out of their ethnographic analysis. In effect, researchers are expected to reconceptualise their evidence in terms of other possible models—to think laterally. Ethnographers should not just fit details into a preformed schema but try to reform the schema to see if the details have different meanings.

None of this is easy, but it is particularly difficult where interviews are ‘one-offs’. The more contact one has the more likely one is to be able to dig deeper. However, a great deal of contact can also lead one to start taking the group perspective for granted and to lose track of the nature of group meanings. It is thus important to record material of all types scrupulously, in as much detail either at the time or as soon after as is reasonably possible. Material received from subjects should be augmented by an ongoing journal of the researcher’s own involvement, actions, and reflections upon the research situation and research process. Constant review of recorded material of all sorts helps reflexivity, theory development and understanding. Most ethnographers, especially those who place reflexivity at the heart of the ethnographic concern, would probably concur broadly with this more recent conventional approach.

1.4.2 Approaches and techniques of critical ethnography

The critical approach to ethnographic analysis is somewhat different. Critical ethnography is a particular approach to ethnography which attempts to link the detailed analysis of ethnography to wider social structures and systems of power relationships in order to get beneath the surface of oppressive structural relationships.7

There are, broadly speaking, three ways in which this is done. The first is to consider the subject group in a wider context. This is the weakest form of critical ethnography and may papers and his (1984) provides a sound account of fieldwork although it tends to concentrate on the educational setting. Lofland & Lofland (19++) is a slim volume that details the process of ethnographic research; Spradley’s two books (1979 and 1980) provide accounts of how to do unstructured interviewing and participant observation respectively. There are many more older texts which are still pertinent such as Adams & Preiss (1960), Becker (1970), Bogdan & Taylor (1975), Denzin (1970 & 1970a), Filstead (1970), Fletcher (1974), Friedrichs (1975), Hammond (1964), McCall & Simmons (1969), and Wilson (1979). 7 The term ‘critical ethnography’ has also been used to refer to ethnographic study in which reflexivity is an integral element, that is, ethnography in which researchers continually reflect upon, monitor and report their role as researcher in the field in order to avoid misinterpretation and permit third party assessment of the research. Critical ethnography in this sense is the same as modern conventional reflexive ethnography.

1. Basics 1.4 Critical and conventional ethnography

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not strictly be critical if, for example, the contextualisation merely takes the form of analysing functional relationships between the subject group and the wider social milieu. The second is to focus on the wider structural relations and examine the ways in which the social processes that are evident in the

subject group are mediated by structural relations. The third, is to incorporate ethnography directly into a dialectical analysis. In this approach, the understanding developed from the ethnographic study is integrally related to the deconstruction of the social structures. Ethnographic techniques are thus used to elaborate an understanding that goes beyond surface appearance and thereby specifies the nature of the essential relationship of the structure under analysis. In the first two approaches to critical ethnography there is a tendency to explore a group and then situate it. In the third, the tendency is to begin with the structural relationships and then undertake an ethnographic enquiry in order to facilitate structural analysis, as Willis does in Learning to Labour (see section 3.6).

All the approaches to critical ethnography make use of the usual ethnographic data collection processes such as in-depth interviewing, semi-structured and unstructured interviewing, participant and non-participant observation and tend to adopt the more recently developed reflexive ethnographic practices. What is important for critical ethnography, however, is that the probing of the subjects’ meanings is not the end of the story. The group operates in a socio-historically specific milieu and are not independent of structural factors. Their meanings may appear to be group centred but are mediated by structural concerns.

Digging deeper to elicit frames of reference also has political implications. Conventionally the researcher-respondent relationship is hierarchically structured with the researcher directing the exchange and extracting information. The retention of control by the interviewer/researcher and the compliance of the respondent/subject is intended, conventionally, to ensure minimum contamination by the researcher, thus maintaining the validity of the research situation. This view is contrary to the aims of critical social research for a number of reasons. First, it subverts the critical process, presupposing the primacy of the researcher’s frame of reference (even if it is subsequently shifted through reflexive accounts). Second, it presupposes a one-way flow of information which leaves the respondent in exactly the same position having shared knowledge and ignores the self- reflective process that the imparting of information involves. Third, the direct corollary of the self- reflection is the inevitable engagement in dialogue where information is required or perspectives need to be discussed. The involvement of the researcher in this real dialogue8 involves her/him in the critical process. Fourth, the critical ethnographic interview (in whatever its form) is not neutral but directs attention at oppressive social structures and informs both researcher and respondent. Thus digging down to reveal the respondent’s frame of reference is not meant to be an oppressive hierarchical process but a liberating dialogical one. In that sense it is linked directly to the totalistic analysis.

The role of the critical ethnographer is to keep alert to the structural factors whilst probing meanings. To explore, where possible, the contradictions between action and words in terms of structural factors; to see to what extent group processes are externally mediated; to investigate how the subjects see group norms and practices constrained by external social factors; to see how prevailing ideologies are addressed; to analyse the extent to which subversive or resistant practices transcend prevailing ideological forms; and so on.

A major problem for ethnographers is the sorting, coding and organising of ethnographic material as ethnographic research invariably leads to the collection of an enormous amount of detailed accounts, quotes, examples, etc. The production of a finished ethnographic report requires the generation of a framework (or ‘angle’) and a selection from the empirical data for illustrative purposes. The choice of material is guided by the theoretical framework which has emerged in the course of the study. For critical social research the framework will be informed by the observed relationships of the study group to the oppressive structure. 8 By dialogue I mean a two way exchange of ideas not question and answer.


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The process of assimilating and reflecting on the data and the research process is the most difficult but also the most crucial part of the critical ethnographic process. There are no simple techniques for doing this as it is the shuttling between detailed material and wider social milieu which is at the heart of the dialectically generated critique. The researcher has to get to know the data and to see it from a number of different perspectives. Critical ethnography requires the location of interesting social microcosms in wider structural forms. It also requires that the understanding of these structural forms is mediated by the closely observed detail of social practices and the meanings they encompass

One way this might be achieved is through multiple reading of data. In the first instance the data is read ‘vertically’ (usually chronologically) until the researcher is familiar with it. It should then be copied and segmented into different themes, with items carefully sourced and cross-referenced (this may require multiple copies of some parts). Some ethnographers refer to this as pile building because they literally cut up their material and arrange it, according to themes, in piles (on the floor) (Bogdan & Taylor, 1975; Weis, 1985). This can, in effect, be done electronically provided one has a fairly large database capacity on a computer, hypertext facilities now available on microcomputers are ideal for this.9 The process of segmenting into themes is guided by recurrent ideas that occur in the data, but also by the sets of structural relations that appear to bear on the field of study.

The identification of pertinent structural relations is not generated by the detailed ethnographic work alone. It requires that, in parallel to it, the researcher undertake a broad exploration of the prevailing social, political and economic structure in which the detailed study is located. This may, and often does, involve an historical examination of structural changes to show how these have impinged upon the subjects of the ethnographic study.

Almost invariably the first segmentation will be but a rough approximation to the themes which ultimately guide the critical analysis. After the first segmentation the data is read horizontally, by theme, to assess the internal cohesiveness of the identified themes and the interrelationship between themes. The critical ethnographer thus seeks to reveal both contradictions and ‘ideological mediations’. Contradictions occur in the disjunctions between people’s words and actions and inconsistencies in expressed opinions or activities. Ideological mediations are reflected in the way stereotypes, myths, or dominant conceptualisations guide or legitimate respondent’s actions and meanings.

The anomalies and ideological mediations thus revealed provide a way of re-examining the data and the dialectical relationships between social structure and detailed observation that are emerging from the analysis. Themes are reconstrued, the data reorganised into new piles and re-read horizontally until the researcher has identified the underlying relationships that inform the observed social phenomena. This process of data segmentation and horizontal reading can be done during the fieldwork as well as after its completion, but almost always requires that ethnographers withdraw from the field temporarily in order to examine the data and locate it in a wider structure.

Critical ethnography, thus differs from conventional ethnography because it locates specific practices in a wider social structure in an attempt to dig beneath surface appearances. It addresses myths or contradictions as expressions of oppressive social structures. It is indifferent to ‘value freedom’ as does not consider it necessary for the researcher to be a neutral observer. Critical ethnography, however, is reflexive in its constant confrontation of taken-for-granteds.

1.5 The Critical Tradition

Critical social research is part of a long tradition of criticism of contemporary social order encompassing Plato, Aristotle, Socrates, Machiavelli, Hobbes, Locke, Saint-Simon and Marx

9 For example, HyperCard on the Apple Macintosh and Guide on both Apple Macintosh and IBM- PC

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(Coser, 1988). 10 It has subsequently been behind the endeavours of Marxists, neo-Marxists, pseudo- Marxists, social critics, structuralists, Marxist-structuralists, critical hermeneutists, feminists, black perspectives and radical social scientists of one sort or another ever since. It is all the more surprising, then, that, while it is simple enough to find accounts of the core processes of say positivistic/quantitative or phenomenological/qualitative approaches to sociological research, accounts of the essential nature of a critical approach are elusive. This book aims to fill this gap

Despite the long tradition, critical social research has waxed and waned in popularity over the last century and there have been numerous reassertions of the need for, and/or principles of ‘critical’ social enquiry. In Europe, up to the 1960s, these have tended to be linked directly with reworkings of Marxism (see section 2.2 below). In the United States, the Marxist element has been less overt and the call for critical social research has tended to be more pragmatic, directed against bureaucratisation, institutionalised power and manipulation of mass society (Ross 1901; Thomas, 1917; Mannheim, 1940). This has been tied to the censuring of social science for failing to develop methodologies sufficiently imaginative to deal with these major substantive issues (Lynd, 1939, Mills, 1959).

The 1960s seemed to mark the full rehabilitation of critical social research with the debates revolving around Marxism in the wake of the widespread student (and worker) revolts of 1968. A rehabilitation given new impetus by the development of Black movements and Women’s movements with their calls for critical social analysis in which ethnic and gender oppression are brought into the foreground (see Parts 3 and 4 below).

However, the case for critical social research has continued to be made. Sometimes the plea is for a particular form of critical enquiry as in Zygmunt Bauman’s (1976) Towards A Critical Sociology with its emphasis on an approach informed by Habermas’ critical hermeneutics. At others it is a the re-expression of the responsibility of the social scientist to attempt to address substantive issues, as in Alfred McClung Lee’s (1978) Knowledge For Whom? In all cases though, rather than assume the centrality of critical social research in the long tradition of social enquiry its place has to be reclaimed.

Bauman (1976), for example, criticises sociology for having far too long conceptualised society in ‘nature-like’ terms. From Comte, through Durkheim to Parsons and various other forms of functionalism society has been seen as ‘second nature’ and as organised organically. The emergence of existentialist and phenomenologically informed sociology, he argues, does nothing to challenge this preoccupation. On the contrary, by strengthening the key role of commonsense, such approaches deepen and strengthen the ‘nature-like’ perspective. They do this in particular by focusing on the way that common-sense is sustained and embedded in the routines and assumptions of everyday life. Herein ‘resides the intrinsically conservative role of sociology as the science of unfreedom’ (Bauman, 1976, p. 36).

The positivistic bent of sociological enquiry into ‘things as they really are’ must be engaged. Against the myth of uncommitted knowledge Bauman advocates a critical sociology aimed at human liberation. Critical sociology must challenge the ‘very daily existence which renders commonsense so placidly, if not fatuously, assured of its righteousness’. Bauman proposes Habermas’ thesis of emancipatory reason as a basis for critical sociology as it does not simply compete with other theories but ‘recklessly denies the validity of information itself’. Information, it claims, is partial, historically specific, inconclusive and the ‘reflection of

10 There is no attempt in this book to engage in debates about the ‘correct’ interpretation of Marx, or whether critical social research is essentially structuralist or humanist. Nor is there a concern with definitions of Marxism, phenomenology or positivism; much less with some balanced comparative analysis of the three orientations. Nor is this book concerned with the adequacy of such a tripartite division of sociology. The prime concern of this book is to provide, in general terms, a straightforward assessment of what are the crucial aspects of a critical methodological approach. Nor is there any attempt in later sections to clarify the prolonged debates about the nature of racism and sexism. For the purposes of this book it is sufficient to point out that critical social research actively engages racism and sexism.


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a mutilated, maimed, truncated existence’. Emancipatory reason does not struggle with common-sense but with the social

reality that underlies it. ‘It is social reality itself which renders commonsensical awareness—even when resulting from faithful, correct [positivistic] reflection—false’ (Bauman, 1976, p. 75).

Bauman’s call for an overt reconsideration of the nature of critical social research reflects the European tradition of critical thought which is grounded in epistemological concerns. His is not just a call for critical social science but an attempt to locate it in a specific framework, in particular it is a concern to disentangle critical-emancipatory social science from the phenomenological critique of positivism. The need to address this distinction is symptomatic of the variety of engagements of critical with non-critical epistemology to be found in European discourse. This has led to a number of different general perspectives on critical social research and thus to a number of overlapping meanings. In its ‘narrowest’ sense critical social research is conflated with ‘a Marxist approach’ or, somewhat more vaguely, a ‘dialectical’ orientation. Gouldner (1970) linked critical social research with ‘radical sociology’, while Radnitzky (1973) construed it in terms of a ‘hermeneutic-1212 dialectic’ approach opposed to ‘logical empiricism’. In his widely read book, Benton (1977) proposed a materialist or Marxist theory of knowledge distinct from both positivism and humanism and Johnson et al. (1984) contrast substantialism with empiricism, subjectivism and rationalism as a basis for a critical dialectical approach.

The approach in the United States has tended to be more pragmatic. In Sociology for Whom? Alfred McClung Lee (1978) takes up the critique of American sociology voiced by Robert Lynd and C. Wright Mills (discussed in detail in Part 2).11 He criticises sociology for failing to deal with the pressing issues of the day and sees sociology as impotent in the face of ‘power brokers and manipulators’, insidious ‘invisible government’ (Lippman, 1913) or ‘plutocratic politics’ controlled by wealth (Sumner, 1888). Lee addresses the extent to which modern sociology is able to help people control themselves and their resources for human ends and proposes a sociology in the service of humanity. He examines the ideals, practices and teaching of sociology and accuses much contemporary sociology of neo-scholasticism; the packaging of research conclusions in complex theories and jargons that obscure the main point. There is also, Lee contends, a tendency to fall back on methodological discussion to disguise inadequate or embarrassing research findings, to the extent of claiming the research as a test of the methodology. For him, social scientists are more concerned with their career prospects than the substance of their research and thus serve the status quo through their acceptance of the pressures of academic administration, the business and political establishment, publishers, and the providers of research monies.

Lee encourages a questioning attitude about the practice of contemporary sociology and the discarding of a narrow insular perspective. He suggests co-operative rather than competitive work; critique of the privileges, power and exploitation within the discipline; jettisoning of privileged texts (‘holy writs’, as he refers to them); a wide-ranging search for facts and ideas; and a critical examination of new fads both in terms of their theoretical and epistemological content and their wider social implications. Further, sociology should address a wider range of social problems than those that ‘irritate the inhabitants of white suburban ghettos’; frame analysis in the context of worldwide ‘colonialist and neo-colonialist exploitation’; and address and publicise the ‘manipulative strategies and propagandas to which so much of our mass media, politics, religious apologetics, and formal education are devoted’ (Lee, 1978, p. 222-223). In short, social scientists must serve ‘all classes of people as citizens, as consumers, and as neighbors’. This must include studies of how people can ‘protect themselves from undesirable manipulation by those in positions of power’.

11 Lee locates Mills and Lynd in a long tradition of social critique including W.E.B Du Bois, W.I. Thomas, R.E. Park, P.A. Sorokin, O.C. Cox and Willard Waller. Space precludes any examination of this critical tradition.

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Humanist sociology must broaden its perspective and embrace other disciplines not retain strict lines of demarcation. Sociologists in the service of humanity ‘act principally as critics,

demystifiers, reporters, and clarifiers.’ They critically review ‘folk wisdom’ and ‘strip away some of the outworn clutter of fictions’ that inform peoples’ lives (Lee, 1978, p. 36).

A decade later, Lewis Coser (1988) felt it again necessary to impress upon the American Sociological Association the salience of the critical tradition and the need to resurrect it. He noted the perturbing influence on ‘hopeful, critical undergraduates’ in graduate school to relegate ‘their critical impulses into half forgotten liminal layers of the mind’. Like Mills and Lee before him, he noted the tendency for sociological training in the United States to be directed at methodological refinement rather than critical thinking. ‘The methodological tail wags the substantive dog’ and in so doing they abandon the ‘critical birthright’ and ‘fail to enhance the critical bite’ of sociology. The resultant work is often dull and ‘tedious as a laundry list’. In the United States, critical reflection on substantive issues is more likely to be found amongst natural than social scientists (Birnbaum, 1988) and the critical edge of sociology relies on imports: ‘Habermas, Giddens, or Bourdieu serve as substitutes for missing native critical products’ (Coser, 1988, pp. 4–5).

Once again, Coser reasserts the need for sociology to take up its responsibilities. Sociology that ‘limits itself to taking account of what is’, he argues, is inadequate. Critical sociological thought is needed ‘in order to pinpoint and locate social problems and issues of which ordinary men and women are not yet aware’. Critical sociology needs to reveal the ‘worm in the apple’, the ‘rot behind the glittering facade of the current scene’. For example, social disturbances, rather than being seen as aberrations, are addressed by critical sociologists as signs of ‘deep-seated maladjustments in the social structure that can only be remedied through thorough reconstruction of basic societal premisses’. Without critical sociology, he argues, ‘the body of our discipline, and also the entire social fabric, are likely to congeal into frozen conformity’ (Coser, 1988, pp. 9-12).

Todd Gitlin (1988), also at the American Sociological Association, similarly voiced his disappointment with lack of criticism in sociology. He offers a tentative explanation for this lack in terms of a hostile economic climate and the academic career structure of sociology which have coincided with an insular, inaccessible sociology, unable or unwilling to take on board social criticism. This is epitomised by the growth of post-structuralism which promises everything but requires no engagement in the polity. For him, the decline of social criticism is rooted in a much larger problem, the decline of a public at large, and in this he reflects Mills’ and Lee’s long held views about public manipulation and mass media. Social critics, he argues, must at the very least address this issue.

Although the idea of critical social research is embedded in the tradition of social enquiry it frequently needs to be unearthed and reasserted. No more so than at the current time in the wake of the right’s claiming of the high ground of moral and philosophical discourse. The left, world wide, confounded by the persuasiveness of consumerism is forfeiting its own analytic concepts and adopting, uncritically, the reactionary reworkings of the three R’s: radicalism, realism and revolution. Critical social research must, as part of its responsibility to reveal the anti-democratic oppressions of the contemporary social world, reclaim these constructs.

This is not to assert any direct political affiliation for critical social research. It is a methodology not a political creed. But it is a methodology that is informed by a view that social structures are, in various ways, oppressive mechanisms. Critical social research, in this book, refers, then, only to work which involves a critique of oppressive social structures. It is not restricted to Marxism nor any other ‘ism’. However, only work that reflects a methodology that in some way attempts to get beneath the surface of appearances in order to reveal the nature of oppressive mechanisms, is included. The next section explores in outline the elements of such a methodology.


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1.6 Elements of Critical Social Research

1.6.1 Introduction Critical social research is extremely varied but critical methodology is based on a number of building blocks. These blocks should not be considered as discrete units which can simply be placed next to one another. They are elements which are drawn together in various ways in the process of deconstruction and reconstruction. These elements of critical social research are abstraction, totality, essence, praxis, ideology, history and structure.

Critical social research denies that its object of study is ‘objective’ social appearances. It regards the positivistic scientific method as unsatisfactory because it deals only with surface appearances. Instead, critical social research methodology cuts through surface appearance. It does so by locating social phenomena in their specific historical context. Historically specific phenomena cannot be regarded as independent, on the contrary they are related to other phenomena within a prevailing social structure. Critical social research analyses this structure. Social structures are maintained through the exercise of political and economic power. Such power (grounded in repressive mechanisms) is legitimated through ideology. Critical social research thus addresses and analyses both the ostensive social structure and its ideological manifestations and processes.

In examining the context of social phenomena, critical social research directs attention at the fundamental nature of phenomena. Rather than take the abstract phenomena for granted, it takes apart (i.e. deconstructs) the abstraction to reveal the inner relations and thus reconstructs the abstract concept in terms of the social structural relations that inform it.

This process of deconstruction and reconstruction is effected in terms of the wider societal perspective, that is in terms of a totalistic approach. A totalistic approach denies the relevance of looking at one element of a complex social process in isolation and argues that elements have to be looked at in terms of their interrelations and how they relate to the social structure as a whole. So critical social research is concerned with the broad social and historical context in which phenomena are interrelated. It is concerned with revealing underlying social relations and showing how structural and ideological forms bear on them. Critical social research, then, is interested in substantive issues, and wants to show what is really going on at a societal level. Not only does it want to show what is happening, it is also concerned with doing something about it. Critical social research includes an overt political struggle against oppressive social structures.

The examination of particular critical empirical studies that forms the bulk of this book is in order to illustrate how critical research has been undertaken in practice and how some or all of these elements have been combined in the dialectical deconstructive-reconstructive process. Before moving on to see how these elements have been developed in practice, a few working definitions are perhaps in order.12

1.6.2 Abstraction Abstraction is usually construed in terms of a distillation of sensory perception of the world of objects into conceptual categories. That is, we start from the (literally) objective world and select out the recurrent or apparently core or defining features until an abstract concept is formulated (at least in our minds if not in a directly communicable form). This process of distillation of some features from a set of observed objects is at the basis of most systems of classification.

This process may be acceptable to phenomenalist approaches to knowledge, which involve an implicit assumption that science begins with factual observations and abstracts from them, but it is

12 Some readers may prefer, at this point, to jump to the next part of the book to see some examples of critical social research and come back to this section later after getting a feel for critical research processes. Others who prefer to work from concepts to concrete examples should continue reading this section

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not adequate for critical social research. Indeed, the start point for critical social research is to reverse this normal process of abstractive thought.

Critical social research admits that facts do not exist independently of their theoretical context. If facts are not self-evident then concepts cannot be abstracted from them. Critical social research thus works by moving from the abstract to the concrete. It starts with the abstract generalisation and investigates them.

At one level this requires a thorough understanding of the way the concept or abstraction is usually used. Of course, any sound non-critical research will also undertake this kind of review. Indeed, it is embedded in the sociological tradition. Critical social research, however, goes further than a comprehensive review of accepted usages to investigate the taken-for-granted underpinnings of the concept. In this respect it differs from most non-critical research. Having understood how a concept is used, critical social research attempts to reveal underlying structures which specify the nature of the abstract concepts, but which have themselves been assimilated uncritically into the prevailing conceptualisation.

Delphy’s analysis of the abstract concept of housework (section 1.2 above) provides an example. The abstract concept is made concrete not just in terms of a set of tasks but in terms of underlying relations of production which are obscured by the non-critical notion of housework. Delphy’s analysis illustrates how critical social research aims to critically develop a reconstructed abstraction which represents the inner structures without which historically specific phenomenal form, or outward appearance, has no meaning. The general concept of housework is grasped in relation to the total structure of patriarchal relations in which it exists. Thereafter, the historically specific, in Delphy’s case French smallholders, may be analysed in relation to the generalised form in terms of the evolution and structuring of the concrete practical circumstances and processes by which some of the housewives’ work is excluded from productive labour.

Critical methodology’s use of abstractions, therefore, differs from the positivist use because, rather than simply providing the basis for ordering appearances and ultimately reifying them, they are used to get beneath the surface of appearances. Instead of simply adopting an empirical approach and logging housework tasks, a critical approach relates housework to the wider sphere of production and sees it as a work relationship. The penetration of this mode of productive relations begins to get beneath the surface of appearances. The superficial taken-for-granted ‘task view’ of housework is replaced by a dynamic conception which provides the basis for an holistic critique of social processes.

1.6.3 Totality Totality refers to the view that social phenomena are interrelated and form a total whole. This implies more than that a social phenomenon should be situated in a wider social context, it requires that social phenomena should not be analysed in isolation. They should not be regarded as encapsulated by a narrowly defined realm which can be investigated in a way that suggests they are self contained elements or organisms. A totalistic perspective implies that the components are interrelated into a coherent structure, that they only have meaning in terms of the structure, and in turn the structure relies on the component parts.13

In adopting an approach in terms of totality critical social research attempts to relate empirical detail to a structural and historical whole. Crucial to a critical methodological approach to history and structure are three things. First, an appreciation that social relations are historically specific. Second, an appreciation of the structural relations operating within that historical moment. Third, an appreciation of the reciprocal nature of the determinancy of historically specific structure and

13 This is slightly different from the similar concept of holism. The latter is the view that an organization, institution, or even society, as a functioning whole has an effect on all the parts of which it is made up, and that therefore one should not study these parts in isolation. Totality is similar but emphasises the coherence, importance and reciprocal nature of the structure.


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specific phenomenal forms. So, returning to Delphy’s example of housework, the French mid- twentieth century housewife is seen as operating within a family unit whose internal exploitative relations are excluded from national accounting. The unremunerated (as opposed to unpaid) labour of the housewife both maintains the social and labour relationship of the family unit and is maintained by it.

1.6.4 Essence Essence refers to the fundamental element of an analytic process. Most positivists regard any concern with essences as bordering on the metaphysical. Their only overt acknowledgement is in relation to the reduction of social or physical processes to their essential causal links. Phenomenologists, investigating the social world, view essences in a rather different way. They seek the essential nature of social phenomena or social relations. That is, some kind of core of being or engagement with a stream of consciousness, or, less transcendentally, the set of constructs that informs interactive processes. For critical social researchers, essence is a fundamental concept that can be used as the key to unlocking the deconstructive process. The key Marx used in his analysis of capitalism is (as we will see in more detail in section 2.3) the commodity form. For Delphy, the essential nature of housework was not the set of tasks, nor its lack of payment but its location within the exploitative relations of the family unit. Housework is essentially a work relationship. It is unremunerated work done by one member of a family unit for another. 1.6.5 Praxis Praxis means practical reflective activity. It is what humans do a lot of the time. Praxis does not include ‘instinctive’ or ‘mindless’ activity like sleeping, breathing, walking, etc., or undertaking repetitive work tasks. Praxis is what changes the world. For the critical social researcher knowledge is not just about finding out about the world but it is about changing it. It is important, therefore, that critical social research engages praxis. However, the critical social researcher is not interested in the specific actions or reasons for action of an individual. Individual actions are simply indicative of social groups operating within an oppressive social structure and/or historical juncture. What critical social research must take account of, in some way, is that changes in social formations are the result of praxis. So the subjects of any enquiry are analysed in terms of their potential for developing group action. Further, however, critical social researchers engage oppressive social structures, and their own enquiries thus embody praxiological concerns.

Throughout, it has been suggested that critical social research is as much about a questioning the nature of knowledge as it is about the critique of the knowledge we have. Knowledge changes not simply as a result of reflection but as a result of activity too. Knowledge changes as a result of praxis. Similarly what we know informs praxis. Knowledge is dynamic, not because we uncover more grains of sand for the bucket but because of a process of fundamental reconceptualisation which is only possible as a result of direct engagement with the processes and structures which generate knowledge. Knowledge does not reside in a cupboard or on a bookshelf to be taken out, dusted down, and looked at. Knowledge exists in our everyday lives. We live our knowledge and constantly transform it through what we do, as much as it informs what we do. For critical social research this means that an analysis of oppressive social structures is in itself a political act. Knowing cannot be shelved, it becomes part of our life, and informs our actions which engage these structures. The activity of engagement is at the root of further development of knowledge. Critical social research is thus intrinsically praxiological. Thus, for example, Delphy argues that the analysis of housework cannot begin until the notion of household unit is overturned.

1.6.6 Ideology ‘Ideology’ has not been easily translated into English and has tended to be little or poorly analysed in much conventional social research. The difficulty in ‘objectivising’ ideology has


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led some social scientists to regard it as beyond scientific analysis and thus not important, or to replace it with terms like ‘norm’, ‘values’ and ‘central value system’. The use of alternative terms has been a notable feature of American social science (Hall, 1978). These alternative concepts, while attempting to operationalise the idea of social legitimations, dispense with the critical element and are of little use in developing a critical analysis which goes beneath surface appearance

Ideology, as a concept, has a long history but it developed its current usage as an analytic and critical tool in the work of Marx and has been an important feature of Marxism. Marx suggested that ideology is present from the moment that social relations take on a hierarchical form. There are, arguably, two approaches to a critical analysis of ideology, the positive and the negative view of ideology (Larrain, 1979, 1982).

Ideology in its positive sense tends to relate ideology closely to Weltanschauung (world view), notably class-based world views (as in Lukacs’ (1971) thesis of working-class consciousness). The world view of the dominant class (the bourgeoisie in capitalism) prevails over other views and distorts perception through various mechanisms embodied in education, religion, the media and so on, in order to conceal the real nature of the relations of production underlying class differences. This dominant world view is said to be hegemonic. Ideology therefore serves to hide the interests of dominated groups from themselves. This view, thus, tends to equate ideology with false consciousness. The positive view of ideology renders enormous power to ideology, or to the manufacturers and dissipators of ideology. The positive view of ideology, while seeing ideology as distorting, tends to ignore the grounding of ideology in social relations. Ideology thus emerges as a seemingly self-evident abstraction. This approach, while supposedly materialist, inserts ideology as an idealist screen between social milieu and knowledge production.

The negative meaning of ideology is fundamentally opposed to a reduction of ideology to false consciousness. The negative view argues that ideas cannot be detached from the material conditions of their production thus it is opposed to a Weltanschauung (positive) view of ideology. The implication is that ideology can only be affected by changes in the material base. The negative view sees ideology as not simply a procedure by which reality is distorted, but one in which ideology is dialectically related to the nature of social relations and serves not to distort or hide that relationship but to reify class differences as intrinsic and natural. This view sees ideology as inhering in thought. Ideology becomes transparent because it appears natural. Ideology is constantly reaffirmed through everyday practice. Thus, the negative view argues that ideology can only be destroyed through praxis which changes the material basis of the production of ideas. While the negative view implies that ideas change only when material conditions change, it is important to realise that the operation of ideology, as process, is also dialectical. Ideology, inhering in social relationships is both informed by, and informs, the nature of these relationships. A critique of ideology is therefore possible if one addresses the interrelationship between ideology and practice, thereby going beyond surface appearances.

Ideology is it an important concept for critical social research then because ideology serves to obscure the ‘true material reality’ and must be engaged. ‘True material reality’ here refers not to self-evident surface appearances, but to relations (usually of production) that are obscured by social totalities. The notion of ideology as obscuring relations of production implies that it is a kind of screen that can be removed or transcended. The possibility of transcending ideology depends upon

what is taken as ideology. The positive view frames ideology as false consciousness or world view which can be engaged and transcended. The negative view sees ideology as all pervasive and grounded in the material relations of production. Ideology cannot be disengaged from the material infrastructure. This makes it difficult to reveal the nature of ideology because it means making apparent something which has been transparent and somehow natural. The approach in this case is to identify the essence of social relations (in


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detail) and separate this essence from structural forms through a process of dialectical deconstruction and reconstruction.

Ideology, of course, does not simply relate to class exploitation, gender, race and other forms of oppression have been legitimated in ideological terms. Patriarchal and racist ideologies can be seen as part of or alternatives to class-based hegemony. For Delphy, the discussion of housework as a set of tasks reflects a patriarchal ideology which obscures the real relations of production within the family unit

1.6.7 Structure Structure is a term used in two ways in social research. Its principal meaning and the one applicable to critical social research is of structure viewed holistically as a complex set of interrelated elements which are interdependent and which can only be adequately conceived of in terms of the complete structure. This is the sense in which structuralism uses the term structure. It also reflects, in general, Marxist views of the structural nature of social systems. What it involves is the idea of wholeness, transformation and self-regulation (Piaget, 1971). Wholeness means an internal coherence, not a simple composite or aggregate of independent elements, but parts conforming to intrinsic laws which determine the nature of the structure and of the parts. Transformation means that the structure is not static, the intrinsic laws make it not only structured but structuring. The structure is capable of transformative procedures. Self-regulation means that the structure makes no appeals beyond itself in order to validate its transformational procedures. Language, for example, is a relational whole with grammatical rules; can transform fundamental sentences into a wide variety of forms whilst retaining them within its structure; and transforms sentences with no reference to an outside reality.

An alternative use of the term structure is to see it as something that can be reduced to its elements. The complexity of a structure is decomposed into a network of linked parts with a view to exposing the elements and simplifying the whole. It is assumed that the elements make sense in their own right. This is more aptly described as a system. It is essentially the approach adopted by structural functionalists. Possibly the easiest way to distinguish structure from system is to see a system as a congealed patterns of interaction, and structure as underlying models of the world that structuralists seek to identify. The reductionist system view tends not to address the dialectical interrelationship of the parts and the whole which is crucial to critical social research.

For Delphy, to break housework down into a system of tasks ignores the relationship between the elements and the whole which is one of a transforming social relation. The exploitative nature of the tasks done as ‘housework’ can only be seen when the individual domestic labour is related to the family unit and the domestic unit is related to the broader economic unit. To see housework as tasks denies this structural relationship. 1.6.8 History History refers to both the reconstructed account of past events and the process by which this reconstruction is made; i.e. the process of doing history. History writing then involves both a view about the nature of history and the assembling of historical materials. There are a number of ways

of ‘doing’ history and a number of different schemes for categorising history.14 Rather than assess these differing views, the nature of the historical perspective embodied in critical social research will be outlined.

14 One way of distinguishing between them is in terms of the three categories; historism, historicism and historicalism (Bleicher, 1980; Gadamer, 1975; Radnitzky, 1973;). These rather similar terms represent three quite distinct views of history. Historism sees history as essentially factual and ignores the role of the interpretive subject/historian. Historicism and historicalism both see history as an interpretiveprocess. The former sees the past as being reconstructed from the standpoint of the present while the latter argues that argues that past and present mediate one another. Other commentators have suggested alternative ways of


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Critical social research involves two essential elements, the grounding of a generalised theory in material history and the exposure of the essential nature of structural relations which manifest themselves historically. Critical social research does not accept that history is essentially ‘factual’. It denies that history exists and is just lying around waiting to be unearthed by the historian. Like all other aspects of social research history is an interpretive process, the product of the activity of the historian. Reconstructing history is not just a matter of digging through archives or libraries to locate the facts and events of history. Reconstructing history is the result of an active interpretation of the available archaeological, documentary or oral evidence.15 Approaches that adopt a view of history as an interpretive process rather than the gathering of already existing facts are usually referred to as historicist approaches.

The first tenet of historicism is that history is an interpretive process.16 A second tenet of historicism is its incorporation of ‘objectivity’ in one form or another. Historicists either explicitly or implicitly propose an account which reconstructs the meanings of events or, in analysing a text, reconstructs the meanings of the author. Such meanings are, however, informed by current conceptualisations. The past is thus reconstructed in one way or another on the basis of the present.17 Naive historicism involves an attempt to objectively reconstruct or re-experience the past. While accepting that history is an interpretive process, it presumes that historical events, or the meanings of historical documents can be reconstructed irrespective of the passage of time. In effect, the ‘presentist’ meaning applied to past occurrences and the questionable nature of the objective reconstruction is apparently naively ignored.

The more frequent Weltanschauung historicism attempts to generate an objective account through a specification of ‘interests’ within a ‘world view’ (Weltanschauung). This specification of interests takes two forms. First, an objectificationist form which sees history as progressing towards some meaningful goal. Such a view is somewhat analogous to a kind of secular version of the eschatological notion of evolution to salvation (Radnitzky, 1973). Historicism in this form is rather doctrinaire, conceiving of a ‘plan’ which history will reveal. Its extreme form is manifest in utopian historicism in which claims are made that there are laws that govern the inevitable succession of historical stages (for example, in the work of Plekhanov (1940a, 1940b, 1947).

The second specification of interests is rather more a declaration of interests. In this approach, the historian declares a perspective which informs the reconstruction of past events. There is no necessary view of the progress of history towards a particular outcome but there is a view that particular interests have been manifested through an historical epoch and that these can be reconstructed through an analysis of documents and events.

Historicism has been adapted as an approach for critical social research in its radical formulations. Radical historicism adopts the basic historicist tenets of history as a presentist, categorising history. For example, history is divided into pseudo-political categories such as conservative, liberal (Whig) and radical (Marxist) history. Mandelbaum (++++), who argues that history should look for specific causes of events, distinguishes three types of history: sequential, explanatory, interpretive. Sequential goes through the story. Explanatory works back from an event to seek out the diverse (and otherwise unconnected) causes. Interpretive history provides the context for a given historical moment, i.e. tends to be a ‘static picture’. A similar kind of approach suggests that history may be descriptive, inferential or contextual. The first simply provides an account, the second draws inferences from events, and the third situates events and actions in a wider context. 15 The process of writing history is sometimes referred to as historiography, especially when it is official historians who are constructing the histories. No doubt the term provides some kind of spurious scientificity to their accounts. Historiography really refers to the study and analysis of history-writing rather than the process of writing history itself and this is the way the term will be used in this book. The process of writing history will simply be referred to as ‘history’ or ‘reconstructing history’ if there is any ambivalence between the process and the outcome. To confuse matters further, historiography is also sometimes used to refer to the history of history writing, this is not a usage adopted in this book. 16 This is where it differs fundamentally from historism 17 The concern with objectivity and the ‘presentist’ orientation distinguishes historicism from historicalism.


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objectivist, interpretative process but in one way or another attempts to dig beneath the surface of historical manifestations. This it does through a critical analysis of the prevailing frameworks in which the history is located. There are two main radical historicist tendencies.

Structural historicism is the process of reconstructing a honed down history, devoid of confusing instances, as a result of a new perspective gained from a critique of prevailing social structures. This approach analyses the prevailing structure and its ideology, deconstructs it, and then reconstructs a logical history guided by the structural analysis. The point of reference for the historicist reconstruction is not the prevailing social system or contemporary perspective but the

radical, dialectically reconstructed, social structure. This approach is illustrated in the review of Marx’s analysis of capitalism (section 2.3).

Critical historicism reconstructs history through the adoption of a critical Weltanschauung (world view). The point of view informs the historical reconstructive process. However, it involves more than just a different point of view upon which to base an historical account. This approach examines the historical genesis of a social system and show how oppressive structures have emerged. It addresses historical events in terms of their relation to prevailing social practices and examines the extent to which prevailing structures are sustained through them. This approach is fairly common amongst feminist historians and is explored below in the work of Mumtaz and Shaheed (1987) and can also be seen in Mills’ (1956) study of the power structure in the United States in the 1950s.

It is worth noting here that an historicist perspective which declares a ‘non-dominant’ perspective informing the historical reconstruction is not in itself indicative of a piece of critical social research. While this book is not intended to provide criteria for judging whether or not work qualifies as critical social research, it is intended as a guide to the many ways of doing such research. Without arbitrarily delimiting the scope of critical social research it seems not inconsistent to suggest that the process of critical social research requires more than an alternative perspective. Providing a broader context within which to locate the history of an organisation is indicative of, but not sufficient for, a critical study. Providing a general framework merely situates the specific history, it is only critical if it relates the specific to the wider social structures. In short, a totalistic perspective rather than an holistic framework is required.

Undertaking historical research is a process of detection. Non-interpretive views of history see this process of detection as akin to piecing together a jigsaw puzzle. Interpretive views of history accept that pieces do not fit together into a pre-arranged picture but that each piece has to be interpreted in terms of an overall picture. Historicists, in the main, have a fairly good idea of what they think the current picture is and interpret historical events in terms of this picture.18 The interpretive process of history involves the historian as active detective, seeking out clues, following trails and leads and gradually getting a feel of what is going on. The critical social researcher applies detection not so much to solve a particular problem but to investigate the circumstances within which it occurred. To pursue the analogy, critical social research is not so much interested in who shot John Kennedy but in uncovering the conspiracy that surrounds the event. Critical social research, of course, does not approach the past as though it were a conspiracy, nor however, does it see it simply as a series of events. The critical approach to history locates events in their social and political contexts, addresses the economic constraints and engages taken- for-granted ideological factors. It does this not just in terms of the events but also reflexively, in terms of the situatedness of the researcher

So, like all aspects of critical social research, history is not just there waiting to be picked up and fitted into the critical historical account. History has to be researched and critically evaluated as well. Within critical social research the reconstruction of history takes place alongside the structural analysis, it both informs and is informed by it.

1.6.9 Deconstruction and reconstruction. 18 Historicalists argue that the overall picture is as much an interpretive conundrum as the pieces.


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Deconstruction and reconstruction begins from the abstract concepts which are applied to, or used in relation to, an area of investigation. In practice, there may be a large list of concepts. It is not necessary to attempt a separate critical analysis of each. They are all interrelated and so the ‘key’ is

to locate a central concept and critically analyse that. From that, the other concepts can be reconstructed.

Before addressing how the central concept is analysed it is important to note that the deconstructive-reconstructive process is not just abstract concept analysis tacked on to the usual idealised sequence of events in a research undertaking. Critical social research is not embodied in a series of discrete phases. It is not just abstract concept analysis followed by hypothesis generation, data collection, data analysis, and the generation of results, with the implications for theory added at the end. Critical social research develops the different elements in parallel, each aspect informs each of the other aspects.

So the abstract analysis, while the starting point, is integrally related to empirical enquiry, not something that stands apart from it. Conceptualisation, for the critical social researcher, is grounded in the material world. It is linked to practice. The deconstructive-reconstructive process which is at the heart of dialectical analysis involves a constant shuttling backwards and forwards between abstract concept and concrete data; between social totalities and particular phenomena; between current structures and historical development; between surface appearance and essence; between reflection and practice. This works as follows.

The researcher is concerned with a realm of enquiry, usually provoked by a particular question that demands attention, such as, ‘why do some youngsters not make the most of the opportunity offered by the education system?’; ‘does the mass media manipulate the viewer?; ‘should women get paid for housework?’. These questions frame an area of enquiry. The first job is to explore its central concepts. The selection of a central concept is not simple, but, as we shall see in the substantive examples, neither is it impossible.

The whole point of critical research is that the researcher is prepared to abandon lines of thought which are not getting beneath surface appearances. It involves a constant questioning of the perspective and analysis that the researcher is building up. It is a process of gradually, and critically, coming to know through constant reconceptualisation. This means that the selection of a core concept for analysis is not a once and for all affair. The researcher does not need to select the ‘correct’ core concept first time, nor is the concept initially selected to be adhered to throughout the analysis. The ‘correct’ core concept only emerges in the course of the ongoing analysis. It is only ‘correct’ in the sense that it provides, at any point in the critical analysis, the best focus for deconstructing and reconstructing the phenomenon in its socio-historic context. The shuttling back and forth between the abstract and concrete, the unit and the structure, and so on, ensures that when the area of enquiry is taken apart, that this deconstructive process is not static. On the contrary, the deconstruction may prove to be unsatisfactory because the reconstructed system may not appear to work or to make sense. Thus the deconstruction needs to be further developed, which in turn will lead to a new basis for a reconstruction. And so the process goes on until the reconstructed analysis is coherent.

So, what one has to do is decide on an initial core concept? Bear in mind that the selection is one that derives from constantly mediated thought. The mediation is in terms of the assessment of potential abstract conceptualisations as well as concrete social processes. Examine how the concept has been used and then ask what the underlying assumptions are that informs this usage and how it relates to the general area of enquiry. The relationship between the abstract core concept and the area of enquiry should be investigated at the level of general abstractions and in terms of concrete empirical relations. Ask what appears to be going on at the abstract level and how this is manifest in concrete situations? To what extent is there some disjunction between the underlying

presuppositions of the abstract concept and the nature of concrete reality? This involves widening the framework of the concrete investigation to consider related aspects.


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Conventional social research encourages the funnelling of attention towards the examination of narrowly construed hypotheses. In ‘good’ conventional research this follows a wide acquaintance with available research and theoretical debate. But it still focuses attention on specifics. Such an approach hinders the digging beneath the surface which is fundamental to critical social research.

Take housework. The conventional approach is to see it as a set of tasks. Delphy addressed it as unpaid domestic work. She showed that deconstructing housework in these terms did not work. Such an analysis failed to address the inconsistencies between work done in one’s own home and work done in another’s. Nor could it deal with the difference between work which was done at home which was regarded as economically accountable yet unpaid (butchering a pig) and that which was not (cooking the pig). A more useful deconstruction was to see housework in terms of a relation of production. As work done for another family member. The exploitative nature of housework is thus reconstructable. The hidden nature of this exploitation in economic accounting which focuses on the family unit is revealed in this analysis by analysing the relationships within the family.

With each new conceptual level the area of enquiry is empirically and conceptually deconstructed. The process is ongoing, the new conceptualisations are used to reconstruct an alternative perspective. Thus, slowly, the ideology embedded in prevailing conceptualisations is undermined. The core abstraction is related to the social totality to see if it reveals further the nature of the workings of the totality. Empirical data is used to elaborate the relationship and suggest further deconstructive stages. The nature and manifestations of ideology are continually revealed. A new and radically different conceptualisation of the social processes and structural relations emerges.19 For critical methodologists then, science as the basis for the understanding of the social world, is not the construction of causal laws, but of a deeper understanding which goes beyond surface appearance and relates the parts to the whole. As such it differs too, from phenomenological approaches in relating its essentialist analysis to the social totality. This process is one of deconstruction and reconstruction.

Throughout the description of this process the concentration has been on the processes of analysis and critique that enable the deconstruction and reconstruction of the realm of enquiry. There has been no concern with data collection procedures. It is not the manner of data collection it is the approach to evidence that is important. However, it is not adequate to indulge in ‘armchair’ speculation. The world of concrete practical activity has to be engaged.

To sum up, the dialectical deconstructive-reconstructive process can be construed as a process of focusing on the structural totality or historical moment and critically reflecting on its essential nature. The totality is taken initially as an existent whole. This structure presents itself as natural, as the result of historical progress, that is, it is ideologically constituted. The critical analysis of the historically specific structure must therefore go beyond the surface appearances and lay bear the essential nature of the relationships that are embedded in the structure. This critique ostensively begins by fixing on the fundamental unit of the structural relationships and decomposing it. The fundamental unit must be broken down until its essential nature is revealed, the structure is then reconstituted in terms of this essentialised construct. The reconstructive process reveals the transparency of ideology. The whole is grounded in historically specific material reality.

1.6.10 Conclusion Critical social research involves a perspective which sees social structure as an oppressive mechanism of one kind or another. This oppression is legitimated via dominant ideology. Thus critical social research involves a totalistic perspective. The structure is a particular historical manifestation and any analysis of it is located in the context of a wider historical analysis. Critical research digs beneath the surface of ostensive appearances through direct 19 It is radical in the (pre-Thatcherite) sense of a critique of doctrinal preconceptions which fundamentally exposes and questions the prevailing ideology. (Thatcherite ‘radicalism’ simply reasserts a taken-for-granted dominant ideology).


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analysis of social phenomena. The concepts which frame and define an area of enquiry are themselves subject to critical analysis The taken-for-granted process of abstract conceptualisation is itself subject to investigation. Specific phenomena are analysed in terms of the way they relate to wider social structures and in terms of their historical manifestations. The critical analytic process is one of deconstructing taken-for-granted concepts and theoretical relationships by asking how these taken- for-granted elements actually relate to wider oppressive structures and how these structures legitimate and conceal their oppressive mechanisms. An alternative non-dominant account is reconstructed. The critical rebuilding involves a process of conceptual shuttling back and forth between the particular phenomena under investigation and the wider structure and history to which it relates; between the taken-for-granted and the deconstructed concepts; and the theoretical deconstruction and the reconstructed social totality. The process leads to a continual revelation of the nature and operation of the oppressive social structure. Critical social research assumes that the world is changed by reflective practical activity and is thus not content to simply identify the nature of oppressive structures but to point to ways in which they can be combated through praxis.


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2. Class 2.1 Introduction

In this part of the book, seven critical research studies that address the nature and functioning of class are examined in detail. The focus is on the methodology employed in these critical studies that address class in one way or another as an oppressive system.

The first volume of Capital is explored below as an example of Marx’s critical social research. Marx, of course, had a prodigious output over his lifetime. There is no attempt to assess his entire work here. The intention is to show how he developed a critical methodology. This involves drawing out his epistemological concerns as well as his dialectical methodology. Marx set himself an enormous task by focusing attention on the working of capitalism as a whole. Broadly, his approach was both structural and historical. He used a wide range of empirical material through which to deconstruct and reveal the workings of the late 19th century capitalist system.

In The Power Elite, C. Wright Mills (1956) analyses the power structure of mid-twentieth century America. He also adopts an historical and structural analysis and draws on a large array of empirical sources.1 Mills work is an exemplar in a substantial tradition of American social criticism.

Goldthorpe and Lockwood in their study of The Affluent Worker (Goldthorpe et al., 1969) address the nature and role of the working class in advanced industrial society through an empirical critical case study of the embourgeoisement thesis. They adapt standard scheduled interviewing data collection techniques to the investigation of the relationship between working class affluence, industrial relations and working-class culture. Their negation of the embourgeoisement thesis has broader theoretical and praxiological implications.

Contemporary analyses that deal with problems of labour and of social order have made use of ethnographic techniques as a means of generating material. Paul Willis’s (1977) study of the schooling of working class children and Roger Grimshaw and Tony Jefferson’s (1987) equally painstaking examination of policing both make use of critical ethnographic techniques to engage the structural elements that underlie observed social phenomena. They do not adopt identical methods: Willis tends towards participant observation while Grimshaw & Jefferson prefer a non-participant theoretical case study. Both make use of in-depth interviews and group discussions and documentary analysis, to augment their observations. Both develop a fundamentally critical ethnographic research process. Willis’ is an analysis guided by an overt concern with working-class culture. Race and gender are factors that are considered in relation to class culture. Grimshaw & Jefferson, while rejecting crude ‘class functionalism’, develop a structuralist-informed critical analysis that sees policing as an ongoing practice determined by the interrelationship between the three structures of law, work and democracy. As such they provide a good counterpoint to the more overt class-cultural approach of Willis.

Media and cultural studies are other areas in which class-based critical social research approaches have been widely adopted. Many of these have been informed by structuralism and semiology as can be seen in Judith Williamson’s (1978) study of advertising and Will Wright’s (1977) analysis of Westerns as the contemporary American equivalent of the ‘tribal’ myth.

Each, in their own way, provides concrete examples of critical social research based on some notion of economic hierarchy. Class, in the sense of the position of social groups in 1 Mills is criticised by some Marxists for replacing a class-based analysis of society by a sort of elite conspiracy theory (Swingewood, 1975).

2. Class 2.2 Class, production and culture

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relation to the process of production, is addressed directly by some of the studies, as in Marx’s own analysis of capitalism and Williamson’s critique of advertising. Other studies concentrate on power-based hierarchies, for example Mill’s analysis of powerful élites in the United States. Nonetheless, the focus is on economic hierarchies of one sort or another, rather than on hierarchies informed by gender or ethnic differences. Subsequent parts of the book deal with these alternative structuring factors. All the studies reviewed in the book are thus approached as methodological examples. 2.2 Class, production and culture

Class, in one form or another, was the key analytic concept in sociology. Marxism has, of course, consistently critiqued the oppressive nature of class under capitalist forms of production and has a commitment to overthrowing capitalism.2 Any student of sociology will be aware that Marx offered what is taken to be the first thoroughgoing critical analysis of the class oppression endemic in the capitalist mode of production. Marx’s work was more than a critical study of capitalist production; through his engagement with epistemology he pioneered critical methodology. In many respects Marx’s lifetime work established a basis for class-oriented critical social research. Most, if not all, subsequent work in this area has been a development of, or at least referred to, the work Marx undertook. Furthermore, a considerable amount of work on both gender and race oppression have also drawn heavily on Marx.

Marxist class analysis is not so much concerned to show that class is an oppressive mechanism than it is to show how such a mechanism works and how class conflict leads to a set of productive relations and consequent superstructure. The oppressive nature of class is, in the main, taken for granted by Marxists, even if capitalism has worked systematically towards concealing class differences and proclaiming the end of ideology (Bell 1962; Dittberner, 1979; Abercrombie, 1980). Marxism is not monolithic and is characterised by ongoing debate and reconstruction. Debates that divide Marxists revolve around the analysis of capitalist production and the role of classes; the nature of socialist economy; the tactics for revolutionary activity; and the potential for gradual non-revolutionary transformation to socialism.

Marx (1845) developed a materialist conception of history and argued for the historical primacy of the economic basis over the ideological superstructure. Drawing on contemporary analyses of the emerging landless proletariat, Marx developed a theory of the evolution of the working class as integral to his analysis of capitalism. In essence, the inevitable crises of capitalism will only be transformed into a post-capitalist order through the agency of the active proletariat. Such praxis is at the core of historical materialism. Working class action will overcome the alienated condition of labour. The working class, Marx argued, must dismantle the State, not just take it over. Marx’s ‘scientific’ socialism is thus not based on utopian ideals but linked to the agency of the working class.3

Marxism, since Marx, has, however, addressed the accuracy of Marx’s own analysis of capital and applicability to changed circumstances. Four lines of development have occurred. The first is based on the view that Marx’s fundamental critique of capitalism and the role of 2 To attempt to provide a schematic account of different critical perspectives on class is to court disaster. No classificatory scheme is likely to please everyone, not least because key terms in such a schema are far from unproblematic. Three concerns are of particular interest to the following analysis of critical research methodology and these will be briefly commented on. First, the broad notion of class, whether or not class is perceived as a relationship to the means of production. Second, the way in which ideology is approached. Third, the extent to which history or structure inform the perspective. 3 Until 1914, Engels had unrivalled prestige as interpreter of Marx's work. Engels was a gifted publicist and became responsible for the exposition and popularism of Marxism as a world view after Marx's death (McLellan, 1988). Engels (1892) reaffirmed the inevitability of proletarian revolution and described the nature of the Communist reorganisation of society that a proletarian revolution will make possible.


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the working class in revolutionary overthrow is essentially correct (Luxemburg, 1900, 1906; Lenin, 1902, 1905; Stalin, 1924; Varga (undated)). The second is that Marx’s analysis was correct but that changed social and economic circumstances require its revision (Lenin, 1916; Bukharin, 1924; Habermas, 1970) The third is that Marx’s original analysis was flawed and has to be radically rethought especially in view of changing circumstances (Althusser, 1969; Gramsci, 1971). The fourth is one that concentrates on methodology and argues that Marx’s historical materialism and its intrinsic dialectical analysis constitutes a basis for social analysis that continues to be salient irrespective of his particular analyses (Sayer, 1980; Zeleny, 1980; Schmidt, 1981; Wolff, 1985; Resnick and Wolff, 1982; Delphy, 1977, 1980, 1985).

The criticisms of Marx’s analysis of capitalism and the role of the working class take four forms. First, that Marx overstated the political mission of the working class. Marx was mistaken in expecting capitalism to continue the polarisation of classes with capitalism forcing wage earners into ever-greater poverty. Through the creation of wealth the working class are neutralised as a revolutionary force. Extending parliamentary democracy thus becomes the way forward (Engels, 1895; Bernstein, 1899, Kautsky, 1918). Second, that Marx saw the state as a coercive instrument of the bourgeoisie and ignored the role of the state in capitalist societies. Political power is not invariably subordinate to economic relations. The state has played an important and relatively independent role (Althusser, 1971, Gramsci, 1971;). Third, that Marx exaggerated the importance of property ownership as a source of social cleavage and conflict and gave insufficient consideration to ideological and superstructural aspects such as occupation, education and culture (Thompson, 1963; Anderson & Blackburn, 1965; Williams, 1965; Petrovic, 1967; Gramsci, 1971; Lukacs, 1971; Berger, 1972; Lefebvre, 1984). Fourth, a specific development of the superstructural view found in humanist Marxism is the argument that Marx underplayed the role of the human agent especially in his later work (Marcuse, 1964; Gortz, 1982).4

Since the 1960s the potentially revolutionary subject, for many Marxists, has been displaced from working-class organisation to protest movements of blacks, women, and middle-class students. These movements had some successes but their basically existential critiques lacked an economic base and the movements failed both to present an alternative organisational infrastructure and to produce any broad and pervasive political change, (albeit they ultimately secured legal sanctions against gender, race and other forms of discrimination.) This failure became the challenge for the theorists of the 1970s. The New Left challenged the ability of orthodox versions of Marxism to give adequate accounts of racism and imperialism on either side of the Iron Curtain. The recent success of grass roots activities encapsulated in mass ‘feed the world’ charity events and organisations, however, re-awakened, in the otherwise sterile 1990s, interest in the protest movements of the 1960s and there is now a (re-)developing view that Marxism should develop along decentralised, self-critical and pluralist lines. This view was further supported by developments in the Soviet bloc and China during the late 1980s. Furthermore, Marxism, especially in Western Europe, has been affected by post-modernist, post-structuralist, feminist and radical black critiques of power as hierarchical structures of difference (racism, sexism, colonialism) that are not reducible to the model of class exploitation.

All this has lead to a continued questioning of the emancipatory process: the role of the working class; the functions of intellectuals; the determining nature of the mode of production; and the place of the state apparatus. Marxism is no longer (if it ever was) a theory in isolation from other intellectual and political positions nor apart from the wider exigencies of history. Marxism is a dynamic, evolving, critical analytic framework. By refusing to take its own categories for granted, Marxism has re-appropriated the critical power of Marx’s interpretive practice. The first part of this book addresses how Marxist analysts have

4 Of course there have been innumerable discussions about the extent to which Marx addressed the role of the working class, the state, and superstructural aspects. Considerations of space preclude the analysis of these in detail here.

2. Class 2.2 Class, production and culture

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undertaken critiques of capitalism. The subsequent parts show how Marxism has been selectively appropriated in addressing issues of race and gender.

Marx has had an enormous effect on critical social research, but there have also been other strands of development, particularly in the United States where Marxism has often been ignored. One such important strand in the development of critical social research is what has become known as social criticism. This was informed more by pragmatism than Marxism, although in its apogee in the work of C. Wright Mills in the 1950s, a number of traditions coalesce. However, as we shall see, Mills perspective was neither directly informed by Marx nor was it entirely congruent with a Marxian approach. While Marx saw class oppression as underpinned by economic processes (although by no means the economic reductionist he is sometimes portrayed) Mills focused on the issue of institutionally-located power in the hands of an élite. Nonetheless, Mills’ social criticism represented an alternative strand to critical social research, and the style is explored in the analysis of The Power Elite below.

In many senses Mills can be regarded as the last of the ‘founders’ of critical social research. His call for critical imaginative work forcibly reaffirmed a need for a critical approach to American social science and as such he voiced the concerns that had been rumbling in various guises in American sociological circles for many years. Mills restates many of the ideas that Robert Lynd (1939) drew attention to in Knowledge For What? Lynd argued that social science was adopting inappropriate methods, was too fragmented into autonomous disciplines and therefore asking insubstantial questions that failed to match the tenor of the cataclysmic times. He argued that social science was characterised by technicians on the one hand and scholars on the other. They both failed to address contemporary issues, the former because of an over-concern with developing method, the latter because of an esoteric detachment of theory from practice.

The funding of social scientific research was, Lynd argued, contingent upon political factors that prescribed the nature of the enquiry; social science was expected to provide radical solutions but not to be subversive. Social science adopted an atomistic approach, the parts were not related to wholes. It is quite inadequate, Lynd argued, to address, for example, economics in isolation from the social and the political. What is needed, Lynd argued, is to restate old questions in a wider context. A fundamental shift in the concerns of social science to match contemporary issues will come about only by relating specifics to the totality. For Lynd, the totality is not the Marxian concept but one that emerges from the work of the culturologists (Ogburn, White and Dorothy Thomas). Lynd (1939, p.51) argues that one has to ground analysis in culture, that there is a ‘continuous reciprocal interaction of culture with individual personalities’. Analysis of the relationship between the personal and the cultural serves to ground the dualism in material practices.

Lynd saw a mediation of Marxism and Freudianism as central to the development of the social sciences. He argued for the assessment of the extent to which ‘economic pressures analysed by Marx are controlling, and where and to what extent the individual motivations studied by Freud operate’ (Lynd, 1939, p. 41). A key concern, reflecting the culturologists, is the idea of a cultural gap: the disjunction created by attitudes and opinions being out of synchronisation with changing social practices that manifest themselves in rapidly changing modern society. Lynd talks of ‘assumptions’ and ‘contradictions’ by which to address this cultural gap. Assumptions are prevailing norms, and closely resemble dominant ideology although Lynd does not ground them in material practices in the same way that Marx does. Similarly, Lynd’s contradictions are the contradictory values that individuals find hard to resolve, rather than the structurally-embedded contradictions of Marxist analysis.

For Lynd, social science must address the issue of power and the related divisions in society, including age and gender divisions. Social science should address cross-disciplinary problems that relate to cultural wholes and that are located in their specific historical milieu. History, rather than an autonomous discipline should become a method of the social sciences. In the end, social science must face its responsibilities and not avoid major


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questions by hiding behind value neutrality. Social science must shoulder its responsibilities and ask substantial and radical (although not revolutionary) questions that address prevailing values and have political implications.

In his seminal book The Sociological Imagination, C. Wright Mills (1959) felt obliged to restate the existence of, the need for, and the principles behind, critical social research. Working at Columbia University gave him a clear insight into how sociology in the late 1950s had polarised into two tendencies, which he labelled ‘grand theory’ and ‘abstracted empiricism’.

Mills couched his reassertion of critical social research by invoking the ‘intellectual craftsmanship’ embedded in the classic sociological tradition of Weber, Durkheim, Veblen, Marx and Mannheim. For Mills, this intellectual craft had been all but suffocated by Liberalistic scientism since the 1930s. Sociology had become abstruse abstract theorising on the one hand and microscopic method-driven empirical study on the other. Substantive issues of consequence were no longer the focus of social scientific enquiry; phenomena were extracted from their dynamic history, dissected and never discussed in macroscopic terms.

Mills maintained that the growing concern with making sociology scientific, expressive of ‘truths’ rather than meanings, and independent of value judgements, meant that the classical method, with its ‘exaggerated historicism’ had become a less acceptable approach to sociology in America. The Second World War and the McCarthyism of the 1950s effectively diluted most radical thinking in the social sciences and there were no well-known ‘schools’ of critical social research. Critical social research was manifested, for Mills, in ‘intellectual craftsmanship’, directed towards macroscopic historically-situated concerns.

Mills acted as a focal point for a brief revival of critical social research in the United States (Stein and Vidich, 1963) which became known (ironically) as ‘The New Sociology’ following the publication of a book of that title (Horowitz, 1964) in honour of C. Wright Mills. His approach further became codified, for a while, in the early 1970s as ‘social criticism’ and various attempts were made to construct a broader notion of social criticism incorporating a wide spectrum of pragmatic radical social theorists (Fletcher, 1974; Stone et al., 1974; Brown, 1977).

2.3 Karl Marx: Capital

2.3.1 Introduction There are contrasting analyses of Marx’s philosophy, social analysis, ontological and

epistemological position and methodology. However, most commentators agree that Marx developed a materialist approach to social, political and economic analysis out of his philosophical opposition to Hegel’s objective idealism. Marx adopted a totalistic approach, that is, he argued that society could not be understood by examining its parts in isolation but that the parts had to be seen as interrelated into a coherent structure and that they only had meaning in relation to the structure. His analysis thus focussed on the interrelation of the components and the total structure and he reconceptualised the Hegelian dialectic.

Social critique underpins his whole work and in Capital Marx sets out to undertake a thorough analysis and critique of capitalism to present the inner organisation of the capitalist mode of production, ‘in its ideal average’ in order to ‘lay bare the economic law of motion of modern society’ (Marx, 1887, p. xix). He concentrates on the structural relations of the economic system but locates it in a wider social context and analyses it as a specific historical form. Marx’s approach involves a critique of positivism. For him, science is not simply the process of explaining the surface nature of the physical and social world. If one needed only to explain surface appearances there would be no need of science. For Marx, the scientific process differed from the positivist view of science in that he saw science as transcending the world of appearances.

2. Class 2.3 Karl Marx: Capital

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2.3.2 Commodification, surplus value and capital accumulation Marx begins Capital with an analysis of commodities.5 He does so because he wants to

investigate the taken-for-granted starting point of bourgeois economics, viz. money. For Marx, capitalism is a particular form of social production. Marx argues that money is not in itself the root of capitalist productive relations. Rather, commodity exchange is fundamental to bourgeois relations of production. Commodities are the embodiment of labour time and they have an intrinsic use value and an extrinsic labour value. (Labour value is the amount of labour required to produce a commodity). Marx, thus, transforms the analysis of capitalism from the economists’ concern with money, which is merely the surface appearance of capitalist relations, to a more fundamental analysis of capitalism embodied in the commodity form. Commodification is the concept that guides his further analysis.

The prevailing view of capitalism was based on the idea that it was based on the investment and accumulation of money. For Marx, this was surface appearance. The real basis of capitalism is the exchange of commodities. The creation of profit, which Marx relabelled as ‘surplus value’ occurs through exchange. A commodity, for Marx is measured by the amount of labour that goes into producing it. A commodity also has use value. In the process of ordinary commodity exchange, equal values of commodities (as measured by labour value) are exchanged. Consumers of commodities gain use-value from the value created by the producers in the exercise of their labour power, for whom the use-value is in excess of their needs. (In short, people make things in excess of what they need and exchange them for things they do need). While any one exchange may lead to someone being cheated, this is an aberration and does not effect the total social value of the commodities exchanged. The social value of commodities depends upon the labour value (as measured by labour time) that goes into them. Exchanging commodities cannot lead to an overall increase in use value.

Profit, or surplus value, under capitalism, arises because labour power itself becomes a commodity. The exchange value of labour (that is, the value that labourers receive for their own use in exchange for their labour power) is less than the use value of the commodities they create. The difference, or surplus value, is appropriated by the capitalist.

So, for Marx, instead of money being a lubricant in the exchange of commodities which are ultimately consumed (and made use of), a commodity, labour power, becomes the medium through which money is exchanged. The capitalist, through the exploitation of labour, appropriates the surplus value of labour. In the process the commodities become alienated labour. Commodities come to exist objectively apart from their producer when their value is measured as ‘exchange value’ rather than their intrinsic ‘use value’. Commodities become fetishised and relations between people become relations between commodities. Human relations, literally, become objectified.

From this fundamental reappraisal of the basis of capitalism Marx elaborates the nature of capital accumulation. His approach is both an examination of general abstract propositions and an assessment of practices in the advanced industrial nations. It is abstract in the sense that he sees it as a mere phase in the actual process of production and thus, for simplicity, treats the capitalist as the representative of all those who share surplus value. As Marx bluntly puts it, in order to see what is going on ‘we should, for a time, disregard all phenomena that hide the play of its [capital accumulation’s] inner mechanism’. (Marx, 1887, p. 530).

However, this elaboration of the abstracted nature of capitalist production goes on throughout Capital side by side with historical and contemporary case studies, which lead Marx to an examination of contemporary economic debates. For example, Marx examines the nature and debates about the ‘working day’ in England and its bearing on other countries. Here he draws on contemporary and historical data. His primary concern, however, is not a simple account of capitalist practices but an illustration of the nature of 5 Marx does not just stumble on this starting point, it is the result of much theoretical analysis over much of his intellectual lifetime and had been prominent in the Grundrisse.


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capitalist exploitative thinking, its ‘reification’ in bourgeois economics and an illustration of how such economic theorists (be they academics or industrialists) fail to understand (or don’t want to understand) the nature of capitalist exploitation. Similarly, in his discussions of the division of labour, of machinery and modern industry and of wages, Marx outlines the basic principles of capitalist production in respect of these elements within the structure, examines them historically, provides case material and engages political economic theory. 2.3.3 Empirical sources Marx used a wide variety of empirical sources in Capital. Apart from his own ‘excellent’ observations (Korac, 1962) he made extensive use of secondary sources, which he approached critically and ‘with responsibility’ adopting an ‘historical comparative method’. Research, for Marx, required approaching the subject matter in detail, analysing its different forms of development and finding its internal connections. Only then can the ‘real’ state of affairs be revealed. Indicative of Marx’s concern to found his theory on empirical evidence is the letter to N. F. Danielson in which Marx points out that the delay in publishing the second volume of Capital in Germany suits him because it gives time for the crisis in England to reach its peak and thus furnish him with further empirical validation (Bogdanovich, 1986).

The various parliamentary and official reports used by Marx are listed at the end of each volume of Capital. In the first volume he cites thirty reports of H.M. Inspectors of Factories made between 1841 and 1867; five reports of the Medical Officer of the Privy Council on public health (between 1860 and 1865); reports of select committees on the adulteration of food (1855), on the adulteration of bread (1855), and on mines (1866); Royal Commissions on Mines (1864) and on Railways (1867); reports of select committees on the Banking Acts (1858) and the Corn Laws (1813–14); the House of Lords Select Committee’s reports on The State and Growth of Commerce and Consumption of Grains and all laws relating thereto (1814-15); the report of the Commissioners on Transportation and Penal Servitude (1863); the Inquiry Commission report on the employment of children in factories (1833); six reports of the commissioners on the employment of children in unregulated manufacture and trades (1863–1867); reports by Poor Law Inspectors on wages of agricultural labourers in Dublin (1870) and in Ireland as a whole (1862); the report on the grievances of journeymen bakers (1862); the report of the committee on the baking trade in Ireland (1861); Inland Revenue Reports for 1860 and 1866; the report of the Social Science Congress in Edinburgh (1863); the Report of the Committee of the Master Spinner’s and Manufacturers Defence Fund (1854); and the report of the Registrar General on births, deaths and marriages in England (October, 1861). Finally he cites Correspondence with Her Majesty’s Missions Abroad regarding Industrial Questions and Trades Unions (1867) and Hansard.

These reports were extensive, were the result of questionnaire research, observation and medical practice. They usually included statistical material as well as vivid descriptions of social conditions. In addition Marx used the 1861 Census for England and Wales; statistical abstracts (1861 and 1866); various agricultural statistics for Ireland (1860 and 1867); official ‘Miscellaneous Statistics’; and Parliamentary Returns (1839, 1850, 1856, 1862).

He makes use of statistical sources to point out changes and relationships. When he does not have adequate statistics he says so. For example, he lacks suitable statistics to illustrate the concentration of agricultural holdings in England, and therefore he restricts his empirical analysis to ten countries for which such information is available between 1851 and 1861. Marx regarded statistical data as important and drew up a draft proposal to the First International urging the world-wide collection of statistics by workers covering sex, age and occupation, the length of the working day, shifts, breaks, wages, health, physical and moral conditions (Bogdanovich, 1986, p. 108).

Marx also referred to various acts and statutes especially the Factory Regulation Acts, 1833, 1859, 1867 and 1878, which were, for Marx an important source of the evolving relations between labour and capital. Other legislation he used directly were the Statutes of


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Labourers (1349, 1496) and Statutes of Massachusetts. Besides these official sources Marx lists thirty-three different British and overseas newspapers and periodicals as sources;6 these include The Times, Morning Star, Spectator, Economist, Neue Rheinische Zeitung, Deutsch-Franzosische Jahrbucher, New York Daily Tribune and Sankt-Peterburgskie Viedomosti. He also collected data and opinions from friends abroad in order to effect comparative analyses between Britain and other parts of the world. Finally, he drew on the writings of over 250 different authors, involving in excess of 300 publications as well as another 48 anonymous essays, pamphlets and open letters.

Marx used one source to complement another and rarely, if ever, relied on a single source. He made considerable use of comparative study, for example, comparing the length of working week and the exhaustion of workers in England, France, Belgium, Switzerland, Austria and Russia. The comparison is founded on an analysis of factory legislation, and various Parliamentary reports, as well as medical reports. In widening his comparisons from Western Europe to America and Russia, Marx undertook detailed examinations of the economic history of each country, as their development was the consequence of essentially different historical conditions to those of Western Europe.

Marx, however, was critical of his source material, in particular he criticised the inadequacies in the collection of statistics. For example, the ‘surprising’ fall in the number of children under thirteen years of age employed, which was a result of surgeons increasing the ages of children ‘to suit the greed of capitalists’. Marx also criticised the inconsistencies and inadequacies in the conceptualisation of statistical measures, and the misleading application of statistics. An example of the latter is the use of absolute wage levels to show how the workers are better off, whereas Marx argues that the cost of living (which, for example, had increased by 20 per cent between 1860 and 1862) has far exceeded wage rises and thus workers were worse off.

His approach to the reports is typified by his view of the reports of the Factory Inspectors, which he saw as providing ‘regular and official statistics of the capitalist greed for surplus-labour’ (Marx, [1887] 1977, p. 230). This is not a casting of doubt on their accuracy. Indeed, in the Preface to the first (German) edition of Capital (25th July 1867) Marx indicated in broad terms his faith in the impartiality of much of the collection of these empirical sources.

The social statistics of Germany and the rest of Continental Western Europe are, in comparison with those of England, wretchedly compiled. But they raise the veil just enough to let us catch a glimpse of the Medusa head behind it. We should be appalled at the state of things at home, if, as in England, our governments and parliaments appointed periodically commissions of enquiry into economic conditions; if these commissions were armed with the same plenary powers to get at the truth; if it was possible to find for this purpose men as competent, as free from partisanship and respect of persons as are the English factory-inspectors, her medical reporters on public health, her commissioners of inquiry into the exploitation of women and children, into housing and food. (Marx, [1887] 1977, p. 20)

What Marx’s comment on the documentation of capitalist greed in the Factory Inspector’s reports reflects is the way Marx fundamentally reconstituted the empirical data as a result of the dialectical process of analysis.

For example, as part of his analysis of the working day Marx compares the surplus-labour manufacturer in England and the Danubian boyard (in what is now Romania). Marx points out that, for example, if the English 12 hour working day consists of 6 hours of necessary labour, and 6 hours of surplus-labour. Then it is the same as if the labourer ‘worked 3 days in the week for himself, and 3 days in the week gratis for the capitalist.’ However, ‘this is not evident on the surface. Surplus-labour and necessary labour glide one into the other’ (Marx, [1887] 1977, p. 227). In the case of the Danubian peasant prior to the Crimean War, the 6 Bogdanovich (1986) says there are (36 not 33) to go along with the 50 Parliamentary Reports and other official publications. Further, she logs 4 of each type of source in the second volume of capital. The third, she notes, has 13 reports and 19 newspapers and periodicals.


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demarcation of labour was clear. The labour that the peasant does for his/her own maintenance is distinctly marked off from the surplus labour on behalf of the boyard on the seignorial estate. Both parts of the labour time exist independently side-by-side.7 The required labour of the corvée is codified in the ‘Règlement organique’.8

The situation for the labourer is the same yet capitalism attempts to conceal this surplus labour. Unlike the positive expression of greed for surplus labour in the Règlement, the English Factory Acts are a negative expression. They conceal the greed by acting to curb the actions of capital. They forcibly limit the working day by state regulations, ‘made by a state that is ruled by capitalist and landlord’. The limitation is not out of any concern with the well-being of the worker but a pragmatic response to the exhaustion of the exploited class and its growing threats. The Reports of Factory inspectors are published half yearly by order of Parliament. Marx uses these documents to list details of the fraudulent activities of capitalists who, in their avarice for surplus labour, start the working day a few minutes early, reduce breakfast and lunch breaks and thereby pilfer labour time.

This example, then, shows how Marx locates practices historically. He draws on a number of sources to make explicit the nature of social practices including official reports, legal codes, and published histories. His approach is comparative, complementary and critical. He shows how empirical material corroborates his exposition, but only after it has been radically transformed by deconstructing its theoretical basis. Central to this is the process of abstraction.

2.3.4 Abstraction, essence and totality In developing his critique of capitalism Marx engages the whole positivist notion of abstraction.9 He does not start with factual observations and abstract from them. Rather, he operates the other way round. Marx argues that beginning with the ‘real and the concrete’ is a superficial exercise as objects of observation are only apparently concrete but in actuality are

7 Marx addresses the question of how the situation in Romania came about. The original mode of production was based on community with part of the land cultivated as freehold and part cultivated communally, the latter as a reserve fund against poor harvests, or to pay for war, religion, and so on. In course of time, military and clerical dignitaries usurped, along with the common land, the labour spent upon it. The labour of the free peasants on their common land was transformed into corvée for the thieves of the common land. This corvée soon developed into a servile relationship existing in point of fact, not in point of law, until Russia, the liberator of the world, made it legal under pretence of abolishing serfdom. The code of the corvee, which the Russian General Kisseleff proclaimed in 1831, was of course, dictated by the Boyards themselves. Thus Russia conquered with one blow the magnates of the Danubian provinces and the applause of liberal cretins throughout Europe. (Marx, [1887] 1977, p. 228) This passage also reveals Marx’s use of irony, acerbic wit, relentless attack, and humour. Marx argued that the model of exposition is different from the method of research. Marx footnotes a comparable situation in Germany by way of further evidence. 8 On the face of it, each peasant owes fourteen working days to the landlord of which 12 are general labour. Not, perhaps excessive and far less a proportion of necessary labour than the British wage-earner provides to the capitalist. But this is an illusion for the Règlement goes on to point out that a working day is in effect the equivalent of three days’ labour. To this must be added ‘jobagie’ owed by the community which effectively adds another 14 days per peasant. This total of 56 days is a large proportion of the working year, which, because of the seasonal climate, random bad weather, and religious days, amounts to just 140 working days. Even this large proportion gets larger. After it has made 56 days out of 12, the nominal day’s work of each of the 56 corvée days is again so arranged that a portion of it must fall on the ensuing day. In one day, for example, must be weeded an extent of land, which for this work, especially in maize plantations, needs twice as much time. The legal day’s work for some kinds of agricultural labour is interpretable in such a way that the day begins in May and ends in October. In Moldavia conditions are still harder. "The 12 corvée days of the ‘Règlement organique’ cried a Boyard drunk with victory, amount to 365 days in the year." (Marx, [1887] 1977, p. 229). 9 There are many notions of positivism, but all seem to include the following. First, the world can only be apprehended directly via the senses. Second, the procedures of natural science are applicable to the social world, that is, causal ‘laws’ can be constructed to explain the social world. Third, social science should be value free.


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abstractions. The correct procedure, he argues, is to move from the abstraction to the concrete.

Abstractions are not irrelevant because beginning with categories facilitates the analysis of the ‘inner structures’ of objects. However, these abstractions must be made concrete. For example, Marx argues, the positivists’ generalised and undifferentiated concept of ‘population’ is a reified abstraction, which hides the complexity of social relations that make up a class-differentiated population. For Marx, population is a correct starting point for analysis but it is a mistake to construe it as a concrete fact, as opposed to an abstract whole emptied of empirical content.

Marx’s analysis in Capital attempts to get to the meaning behind the categories used by the political economists of the time. He wanted more than the organisation of ‘facts’, he wanted to reveal the essential nature of the social world that lay beneath the world of appearances.

Marx’s process of abstraction in Capital involves a rejection of the taken-for-granted starting point of bourgeois economics. Marx wants to examine the essential nature of capitalist relations so he does not start with money values, as is conventional, but examines the basis of production and exchange to see what lies behind the obfuscation of money values. The commodity, as we have seen, is the essence he reveals.

Marx’s conception of essence and phenomenal form are qualitatively different from the notions of ‘fixed essences’ and ‘natural forms’ employed by the classical political economists. It is also different from phenomenological reduction to essences. While Marx is concerned to get beneath the surface of phenomenal appearances his aim is not a mere reduction to essences. Rather the aim is to utilise the examination of the essential nature of phenomenal appearances as a base for a fundamental critique of the social process (system). He wants to analyse the essential nature of the social (economic, political) world. It is a work of critique. The unveiling of surface appearance is but an initial step. The ultimate aim is to provide a basis for practical revolutionary activity.

For Marx, essences are dynamic and historical. The task of science is to critically analyse abstract categories, penetrate empirical observations, grasp them in concepts, and reproduce them in concrete thought.

For example, as we have seen, in Capital Marx argued that surplus value resulted from the commodification of labour power. Marx’s selection of commodity as the essence or fundamental element of capitalist relations was not arbitrary. Marx derived his starting point dialectically. Only as his analysis and critique shuttled back and forth between the elements of capitalism and its phenomenal form manifested as a structural totality did he begin to approach the idea of the commodity as fundamental. Its core role emerged only as Marx analysed the nature of commodities to reveal the objectivation of relationships that they conceal (the fetishism of commodities). Concentrating on commodity form did not prejudge the outcome of Marx’s analysis, rather it was a pivotal device for elaborating the structural and historically specific nature of capitalism. The use of the commodity as pivot was the result of a dialectical analysis, not a phenomenological reduction. Marx showed that the concept of commodity involves something other than the object in itself; it embodied relationships between people.

So the discrepancy between the basic condition of social exchange of equivalents and the observable phenomena of capitalism, (the generation of profit), is thus explained through an examination that addresses the essence of capitalist relations, that is, the commodity form.

However, underlying the first problem is a second, which Marx again proceeds to resolve through analysis designed to penetrate phenomenal form. He asks under what conditions can the commodification of labour power take place? This requires a totalistic perspective. In answering this question it becomes clear that capitalism, whose phenomenal form appears as a mode of production characterised by commodity exchange, is itself presupposed by a class relation between labour and capital, without which capitalism cannot exist.


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This cannot be understood simply through the phenomenal forms such as ‘profit’ and ‘commodity’. These concepts indicate how surplus value appropriation takes place but not how the structure, which depends on it is developed and sustained. For Marx, the categories ‘profit’ and ‘commodity’ only make sense in relation to the wider social totality.

For Marx, then, science as the basis for the understanding of the social world was not the construction of causal laws but of a deeper understanding, arrived at through a process of deconstruction and reconstruction, in which the part is dialectically related to the whole. Marx attempts to grasp the essential nature of capitalist relations, not as phenomenal form in themselves but as a basis for the deconstruction and reconstruction, dialectically, of the productive process. This dialectical process involves relating parts to whole, through the analysis of concrete historical practices. 2.3.5 History and structure In Capital, Marx (and Engels) treated history logically rather than as narrative (Schmidt, 1981). Marx denied the positivist historist view of a self-evident unproblematic history. The past cannot be reclaimed, merely reconstituted, and such reconstitution is ideologically imbued. Similarly Marx denied the utopian view of the linear progress of history.

For Marx, a logical approach to historical understanding requires a ‘correct grasp of the present, which involves understanding structural relations. This required that the primary pivot of attention in the construction of history be the logically generated critical theoretical perspective. Thus the process of reconstructing history starts out from an analysis of structures. Rather than begin with dogmas or arbitrary premises, Marx analysed the prevailing structure, deconstructed it, raised questions about its ideological underpinnings, and then ‘logically’ constructed the history.

In the analysis of capitalism, Marx first grasps the essence of capital theoretically and then adhered to the logic of that analysis in constructing the history. He focused on immanent developments and shelved particular details that may have served to clutter the analysis. Empirical history then appears to be processed to remove vicissitudinous instances. This is the sense in which Marx argued, that the present be grasped and the past interpreted in relation to it.10

So, in his analysis of bourgeois economy, Marx starts out from the existing social relations rather than beginning with an analysis of the origin of bourgeois social relations. The theoretical development in Capital is interwoven with historical detail. Theory and history dialectically inform each other. Historical ‘fact’ is reviewed in terms of the critical theoretical analysis of present social relations. But, the theoretical analysis, although primary, is also mediated by an analysis of past events. This dialectical process involves two essential elements; the grounding of a generalised theory in material history and the exposure of the essential nature of structural relations which manifest themselves historically. Thus, in order to comprehend the nature of capitalist relations of production it was necessary for Marx to get at the essential nature of capital, that is, the commodity form, rather than simply reconstruct the historical origin of capitalism. The commodity form of capitalism was then located within a specific historical context thus clearly revealing the actual (rather then theoretically generalised) structural processes of capitalist production.

In this way the shift from abstract theoretical analysis to material historical analysis was effected. For. although Marx conceived of bourgeois society, irrespective of its origins, as a closed system explicable in relation to itself, he saw nothing inevitable or natural in bourgeois relations of production. Essentially they are arbitrary, historically specific, relations that can be transcended by human praxis.

10 Marx was clearly not interested in historicalist mediation. Similarly, he dissociates himself from any notion of an ultimate goal of history. Marx was able to do this because he denied a pre-formed ‘world view’. An analysis of the historically specific structure informs the historical analysis.

2. Class 2.4 C. Wright Mills: The Power Elite

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2.3.6 Ideology and praxis Marx saw social structures as oppressive. In Capital he was concerned with class oppression and economic exploitation. Oppressive structures, while maintained by oppressive mechanisms embodied in the state and judiciary, are also legitimated by ideology. For Marx, ideology was a transparent and intrinsic element of social structures. Prevailing ideology, as the ideology of the dominant class, was constantly represented through institutions such as the church, the school, the courts and the family. This dominant view legitimated, as natural, the existing social, political and economic structure. Ideology thus served not only to reify social relations but also to conceal their real nature; in the case of capitalist economy, their exploitative element. In order to understand the nature of the social relations it was necessary to engage ideology. However, as ideology is grounded in material relations, it is not just a matter of transcending ideology in thought (however useful that might be as an initial step in revealing the underlying nature of social relations) but of changing material relations through practical reflective activity (praxis). There is a dialectical relationship between ideology and material forms. Changes in material relations impact upon ideology, which in turn informs praxis and further effects the nature of material relations.

Marx’s dialectical analysis, in engaging taken-for-granted abstractions and the pre-givens of bourgeois economics, exposed the transparent nature of prevailing ideology. His deconstruction of the capitalist mode of production and the reconstruction of the exploitative relations engaged the prevailing ideological forms. However, he was also aware that to effect changes required praxis. The dominant ideological legitimation could not be thought away and changes be effected on the basis of a new consciousness. Changes in the material base must also be effected in order to sustain, or even initiate, a comprehensive ideological critique.

Ideology, like material relations, is not a timeless abstraction but is a historically specific construct. Fundamental transformation, however, requires that people act to effect changes. The social world does not just change of its own accord; it changes as the result of praxis. So in pointing to exploitative processes, Marx was not simply undertaking an economic analysis he was engaging the bourgeois ideology that reified exploitative practices and was providing an examination that could be linked with revolutionary praxis. 2.3.7 Conclusion Marx was opposed to the analytic approach of the classical economists because it accepted surface appearances at face value and made no attempt to penetrate bourgeois ideological forms. Marx was concerned to lay bear the essential relationships manifested in capitalism. His aim was to analyse the structure of bourgeois economy dialectically. This involved, initially, taking the social structure of a historically specific moment as pre-given, and by concentrating on the fundamental unit of capital relations (commodities) to decompose the nature of commodities and thereby reconstitute the relations of production, thus revealing the essential structure. History would then be logically reconstructed using this revealed structure as guiding principle. Thus, Marx uses structure to guide history but this theoretical orientation is not a timeless abstraction, it is historically specific, and its illustration is grounded in material history. Essentially, the process incorporates history in the grasping of the essential nature of the totality. Thereby the nature of the processes of capitalist economy are revealed providing a basis for revolutionary action. 2.4 C. Wright Mills: The Power Elite

2.4.1 Introduction: social criticism C. Wright Mills was a professor of sociology at Columbia University until his death in 1962. Educated at the University of Texas he gained his doctorate at Wisconsin before his first teaching appointment at the University of Maryland in 1941. He moved to Columbia shortly


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afterwards and, for three years, was director of the Labour Research Division of the Bureau of Applied Social Research. He was a provocative and controversial social critic who did not flinch from addressing contemporary issues. He was disenchanted with American society and politics and berated his sociological colleagues for failing to undertake substantive research. He was the victim of extensive criticism from leading members of the academic establishment for his radical views, was vilified by political opponents, and was turned down by all but one granting organisation after the publication of The Power Elite.

Mills grounded his notion of a critical social science in the re-establishment of the sociological imagination. He argued that the sociological project should be the analysis of biography and history and the interaction of the two (Mills, [1959] 1973, p. 12). Sociological imagination, for Mills, meant an empirical historical analysis of the relationship between the ‘personal troubles of milieux’ and the public issues of social structure. So an historical perspective is essential, the social system must be analysed as a dynamic historical form. This in itself meant, for Mills, that the enquiry is of necessity critical. A critical historical perspective that grasps the relationship between biography and history involves grounding social structural views in empirical reality. To do this involves asking a myriad of interrelated questions, such as: What is the structure of the society as a whole? What is the interrelationship of its essential components? What are the mechanics by which it is changing? What varieties of people prevail in the society? How are the non-prevailing men and women repressed? How is any particular feature of the society affected by its historical period? What is its place in the wider context of the whole world?

Thus, for Mills, the ‘classical’ method requires the researcher to be a social scientist, not just a sociologist. Social criticism involves reflection, so the researcher should be both theorist and methodologist not just methodical technicians with an inadequate sociological appreciation 2.4.2 Verification and validity A key concern for Mills was the nature of evidence. He was writing at a time when validation techniques were of a high order of priority among social scientists in the United States, especially amongst those engaged in microscopic quantitative research, the prevalent style of the time. Thus he explicitly addressed the issue.

How to verify statements, propositions, putative facts does not seem to the classic practitioner as difficult as it is often made out by microscopic workers. The classic practitioner verifies a statement by detailed exposition of whatever empirical materials are relevant (sometimes using the precision of statistical enquiry). For other problems and conceptions, our verification will be like that of the historian; it is the problem of evidence. (Mills, [1959] 1973, p. 140)

For Mills, classic sociology is about attempting to ‘improve the chances that our guesses about important matters might be right.’ The problem of evidence to some extent resolved itself for the social critic who has a sense of real problems as they arise out of history. In confronting important issues the social critic works carefully and as exactly as possible towards elaborating hypotheses, which are documented at key points by more detailed information. This is not rigid; it requires intellectual craft. Social scientists should be social critics rather than tied up with questions of validation. After all, the prevailing concern with verification procedures was simply a pragmatic interpretation of but one epistemological view of science. If such a view were to prevail absolutely then imaginative thinking would be impeded by a concern with ‘proof’.

The social critic should analyse substantive issues and, no matter how intense the search for detail, the study should always be related critically to the social structure as a whole. For Mills this is achieved not through a single grand design for one large empirical study but through a ‘continual shuttle between macroscopic conceptions and detailed expositions’. The procedure involves designing a series of smaller-scale empirical studies, each of which seems


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to be pivotal to some part or another of the solution that is being elaborated. That solution is confirmed, modified, or refuted according to the results of these empirical studies.

Mills, then, was less concerned with the details of empirical than with historical holistic analyses of substantive issues. However, he was rather more concerned with addressing the pragmatic manifestations of problems than in analysing abstract concepts; and this reflects a major epistemological difference from Marx’s approach to critical social research.

Mills’ intellectual development was rooted in pragmatism (he came across Marx much later in life (Horowitz, 1966, p. 13)) and he was less overtly concerned with the problem of the structural mediation of observation. Marx saw the concrete as theory laden and abstractions as reifications emptied of content that needed to be dialectically deconstructed. Such deconstruction would facilitate the revealing of ideological manifestations thus assisting the process of digging beneath the surface of appearances. Mills’ focus on revealing the bare wires of the system was much more pragmatic in that it directed attention to questions of who does what and in whose interest, rather than attempting to analyse generalised structural issues. Mills was concerned with historical processes from a social perspective rather than structural issues as historically specific manifestations. This approach is evident in his analysis of power. He sees power as the crucial concern of social research, yet is not concerned to analyse it as an abstract concept but to investigate its manifestations. Ideology becomes the manipulative process, implemented through the mass media, which ensures voluntary obedience to the powerful. 2.4.3 The question of power In The Power Elite, Mills (1956) brings together his earlier researches into the nature of power in the United States (Mills, 1948, 1951, 1953) and it serves as a useful classic example of the social critical approach. Mills was not happy with the trend in American sociology that manifested itself in theories that effectively sublimated the problem of power as of little consequence within ‘Liberal Democracy’. In Character and Social Structure (Gerth & Mills, 1953) Mills had considered the implications of immense power concentrated in the hands of the few. He showed how people are socialised into a political society where important decisions are remote but tacitly accepted as inevitably remote. From his studies of the American Trade Union movement and white collar groups, Mills was convinced of the political impotence of both type of collective organisation. He thus looked amongst the upper reaches of American society and from this analysis, and in conjunction with his earlier studies, he produced The Power Elite (1956).

Like Marx, Mills style of exposition differs from his style of research. In The Power Elite Mills tends to assert his main points and then illustrate them with general, sometimes anecdotal, examples framed as though the content were self-evident. He follows this up with more detailed data. What he claims he is doing in working up the text is deliberating upon three kinds of ‘conversations’. These were, first, with himself and imaginary persons. Such reflection is underpinned by a second conversation between influential thinkers whose ideas have filtered the mind of the author and of the readers. Third is the conversation readers have with themselves in which they relate what they read to their own experiences. The incorporation of the latter two conversations involves reasoning along with the reader and this involves more than merely setting forth views but also clarifying them.

Mills argues, from the outset, that in America in the mid 20th century important decisions of national importance are made by powerful people whom he calls the elite. This does not necessarily mean that the powerful are united, that they ‘fully know what they do, or that they are consciously joined in conspiracy’ (Mills, 1956, p. 18). Picking up the tentative ideas in Character and Social Structure Mills provides the following working definition of ‘important and continuous’ power.

By the powerful we mean, of course, those who are able to realize their will, even if others resist it. No one, accordingly, can be truly powerful unless he has access to the


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command of major institutions,11 for it is over these institutional means of power that the powerful are, in the first instance, powerful. Higher politicians and key officials of government command such institutional power; so do admirals and generals, and so do the major owners and executives of the larger corporations. (Mills, 1956, p. 9)

These three areas of power he calls the ‘big three’ and refers to those at the top of these hierarchies as ‘the elite of the command posts’. The aim of his enquiry is to find out who this elite are, how they operate, whether they derive from a clear and distinct social class, and whether they are self-consciously members of an upper class, status group or elite.

Emphasising his pragmatic approach, Mills (1956, p. 9) notes of his subject group that all biographies and memoirs of the wealthy, powerful and eminent agree that those operating in ‘higher circles’ do so within ‘overlapping crowds’ and ‘intricately connected cliques’. Thus, to examine the elite as a social class, Mills (1956, p. 15) argues it is necessary to examine a whole series of ‘smaller face-to-face milieux’, the most obvious of which, historically, has been the upper-class family; but the most important of which today are the ‘proper secondary school and the metropolitan club’. 2.4.4 Holistic approach: biography and history Mills’ holistic approach is reflected in his view of the interrelationship of biography and history. In The Power Elite he argues that while the personal awareness of the powerful is useful material for understanding the ‘higher circles’ it is not satisfactory on its own. Nor is it satisfactory simply to consider historical events. Linking the two are the institutions of modern society, the state, economic corporations and the military, which constitute the means to power.

Mills then takes as generic the idea that the elite is defined by institutional position. This seems to Mills to have the practical advantage of being the most concrete way into the whole problem, not least because a good deal of information is available for sociological reflection about such circles and institutions. More importantly, the institutional or structural definition does not prejudge what is to be investigated. Further, the structural approach underpins the other elements. The institutional positions determine people’s chances to get and to hold selected values, which in large part determines the kinds of psychological beings they become. All of this tends to influence the extent to which they see themselves as part of select social class. Prestige, status, wealth and power are interrelated and dependent upon access to major institutions independently of individual personality.

Within this holistic perspective he designs a series of related studies. He looks first at the elements that ‘people know best: the new and the old upper classes of local society and the metropolitan 400’ (Mills, 1956, p. 27). Then examines the nature of ‘celebrity’ and the ‘national’ system of prestige. Then the ‘very rich’ are examined in relation to corporate wealth. An historical analysis of the ‘American statesman’ is followed by an assessment of the ‘invisible government’ that operates at a higher level than visible democratic manoeuvring. The historical ascendency of the military is scrutinised and the powerful positions assumed by admirals and generals revealed. Coincident interests with the corporate rich and political directorate are pointed out.

In each case he attempts to identify the actors, examine their institutional affiliations, discover what they have, what they belong to, and what sort of personality types they appear to be. He uses empirical data to help in this endeavour but notes that:

We neither take the world for granted nor believe it to be a simple fact. Our business is with facts only in so far as we need them to upset or clinch our ideas. Facts and figures are only the beginning of the proper study. Our main interest is in making sense of the facts we know or can readily find out. We do not want merely to take an inventory, we want to

11 Mills’ references to social researchers and to members of the power elite in America are almost always to men. When directly quoting Mills, his own words are used without amendment despite their sexist implications.


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discover meanings, for most of our important questions are questions of meaning (Mills, 1956, p. 364). 2.4.5 The empirical data The empirical data Mills makes use of in the study derives from a multitude of sources. Prominent are his own researches, some of which had been previously published. He made considerable use throughout of newspaper and magazine articles in helping him identify powerful Americans and in assessing trends in the shift of power. Extensive literary reviews of scholarly work were undertaken, and official data was also consulted. Mills obtained a considerable insight and first hand empirical data from ‘several individuals who know at first hand the Federal government, the military, or large corporations’ (Mills, 1956, p. 364) who at their own request Mills was unable to acknowledge.

In analysing local society, for example, Mills draws mainly from his own observation and interviews in ‘some dozen middle-sized cities’ in the Northeast, the Midwest and the South. Some results of this work had already been published (Mills & Ulmer 1946; Mills 1946, 1951). Field notes made in 1945 during ‘the course of an intensive study of a city of 60,000 in Illinois’ were also used. In addition he used a memorandum (prepared by J. W. Harless) based on a literature search of sixteen local community studies (published between 1929 and 1950). The whole is augmented by literary works on local communities that, Mills claims, reached similar conclusions to sociological analyses. The problem, for him, in both is that there is a tendency to be concerned with status rather than power.

Material on metropolitan ‘high society’ came from a number of published sources, the primary one being The Social Register that since the 1890s had been published listing the top families (with considerable detail of education, etc.) in New York, Boston and Philadelphia and this was expanded to include nine other cities by 1910, with each supporting a regular annual volume from 1928. Similarly, the ‘celebrated’, epitomised by ‘cafe society’ Mills determined again through literature search, principally, listings in Fortune and by reference to, and further investigation upon, Igor Cassini’s ‘The New 400’ in Esquire, June 1953.

The investigation of the rich, Mills acknowledges, is tricky because little by way of precise figures on great fortunes is available. On the nineteenth century he used a few relatively recently published works plus the methodical listings of Moses Yale Beach of the Sun Office in the 1840s and 1850s. Reviewing the dozen or so histories of great fortunes and the biographies of the wealthy, making careful use of data published in newspapers in 1924 and 1925 when a temporary law allowed the reporting of income tax payments, and using share ownership published in the Temporary National Economic Committee’s (TNEC) monograph, No. 29, Mills devised a list of all those born since 1800 identified as having $30 million or more.12 The research was as systematic as the scattered evidence would allow and it was checked as far as possible in the case of those now deceased by reference to probate of will. While the list may not be exhaustive, without doubt, Mills reckons that all 302 on it are among America’s richest people. In the same way he assembled empirical evidence on the corporate rich and military personnel.13 12 The cut-off figure was guided by pragmatic concerns about available resources; it produced a list of 371 names. No biographical details could be found on 69 who were excluded. Mills reckons that these were transitory fortunes, mainly accumulated in the speculative 1920s. 13 Mills’ analysis of the chief executives and interconnected directorates was based on his own research, some of it previously published (Mills, 1945, 1948, 1951), supported by other published material including TNEC monographs, Taussig & Joslyn (1932) and Keller’s (1954) analysis of Miller (1952). Similarly, information on the corporate rich came from official data from the Bureau of the Census and the Treasury Department along with Kuznes & Jenk’s (1953) analysis of tax data, various newspaper articles, and TNEC monographs. The generals and admirals selected for detailed study in his analysis of the warlords were taken from official army, airforce and navy registers, augmented by Barbera’s dissertation (1954), for wjich he provides no full reference, simply noting that he he ‘wishes to thank Henry Barbera for use of material from his M.A. thesis at Columbia University, 1954’ (Mills, 1956, p. 392, footnote 6).


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2.4.6 Interpretation: public and mass Mills then had to make sense of all this material. He could not have coped with all his data inductively. This, however, had never been his intention. His historical approach was guided by an holistic view that, as has been illustrated, generated a series of interrelated questions. The studies provided some evidence germane to these questions. At one level he was able to trace the institutional affiliations and cross linkages of the wealthy, the corporate executives, the military and the political leaders and thus indicate that power was rooted in corporate, military, and political hierarchies and no longer in local society, family, education or the church. Having provided evidence on these aspects, Mills returns to the ‘master problem of the power elite’ and its complement, mass society. The real substantive issue was whether these powerful people operated as an elite. Do the corporate chief executives, the members of the political directorate and the soldier-statesmen clustered around the Joint Chiefs of Staff come together to form the power elite of America?

While he shows that the unification of the elite can be seen in their coincident institutional affiliations, common schooling, socialising, intermarriage, and even similar personalities, he argues that there is a more explicit co-ordination. This is not to say that the power elite has emerged as a realization of a plan.

But it is to say that as the institutional mechanics of our time have opened up avenues to men pursuing their several interests, many of them have come to see that these several interests could be realized more easily if they worked together, in informal as well as more formal ways, and accordingly they have done so. (Mills, 1956, pp. 19–20)

This more explicit co-ordination can be seen superficially when it occurs rather openly at times of national crisis. However, there is a more subtle coincidence of interests that can only be seen to make sense when seen in relation to the notion of mass society.

Thus while the coincident data are promising, their meaning really only derives from an holistic perspective which sees the power elite in relation to mass society. If the elite is truly responsible to a community of publics it carries a very different meaning than if such a public is being transformed into a society of masses.

Mills undertakes an historical analysis, at a structural level, of the transformation of American society from something close to ‘public’ to something close to ‘mass’. He uses four pragmatic criteria to distinguish public from mass. A public is characterised by numbers of opinion givers equalling receivers; communications allow effective and immediate feedback; direct and effective action based on opinion is possible; and authoritative institutions do not penetrate the public. The mass is the converse of this with authoritative institutions controlling opinion, communications and channels of action.

Mass democracy is manifested in the organised struggle of large-scale interest groups, which are located between the individual and the powerful decision-making elite. This gap, Mills shows, is getting wider and is epitomised in the steady growth of metropolitan society that segregates people into specialisms and destroys any sense of being an integral public. In this situation, mass media manipulation is sovereign. Mills thus proposes a ‘manipulative model’ of advanced societies.

Mills analysis is historically specific and he is not intending a general theory of history, viz. that all historical events are shaped by an omnipotent elite. Nor is his investigation directed at the process of decision making as such but is an attempt to delimit the social areas within which that process, whatever its character, goes on. 2.4.7 Conclusion Mills is overtly critical of the American social system in his Power Elite but also raises epistemological questions that he elaborates in his subsequent critique of the sociological enterprise in Sociological Imagination. In The Power Elite Mills dug beneath the surface of apparent democracy to expose the real nature of power relations in America. His concern is

2. Class 2.5 J.H Goldthorpe, D. Lockwood et al.: The Affluent Worker

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not specifically with class relations,14 and how they relate to a materially grounded structure of power, but with the nature of power itself and how it is exercised in the interests of the powerful. Mills takes the abstract concept of power and defines it as the exercise of the will of one person or group of persons over another or others. The exercise of power is essentially located within an institutional structure. His analysis thus moves from the abstract concept to historically specific concrete structural manifestations.

His deconstructive analysis is enabled by the holistic interaction of history and biography. Mills is circumspect in following through the political implications of his analysis and tends only to point to the anti-democratic nature of the exercise of power in the United States of America. There is no overt critique of ideology but an implied censure of the democratic sham. This is clearly evident in his analysis of public and mass, which hinges on the fundamental disjunction between the power elite and those in the middle layer of power. The latter are elected by the powerless and fragmented mass of the population and are tenuously accountable to them. However, this middle layer is powerless in the last resort and real power lies with the elite who has no public to whom they are accountable, only a mass whom it manipulates.

Mills’ approach, guided by pragmatism, involves a less rigorous approach to critical deconstruction than Marx. It is an approach guided by holistic concerns but one in which elements of critical analysis (abstraction, essence, ideology and praxis) are held together in a loose confederation within an historical and structural critique rather than as a tightly interlocked analytic framework.

2.5 J.H Goldthorpe, D. Lockwood et al.: The Affluent Worker

2.5.1 Introduction The Affluent Worker in the Class Structure (Goldthorpe, Lockwood, Bechhofer, and Platt, 1969) provides an example of an embryonic critical social research project that used and adapted standard quantitative research methods. Goldthorpe and Lockwood, the principal researchers, initiated a research project into the sociology of the affluent worker in 1962 (Goldthorpe et al., 1969). Fieldwork started later the same year. Financial support came from the Department of Applied Economics of the University of Cambridge and later the Human Sciences Committee of the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research (a precursor of SSRC subsequently ESRC). Bechhofer and Platt were members of the research staff of the department throughout the fieldwork and analysis stage.

Several reports of the study of the affluent worker were published in journals (Goldthorpe and Lockwood, 1962, 1963; Lockwood, 1966; Goldthorpe, 1966) as well as two longer reports The Affluent Worker: Industrial Attitudes and Behaviour (Goldthorpe et al. 1968a) and The Affluent Worker: Political Attitudes and Behaviour (Goldthorpe et al., 1968b). The Affluent Worker in the Class Structure was the final and central book-length report and effectively marked the conclusion of the research.

Goldthorpe and Lockwood saw the Affluent Worker study as a contribution to the century-long debate about the working class within Western industrial society. They review the debate in order to provide a ‘wider perspective’ within which to locate their study. They are ‘well aware that the conclusions from any single study, restricted in time and space, are likely to be of only limited application’ and in no way suppose their work to resolve the problems they address. Their aim ‘might more accurately be defined as that of providing controversy with more and better material on which to feed’ (Goldthorpe and Lockwood, 1969, p. 1).

14 This has resulted in various of critiques from Marxists (for example, Swingewood, 1975) who argue that Mills develops something close to a conspiracy theory of power and fails to engage in an adequate dialectical analysis.


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2.5.2 Embourgeoisement Capitalism, since 1945 had been marked by the growth of ‘affluence’ and consumerism; the replacement of intolerable factories; the increasing concern by management with ‘human relations’; the general increase in automation with its changing work conditions; and the development of suburbanism. The middle-income group had swollen as a result of significant standard-of-living advances gleaned by large numbers of manual workers particularly in advanced technological plants.

In such circumstances, the working class was seen by liberals as in the process of decline and decomposition; as an anachronism belonging to the infancy of capitalism. This view was not new and repeated the long-running concern about the revolutionary potential of the working class.

Goldthorpe and Lockwood (1969) examined the various Marxist and non-Marxist contributions to the idea of the changing nature of the working class. They critically examined the widely taken-for-granted embourgeoisement thesis and revealed a number of different dimensions to the proposition that covered the work situation, social lives and cultural values, and aspirations. Briefly, the embourgeoisement argument was that the working class was no longer economically inferior, mass deprivation (Bernard, 1956) and alienated labour (Blauner, 1964; Woodward, 1958, 1964, 1965) no longer characterised capitalism. The traditional distinction between manual and non-manual labour and antagonistic worker-management relations were disappearing. Homogenisation of living standards had also meant the more affluent working class adopting bourgeois norms, value and attitudes in respect of a wide variety of cultural activities from fashion and eating to entertainment and parenting. Migration and the development of new housing estates further undermined traditional working-class communities and workers became more exposed to mass media and the values of other social strata. In short, the embourgeoisement thesis argued that status distinctions based on consumer power had replaced class distinctions based on productive role. Thus the Marxist notion of embourgeoisement reappeared not as temporary irregularity, as Engels (1895) suggested, but as an integral part of the evolution of capitalism. Instead of salaried workers joining the proletariat, production workers were believed to be joining the middle class.

There is a persuasiveness to the embourgeoisement thesis that gained considerable popularity after Labour’s third successive electoral defeat in 1959. The thesis was accepted in Conservative circles as largely accounting for the party’s unprecedented run of electoral success. Indeed the two-party system was thought to be in doubt. Labour supporters also accepted the thesis and it led to a radical reshaping of Labour policies and of the party’s ‘cloth cap’ image15 2.5.3 The approach—a critical case study Goldthorpe and Lockwood reviewed the contributions to the debate in detail in order to clarify what exactly was being claimed about the nature of embourgeoised worker in respect of these different dimensions. They then designed a study to test these different elements.16

Given limited resources and the requirement of an in-depth analysis, Goldthorpe and Lockwood decided to adopt a critical case study approach. They determined criteria, based on the characteristics of an affluent working class community that they derived from the

15 However, there were voices sceptical of the embourgeoisement thesis (Lockwood, 1960; Miller & Reissman, 1961; Goldthorpe and Lockwood, 1962, 1963; Willmott, 1963; Runciman; 1964; Shostak & Gomberg, 1964; Westergaard, 1965). 16 Goldthorpe and Lockwood countered the embourgeoisement thesis on five grounds. Changes in the existing pattern of social stratification that have supposedly occurred are imprecisely specified. The lack of class distinction as consumers blurs distinctions as producers. Assumptions have been made about the adoption of middle-class values rather than adaptation of traditional working-class patterns of culture. There is no evidence of changes in relationships between individuals and groups. Similarly, there is no evidence that manual workers actually aspire to middle-class social acceptance.


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proponents of an embourgeoisement thesis, of a case study that would be as favourable as possible for the confirmation of the thesis. They argued that, if in this case the thesis was confirmed then they would have detailed material on workers who were in the process of changing their class situation. If the thesis were not confirmed in these favourable circumstances then they argued that they would be in a position to ‘claim that a fortiori it was unlikely to be occurring to any significant extent within British society at large’ (Goldthorpe et al., 1969, p. 32).

The criteria for the critical case study were that the population of workers should be physically mobile, affluent, economically secure, and consumption conscious. They should be in an industrial setting with ‘progressive’ employment policies, advanced technology and harmonious industrial relations. The community within which this population lived should be socially heterogeneous, economically expanding and open, new, and lacking tightly-knit kinship networks. While this ideal-type was not entirely attainable they showed that in Luton, workers at Vauxhall Motors Ltd., Skefko Ball Bearing Co. Ltd., and Laporte Chemicals Ltd., matched the criteria as nearly as possible. As a bonus, Luton had been identified as the prototype of the ‘new middle-class’ Britain, and, although they had not chosen Luton for that reason, it was fortunate that they were able ‘to meet supporters of the embourgeoisement thesis on their own ground’. Thus they ‘cannot be accused of seeking for workers turning middle-class where no-one had ever claimed or supposed that such a pattern of change was likely’ (Goldthorpe et al., 1969, p. 47).

Testing the thesis required that the elements that constituted the various dimensions of embourgeoisement thesis be operationalised so that they could be checked against the descriptions of actual work practices, social activities and aspirations. For example, within the world of work, the newly embourgeoised worker was, according to the thesis, supposed to relate positively to the work situation reflecting white-collar careerism; teamwork; commitment to the job; derivation of a certain intrinsic satisfaction from the work; relative autonomy of action; a degree of social spin-off; and so on.

A substantial sample of workers were then analysed to see if their lives both at work and outside the work situation, and their attitudes and opinions reflected embourgeoisement. A small ‘control’ sample of white-collar workers, backed up by available empirical evidence from other studies, was used for comparative purposes. The population of workers was drawn up so that, at each of the three plants, workers who were central to the main production system were sampled (assembly line workers at Vauxhall; machine operators, setters and maintenance workers at Skefko; process and maintenance workers at Laporte). The population was limited to male workers between 21 and 46, married and living with their wives and regularly earning at least £17 per week gross (October 1962) and resident in Luton or the immediately adjacent housing areas. The sample was not a simple random sample of the population but, for practical reasons, one that was drawn from the major departments in the plants. All workers in the selected departments were interviewed except in the case of the two largest assembly divisions at Vauxhall: this covered 60 to 70% of the population. This does raise questions about representativeness especially among the assemblers; however, Goldthorpe and Lockwood checked the sample in detail and claimed that ‘no grounds could be found for supposing that those men in our population in the excluded departments differed in their basic social characteristics from those in the departments studied (Goldthorpe et al., 1969, p. 48, footnote 2).

In all, they had an initial sample of 326 that yielded a final sample of 229 (a 70% response rate) made up of 86 assemblers at Vauxhall; 41 machinists, 23 setters and 45 craftsmen at Skefko; and 23 process workers and 11 craftsmen at Laporte.

The comparative sample of white-collar workers in the same age-range was drawn from general clerks and commercial assistants at Laporte and cost, correspondence and general clerks at Skefko. The initial sample of 75 men ended as a final sample of 54, a response rate of 72%. Material from this ‘restricted’ sample is only used for comparisons where it is supported by data from more ‘extensive studies of members of white-collar strata’.


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The main research instrument for obtaining material on social attitudes, behaviour and relationships was the scheduled interview. Respondents were interviewed first at work for about an hour and then again at home with their wives for about three hours (sometimes split into two sessions). The firm compensated for ‘lost time’ in the first interview and the project team paid £1 to the couples for the second (although some couples refused the payment). The interviews of the comparison sample of white collar workers also took in respondent’s wives and were based on a schedule ‘consisting of parts of both the “home” and the “work” schedules used with our manual respondents. Thus, over quite a wide range of items directly matching data for the two samples were obtained’ (Goldthorpe et al., 1969, p. 52–53).

Interviewing was supplemented by observational studies of the respondent’s working lives but no such observation of ‘out-plant’ life was possible as the respondents led very private lives. There was no local community of a ‘public kind’ which was accessible to the researcher as a fieldwork location. The social lives of the sample of affluent workers and their families ‘were built around such essentially private occasions as the family walk or car-ride, the visit to relatives, or the couple’s ‘evening out’ at a cinema or restaurant’ (Goldthorpe et al., 1969, p. 50). All information relating to aspects other than work were based on the respondent’s own account rather than ‘direct study’. This raised the possibility of bias and distortion as respondents may present themselves in a particular way. Clearly, Goldthorpe and Lockwood noted, ‘as the social anthropologists have traditionally insisted, it is wise to distinguish between what people say they do and what they do in fact’. However, this is not, an intractable problem and they found that their interviewees were both disinclined to attempt a ‘front’ and prepared to present themselves in what, for them, was often an unfavourable light. Where cross-checking of responses was possible ‘no serious degree of inconsistency was found in the answers individuals gave’. 2.5.4 Testing the thesis Goldthorpe and Lockwood maintained that there research design provided the basis for a descriptive account of the social lives of the affluent workers and thus the basis for an ‘appropriate and cogent test’ of the embourgeoisement thesis. The primary data that described those aspects of workers’ lives relevant to the operationalisation of the embourgeoisement thesis were compared to expectations. This was cross-checked by using comparative material of white-collar workers.

For example, they used the reason why their respondents remained in their jobs as one indicator of the kind of satisfaction they derived from the work.17

The reason that our respondents by far most frequently gave for remaining in their present jobs—and most appeared to be quite firmly attached to them—was in fact the high level of pay they could earn.... This reason was given by half the process workers, by two-thirds of the more skilled men and by three-quarters of the assemblers and machinists; and with 1 in 4 of the latter, this was the only consideration mentioned. The reason next most frequently advanced was security of employment (referred to by 38% of our respondents overall) and taking all economic factors together—level of pay, security, extent of social welfare and other fringe benefits—one or more of these was referred to by 87% of the craftsmen and setters in the sample and by 82% of the semi-skilled men. In contrast, in no occupational group did as many as a third of our affluent workers make any mention of staying in their jobs because they liked the work they did; and among the assemblers and machinists the proportion was as low as 1 in 8. (Goldthorpe et al., 1969, p. 56)

A table of results is supplied for greater detail. The analysis is further developed by way of a comparison with white-collar workers. This showed that among the blue collar workers ‘affluence has been achieved only at a price: that of accepting work that affords little in the way of intrinsic rewards and that is likely to be experienced essentially as labour‘ . This is in 17 This was a prosperous pre-Thatcherite era, a time of high and secure employment and numerous job opportunities.


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contrast to white-collar work where a ‘clear majority (70%) did not refer to pay as a factor attaching them to their present employment’. The comparison was further developed by assessing the reasons why the skilled workers showed dissatisfaction with their work. In became clear that, for them, affluence was bought at the price of less freedom in their work environment.

While it was evident that work experience was dissatisfying, it also became clear that non-economic, social, satisfactions did not compensate for inherently unsatisfying work by, for example, building up rewarding relationships with workmates, superiors or other work associates. Their observational studies indicated that ‘tightly knit work groups were something of a rarity in the shops and departments in which we were concerned’. This conclusion was reinforced by ‘the finding from our interviews that 76% of the more skilled men in our sample and 66% of the semi-skilled felt that they would be ‘not much bothered’ or ‘not bothered at all’ if moved to another job away from the men they presently worked with (Goldthorpe et al., 1969, p. 65).

Goldthorpe and Lockwood argued that among workers in their sample, ‘affluence had been gained by these men sacrificing, directly or indirectly, the possibility of a higher level of intrinsic job satisfaction’. This sacrifice involved greater stress and deprivation in the work situation, overtime and shiftwork. The work experience was a fundamentally dissatisfying one for the workers.

In this way, each aspect of the embourgeoisement thesis was addressed and primary data used to test the expected attitudes and life experiences of the supposedly embourgeoised workers. The test is thus dependent upon an operationalised concept of embourgeoisement against which the actual lives and attitudes of workers can be compared. The operationalisation process reflects the standard quantitative social research process of identifying various dimensions of the concept, based on a literature review, and the determination of indicators of the various dimensions. The three dimensions identified were work, sociality, and social aspirations and imagery. The key difference from a standard quantitative approach was rather than construct ‘neutral’ operationalisations to be used to measure a random or otherwise ‘representative’ sample, the empirical context was selected to favour the thesis and the measures designed to address supposed material manifestations of the thesis.

The design of the research was thus directed to materially grounding an abstract theoretical debate. It was not a study of the process of embourgeoisement as it basically provides a static picture. It, thus, does not permit analysis of the mobility of the workers in the study. However, this is not the aim. What the study does permit is an assessment of whether, amongst affluent workers, middle-class values, and so on, have already been adopted. Thus, given their critical case, if the embourgeoisement thesis is a sound one, there should be a sizeable proportion of the sample that is indistinguishable from, at least, ‘lower middle-class non-manual workers’.

Similarly, the research study, unlike most standard quantitative social research, does not attempt any causal or pseudo-causal explanations, or broad generalisations. It does not look for the factors that might account for an observed phenomenon. The principle aim of the primary data analysis is to critically examine, through a case study most likely to confirm the embourgeoisement thesis, the adequacy of this widely taken-for-granted view.18

Goldthorpe and Lockwood conclude, by way of ‘generalising from their findings’, that in respect of the world of work the class situation of the affluent worker has not changed and the thesis is inadequate as it breaks down ‘fairly decisively at any one of several points’. Workers lives and attitudes do not indicate a shift to middle-class values, attitudes and activities. The embourgeoisement of the worker is not as an inexorable thesis as it has been

18 Thus, although appearing to adopt falsificationist principles, the critical case study is not concerned with cause and effect nor does it remain within the parameters of the ‘experimental situation’. On the contrary the research is about a broder issue, the debate surrounding the role of the working class, and it is an attempt to fundamentally question the myth of embourgeoisment from a structural perspective.


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portrayed and has little relevance to contemporary British society. Although changes may have occurred in consumption, within the sphere of production there is still ‘a fairly distinctive working class’ (Goldthorpe et al., 1969, p. 83) even in progressive, modern industrial establishments. If anything, changes in white-collar work are tending to bring some non-manual workers closer to manual workers rather than the other way round.19 In contrast to the version of the embourgeoisement thesis that asserts affluent workers have a dual social identity (working class at work, middle class out of work), there is a tendency for workers to dissent from middle class conceptions of the status hierarchy. The aspirations of the affluent workers seemed to reflect neither working-class consciousness nor middle-class status consciousness. Differences in prestige and power were less significant for respondents than differences in income and standards of consumption. 2.5.5 Implications: the working class and party politics The primary intention of the empirical analysis, the examination and testing of the thesis, has thus been completed. The authors do not finish here, however, but relocate their work in its wider framework. They argue that their resounding rejection of the thesis rebounds on the whole evolutionary theorising about the nature of class in advanced capitalist society. Clearly, their analysis shows that although economic development has had a considerable impact on working class lives, class and status relationships are relatively autonomous of changes in the economic, technological and ecological infrastructure.

Rather than an embourgeoisement thesis the authors point to a ‘normative convergence’ between certain manual and non-manual groups amongst their respondents, which blurs the distinction between middle and working class. In the case of white-collar workers there is a shift away from traditional individualism and towards collective, if instrumental, means of pursuing economic objectives. Manual workers are shifting from community oriented social life to recognition of the centrality of the conjugal family.

What then are the implications of their research for the debate on the working class as an historic agent of radical social change? Two alternative arguments can be constructed from the apparent decline of workplace and communal solidarity of workers who see labour as a means of sustaining a mode of social life dominated by home and family. The first, the ‘liberal view’, suggests that workers are becoming more individualistic, with a consequent decline in support for unionism and the Labour Party, and, as such, their potential as a radical force has declined. The second, the ‘neo-Marxist view’, takes up the alienation of the worker. Commodity consciousness and the lack of intrinsic satisfaction in work are indicative of the denial of the real needs of the affluent worker and thus such a worker is fundamentally in opposition to the system. The empirical material, when analysed in detail, leads Goldthorpe and Lockwood to reject both views.

Essentially, both approaches rely on an evolutionist position that takes basic premises for granted: on the one hand that ‘middle class incomes’ lead to a decline in support for labour politics: on the other that consumerism is alienating. On the contrary, affluent workers continue to adhere to traditional forms of working-class collectivism, although this tends to be instrumental and irrespective of any sense of participation in a class movement seeking structural changes in society, and are characterised by a growing ‘commodity consciousness’.

Goldthorpe and Lockwood offer an alternative scenario, which they link firmly to Labour Party policy. Seeing a general disaffection with the anti-working class economic policies of the second Wilson administration and the particular drift of the new affluent worker away from Labour policies they predict that Labour would loose the next election (which, of course, they did a year later in 1970) and that a long period of Conservative government is likely to follow. This defeat will be because Labour has adopted a centrist position, not because they have ignored the new affluence. It is precisely the apparent abandoning of the working person in attempting to play the Conservative game of ‘managing the economy’ that 19 Although they are as critical of any thesis suggesting the proletarianisation of the middle class as they are of the embourgeoisement thesis.

2. Class 2.6 Paul Willis: Learning to Labour

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Labour will lose support. They conclude their praxiological analysis of what the Labour Party might do in the face of the growing affluence of the workers in order to sustain a class based political movement as follows:

if the working class does in the long term become no more than one stratum within a system of ‘classless inegalitarianism’, offering no basis for or response to radical initiatives, then this situation will not be adequately explained either as an inevitable outcome of the evolution of industrialism or as reflecting the ability of neo-capitalism to contain the consequences of its changing infrastructure by means of mass social-psychological manipulation. It will to some degree be also attributable to the fact that the political leaders of the working class chose this future for it. (Goldthorpe et al., 1969, p. 195)

Thus, Goldthorpe and Lockwood do not just draw on an existing wider theory, use it to inform their concept construction, undertake a study and suggest implications for a particular theory, as in the standard quantitative approach. Instead, they relate their analysis back to a much larger realm of debate and praxis. It is the framework in which it is situated and the nature of the enquiry into structural taken-for-granteds that gives Goldthorpe and Lockwood’s study its critical edge.

2.6 Paul Willis: Learning to Labour

2.6.1 Introduction: schooling for working-class jobs In Learning to Labour, a study of how working class kids get working class jobs, Willis (1977) grounds his critical analysis in ethnographic evidence analysed from a Marxist cultural perspective. He attempts to dig beneath the surface of what was seen at the time as a developing crisis in education evident in pupil misbehaviour in schools. Willis was not so much concerned with the ‘misbehaviour’ as such but rather set out to look at the transition from school to work of non-academic working class boys. The primary aim of his research was to cast light upon the ‘surprising’ process whereby, in a liberal democratic society, where there is no obvious physical coercion, some people are self-directed towards socially undesirable, poorly rewarded, intrinsically meaningless, manual work.

As such Willis’ critical analysis is structural rather than historical in the first instance. He sets out not by asking what occurs in the classroom, but by asking what happens at school that leads some boys into low status manual jobs? His ethnographic work reveals that there is a counter culture among some working class ‘lads’ that denies the expectations, values and social control incipient in the ‘educational paradigm’. The lads are suspicious and distrustful of schooling; see it as failing their own aspirations; as irrelevant; and actively ridicule the schooling process. 2.6.2 The participant study An ethnographic approach was chosen as its ‘sensitivity to meanings and values’ and its ‘ability to represent and interpret symbolic articulations, practices and forms of cultural production’ provided a way for Willis to access the collective praxis that he saw as constituting culture. Willis’ ethnographic work is organised around a main case-study group and a number of comparative groups. The latter suggest that the characteristics of the main group of ‘lads’ are by no means unique, and that they, as a type, can be distinguished from more academically oriented working- and middle-class groups who hold different cultural values.

The main case-study was of twelve non-academic, white, working-class males, in their penultimate year of schooling, aged around 15 (at the start of the study) from an industrial town in the Midlands (‘Hammertown’). The subjects formed a friendship network, and were in the same year at a single-sex, working-class, secondary modern school in the heart of a working class estate in Hammertown. Willis saw them as all members of some kind of oppositional culture. They were intensively studied during their last two years of schooling,


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via participant and non-participant observation in classrooms; around other parts of the school; and in leisure activities. Willis attended, as a class member not teacher, some of all the different classes that the group went to, including careers classes. This direct observation was supported by ‘regular recorded group discussion; informal interviews and diaries’. (Willis, 1977, p. 5). In addition Willis taped long conversations with all parents and teachers of the main group, as well as all other senior teachers and careers officers. After they left school, Willis undertook short periods of participant observation of each of the twelve in their workplace by actually working alongside them. This was augmented by taped interviews with the individuals and with selected foremen, managers and shop stewards.

The main study was supported by less intensive studies of five comparison groups of working class lads in the same school year. These were of two ‘conformist’ groups taken from the same year of Hammertown Boys and from a nearby Hammertown mixed secondary modern and three ‘non-conformist’ groups from a single sex Hammertown grammar school; from a mixed comprehensive in the centre of the nearby larger conurbation; and from a high-status grammar school in the ‘exclusive residential area of the larger nearby conurbation’. These comparison groups were all friendship groups who intended to leave school at 16. Three subjects from these comparison groups were selected for participant observation at work, the same approach being used as for the main study group.

The research is reported in two parts. The first part presents the empirical data and main findings of the research. It is basically an ethnography of the school, focusing on the ‘oppositional working class cultural forms within it’. Large numbers of excerpts from the ethnographic material are quoted verbatim as Willis outlines the elements of the oppositional culture. On the basis of interviews with parents and the research in the factories, this elaborated oppositional culture is then contextualised, as part of a more general working-class culture, and specifically shown to have profound similarities with shop-floor culture. This is further developed in terms of local institutional manifestations of working-class culture. Finally, Willis examines the way the culture subjectively prepares labour power. He illustrates how manual work is seen in oppositional culture as a sociable practice that substantiates a view of life that, in an elusive way, generates self-esteem while demeaning others. It is the sense of their own labour power, learnt within the counter-school culture, that sustains the positive image.

The second part of Learning to Labour is more theoretical and it is this analytic framework that develops the study from an ethnographic account into a piece of critical social research. His avowed aim is to ‘plunge beneath the surface of ethnography’ in what he calls ‘a more interpretative mode’. (This should not be confused with an interpretive or Verstehen approach, however). Willis offers an analysis of the inner meaning, rationality and dynamic of the cultural process revealed in the ethnographic study and considers how these processes contribute both to working-class culture in general and to the maintenance and reproduction of social order. The ethnographic study cannot reproduce the ‘logic of living’, which must be traced back to the ‘heart of its conceptual relationship’ if the creative aspect of the culture is to be understood.

Willis thus adopts a ‘critical ethnographic’ approach. His material is based on extensive ethnographic enquiry but, rather than simply report his observations as the sets of meanings that operate within the group, he is concerned only with the ethnographic detail in as much as it provides indicators at the local level of the more general structural questions that frame his enquiry. Willis retains, throughout, the question, framed at the holistic level, of why working-class kids get working-class jobs? In order to link the particular to the general he asks a number of intermediary questions that provide a framework for shuttling between the wider social-cultural and the specific manifestations. These questions provide the basis for the interrogation of his ethnographic material in order to discover how the structural features relate to the particular: what unspoken assumptions lie behind and make the cultural attitude sensible? The intermediate questions he asks are: why do some working class lads


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differentiate themselves from the institution? What is the basis of the conviction with which the ‘lads’ hold their views, insights and feelings? How does one explain the ‘lads’ reversal of the conventional occupational hierarchy? How, in the end, are the ‘lads’ entrapped rather than liberated by their work situation? What, at root, determines the cultural forms?

2.6.3 Penetration and limitation

To go beyond the ethnographic study, which he sees as describing ‘the field of play’, and thus answer some of these structurally oriented questions, Willis suggests two key organising concepts that interact to provide a basis for understanding how the ‘self-damnation’ to manual work is seen so positively. These concepts are penetration and limitation.

Willis’ analysis is widely regarded as somewhat dense at this stage and this is reflected in his definition of these core concepts:

Penetration’ is meant to designate impulses within a cultural form towards the penetration of the conditions of existence of its members and their position within the social whole but in a way which is not centred, essentialist or individualist. ‘Limitation’ is meant to designate those blocks, diversions and ideological effects which confuse and impede the full development and expression of these impulses. (Willis, 1977, p. 119)

This means that the counter-school culture is able to cut through the (middle-class or dominant) ideological notions embodied in schooling and reveal them for what they are. Essentially, the educational paradigm espouses individualism (the free action and self-interest of individuals) and the counter-school culture voices its opposition to individualism, although, of course, not in such abstract terms. The illusory promise of qualifications, the irrelevance of the curriculum, the meritocratic values, are all seen, by the counter culture, as at variance with immediate gratification, group solidarity and the primacy of labour power. This is rooted in a clear conception of the working class as at the bottom of the status hierarchy, irrespective of any movement by individuals.

The wisdom of movement up the gradient as an individual is replaced by the stupidity of movement as a member of a class. By penetrating the contradiction at the heart of the working class school the counter-school culture helps to liberate its members from the burden of conformism and conventional achievement. (Willis, 1977, pp. 129–130)

However, the counter-culture is only partial in its penetrations, and faces limitations that are generated within the working-class culture upon which it draws.

The idea of labour power is central. Willis suggests that the positive affirmation of labour power might have precipitated a radical, alternative, liberating culture. However, it is blocked out by distorted impulses and ends up simply inserted into an exploitative and oppressive class structure. He thus addresses the impulses towards penetration in the oppositional culture and then considers the internal and external limitations that prevent and distort their impacting on the cultural form.

Willis’ analysis of labour power is a direct re-presentation of Marx’s surplus value analysis (see section 2.3). Labour power is a unique commodity upon which profit is based as the result of the appropriation of surplus labour by the accumulating capitalist. An infinite capacity has been purchased for a finite sum and this is socially legitimated through the apparent equivalence of wages and human power that permits the continuation of this purchase and use of labour power.

Capitalist ideology hides this exploitative relationship, yet, argues Willis, the counter-school culture reacts to it ‘as if by instinct’ and limits labour power. At the immediate level, in the school, this limitation is in order to devote more energies to the activities of the counter-school culture. The ethnographic material indicated that the ‘lads’ saw their own labour power as ‘a barrier against unreasonable demands from the world of work’. This feeds directly into shopfloor culture ‘whose object is at least in part to limit production’ and as such is a ‘creative response to the world of capitalism’, although one devoid of a clear analytic appreciation of the special nature of labour power as a commodity.


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Capitalism is concerned with the profit derived from labour power rather than the use to which it is put. The concrete form of labour power is underpinned by the idea of labour power in the abstract, as the exploitative mechanism. Abstract labour is measured in units of time (which is its exchange value) not its use value. This is reflected in the indifference expressed by the ‘lads’ in their choice of manual labour. The indifference derives from the continued de-skilling of labour and the meaninglessness of manual labour; the narrowing of the gap between concrete and abstract labour. The counter-school culture ‘recognises’ the principle of abstract labour and the commodity form of labour power. The reaction to abstract labour by the counter-school culture digs away at the core of the capitalist reproductive process. However, it operates not to expose exploitation but to enable it by creating a subjective acceptance of the abstractive labour process and by promoting the celebration, by the ‘lads’, of their labour power which can be applied to their own ends and purposes.

However deeply critical of the educational paradigm and the capitalist mode of production this is, Willis notes that it does not lead to a fundamental (working class) critique of the capitalist mode of production. He asks, why is the potential for a total social transformation not fulfilled?

2.6.4 Contradictory divisions: labour, sexism and racism

The counter-school culture (reflecting the wider working class culture) has internal divisions; these are based on a division on the lines of mental and manual labour, of gender, and of race. These divisions serve to override any potential analytic recognition of the uniqueness of labour power as a capitalist commodity.

The first division, Willis argues, arises as a result of a partial penetration of individualism. The school represents individualistic values and the group solidarity of the ‘lads’ is opposed to this. However, this opposition is inextricably linked to an expressed opposition to all that the school embodies by way of practice, namely mental work with the associated qualifications whose promise is illusory. Thus within the working class a mental–manual division is rehearsed at school (the lads versus the ‘ear-‘oles’) which produces division. This is further accentuated by a linking of mental work with unjustified authority, as manifested in the school hierarchy (the ‘lads’ resented the authority of the teachers which, for the ‘lads’, was based solely on the teachers knowing marginally more than the kids). Thus, as ‘one kind of solidarity is won, a deeper structural unity is lost.... Individualism is penetrated by the counter-school culture but it actually produces division’ (Willis, 1977, p. 146).

Capitalism benefits from this mental-manual division, indeed, this positive affirmation of manual labour is essential for the stability of capitalism as without this inversion of the ideological order there would be a constant clamouring away from the giving of labour power, which could only be opposed by coercion. However, just because capitalism needs the shift does not explain why that need is satisfied. Why do the ‘lads’ not aspire to the rewards and satisfactions of mental labour? The ethnographic data indicated that the lads preferred manual labour and affirmed themselves through it? However, capitalism does not directly generate this inversion, it is actually generated from within patriarchal working-class culture.

Thus, the second division is gender based, with the male counter-school culture promoting and celebrating its own sexism. This is manifested by the lads’ exploitative and hypocritical expectations of, attitudes towards, and treatment of young females. Once again the sexual division is emphasised at the point at which individualism is penetrated. The sexism of the wider working class culture, evident in the division of labour at work and home and its associated power relations, provides the model for the counter-school culture. It is this, Willis argues, rather than the institutionalised sexism of the schools that is the dominant force in the reproduction of sexism.20 20 Willis suggests that although the school plays a vital and systematic role in the reproduction of class society, it is ‘no product of the school’s manifest intentions that sexism and profoundly naturalised divisions arise in more virulent forms at the moment when its own authority is broken’ (Willis, 1977, p.


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It is the gender superiority enshrined in working-class culture that enables the ‘lads’ to accept their disadvantage as manual rather than mental labourers. The ethnographic material makes it clear that the two divisions do not operate separately but are conflated in lived experience. Patriarchy buttresses the (mental/manual) division of labour but in doing so reproduces gender oppression. It operates in the counter-school culture through the lads regard of mental work as effeminate ‘pen pushing’ and not as ‘real’ work. Mental work lacks ‘robust masculinity’, a conception grounded in the restricted role of women. Manual labour takes on a grandeur from this macho perspective, which works both to generate a self-esteem among the ‘lads’ and to entrap them into the giving of their labour power.21

Thus patriarchy is a pivot of the complex process of capitalism in its preparation of labour power and reproduction of social order. The counter-school culture raises consciousness about the ‘commonality of the giving of labour’ only to undermine this awareness by concentrating only on manual labour and sliding into a distorted affirmation of it by disengaging it from its role in capitalism and using it to establish the nature of self. As the affirmation of manual labour provides a sense of self so the acceptance of unfavourable status reflects patriarchal dominance. The unfavourable status the lads have at school simply reflects the unfavourable status they are aware of for women in working-class culture in general.

The third division is racial division. Willis does not develop this aspect and tacks it on rather than integrates it with his earlier labour type/gender analysis. Racial division serves to further divide the working class both materially and ideologically. It provides a heavily exploited underclass that is itself partially or indirectly exploited by the working class and that provides a basis for simplistic assertions about the superiority of self among the white working class.

Willis argues that racism enables the ‘lads’ to develop a ‘more carefully judged’ cultural categorisation of masculinity. Rather than link masculinity directly to tough labour, the unwillingness to concede ground to black labour (who at the time tended to take the harder and rougher jobs) resulted in a specification of some forms of labour as ‘dirty’ and therefore unacceptable. Such work fell off ‘the cultural scale of masculinity’. The reaction to the ‘upward mobility’ of some ethnic minority groups, particularly those perceived as ‘Asian shopkeepers’ reflected the ‘lads’ feeling that such groups should be doing ‘dirty work’, although at the same time they could be despised as ‘pen pushers’.

2.6.5 Culture, ideology and 'collsion'

Willis suggests that the idea of academic achievement being reflected in job opportunities is an inadequate middle-class notions of success and failure. Working-class culture has a radically different perception which is grounded in lived experience. This culture delimits and structures the sets of choices and decisions that its members can make.

And this class culture is not a neutral pattern, a mental category, a set of variables impinging on the school from outside. It comprises experiences, relationships and ensembles of systematic types of relationship which set not only particular ‘choices’ and ‘decisions’ at particular times, but also structure, really and experientially, how these ‘choices’ come about and are defined in the first place. (Willis, 1977, p. 1)

Thus, Willis argues, it is their own culture that most effectively prepares some working-class lads for manual labour. Paradoxically, the culture projects itself, and is articulated, as

147). For the working class, ‘female domestic work is simply subsumed under being ‘mum’ or ‘housewife’. ‘Mum’ will always do it, and should always be expected to do it. It is part of the definition of what she is as the wage packet and the productive world of work is of what ‘dad’ is (Willis, 1977, p. 151). 21 Willis (1977, p. 151) summarises the attitude to masculinity embodied in labour power. Its labour power is considered as an ontological state of being, not a teleological process of becoming. Housework is not completion, it is maintenance of status. Cooking, washing and cleaning reproduce what was there before. Certainly in a sense housework is never completed— but neither is it as difficult or productive as masculine work is held to be.


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‘true learning’, affirmation, appropriation and resistance. However, this cultural articulation is distorted and turned back on itself. Complex ideological processes meshed with the actions of the guidance agencies and the school, in addition to the influence of patriarchal, sexist, male domination of working class culture, are all involved in the self-damning impact of school counter culture.

Working class culture with its resultant self-induction into the labour process is related in complex ways to regulative state institutions that have an important function in the reproduction of the social totality. Culture and ideology are dialectically related. Dominant ideology is not simply imposed from above but may (and does) emerge from within a potentially antithetical (working class) culture. It may be, Willis suggests, that elements useful to the state such as racism and sexism are passed up from the working-class culture and are grasped opportunistically. Thus, Willis argues that dominant ideology is that which is ostentatiously handed down through the media and the education system. This dominant ideology appears ‘natural’ and the result is that the giving and exploitation of labour power also emerges as a natural outcome, as the ethnographic material reveals. There is a contradiction between the penetration of counter-school culture and the tendency to ‘conventional morality’. The partiality of the oppositional cultural processes are overpowered by dominant ideology. The dominant ideological conceptualisations (control, order, private ownership, etc.) remain reference points of the last resort for those involved in the counter-school culture.

Culture is, thus, praxiological. It is not just socialisation nor is it the determination resulting from the action of dominant culture. Working class culture is the result of collective consciousness derived from the active struggle of each new generation. However, working class counter culture operates within a determinate social structure and, in ways Willis has revealed through his critical analysis of ethnographic material, serves to reproduce the dominant culture through its opposition. It is important, however, to avoid a reductionist view of culture. Industry’s labour requirements do not simply determine the formation of working class culture. Schools alone do not produce candidates for manual labour, working-class culture in general and the counter-school culture in particular act to affirm the labouring ethos. In short, cultural reproduction contributes towards social reproduction in general.

In contradictory and unintended ways the counter-school culture actually achieves for education one of its main, though misrecognised objectives—the direction of a proportion of working class kids ‘voluntarily’ to skilled, semi-skilled and unskilled manual work. Indeed far from helping to cause the present ‘crisis’ in education, the counter-school culture and the processes it sponsors has helped to prevent a real crisis. (Willis, 1977, p. 178)

Willis’s detailed first-hand analysis of the counter-school culture is related to a broader analysis of working class culture with its intrinsic racism and sexism and its celebration of manual labour. This is seen in the context of the wider dominant culture and the need of capital to ensure the reproduction of labour power. In his ethnographic analysis Willis used the concepts of penetration and limitation to unlock the interrelationship between counter-school culture and working-class culture and it is this that makes Learning To Labour is a paradigm case of critical ethnographic work.

2.7 Roger Grimshaw and Tony Jefferson: Interpreting Policework

2.7.1 Introduction: a structural perspective In Interpreting Policework, Roger Grimshaw and Tony Jefferson (1987) undertake ethnographic and document analysis of policework and policing policy. Their analysis is concerned with the interrelationship between law, work and democracy that they see as the three core structures within which policing as an ongoing activity is located. They are concerned with

2. Class 2.7 Roger Grimshaw and Tony Jefferson: Interpreting Policework

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the ‘normal’ activities of beat work, looking separately at unit beat policing, with its emphasis on fast response, and at resident beat policing, with its emphasis on community intervention.

They examine a number of existing perspectives on the police and are critical of the empiricism and idealism of ‘sociological liberalism’ (of which they identify three varieties: the ‘machine model’, subcultural studies and environmental studies) and of the economism and voluntarism of crude Marxist class reductionism.22 This is not only dissatisfaction with the epistemological presuppositions but with the failure of the approaches to provide an adequate framework for understanding organised policework in practice. Empiricist approaches tend to be partial; idealist ones assertive; and reductionist ones trivialise the actual content of police work.23 22 The machine model of the organisation sees actors as executing directives of superiors, thus a knowledge of the formal organisation and structure, its rules, policies and procedures is assumed to be sufficient to understand the ‘normal’ functioning. Such an approach is ‘clearly idealistic in its failure to examine concretely the relation between individual behaviour and organizational dictates’ (Grimshaw and Jefferson, 1987, p. 7). In short, it fails to contextualise the machine or examine its workings.

The subcultural model is, in effect, the opposite liberal interpretation, which presumes the actual practices in the organisation do not reflect its formal organisation. The concern is to define and explain the occupational subculture of a particular occupational group. Interactionist and ethnomethodological studies of this type place considerable emphasis on ethnography as the means to reveal meanings and dynamics of situational encounters. This approach, however, tends to ignore the law, the formal organisation, the policies and the spheres of higher authority. The relationship between the subcultural group and these other elements are taken-for-granted rather than examined.

The environmental model sees the behaviour of the organisation (its structure, policies and working practices) as the product of a series of negotiations with its ‘environing system’ (Reiss & Bordua, 1967, p. 25). This approach, particularly in the work of Wilson (1968), attempts to ‘link police behaviour to organisational and legal constraints, and to the composition of the community and its prevailing style of political administration’ (Grimshaw and Jefferson, 1987, p. 10). Unfortunately, in practice, it provides neither the ethnographic detail of practices of agents nor the organisational analysis that the subcultural and machine model approaches do. All three liberal approaches define the police in a partial empiricist or pragmatic way and link them to the law only through idealistic normative assumptions.

In crude ‘class functionalist’ versions of this approach (sometimes referred to as ‘conflict theories’ in the United States) the analysis of historical and material determinations become a prescription that the police act in the interests of the ruling class. The result is a ‘reductionist functionalism’, a sort of ‘mechanical materialism’ that reduces the structured reality of empirical reality to the simple ‘underlying economic class determinations’. The police is seen as part of the state and as such must therefore act as a mechanism to reproduce economic class domination and consequent exploitation. Where there is an acknowledgement that not all laws reflect the economic advantage of the bourgeoisie, the approach reverts to voluntarism to indicate that the police choose to selectively enforce laws in accord with class domination. Grimshaw and Jefferson have no time for such class reductionist approaches that ignore the complexity of the empirical evidence.

Sociological liberalism is empiricist in its ‘drawing of inferences from the self-evident appearance of an arrangement of given facts’ and is idealist in its choice of ‘a starting point in the realm of ideas rather than material reality’. Class functionalist approaches are economistic in reducing ‘all political and cultural activities to mere epiphenomena’ and are voluntarist in the ‘reduction of activity to the chosen ‘will’ of a social class’ (Grimshaw and Jefferson, 1987, p. 4).

23 Their evidence, they argue, does not fully support liberal sociological machine or subcultural models, although at one level there is a degree of endorsement for the former. The form of unit policing owes ‘much to this mechanical conception, emphasizing speed, efficiency and service’ and failures in the model and in unit policing practice are blamed on failures of communication. Indeed, they found that where there is no message, ‘the contacts between the centre and the operating edge of the system do break down, as the ‘machine’ model would have suggested’. Critical analysis of the evidence, however, points to the inherent problem of the model, its fragmentary and desultory aspects that lead to the ‘officer’s search for coherence through a practical legal orientation involving the deployment of independent judgement’. This outcome, manifest in the observations made by the researchers, the machine model is unable to cope with. Indeed, it is closer to the kind of analysis to be found in subcultural models. However, the projected conflict between rank and file subculture and management directives in the subcultural model ‘fails to come to terms with the evidence’. On the contrary, Grimshaw and Jefferson suggest that their evidence points to an integral police culture, in which senior officers are role models for junior officers, ‘indicating the acceptable norms of practical policework’. In the end, law ‘remains a focus of the officer’s attention,


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Grimshaw and Jefferson draw on a broad structuralist tradition in developing a framework for analysing the structural relations within which the police operate.24 They identified seven aspects of this synthesised view of structuralism. Individual activity becomes social through interactive discourse constituted by signs. Group communication is possible as the elements of discourse are objective. Language is a signifying system that involves different levels of signification. Signifying elements are arbitrary (not intrinsically meaningful) and signification is the result of the relational nature of signs. Applying simple generative rules allows the production of complex expressions and, vice versa, simple key terms can be used to explain elaborate discursive expressions. Significations are not fixed because elements can be re-grouped to create further significations. History is subordinate to structural transformations in structuralist analysis.

Their synthetic analysis of the police suggested that law is a signifying discourse. Such discourses sustaining police activity are objectively intelligible. Policing events have a number of discursive implications. Law can be seen as a systematic structure despite discrepancies within and between its domains as there are socially constructed categories of legal infringements (such as ‘theft’). Policework can be understood through an analysis of the three key structures of law, work and democracy. However, these should not be seen as fixed. The politics of police accountability may be the basis for a structural transformation.

2.7.2 Abstraction—law, work and democracy

Grimshaw and Jefferson undertake a detailed analysis of the three key concepts, law, work and democracy, that derive from their critique of prevailing theories, mediated by their fieldwork experience. Rather than take these for granted they deconstruct the broad abstractions and develop them through concrete practice. Thus for example, law, as it relates to political activity, is seen, by various commentators, as tripartite, comprising the legal system, procedural law, and types of substantive law.25 Grimshaw and Jefferson argue that to assess the role of the law as a structural determinant of police behaviour, it formal structure must be investigated, rather than assumed, in order to identify the legal constraints operating in particular situations. This meant acquiring detailed knowledge of the legal structure even in a practical form, rather than disappearing beneath subcultural norms’. The more fruitful environmental model, which suggests and ‘all-embracing conception of unit policework’ emphasising relations with legal systems, publics and senior management, does not however, take account of the ‘significant subordination of the public to the structure of relevance adopted by the police’ that Grimshaw and Jefferson observed in practice. The ‘class functional’ approach would imply clear discriminatory practices in police activity in respect of class and race. The empirical evidence was far from unambiguous on this point. Given the inadequacies of prevailing models, Grimshaw and Jefferson (1987, p. 111) address their own model which drew on structuralism. 24 Including Levi-Strauss (1963, 1970), Leach (1967), Althusser and Balibar (1970), Barthes (1974), Jameson (1974), Coward & Ellis (1977). They draw particularly on Althusserian concepts of dominant and determinant structure, and utilise his critical frame to review other analysts of policework. However, they are not totally committed to an Althusserian view, but rather situate him within a more general structuralist tradition in developing a framework for analysing the structural relations within which the police operate. Althusser’s (1969, 1971) Marxist structuralism argues that, rather than simply reflect economic structure, the forms of the state are relatively autonomous, although decisively affected by the economic base. Althusser distinguishes between ideological and repressive state apparatuses. The latter, operating by violence, include the police. However, Althusser does not relate the police to the law, which he regards as both repressive and ideological. For Grimshaw and Jefferson (1987, p. 271), Althusser is too reductionist, despite his avowed intention to avoid this. Their concern throughout, in line with Althusser’s own epistemological critique which considers theoretical starting points as potentially pre-defining available evidence, was not to foreclose analytic avenues. They critique a number of perspectives and, through the analysis of existing theorising, filter out the key analytic abstract concepts. They then deconstruct these concepts through an analysis of their practical relevance, a shuttling between the notion and its application, and reconstruct a set of organising concepts. 25 Procedural law represents the constraints on police activity; substantive law is that which deals with criminal activity, maintenance of order etc.; the legal system refers to the courts, the prosecutor and the political organisation of the criminal justice system.


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including the powers and duties of constables and Chief Constables; the relevant Police Acts; common law; statutes and their interpretation in the courts; and the legal powers of citizens and legal authorities and the use made of them (Grimshaw and Jefferson, 1987, p. 18). This led them to analyse procedural law, substantive law and the legal system as concrete entities. For example, in confronting the abstract notion of procedural law, they ask questions like, what are the legal powers of constables and Chief Constables? What discretion do they have in practice in different situations? In this way the idealistic abstract notion of procedural law is replaced by a materially grounded concrete concept. This reflects Marx’s approach to abstractions in Capital (section 2.3, above). Marx starts with the abstract concept but rather than construe it as a concrete fact sees it as an abstract whole emptied of empirical content which needs to be filled.

In the same kind of way they analyse the notions of work and democracy/community as they effect policework.26 What is important for an analytic framework, they argue, is the interrelationship between law, work and democracy. Such a framework should allow the empirical testing of the proposed interrelationships without foreclosing on the variety of empirical possibilities. They therefore distinguish between dominant and determinant structure (Althusser & Balibar, 1970) and suggest, for a host of reasons, that law, rather than work or community, is the determinant structure of police activity, in that it determines which of the three is empirically dominant at any moment. The research is thus organised around the exploration of aspects of this thesis.27

2.7.3 Procedure—integrated theoretical case-study

Grimshaw and Jefferson, (1987, p. 27) undertook an integrated case-study approach because, they argued, it is the ‘approach, par excellence, which enables the adequate tracing of differences and connections’ and they needed a method that was capable of ‘illuminating in one movement the form of the structures and their interrelationship.’ The task they intended to undertake was ‘equally empirical and analytic’ and involved ‘making distinctions, marking limits, setting out conditions and reducing processes to their elements’.

Despite their assertion about the suitability of a case-study analysis, their concern was not with case study as method but case study as a vehicle for analysing the interconnections between structures. The analytic framework organises the methodic enquiry. This differs from the more conventional approach that is characteristic of subcultural, interactionist, ethnographic case study that, as was noted in Section 1.4, exhaustively experiences a situation in order to inductively generate the implicit meanings of actions. Conventional approaches to ethnographic case-study work (especially those used by subcultural theorists) prioritise structures of meanings and thereby inhibit the making of structural connections.

The usual notion of case study had to be developed and they proposed a theoretical case-study28 that is characterised by ‘a sufficient range of empirical differences and 26 They tend to use the terms democracy and community interchangeably. They are concerned with the way the ‘public’ effects policework. In a democratic system, the public are formally supreme. Without analysing the nature of British ‘democracy’ they suggest that policework practices are affected by a democratic as well as work and legal structure. 27 Rather than reduce law to some form of essence, as ‘capitalist law’ they investigated law as a contemporary process. They emphasised a composite and differentiated conception of law to which classes have a range of relationships depending on ‘the type of legal discourse and the sector of law concerned’. ‘Since law provides a central discursive framework for police activity; it defines the principal elements of the police task, distinguishes the police from other state institutions and produces the forms of police accountability. This is not to say that law may not ‘represent’ other social structures by means of signification; indeed our rendering of structuralism provides for this. Rather we mean that the discourse of law is the starting point for making sense of policework’ (Grimshaw and Jefferson, 1987, p. 271). 28 Grimshaw and Jefferson (1987, p. 29) argue that ‘these case-study approaches, because of certain theoretical presuppositions, make connections solely on the basis of members’ perceptions, which effectively exclude other structures, except in so far as these were indicated in the particular discourses of empirical individuals. Or they make connections between a closely-observed group reality and an unobserved and essentially assumed set of ‘external’ structures. In either case, the methodological


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interconnections to constitute a starting-point for the task of elucidating theoretical concepts generated through a critique of existing theory’. Further, such a case study is not confined to comprehending subjective meanings of participants but concerned with the ‘systematic articulation or connection of social structures’ (Grimshaw and Jefferson, 1987, p. 32).

In practice this meant investigating a large metropolitan county force with a range of specialist departments and a large centralised command structure, located in an area of ‘ethnic settlement and incipient economic decline’. In addition, the theoretical case study required:

detailed observational work at strategic sites within the organization designed to elucidate the full range of practices: from policy consideration through operational command and supervision, to operational duties of various kinds. It meant detailed attention to the written statements relating to working practices: standing orders, policy files and operational orders…. Finally, it meant special attention to police-public contacts of all kinds: to contacts with complainants, victims, arrestees, letter writers, petitioners and organizational agents, since these provided one important empirical indicator of the presence of the working of democratic elements. (Grimshaw and Jefferson, 1987, p. 33)

The field research included direct observation of police personnel at work on 57 different occasions. One of the researchers accompanied a police officer throughout all (or most) of a working shift. The selection of shifts was such as to cover different days of the week, all three shifts (early, late and night), and a variety of officers. They were present on 28 shifts of unit officers and on 29 shifts of resident beat officers. Details of seven of the former and eight of the latter are included in the book by way of representative ethnographic material.

2.7.4 Structural analysis: a brief example

As an example, the following is a résumé of Grimshaw and Jefferson’s (1987, pp. 61–65) reporting of the night shift (10 p.m. to 6 a.m.) of a ‘first-response car’ duty. In this example, the officer being shadowed is DL, the driver of the first-response car. This is the vehicle kept in reserve and sent first to more ‘serious’ situations.

DL and his partner (JR) accompanied by the researcher went to a house, at 10.15 p.m., in response to a complaint from a woman that her neighbour’s children had broken her windows. The PCs visited the neighbours who in turn complained about the original complainant, referring to her as a prostitute. The car was then called to a fire arriving at 10.35. The fire may have been started deliberately as part of a domestic dispute or by accident by the drunken husband. Fire officers and a panda car also arrived at the house. DL followed the fire officers upstairs to the scene of the fire. It later emerges that he has checked serial numbers on some stereo equipment in the son’s room. JR chuckles, ‘Well, you’ve got to take your opportunities’. They left the house around 11.00 and DL followed a car containing young black people and asked for a registration plate number check, which proved negative. A man, who was waiting for a late bus, was ‘called over for a word’. After a return to the station they were recalled to the neighbour in the earlier incident who was not satisfied by the police action and indicated that a complaint would be made about the lack of action taken. The policemen left, joking between themselves about the potential complaint.

At 11.35 in the town centre they got a call to look out for a driver failing to stop at the scene of an accident. The discovered the car as it was being indicated to stop by a walking beat policeman. DL took over dealing with the situation after the driver admitted to have been drinking and the inexperienced ‘walker’ clumsily began to administer the breathalyser. The driver was cautioned and arrested after a positive test. The subsequent test, administered by the walker at the station, was negative. The man admitted to driving off but only after he had offered his name and address and had been abused by the complainant. At midnight, after dealing with the drunk driver, they responded to a general alert that intruders had been reported at the local football ground. A young man outside the ground was detained, he was predilections significantly skewed the resulting theoretical accounts.’ This theoretical case-study is similar to Goldthorpe and Lockwood’s (1969) critical case-study (Section 2.5).


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clearly drunk. DL initially intended to arrest him for being drunk and incapable but after the drunk complained that he would have been home by now if he had not been detained, and that he also had an ulcer, DL took his name and address and let him go. In the interim there had been two arrests in the ground and a third person was being sought. Back at the station DL learned that one of the men arrested had the same surname as the drunk he had let go.

As he rushes from the station, the station sergeant says, ‘As long as you’re sure’ DL drives to the address the man gave him. The door is opened by the man we know. ‘Can we come in?’ asks DL. The man is silent, and DL quickly walks through the gap in the doorway. As I follow, the man recognizes me and protests. DL tells him the reason for our visit. The man protests loudly again, but DL grabs him by the hair and tells him to be quiet. It is about 12.40 a.m. He is taken to the car, and DL drives to the station. There is no caution. DL says to the man, ‘You hopped over the wall. I saw you come over the wall.’ ‘I didn’t,’ says the man. You did’, said DL; ‘you’ve taught me a lesson.’

The man was put in custody at the station, around 1.00 a.m., and a discussion ensued as to a suitable charge, given the peculiar, roofless, nature of the premises in which those arrested were found. The Vagrancy Act of 1824 was favoured by the officers in the station as it allows a charge of ‘being found on enclosed premises’ and this was confirmed by a telephone conversation with the senior officer on duty. On more than one occasion both JR and DL said that they saw the man arrested by DL come over the wall of the stadium. ‘When they are asked about this point by the sergeant, there is laughter’. The men arrested finally admit to the offence. The sergeant talked about the Judges Rules to the researcher while all this was going on. No other significant events took place and the officers spent the rest of the shift involved in paper work.

This, and the other, extensively reported field observation are critically analysed in order to develop an introductory sketch of the main structural features. Having collected the data the researcher’s analytic strategy consisted of:

perusing the data relevant to particular practices, proposing a concrete idea structured around the question of the relationship of the original theoretical concepts, then ‘testing’ the idea by searching for aberrant cases, reformulating the notion, if necessary, until a thesis about the relationship between the determinants of a particular practice had been achieved. (Grimshaw and Jefferson, 1987, p. 33)29

Grimshaw and Jefferson initially address the formal elements of the structure of police work. They note the rhythm of activity during the shifts, the diversity and fragmentary nature of the beat police officer’s work and bouts of desultoriness and triviality. In the example quoted, the activity takes place at the beginning of the night shift; there are a number of different activities, and some are fragmentary (the number plate check, the man at the bus stop). Grimshaw and Jefferson (1987, p. 71) argue, for example, that the need to be ready for a call is greatly responsible for the fragmentary, diverse, and desultory aspects of the job as the ‘call system takes command over the individual’s dispositions and instantly imposes its own priorities’. Performing trivial tasks (noted when shadowing other officers) far from being an evasion of responsibility is a response ‘to the functioning and requirements of the call system’.

There is continuity, however, in some aspects of the work that have more legal substance, as, for example, in the seeking of intruders, subsequent arrests, interrogation and paperwork. Such work is concerned with interpreting and applying definitions of law. In the case of the arrest made by DL, for example, the minor routine contacts were suspended and a concerted set of actions from arrest to interrogation was undertaken with a view to explicitly catching a ‘criminal’. Legal relevance, which characterises elements of continuity, is the common feature

29 This appears, superficially, to reflect the kind of model building advocated by interactionists such as Becker (1958) and Geer (1964). While Becker’s and Geer’s approach is to build up an understanding of the structure of meanings through modifications to working hypotheses following the discovery of negative cases; they are not concerned with the structural interconnectedness, and thus the totalistic perspective that fundamentally informs the work of Grimshaw and Jefferson.


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that ‘unifies the otherwise disparate subjects to which significant police attention is given; unit work becomes more clearly visible as the ongoing practice of distributing and rationing scarce legal resources in response to prima-facie demands’ (Grimshaw and Jefferson, 1987, p. 74).

Public contact is similarly fragmentary but falls into two broad camps: elective and non-elective. The woman visited by DL following a phone call is an example of the former, while the man at the bus stop, and the one outside the stadium are examples of the latter. Although the public may initiate encounters, they do not organize or direct them. The police, guided by organisational and legal structures, follow up those contacts that are or appear to be legally relevant.

In this way (although in far more detail than represented in this summary), Grimshaw and Jefferson move from the initial ‘impressions and suggestions’ to the identification of significant structural features of police work. This they elaborate with the aid of additional depth interviews with personnel of different ranks (in the case of the unit policing with four supervisors and seven PCs).

For example, the unit beat system can be seen to be structured around different grades of work. The existence of structured differences in competence and seniority in the unit was revealed in various ways. DL, for example, in one case took over the breathalyser procedure when the foot patroller seemed to go about it clumsily. The expectations placed upon a first-response car officer are perhaps indicated by the former’s confident decision later to make an arrest despite the lack of a credible independent witness but rather to rely in effect on plausible circumstantial evidence (Grimshaw and Jefferson, 1987, p. 78).

They conclude that in assessing the relationships between various determinants of unit work, the organisational features lead towards legally oriented work in which both public and management play only a relatively minor role in routine activity. The call system with its inherent frustrations is designed to deal expeditiously with public interventions. However, the critical function of the public in call initiation, is mediated by the organisational deployment of resources which prioritises legal process work. Leadership and supervision are thus influential if they conform to legally oriented competence in practical application rather than to abstract rational–technical norms.

The authors undertake a similar analysis of the residential beat system. Overall, they conclude the analysis of practical policework by suggesting that the structure of law manifests itself indirectly in beat-work as, on the one hand, ‘a reflex in the unit’ and, on the other ‘as a resource in resident beat-work measured against the search for consent’. They follow up the structural analysis of their observational material with a further analysis of policing policy.

2.7.5 Policy

In the analysis of beat work, Grimshaw and Jefferson proceeded from a critique of prevailing theories to an empirical examination guided by a structuralist view that posited the interrelationship between three structures, law, work and democracy (or community). These abstract concepts were made concrete in respect of police activity through particular attention to the practices of police officers. On the basis of their framework they proposed a set of alternative hypotheses to those implied by the machine, subcultural and environmental models. One of their major critiques of other perspectives was a lack of concern with policing policy and thus consequent lack of attempts to relate activity to policy. Rather than assume the nature of the relationship between policy and action Grimshaw and Jefferson again developed an empirically grounded materialist analysis. This involved an initial definition of policy as ‘an authoritative statement signifying a settled practice on any matter relevant to the duties of the Chief Constable’.30 The authoritative source of policy is 30 As before, Grimshaw and Jefferson’s definition of policy is a specific, empirical definition that enables a concrete, empirical examination of their hypotheses. The definition is initially empty of content because, despite conventional notions that police policy is enshrined in authoritative guides to action, their analysis


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highlighted in this definition, as is the distinction between a descriptive statement of policy and practice. An example of such a policy would be a statement made by the Chief Constable or one of his senior officers that:

‘Resident beat officers will not be taken off their beats except in exceptional circumstances.’ This ‘authoritative statement’ clearly ‘signifies a settled practice’ since it has direct implications for the deployment practices of the Superintendents (that they must not use RBOs as reserve manpower), implications which are intended to be more than temporary. (Grimshaw and Jefferson, 1987, p. 204)

By analysing managerial practices other than policy concerns, such as advice, supervision and command, and taking into account moments of policy consideration, as well as policy inauguration, they concretised the definition of policy and located it specifically in meetings, conferences and policy files. Their analysis of the formal structure suggested that policy would be characterised by competing discourses mediated by law. ‘Rational-scientific’ management approaches derive directly from statutory requirements placed on Chief Constables to ensure adequacy and efficiency of provision, while ‘common sense’ discourse reflects the constitutional discretion vested in the constable. Grimshaw and Jefferson’s (1987, pp. 198–199) structural analysis suggested the hypothesis that ‘apparent discrepancies between policy and practice are best explained by a specific examination of how the three structures (law, work and the democratic) relate to the particular policy in question, explaining the role of the legal structure in organising the relations between the structures’. Specifically, they hypothesise that occupational ‘common-sense’ will characterise operational tasks and that administrative tasks will be characterised by the values of rational-scientific management. Further, that the impact of policy will be more unpredictable in respect of tasks guided by occupational common sense than those where rational-scientific values are uppermost.

They developed their analysis empirically by attending 23 policy meetings at Force, Division and Subdivisional level ranging from The Chief Constables’ Management Team, through the Joint Advisory Committee, to the Subdivisional Superintendent’s Senior Officers’ Meeting;31 and through an analysis of policy files, which contained records of correspondence and meetings. Faced with around seven hundred such files to analyse they indicated a list of 342 files of interest based on titles of which 62 were identified as those they preferred to analyse. In the event they were given access to 28 (45%) of their preferred list plus another 34 files mostly drawn from their initial list of 342. The analysis of the files

of sites of policy development (meetings, conferences, policy files) showed that such guides were unusual. More often ‘policy’ was a general ‘umbrella term for discussion and statement’ (Grimshaw and Jefferson, 1987, p. 204). 31 Their field observations at the different meetings and conferences, presented in their study as composite ‘analytic portraits’ indicates a clear distinction between administrative and operational issues, the former being characterised by a rational-scientific discourse and the latter by a common-sense one. The 23 meetings had a total of 572 agenda items (56% new business) of which operational items made up 31% of the total and administrative ones 58%. They provide detailed examples of the processing and discussion of three policy issues, raised and discussed in various meetings. The first, on replacement traffic cars, is a ‘scientific rational discourse’; the second on deployment and divisional policy which is a ‘common-sense discourse’; and the third on controlling petrol consumption is a mixture of the two discourses. The latter is characterised by a constant tension between common-sense and scientific management which: produces some bizarre images, and endless prevarication, postponement and irresolution. As the ACC said, he talked as an administrator, but that was different from the ‘operationally desirable’. In so far as the public enters, through the question of ‘waste’, its influence is constantly mediated by (and ultimately subordinated to) the occupational common sense of the ‘operationally desirable’. (Grimshaw and Jefferson, 1987, p. 243)

Generally, where operational matters are concerned, common sense takes priority over the rational-scientific and, while the legal structure is determinant, the internal issues of police work tend to be far more dominant influences on policy consideration than external legal or democratic ones.


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took three to four months.32 A quantitative analysis of the external agencies referred to in the files, supported by an interview with the chief constable clearly shows the importance of the Home Office, which is consistent with ‘expectations derivable from a study of statutory systems of accountability’. However, other statutory agencies, notably the Police Authority and the Police Complaints Board are far less significant. On the other hand, the references to various occupational and community representatives (e.g. councillors and M.P.s) reflect the perceived importance of a range of democratic and work-related audiences, ‘buttressed by statutory obligations in some cases but not in others’. The actual influence of the various structures is illustrated by two operational issues, analysed in depth: unit car speeds and racial attacks. Both demonstrate the centrality of the legal structure in determining the relationship between the law democracy and work. The organisational and occupational concerns of efficiency and welfare are overridden by the legal structure in the case of a policy on car speeds. Similarly, the democratic structure with a clear and pressing public concern was overridden by the legal structure in the case of a policy on racial attacks.33

In concluding the analysis of policy, Grimshaw and Jefferson argue that none of the ideas of policy as super-relevant (‘machine’), irrelevant (‘subculture’), shaped by the environment (‘environmental’), or by class (‘class-functionalist’) captures the bi-polar nature of policy that our detailed observations have revealed. The notion of policy as a universal, homogeneous entity (instructions, guidelines or principles to inform practice) cannot therefore withstand a critical, concrete examination. Such an investigation produces, as has been shown, a conception of policy embracing two distinct forms (administrative versus operational), each possessing a distinctive discourse (rational-scientific versus common sense) and each producing a distinctive kind of practical outcome (predictable, calculable effects versus unpredictable, incalculable effects) (Grimshaw and Jefferson, 1987, p. 262).

In reviewing structural interrelationships it is clear that the priority of common sense in operational matters reflects the discretion allowed constables in law and thus occupational common sense dominates other considerations including the concerns of the community, that is, the democratic structure.

2.7.6 Structure, history and praxis—the 'police debate'

The study does not come to an end following the outline of the interrelationship between the key structures. Grimshaw and Jefferson go on to relate structure to history in order to provide a context for examining the debate about forms of policing. This they do by reference to Gramsci and to Foucault. Gramsci’s hegemonic analysis, focusing on the centrality of consent and Foucault’s (1979) genealogical analyses of techniques of power which posits an historical shift from the notion of sovereignty-law-repression to more subtle and economical forms of power are central to Grimshaw and Jefferson’s development of an historical context. Having shown the interrelationship between the structures of law, work and democracy, using Gramsci and Foucault’s historical conceptions of social control

32 They divided them into three categories, ‘operational, ‘non-operational’ and ‘mixed’. An example of the first is a file entitled ‘Race and Community Relations—Incidents Arising From Racism’ which contained summaries of the procedural activities of the police in responding to four incidents brought to their attention by the public in the late 1970s. An example of the second is a file entitled ‘Orders—Policy on Police Divisional Orders’ which contained material solely on the administrative system of communication and control. An example of the mixed file category was one on ‘Arrests—Stop and Search’. This file contained Home Office requests, in response to Parliamentary Questions, for statistics, plus circulars about desirable procedures. The file dealt with adequacy of procedures as well as operational matters. On this classificatory basis, the sample consisted of 13 operational, 20 non-operational and 29 mixed files. There is a paucity of operational files despite a selection procedure that was biased towards them and this reflects the qualitative and quantitative analysis of the meetings. ‘The unpredictable exigencies of the operational appear to escape the grasp of policy consideration’ (Grimshaw and Jefferson, 1987, p. 248). 33 While this quantitative analysis, presented in more detail in the study, is not in total harmony with the qualitative assessment the general common sense-operational and rational-administrative dichotomy is confirmed.


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offered the possibility of indicating just how, for example, ‘community policing’ emerges from a scene dominated by a unit beat policing system. Grimshaw and Jefferson argue that modern society, rather than being directly repressive, relies on consent (Gramsci, 1971) and normalises power through the more localised imposition of discipline outside, or supplementary to, the formal juridical apparatus (Foucault, 1979).34 Unit beat policing reflects the view of the police as representative of the law while resident beat policing appears ‘less as a representative of the law than a guardian of the norm, as a community worker rather than a gendarme’ (Grimshaw and Jefferson, 1987, p. 277).

Although unit policing and residential ‘community’ policing co-exist, the emergence of the latter from a situation dominated by the rationalist unit policing system can be understood by focusing on the ‘structural combinations of elements that constitutes policework and notice the way in which elements of the ‘old’ system are re-grouped in the ‘new’’. The unit system based on the organizational concerns with responsiveness, speed and mobility, failed to establish consent because, it simultaneously increased police-public contact whilst reducing the intensity of such contacts.

This led to contradictions in the ‘message’ transmitted to the public. This led to pressure for more intensive public contact to produce a ‘new and more consistent message’. As a result the ‘democratic structure is highlighted while the work structure and the legal structure are selectively reshaped for the task of ‘normalization’—an occupational reflection of the democratic structure (Grimshaw and Jefferson, 1987, p. 281).

In this way Grimshaw and Jefferson show how policework selectively calls upon different structures at particular historical conjunctures. As such, a historical understanding of conjunctures in policework complements the structural analysis and informs the praxiological concern with the political debate on policing.

Although the field research took place in 1978–80, prior to the ‘convulsions’ of 1981, brought about by Thatcherism, they ‘could not overlook’ the issues that came to prominence in the following years during which the book was written. However, the book focuses on the ‘normal’ activities of uniformed police beat work rather than the ‘explosive’ events, and thus provides an ‘essential background’ for understanding the setting within which such events were located. Nonetheless, Grimshaw and Jefferson have a clear praxiological concern with the politics of policing. They argue that previous contributions to the ‘police debate’35 failed to appreciate that the demographic or legal structure cannot be changed in isolation. Grimshaw and

34 They depart from Foucault’s analysis, however, in retaining law as the determinant structure in the role of police in occupying ‘the ‘legal-repressive’ space in modern society that was characteristic in general of the older state whose obsolescence Foucault seems to proclaim’. Not that Grimshaw and Jefferson argue that repression is the only activity of the police but rather that ‘upholding the law’ assumes a greater importance precisely because of the public policy constraints on disciplinary power. The distinction between discipline (imposed via ‘hierarchical observation’, ‘examination’, ‘normalized judgements’ and intended to compare individuals by norms of conformity) and legality (a corpus of texts and structures forbidding some actions and permitting others) is crucial to the distinction between unit and resident beat work. 35 The ‘police debate’ covers police powers, accountability, training, styles of policing and relations with the public, especially relations with ethnic minorities. They distinguish three positions in the debate: the political right embodied in sections of the Police Act (1984); the classic liberal position exemplified by the Scarman Report (Scarman, 1982); and that of the left, exemplified in Jack Straw M.P.’s private members bills (November 1979 and March 1980), the Greater London Council (1983) initiative and the Labour Party (1983) proposals. The Police Act fails to balance increased police powers with new controls, as the liberal Scarman Report had argued for. The Straw Bills aimed for increase democratic control without altering constabulary accountability to law. Grimshaw and Jefferson see all these positions as failing to resolve the respective responsibilities of legal and democratic authorities because they are all based on ‘an inadequate sociological understanding’. There is a failure to appreciate that the democratic or legal structure cannot be changed in isolation. The interaction between structures is ignored in all these proposals.


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Jefferson offer alternative proposals based on an appreciation of this structural interrelationship, and the determining role of law. The fundamental general feature of the office of constable is the idea of independence in judging infringements of law. This independence makes effective operational policy redundant and in operational matters other instruments of managerial control come into effect: deployment, supervision, training and so on.

What is needed, they argue, is a reformed legal structure, with democratic control of police policy making, is necessary for the establishment of agreed principles of public justice. Only from this base can effective operational policies be formulated. From the point of view of such a reformed legal structure the work and democratic structures can be reformed.36

In the mid-1980s, in the wake of Brixton, Handsworth and Broadwater Farm, some changes are sorely needed, in order to address issues of public justice in law enforcement, and to open up these questions to democratic debate and direction. In the hope of providing useful background material for that important debate, we end this book. (Grimshaw and Jefferson, 1987, p. 296)

2.8 Judith Williamson: Decoding Advertisements

2.8.1 Introduction Judith Williamson (1978) regards advertisements as one of the most important cultural factors moulding and reflecting our everyday life. Advertisements are pervasive and immensely influential and have an ‘apparently autonomous existence’. In Decoding Advertisements, Williamson is not concerned with assessing the influence of advertisements but investigates the way that advertisements work.

In selling things, advertisements address both the qualities of the product and the ways in which they can be made to mean something to the reader.37 Advertisements translate use-value into symbolic exchange-value. A ‘50 miles per gallon car’ is translated into a ‘careful, thrifty driver’. Advertising thus sets up a relationship between a type of consumer and a type of product. In this sense, advertisements sell by making objects meaningful. However, the meaning they create is contrived, both at a consumer level and at a societal level. Williamson provides a methodology for decoding advertisements.

Decoding Advertisements was originally submitted as a project for a course in popular culture at the University of California, Berkeley. In its transformation to a published text, Williamson made explicit the basis of a theory for the analysis of advertisements. However, Williamson is not just interested in developing a methodology for looking at advertisements in the abstract. She also wants to provide a basis for a critique of advertisements in the context of consumerist society. Although her book has emerged as a ‘theoretical analysis’ she is ‘impatient with any theory of ideology which is not tied to anything practical, to the material factors which influence our feelings, our lives, our images of ourselves’ (Williamson, 1978, p. 10). Her analysis thus draws on a vast amount of empirical material, more than one hundred advertisements, in developing a theory of the decoding of advertisements. 36 Given that the political climate is not conducive to such changes, Grimshaw and Jefferson undertake to offer ‘open-minded police chiefs’ a pragmatic route to change which could be developed through their managerial instruments. The changes relate to law, work and democracy. For example, using public complaint as the selection criteria for ‘absolute offences’; adopting non-partial approaches to public complaints; avoiding over- or under-attention to particular sections of community; develop conceptions of rational effectiveness in operational areas and monitor them; aiming to increase public acceptability; and so on. All this tends to point towards a shift from the organisational imperatives of immediate reactive response, epitomised by unit beat policing, towards the more flexible approach of residential beat policing. 37 The subject to whom the advertisement is addressed will be referred to as the reader. This is not meant to imply that only advertisements in texts, etc. can be analysed in this way. The ‘reader’ may be a ‘viewer’. Williamson uses reader, viewer, subject, and ‘you’ as terms to refer to the person to whom the advertisement is addressed.

2. Class 2.8 Judith Williamson: Decoding Advertisements

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Williamson argues that the real distinction between people in Western society is based on their relation to the process of production. Advertising re-presents that as a distinction based on the products of work. The real structure of society is obscured by a distinction based on consumption of particular goods. Consumerism identifies people by what they consume and not what they produce. Fundamental class differences are recreated via consumption of manufactured goods. Meaning becomes ideological. An analysis of advertising has also to be an analysis of the ideological distortion of the relations of production.

2.8.2 Signifier, signifies, sign

Williamson sees advertisements as sign systems operating on a denotative and connotative level (Barthes, 1967, 1974, 1977).38 Signs, according to Barthes, consisted of signifiers (sounds, pictures, words) and signifieds (the concept meant by the signifier). Williamson’s basic premise is that ‘it is part of the deceptive mythology of advertising to believe that an advertisement is a simply a transparent vehicle for a ‘message’ behind it’ (Williamson, 1978, p. 17).

Advertisements work by simultaneously creating meaning and drawing on the reader’s already existing meanings. There is a transfer from a set of referents pointed to by the advertisement and the product. Williamson deconstructs the process by which meaning is created, and along with it, the way in which advertisements create consumers. She breaks down the simultaneous working of advertisements. Initially she addresses the formal arrangement of advertisements in order to reveal the way that transfer of meaning is enabled. Then she addresses the interpretive act that the reader has to perform to make sense of the advertisement. Finally, she looks at the nature of the referent systems that advertisements draw on, that makes them meaningful here and now. In Barthes’ terms her analysis moves from a cynical reading, through the exposure of the mythologist to the ideological analysis of the myth-reader.

Signifiers are not passive carriers of the overt meaning of the advertisement. Signifiers in advertisements do not just lead to the ideas contained in the signifieds but also have a role in producing an alternative ‘less obvious’ meaning. Advertisements, in Barthes’s terms, denote one thing while connoting something else. This connotation or latent meaning requires work on the part of the reader of advertisements. Unlike the overt meaning of the advertisement the latent meaning is not completed. The latent meaning involves the correlation of two elements in the advertisement, the product and a referent. This is effected through the formal composition. This connection has to be made by the reader. The reader has to have a prior set of meanings that can be brought to bear in ensuring the transference of meaning.

For example, a magazine advertisement39 for Belair cigarettes has the simple message ‘Fresher tasting’. A packet of Belair cigarettes is pictured in front of a bowl of fresh fruit and salad vegetables. All the items in the bowl are crisp (apple, cress, lettuce) and sprinkled with droplets of water. Right in the front of the bowl is a section of cucumber. The formal composition links the cigarette packet with the bowl of fresh produce. The reader knows the foods are ‘fresh tasting’. This information is transferred to the cigarettes, ‘the other oral pleasure’. We might wonder how a cigarette can be ‘fresh’, yet ‘it seems to be because of the dewy drops on the cucumber’. The unstated message is the ‘coolness’ of the cigarettes, and the known correlative of ‘cucumbers for coolness’ is invoked to sell us ‘an unknown and unproved correlative’. The reader has ‘to make a leap of credibility’ via the known correlative

38 Williamson acknowledges that while influenced by Marx she also draws on structuralist thinkers. She states that she uses other peoples’ ideas as tools, that this is not eclectic, but practical. She refers to, and makes use of, the work of Levi-Strauss, but it is Barthes’ sociological semiology which is most apparent in her treatment of advertisements as sign systems. Indeed, the book can be read as an attempt to take up Barthes’ (1977) programme for the ideological analysis of myths and apply it to advertising. Taking her cue from Barthes, she draws on Lacanian psychoanalysis to augment the more conventional semiotic analysis of advertisements as sign systems. 39 Williamson’s substantive analyses all refer to magazine advertisements, for logistic reasons.


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object. The words in the Belair advertisement make no claim. It is the close positioning of two things that suggests the transfer of meaning from the fresh tasting produce to the cigarettes (Williamson, 1978, p. 33).

An advertisement, then, makes a connection that evokes meaning for the reader between the object being sold and some referent. This is done through juxtaposition and other formal elements in the advertisement. The link between the product and the referent can be made by colour; by formal arrangement; by linguistic connection, such as a pun, or replacing one for the other in a narrative.

However, the formal arrangement only works if it taps our pre-knowledge. Advertisements appropriate the formal relations of pre-existing systems of differences that exist in social mythologies. For example, Chanel used the face of Catherine Deneuve in their advertisements for Chanel No.5.40 In so doing, it used an existing mythological system: Catherine Deneuve as signifier for the signified, ‘classic French glamour and beauty’. If we are unaware of this signification, or cannot deduce it from our store of knowledge on confronting it, then the advertisement has not worked.41

Advertisements, then, equate commodities with meanings and transfer the meaning of the referent to the commodity. Meaning then flows from one to the other in an apparently autonomous fashion. Advertisements transfer meanings by juxtaposing two objects simultaneously given the same value (or ‘currency’) but they do not do so entirely within the closed world of the advertisement. The advertisers signs have meanings only in relation to a wider set of meanings. It is through this wider set of meanings, which consumers have, that products are turned from signifieds into signifiers.42 As receivers of advertisements we create the meaning but only because we have been called upon to do so (Williamson, 1978, p. 41).

Advertisements work by simultaneously creating meaning and drawing on the reader’s already-existing meanings. There is a transfer from a set of referents to the product. For the purposes of analysis, Williamson breaks down the simultaneous dialectical process of meaning construction in advertisements into four linear stages. These are, first, the way we

40 The magazine advertisement has a full-page close-up of Deneuve’s face. Next to her face, and overlaid in front of her neck and left shoulder is a bottle of Chanel No. 5. In very small print across her right shoulder is the caption ‘Catherine Deneuve for Chanel’. Across the bottom of the advertisement in large letters is the name of the product ‘Chanel No. 5’. 41 Advertisers make connections between objects, Williamson argues, in order to differentiate their product from other similar products. Deneuve is used to differentiate Chanel No. 5 from alternative perfumes, including those in Chanel’s own range. When, for example, Babe, a new perfume (in the 1970s) was launched it was represented by the active, ‘liberated’, Karate-kicking, figure of Margaux Hemingway, to clearly differentiate it from Chanel No.5 and other perfumes. 42 Once the link has been made between the commodity and the meaning of the commodity, the symbols of exchange that are generated become taken-for-granted by the consumer. For example, diamonds may be marketed by linking them to eternal love. The mineral is no longer a rock but a sign that comes to ‘mean’ love and endurance. Thus, the marketing relationship between diamonds and eternal love becomes reversed. The sign comes to mean what it signifies; a diamond means eternal love. This becomes objectified and the consumer no longer translates one to the other, the connection has been made and the object is taken for the feeling. An advertisement showing a packet of JPS cigarettes laying on the edge of a roulette board with the reflection of the wheel and the ‘high class’ players in its shiny black surface has moved towards this reversal. The message, ‘John Player Special. A reflection of quality’, implies that ‘The Quality’ (i.e. upper class) is encapsulated in the cigarettes which literally reflect the people. This reversal is completed in advertising jingles such as ‘Beanz Meanz Heinz’. No longer is Heinz signified as being beans, rather beans are completely enclosed by the signifier Heinz. 32A Williamson adds, “Therefore an examination of signs and sign-systems inevitably involves more than a structural analysis of those systems in themselves: such analyses are valuable as synchronic representations of signifying relationships, but to investigate the dynamics of these relationships we must enter the space between signifier and signified, between what means and what it means. This space is of the individual as subject: he or she is not a simple receiver but a creator of meaning. But the receiver is only a creator of meaning because he/she has been called upon to be so. As an advertisement speaks to us, we simultaneously create that speech (it means to us, and are created by it as its creators (it assumes that it means to us). Thus we are constituted as ‘active receivers’ by the ad.” (Williamson, 1978, p. 41).


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create the meaning of an advertised product; second, how we take meaning from the product; third, how we are created by the advertisement; fourth, how we create ourselves in the advertisement. The semiological system that operates in the first two stages is inextricably linked with a psychological one that operates in the last two stages. What connects the two parts of the process is ideology. It does not do it overtly but ‘provides the invisible cloak’ through which their ‘intermeshing is rendered transparent’. The transparency is, ironically achieved through our own agency. We do not simply receive advertising messages but are active in the process of constantly recreating them. So the process ‘works through us, not at us’. As readers we are not being deceived by false ideas that someone is ‘putting over’ on us. Ideology works in a far more subtle way, it ‘is based on false assumptions’ (Williamson, 1978, p. 41).

Ideology operates by making assumptions about the world that we do not question because they are seen as already true. Advertisements create an ‘alreadyness’ of ‘facts’ about ourselves. Advertisements assume that we are consumers who will freely buy things, that this freedom is encapsulated in our freedom to choose what we will buy, and that this choice is determined by certain values.

2.8.3 Exchange and creation

Taking the first part of this deconstructed process, Williamson examines the way the reader creates the meaning of an advertised product. The exchange of value that takes place in an advertisement only works if the reader is somebody for whom the currency has value in the first place. We give Deneuve’s face its meaning for use in the advertisement for Chanel No. 5. The advertisement did not create that meaning, it appropriated an already-created meaning. We did not (necessarily) know that we already knew the value of Deneuve’s face until it was used in the advertisement. The point is that it is in their use that ideas have currency, not in their abstract existence. ‘Values exist not in things but in their transference’ (Williamson, 1978, p. 43).

For Williamson, any system of values constitutes an ideology. As values exist in their transference, then ideology exists only in as much as the component values are regenerated through transference. The constant decoding of signs, as embodiments of values, reproduces ideology. The advertisement transfers an empty relationship, it is filled by what we already know. The referent system (the world of glamour) is inextricably linked to the product system (the world of perfumes) through the form of advertisement (for example, juxtaposition of images and colours). The ideology of the referent system is constantly being regenerated as the reader engages the advertisement. The reader is thus active in reproducing ideology. Advertisements provide a meta- structure where meaning is not simply decoded in one structure but transferred to create another. This process of transference is not just one of transferring already constituted meanings but it is also one of participation in ideology through its very creation. The advertisement appeals to the knowledge of the reader, that which is implicitly known about the referent system. It assumes a meaning that we provide and leads us to irrationally apply the meaning of the referent to the commodity. The advertisement takes this anterior knowledge for granted (Deneuve means glamour), refers to it, and the reader does the work of transference in understanding the advertisement. The active subject has thus been created by assumption. The ‘space’ between the bottle of perfume and the face of Deneuve (which are only linked by their formal juxtaposition, not by any explicit claims) is bridged by the reader. The reader is the space, the subject is signified through the transaction in the advertisement. Advertisements thus work by a process in which they invite us ‘freely’ to create ourselves ‘in accordance with the way in which they have already created us’ (Williamson, 1978, p. 42).

Having gained meaning through the transference in the advertisement the product gives meaning back to us. This is the second stage of meaning construction in advertisements. The meaning applied to Chanel No. 5 in the Deneuve advertisement is used to differentiate the user from the user of other perfumes. The advertisement thus serves to create a new system


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of groups. Take, for example, the Kraft Superfine Margarine advertising slogan ‘Is your Mum a Superfine Mum?’. With a small ‘s’ this endows the mum with the qualities of superfine-ness. But with the large ‘S’ it identifies her as part of the Superfine group, a clan of Kraft margarine users. Of course the synonymity of the two spellings indicates that the quality of superfine-ness is strictly limited to Superfine Mums. The product translates between the quality and the person; or rather intervenes. You can only have the quality or meaning within its parameters. We are thus created not only as subjects but as particular kinds of subjects through products in advertisements (Williamson, 1978, p. 45). So, at one level advertisements enable the product to appropriate a desirable state (for example, glamour, happiness). At a second, more subtle level the advertisement draws on the ‘alreadyness’ of the reader. The reader does not buy the product to become part of the group it represents, but must already feel a natural belonging to the group; therefore the product will be purchased.

Advertisements do not operate by conjuring up an image hoping that the reader will retain it until such time as they become purchaser. The advertisement is not about influencing the reader’s choice in the shop. It attempts to create the reader’s self-image so that the reader has already chosen when confronted by an array of perfume or margarine, or soap powder, or whatever. Advertisements thus appeal to the ‘freedom’ of the unique subject to choose but constitutes the subject as part of a ‘totemic’ group existing around a product. The advertisement is a contradiction appealing to the reader’s difference from other people but also their similarity to (a sub-group of) other people. Social class is subverted to consumerist groupings on the one hand and individuality on the other.

The third stage in the meaning construction of advertisements is the process by which the reader is created by the advertisement. Advertisements address the reader as an individual even if they are part of a group. The Player’s No. 6 advertisement that carried the message ‘People like you are changing to No. 6’ indicates, through the associated picture, that ‘ordinary people’ are moving to smoking No. 6. It also makes it clear that they are not just any ordinary people but ones like you, the reader of the advertisement. Advertisements project an imaginary reader that does not exist but in being appealed to, by stepping into the totemic space created by the advertisement, becomes part of the totemic group centred on the product. We become ‘the person who is like the No. 6 smokers in the picture. We constitute a totemic set of one, we find our identity as part of a group the rest of which does not exist. We are appellated as already in a group of one’ (Williamson, 1978, p. 51). The reader is trapped by his/her ‘alreadyness’. The current experience of the reader in front of the advertisement is displaced by the advertisement into an already constituted past. The reader already is the type of person who smokes No.6, or uses Chanel perfume.

The final stage is the way the reader creates her/his self in the advertisement. Advertisements appeal to the reader and ensnare the subject through the exchange of signs. This is effective only if the referent coincides with the subject’s desires. Advertisement work to ensure this coincidence. Williamson sees Lacan’s notion of the mirror-phase43 as essentially the process operating in advertising in the way advertisements present an image we aspire to but cannot achieve.44

43 Lacan in his reworking of Freudian psychoanalysis sees consciousness as created not inherent. A major element of Lacanian theory adopted and adapted by Williamson is the theory of the mirror-phase. Lacan developed this by observing children in front of mirrors. Crucial to this is the distinction between the Imaginary and the Symbolic, which comes about, Lacan (1951) argues, when the child is aware of the nature of its reflection in a mirror. On the level of the Imaginary the child is aware of the identity of the image and the self. But at the moment of such an awareness the imaginary unity (Ideal-Ego) is destroyed by the coincidental awareness that the reflection is a sign which signifies something. The sign (the reflection) means the child but cannot also be the child. The awareness of difference provides access to the level of the Symbolic. The access to the Symbolic creates the ‘social-I’. It is then impossible to return to the old, unified, ‘Ideal-Ego’, because the mirror image now reflects the Social-I which is itself a symbolic representation and with which the child can no longer merge. 44 ‘People like you...’ assumes both a coherent ego... and an explicit ‘non-youness’ - a system of differences. It has already been pointed out that difference is crucial to signification: a sign is defined by what it is not.


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Advertisements constitute ‘us as one of the objects in an exchange that we must ourselves make’. They are alienating as they appropriate an image from us that gives us back our own value. In the No.6 advertisement ‘you give the product its image/value (because it’s people like you who smoke it) and then in buying the product you receive this image back. So this alienation takes place via the product’ (Williamson, 1978, p. 64). However, there is more to it than that. The people in the No.6 picture are also giving the product its value. The reader is in the same relation to the product as those depicted. The advertisement projects the product as the mirror through which the people depicted are reflections of the reader.

What advertisements dangle before us is that which we desire. In the advertisement, the sign is never the referent. The picture is not what it represents. Desire does not acknowledge this. The advertisement creates an imbalance between one sign and another (Deneuve’s face and the bottle of Chanel No. 5), which the subject fills through the mirror axis of the product (Chanel perfume) reflecting the desired signified (glamour) onto the self. We want to traverse the space in the advertisement. We desire to make up the lack. We want to merge with, to be part of, something that signifies us only through its separation from us. Desire must always make a leap, across that gap between self and other, in its attempt to unite them (Metz, 1975).

Advertisements claim parts of the subject as separate objects that must be reclaimed (purchased) in order to recreate the self. ‘We are both product and consumer’. We create our own lives through buying those products that combine to form the ‘identikit’ of various fragmentary images of ourselves.

Thus Williamson has shown how advertising, as an ideological system has appropriated systems of signification and psychic processes (hence the role of semiology and psychology in decoding advertisements). The formal structure of advertisements functions ideologically in signifying the reader. However, the subject should appear to be ‘free’ and in control of the system rather than part of it. Advertisements constitute the subject as the decipherer of signs. They conceal the fact that the reader is already signified.

Williamson also discuses the way that hermeneutic advertisements, as she calls them, work. Click here for more detail and examples.

In order to be a sign at all, it must also point to an Other, the referent which it is not, but which it means (Williamson, 1978, p. 60). Advertisements do not always address a coherent ego, sometimes advertisements draw on the multi-layered personality but nonetheless assume that the product unites them and that there is a desire for a coherent self. As such it feeds off the subject’s own desire for coherence. Advertisements signify objects of desire through transference, but that desire is ultimately grounded in self: what the reader is (or is assumed to be and becomes through the act of filling the space between object an referent). Thus, the advertisement clearly signifies the object of desire that becomes the self. This is central, Williamson argues, to the advertising process. Sometimes, as Williams points out, the alreadyness is the reader’s individuality that will be brought to bear on the mass-produced commodity. The reader is not already a user and part of a group but already an individual who will be a user by being an individual. This is exemplified by Pentax who individualised their mass produced cameras by depicting the Pentax cameras used by the famous (for example, David Hockney, Ken Russell). These bore marks of individuality whilst also putting the user in a discerning group. We cannot, however, just assume a universal desire for individuality and coherence. It is necessary to address the historical conditions in which this has come about and thereby allows advertisements to work. How the self is produced is fundamental to undertaking an analysis of how advertisements work through reproducing the self. Williamson develops this analysis of the self by drawing selectively Lacan’s mirror-phase as a metaphor for all social and external reflection of the self. Williamson sees this as essentially the process operating in advertising. Advertisements appropriate and represent the Imaginary and thus embody the contradiction of offering us an image of some other while inviting us to become the same, thereby ‘capitalising on our regressive tendency towards the Imaginary unity of the Ego-Ideal In offering us symbols as the objects of unity they ensnare us in a quest for the impossible’ (Williamson, 1978, p. 65).


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2.8.4 Analysis: an illustrative example Having established the principles of decoding, Williamson shows how advertisers adopt

different formal structures to enable meaning transference.45 The major referent systems adopted by advertisers include history, nature and science.46 These referent systems are ‘cooked’ so that they become idealised and devoid of material content, and are simply evocative, reusable empty referent systems. Mushrooms are shown as made of, and as meaning, cans of soup; Stonehenge is propped up by a cigarette packet; and so on.

Williamson develops her analysis through many different types of advertisement but the basic principles are summed up in one of her concluding examples that shows how advertisements appropriate and empty out ‘real’ systems. The advertisement is for Holsten lager. The magazine advertisement has a large picture bottom left taking up half the area of the advertisement. The picture shows the portion of a droplet-speckled bottle on which the brand label is stuck. This is bordered on two sides by a light coloured area with text and a small inset picture of an old monochrome etching of a brewery. The text banner reads:

In 1188 Duke Adolph III granted the city of Hamburg its own brewing rights. The rest is history.

The text is an ‘explanation’ of the banner message, which wraps round the picture of the label. The foot of the column has, in heavy type:

Holsten. The historic beer of Germany. Williamson decodes the advertisement in the following way. The historical figure of the

Black Knight, that symbolizes Holsten is insubstantial. The advertisement even tell us this —’Nobody knows for certain who he is’—despite the fact that it is his substantial ‘historicity’ that is 45 In the second half of the book, Williamson addresses the way in which advertisements hollow historical meaning from structures and is thus able to work on anything because, like ideology (Barthes, 1957), it deals with referent systems devoid of content. Williamson thus examines in detail the way subject’s knowledge is appropriated by advertisements, via reference to major referent systems, for ideological ends. The reader of an advertisement is a subject who is drawn into the advertisement as one who knows. This reflects the nature of ideology. It is the re-presentation of ideas that stand in an ahistorical vacuum with no beginning or end. Ideology already exists as a synchronic structure, an inevitability. It is re-created through re-use. Nonetheless, such systems are historically specific though they deny it. When anterior knowledge is brought to an advertisement, such knowledge is not ‘true’ and does not make the advertisement ‘true’. What happens is that the advertisement is endowed with ‘truth’ by the attachment of anterior knowledge. We can only effect the exchange between Catherine Deneuve and Chanel No.5 and relate it to one between Margaux Hemingway and Babe oerfume, if we are already in a position of knowing. This exchange takes place by pointing to another structure; the connoted referent structure. What is denoted is the product. However, there is a circularity because having connoted the reference system, the advertisement makes the referent system denote the product through placing it in a system of meaning. Williamson uses Barthes (1957) analysis of signs. The denoted sign becomes the signifier for a connoted sign. A photograph (in a Chanel advertisement) denotes Catherine Deneuve but this is the signifier for the connotation ‘chic Frenchness’. The signified ‘Margaux Hemingway’ becomes a signifier for ‘aggressive femininity’ at the connotive level. Signification operates at the denotative and connotative levels by intersecting with the knowledge of the reader. This knowledge consists of whole systems of referents. Williamson looks at some of the referent systems used by advertising. All these she notes involve a transformation. ‘We are placed in a reconstructed and false relationship to real phenomena’ (Williamson, 1978, p. 102). Williamson concentrates on the way advertisements misplace the subject in time and nature, thereby emulating ideology, (although she also shows how other systems such as magic can be made into a referent system just like nature and history). Indeed, advertising can appropriate any referent system and empty it out, including critical ones such as Women’s Liberation or revolution and protest. Advertising can even use itself as a referent system, as in the Carling Black Label remake of a Levi Jeans advertisement. This analysis of referent systems shifts the analysis of advertisements from the realm of the mythologist to that of the myth-reader. 46 An exemplary case is an advertisement for Panasonic televisions that seems explanatory but only refers to scientific knowledge but does not actually offer it. Nobody reading the advertisement can have any idea of the scientific technicalities. The whole advertisement is a sign pointing to ‘Science’, and thereby transferring all the taken-for-granted notions of ‘Science’ to the product, but being totally empty of science.


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meant to transfer this quality to the beer. So history becomes identified with a total mystification but is somehow suggested as being both unknowable and yet ‘obvious’. ‘The rest is history’ implies that it need not be told, it stands so objectively and solidly on its own. So a completely hollow symbol is used to signify both history and the beer: and in connecting the two the beer becomes the ‘historic beer’ Clearly the material substance that has been knocked out of history has been transferred to the beer: the referent system may be empty, but the beer has a ‘full distinctive taste’. What history has lost, the taste of the beer has gained.

This shows precisely that the loss to the referent system is always replenished by the product: history may have been relegated to the level of ‘tradition’ (‘tradition says the Black Knight is Duke Adolph III and it’s a happy explanation’), that is, not ‘true’ necessarily, but ‘happy’ (since it coincides with the mythical origins of the product). To sustain this the ‘wood-engraving-style’ picture of beer being made has the caption ‘History in the making’ and thus history and beer have become totally confused because they are both subject to the same mythological structuring.

Once a reality like history has been made into a ‘symbol’ about which ‘nobody knows for certain’ and a ‘tradition’ which may offer at the most a ‘happy explanation’ (in other words, a myth), its elements have become, not significant of themselves, but signs. The ‘historical’ bit of the advertisement here tells us absolutely nothing about Duke Adolph or Germany but nevertheless implies that there is a whole body of knowledge (but unknown knowledge) that suggests a ‘body’ to the beer (Williamson, 1978, p. 172–3).

2.8.5 Conclusion: engagement

When people are asked about advertising they nearly always say that advertisements are misleading, dishonest, and that they are not influenced by them. This would seem to raise doubts about the point of advertising. Williamson argues that advertising is not ideological brainwashing forced on us, on the contrary they work, as has been illustrated, because we collude in their working. Advertisements work because they empty out content. It is not the overt message in an advertisement that is important. The reader may not believe that X washes whiter than Y. It is the exchange, the referent system that replaces the overt message that is insidious. It is the images of the referent system that remain, not the claims for the product. Williamson argues that this is why advertising is so uncontrollable.

This is where Williamson’s overt political concern is voiced. She argues that while advertisements can be attacked on the grounds that their messages are capitalist or sexist, critique must go further and engage ideology. Advertisements work through ideology, not the overt message. Exchange systems cannot be controlled by law, only overt claims.

Williamson warns against complacency in critiquing advertisements. Having revealed some of the formal strategies is only the first stage of an ongoing struggle with advertising. A struggle that it is hard to keep abreast of.47 Advertising has been quick and adept at incorporating critical material in increasingly subtle ways. Advertising is highly adaptable and tenacious because it lacks real content: ‘a framework can be filled with anything, and structures of social myths are re-used and re-used’. Ideology cannot be entirely overturned only engaged. This engagement makes use of structural analytic tools. However, Williamson warns against allowing analysis ‘to become a value in itself—in some way making perception more important than what is perceived’. One must not loose sight of the context and settle for an introverted structural critique. ‘Ultimately it is not this knowledge in itself that is valuable, but its potential to change the system which is its object’ (Williamson, 1978, p. 178). Advertisements must be criticised and their values fought.

Williamson’s analysis of advertisements is clearly critical in its deconstruction of the advertising process. She reveals what is going on beneath the surface by abstracting out the formal process by which advertisements operate to project a latent meaning behind an overt message. The analysis of the process emphasises the re-production of ideology; linking the 47 For example, the way that Holsten have amended their use of the Black Knight symbol in their advertising campaign. It is now clearly identified as the symbol of Duke Adolph III.


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advertisement to wider social structures through the analysis of referent systems. She views advertisments as a total system in which meaning does not arise in advertisements in themselves but only in relation to other elements in a totalising structure. Advertisements are addressed as socio-historically specific despite their attempt to usurp and subvert history and create themselves as timeless, in the manner of all ideology. Finally, she has a clear praxiological intent to engage and oppose the insidious values of advertising. The aim is the continued critique of the way advertisements appropriate referent systems in order to sustain a critique of the shifting ideology of consumerism. The very process of decoding and thus revealing the way an advertisement works provides the reader with a basis for reconstructing the meaning in a way that enables a distanciation from the product. The ‘alreadyness’ of the advertisement is fractured through the decoding. The decoder of advertisements is no longer a passive colluding reader but a critical reader, revealing and effectively denying the efficacy of the process of meaning transference.

2.9 Will Wright: Six Guns and Society

2.9.1 Introduction In Six Guns and Society, Will Wright (1975) sets out to explain the popularity of the Western. The popularity might be attributed to interest in a ‘unique and colourful’ era of American history. However, the period of history in which Westerns are located only lasted from 1860 to 1890, which was much shorter than the settling of the Eastern seaboard that lasted 130 years.48 For Wright, the key to understanding the popularity of the Western and for interpreting Westerns is to see it as a contemporary myth.49 The appeal of the Western is that it encompasses a variety of ways of life with clear-cut conflicts of interest and values that are available as a vehicle for myth.

Most anthropologists and most literary critics draw a distinction between the ‘synthetic’ myths of ‘primitive society’ and the ‘analytic’ literature and history of ‘modern societies’. They argue that modern societies do not have myths in the sense of popular stories that serve to locate and interpret social experience. Modern societies may have folktales, fairytales and legends but they do not need myths for it is history and science that explains origins and nature and literature that ‘expresses the archetypes of the collective unconscious’ (Wright, 1975, p. 185). However, Wright suggests, that while history can explain the present using the past, it cannot provide an indication of how to act in the present based on the past since, by definition, the past is categorically different from the present. Myths can use the past to

48 The Indian wars with the Cheyenne began in 1861 and the Homestead Act was passed in 1862. By 1890 the American Indian had been exterminated or placed on reservations and the last ‘unoccupied’ territory, Oaklahoma, had been settled. The rise and fall of cattle empires took place between these dates and the great cattle drives lasted only from 1866 to 1885. If Western settlement is extended to include the ‘California gold rush and the first wagon trains to Oregon’, the entire period of Western settlement lasted less than fifty years. Wright thinks that the appeal of the Western is more likely to have been that for a few years there was a rich mix of ways of life available, each having its element of adventure. There were farmers, cowboys, cavalrymen, miners, Indian fighters, gamblers, gunfighters and railroad builders all contemporary with one another. Though these different types may have had little contact with each other, as a source of narrative inspiration the variety of livelihoods allows for clear-cut conflicts of interest and values. There have been other frontiers, but probably none as rich in different and conflicting activities within a remarkably compressed period. The East could never match the West as a context for fiction, and more precisely, as a ground for myth. 49 Wright side steps the possibility that American tastes are moulded by the media, including Westerns rather than reflect them. The Western myth, he claims, remains independent of stars and publicity. ‘A clear pattern of change and development in the structure of the Western is apparent in a list of successful films of the last forty years’. This suggests that within a given period, films with only a specific structure were popular, irrespective of stars or publicity.

2. Class 2.9 Will Wright: Six Guns and Society

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create and resolve the conflicts of the present, they tell us how to act in the present. In ‘tribal societies’ myths can stand for history.

In ‘modern societies’ myths are not history but present a model of social action based upon a mythical interpretation of the past. Modern America, Wright suggests, has myths that function in similar ways to myths in ‘primitive’ societies. These myths take the form of popular stories and the Western is one such form. The Western contains a conceptual analysis of society that provides a model of social action. Six Guns and Society is devoted to demonstrating not only that the Western is a myth but how it operates.

Wright’s study concentrates only on Western films, not novels, as the former reach a much larger audience. The detailed analysis is only of successful Westerns, because Wright (1975, p. 13) assumes that they ‘correspond most exactly to the expectations of the audience’. As such data of the study is available to all the readers, unlike most works of social science research.

The few attempts to analyse Westerns up to the mid-1970s were of rather rudimentary type. Sociological studies assume that the Westerns resolve a cultural conflict (Warshow, 1964; Kitses, 1969; Bazin, 1971; Cawelti, 1971) while psychological approaches attribute the popularity of the Western to universal and unconscious needs (Munden, 1958; Emery, 1959). Wright argues instead that the Western as myth is essentially about communication.50

2.9.2 Analaysis of myth

Wright’s analysis of myth is directed to an examination of the assertion that: ‘the social concepts and attitudes determined by the history and institutions of a society are communicated to its members through its myths’ (Wright, 1975, p. 16).

He argues that within each period the structure of the myth corresponds to the ‘conceptual needs of social and self understanding required by the dominant social institutions of that period’ (Wright, 1975, p. 14). The structure of myth therefore changes over time in accordance with the changes in the structure of those dominant institutions. The popularity of myth thus depends on its ability ‘to tell viewers about themselves and their society’ (Wright, 1975, p. 2). To analyse myth it is therefore necessary to discover the meaning of myth and how a myth communicates its meaning.

Wright argues that myth consists of an abstract structure and a symbolic content. The structure of myth is assumed to be universal while the symbolic content is socially specific. If myth provides models of social action then it is necessary to analyse the structure, the symbolism and the narrative contained within myths. Wright proposes a four-part process for doing this based on Levi-Strauss’s (1963, 1967, 1970) theory of the structure of myth, which he substantially transforms by drawing on Danto (1968), Propp (1968) and Burke (1969). The deconstruction then has to be located within a wider context. This results in five tasks. First, identify the binary oppositions operating in a myth. Second, provide a symbolic coding for the characters. Third, identify the functions of the plot. Fourth, determine narrative sequences. Fifth, locate the myth in the socioeconomic context.

50 Bazin (1971, p. 145) saw the Western as a conflict between law and morality, while Warshow (1964, p. 103) saw the Western offering a ‘serious orientation to the problem of violence’ and Cawelti (1971, p. 80) argued that Westerns resolve the conflict ‘between key American values’, such as progress and success, and ‘lost virtues of individual honor, heroism and natural freedom’. Kitses (1969, p. 12) sees the Western reflecting the Puritan obsession ‘with the cosmic struggle of good and evil’. Psychological approaches attribute the popularity of the Western to universal and unconscious needs. Emery (1959, p. 11) sees the Western fitting the unconscious inner needs and tensions of viewers, while Munden (1958, p. 144) believes they symbolise the central conflicts of the Oedipus complex. Both types of explanation, Wright argues, are elliptical. Both assume that a myth reflects shared concern with a specific conflict in attitudes or desires. Further, they assume that if this conflict is not somehow displaced or resolved, an emotional tension or disturbance will result. Circumstances create a specific and widespread incompatibility of needs, and the myth is popular and successful insofar as it contributes to the satisfaction of those needs and the circumvention of the associated emotional tensions. From this perspective, the myth can only be understood via one overriding emotional dynamic (Wright, 1975, p. 8).


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Below, the rationale for each stage and what is involved is outlined in principle and illustrated by a case study.

Like Lévi-Strauss, Wright adopts Jakobson’s (1962) view that the structure of language is inherently dichotomous and symbolic meaning is determined only by differences: similarities are irrelevant. Wright argues that myths reflect this binary structure because it provides for ease of comprehension and does away with the fine distinctions necessary in interpreting stories in which three or more images/characters are structurally opposed. While literary works need more complexity and subtlety, myth depends on simple and recognisable meanings that reinforce (rather than challenge) social understanding. Of course, more than two characters appear in myths and in Westerns but when they do they are contrasting pairs rather than complex triads.

The first task is thus to determine the characters (or groups of characters) that are structurally opposed (for example, cowboys and Indians, gunslinger and sheriff, farmers and drovers).

Within the binary structure myth uses sensible, or secondary, qualities to develop conceptual differences. An image of something (a human) is structurally opposed in a myth to an image of something else (an animal). The sensible differences (like human/unlike human) become symbols of conceptual differences (culture/nature). Thus the image of a character (human) in a myth does not come to represent a concept (culture) because of any inherent properties of the image but because of differences between it and the image of the character (animal) it is opposed to. Each society has a system of such oppositions and it is through them that myths are (unconsciously) understood by members.

The second task is to provide a symbolic coding for the characters (for example, civilization/wilderness, good/bad, stable/transitory).

Structural anthropologists, such as Lévi-Strauss, tend to stop here because they are primarily concerned with the social symbolism in myth.51 However, Wright sees myth as a guide to social action and argue that differences between this being and that being are differences between this kind of being and that kind of being (Burke, 1969). Thus the characters of a narrative represent social types acting out a drama of social order. Thus interaction between characters represents the social principles that the characters represent. To understand what the characters mean, and thus how myth presents a model of appropriate social action, it is necessary to analyse the narrative because it is in what they do that the characters’ meaning becomes clear.

Analysing narrative structure involves problems of ‘temporal order, cause and effect, and explanation’. Wright deals with this, in analysing Westerns, by reducing the narrative to a single list of shared functions (Popp, 1968). A function is a one-sentence statement that describes a single attribute or action of a character (for example, ‘the hero fights the villains).52 Thus, the third task is to break the narrative down into a set of functions.

Wright argues that the narrative changes in accordance with the changing social actions and institutions, while the binary oppositions are fundamental to the consciousness of the

51 Lévi-Strauss was principally to show how myth reveals a universal autonomous mental structure rather than any particular concern with analysing the meaning of myths. He asserts that the mind is structured as oppositions. Levi-Strauss claims that if myth exhibits the same binary structure as phonetics, this structure must be derived from the human mind. In Mythologiques he demonstrates the existence of binary oppositions in tribal myths from which he imputes that the conceptual meaning of tribal myths is expressed through this binary structure. For Lévi-Strauss, this implies that myths signify the mind that evolves them. Wright argues that even though Levi-Strauss argues meticulously that the myths of totemistic societies serve to resolve conceptual contradictions inherent in those societies his concentration on the conceptual dimension of myths is at the expense of their function as a model of social action. 52 Propp (1968) analysed Russian folk tales and showed that the actions (functions) characterising a set of stories occur in a rigid unchangeable order. In each tale, every function appears in exactly the same order. Wright, unlike Propp, includes attributes as well as actions in his functions and is also less concerned about the rigidity of ordering, arguing that in the more complex Western film similar stories have slightly different ordering of events.


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society and any fundamental change in them would essentially mean a change in society and thus the need for a new myth. In terms of his study of the Western myth, he would expect the basic opposition to remain the same but the interaction between the symbolic characters to vary as American social institutions change.

Analysis of narrative structure needs to be descriptive and explanatory, that is, to explain how individuals in a society interpret the narrative actions in their myths. The narrative structure of a myth or story consists of one or more narrative sequences (Danto, 1968). A narrative sequence is an internally ordered sequence of narrative functions that is typically smaller than the entire list of functions but whose order is unchanged. Narrative sequences explain a change and thus provide an analytic connection between the functions (as a description of a myth) and the narrative structure (as a model and communication of social action). Most narratives are too complex for a single sequence, so narratives are composed of a number of sequences that may follow one after the other but are more likely to be embedded (nested) or overlap.

The fourth task is thus to determine the narrative sequences (for example, the hero fights the villains; the hero has exceptional ability; the hero defeats the villains).

The sequence ensures that the narrative ‘makes sense’, that is, tells a story rather than giving a listing of events. More specifically, the sequence provides rules by which characters are created and conflicts resolved. The receivers of the myth ‘learn how to act by recognizing their own situation in it and observing how it is resolved (Wright, 1975, p. 186). If the recipients are to recognise their own situation then narrative structures most reflect the social relations ‘necessitated by the basic social institutions within which they live’. Changes in these institutions brought about by technology, conflict, economic or social factors must be reflected in the narrative structure of myth. However, social types symbolised by the oppositional structure will generally remain the same, since they are fundamental to society’s understanding of itself. Nonetheless, as the institutions change, the conceptual relationships between those types will change.

Identifying the narrative sequences leads on to the final stage of analysis; the location of myth in the socioeconomic context. Wright argues that the interaction of individuals is structured more or less directly by the major institutions of society. To relate the Western plot to social context requires an independent analysis of social institutions of America (Wright uses Polanyi, 1965; Galbraith, 1968; Habermas, 1970) and the demonstration of the correlation between the structure of the Western and the structure of these institutions. Furthermore, it is necessary to show that structure of institutions changes in accordance with, but slightly prior to, changes in the structure of the Western. The intention is not to show how myths create institutions or vice versa but that the structure of myth symbolically reflects the structure of social actions ‘as those actions are patterned and constrained by the central institutions of society’ (Wright, 1975, p. 131).

The final task, then, is that of myth-reader (Barthes, 1957). It involves showing how the meaning of the narrative structure represents dominant ideological forms grounded in existing social structures.

2.4.3 The classical Western

Wright undertook an empirical analysis of the Western myth by examining 54 of the 63 ‘top grossing’ films.53

53 Top grossing films are those that the Motion Picture Herald identifies as having rental receipts in the United States and Canada in excess of four million dollars. Wright identified 63 Westerns that fell into this category between 1930 and 1971. Nine were excluded from Wright’s analysis because he was unable to see four of them recently (Colt 45 (1950); Hondo (1954) Gunfight at the OK Corral (1957) Cheyenne Autumn (1965)), four others were hybrids (Fort Apache (1948); She Wore A Yellow Ribbon (1950); Chisum (1970) and Little Big Man (1971)) and ‘The Charge at Feather River is an awful Western, which I refuse to consider since its commercial success was solely due to its big release as a three-dimensional film at a time when this gimmick was new and exciting’ (Wright, 1975, p. 30). Wright actually discusses 64 films as he includes The


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Wright’s analysis of the narrative structure o the Western leads him to propose a basic myth and three variants. The basic myth is embodied in the ‘classical’ Western in which a hero saves ‘society’ from oppressive villains. The three variants Wright identifies are the ‘professional’, the ‘vengeance’ and the ‘transitional’ Western. Of the 54 films, 24 are classical, 17 are professional, 9 are vengeance and 3 are transitional. Wright’s approach is illustrated by focusing on his analysis of the classical Western. Wright has developed and tested his structural analysis by applying it to actual movies, as he shows in the book. 54 The approach he adopts in reporting his research to avoid undue repetition is to select five classic Westerns and analyse them in detail, referring to the other nineteen in passing. The selection is based on ‘distribution over the period of time involved, differences in plot, and popularity’ with the aim of providing a representative cross section (Wright, 1975, p. 33).55 Wright provides an outline of the plot and then shows how the functions and oppositions are manifested.

In the classical Western there are three characters, the hero, the villains, and the society. Although, the villains and the society are made up of a number of people they are composites with no basic internal conflicts and are treated as a single unit.

Wright identifies sixteen functions of the classic plot (and these are illustrated using his example of the classical Western Shane).

1. The hero enters a social group. Shane rides into the valley and meets the farmer, specifically, Joe and Marion Starret and their son Joey.56

2. The hero is unknown to the society. Shane has no past and no last name. 3. The hero is revealed to have an exceptional ability. Shane is a gunfighter and

demonstrates his skill. 4. The society recognises a difference between themselves and the hero; the hero is given

a special status. The farmers are unsure of Shane because, although a gunfighter, he refuses an offer of more money from the villain Riker.

5. The society dopes not completely accept the hero. Shane is initially distrusted following his refusal to get involved in a fight with one of Riker’s men.

Cowboys (1972) which he expects to be a top grossing picture but which has not appeared as such in his source journal. It has been excluded from this review. The films are as follows.

Classical Plot: Cimarron (1931); The Plainsmen (1937); Wells Fargo (1938); Union Pacific (1939); Dodge City (1939); Destry Rides Again (1940); Northwest Mounted Police (1941); Along Came Jones (1945)*; Canyon Passage (1946); San Antonio (1946); Duel in the Sun (1947); California (1947); Whispering Smith (1949); Yellow Sky (1949); Bend of the River (1952); Shane (1953); Saskatchewan (1954); The Far Country (1955) Vera Cruz (1955); How the West Was Won (1964); Cat Ballou (1965)*; Texas Across the River (1967)*; Hombre (1967); Support Your Local Sherriff (1969)*

Vengeance Variation: Stagecoach (1939); Red River (1949); Winchester ’73 (1950); The Naked Spur (1953); Apache (1954); The Man From Laramie (1955); The Searchers (1956); One-Eyed Jacks (1961); Nevada Smith (1966); Hang ’Em High (1968).

Transition Theme: Broken Arrow (1950); High Noon (1952); Johnny Guitar (1954). Professional Plot: Rio Bravo (1959); The Alamo (1961); North to Alaska (1961); The Commancheros (1962); Four for Texas (1964); Sons of Katie Elder (1965); The Professionals (1966); The War Wagon (1967); El Dorado (1967); The Good, the Bad, and the Ugly (1968); The Wild Bunch (1969); True Grit (1969); Two Mules for Sister Sara (1970); Cheyenne Social Club (1970)*; Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid (1970); Big Jake (1971); Rio Lobo (1971). *These were self-conscious parodies of their respective plots. 54 ‘I found that, in the forty-year period from 1930 to 1970, there were four significantly different forms of the relationship, which seemed to change with time, particularly after the war. Concentrating on this relationship, it was not difficult to discover that each of the four forms appeared in a series of films that—for all their differences in content—had essentially the same plot structure. Furthermore, I found that the characterization of the heroes, society, and villains was essentially the same within any one plot structure, but was often quite different across the structures. After this, all that remained was to reveal, through investigation, the details of each plot structure and the conceptual meaning of the characterization within each.’ (Wright, 1975, p. 33). 55 The five he selects are Dodge City (1939), Canyon Passage (1946), Duel in the Sun (1947) Shane 1953) and The Far Country (1954). 56 Wright spells the farmer’s name Starret on page 34 when first mentioned, and Starrett later in the book.


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6. There is a conflict of interest between the villains and the society. Riker wants the land for cattle and the farmers want it for farms.

7. The villains are stronger than the society; the society is weak. Riker is an old Indian-fighter, supported by Wilson is a professional killer. The farmers are mainly middle-aged and afraid of violence.

8. There is a strong friendship or respect between the hero and a villain. This function does not apply to Shane.

9. The villains threaten the society. Riker kills one farmer and almost succeeds in driving all of them out of the valley.

10. The hero avoids involvement in the conflict. Shane does not initially interfere in Starret’s plan to go and see Riker.

11. The villains endanger a friend of the hero. Shane only fights after he is told of the impending trap set for Starret.

12. The hero fights the villains. Shane goes to town alone to fight. 13. The hero defeats the villain. Shane kills the villains in gunfights. 14. The society is safe. Shane wins the valley for the farmers. 15. The society accepts the hero. Shane leaves the valley to avoid the gratitude and

acceptance of the farmers. 16. The hero loses or gives up his special status. Shane thus forfeits his special status as

the deadliest man in the valley, instead prefers the dark night and the cold mountains. The majority of these functions are present in all classical Westerns, although functions,

2, 8, 10 and 11 are optional. The functions do not have to appear in the exact order above in the classical plot, although the general pattern is maintained and the narrative sequences are consistent. The classical Western operates through an oppositional structure that is clearly identified in the codes that distinguish villains from society and the hero. There are ‘three basic oppositions, each differentiating between at least two of the characters, plus a fourth opposition which is less important structurally’.

The first opposition is inside/outside. The hero is contrasted with society and is clearly outside society. The villains may be inside or outside. (In Shane this is coded by the contrast between Shanes’s wandering unsettled life and the settled life of the farmers and the villains who are ranchers.)

The second opposition is good/bad. The hero and the society are good and contrasted with the villains who are bad. (Two codings are used for this opposition in Shane. The first is the opposition of social against selfish values, with the farmers wanting community progress while the Rikers want individual exploitation of the land. The second coding differentiates those who are kind and pleasant (Shane and the farmers) from those who are not (the Rikers). This permits the hero, who has no particular interest in settlement to be classified as good.)

The third major opposition is strong/weak with the hero and the villains being strong and contrasted with the weak society. (Shane and the Rikers while the farmers who are virtually helpless in the face of violence. They constantly complain that the only law is three days ride away.

The fourth much less important opposition is wilderness/ civilization. The hero is associated with the wilderness and contrasted with both society and the villains. (This operates in Shane in an entirely visual way. The film opens with Shane riding down from the mountains and he leaves the valley at the end by riding into the mountains. Shane is the only character filmed alone against the spectacular Teton Mountains, just as he is the only one to wear buckskins. The mountains are used in Shane to reinforce an association of the wilderness with strength and goodness; and the mountains are never in shot at the same time as the villains.)

Thus the classical coding is: society >> hero >> villain inside >> outside >>(inside)


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good >> good >> bad weak >> strong >> strong civilisation >> wilderness >> civilisation Wright identifies the following narrative sequences of the classical Western. The status

sequence (functions 2, 3, 4) that begins with the hero being unknown, revealing an exceptional ability and ends by being accorded a special status. This sequence itself is the middle sequence of the outside sequence (functions 1, 5 and status sequence) that begins with the hero entering the group and ends with not being completely accepted as a result of the status sequence, which projects the hero as different. And so on, through the weakness sequence (functions 6, 7, 9); the optional friendship sequence (functions 2, some combination of 3 and 7, 8); commitment sequence (functions 10, 11, 12) again optional but prevalent; the crucial fight sequence (functions 12, 3, 13); the safe sequence (function 9, the fight sequence, function 14); the acceptance sequence (function 5, the safe sequence, function 15); and finally the equality sequence (function 4, the acceptance sequence, function 16).

2.4.4 Oppositions, narrative and socioeconomic context

To complete the analysis of the classical Western it is necessary to locate the oppositions and narrative structure within the socioeconomic context. The theoretical problem of individual and society becomes a practical problem in the myth. The inside/outside opposition reflects the distinction evident in American society of the individual striving to be autonomous in the market but wanting to belong to a social group.

The hero is separated by society by the strong/weak opposition. Independence derives from the hero’s strength while weakness makes the society dependent on each other and the hero. This notion of strength (or independence) reflects the attributes of the possessive individualist and becomes shorthand for ‘those who can look after themselves’.

The good/bad opposition in the classical plot is almost always coded in economic terms between those whose motivations in making money are good against those whose motivations are bad. The villains represent possessive individualism, are exploitative and selfish. The society represents social values, a concern with others and (some) communal objectives such as establishing the infrastructure of a community. The individual–social distinction is necessary for a market economy. In short, the oppositions in the classical Western reflect differences between individual and society in a market economy.

Wright then addresses the way in which the narrative of the classical Western structures the interaction between the different kinds of people defined by these oppositions. The meaning of the narrative is not contained in the list of sixteen functions but in the structure of the functions, that is, in the narrative sequences. The structure of the classical Western reflects the conflict between institutional constraints and the cultural values of a market economy. For example, the following paraphrase shows how the fight sequence is instrumental in saving society.

The strong hero acts alone to save society from the villains. This demonstrates the critical importance of the individual to society. Society produces individuals but that they are selfish villains against whom society is powerless. Society needs the help of an independent strong outsider. Yet it cannot produce such an individual for his or her strength comes from relying only on him/herself, not on others or social institutions. The existence of society and the happiness of the individual depend upon a negotiation between the two positions or sets of values: independence and self-reliance against love, law, friendship and family. This negotiation centres on the threat of the villains, for it is this threat that disturbs the separation and makes the interaction both possible and necessary.

In this way Wright addresses the various sequences and shows that the values and goals of the bourgeois society reflect the market principle of ‘just exchange’ but are also grounded in the idea of the ‘good life’, the ‘achievement of equality, work, community and mutual respect’. The market values possessive individualism (MacPherson, 1962) as the means by


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which individuals increase wealth and thereby their control over their own labour.57 This is in conflict with the moral order based on social interaction.

As a myth, the classical Western addresses this conflict and provides a resolution. The myth asks ‘how do we, as autonomous, self-reliant individuals, relate to the society of others, a society of morality and love?’ The myth thus asks how the dilemma of independence from, but integration into, the society can be achieved. The analysis of the Western ‘should tell us how it establishes the context of this problem—what are the components of a society in which this problem is both significant and capable of solution?—and, of course, what is the solution’ (Wright, 1975, pp. 137–138).

Wright argues that in this way a ‘structural grid’ in which the actions and relations of the characters are given 'conceptual meaning’ can be compiled for each of the narrative structures of the Western myth. These narrative structures change with time, creating new ideas of society and of the individual's relation to it. Thus right, for example, analyses the ‘professional’ plot that, he argues, reflects the more recent development of corporate economy. The ideas in the myth reveal to the members of society what their society is like and how they as individuals should act in it.

2.4.5 The Western as a meaningful experience

Wright argues that seeing a Western is a meaningful experience. Empirical claims can be made, and rested, about the experience. It is possible for observers to agree on the story, dialogue, length and components of the imagery. A framework of analysis can be tested empirically. None of this, however, provides any understanding of how the Western is experienced as meaningful. The problem for Wright is to determine which of these aspects makes it meaningful.

Meaning is not something that can be pointed to or hit with a hammer; it must be communicated—that is, meaning does not exist in the world; it exists in relationships between things in the world and a person or group of people. Meaning cannot be observed; it can only be interpreted. (Wright, 1975, p. 196)

Locating meaning is not an empirical problem. Empirical elements can be identified but cannot be used to arbitrate meaning. ‘Facts’ cannot ‘prove’ the correctness of an interpretation. This means that there is no empirical grounds for asserting whether it is the structure of the Western or some other aspect (such as the ever present (threat of) violence) which gives it social meaning. However, a lack of ‘empirical proof’ does not disable the analysis. The meaning is located socially; the same empirical information can be interpreted in different ways. New interpretations are not the result of additional evidence but of new ways of seeing—a ‘Gestalt switch’ (Wright, 1975, p. 197).

I was quite conscious as I did the study that I was selecting some aspects of each film and ignoring others. But this selection has enabled me to reinterpret the Western myth. Instead of a series of films that repeats ‘near-juvenile formulas’ (Smith), ‘a serious orientation to the problem of violence’ (Warshow), or ‘the contrasting images of garden and desert’ (Kitses), I have suggested that the Westerns, as I see it, represent a conceptual model for social action. To support this suggestion, I have in effect reconstituted the Western myth, taking it apart and putting it back together again in a special way. (Wright, 1975, p. 198 (emphasis added)).

Wright argues that in this sense he has recreated the Western and altered its meaning because people who read his book will see Westerns in a new way. Until now, no one has argued systematically that the Western represents forms of action and understanding that are inherent in the changing economic institutions of America. He argues that he must, therefore, make explicit and justify the effects of his work. He maintains that it is not

57 MacPherson (1962) lists the attributes of the possessive individualist as freedom from dependence on the wills of other, freedom from any relations with others except those entered into voluntarily and self-proprietorship that owes nothing to society.


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sufficient to suppose that a scientific work is its own justification; that somehow knowledge exists for its own sake. His position is that to increase the possibility of a meaningful life people need to understand the empirical conditions of their lives. The only just and liveable society is one in which, through science and social myths, people are aware of the real conditions that structure their life. ‘I assume that the only studies that can be scientifically justified are those that contribute to a better world—studies that will not decrease but only increase the understanding and control people have over their own lives’ (Wright, 1975, p. 200). The basis of the claim of validity of his study, then, is not empirical but political. The research, in recreating the Western, is itself political, as interpretations of the meaning of the empirical world are the basis for social and political action.

Wright argues that his analysis of the Western, although incomplete, is far better than any previous ones because it locates it firmly in its economic and social setting, addresses the ideology in the myth and its relation to objective social conditions. In so doing it does not simply provide an understanding of part of society (the Western film) but makes the whole of society more understandable.

2.10 Conclusion

A wide variety of methods have been used in these studies. Marx and Mills primarily used secondary sources ranging from newspapers through books and articles to enacted legislation. Mills additionally made use of key informants and they both augmented their library and archive research with direct observation. Goldthorpe and Lockwood focused their research, specifing a restricted sample, and used of a schedule of directed questions backed up by library research and direct observation. In as far as it was possible, Willis was a participant observer of the small sample of school leavers in his study. Grimshaw & Jefferson undertook detailed non-participant observation, augmenting their research with document analysis in order to uncover policing policy. In her study of advertising, Williamson adopted a semiotic approach that involved close scrutiny and analysis of a large number of magazine advertisements, a hundred of which were used in her presentation. Wright's analysis of the Western involved him in analysisng character types, plot and narrative of over fifty popular Western films.

This diversity of method is characteristic of critical social research. It is not the data collection techniques but the way the data are utilised to answer substantive questions about the nature of oppressive social structures that characterises these studies as critical. Grimshaw and Jefferson, for example, did not just undertake an observation study of police activity but assessed how the conflicting demands of work, legal and democratic structures were resolved in practice. Willis was not just interested in the disruptive strategies adopted by the 'lads' for their own sake but looked at them in the light of the partial penetration of working-class culture. Mills was not interested in just naming the power elite but in analysing the extent to which the possibility of an ‘invisible’ power bloc was related to the evolution of mass society. Williamson was not interested in a content analysis of the innumerable magazine advertisements she looked at but was concerned to reveal the various ways in which advertisers tramsmitted their connoted messages.

In each of these studies the authors have attempted to get beneath the surface of appearances to show how class oppression operates and is legitimated. A substantial question is raised and the taken-for-granteds are examined. Mills, for example, does this by asking a series of questions that try to unravel not only who has the power in America but how they are able to wield it. Marx asks what it the exploitative process that underlies capital accumulation. Willis wants to know how working-class culture, although critical of bourgeois individualism, ends up colluding in the oppression of the working class. Wright asks what is the essential nature of the Western myth, its underlying structure and its relation to social practices.

2. Class 2.10 Conclusion

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What is characteristic of all these studies is that, in one way or another, they dissect taken-for-granted concepts and reconstruct them as concrete entities. In so doing they lay bear the essential concepts of the research and use these as a basis for revealing what is really going on. Abstraction, essence, totality, ideology, history, structure and praxis are key elements of critical social research. The studies have been analysed to show how they deconstruct taken-for-granted abstractions, determine core concepts, relate particular practices to historically specific structural wholes, analyse the mediating role of ideology and address praxiological issues. What the examination has shown is the interrelatedness of these elements. Willis's notions of penetration and limitation make sense only if the activities of the lads are seen in the light of the relationship between working-class culture and hegemonic ideology. Capital accumulation, for Marx, is only possible if labour power is commodified, which itself can only occur in a class-based society legitimated by bourgeois ideology; and so on.

So critical social research is not methodic, but it is clearly dialectical. The dialectical process cannot be summed up in a procedural recipe, it is an imaginative and creative process that involves the interrelationship of the seven elements in order to provide the basis for an insight into a substantive question. We have seen some examples of how this is done in relation to class; and the next part looks at how gender oppression has been engaged by critical researchers


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3. Gender 3.1 Introduction

In this part of the book five critical research studies that concentrate on gender oppression are examined in detail. The examination is focused on the methodology rather than the substantive issues; however, methodology and substance are interrelated and the following analyses show how methodic practices are combined with underlying presuppositions in order to generate a critical investigation of substantive issues relating to gender.

A central concern of much research analysing gender oppression is the representation of women’s views and perspectives. A widely adopted mode is to undertake and present research in which women speak for themselves about women’s realms. An early ‘classic’ of this type was Ann Oakley’s (1974a) research into housework that addresses domestic labour from the point of view of housewives.

Oakley explicitly adopted a feminist approach. To propose an academic research endeavour premised on a feminist perspective was, at that time, a radical step in itself. As will be shown, her feminist methodology was of necessity entwined with a more conventional positivistic analysis. For Oakley, feminism was an alternative perspective to the scientistic ‘male paradigm’. Although noting alternative prescriptions for women’s liberation (Myrdal & Klein, 1956; Firestone, 1972; Rowbotham, 1973), she felt no need to address the differences in feminist perspectives that were to become so hotly debated for the best part of a decade.

For Oakley (1973, p. 3), feminism is not a set of values but a perspective on social analysis that ‘consists of keeping in the forefront of one’s mind the life-styles, activities and interests of more than one half of humanity—women.’ The detailed analysis of her methodology reveals her concern with reaching the real feelings of her interviewees. Guided by a notion of sisterhood, Oakley deliberately sets aside the manipulative approach embodied in the conventional interviewer–interviewee relationship.

Cynthia Cockburn’s (1983) Brothers also used ethnographic interviewing. Hers was a feminist study of a male realm that examined the processes by which men excluded women from craft unions and thus high-paid skilled employment and how they identified their exclusivity with their maleness. Her account lets the men talk about how they see their world and how they legitimate the exclusion of women as a function of the engagement with capital. She situates her ethnographic material in a historical context that addresses the particular history of the print trade from which her subjects are drawn and the wider history of women’s employment. Her study is thus firmly located in a broad socio-economic and political context. Ethnographic material provides details of actual experiences. These serve as insights into the structural and historical processes. While the reported experiences are located in a specific milieu they also inform the understanding of the nature of the oppressive structure and its historical genesis. In reporting the ethnography, the spoken accounts are included both to illustrate the text and as a basis of an analysis of the structural forms. The methodological tactic Cockburn used to deconstruct social relations was to reveal and analyse contradictions that were evident in both what respondents did and in what they said. The contradictions were examined to see how they related to the ideological forms legitimating the oppressive structures. Cockburn argues that her empirical material only makes sense when examined as a dual system of oppression: capitalism and patriarchy.

Letting women speak for themselves was a research technique used by Sally Westwood (1984) in her study of the role of work in the making of women’s lives. In All Day Every Day, Westwood adopts a participant observation role, rather than depth interviews, in her analysis of the interrelationship between oppression of women at home and at work. Like Willis (1977) she reveals how the participants collude in their own oppression. Like Cockburn, she

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focuses on contradictions and like Oakley she regards the women she talks about as friends to be treated sympathetically, not subjects to be engaged and exploited. Ethnographic study, then, reveals women’s lived experience of patriarchal oppression (Oakley, 1973; Westwood, 1984). The ethnographic strategy of letting women talk for themselves makes women and women’s concerns visible.

An alternative strategy for making women visible is the reconstruction of history from a feminist perspective. Historical reconstruction is a key to both reversing the marginalisation of women in dominant ‘male history’; cataloguing the nature and extent of male oppression; and as a means of exploring the evolution of oppressive structures. This is achieved by either re-constructing the conventional concerns of history showing the role of women or the impact of events on women, or by writing the history of women’s realms hitherto ignored. Khawar Mumtaz and Farida Shaheed (1987) in writing about the women’s movement in Pakistan reconstruct an historical account of the role of women in the struggle for the independence of Pakistan and their subsequent oppression under the new Islamic conservatism initiated during the Zia régime.

Joanna Liddle and Rama Joshi combined an ethnographic approach that let women speak for themselves with an historical analysis, which involved the historical reconstruction of a neglected realm, the history of female power in Asia. Their socialist feminist analysis of women in India sets the ethnographic study, based on unstructured interviews, in a historical context. The experiences of women professionals is set against a background of the struggle for Indian Independence and the subsequent attempts of the new capitalism mixed with traditional patriarchy to restrict and exclude women from economic and social power through seclusion. In an approach similar to Cockburn (1983), Liddle and Joshi suggest a dual system of oppression of women. However, they adopted an alternative to Cockburn’s tactic for deconstruction. Instead of focusing on contradictions they addressed prevailing myths in order to suggest the ideologically constituted interests that are encapsulated in these uncritically accepted myths.

3.2 Perspectives

3.2.1 Introduction There are different feminist views about the nature of and mechanisms for the oppression of women. A lot of prefixes have been added in various combinations to feminism: socialist, Marxist, bourgeois, radical, materialist, positivist, idealist. Unfortunately, these labels have not always been used to mean the same thing, nor are they mutually exclusive. More profoundly, the theoretical positions embodied in different perspectives are not entirely distinct. In practice, too, feminists with very different epistemological perspectives collaborate in combating gender oppression and there is a tendency for research endeavours to adopt a plurality of perspectives in exploring a substantive area of enquiry. Thus no set of definitions will be entirely satisfactory. The following outline of different perspectives is, however, intended to help the potential critical social researcher grasp the key points of debate within feminism.

‘Traditional’ feminism around 1970 directly reflected the women’s movement of the 1960s. It emphasised ‘sisterhood’ in redefining women’s relations to one another and the ‘personal’ realms in drawing attention to women’s position. Feminism, really for the first time, began to directly engage oppression of women rather than their social disadvantage (Oakley, 1974a). Women’s movements and feminist thought earlier in the century had tended towards the advocacy of the equality of opportunity for women in a man’s world. These, so-


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called, liberal or bourgeois feminists1 wanted equality for women within the existing social system (Mary Wollstonecraft; Elizabeth Cady Stanton; Harriet Taylor Mill).

The feminist positions that were emerging in the early 1970s were opposed to reformism arguing that the position of women cannot be changed within prevailing social structures because it is capitalism and/or patriarchy that ensures the oppression of women. Only a fundamental change in social relations will provide women with equality.

A fierce debate about the nature of women’s oppression, the means of analysis and the direction of feminist politics erupted in the mid-1970s and lasted for around ten years to the mid 1980s (Vogel, 1984). The debate has been characterised in several ways; most often it is seen as embodying a split between socialist and radical feminists. The former are presented as seeing capitalism as the basis of oppression while the latter see patriarchy as the fundamental oppressive mechanism. While class and gender constitute the major axis of this debate, in reality the distinction is much more blurred and the debate far more subtle. Although it is not the intention of this book to rehearse theoretical debates, which have in any case been well documented elsewhere, a brief characterisation of the different positions does provide a context for the examination of different methodologies. 3.2.2 Socialist feminism Socialist feminism is a general term for those feminists who see capitalist relations of production as important to an analysis of the oppression of women. In essence, socialist feminism argues that the position of women cannot be divorced from a Marxist analysis of capitalism. Generally speaking, their are two basic versions of this approach.

First, a view that suggests that productive relations within capitalism underpin the oppression of women. This might better be better referred to as ‘a socialist class analysis of the oppression of women’. The approach is based on Engels (1884) analysis of gender oppression in The Origin of the Family, Private Property, and the State. Engels offers a materialistic explanation that shows the relationship between the ownership of private property and the ideological subordination of women. His analysis is important to socialist women as it is virtually the only account within 19th century Marxism of relations between the sexes and of the possibility of social advance united with sexual emancipation. Engels argued that emancipation of women depends on their full integration into social production. Human reproduction is identified along with production as constituting the material basis of society. Engels argued that the origin of the monogamous family, and its attendant domination of women by men, results from the emergence of private property. Private property is at the root of class differences and the oppression of women is thus linked to the emergence of socio-economic classes and resolvable only through class conflict.

Although this approach has been recently reworked and developed (Sayers et al., 1987) it

has had a mixed reception even in socialist circles. Kautsky regarded it with suspicion and in the USSR until recently, Engels’ concentration on sex/love was seen as individualistic, and outside the province of the state (Millett, 1969; Rowbotham, 1970; Porter, 1980). Lenin (1919, p. 3), however, endorsed The Origins, as did Eleanor Marx and Rosa Luxemburg 1 The term bourgeois feminism, because of the apparent naïvety of the bourgeois feminist position, has become a derogatory term and one applied rather loosely in debates. Consequently, feminists who do not seem to be arguing the same line (such as de Beauvoir and Firestone), and indeed, feminists who would seem to be radical or socialist feminists, sometimes get labelled as bourgeois feminists. This makes the term a rather slippery one and perhaps best avoided. The situation is further complicated by two other elements. First, approaches that seem overly biologically deterministic, despite apparent ‘revolutionary’ content, are usually referred to as bourgeois, as they delimit, in effect, the possibility of social change (for example, Firestone, 1972). Second, approaches that adopt a positivistic methodology (sometimes called positivistic feminism) are also sometimes referred to as bourgeois. Positivist feminism tends to argue for gender as a generic variable to be considered in the same way that (positivist) sociologists treat socioeconomic variables. This approach, then, tends to concentrate on variable analysis within prevailing social structures hence the ‘bourgeois’ label. return


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among other prominent female Marxists (Thonnessen, 1973; Draper & Lipow, 1976; Porter, 1980). Simone de Beauvoir (1952), on the other hand, saw Engels as an economic determinist, (le Doeuff, 1980) while more recently, Millet (1969), Eisenstein (1979b) and Vogel (1984) have pointed to contradictions in his analysis. More recent proponents of the approach that sees gender divisions as a by-product of class processes (Seccombe, 1974; Zaretsky, 1976) have been attacked for ignoring the benefits to men of patriarchal oppression (Cockburn, 1983).

On balance, socialist feminists prefer a view which gives as much weight to feminist as

socialist concerns (Hartmann, 1979b) and the tendency in the 1980s is a view that argues that women are oppressed by both productive and reproductive relations within capitalism. This approach has a number of variants. First, is the view that women are oppressed by class relations (as are men) but that within classes they are oppressed by gender relations that cannot be reduced to class. Second, women are oppressed by both capitalism and by patriarchy. This second form, which might be regarded as the dominant approach of socialist feminism, has developed two ways of combining a Marxist class analysis with a feminist gender analysis of society.

One approach posits a fusion of the two oppressive mechanisms and argues for capitalist

patriarchy, which emphasises ‘the mutually reinforcing dialectical relationship between capitalist class structure and hierarchical sexual structuring’ (Eisenstein, 1979b, p. 5). The capitalist patriarchy view argues that women are exploited as labourers within the class structure but are also oppressed by patriarchy. This oppression reflects the hierarchical relations of the sexual (and racial) division of labour and society, which defines people’s activity, desires, and so on according to their biological sex. This sexual division separates men and women into their respective hierarchical sex roles and structures their related duties in the family domain and within the economy. The sexual division has evolved from ideological and political interpretations of biological difference that men have chosen to interpret and make political use of.

The view argues that capitalism ‘needs’ patriarchy in the sense that patriarchy provides the

necessary order and control. Male supremacy involves a system of cultural, social, economic and political control. The capitalist concern with profit and patriarchal concern with sexual hierarchy are inextricably connected (but cannot be reduced to each other), patriarchy and capitalism become an integral process: specific elements of each system are necessitated by the other (Eisenstein, 1979b, p. 28).

Patriarchy provides the sexual hierarchical ordering of society, but, as a political system,

cannot be reduced to its economic structure. Capitalism, as an economic class system, driven by the pursuit of profit, feeds off the (prior) patriarchal ordering. Together they form the political economy of the society, not merely one or another, but a particular blend of the two. The view suggests that a reformulation of the idea of class is required that takes into account the complex reality of women’s lives in capitalist patriarchy.

The other approach to combining a Marxist class analysis with a feminist gender analysis

of society is to adopt a dualist thesis that sees capitalism and patriarchy as separate but interrelated oppressive structures. The dual approach requires that social structures and practices are examined for both gender and class oppression (Hartmann, 1979a; Cockburn, 1983). This reverses the intention of socialist feminism to dissolve the distinction between the radical feminist gender-oriented perspective and the socialist or Marxist class-oriented perspective. Dualist approaches have been criticised for proposing a mysterious coexistence of unrelated explanations of social development. Each of the dual realms remain relatively autonomous and the unsatisfactory analysis of patriarchy that derives from radical feminism


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and the gender blind analysis of class that derives from Marxism remain more or less in tact (Young, 1981; Vogel, 1984).

Although the view that women are oppressed by patriarchy and capitalism, either through

some kind of fusion of the two mechanisms or through the workings of two relatively autonomous realms, has been the dominant approach of socialist feminism it is regarded as unsatisfactory in developing a ‘unified materialist perspective on women’s liberation’ (Vogel, 1984, p. 28) not least because it pays only lip service to racial oppression. 3.2.3 Radical feminism Radical feminism, a multi-faceted perspective, argues that, at root, women are oppressed by men. Radical feminists see it as a mistake to subsume the oppression of women under class oppression. There are, arguably, two basic forms of radical feminism, the idealist and the materialist approaches.

Idealist radical feminists make up the bulk of what is usually referred to as radical

feminism. In the early 1970s they were often referred to simply as feminists and have more recently been called (rather inappropriately) cultural feminists. They adopt a view that the biological differences between men and women constitute an impassable barrier for cognition (for this reason idealist radical feminists are sometimes referred to as biological feminists). In effect, idealist radical feminists adopt an ascriptive and separatist approach (Rich, 1977; Morgan, 1978, 1982; Daly, 1979, 1984; Spender, 1980, 1982, 1984; Orbach, 1981; Arcana, 1983; Griffin, 1984a, 1984b). They posit a view that suggests that women are biologically different and as a consequence are psychologically different and thereby have a view of the world that is ungraspable to men. It is this innate difference (which usually projects men in negative ways emphasising aggressiveness, insensitivity and egocentrism, and women in positive ways) that excludes men from female perspectives and which has led men, in the past, to dominate and oppress women.2

Another form of idealist radical feminism occurs in what has been labelled psychoanalytic

feminism. The approach, which was particularly strong in France in the 1970s3 and subsequently in Italy and the United States, derives from the work of the French post-Freudian psychoanalyst Jacques Lacan. He argued that ‘woman’ or ‘femininity’ are radical symbols contradicting the patriarchal ‘symbolic order’— signs, codes and rituals expressed linguistically that make up the way in which we operate in society. Women from childhood are not allowed to develop, indeed, it is argued that women have never existed because they have had to use male points of reference. Psychoanalytic feminism is thus concerned with the masculinity in women’s heads that results from them being in a patriarchal society. It is not initially concerned with the material conditions of women’s lives, nor with discrimination that can be changed by legislation. Psychoanalytic feminism argues that women must re-evaluate their own worth, celebrate their own bodies and generally learn to appreciate and nurture their womanness. Strategies to do this include: psychoanalysis; women-only spaces; redefinition of sexuality; breaking with dependence on men; and developing new concepts and language. 2 It has been argued that this version of radical feminism is a highly conservative and politically reactionary approach. The approach is, in its extreme separatist form, incompatible with critical social research as it tends not to address the historically specific nature of social structures nor to undertake a materialist analysis of empirical data, instead relying heavily on idealist notions of inherent psyche. return 3 Key figures in the French movement which came to be called Psyche et Po (an abbreviation of ‘Psychoanalyse et Politique’) are Antoinette Fouqué and Helene Cixous. Its strong views and ‘intellectual terrorism’ waged over other feminist groups (including the ‘hijacking of the term ‘women’s liberation movement’ by registering it as a trademark and preventing other French feminists from referring to themselves as from the women’s liberation movement) led to strong feelings being expressed both for and against psychoanalytic feminism. return


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Materialist radical feminism also sees the oppression of women as primarily an oppression

by men. However, it is opposed to idealist radical feminism because it argues that such oppression is rooted in social relations and not biology. Materialist radical feminism therefore does not advocate ‘cultural separatism’. Materialist radical feminism proposes that radical changes in social relationships between men and women, and thus of radical changes in society, are the only long-term solution to the oppression of women.

In the main, materialist radical feminism takes a critical (and often Marxist) framework

and gives precedence to gender over class oppression. There is often a dualism in this approach that sees gender as related to but somehow prior to, and distinct from, class oppression. Radical materialist feminists sometimes refer to themselves as Marxist feminists as opposed to socialist feminists because they prefer to take on board Marx’s analytic framework and dialectical methodology rather than his socialist or class theory (Delphy, 1985).

Materialist radical feminism is similar, in its materialist orientation and dialectical analysis,

to a ‘capitalist patriarchy’ approach to socialist feminism. However, contrary to socialist feminism, materialist radical feminists (such as Christine Delphy) argue that feminism and Marxism will not be integrated by adding patriarchy to capitalism. Nor is it possible to see how class and gender oppression interrelate until women’s oppression is understood. Further, feminism cannot simply use the concepts developed for the analysis of class oppression in its analysis of patriarchy because such concepts actually obscure gender oppression,

Socialist feminism then differs from idealist radical feminism because it adopts a

materialist dialectical analysis and does not accept that gender is the sole or primary determinant of women’s oppression. Socialist feminism differs from materialist radical feminism in more subtle ways but, primarily, socialist feminism argues that sexual oppression within classes is (at least in part) a structural effect of capitalist relations. (Patriarchy, then, is interrelated with capitalism). Materialist radical feminism, argues that patriarchy and capitalism are separate forms of oppression (and that, chronologically, patriarchy precedes capitalism). 3.2.4 Conclusion While Marxist analysis tends to assume the oppressive nature of class, feminists have expended considerable effort arguing that gender is an oppressive mechanism. Even in the 1990s there was still considerable resistance to the idea from both women and men. Feminists still had to constantly reassert the sexist nature of society and will have to continue to do so in the face of post-feminism.

Feminists are divided over the operation of gender oppression. For some, it is

fundamentally down to the dominance exercised by men. For others, it is intertwined with class-based oppression, or at the very least cannot be seen in isolation from the structural organisation of society. Women have been systematically denied access to resources and thus to power. There is also considerable disagreement among feminists about suitable political tactics and the nature of the transformation that is being sought. A liberal democratic view asks no more than equal opportunity and access to resources. A more politically radical perspective declares such view bankrupt within the given socio-economic structure. Socialist feminism broadly requires an economic and gender transformation. Radical feminism argues the transformation must be directed to a new politics of gender, possibly achievable only through separatism (see Segal, 1987).


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While class and gender have provided the major axis of the debate and the focus of most of the antagonisms between different feminist perspectives, the debate has also been cross-cut by issues of race and sexuality. These have grown in prominence since the mid-1980s and have provided a basis for a redirecting of feminist analyses and a shift away from approaches that emphasise a unitary perspective to those that suggest the need for a multi-faceted analysis. For example, it is increasingly clear that the absence of black women in feminist discourses cannot be resolved by simply adding to existing corpus of knowledge, but that feminism must integrate the experiences of black women and take on board an understanding of racially constructed gender roles (Joseph, 1981; Moraga & Anzaldua, 1981; Carby, 1982; Davis, 1982; Jones, 1982; Parmar, 1982; Bourne, 1983; Dill, 1983).

The critical studies of gender oppression examined below do not include idealist radical

feminism. Such approaches tend to be conservative and politically reactionary. They do not tend to address the historically specific nature of social structures nor to undertake a materialist analysis of empirical data. Instead, they are transhistorical analyses that rely heavily on idealist notions of inherent psyche. When not rooted in biological determinacy, radical feminism invokes cultural separatism. Like many multiculturalists, the radical feminist construction of cultural absolutes ironically reflects the sexism and racism of the New Right (see section 4.2, below). In short, idealist radical feminism is incompatible with critical social research because (despite misleading titles (Firestone, 1971)), it does not undertake a dialectical analysis of historically specific social relations.

3.3. Ann Oakley: Sociology of Housework

3.3.1 Introduction Ann Oakley’s (1974a) The Sociology of Housework is an early example of critical research that analyses gender oppression.4 She regards as axiomatic that women are discriminated against; that gender differences are cultural; and that it is desirable that changes in women’s position should be brought about (Oakley, 1974a, p. 190). She takes up the issue of the invisibility of women and women’s concerns in both society at large and the discipline of sociology in particular. The sexism of society, she maintains, is reflected in the sexism of sociology.

Oakley’s study is indicative of the dynamic nature of critical social research. Feminist theory and analysis was much more sophisticated in the 190s [when Critical Social Research was published] than when Oakley did her study. Her analysis of the sexist nature of sociology and its indifference to women’s work was, as she admits, naïve. This does not deflect from the fact that they were apposite comments in the early 1970s. Indeed, fifteen years on from publication, sociology was only then seriously addressing its sexist (and racist) bias; and the reality of women’s domestic labour has hardly changed, even if feminist interest in the debate has waned. That Oakley would research and report the topic differently if she were to do it again (Oakley, 1985, p. xii)) does not detract from the critical nature of the study. The critical aspect of any work has to be judged in relation to the context of its time. Although somewhat imprecise about her feminist epistemology and reticent in her critique of positivism The Sociology of Housework, nonetheless, illustrates the critical process at work and provides a useful historically situated example of the development of gender-based critical social research. A view attested to by the re-publication of the book in 1985 with a new preface.

The social, political and academic context in which the work was undertaken inhibited a forceful assertion of her critique. Indeed, the research took place at a time when sexism was not a widely recognised concept outside the women’s movement. Feminists employed the

4 Oakley also used her research for a less sociological book on domestic work called Housewife (Oakley, 1974b).

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term but in society in general there was a low level of critique of sexism. In the academic sphere of sociology it was a term neither widely used nor understood, indeed it was actively resisted in many quarters.

Oakley’s empirical analysis of housework differed from prior work in two respects. First, it treated housework as a job in its own right and not an extension of the woman’s role as wife or mother. As such it disputes the biological determinist presupposition that women are reproducers and nurturers for whom housework is a natural extension of their maternal role. Second, it addressed housework from the point of view of those who did it, in this case, housewives with young children. It thus provided a woman’s perspective on housework and offered a correction to the distorted male-oriented perspective. As such it opposed the compliant approach of previous research by women on housework that, while arguing that housework is work, also accepted that to analyse it as such would mean a fundamental critique of patriarchal ideology.

3.3.2 Subject group and approach The Sociology of Housework is based on tape-recorded two-hour-long interviews conducted in 1971. The sample, selected from the medical records of two general practices, consisted of forty London housewives, born in Britain or Ireland, and aged between 20 and 30 all of whom were mothers of at least one child under five. The sample came from two different areas of London: one a predominantly working-class area, the other a middle-class area; and the sample was divided into two equal halves according to class, the designation of which was based essentially on the husband’s occupation.5

There is an apparent ambivalence in Oakley’s approach to her research topic. She was restrained by the academic rigours of doctoral research in the early 1970s while also wanting to develop a feminist perspective on research. The preponderant approach to social research in Britain at the time emphasised the ‘scientific’ collection of standardised, statistically analysable, objective data. Validity, reliability and representativeness were the watchwords of this scientistic approach in which the researcher/interviewer was to be a neutral data-collecting instrument sucking in information from a compliant and willing subject/interviewee. Researchers were expected to be unbiased and ‘value free’. The interpretation of data was supposedly not to be influenced by the researcher’s own perspective.

Accordingly, Oakley described her work as an exploratory pilot study, which is a prelude to the development of precise hypotheses for examination or for the testing of theory derived inductively from empirical data (Oakley, 1974a, p. 30). The reported aims of her research are to describe the housewife’s situation and the housewife’s attitude to housework; to examine patterns of satisfaction; and to suggest possible hypotheses to explain differences between housewives’ attitudes to housework and the housework situation. She construes her empirical data in scientistic terms arguing, somewhat tenuously, that her sample is unlikely to be unrepresentative. She concentrates on ‘factual’ questions susceptible to incorporation into rating scales (of satisfaction with housework), which ‘minimizes the task of interpretation’ and regrets the lack of additional judges to validate her scales (Oakley, 1974a, p. 36). Oakley presents her material both qualitatively and quantitatively. The discussion includes direct quotes from respondents alongside tables of sample percentages. She relies heavily on the construction of cross-tabulations usually of dichotomized or trichotomized variables, which are subjected to chi-square tests of statistical significance.6 These simple categories are based on her judgement of responses to specific questions, sometimes supported by additional material that emerged in the interview. She provides illustrative material, often lengthy quotes from respondents, as examples of how she classified respondents. Analysis of aggregate data 5 Oakley did this for comparative reasons with previously published studies and because her objection to this classificatory device was only at its embryonic stage at the time of the fieldwork. 6 One critic accused her of burying her substantive material under a mountain of chi-square tables (Hurstfield, 1975).


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is also augmented by quotes from her respondents and is usually set in the context of other published work from related fields.

The following excerpt, which considers the monotony of housework tasks, is an example of the kind of quantitative/qualitative analysis Oakley undertakes:

Dissatisfaction is higher among those who report monotony. Eighty per cent of the women who said ‘yes’ to the monotony question are dissatisfied with housework, compared to forty per cent of those who said ‘no’. (This difference is significant at the five per cent level). The conclusion to be drawn is that monotony is clearly associated with work dissatisfaction, and this is supported by the large number of housewives who mentioned monotony spontaneously at various points in the interview. A cinema manager’s wife and a toolmaker’s wife provide examples.

I like cooking and I like playing with the children, doing things for them—I don’t like the basic cleaning. It’s boring, it’s monotonous.

It’s the monotony I don’t like—it’s repetitive and you have to do the same things each day. I suppose it’s really just like factory work—just as boring. (Oakley, 1974a, p. 81)

Oakley concludes that when the percentage of housewives in her sample experiencing monotony, fragmentation of work tasks, and pressures of speed is compared with assembly workers (from Goldthorpe et al., 1968a) there is a close match between the inherent frustrations of assembly-line work and housework, which gives substance to feminist claims that housework is alienating.

3.3.3 The 'male' paradigm

Although Oakley adheres to conventional reporting for much of the study she is sceptical of the positivist approach and the ‘male-paradigm’ of scientistic research. From the outset there was a tension between the scientistic context and the feminist critique of sexism embodied in the societal and sociological view of housework.7

In The Sociology of Housework Oakley (1974a) voices two concerns about the taken-for-granted scientistic paradigm. First, an internal critique, which suggests that concerns with reliability and, more particularly, representativeness of the research are emphasised to the possible detriment of the validity. While large size samples reduce sampling error and therefore provide a more substantial basis for statistical generalisations, this does not in any way guarantee valid conclusions and many factors mediate against unbiased results from large samples: notably non-response; incomplete sampling frames; lack of ‘rapport’; and ‘hired hand effect’ (as Roth (1966) called it). Oakley (1974a, p. 33) argues that studies should be assessed on the basis of the objectives they set themselves and not some standardised ideals of statistical generalisability.

Second, and more importantly, Oakley (1974a) questions the whole idea of collecting comparable and statistically analysable objective data from her interviewees. Developing this point, Oakley (1981) sees ‘objective data gathering’ as part of a ‘male paradigm’ of science, which is concerned much more with ‘objectivity, detachment, and hierarchy’ than individual’s concerns. The ‘male paradigm’ proposes ‘science’ as an important cultural activity and this reflects ‘a masculine social and sociological vantage point’ rather than to a feminine one (Oakley, 1981, p. 38).

The research procedure of the ‘male paradigm’ is encapsulated in the paradox of the ‘perfect interview’. Conventional wisdom (Goode & Hatt, 1952; Kahn & Cannell, 1957; Moser, 1958; Sellitz et al., 1965; Galtung, 1967; Sjoberg & Nett, 1968; Benney & Hughes, 1970; Shipman, 1972) demands that the interview should be a data-collecting instrument that works unidirectionally (interviewee to interviewer) and in which the interviewer is in control and the interviewee socialised into the role of information provider. The interview should be conducted dispassionately in order that ‘objective’ and statistically analysable data can be collected. The success of the interview depends on good ‘rapport’ between interviewer and 7 Indeed reviewers of the book have attacked her lack of ‘objectivity’ because she was quite open about being a feminist (for example, Barker, 1974) (see Oakley, 1985).


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interviewee, in which the interviewee is manipulated in a kindly and sympathetic way to provide the desired information. ‘Rapport’, then, is not about an interrelationship between the interviewer and interviewee but about manipulation of the interviewee. The interviewer must, however, avoid ‘overrapport’ as this might jeopardise the ‘objectivity’ of the process. The balance between intimacy and objectivity is not just a fine line but, argues Oakley, is contradictory.

At root, the ‘male paradigm’ denies the relevance of the personal. Subjectivity is derided. Emotions and feelings are treated with scorn. The personal is not a constituent of knowledge according to this scientistic paradigm. Oakley argues against the ‘male paradigm’ that feminist research, in taking the personal seriously, must not only be unafraid of a more intimate relationship with subjects but must be prepared to become involved with respondents in a non-hierarchical way. The interviewer must be prepared to ‘invest his or her own personal identity in the relationship’ (Oakley, 1981, p. 41).8

The ‘use of prescribed interviewing practice is morally indefensible’ (Oakley, 1981, p. 41) because it undermines the feminist reassessment of the interrelationship of women with one another that are encapsulated in what Oakley describes as the nebulous but important concept of ‘sisterhood’. Thus she could not adopt an exploitative attitude to interviewees as sources of data. xxxxxx She suggests that the, ‘general and irreconcilable contradictions at the heart of the textbook paradigm’ (Oakley, 1981, p. 41) are exposed when matched against her own experiences (chiefly Oakley, 1979), which showed that, in repeated interviewing, being asked questions by subjects was a frequent occurrence and it would have been impossible not to provide information, pass opinions, and so on, as the women involved wanted information (about childbirth) they did not have, nor felt they could seek elsewhere. To remain detached and non-committal would have undermined the ‘rapport’. The contradiction of the ‘male paradigm’ is also apparent in the comments made by people who recount research experience (Bell & Newby, 1977; Bell & Encel, 1978). They show that there is a disjunction between the reality and the textbook prescriptions that fail to engage the political contexts of research. xxxxxx More specifically, Oakley argued that depth interviews that explored an area of concern were far better than standardised interviews that used single item indicators. She noted, for example, that in a reply to a simple question ‘Do you like housework?’ middle-class women were far more likely to give a negative answer than working-class women. On probing, however, Oakley’s interviewees clearly undermine the view that the ‘unhappy housewife is a purely middle-class phenomenon’. The attitudes of working-class women to the different tasks that make up housework are very similar to the middle-class group. Oakley suggests that this apparent contradiction is illustrative of a ‘methodological moral’, that simple questions produce simple answers.

This dissatisfaction with direct questioning is also manifested in her inclusion of an adapted ‘Twenty Statements Test’ (Kuhn & McPartland, 1954; McPartland & Cumming 1958; Kuhn, 1960) as a research tool. About half way through the interview the forty women were given a test of ‘self-attitudes’. Oakley asked her respondents for ten (rather than twenty) written statements beginning ‘I am ...’ which she wanted them to write as quickly as possible ‘as though describing themselves to themselves rather than to anybody else’ (Oakley, 1974a, p. 121). Kuhn and McPartland’s idea was that such a technique, contrary to direct questioning, allowed the salience of an attitude to become apparent. Oakley uses the responses to show that working-class women are more likely to refer to themselves by

8 Oakley became ‘involved’ with her interviewees, where necessary helping out with domestic tasks whilst interviewing and usually enjoyed hospitality ranging from tea or coffee to a meal (Oakley, 1979). In short she broke down the idea of hierarchical relationship of data-gatherer to informant and substituted a two-way interchange of equals. ‘The attitude I conveyed could have had some influence in encouraging the women to regard me as a friend rather than purely as a data gatherer’ (Oakley, 1981, p. 47). Indeed, four years after the final interview used in her study, she was still in touch with a third of the sample and four had become close friends. She notes that such features of repeated interviewing are not unknown (Laslett & Rapoport, 1975; Rapoport & Rapoport; 1976) but are under-reported.


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reference to a domestic role than are the middle-class women, the latter tending more to refer to their personality traits. The use of this device, although firmly underpinned by the intention to provide objective measurable criteria, is indicative of Oakley’s desire to discover what is central to the women’s own perspective. The interpretive-objectivist tension inherent in the Twenty Statements Test (Meltzer et al., 1975; Couch et al., 1986) is indicative of the methodological ambiguity in the book as a whole.

The Sociology of Housework represented the first approximation to a research style more fully discussed and developed by Oakley some years later. The approach, which was evident ‘between the lines’ (Oakley, 1985, p. xi), sets aside the prevailing objectivism of standard empirical enquiry. Oakley abandoned conventional interviewing ethics and did not treat the women interviewed simply as data providers. She adopted the view that the subjectivity of the subject is intrinsic to feminist analysis of social experience. Her approach gave more prominence to the subjective situation of women in both sociology and in society in general. Interviewing women was a strategy for documenting women’s own accounts of their lives with the interviewer providing a vehicle for promoting a sociology for women. Thus the interviewer is no longer a data-collecting instrument for researchers but has become ‘a data-collecting instrument for those whose lives are being researched’ (Oakley, 1981, p. 49).

3.3.4 Sexism in sociology and consciousness raising

A fundamental element of Oakley’s work is a critique of the sexism of sociology. This is evident not only in the ‘male paradigm’ of knowledge9 but also in the substantive issues explored by sociology. The academic sexism she reveals owes much to three factors: the traditional concerns of sociology encapsulated in the perspectives of the aptly named ‘founding fathers’; the sex of the majority of sociologists [at the time]; and the tendency of functionalist sociology (dominant in the USA and UK in the 1960s) to reproduce the status quo, especially the ideology of gender roles, which it assimilates uncritically from the wider society. Sociology is male-oriented. It focuses on the interests and activities of men in a gender-differentiated society. Women are rendered invisible.

What little work has been directed to housework has invariably been done in the context of the family and it has tended to a view that suggests that there is more equality in the marriage relationship than hitherto (Blood & Woolf, 1960; Fletcher, 1962; Bott, 1971; Young & Willmott, 1973). Oakley’s empirical work denies this presumption. Her respondents show that a fundamental separation remains within the family unit with home and children remaining the woman’s primary responsibility (Oakley, 1974a, p. 165).

Essentially, Oakley argues that sociologists bring to their data their own values that repeat the popular theme of gender difference. There has been little interest in researching housework as such and even less concern with women’s views of housework. This lack of interest taken in housework by the sociological establishment she sees as indicative of its intrinsic sexism.10

Sociology, despite its studies of the socialization of girls (Hartley, 1966; Joffe, 1971; Weitzman et al., 1972) has failed, Oakley argues, to critically transcend mere commentary on the long period of apprenticeship of girls to the housewife role. Her interviewees provide substance for the view that girls are socialised to a feminine role in which housewifery and self-determination are blended together. The pervasive sexist ideology encumbers women’s awareness of their subservient and exploited role by coalescing their labour with their self-perception as wives and mothers. Thus, ‘housekeeping behaviours’ tend to be developed as

9 This tends to categorise qualitative methods such as participant observation and small-sample depth-interviewing as ‘feminine’ and academically less prestigious than ‘masculine’ quantitative techniques. (Oakley, 1974a, p. 21). 10 For example, a belief that the family is the only important vehicle of reward and realization for women has led to a distortion of their role in the stratification system. Similarly, and an unspoken devaluation of female types of power as trivial and insignificant has led political sociology towards a one-sided examination of formal constraint-and authority systems (Oakley, 1974a, p. 25).


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‘personality functions’ (Oakley, 1974a, p. 114). This ideology is manifested in the self-discipline that many of her sample imposed upon themselves through routines and standards ‘inherited’ from mothers.

Oakley uses her material not simply to provide a female perspective on housework, which hitherto had been more or less ignored, but also to present a political case, guided by feminist principles, to ‘liberate’ women from the structural oppression that the pervasive concept of domesticity consigns them to. The presentation and examination of women’s feelings and attitudes about housework is used to cast doubt on the dominant and pervasive notion and to suggest a strategy for action. She is concerned to explore the extent of anti-sexist consciousness among women and thus suggest the most suitable tactics for liberation. She sees a goal of feminist research the fostering among women of ‘an understanding of the social and economic forces that mould their role in society, and the ways in which this role is potentially open to change’ (Oakley, 1974a, p. 190).

She found that her interviewees held conservative views, preferring to retain differences between men and women, particularly the retention of what they saw as the traditional privileges of femininity (such as priority over a seat on a crowded bus). They tended to hold contradictory views about their role as housewives. One apparent contradiction was the general dislike of housework but not a denial of the housework role. More profoundly, there were marked contradictions in respect of their work contribution and their status. Women who clearly ran the home talked of their husbands as the natural head of the household; those who complained about their husbands’ lack of involvement in domestic tasks referred to women liking housework; those who complained of greater freedom for men in marriage regarded their own restriction to the home as natural.

The acceptance of these contradictions encumbered any acceptance of feminist perspectives, as resolving the contradictions required a fundamental critique of their existence and of the position of women. As a response to this, Oakley argued for the need for consciousness raising among women. She suggested her own survey had inevitably sparked off such consciousness raising simply by getting the housewives in her sample to talk about what they did.

There was, however, another political lesson for feminists to learn. Her respondents were unsympathetic to the Women’s Liberation Movement (which they tended to see as represented in banal media images and stereotypes) and unresponsive to feminist concerns because they felt that activists were scornful of housework and only concerned with paid work. There was no point of contact, no empathy, between housewives and feminists. Oakley found this disappointing given that ‘at the present time there is an increasing vogue for seeing housewives at the centre of women’s revolutionary potential’ (Oakley, 1974a, p. 193). She argues that it is optimistic to expect ‘total liberation from a divisively feminine upbringing in a decidedly sexist culture’. This should not, however, deter a striving for liberation a major tool of which is a ‘comprehensive understanding’ of the way in which women ‘internalize their own oppression’. Structures that oppress women ‘cannot be altered unless there is a prior awareness among women of the need for change’ (Oakley, 1974a, p. 195).

Thus consciousness raising should focus on housework and not motherhood or sexuality. It should not simply ridicule media stereotypes of the housewife, rather it should uncover and analyse ‘the need to be a housewife which is at the heart of the female predicament’. The unintended collusion of women in their own subordination, Oakley suggests, would be realized by this means and the ‘deconditioned’ wife would become a potential revolutionary (Oakley, 1974a, p. 196).

3.3.5 Conclusion

The critical nature of Oakley’s work is evident in a number of ways. She clearly objects to the spurious objectivity of the positivistic scientific method, which she refers to as the ‘male paradigm’ of research. Her focus is a critique of conventional interviewing techniques but


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underpinning it is a severe doubt about the nature of the knowledge so generated and the ethics of a male-oriented exploitative process. Her intention is to go beyond an account of housework as the work of housewives and to locate it in the context of the patriarchal family. She reconceptualises housework, on the one hand, in the same terms as any other paid work, and, on the other, as a series of tasks. Although the deconstruction of the concept of housework could have been developed further,11 she does provide a basis for examining the contradiction between the role and the work.

Oakley locates housework in the wider context of economic, social and political structures, pointing to the socialisation of girls to the role of housewife and the pervasiveness of patriarchal ideology that coalesces femininity with housewifery. Although using statistical techniques her concern is not to draw cause-and-effect relations but to provide some insights to the world of domestic labour from the point of view of the women who do it. Her aggregate material is thus always supplemented by qualitative excerpts.

The work is not pitched ‘objectively’ (except in as far as was necessary for academic recognition) but is geared to political ends that are predicated upon a feminist view of women’s oppression. Her analysis of housework is in direct conflict with others who have looked at family relations without transcending taken-for-granted views of the permanence of patriarchal relations.

3.4. Cynthia Cockburn: Brothers

3.4.1 Introduction Cynthia Cockburn’s Brothers is a feminist study of the impact of new technology on the work situation of highly paid skilled print compositors. The compositor,12 who throughout the history of printing in Britain has almost exclusively been male, enjoys a patriarchal craft culture with a strong trade-union identification. The tenacity by which compositors have held onto their craft identity marks them out as unique. However, Cockburn argues that despite the lack of typicality they offer an excellent illustration of the processes of change that lead to the dissolution of a craft and the effects of that dissolution. Examining the changing world of the compositor raises the questions: ‘What alternatives are open to such men? What sense do they make of what is happening to them? What will influence their political decisions and trade-union strategies?’ (Cockburn, 1983, p. 4).

Cockburn sees her subjects not just as skilled craft workers but as men too. She is as concerned with the gender relations at work and at home as she is with the conventional class relations. The experience of class, Cockburn argues, cannot be understood without reference to sex and gender (Rubin, 1975). She thus combines a Marxist analysis of class with

11 As Oakley acknowledges when she points to ‘the rather poor differentiation between key concepts such as “identification” and “involvement” with the housewife role, the enormously important underlying assumption that there is a single phenomenon called the housewife role rather than—a distinctly more interesting but difficult possibility—many interpretations in different social groups of what it means to be a housewife.’ (Oakley, 1985, p. ix). 12 The compositor’s work consists of typesetting and composition along with a number of lesser tasks. Typesetting is usually via a linotype machine which is a skilled job in as much as the operator has to be able to operate the keyboard of ninety keys (which is nothing like a QWERTY typewriter keyboard), make decisions about spacing and hyphenation, carry out routine maintenance of the machine. The machine operates as follows. At each keystroke a small brass matrix is released from the overhead magazine, slides down a chute, and collects in an assembler where they may be read as a line. The collected matrices, each representing a letter of the alphabet, have molten lead forced into the characters resulting in a solid slug or ‘line o’ type’ which is ejected into a waiting tray (galley). Composition, in its narrow sense, refers to the process of collecting the set type and assembling it to form a printing surface. The compositor’s tasks make demands on physical strength (the assembled type is heavy), numeracy, literacy and aesthetic sense in composing the page. In its broadest sense, compositor refers to an all-round craft worker who undertakes both these and the lesser-related tasks.

3. Gender 3.4. Cynthia Cockburn: Brothers

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a socialist-feminist analysis of sex/gender. It is not satisfactory to see sex/gender divisions as a by-product of class processes (Seccombe, 1974; Zaretsky, 1976). To argue that capital exploits women as cheap labour that is resisted by male workers overlooks the ‘social and political benefits accruing to men of all classes of women’s long subordination’ (Cockburn, 1983, p. 6).

Cockburn is clear from the outset that she adopts an explicit Marxist historical materialist method. She is equally clear that this should be applied to a sex/gender as well as a class dimension. She thus proposes a dual class and gender analysis.

Using a historical and materialist method that does not differ from marxist method, we can none the less model the world in an alternative way. Marxist historical materialism speaks of a mode of production. Feminist historical materialism proposes that there exists as well, as in all societies, a sex/gender system which determines the social categories that people of different sexes fill. (Cockburn, 1983, p. 6)

She takes the view that biological sex differences are socially constructed into gender differences. The study of the print compositors reflects the ‘constitutive process’ (Williams, 1961) in the historical evolution of classes (in capitalism) and genders (in patriarchy). The capital–labour struggle over the control of technology, skill and trade unionism is both about the forging of class character and the process by which men and women define each other as genders. Capital holds the initiative over workers and, by securing privileged access to money, men hold the initiative over women.

Within the male bastions of the craft unions there evolves a ‘masculine’ self-image with its attendant desire to ‘keep’ a wife who ministers to his needs at home in a strictly gender defined division of labour. This, Cockburn argues, cannot be explained by class theory but requires reference to a sex/gender system. Cockburn, thus, operates with an explicit dualist system (Hartmann, 1979) of class and of sex/gender rather than a single social system, capitalist patriarchy (Eisenstein, 1979), that combines both mode of production and sex/gender system. Cockburn argues further, that neither class nor gender analysis makes any sense without the other.13

Cockburn is aware that attempting a dual analysis is difficult because ‘thinking in terms of two systems at once is not easy’, especially to ‘marxists who have such a well developed sense of the class system’. A century of experience of distinguishing a ‘mode of production’ has led us to ‘expect to find an economic base, a set of practices that produce wealth and distribute goods’; political institutions ‘for controlling class conflict’; ‘physical forces mobilised in class struggle’; and the material expressions of a class manifest ideologically (Cockburn, 1983, pp. 194-5).

Thus when a feminist and Marxist analysis are attempted simultaneously the former is often subordinated to the latter (Hartmann, 1979a) and consequently men’s contribution to exploitation and oppression is ignored. This is partly due to a lack of confidence in defining the location of a sex/gender analysis. It appears that all the practices and institutions (even the bastion of feminism, the family) are already integrated into the class analysis that raises questions about the arena for the operation of patriarchy. Cockburn’s resolution questions the notion of autonomous oppressive realms. She argues that it is as mistaken to see patriarchal oppression only in relation to the family or sexual relations as it is to suppose that capitalist power is exercised only in the factory. The sex/gender system operates in all the same structures as does class relations.

We don’t live two lives, one as a member of a class, the other as a man or a woman. Everything we do takes its meaning from our membership of both systems.... Feminism, like marxism, is a world view and its subject is the world itself: a totality. The two systems are, at bottom, conceptual models, each explaining different phenomena. We need them both. (Cockburn, 1983, p. 195)

13 Indeed, the book is as much about showing the relevance of a sex/gender dimension as it is about the examination of the impact of new technology.


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In her analysis of the particular workplace occupied by male compositors, events, she argues, can only be understood if read from both a class and a gender perspective.

3.4.2 Technology control and working practices

Cockburn (1983, p. 86) develops a totalistic approach in that she sees the struggle over the control of the work process as an integral feature of the recurrent crises endemic to the capitalist process. Capitalist development is characterised by cycles of boom and depression.14 To prevent a deterioration in profit ratios capital has to assert control over the labour process, to override the human priorities of the workers by the imperative of productivity. Thus technology plays a key role in the struggle between capital and labour and, consequently, in capitalist development. Photocomposition and computer technology in the print industry cannot be seen as standing alone. They are an integral part of the politics of control that is intrinsic to the continual crises of capitalism.The cyclical nature of capitalism, rooted in its inherent contradictions, is an economic presupposition that informs Cockburn’s analysis. It is in this context that the struggle for the control of the work situation is enacted. This struggle for control is not, however, just one that operates on a class dimension but is also manifest on a sex/gender dimension.

Technological innovation is not a new weapon of capitalism; it has always been the tool used by capital to strike at the heart of craft power and nowhere more so than in the print industry. Cockburn describes the historical context of her ethnographic study in order to reveal the continued process of struggle over technology and the consequent effect on the constant reappraisal of the job. She focuses on working class practices in relation to new technology as this both grounds the analysis empirically and allows an examination of the divisive forces acting within the working class itself.

For example, in the 1890s with the patent of the linotype machine, capitalist employers attempted to divide labour by deskilling, and thereby usurping craft control. The technical know-how needed to operate a linotype machine however enabled the craft unions to retain control of the labour process and undermine the potential increased ‘productivity’ offered by the ‘hot metal’ process. This control was abetted by the lack of female labour (due to a number of factors including male hostility, the perceived ‘heaviness’ of the work, and legislation that restricted female night-work) and the continued success in denying the access of unskilled labour to the compositors’ closed craft shop.15

14 Periods of profitable growth produce full employment and so strengthen the working class. Workers have a choice of jobs, unions can demand high wages and exert a confident sway over the actual process of work. The competition for profits, however, leads to heavier capitalisation by individual firms, or nations, in order to increase their competitiveness. Advanced technology ‘saves’ on labour and increases a firm’s capacity, enabling it to profit by expanding markets. But as more and more capital is drawn into use, production tends to outstrip consumption and the boom to be broken by crisis. The weakest firms go bankrupt. The economy contracts, workers are laid off, unemployment rises and the weakened working class is unable to resist the depression of wages and the intensification of the authority of capital. The units of capital that survive do so by investing in new areas where labour is cheaper, such as the Third World or by developing new technology that cuts the reliance on costly workers. While capitalism needs wealthy consumers, each firm or nation, to remain competitive, needs poorly paid workers. 15 Elements of current and recent practices are located in the long-established printers’ apprenticeship system, the key strategy of which was control of entry of labour to the craft and the job. The strategy was successful in ensuring a shortage of labour in the trade until the 1960s. The strategy was made possible by the pre-capitalist ‘chapel’ system that, guided by the ‘oldest freeman’ or ‘father of the chapel’, operated a system of democratic and collectively binding decision-making. The system became encapsulated in the print unions with the advent of capitalism. The local sections of the National Graphic Association (NGA) are still referred to as ‘chapels’ with the local shop floor union representatives retaining the title of ‘father of the chapel’ (FOC). The chapels were exclusive groups of skilled working men. Unskilled male workers were excluded. The entry of women to composition was even more determinedly resisted through both the development of ordnances and by custom and practice, which created a hostile setting that it was difficult for women to penetrate.


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The history of printing shows a conscious activism and a fundamental presupposition that there exists a state of conflict between printers and employers (Sykes, 1967). Capitalist owners continually attempted to undermine the exclusivity, and hence power, of the skilled print workers, hoping to cheapen the value of labour power. Any incursions were met with considerable vigour by the chapels. Cockburn outlines a class-based analysis of the emerging crisis faced by print workers, drawing on notions of labour aristocracy (Hobsbawm, 1964; Foster, 1974; Stedman-Jones, 1975; Lenin, 1977), dequalification and deskilling (Braverman, 1974; Brighton Labour Process Group, 1977; Elger, 1979). However, despite the sophistication of the class analysis it is not, Cockburn argues, adequate alone as it ignores the sex/gender dimension.

The skilled workers saw women as a distinct problem; as almost an underclass ‘below’ the unskilled. Women have quite openly been excluded and seen as rivals for jobs. The aggressiveness shown by craftsmen and their unions towards women is projected as an inevitable by-product of the men’s class struggle with the employers (who wanted to use women as a source of cheap labour). This, Cockburn argues, is illusory as men used different arguments against women than against other male rivals for jobs and they ‘expressed the interests of men in the social and sexual subordination of women’ (Cockburn, 1983, p. 151). Drawing on specific historical events which pitted men against women in the print trade and resulted in the virtual exclusion of the latter, Cockburn shows that the three-cornered struggle between employers, male and female workers only makes sense if a sex/gender analysis is combined with class. For example, capitalists were not interested in having women enter the trade other than as a cheap source of labour. When a national conference of print compositors hypocritically passed a motion in 1886 agreeing to accept women into the trade but only on equal pay rates with men (although simultaneously denying the suitability of women for the work) they were creating a situation in which employers would never take on women. The apparent egalitarianism of the motion belies its clear intention to retain an all-male bastion.

That women have been employed in printing in fewer numbers than men, earned lower wages for ‘equivalent work’, and been ghettoised in lower status occupations, is not entirely the fault of the capitalist. Working men have had a hand in it. At root, the exclusion of women reflects a patriarchal ideology that hides behind class interests. Cockburn adopts a hegemonic view of ideology (Gramsci, 1971), arguing that, although ideologies are grounded in material practices and that in the last resort the material world provides the limits of ideological change, ideology is not determined by material forms. Material forces are ‘riven by contradictions’ and it is in the engagement with these contradictions that people are able, collectively, to develop their ideology.

Male hegemony holds women in compliance by making alternatives unthinkable and is thus as effective as bourgeois hegemony in its control of the working class. The patriarchal ideology of the compositor is encapsulated in the idea of essential gender attributes, the complementarity of males and females, and a dualist view of women as people to be protected or to be used. Essentialism and complementarity are functional ideologies, with which women collude, which deny inequality and prefer the inevitability of the gender status quo.

Cockburn analyses her material to try and draw out the meanings that the men are constructing about their changed situation and the ideology they are constructing and deploying to stave off their loss. The printing industry in general is having to fight against do-it-yourself printing, electronic media, and so on. Unemployment is high and the position of labour weakened. Computerisation offers productivity gains that far outstrip the gains that could have been made from mechanical typesetting. Women cannot be excluded on spurious grounds (strength, concentration, lacking basic skills). The structure of patriarchal rights has been undermined by legislation and state policy and this is reflected in a growing female self-consciousness.


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3.4.3 Contradiction Cockburn’s study, which was carried out between mid-1979 and late 1981, draws

principally on fifty, lengthy, semi-structured interviews with compositors in four newspaper companies, two on Fleet Street (Mirror Group and the Times) and two London regionals (King & Hutchins Ltd. and Croydon Advertiser Ltd.). Her questions focussed on eleven key areas:

apprenticeship, the old technology, the new technology, the firm, women as competitors and colleagues, union policies, relations with less skilled men, feelings about class, homelife and domestic relationships, the newspaper as product, and the future of work for compositors. (Cockburn, 1983, p. 9)

The interviews were structured around ‘72 basic questions’, which she asked in any order that fitted the conversational approach of the interview, which began with the general questions of how and why the subject came to be in the trade.

Cockburn also interviewed management, shop-floor union representatives, some women members of the NGA as well as men and women members of the less-skilled union NATSOPA. All the subjects have in common experience of the ‘hot metal’ process of type preparation for letterpress printing and experience or anticipation of a transfer to ‘cold’ computerised photocomposition. The interviews allowed her to construct specific case studies of the incorporation of new technology in the four newspaper groups. She noted the circumstances, reasons, key decisions, style of introduction, and degree of resistance that accompanied the installation of new technology.

What Cockburn seeks from the tape-recorded and carefully transcribed interviews is not a catalogue of percentages summarising her basic questions but the revelation of contradictory actions and attitudes evident in the work process. The compositors in her study are faced by contradictions that are both a result of material working practices and of ideology. For example, the work environment in which the men operate the new technology is cleaner, quieter and more comfortable and the work itself is lighter and less onerous. The result is higher productivity for less effort and yet, contradictorily, it is regarded as less satisfying. This reflects a historically established contradiction. On the one hand compositors have high regard for the idea of craft excellence and hard work, while on the, they realise that it is a work ideology that accentuates self-exploitation. Cockburn argues that it is the very mechanism of contradiction that prompts a redirection or ideological change.

The identification of contradictions reflects Oakley’s (1974a) analysis but Cockburn makes them a much more central concern. To conceptualise contradiction, she argues, involves a dialectical way of thinking that emphasises process. ‘Events and interconnections not linear causality unfold and one form replaces another, denying it and yet developing out of it’ (Cockburn, 1983, p. 11). This synthetic view of contradiction involves a view of dialectics that presupposes that all phenomena contain their opposites (Mao, 1971; Hegel, 1974; Engels, 1975). The inherent contradiction can lead to a rupture given changing external circumstances. The nature and timing of any break, however, is not determined by external pressure but is contingent upon the form of the contradiction itself. There is no end to this process as the resulting synthesis contains its own negation. Thus dialectical analysis is not about establishing causal links but proposes a ‘theory of the relation between knowledge and the world and between phenomena and the sense we make of them’ (Cockburn, 1983, p. 11).

Cockburn aims to reveal the contradictions operating in the world of the print compositor, not just in abstract but through the direct experiences and reflections of her subject group. Her account of the compositors’ world and the contradictions that operate in it is thus generously laced with direct quotes from the interviews that reveal contradictions in the men’s ideas, opinions and actions. For Cockburn, contradictions were not problems to be resolved; they became the goal of the research.

The increased participation of women in printing upsets the gender separation and accompanying image men have of women. The image that women are either ‘pure’ and family oriented or ‘loose’ and available on demand (by men) is upset by having women work


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alongside men in what used to be a male bastion in which these simple stereotypes were common currency for idle conversation. The arrival of women in the workplace means that the male image is contrasted by the woman’s own definition of her sexuality. ‘As a competitor for jobs she must be taken seriously and cannot be seen as a sexual pawn which he can protect and cherish’ (Cockburn, 1983, p. 187). This fundamental contradiction that has arisen as a result of males being unable to sustain an exclusive bastion in the face of new technological innovations has far reaching consequences. Compositors are faced with more than an economic threat to their jobs; they face a threat to the sexual structuration of their whole world. Thus Cockburn is led, by the impact of new technology, into ‘a study of the making and remaking of men’ (Cockburn, 1983, p. 3).

3.4.4 Deskilling

The remaking is enacted at one level in the acquisition of new skills; of prime importance is the skill to touch-type on an electronic QWERTY keyboard. This they learnt, in the main, from women instructors. Such skills the compositors regarded as deskilling. The new technology was intangible, if anything went wrong with a keyboard or terminal the men were unable to repair it or carry out routine maintenance. Except for their aesthetic appreciation, their old hard-won skills were irrelevant. Their new skills are by no means exclusive or indicative of a trade. The men feel they are craft frauds. This reskilling has the direct effect of emasculation, the male compositor feels that the new technology has turned the craft into a ‘woman’s job’ and with it the mystique of the craftsman has gone (Cockburn, 1983, p. 104).

The issue of skill and deskilling is of central significance in the particular case of the impact of computerised technology on the print compositors craft, but it also has much wider consequences. At one level deskilling is about attempts by capital to undermine the power of craft unions. Deskilling according to the standard Marxist theorists is about control manifested in the standardisation of routines, disassociating the labour process from the skills of the worker, managerial organisation, and efficient division of tasks into unskilled components.16 However, Cockburn argues, this analysis rather oversimplifies the situation relating to the British print compositor. To understand it better it is necessary to carefully analyse the concept of skill.

The concept of skill is of central importance in understanding the internal divisions in the working class. Skill operates in a complex way in respect of both class and gender divisions. Skill as an abstract category needs to be examined in relation to work practices; in short skill, as an empty abstraction, has to be filled by reference to empirical work practices. At one level, skill is the individual’s accumulated experience that adds up to the total experience of the worker. Second, skill refers to that which is necessary to perform a given job. This may or may not match the worker’s skill. Third, skill has a political dimension, being that which a group of organised workers can defend against challenges from employers and other groups of workers. Initially, in printing, the three aspects of skill were in harmony but with the advent of computerised photocomposition the three aspects are no longer synchronous. The new technology has seen a sharp distinction arise between ‘skill in the man’ and ‘skill in the job’ with the union struggling hard to hang on to ‘skill as a class political concept’.

Skill has a fourth dimension. It is also a sex/gender weapon. The skill attributed to a job (and hence the status of the job) has much more to do with the sex of the person doing it than the real demands of the work (Rubery and Wilkinson, 1979; Phillips and Taylor, 1980; Coyle, 1982). Compositors are faced with accepting that their new job is deskilled or acknowledging that many women are as skilled as men. This dilemma is reflected in bitterness voiced by the men.

16 Thus labour can be recruited, trained and replaced cheaply and can be easily diverted from one task to another. In short, capitalist control of the labour process leads to ever-increasing division of labour and ‘degradation’ of work (Braverman, 1974). Although deskilling is about job control it also reflects a shift in the interests of capital. The disinterest in craft was accompanied by a similar lack of concern with standards. Instead, the focus of attention was on specialisation, increased productivity and selling.


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A fifth dimension of skill is its social status. Skilled craftwork sets the worker above other manual workers. The acknowledged loss of skill goes hand in hand with a loss of self-esteem and status amongst other male workers. The perceived social decline is accentuated because women are equally able to do the job, and, this time, have access to it. In making the old skills redundant the new technology has left the compositor confused about the standing of their work. They see the new office environment as upgrading the job but as downgraded by the change in skill required. Where this leaves them as far as their social status is concerned is a problem they find difficult to resolve.

So the question of skill is as much about gender as it is about class. Cockburn was able to draw out this dual impact in her interviews as she focussed on the issues of union amalgamation and the impact of new technology on skill differentials.

3.4.5 Conclusion

Cockburn shows, through situating the empirical data, in a wider social context that men have created an economic, political, social and physical position of advantage for themselves over women. This is encapsulated and perpetrated in patriarchal institutions varying from general political structures, through the nuclear family, to the specific exclusivity of male clubs and, in the case of the study group, print chapels. In short working-class women are doubly trapped.17

Cockburn’s study engages prevailing studies of male work by addressing it from a gender perspective as well as a class perspective. Work for Cockburn, is integral to the self-identity of the workers. She thus addresses the changes to the long-established skilled occupation brought about by new technology as it affects the remaking of self-image. At the heart of this remaking is the concept of skill. Cockburn deconstructs the abstract notion of skill to reveal its multi-faceted nature, which incorporates economic and political dimensions as well as that of performance. The analysis of skill makes sense only as part of a holistic appreciation of the compositor’s job. Cockburn’s holistic analysis is both structural and historical, tracing the development of the print trade as it relates to their evolution of capitalist and patriarchal forms. The way she is able to reveal the tension between material practices and ideological forms is through the examination of contradictions that emerge from her ethnographic interviews. These contradictions become the focus of the study and provide a means of linking the particular ethnographic material to the wider socio-economic and political structures that impinge on the world of work and the gender relationships that it supports.

3.5 Sallie Westwood—All Day Every Day

3.5.1 Perspective In her study of female factory workers Sallie Westwood (1984) looks at the way paid

employment and family commitments come together to make women’s lives. Westwood’s empirical study focuses attention on the lives of women on the factory shopfloor. Women are subjected to patriarchal and capitalist oppression, and, for a good many of the women she researched, racial oppression as well. She argues that feminist analysis must take account of both class and race as well as gender.

Women, she argues, are exploited through the capitalist mode of production which, in selling their labour power, gives them their class position. In addition, women are workers in the home where they are also exploited through the gift of their domestic labour to men. Both situations are oppressive, and conceptually it would be possible to distinguish two 17 ‘Socio-political power organised within a trade union such as the compositors’ societies wins the ‘right’ to certain physical competences and so secures greater earning power. Higher earnings make men more politically and socially powerful in domestic life. Physical and technical competence produces economic advantage for men but also enables them to control women physically. The circle is complete - and vicious indeed. What is more, this circle interlocks with another, with the exploitation of one class by its counterpart, in such a way that working-class women are doubly trapped.’ (Cockburn, 1983, p. 205).

3. Gender 3.5 Sallie Westwood—All Day Every Day

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systems of oppression. However, Westwood suggests that capitalism and patriarchy bear on each other and are not easily divided between home and workplace. Indeed, she went first to the work-place rather than the home in order to ‘seek out patriarchy’ (Westwood, 1984, p. 3).18

The inextricable link between patriarchy and capitalism Westwood sees as encompassed in the dual relation of women to class. They are working-class wage- earners but the wages they earn are not equivalent to a living wage and this leads to a tendency to marriage as a means of accessing higher wage income. This results in a second relationship to class through a relationship with a male wage which in itself reinforces the dependence and subordination of women to men.

Westwood argues that both capitalism and patriarchy19 effect women’s subordination. She does not see capitalism or patriarchy as wholly autonomous nor reducible one to the other.20 For her, patriarchy (which includes material control and exploitation and a legitimating ideology) and mode of production are ‘simultaneously one world and two, relatively autonomous parts of a whole which has to be fought on both fronts’. She sees the lives of her subjects as ‘encompassed by patriarchal relations, which are part of “patriarchal capitalism”’ (Westwood, 1984 pp. 5–6).

Race provides a further dimension. Westwood argues that feminists cannot afford to ignore race nor simply tack it on to analyses of gender oppression. Nor, she argues, is it a good idea to consider race along with class and gender as a triple oppression. It has been hard enough for feminist socialists to bring class and gender together in a way that allows them to hold onto the complexities of both. Instead of a ‘triple oppression’ model it is more illuminating, if more complicated, to try and see contradictory and complementary

relationships between the areas of class, race and gender as they relate to ongoing struggles. This she attempts to do by grounding her analysis of the politics of race, class and gender in the lives of women in the factory.21

18 Westwood reflects Hartmann (1981) and McDonough & Harrison (1978) in directing her study to both home and work. However, Westwood argues that although family, schooling and the media are all responsible in part for the production and reproduction of gender identities, it is the workplace that is central. The workplace operates in two ways. First, women who enter into waged employment ‘become workers and therefore classed subjects’. Second, the workplace also ‘enshrines the subordination of women’ both through the capitalist work process and through the culture that is produced in opposition to it by the women. Women at work ‘receive’ a concept of woman, elements of which they adopt and link to a ‘feminine’ destiny. Being at work is ‘most crucially about becoming a woman’ (Westwood, 1984, p. 6). This mirrors Cockburn’s (1983) view of the relationship between work and self-identity of male print workers (see section 3.4). The collusive nature of this is also reflected in Westwood’s analysis, below.

19 Westwood uses Hartmann’s (1981) definition of patriarchy: ‘We can usefully define patriarchy as a set of social relations between men, which have a material base, and which, though hierarchical, establish or create interdependence and solidarity among men that enable them to dominate women... The material base upon which patriarchy rests lies most fundamentally in men’s control over women’s labour power. Men maintain this control by excluding women from access to some essential productive resources (in capitalist societies, for example, jobs that pay living wages) and by restricting women’s sexuality. Monogamous heterosexual marriage is one relatively recent and efficient form that seems to allow men to control both these areas.’ (Hartmann, 1981, pp. 14–15 quoted in Westwood, 1984, p. 5). 20 It is not altogether clear whether Westwood sees capitalism and patriarchy coming together as ‘capitalist patriarchy’ (a term she uses but not quite in the same way as Eisenstein (1979)) or sees a dual system of oppression. It would appear that in endorsing Cockburn’s (1983) view she tends to the dualist approach but she emphasises the interlocking nature of the two forms of oppression. 21 Westwood undertakes detailed analysis of the impact of race as well as gender on the lives of the working-class women. She shows how Indian women (as those in her study described themselves) are confronted by different forms of domestic oppression and discrimination at work, as well as the burden of racist oppression. Space considerations preclude a review of this material. The example used below concentrates on sexism, the methodology for the analysis of racism is the same.


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3.5.2 Approach Westwood’s approach was to see at first hand what was involved in the world of work on

a factory shopfloor. Through the auspices of a local contact, Westwood was able to gain access to a hosiery factory, ‘Stitch Co.’ in ‘Needletown’ where she spent a year from March 1980 to May 1981 on the shopfloor.

For some reason, the idea of an anthropologist studying the culture of the shopfloor by hanging around the coffee bar, lurking in the lunch canteen and sharing a few ‘risque! ’ jokes, appealed to management who saw my immersion as a baptism of fire. (Westwood, 1984, p. 2)

Her participant observation study involved talking, watching, listening and working, and generally joining in the life of the shop floor. Her account is thus based on her own observation and what she was told by, or overheard from, the women she worked with. Westwood addresses the situation on the shopfloor and then turns to the domestic sphere. As the study progressed Westwood developed friendships and was able to participate more and more in the domestic and social life of the women and this provided insights into the oppression and exploitation experienced by women in the home. This direct observation out of the workplace was augmented by the plentiful accounts of domestic labour and motherhood, which are major topics of conversation on the shopfloor. Throughout she illustrates her analysis with excerpts from discussions and quotes from the participants.

Westwood argues that what she intended was to grasp a specific cultural space and this required immersion in the life of the shopfloor. She is unimpressed by critics of participant observation who argue that the method is unreliable, ungeneralisable, intrusive and subjective. For her, it is the only methodic practice that possibly allows one to inhabit and record a cultural space. Westwood hoped to be able to illuminate the lived experiences of women workers who come together to generate and sustain a culture, a world of symbols and meanings that has to be unravelled. However, she notes:

lived experience, everyday life, the ‘real’ world, are not simple unambiguous phenomena which can be easily caught and reproduced in the pages of books. Life does not lie around like leaves in autumn waiting to be swept up, ordered and put into boxes. The drama of everyday life is richly textured, multifaceted and dense and we cannot hope to make sense of our world and, more, interpret it, without a coherent theoretical understanding. (Westwood, 1984, p. 3)

On the other hand, Westwood has no intention of fetishising theories but, rather, hopes that her work will contribute to feminist theories and politics because it reveals the complexities of women’s subordination through a study rooted in women’s lived experiences.

Her focus tends to be on the way that women, through shopfloor culture, resist the pressures of capitalism and patriarchy; features common to all the women. Throughout, she addresses the differences in lived experiences of the white and non-white women in

the factory. She does not assume that their sex determines their gendered roles but acknowledges that these are racially constructed (Parmar, 1982).

3.5.3 Resistance and feminine culture: contradiction and collusion

Westwood provided a description of the company and its paternalistic attitude. She outlined the general patriarchal nature of the factory and gave a detailed description of the organisation of work and the system of remuneration, known as ‘the minutes’,22 in the

22 The ‘minutes’ was slang for the measured day work system in which pay is fixed against a specified level of performance. This requires some form of work measurement and a monitoring process. At StitchCo this involved specifying how many minutes it took to do an operation. Workers were graded and remunerated accordingly with each grade having specific production level, which guaranteed the weekly wage that could be augmented by bonuses if targets were exceeded. Women were assessed monthly to see whether they should be upgraded or downgraded. The decision was based on output (taking into account management’s responsibility to provide a constant flow of work), timekeeping and general discipline


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finishing department in which she worked. Essentially, women were segregated into areas which reflected their perceived domestic role, were closely supervised and poorly paid. Males tended to be in control, for example the all-female finishing department had a male manager who referred to the women as ‘girls’, and the workers relied on male maintenance technicians who were in a position to affect the women’s bonus earnings.

Like Cockburn (section 3.4), Westwood focuses her analysis on the ‘inherent contradictions of women’s lives under conditions set by patriarchal capitalism’. The nature and operation of some of these contradictions are revealed in the detailed examination of female shopfloor culture.23 Shopfloor culture is oppositional on the one hand, in that it resisted management control and the union hierarchy, but binds its creativity securely to an oppressive version of womanhood in its reassertion of notions of femininity. For example, feminine culture was affirmed through the domestication of the work situation, notably claiming ‘possession’ of machines and chairs and decorating them with icons of domestic life and family ties (or some form of sentimental surrogate); through the wearing of house slippers at work; and the manufacture of elaborate aprons from oddments which served as a means by which women workers insisted upon their ‘womanhood’ and, thereby, their selfhood’ in an alien and masculine environment (Westwood, 1984, p. 22).

Forms of resistance also reflected this culture of femininity. Although the women very occasionally resisted ‘the minutes’ by refusing to work, resistance, in the main, took less dramatic forms tolerated by the company. For example, it was embodied in a system of ‘informal economics’. The shopfloor was a marketplace for outside goods brought in and for catalogue sales, and a forum for generating ‘selling parties’. The repair and alteration of clothes, the making of clothes for personal use on company machines and sometimes in ‘company time’, rather than lunch breaks, also took place. Small domestic appliances were brought in for mechanics to repair.

The constant reassertion of a culture of femininity led the women to collude with male definitions of a subordinate version of woman tied ‘to domestic labour in the home’. The shopfloor is the site in which patriarchal ideologies and the materiality of patriarchy is reproduced. Female shopfloor culture established a female realm but in terms that represented male constructs of femininity with its consequent exploitative domestic labour and nurturing obligations and its subversion of creativity and sisterhood. The collusive nature of the resistant shopfloor culture was apparent (for both white and non- white workers) in its celebration of marriage, the family and motherhood. Marriage was construed in romantic terms and seen as both liberating and transformative. Marriage transformed ‘girls’ into ‘women’, that is, wives and mothers. The notion of motherhood was central to the contradiction in women’s lives. Shopfloor culture celebrated motherhood as the final stage in the process of becoming a woman and in so doing

colluded with patriarchal ideology. Such a woman is a ‘gendered subject’ defined in her reproductive not productive role.

While biology makes women reproducers it is patriarchal ideology that institutionalises motherhood and heterosexuality and creates the myth of the maternal instinct with its consequent burden of nurturing. Patriarchal ideology treats motherhood as natural and the

record. Grading was an important part of control as people doing the same job were rewarded differently on the basis of different production targets. ‘Making time’ occurred when daily targets (for top grades) measured by the ‘minutes’ actually exceeded the number of minutes in the working day. To fulfil targets, and exceed them in order to gain bonus payments, the worker had to make time for the company by working above, the ‘scientifically’ determined time for the job (which was in no way generous in the first place) and upon which the labour value and thus price of an article was calculated. Thus top rate targets were blatantly exploitative and the women were well aware of it. 23 The shopfloor culture was organised on the basis of (mainly age and race base) friendship groups that were essential for relieving the monotony, organising resistance, and as mutual support groups in respect of family, boyfriends, and management. Westwood’s study thus examines the way resistance is embodied in a feminine culture that enabled the women to re-interpret their exploited situation to ‘make anew the world of the shopfloor’ (Westwood, 1984, p. 15).


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majority of women Westwood studied had absorbed this view. A pregnancy was greeted with virtual universal approval and celebrated with gifts. The positive aspects were highlighted and the potential physical dangers, the pain and the psychological upheavals were ignored or glossed over.

Westwood’s study, like Willis’s (1977) study of how working-class lads get working- class jobs, reveals how women collude in their own oppression through the reproduction of patriarchal ideologies in the expression of their resistance to capitalist exploitation. In exerting some independent economic control over their own lives the women developed a shopfloor culture that, rather than overtly promote solidarity and strength, embraced romance and sexuality and reproduced the myths and stereotypes of male-female relationships.

3.5.4 Method: the ‘hen party’

Westwood’s participant observation thus focused on the contradictions in the lived experiences of the women. Her approach to participant observation differs fundamentally from the conventional approach24 in two important ways. First, she sees no requirement for a detached, balanced view of the social situation she is investigating. She is concerned with the world in which the women she works with operate. Second, and related to this, she is not concerned so much with the actor’s meanings as the way in which the events she describes in detail rehearse and reproduce oppressive mechanisms and ideologies.

It is axiomatic both for Westwood, and for the women themselves, that the world is constructed and controlled by men. Westwood then addresses the way this male domination is played out in everyday structures, be they the disputes over ‘the minutes’, a wedding celebration on the shopfloor, or a night on the town. Westwood is not bothered about a ‘balanced’ view in the sense of comparing male and female perceptions, nor is she willing to remain a detached and uninvolved observer. The women are her friends25 and she is quite prepared to overtly act in a way that engages male ideology and may serve to inform her friends.

The way she differs from the conventional approach and the essentially critical nature of her work can best be revealed by taking an example and analysing how her a critical interpretation is developed. Westwood (1984, pp. 112–126) described in detail the traditional celebration and ritual26 connected to matrimony using as a case study the double marriage of twins (Tessa & Julie). This ‘rite of passage’ for brides was a taken- for-granted element of shopfloor life. Work was more or less suspended and management were tolerant of the ceremony. The celebration (usually on a Thursday) traditionally involved intending brides dressing in elaborate costume made by the other women on their units. The fancy dress constituted a comment on the bride’s sexuality. Both twins were already living with boyfriends and Tessa was pregnant. This meant that both costumes could be suggestive without causing offence. Julie was dressed in a lewd St. Trinian’s outfit and Tessa in an outrageous ‘oversize Babygro’.

Dressed in these costumes, the twins received visitors and practical gifts (such as Pyrex dishes and tea towels), and supplied ‘gooey cakes’ for their friends. At lunch the unit went to the nearest pub and the brides were plied with drink. On leaving the pub the twins were, as was traditional, tied, with yards of binding, to the railings near the pedestrian bridge over the dual carriageway next to the factory. It was pouring with rain. Their mother laughed at their plight and photographed them. The twins were left to struggle free. When they reappeared in the department bruised, cut and bedraggled they were greeted with laughter not sympathy. Then they were bundled into a large wheeled basket normally used for moving work or

24 See section 1.4.1 25 In this respect Westwood reflects Oakley’s (1981) approach to researching women (see section 3.3). 26 This was not unique to the department but seemed to be common to all departments at StitchCo and, according to people who had worked elsewhere, a ritual enacted in similar vein at other hosiery factories in ‘Needletown’.


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scraps around the factory and pushed at increasing speed around the department. The screaming twins looked terrified and, after the hectic ride eventually came to an end, the exhausted, pale and giddy pair were helped to the canteen and given coffee much to the amusement of the other women.

The twins, unable to do any work, left the factory at 4.30 with their presents. However, the celebration was not at an end; the evening’s hen party was to follow. The party of twenty-four women ‘pub crawled’ round an established circuit attracting the hoots and whistles of passing men. The women were ‘high on friendship’ and were ‘loud, noisy and abusive, shouting at passing cars, the police and anyone in range and enjoying every minute of this freedom’ and ‘sense of power’. ‘The term “girls” was forgotten, left inside the factory; out on the street in force, we were women’.

At a crowded ‘fun pub’ a host disc-jockey invited brides-to-be on stage. The twins were encouraged to lay on their backs and wave their legs in the air while ‘The Stripper’ music was playing. Their friends egged them on, wanting them to strip, and the twins became embarrassed. Eventually, the party arrived at a nightclub. Although excited, the sight of two bouncers on the door subdued the group and they made a rather meek entrance. Some of the women danced ‘with impassive faces around their handbags’ while the men at the bar made sexist comments about the appearance of the women. Tessa, on overhearing one of the men told him to ‘fuck off’ and then said to Westwood, ‘They make me sick, that’s all they think about.’

I agreed with Tessa and felt my anger rising to explosion-point as we made our way to and from the bar amid a sea of such comments. We were in a cattle market....

As we were dancing our group was approached by three large drunken men who started to make remarks about legs and ‘tits’ and who lurched towards us, prompting me, my anger now very visible, to tell them loudly to ‘piss off’ which was applauded and cheered by my friends who could hear me, it seemed, above the disco and the drunken roar.

At midnight a ‘seedy, fat’ dinner-jacketed compe" re called each bride in turn onto the stage (there were others besides the twins) and subjected each of them to a humiliating titillation scene that involved eventually placing a garter on the bride’s thigh in return for a bottle of Asti Spumante. The twins who were last on stage were more resistant to being messed about than the other punters. After leaving the stage Julie was angry. ‘Did you see that, Sal ? ... I’ll punch his face in. I don’t like him, dirty ol’ man.’ The evening ended at three in the morning. The following day at work most of the party-goers had hangovers although all agreed that the night before had been enjoyable.

3.5.5 Analysis: reflexivity and totality

Westwood argues that both the ceremony and the ‘hen party’27 are deeply contradictory events. The ritualised celebration involved both ambiguous symbolism and women in a celebration of their own oppression in marriage. The making of elaborate fancy dress emphasised the creative skills and abilities of the women on the unit but the celebration of their skills and ingenuity were, however, manifest in demeaning costumes for the brides. The workplace ritual contained ‘powerful sexual imagery’ that related to the women becoming sexually active as wives, where their sexuality was mediated by men and this was reflected in the fancy dress.28

Marriage was clearly equated with bondage ‘and the binding of a woman to a man’. While the women were bound ‘they also sought to struggle free—thereby securing for the bride a new freedom’. The woman’s struggle was enacted in public. It was as though the whole

27 Westwood notes that even its label, ‘hen party’ tells us a lot about how women are viewed when we compare it with the virile symbol of the stag used for the men’s night out. 28 Even the more conservative costumes for less sexually experienced brides clearly emphasised the sexuality of the women and their availability as sexual objects for their husbands. For example, the use of the contraceptive pill as an item of adornment on most costumes indicated the change of status from ‘sexually unavailable girl’ to ‘sexually experienced woman’.


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exercise was a shaming experience, a ‘way of showing women as harlots and witches’, which was also symbolised in the costumes worn by the brides. (A typical costume included a long, black, pointed witches’ hat.) These images represent the enduring myths that surround women’s sexuality. Such myths are not simply benign but are part of the subordination of women that the shopfloor workers collusively represented in the ritual (Westwood, 1984, p. 119).

The ‘hen party’ made ‘a statement about solidarity and affection between women’. A night out presented the women with the opportunity to get together, free of the confines of home and work. Westwood argued that the events clearly showed that the women gained strength and support from the occasion and that the solidarity would remain important to the bride despite her marriage. This, Westwood argues, reasserted the sisterhood of women. However, like the other aspects of the bride’s ritual, it had ‘deeply ambiguous elements’. The sisterhood generated was ‘undercut by the sexism of the setting’ clearly evident in the male-constructed stereotypical events to which the women were subjected. ‘Men were the ever-present, all-pervading context which surrounded the hen party’.

The ‘powerful sexist ideologies’ invaded an event that gives power to women through their solidarity. While the evening overall clearly emphasised the distance between ‘the world of women and the world of men’ the women were ‘placed in a situation of competition for male attention’ and were drawn into a chauvinistic culture that emphasised caricatured sexual relations. Such relations are regarded as ‘natural’ not socially constructed. The events of the evening reflected the power of men to trivialise and denigrate women.

Westwood’s analysis differs from the conventional ethnographic analysis in that it does not just examine the ritual celebration of marriage but addresses the events as contradictory expressions by women of patriarchal oppression. Westwood might have simply described the ceremonial events and then drawn out the meaning of the ritual for the participants. She might have focused on the solidarity of the women as a celebration of women qua women. Instead, by concentrating on the contradictions, she was able to show how the manifestations of sisterhood and the celebration of woman was directed in ways that were informed by patriarchal ideology.

The focus on contradictions both enables and draws upon two other aspects of her research, a reflexive attitude and a totalistic perspective.

Although Westwood makes no attempt at a ‘value free’ research study, this in no way inhibits her reflexivity. The focus on contradictions as a way of making sense of the lived experiences spurs a constant reflexive re-examination of the events: both her own involvement and her taken-for-granted understanding of the meanings of these events for the participants. It also provides her with the framework for engaging ideology, which she regards as rooted in a hegemonic ‘common-sense’ (Gramsci, 1971).

For example, it would have been easy for her to regard the women’s idea of marriage and family as romanticised and myopic. However, she notes that:

I came slowly to appreciate, as they did, that the ideological and material parameters of their lives presented marriage and children not as burdensome and oppressive, but as liberating events—part of the great adventure of life. In taking hold of these moments, young women locked themselves into domesticity and subordination in just the same way that young men, taking hold of manual labour as their moment of liberation from boyhood, locked themselves into dead end jobs with low wages.29 (Westwood, 1984, p. 103)

This was not just an acceptance of the subject’s point of view and a representation of the meanings that the subject conferred on marriage. Marriage was emphasised and enshrined in the shopfloor culture of femininity and it would have been easy for Westwood to have simply presented this as group ritual. She went further, however, to analyse the ‘good reasons’ why the women should embrace both marriage and men, despite its apparent contradictions.30 29 Westwood cites Willis (1977) in a footnote. See also section 2.6 30 Westwood’s analysis reflects Oakley’s (1974a) analysis of the ‘need to be a housewife’ (see section 3.3).


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The reflexive process of analysing contradictions enabled Westwood to make structural connections through digging deeper, which the ostensive celebration of marriage, surrounded by an explicit gloss of romance, only hinted at. For example, engagement was not simple-minded romanticism but was underpinned by economic constraints that necessitated an alliance between men and women if a reasonable standard of living was to be enjoyed. Engagement and marriage, according to the women interviewed by Westwood, was a strategy adopted by women to get away from parental control, to exercise some (localised) power in a male-dominated world, to gain access to the resources controlled by men, to improve their bargaining position vis- -vis men and thus to realise some of the benefits of society.

In short, the reflexive analysis of contradictions requires a totalistic perspective (as was shown in Cynthia Cockburn’s (1983) analysis, section 3.4). Westwood adopts a totalistic approach in which the substantive question of why women have a dual relation to class is the focal point. This dual relation to class cannot be answered through the ‘crude economism of “cheap labour” arguments’, instead it is linked to the ‘power of sexist and racist ideologies to affect employers and unions’ and thus the way people are ‘positioned in the labour markets’ (Westwood, 1984, p. 232).

3.5.6 Praxis

Westwood’s praxiological analysis is evident in her unambiguous revelation of sexist and racist practices, in her direct intervention within the research context to engage them and in her wider political concerns. Throughout her account she relates incidents of racism and sexism. The latter were evident in her description of the ‘hen party’, for example, she constantly emphasised the ‘seediness’ of the nightclub compe" re and the ‘tits and bums’

language of the male punters in order to highlight the direct and oppressive sexist context. Her own interventions were direct responses to situations that affected her and as a sounding board for a growing vocalisation among her friends, again evident in the nightclub scene. Throughout the book Westwood makes explicit political points, which she brings together in her conclusion, that argue for a feminist fight on a number of fronts in order to tackle the impoverishment of women that sexist and racist ideologies applied to the class situation of women workers have resulted in. Attacks have to be made on the ghettoisation of low-paid work, on white male privileges in highly paid skilled work and against low pay for women. Her study revealed that while their was a degree of solidarity and sisterhood among the women, the trade union, informed by sexist and racist ideologies, negotiated enormous wage differentials on the spurious grounds of skilled work. Thus, suggests Westwood, the fight against low pay is bound up with a fight against the ideologies of the unions.

Furthermore, Westwood suggests that feminism must address issues beyond the concerns of middle-class whites. Apart from the obvious neglect of racism, there seems little connection in feminist analysis with the lives of working-class women. For example, calls to develop sisterhood seem strange to working-class women who spend much of their lives in a mutual dependency culture with other women. Similarly, to be told that women are powerless does not fit the experiences of working-class women who feel they have control over their own part of the world, separate from men.

In conclusion, Westwood argues that, in the face of Thatcherism, ‘We must support and protect the efforts being made by those working at the local level, in the unions and left Labour councils, who are trying to forge meaningful alternatives’ (Westwood, 1984, p. 241).


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3.6 Khawar Mumtaz and Farida Shaheed—Women of Pakistan

3.6.1 Introduction In their commission to write about the ‘embryonic women’s movement’ in Pakistan, Khawar Mumtaz and Farida Shaheed (1987) develop an alternative strategy for making women visible. Their concern is not with an ethnographic account of the organisation and functioning of the women’s movement but an historical analysis of the genesis and evolution of the movement in relation to the socio-economic and political structures that serve to oppress women.

Mumtaz and Shaheed were an integral part of the women’s movement in Pakistan. For them it was important not only to raise some of the issues confronting the women’s movement but also to encourage other women to write on the women’s issue in order that a deeper understanding could be evolved. This aim to generate the basis for a deeper understanding led them to provide a broad social and political context in which to locate their account of the rise and activities of the Women’s Action Forum rather than simply document the short history of the organisation and their role in it.

3.6.2 History writing

In attempting to provide this wider context Mumtaz and Shaheed became aware that no record of the history of women’s struggles for their rights and their involvement in politics existed. This they had to piece together from ‘scattered facts and footnotes’. Their research draws on published academic sources and bibliographies (including, Ahmed, 1975; Burki, 1980; Epstein & Watts, 1981; Gardezi & Rashid, 1983; Syed, 1984; Jayawardena, 1986; Mathur, undated;); newspapers and periodicals; conference and other unpublished papers; constitutions, position papers and other documents of women’s groups; government publications; legal ordinances and orders; and articles of the Constitution of Pakistan. As such, they admit it is only the first reconstruction of the struggle.

In their reconstruction they acknowledge that they confronted only some of the issues facing the movement in Pakistan as their priority was to ‘inform and to record events which, from today’s perspective, appear important’ (Mumtaz & Shaheed, 1987). Clearly this is a historicist approach to history writing. The procedure is historicist in its reconstruction of the past from the perspective of the present. This is not a critical approach in itself. It becomes a critical approach if it does three things. First, it adopts a critical perspective (Weltanschauung) through which to generate an alternative history. Second, it addresses historical events as they relate to prevailing social practices and examines the extent to which prevailing structures are sustained through them. Third, in

analysing the relationship between history and structure it digs beneath the surface appearance to reveal the nature of oppressive mechanisms.

The procedure adopted by Mumtaz and Shaheed was to work from the general to the particular. They begin their report with a wide general political history of Pakistan from pre-independence through the Pakistan Movement, the establishment of the separate state of Pakistan, and the recent history up to the early 1980s. This general political history was refined in stages (subsequent chapters) addressing, ever more closely, the oppression of women. The second stage of this historical reconstruction involves the production of a general social historical profile of Pakistani women. The third stage looks specifically at the impact of British imperialism on Muslim women in the Indian sub-continent. The fourth stage deals with the gradual progress of women’s rights in the new Pakistan up to the establishment of Zia’s military dictatorship. Stage five concentrates on how the Islamicisation process during the Zia period affected women in general. The sixth stage addresses the establishment of the Women’s Action Forum in response to this. Finally, two specific issues concerning the restrictions on women in the Zia period are examined more closely. These are the efforts to veil and seclude women and the systematic reduction of women’s legal status.

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The approach, then, is to start with a broad historical perspective that addresses the position of women and progressively focus down on specific issues. In this manner the issues are contextualised both historically and structurally. The particular impact of the Women’s Action Forum can then be assessed as a historically specific institution. The study was shaped by two considerations: first, the concerns of the Women’s Action Forum; second, the relevance of Islam.

3.6.3 Women’s rights and the Islamicisation process

A fundamental question that their analysis needed to address was ‘whether Islam’s relevance to politics in general and women in particular was only temporary, created by an unelected authoritarian government seeking legitimacy through religion, or whether there was a deeper issue’ (Mumtaz & Shaheed, 1987, p. vii).

Conventional histories of Pakistan have focused on the relationship with India, the struggle for democracy and the friction between the centralised state and the provinces. The nature, role and use of Islam by political forces and its relationship to the women’s struggle has not been the focus of attention and thus the authors had to reconstruct a history from an entirely different perspective.

Mumtaz and Shaheed show that the women’s struggle has been intertwined with the nationalist struggle (at least until independence) and then with democratisation up to the mid-1970s. Only in the Zia period has there been an overt struggle with conservative forces of Islam. However, Islam has had a much longer impact on Muslim social and political life and is seen as running parallel to Muslim women’s struggle in the sub- continent. Despite its lack of overt prominence in conventional histories, their research indicates that Islam has been a recurrent theme in the political awakening of Muslim Indians, both progressive and conservative, and has had a concomitant effect, which has not always been negative, on the women’s struggle. Only since independence in 1947 has Islam been increasingly hijacked by reactionary forces. Ironically, the very people whose conservative interpretation of Islam led them to oppose the creation of Pakistan came to power in the Zia regime. This new conservative intelligentsia are alienated from the

earlier West-educated e! lite and instead of looking to indigenous cultural and historical roots have turned to religion. The result is that the only version of Islam that has flourished is ‘conservative, bigoted and fanatical’ and Pakistan seems to be ‘in the grip of the unenlightened and the closed-minded’.

Indicative of their critical historicism is the way in which Mumtaz and Shaheed analyse the legislative changes that affected women’s rights. They do not just provide an account of what appear, from a current perspective, to be important legal changes and judicial decisions but also investigate what impact these had in practice and how they were implemented given the socio-economic conditions of women’s lives.

Mumtaz and Shaheed illustrate two important aspects of this. First, they explore the perspective adopted by Pakistani women in their campaign for greater rights. There has been, they argue, little overt conception of the women’s struggle as being one against a patriarchal system. Women have tended to think of a gradual and natural evolution of their rights. This was a situation that seemed to be occurring in the nationalist struggle. However, the women who were active and who were affected by greater freedom in the nationalist struggle and then by greater restrictions in the Islamicisation process inaugurated by Zia in 1979, were urban upper-middle-class women in the main and the impact of the legislative gains had not filtered through to the majority of Pakistani women.

Second, the life experiences of Pakistani women did not match their changed legal status. Mumtaz and Shaheed show that the reality of the patriarchal system is such that the majority of women are entirely economically and socially dependent on men and, while they have more rights in theory, in practice they are unable to demand them for fear of ‘reprisals’. The constraints on women imposed through purdah extend to both private and public spheres


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and are legitimated by a web of myths that bolster patriarchal power and undermine women’s access to the basic means of production and thus to political power.

The legal changes and the patriarchal dependency have themselves been mediated by changes in the social infrastructure. Capitalisation of agricultural production, industrialisation, migrant labour, inflation, education and the emergence of new classes within Pakistan and the international effect of unequal development all have an impact on the position and participation of women in society, not least because ‘economic imperatives in Pakistan are pushing an ever greater number of women onto the labour market’. The study takes into account these infrastructural developments as they have an impact on the entrenched patriarchal system.31

Mumtaz and Shaheed addressed the impact of colonialisation. Again they might simply have recorded the role the British Raj played in ‘liberating’ women by logging the contributions made by the imperialists, such as the banning of sati and the promotion of women’s education. However, like Liddle and Joshi (1986) (Section 3.7, below) they critically assessed the nature of the imperialist contribution and showed that, during British rule, women’s legal status was little improved and that changes were made in the context of a colonial power concerned with its own self-interest and profitability. Promoting education served the dual purpose of propagating ideology and providing an administrative class to serve the needs of the empire. Legal changes were related to criminal law, revenues, land tenure and such areas that affected the economic concerns of the imperialists. Interpersonal relations, disposition of property, and so on, were left

untouched and in the hands of Muslim religious law. The only salient contribution of the British in this sphere was to act to deprive Muslim women of their right to inherit property by imposing Hindu custom. It was only in the last years of British rule, when after agitation from Muslim women, the Muslim Personal Law (1937) was passed which permitted Muslim women to inherit property, although not agricultural land.

In their examination of the reactionary interpretation of Islam as far as women’s rights were concerned under the Zia dictatorship, Mumtaz and Shaheed again dug beneath the surface of appearances. The campaign extolling people to be more Islamic was, they showed, quite clearly skewed as the impact fell far more heavily and one- sidedly on women. Interpretations of the Qur’an were hypocritical and biased in favour of female subjugation. Suddenly the struggle for women’s rights was pushed into a debate about Islam.

Instead of arguing that this shift represented the victory of conservative patriarchal forces per se, Mumtaz and Shaheed examined the political expediency involved in the Islamicisation process. At one level such expediency was to ensure support from conservative forces, and while some ordinances had grave repercussions, legal decisions neutralised them to some extent. At another level, the Zia government tried out policies by implementing them without and resolutions, edicts or written commands to try and see what kind of reaction would ensue. For example, women stopped being recruited to banks, which were all nationalised, for a year (1982-83) without any government directive being issued in writing. No explanation was offered and after protests by women the directive was withdrawn as mysteriously as it was issued.

3.6.4 Conclusion

In providing an account of the emergence of the Women’s Action Forum, Mumtaz and Shaheed have adopted a feminist perspective that reconstructs history by looking at the concerns of women and, in so doing, is a critique of taken-for-granted sex-blind political history. This radically different perspective on conventional history is developed critically through the adoption of a totalistic perspective that links the specific history of the Women’s Action Forum with the wider women’s struggle. It focuses on the emergence of a patriarchal 31 The authors admit that they do not develop the study of the infrastructural changes in great detail and to some extent undo their totalistic analysis by suggesting that they ‘have a logic of their own’ (Mumtaz & Shaheed, 1986, p. 3), which modifications in patriarchal norms have followed

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Islamic economic and political system and the impact that it has on women. They dig beneath the surface of, for example, government directives to show the differential impact on women. Patriarchal ideology is revealed in the Islamicisation process with its consequent material affect on women.

Their study has a praxiological element summed up by their analysis of the way forward for the women’s movement. They argue that a shift has occurred in the women’s movement of the mid-1980s in Pakistan with more emphasis on women’s rights, a greater degree of militancy, and an ‘increased consciousness of the need to mobilize greater numbers of women from all classes’. However, they argue that on the basis of their analysis, if the women’s movement wants to replace patriarchy, rather than simply improve their lot within it (a tenuous aim as the Zia government has shown) then they need to recognize that patriarchy ‘is not the only form of oppression it will have to fight against’. Patriarchy, they argue, has been absorbed into tribalism, feudalism and now capitalism and while it is possible to distinguish patriarchy in theory, in practice it is inseparable from these socio-economic systems and opposition to one implies opposition to the other. So the women’s movement, while remaining autonomous, must not remain

forever isolated. Meanwhile, women must struggle as it is less burdensome than immobile silence.

3.7 Joanna Liddle & Rama Joshi—Daughters of Independence

3.7.1 Introduction Joanna Liddle and Rama Joshi (1986) undertake an ethnographic and historical analysis of

the impact of class and caste on women’s subordination in India. Their ethnographic study looks at the lives of professional women. They locate these women’s experiences ‘in the context of the social structures in which they occur to show that the experiences are not merely personal and individual but part of a wider pattern of social relations’ (Liddle & Joshi, 1986, p. 10).

The ethnographic study is paralleled by an historical analysis. Their approach to the history of women’s oppression is similar to that of Mills (see section 2.4). The substantive question they raise is ‘why are women subordinate in the sex/gender system’? They address this through the examination of several less extensive but related questions that address different facets of the overall area of enquiry. For example, they ask, what is the basis of the relationship between gender and caste in India?32 What have been the main influences in freeing women from the constraints of the caste system? What are the social processes that link gender with the particular system of class that began to develop as a result of British imperialist intervention?

The historical analysis addresses both the recent history of colonialism (and nationalism), particularly the impact of the British Raj on upper-caste women, and the longer-term struggle between female and male power principles in the sub-continent.

Liddle and Joshi show that the development of the women’s movement in India over the last century, like in Pakistan (Mumtaz & Shaheed, 1987), has been inextricably linked with the nationalist movement. The organised women’s movement, like the nationalist movement, was dominated by the urban English-educated middle class and they tended to see custom rather than men as the prime enemy of women’s freedom. The major concerns of the movement, property rights, widow remarriage, dowry and polygamy, primarily affected the higher castes and middle class. Thus, until the mid-1970s, the women’s movement, which has waxed and waned with the nationalist struggle, tended both to underplay the impact of

32 In other societies, the constraints on women have been shown by some researchers to be related to their social class position. In India the caste system is confused by the imperialist class system.


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gender domination, subordinating it to imperialism, and to neglect the impact of class and caste on women’s subordination.

On a longer view, they show that the subordination of women was crucial to the development of caste hierarchy, with struggles over the maintenance of the caste system being associated with constraints on women. The development of a class system had contradictory effects. Although acting to reinforce women’s subordination albeit in

different forms, it also provided an escape from the patriarchal caste restrictions for a small number of educated middle class women.

3.7.2 Power

Underpinning all this is the core construct of power. The question of power is crucial for Liddle and Joshi, as it was for Mills in his analysis of American society. While Mills considered power as the exercise of social and political control and linked it with corporate wealth, Liddle and Joshi are concerned with idea of female power. They argue that female power, which has a long history in Asia, is regarded as strong and has been seen as a threat by men. Male dominance over women has been established by suppressing female power. This suppression has occurred in the caste suppression of women and in the patriarchal family organisation, which is neither universal nor natural but has been the site of the struggle to restrain female power. This is contrary to Western notions where females are regarded as ‘weak’ and in need of protection.

Liddle and Joshi argue that the historical analysis of the female power principle and the opposition to it embodied in the dominant male structures, particularly the patriarchal family, are crucial for both an understanding of the subjects of their ethnographic study and for the lessons that Western feminists can learn from the Indian experience.

Their historical analysis is contingent upon the assertion of a female power principle. It provides the basis for a critical historicist reconstruction that engages dominant ideological forms. They concentrate on reconstructing the history of female power particularly as it relates to family structure and religious culture. Tracing the history of the unique cultural heritage of women in India is not easy as most written history is recorded by men and represents predominantly male concerns. To get beneath the surface of the dominant history requires finding ‘alternative sources such as later written history, oral history, archaeological evidence, and surviving religious practices and social organisation’ (Liddle & Joshi, 1986, p. 51).

They argue that although the idea of the male as the dominant source of power attained supremacy in India, as it did in the West, this followed a struggle in which the female power principle was accommodated into the patriarchal culture and remained visible (which is what makes it distinct from its Western counterpart). For example, in the residual elements of pre-brahmin religious symbolism the goddess is powerful and not suppressed by the power of male gods. Only in the dominant brahmin religious forms (which suppose the dominance of the male) does the powerful, and usually malevolent, goddess become controlled by her male partner. The result is that given a cultural heritage of female power, male dominance over women is exercised in different ways to that found in the West.

Control over women’s power is manifested in the caste system.33 Liddle & Joshi undertook an analysis of brahmin religious writings to show how the position of women was related to the concentration of economic power within the caste system. For example, as material prosperity came to be monopolised by the higher castes, women were seen as a

33 Caste is defined primarily by social honour attained through personal lifestyle. There are four main caste distinctions and thousands of sub-castes that operate at a local level. Social mobility is not achieved by individuals in the caste system but by the rise of a complete sub-caste. This is a slow process. A major feature of the patriarchal caste system was control over women’s sexuality, which is more rigid and extreme the higher the caste. So as a sub-caste rises in the hierarchy, the women are more tightly constrained. The men benefit at the expense of the women. Other academics have commented on this phenomenon (Hutton, 1963; Yalman, 1968; Das, 1976) but have not analysed its ideological and material basis.


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potential source of loss of property and wealth as they might marry out of caste. They were therefore refused inheritance rights, reduced in social status and made increasingly dependent on men. This was legitimated by reference to the uncontrollable and damaging power of women, whose strength and unbridled sexuality would threaten the social order. Women’s power was used to legitimate the economic concentration of

power in the upper castes (strict control of women was only something the upper castes could afford to do).

The adaptability of brahmin patriarchy is attested to in the way it inverted the legitimation for restrictions on women in the wake of various Muslim invasions (where restriction on upper caste women was then seen as protection from abduction and rape) and in their assimilation, contrary to their basic patriarchal philosophy, of popular goddess cults.

The rise of the middle class, in response to the administrative needs of the British Raj, was based on caste divisions. The urban middle class imposed similar strictures on women as did the rural upper castes and tended to build on caste-based gender divisions (Bhasin, 1972; D’Souza, 1980). Nonetheless, alternative opportunities arose for women through the development of the middle class, which was an embryonic force for change and provided the potential for economic independence for women. It is no accident that the women’s movement was led and drew heavily on the urban middle class. However, while it has been possible for educated middle-class women to gain limited access to the professions because the social groups to which they belong are developing a class rather than a caste power and status system, this should not be seen as a march towards modernism in the wake of Western ideas. The class system does nothing to diminish male control and the access of women to the higher echelons of the professions and the freedom that goes with it is still limited by various forms of male control.

3.7.3 Ethnography and professional women

In their ethnographic study, Liddle and Joshi focus on the change that occurs when women struggle to emerge from domestic seclusion to professional employment. Professional women were chosen as subjects because they address the analytic questions of the relationship between gender and class/caste. Their move from high-caste seclusion to professional employment engages questions about the link between caste and gender subordination and allows an insight into what happens when this link is strained, adapted or broken in the transition to a class society. These professional women have been subjected to the dual process of Sanskritisation (restriction of higher caste women) and Westernisation (adoption of Western cultural norms) (Srinivas, 1962).

The ethnographic work, carried out in 1977, involved the researchers talking to 120 college-educated women employed in Delhi in one of four professions; education, medicine, civil service and management. The subjects from a variety of religions, were aged between 22 and 59, and came from most states in India, Bangladesh and Pakistan and from a variety of urban and rural backgrounds. Most of the subjects were selected at random, although this was in order to obtain a wide variety of respondents rather than for purposes of generalisation of statistical results. Liddle and Joshi make no attempt to generalise the findings to other groups nor to claim that professional women represent a vanguard in the struggle for women’s freedom from oppression.

The sample of lecturers was selected randomly from one of the two universities in Delhi and three of its related co-educational colleges and came from twenty different subject disciplines although the arts and social sciences predominated. Thirty doctors ranging from house surgeons to professors were similarly selected at random from the staff lists of three state-owned and three private hospitals in Delhi. A similar-sized random sample, taken of all the women civil servants listed as working in Delhi, included

under-secretaries to joint secretaries in fifteen different ministries. The women managers constituted a non-random snowball sample (initially based on graduates of the Delhi


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Management Department’s MBA course) who worked in five private and eight state- owned companies of various sizes. The refusal rate was low at around five per cent.

Data was collected by three methods. First, a structured questionnaire seeking standard classificatory data, mailed to the potential respondents prior to the interview. Second, a semi-structured interview relating to four major areas of enquiry and containing specific questions on actual experiences and the attitudes of others. Third, an unstructured interview with six topic areas and suggested questions designed to explore the respondent’s general approach to the position of women, how they saw the social world and their place in it. This interview was sensitive to, and dependent upon, leads provided by the subjects. Besides the authors, a male interviewer was also used to collect information. There were no discernible differences in the kinds of information gathered by the interviewers in respect of their gender or race.

Drawing on the experiences of their subjects, which they quote for illustrative purposes, Liddle and Joshi describe the expectations forced on higher-caste women. These include economic restrictions such as prohibition of work outside the home and restrictions on their sexuality, notably early marriage and a life of penance for widows who are not permitted to re-marry. Their subjects’ experiences show that seclusion, although occurring in varying degrees, is about how women should live in a patriarchal society. Seclusion privatises women and restricts them to the domestic sphere thus making them both sexually and economically dependent; effectively making women the sexual property of men (Hartmann, 1981). Liddle and Joshi describe and analyse both the pre-employment controls imposed on the women and also the mechanisms used by men to control professional women and thus maintain male domination in the class structure.

Liddle and Joshi have a wealth of material that they use to explore the emergence of the women from seclusion to professional employment. In practice, their subjects reveal that economic independence and family support are necessary in order for their determination to resist subordination to manifest itself in action. For example, ‘Puja Shukla’, a brahmin high-caste woman, only broke out of the seclusion enforced on her at the death of her husband. As a result of her determination to write books while secluded in the home, she gained a university lectureship. This resulted in her family changing from implacable opposition to her seeking employment to pride at her prestigious position. Further, from being a brahmin widow she took control of her own sexuality by marrying a non-Brahmin, a foreigner of her own choice.

Nonetheless, while achieving a degree of economic independence and social-class status, women still provide men with status in the class system, albeit in ways different from those in the caste system, but are still subject to restrictions that have essentially the same economic and patriarchal basis. For example, ‘Veena Goyal’ a financial manager noted

Women aren’t suitable for marketing because they have to travel, so I chose an office job in finance in a housing company. The touring aspect is the most satisfying part of the job; when you see work being executed and people living in the houses. But mobility’s a great hindrance for women. For instance, on tour they don’t see women’s motive as work, only immorality. (Quoted in Liddle & Joshi, 1986, p. 138)

3.7.4 Engaging the myths

Liddle and Joshi, similarly to Mills, raise certain preconceptions or myths about the oppression of women in India and provide an alternative analysis based on their ethnographic research as well as a wide variety of documentary sources.

For example, they analyse the myth of the emancipatory impact of British colonialism. The British claimed, and were often believed, to be a liberating force for women in India (in particular, the banning of sati—widow burning). British liberalism in respect of women was, however, less extensive in theory and practice than claimed and, more importantly, it was dependent upon British financial interests. The impact of colonialism was therefore selective and not always progressive, especially in the personal realm. The matrilineal system of the Nayars, for example, was eradicated as a result of concerted legal and economic action by the


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British, supported by the patrilineal groups, who regarded the Nayar family and its system of inheritance as alien.

Ambiguity was also evident in the nationalist movement’s attitude to women’s issues. Women’s causes were supported when they furthered the nationalist cause but resulted in split support when they posed a direct challenge to male privilege. While female suffrage was supported, the Hindu Code, which related to the personal areas of marriage and inheritance, was resisted. The area of personal law reform exemplified the divergence of nationalist and feminist concerns. The women’s movement went into decline following independence, universal suffrage, and a constitutional guarantee of sex equality in all realms of life. However, in practice, women were clearly not as ‘free’ as men on either the personal or structural levels.

More fundamentally, Liddle and Joshi address some of the cultural ideas, stereotypes and myths that inform the position of professional women in the gender and class hierarchies, examining the context of the development of the myths and the relationship between them and the socioeconomic lives of the women. Their data shows that women become aware of the contradiction between their own experience and the construction of that experience within a male-oriented gender ideology. They know that the stereotypes of women form part of a gender ideology, which is specific to class, cultural and national context. They know that the dominance by men is a social process, not a natural one.

Three major myths were identified by Liddle and Joshi’s respondents as contributing to the ideology of gender: women’s inferiority, subservience and domesticity. These myths are created, or at least sustained, in a number of specific ways. The idea that women are intellectually inferior or less competent is sustained by the active exclusion of women from many areas of education, training and employment. These restrictions mean that women have less opportunity in employment, which in turn fosters the myth of female domesticity. In turn, the requirement for women to work, unacknowledged, in the domestic sphere, with its inevitable drain on stamina, further fuels the myth of women’s weakness. The myth that women are naturally subservient is a legitimation for the existing social order in which men have economic and sexual control. These myths, of course, serve men through greater leisure time, domestic and personal services, priority in education and employment, and gender dominance. And each myth is easily countered empirically, for example, by the everyday sight of working-class women doing heavy labouring jobs on building sites and to powerful images in Indian religion of strong female goddesses.

The women in the study operated on a number of different ways in respect of these myths. While accepting the social (male) construction of femininity they would sometimes regard themselves as deficient when their experiences were at variance with the constructions and thereby collude unknowingly. At other times they would collude consciously ‘keeping to themselves the evidence which contradicts men’s deficient knowledge of them’ (Liddle & Joshi, 1986, p. 194). For example, ‘Shikha Munshi’ said

Men often can’t handle an intelligent woman. They expect them to be inferior. If they’re not they can’t be natural with them. Senior colleagues will not talk to me in Japanese because I speak it better. I have to play down my ability, otherwise it creates problems. (Quoted in Liddle & Joshi, 1986, p. 178)

In short, Liddle and Joshi’s ethnographic analysis shows that men’s dominant position in the social hierarchy is far from natural but based on the control of women’s sexuality, itself based on the control of economic resources. The impact of the West on women’s liberation is at best ambiguous. Women’s resistance to oppression in India neither began nor ended with the British women’s intervention but had its roots in the Indian social structure and cultural heritage. The psychological basis for women’s individual resistance is drawn from the Indian cultural heritage of female power rather than Western ‘liberal’ ideas. International capitalism binds the gender and social hierarchies together. That women’s experiences are not purely personal but are crucially related to the social structure is shown in stark relief when the Indian economy is seen in the context of it subordination to Western financial


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interests. Ideologically, cultural imperialism introduced the notion of female inferiority into Indian culture. On a material level, the gender division is maintained and legitimated in imperialism by giving men priority in scarcity.

3.7.5 Conclusion

Liddle and Joshi’s research leads them to the view that the socio-economic hierarchy and the gender hierarchy are distinct but interrelated aspects of women’s subordination. Neither form of oppression is primary. The link between them is historical not logical (Barrett, 1980). In this respect they adopt a dualist socialist feminist approach (Cockburn, 1983) and are opposed to views that argue that the gender hierarchy exists independently of the class hierarchy (Leonard, 1982). Their data shows that isolating either system of oppression leads to a failure to understand the reality of women’s lives.

Daughters of Independence is not only a critical study by dint of its analysis of the oppressive structure of Indian society as experienced by women, its critique is also linked to practice. Throughout, the authors refer to the lessons that can be learned from history, not only for Indian women but also for women in the West. These are linked to the particular experiences and tactics adopted by the women in the study who have broken out of the socially constructed role expected of them. The authors argue that whether or not social movements exist for the promotion of women’s rights, in the last resort women have to take these demands into their own homes, as these, as much as wider social structures, are sites of oppression. The tactics adopted by the women, and their outcomes, provide data for practical recommendations.

In all cases the women in the sample engaged oppression through individual initiative, although often supported by another member of the family. Sacrifice,

compromise and resistance were approaches adopted by different members of the sample. Sacrifice is encouraged in middle-class society as it is a means of oppressing women and embodies the self-negating ideology of Hinduism. Although essentially inhibiting the woman’s potential and freedom, is also a form of resistance in the last resort as it can be used to deprive others as well as oneself. However, it is essentially mutually destructive and is only effective in struggle when used collectively as a form of passive resistance. Compromise is only effective from an established power base, and most women in the sample were already established in their profession before they married. Compromise was managed most effectively when women established their position in the marriage relationship prior to getting married. Not surprisingly, older brides were in the strongest position. Resistance usually takes the form of rejecting the expectations of society and family, particularly by denying marriage or by leaving a marriage relationship when personal oppression becomes intolerable.

The political lessons of India’s history and the experiences of the sample indicate that women’s liberation requires both collective social change and individual personal change. This involves: first, negotiating changes at a personal level with family members; second, making sure that when alliances are formed with other movements the specific differences between groups is clearly confronted; and third, realising that there are differences between different class groups within the women’s movement.

3.8 Conclusion

These critical studies of gender oppression have involved a wide variety of data- collection techniques including structured questioning, in-depth interviews, participant observation and document analysis. Once again, however, it is not the method but the methodology that is crucial to the critical process. The authors held varying views on patriarchy and its relationship with the class structure and, to a lesser degree, with racial oppression. In each case, though, the material practices underpinning patriarchal oppression was analysed rather

3. Gender 3.8 Conclusion

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than an idealisation of patriarchal domination. The historically specific manifestations of sexist oppression were related to broader social structures: Westwood, for example, located the shopfloor rituals as part of the collusive process that reproduces female domestic labour; and Mumtaz and Shaheed addressed the repression of women in Pakistan as a function of the right wing’s appropriation of the Qur’an to legitimate its grasp of political power.

These empirical studies embodied three projects. First, they set the practices in stark relief and revealed them as clearly sexist. Oakley, in the early 1970s, had to expend considerable effort revealing the continuing sexism inherent in the process of domestic labour. Her analysis of housework and her critique of sociology were both attacked because of her ‘biased’ feminist views. Although the situation had changed somewhat by the 1980s, neither Cockburn nor Westwood in Britain, nor Mumtaz and Shaheed or Liddle and Joshi discussing the Indian subcontinent, could take sexist practices for granted.

The second project of these studies was to relate specific practices to much wider structures of oppression. Sexist practices do not stand in isolation but are part of a broader process of oppression and only have meaning within the totality. This involved various constructions of the relationship between production and reproduction: between class and patriarchy (Oakley, Cockburn, Mumtaz and Shaheed); between patriarchy, class and race (Westwood); and between patriarchy class and caste (Liddle and Joshi); and the way they were legitimated ideologically. While women are oppressed by men they are not oppressed in isolation from other social structures. The historical primacy of one form of oppression or another is not the issue. These studies were not concerned with establishing the mythological past of female oppression or constructing idealisations of the oppressive process. Rather, where they addressed history it examined the particular ways in which women became oppressed, how the oppressive practices were developed and legitimated. For example, Liddle and Joshi explored the way the Brahmins incorporated goddess cults; and Cockburn looked at the techniques employed by the compositors to exclude women. The success of these practices historically, and the

continued employment of sexist practices could not be seen as somehow internal to specific institutions but only as sustainable through the broader legitimations encapsulated in patriarchal ideology. Patriarchal ideology was seen not as a transhistorical form but as interlinked with class (and racist) ideologies.

The third project of the studies was, in revealing the nature of the practices and their structural significance, to provide a basis for challenging sexism and undermining patriarchal oppression. Oakley, for example, called on the Women’s Liberation Movement to change emphasis to incorporate the interests of housewives; Westwood proposed support for local anti-sexist anti-racist initiatives; and Mumtaz and Shaheed set out, in the first place, to documents the history of the women’s movement in Pakistan.

In all these studies, then, the intention was to get beneath the surface and reveal the true nature of patriarchal oppression. It meant deconstructing historically specific forms of patriarchy by analysing particular practices, a process confounded by the parallel operation of class (and racial) oppression. The observed practices were given new meaning through the reconstruction that dissolved taken-for-granted sexist practices and male priorities.

Patriarchy oppresses women by rendering them invisible and their views trivial. Making women visible and re-presenting women’s perspectives are a major part of feminist critical research. Oakley pioneered in addressing housework as work and investigating it from the point of view of the women who do it. She developed a sympathetic ethnography that countered the spurious ‘scientism’ of the male paradigm. Critical ethnography has emerged as one of two widely used methods for feminist critical research. Cockburn, for example, concentrated on in-depth interviews while Westwood preferred participant observation.

The other major approach is the development of women’s history and Mumtaz and Shaheed’s study is one among many examples. Women’s history counters the marginalisation of women in dominant history. This is done by recasting history to take account of women’s


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roles: reconstructing it to address women’s rather than men’s concerns; or by writing the history of women’s realms.

Ethnographic approaches are often combined with historical analysis as in Liddle and Joshi’s Daughters of Independence and Cockburn’s Brothers. Ethnographic material, detailing actual practice, serves as insights into the operation of oppressive structural and historical processes.

Unravelling myths and exposing contradictions provides the major ways through which feminist critical social research enables the dialectical deconstructive process. Stereotypes and anomalies are located structurally and this provides the basis for revealing the operation of patriarchal ideology. Detailed analysis of the operation of legitimating practices reveals the nature of the oppressive mechanism.

The next part undertakes a similar examination of how racial oppression has been approached by critical empirical analysts.

4. Race 4.1 Introduction

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The studies examined in this part of the book focus primarily on racial oppression. The terms ‘race’, ‘racism’, ‘black’, ‘Afro-Caribbean’, ‘Asian’ are all, of course, politically charged and dynamic concepts. The lack of any clearly non-repressive signifiers (Bulmer, 1986) means that the selection of terminology is both transitory and to some extent arbitrary. When referring to other commentators, and in the studies reviewed below, the terminology used by the authors will be adopted. Otherwise I shall refer to white and black (to include all non-Whites, sometimes split into Asian and Afro-Caribbean). This is not to imply any phenotypical characteristics or hierarchy. On the contrary, the terms used merely represent socially constructed notions of ‘race’ (discussed in section 4.2). Furthermore, although accepting the ideological nature of the term ‘race’ itself, I shall only use the inverted commas when referring to specific usage in this form by another author.

Traditionally, in both the United States and the UK, non-whites have been viewed as ‘a problem’. American sociology, well into the 1970s, was characterised by the ‘pathological model’ of blacks. British analyses of race since World War Two have mainly focused on the ‘problem of immigration’ (Rose, 1969) without examining wider socio-economic structures (Zubaida, 1970; Lawrence, 1982b).

The four studies reviewed are critical of the pathological view. They agree that the notion that blacks comprise a problem is at the core of racist reasoning. They adopt a wider structural perspective but do not see race in isolation as a system of oppression. Rather they see the lives of non-whites in Western society as effected in the first instance by issues of race rather than class or gender. In Tomorrow’s Tomorrow, Joyce Ladner (1971) argues that race is a much more powerful variable in American society than social class. She undertakes a detailed analysis of the growing into womanhood of black girls from a St. Louis ghetto. Her study is critical of dominant sociological perspectives that type blacks as deviant, and of approaches to data collection that reproduce forms of oppression. She explores the lives of black women in the broader structural context of institutionalised racism.

Lois Weis (1985), in Between Two Worlds, takes up directly some of the issues raised by Ladner in her ethnographic study of a predominantly black community college. As the title suggests, she examines the ways black ghetto students balance the world of the ghetto, which supports them, with the world of (white) academia, which offers them a tenuous escape from the ghetto. She shows that such students (like Willis’s, 1977, lads) are on the one hand able to penetrate the racism of the community college system while

on the other are limited in their critique and engagement with the system because of their dependence on ghetto-based black culture.

Unlike Ladner who found herself torn between scientific ‘objectivity’ and active involvement, Ben-Tovim et al. (1985) in The Local Politics of Race are quite clear that social researchers should act to engage racial oppression. Their action-research approach saw the research team becoming directly involved in local action to counter racism. Rather than see this as a hindrance to disciplined and detached scientific enquiry they see direct involvement as crucial to the understanding of the local political machinations that bear upon issues of racial equality in Britain.

Mark Duffield’s (1988) study of Indian ironfoundry workers in the West Midlands, Black Radicalism and the Politics of De-industrialisation, is critical of piecemeal, institutionalised approaches to anti-racism seeing them as part of the cultural hegemony that sustains racist oppression. His critical study is a detailed historical analysis of the social, political and


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economic reasons that led to a concentration of Indian workers in the foundry industry in the West Midlands. He reveals how institutionalised racism provided the basis of an alliance between unions, employers and government to defeat the radical Indian shopfloor movement.

All four examples are concerned with colour prejudice rather than with anti- Semitism1 or forms of ethnic oppression that have, for example, characterised the attitudes and actions of North Americans towards Latin Americans (Briggs et al., 1977), Russians towards national ‘minorities’ in the former USSR (Karlkins, 1986), Japanese towards Koreans (Dower, 1986), and the English towards the Irish (Lebow, 1976). This is a methodology book and so no apology is made for failing to provide a definitive analysis of different forms of racism. The examples included illustrate forms of critical methodology used to analyse and engage racism.

4.2 Race, racism and ethnicity

Race, racism and ethnicity are complex phenomena that have been analysed extensively from a multitude of perspectives. There is no intention here to summarise the history of sociology of race or the debates about the nature of race, racism and ethnicity. Instead some of the general features of these concepts and their interrelationships that characterise critical social thought will be outlined.

Race, racism and ethnicity are interrelated concepts but it is important that they are not elided in critical research. In one sense, race is a meaningless concept in critical social research because such research denies any inherent notion of biological characteristics and traits attributable to racial origin.2 In this sense, race and racism are intertwined because racial attribution is seen as fundamental to racism. Such attribution is social and not natural. The social construction of race and the development of racism are concrete historical processes. Racism is not natural or inevitable. It takes many forms, each with its own history and structure of meaning. Race is not an empirical social category but it is social in as much as it is an ideological construct signifying a ‘set of imaginary properties of inheritance which fix and legitimate real positions of social domination or subordination in terms of genealogies of generic difference’ (Cohen, 1988, p. 23). When ‘race’ is naturalised racism is viewed as an external problem not an integral part of capitalism.

Ethnicity, on the other hand, refers to the linguistic and cultural practices through which a dynamic sense of collective identity is produced and transmitted from generation to generation (Bulmer, 1986). Ethnicity does not necessarily connote innate characteristics although race always implies ethnicity. It does so in two ways; either by reducing linguistic or cultural identity to biology, or by naturalising linguistic or cultural identity within a fixed hierarchy of ‘social traits’. In other words, ethnicity is racialised in either social or cultural terms.

Critical social research, in arguing for the social construction of race rather than race as a biological category reflecting innate characteristics, denies that racism is just skin deep. ‘Names and modes of address, states of mind and living conditions, clothes and customs, every kind of social behaviour and cultural practice have been pressed into service to signify this or that racial essence’. So a critical social research perspective does not simply see racism as rooted in natural biological differentiation. On the contrary, racism is an ideological code that seizes, opportunistically, on various ideological signifiers that work most effectively at any point in time to naturalise difference and legitimate domination. Racist imagery does not

1 Anti-Semitism and colour prejudice are distinctive modalities of racism. (Cohen, 1988, p. 15) 2 The nineteenth century attempts at an objective classification of the human species into biological groupings, or ‘races’ have been ‘progressively discredited’ and critical social research takes as axiomatic that discernible differences in skin colour, type of hair, or even gene frequency in no way provides the basis for the classification of people into racial subtypes. In social research in general the tendency is to see ‘race’ as the ‘way in which members of society perceive differences between groups in that society and define the boundaries of such groups taking into account physical characteristics such as skin colour’ (Bulmer, 1986, pp. 54–5, italics added). Critical social research insists that ‘race’ is an ideological construction.


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merely reflect, in a distorted form, observable ethnic attributes. To suggest it does is to provide racism with a common-sense

rationale that serves to bracket out historical reality (Lawrence, 1982a; Cohen, 1988). On the contrary, racist constructs have an internal structure that cannot be deduced from, or reduced to, the empirical characteristics of the populations against which they are directed.

There are broadly speaking four critical approaches to the analysis of ‘race’ and racism.3 The first supposes that economics has primacy in determining the character of race politics. It tends to project blacks as an ‘underclass’ (Glasgow, 1971; Rex & Tomlinson, 1979), ‘sub-proletariat’, ‘class fraction’ (Edwards, 1979) or ‘reserve army of labour’. Racial structuration is imposed by capital, which needs racism for the sake of capital (Sivanandan, 1982). Struggles against racism are thus struggles against capitalism. This view emerges in various ways in both Joyce Ladner (1971) and Lois Weis (1985).

The second is an anti-race relations position (Phizaclea & Miles, 1980; Miles, 1982), which not only denies biological races but also critiques all uses of the concept ‘race’ as descriptive or analytic tool. ‘Race’ is regarded as an ideological effect that threatens class unity. The proponents of this approach want to see race dissolved into class.4

The third approach focuses on social policy issues. It sees race and class as fundamentally split with issues of racism having no contact with class politics. The policy approach supposes that radical theorists of race and racism should produce critiques of official race policy and formulation of alternatives (Gabriel & Ben-Tovim, 1979). The plausibility depends on two things: an idea of racism as ‘popular democratic and divorced from class’; and a positive evaluation of the capacity of state institutions. Gilroy (1987, p. 26) suggests that the favoured vehicles of this approach involve ‘black para- professionals’ in the development of race relations legislation, multicultural education policies and racism awareness training, (Ben-Tovim et al., 1981, 1986).

A fourth approach is sceptical of the multiculturalism of social policy initiatives and suggests an alternative view of the relationship between class and race (Gilroy, 1987; Cohen, 1988; Duffield, 1988). Whatever the actual social and economic conditions faced, for example, by Black or Jewish people they do not constitute, for all time, an ‘underclass’. The privations and abuse they suffer is a function of hegemonic racism and to analyse them as an ‘underclass’ both falsifies the historical process and reifies the negative stereotype (Cohen, 1988, p. 27). What is necessary is to see racism as a process that is neither detachable from issues of class nor subsumed under it. This view brings the contemporary debate within Marxism about the nature of class struggle into the analysis of race. The former cannot be reduced to the latter. The processes of race and class formation are not identical. Class analysis can help to illuminate the historical development of racism provided it is not just applied in anachronistic ways. The potential of a unified working class must be addressed not assumed in simplistic applications of economic determinism to race. Class analysis must be modernised; the capital-labour distinction is inadequate. Class struggle cannot be reduced to productive relations but also involves gender, racial and generational divisions of labour.5 The issue becomes one of how race materially relates to class through social action at any given historical juncture. Race is potentially a feature of class consciousness and class formation and is likely to be ‘a more potent means to organize and focus the grievances of certain inner- city populations than the languages of class politics’ (Gilroy, 1987, p. 27). 3 This outline owes much to Gilroy (1987) and Cohen (1988). There are in addition idealist approaches that deal with race as an autonomous realm of scientific enquiry (Banton & Harwood, 1975) An alternative tendency has, in defining ‘race’ as a cultural phenomenon, turned it into a ‘synonym for ethnicity and a sign for the sense of separateness which endows groups with an exclusive, collective identity’ (Lawrence, 1982a). For these writers, blacks do not live in the castle of their skin but behind the sturdy walls of discrete ethnic identities (Gilroy, 1987, p. 16). 4 Because this section sets out to provide examples of methodology, which see race as the major form of oppression, no examples from within this tendency are included. 5 This, of course, reflects socialist/Marxist feminist approaches unhappy with the way gender has swamped race, for example, Westwood (1984).


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In short, taking up the debate within Marxism about the nature of the revolutionary vanguard (Section 3.2, above) this approach suggests that revolutionary potential lies with those groups whose collective existence is threatened. ‘Collective identities spoken through “race”, community and locality are, for all their spontaneity, powerful means to co-ordinate action and create solidarity’. Because of this real radical potential ‘race’ ‘must be retained as an analytic category ‘not because it corresponds to any biological or epistemological absolutes’,6 but because it directs attention to collectivities that ‘are the most volatile political forces in Britain today’ (Gilroy, 1987, p. 247).

Much analysis of race and racism confuses race with ethnicity. This confusion leads to ethnicity being reified into a set of essentially defining traits and removed from concrete historical processes. Ethnicity becomes ‘Jewishness’, ‘Irishness’, ‘Blackness’, and so on, which are abstract expressions of an eternal trans-historical identity. Cultural identity has become naturalised. This is manifested in approaches that, in defining race as a cultural phenomenon, have turned it into a ‘synonym for ethnicity’ and a sign for the ‘sense of separateness which endows groups with an exclusive, collective identity ‘(Lawrence, 1982b). While these trans-historical traits can be used successfully in anti- racist work (for example, positive images of Blackness), there is a potential to slip into the very epistemological modes (of the New Right) that are being challenged. This is the very foundation of racist reification of ethnicity that is the basis of what was referred to in the 1980s as the New Right racism (Gilroy, 1987; Cohen, 1988; Duffield, 1988). This racism asserted incompatible cultural differentiation. It was an argument used in the United States and in South Africa to support separate development and in its Powellist version (in the United Kingdom) predicted that the (white) British people would not tolerate alternative cultures in their midst. Thatcherism embodied a trivial version of Powellist racism in its call for an end to immigration in 1978 in order to avoid being swamped by alien cultures (Barker, 1981).7

Ironically multiculturalism has taken on the same epistemological presuppositions. By defining ‘race’ and ethnicity as cultural absolutes, blacks themselves, and parts of the anti-racist movement risk endorsing the explanatory frameworks and political definitions of the New Right.

Although still highly contentious, critical analyses of race must avoid replacing biological absolutism by ethnic absolutism. It must avoid the replacement of racism rooted in biological attribution to one rooted in intrinsic cultural traits.

4.3 Joyce Ladner—Tomorrow’s Tomorrow

4.3.1 Introduction In Tomorrow’s Tomorrow Joyce Ladner (1971) analyses the growing into womanhood of low-income adolescent black girls from the large metropolitan centres of the United States.8 Ladner collected most of her empirical data between 1964 and 1968 while working as a research assistant on a study, supported by the national Institute of Mental Health, of an all-black low-income housing project of over ten thousand residents in a slum area of St. Louis.

The majority of females in the study were drawn from the Pruitt-Igoe housing, the remainder were in ‘substandard private housing’. The sample consisted of ‘several peer

6 Radical in the sense of ‘rootedness’ that implies a return of power to ‘grass roots’ rather than the conservative usurpation of radical. 7 The identification of Thatcherism with racism was perhaps the reason for the demise and redirection of the National Front (in the late 1970s), which no longer had a distinctive policy (Edgar, 1977). Thatcherism has reinforced new popular images of racism, notably those around mugging (Hall et al., 1978), and created a popular consensus that explained the ‘riots’ of 1980 and 1981 not as an economic failing but as street crime, indiscipline in the home, declining moral values, and falling educational standards, all of which were associated with young black people in the popular racist mind. 8 Ladner refers throughout to Black persons with an upper case B.

4. Race 4.3 Joyce Ladner—Tomorrow’s Tomorrow

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groups which over the years changed in numbers and composition’ (Ladner, 1971, p. xxv). Most of the data reported are based on systematic open-ended interviews that related to life histories and ‘attitudes and behaviour that reflected approaching womanhood’ (Ladner, 1971, p. xxv). This material is supported by direct observation as Ladner spent a considerable amount of time with the girls and their families in their homes, homes of friends and her own apartment, at church, parties, dances, out shopping, and so on. In this way she established a strong rapport with both the girls and their parents.9

Ladner regards the majority of her research as ‘exploratory’ and from it she drew some preliminary conclusions, which she tested via the agency of taped (and transcribed) interviews with a randomly selected sample of thirty girls aged between 13 and 18. Ladner thus sees her results as generalisable to all low-income urban Black American girls.

This method, reflecting Ladner’s concern to develop a multivariate analysis of black culture, might at first sight not appear to be particularly critical. However, it must be set in relation to a number of other considerations: first, the contextualisation of the data historically and structurally; second, the inadequacies of dominant sociological approaches. Third, the requirements on her to conform to specific academic standards of objectivity and her own concerns about the possibility of value-freedom.

Ladner’s book was a radical statement in the United States at the time, not least because of its positive assertion of a black culture, its denial of the relevance of white middle-class norms for assessing black culture and its claim that (working-class) black womanhood provided the model for the new liberated white middle-class women.

4.3.2 Structure—institutionalised racism Ladner sees Black women as located historically and structurally in an oppressive, racist system. They are acting subjects who engage dialectically with the system that engulfs them. They are neither wholly determined by, nor do they act freely to structure, their environment. Poor black women, informed by a particularly oppressive heritage, adapt their social circumstances in order to survive in, transform, and confront the oppressive system. Through depicting the lives of black pre-adolescent and adolescent girls in a big- city slum, she shows how distinct socio-historical forces have shaped a very positive and practical way of dealing and coping with the oppressive system.

It is difficult to capture the essence of this complex period of psychosocial development because of the peculiar historical backdrop against which this process occurs. Therefore I have endeavoured to analyze their present lives as they emerge out of these historical forces, for they have been involved in a strong reciprocal relationship in that they have been shaped by the forces of oppression but have also exerted their influence so as to alter certain of these patterns. (Ladner, 1971, p. 270)

The structural focus of her analysis is institutionalised racism, which ‘has exerted the strongest impact upon all facets of the Black woman’s life’. Ladner defines institutionalised racism in general terms as the policies, priorities and functions of a system ‘of normative patterns’ that subjugate, oppress and force dependence through the sanctioning of unequal goals, inequality in status and access to goods and services (Stafford & Ladner, 1969, p. 70).10

4.3.3 White social science—pathology and black culture

Sociology, reflecting the myths of institutionalised racism, has tended to see blacks in general as pathological terms. In particular, the black family continues to be seen as ‘disorganised’ (Frazier, 1931, 1939; Moynihan, 1965) and black women as an aberration of

9 Ladner also refers to the use of Thematic Apperception Tests. 10 This definition fails to ground institutional racism in explicit material practices, reflecting the prevailing approach to American sociology of the late 1960s. Nonetheless it does provide a structural context within which to locate the day-to-day struggles of black women.


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the white middle-class model.11 Ladner is critical of this prevailing sociological tradition and turns the taken-for-granted on its head by arguing that it is ‘malignant’ institutionalised racism in both its overt and covert forms that has provided the structures and processes within which the apparent features of ‘disorganisation’ (matriarchy, illegitimacy, juvenile suicide, violence) have occurred. The institutionalised racism of the oppressing classes is legitimated by blaming racial minorities for their situation, labelling them as deviant and, furthermore, ‘indoctrinating the oppressed to believe in their alleged inferiority’.

Dispensing with the pathological model, Ladner undertakes one of the first positive analyses of the black community and particularly of black women. This analysis is informed by a notion of black culture sustained by the functionally autonomous black (ghetto) community.

Ladner argues the existence of a distinct black culture comprised primarily of two elements: Africanisms that have survived slavery; and the adaptive responses blacks made to slavery and post-slavery racial discrimination. ‘The "Black cultural" framework has its own autonomous system of values, attitudes, sentiments and beliefs’ which cannot be assessed by the norms of white middle-class culture. What is necessary is ‘rigorous multi-variate analysis’ of Black culture (Ladner, 1971, p. xxiii), which is something that

white middle-class social science has failed to do, preferring instead simplistic stereotypes. The inherent bias of social science, which draws on the basic concepts and tools of white

Western society, reproduces ‘the conceptual framework of the oppressor’ with the researcher defining the problem. This prevents most social researchers from being able to accurately observe black life and culture and the impact racism and oppression has on blacks.

Although Ladner argues that black women must be situated within black culture, she insists that their lives must be seen in a wider context of oppression. It is inadequate to view the subjects of her study in the isolated context of the slum area of St. Louis, Missouri, rather they must be located within ‘the national and international context of neo-colonialism and its disastrous effects upon oppressed peoples. Their conditions and life chances are necessarily interwoven with the status of the oppressed all over the world. As this broader context changes so will their lives’ (Ladner, 1971, p. 287).

Ladner argues that dominant (white) social science has dealt woefully with black culture because it has failed to address the fundamental problem of neo-colonialism. To understand blacks it is necessary to develop a ‘new frame of reference which transcends the limits of white concepts’ (Bennett, 1970).

4.3.4 Objectivity and value-freedom

Ladner’s training had been informed by the deviancy perspective on black women and she began the fieldwork with such preconceptions, initially intent on elaborating what was alleged to exist. However, her life experiences invalidated the deviant perspective and as she came to understand her subjects, Ladner moved her focus from trying to find out how ‘harmful consequences’ of the ghetto affected women’s life chances and how a ‘less destructive adaptation could be made to their impoverished environments’ to one that saw the subject’s lives as a healthy and successful adaptation to their circumstances.

As she became more involved with the subjects of the research she was unable to continue the expected role of dispassionate scientific data extractor. She became unhappy

11 The disorganisation thesis derives from so-called ‘Chicago School’ studies of ‘social disorganization’ the 1920s and early 1930s. Along with its associated concepts of ‘definition of the situation’ and ‘social becoming’ it had a long lasting impact on American sociology. Social disorganisation was initially used to refer to the disorganisation that occurs within societies as a result of social change (see Carey, 1975; Bulmer, 1984; Harvey, 1987). A parallel notion of individual disorganisation emerged in a number of guises, initially integrally linked to social disorganisation but later becoming a more autonomous notion linked to personal or group pathology. Disorganisation was first used in relation to the family by Mowrer (1924, 1927), and Frazier (1931, 1939) draws on this.


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with a process that set out to simply ‘describe and theorize’ about the ‘pathology-ridden’ conditions of Black people.

I began to perceive my role as a Black person, with empathy and attachment, and, to a great extent, their day-to-day lives and future destinies became intricately interwoven with my own. This did not occur without a considerable amount of agonizing self-evaluation and conflict over "whose side I was on." On the one hand, I wanted to conduct a study that would allow me to fulfill certain academic requirements, i.e. a doctoral dissertation. On the other hand, I was highly influenced by my Blackness—by the fact that I, on many levels, was one of them and had to deal with their problems on a personal level... I was unable to resolve the dilemmas I faced as a Black social scientist because they only symbolized the larger questions, issues and dilemmas of our times. (Ladner, 1971, p. xiv)

Ladner, drawing on Gouldner’s (1962) denial of value-freedom and exhortations to be open and honest about ones values and on Clark’s (1965) admissions about his role as ‘involved observer’ questioned the possibility of value-free research. Although attempting to maintain some degree of objectivity, she ‘soon began to minimize and, very

often, negate the importance of being “value-free,”’ arguing that the selection of the topic itself reflected a bias. She researched Black women because of her ‘strong interest in the subject’ (Ladner, 1971, p. xviii).

The ‘inability to be objective about analysing poverty, racism, disease’ raised for her a further problem: a problem of conscience, morality and action. To what extent should involvement in subjects’ lives lead the researcher, black or white, to direct action to ameliorate ‘many of the destructive conditions he studies?’12 (Ladner, 1971, pp. xix-xx) How can researchers remain dispassionate observers and not intervene? While giving no direct answer to the question Ladner admits that on many occasions she found herself acting as counsellor or ‘big sister’.

Ladner’s account retains elements of ‘positivism’ necessitated by the research context and the PhD, although mediated by her critical perspective. Her reference to testing exploratory conclusions, her agonising over objectivity and value-freedom, her references to multivariate analysis, her latent ‘apology’ for not providing answers and making causal connections parallels the presentation in Oakley’s (1974a) Sociology of Housework. She too was trapped by white male, academic constraints and had to balance her critique of dominant sociological methods and perspectives along with her involvement and sympathy for her respondents against her desire for academic credibility. Like Ladner, she was opposed to a dominant-subordinate researcher-subject relationship. They both wanted to make the activities of women visible as meaningful and resourceful activities located within a wider oppressive structure.

4.3.5 Myths

Given these concerns, Ladner deals with the broad question of the socialisation of Black women through the specification of a number of more specific questions.

What is life like in the urban Black community for the ‘average’ girl? How does she define her roles, behaviors, and from whom does she acquire her models for fulfilling what is expected of her? Is there any significant disparity in the resources she has with which to accomplish her goals in life and the stated aspirations? Is the typical world of the teen-ager in American society shared by the Black girl or does she stand somewhat alone in much of her day-to-day existence? (Ladner, 1971, pp. xxiii–xxiv)

What do the sociohistorical traditions of the Black community do to mold girls into women? How do contemporary circumstances and events play important roles in preparing them to fulfill the expectations of their community and the larger society? (Ladner, 1971, p. 43)

12 Ladner uses the male pronoun throughout to refer to social researchers.


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What does ‘becoming a woman’ mean symbolically to the adolescent girl? (Ladner, 1971, p. 104)

In dealing with her material, Ladner first provides an introductory historical context that documents the changing circumstances of black women from Africa through slavery to contemporary ghetto life. She then explores how her fieldwork material engages

numerous myths about the black community, which she draws out of her review of the relevant literature.

For example, the literature led Ladner to expect black girls to express feelings of inadequacy, worthlessness and self-disparagement because of their colour. She presents a large number of verbatim statements from respondents, ranging in age and political awareness, which clearly show this presupposition to be false, for example:

I’m proud of being a Negro. I mean it’s not bad to be a Negro and that’s why I’m proud.... (13 year old)

I’ve always been proud of being Black because I think it is a superior colour.... (15 year old)

We are not Negroes. We are "so-called" Negroes. That’s the name they gave us. Our original name is Black.... (17 year old)

She concludes that the statements ‘speak for themselves’ and, while a ‘very small number’ of girls did ‘not speak favourably of being black’ none of them wanted to be white. She concludes by turning the analysis round and asking why the ‘self-hatred’ thesis has been consistently advanced when there has been so little empirical evidence to validate the thesis. (Ladner, 1971, p. 99)

Similarly, the myth of black promiscuity is also confronted by the testimony of the girls. An alternative moral code and less formalised family structure operate within the ghetto, which provides statistical indicators interpreted by middle class whites as indicative of promiscuity. However, the ethnographic data on the reality of ghetto women’s lives reveals this to be a misleading view.

In this way Ladner addresses the girls views and life experiences involving numerous facets including poverty, the ghetto environment, exploitative agencies, policing, theft, femininity, sexuality, marriage, and so on. The young women were generally very positive about themselves and contrary to the myths of black helplessness clearly revealed their creativity and resourcefulness. Further, the views expressed showed that the girls had a ‘phenomenal’ awareness of what the sources of oppression of blacks are.

The exploration of the myths, Ladner maintains, shows that they are propagated as part of the ‘institutional subjugation that is designed to perpetuate an oppressive class’. The perceived ‘institutionalized pathological character’ of the ghetto provides the legitimation for its continued subordination and exploitation (Ladner, 1971, p. 100). Revealing the myths is the first step in developing a more fundamental critique of the oppressive forces that produce various forms of anti-social behaviour. When this has been done then the conceptualization of pathology can be reversed. ‘The society, instead of its members, becomes pathological’ (Ladner, 1971, p. 101).

4.3.6 Praxis

Ladner, as an anti-racist, is committed to social change. The historical situation of black women in America convinces Ladner (1971, p. 282) that the ‘most viable model of womanhood in the United States is the one which Black women symbolize’. This is reinforced by her ethnographic material, which shows that black women are characterised

by realism, resourcefulness, creativity, strength and determination to struggle against racism. However, she suggests, aspects of this model need re-evaluation and alteration.

Black women should be at the forefront of the Women’s Liberation Movement (WLM). However, the issues addressed by the WLM are mainly irrelevant to black women.13 For 13 ‘Black women in this society are the only ethnic or racial group which has had the opportunity to be women. By this I simply mean that much of the current focus on being liberated from the constraints and


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example, the ‘protection’ afforded white women by white men from which the white WLM wants to extricate itself. Black men have never been allowed to protect their women and so ‘Black women have always been “liberated”’ (Ladner, 1971, p. 283). Further ‘battles between the sexes’ are a ‘luxury which Black people as a race can ill afford’. ‘Black women do not perceive their enemy to be Black men, but rather the enemy is considered to be the oppressive forces in the larger society which subjugate Black men, women and children.’

The advent of the civil rights movement led to an assertion of black masculinity. Black males demanded the right to provide for and protect their family, to compete equally in the job market, and so on: that is, to have equal rights to patriarchy. Ladner argues that this has required black women to redefine their roles in relation to black men. Traditionally strong, black women are facing a dilemma of continuing to assert individuality or becoming a passive supporter of black men. This dilemma is reflected in the tensions within interpersonal relations experienced by the girls and women in the study.

Many blacks assert the passive role on the assumption that ‘Black men cannot find their places at the top of the family hierarchy if women continue to maintain the[ir] aggressive roles’. The alternative denies patriarchal usurpation of power and argues that men must discover ‘their assertiveness through their own inner resourcefulness, with the compassionate support of Black women’ (Ladner, 1971, pp. 284–5). Ladner argues that black women, while not necessarily embracing patriarchal dominance, must adjust to allow for the ‘full development of male and female’, utilising their ‘survival techniques in the larger struggle for the liberation of Black people’. In short, black women, both working- and middle-class, should take their struggle out of the confines of the family into a wider political struggle.

Ladner is not, however, claiming to chart a course of action for black women. Indeed, in her book she is simply saying ‘This is what the Black woman was, this is how she has been solving her problems, and these are the ways in which she is seeking to alter her roles.’ The actions of black women, though, cannot be seen in isolation as they are ‘dictated by, and interwoven with, the trends set in the vast Black American community’ (Ladner, 1971, p. xxi). It is necessary, she argues for blacks to unite in an aggressive opposition to the growing racist repression, evidenced in the United States at the start of the 1970s, in the growing number of killings, attacks on black intellectuals, failure to enforce desegregation and general confiscation of fundamental rights.

The unified struggle, she argues, must be grounded in black culture. Ladner sees black culture ‘as a non-material culture’ and as ‘emotive’, ‘spiritual’ and ‘aesthetic’. It is in this respect that it is humanistic and may counteract prevailing destructive forces in society. White culture is decadent and unworthy of emulation. Instead she argues that black people should work towards strengthening the values that have emerged out of the black experience. Furthermore, reflecting Black nationalist movements, she is sceptical of integration into a society whose terms are dictated by the oppressing group. However, she warns against romanticising Black culture and seeing it as an opiate and an end in itself. ‘No matter how much we celebrate our culture and its heroes, we must still do the necessary activist work to eliminate oppression. Cultural nationalism can never be a total substitute for direct political involvement’ (Ladner, 1971, pp. 278–9).

protectiveness of the society which is proposed by Women’s Liberation groups has never applied to Black women, and in that sense, we have always been “free”, and able to develop as individuals even under the most harsh circumstances. This freedom, as well as the tremendous hardships from which Black women suffered, allowed for the development of a female personality that is rarely described in the scholarly journals for its obstinate strength and ability to survive. Neither is its peculiar humanistic character and quiet courage viewed as the epitome of what the American model of femininity should be.’ (Ladner, 1971, p. 280)


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4.4 Lois Weiss—Between Two Worlds

4.4.1 Introduction Lois Weis’ (1985) Between Two Worlds is an ethnographic study of the black student culture at a community college ‘on the edge of the urban ghetto’ in a large north-eastern city in the United States. Seventy per cent of the students were black and eighty percent were under thirty years old. Weis builds on the work of McRobbie (1978), Everhart (1983) and, in particular, Willis (1977). Reflecting Willis’ study of the ‘lads’, Weis situates the lived experiences of the black students in a wider socio-historic structure by focussing on the production and reproduction of culture. She focuses on contradictions, linking contradictions in student attitudes towards education and their practices within the institution to wider social structural contradictions. The college culture is grounded in black ghetto culture and, like Willis’ counter-school culture, in the long run renders impotent the avowed intention of most student returners to escape the ghetto streets.

Weis argues that despite legal and ethical changes the economic and social situation of the majority of blacks in the United States has not advanced as rapidly as the upheavals of the 1950s and 1960s might have suggested and substantial inequalities by race persist in the United States (Reich, 1981). Most blacks are trapped in the ‘urban underclass’ (Glasgow, 1971), which is characterised by heavy involvement in the predominantly casual secondary labour market that is closely linked to various illicit activities as a means to supplement a non-living wage. The working class is fractionalised and blacks are predominantly located in the economically lower fractions. In addition, racism operates in ways that disadvantage blacks in other working-class fractions (Edwards, 1979; Reich, 1981).

Weis argues that the self-formative process of cultural production is linked in contradictory ways to this unequal social structure and it is this that underpins her critical ethnographic analysis of the community college which she refers to as ‘Urban College’.

4.4.2 Method

Weis wanted a method that would permit the analysis of the interplay of culture and economy. Like Willis (1977), she sees qualitative methods as sensitive to meanings and as allowing interpretations of symbolic articulations, practices and forms of cultural production. She thus undertook a direct ethnographic study that involved attending classes three days a week for the duration of the 1979–80 academic year, conducting in- depth interviews with both staff [faculty] and students, and in general ‘immersed’ herself in Urban College. She kept a daily record of interactions with students or staff, inside or outside the institution, which included experiences and comments of students and

teachers ‘in classrooms, corridors’ stairwells, offices, cafeteria and local coffee shop and bar’. She recorded field notes as soon as practically possible after the interaction and argued that while data recollection seems difficult, in practice it is not. All that is required is ‘extreme concentration on the researcher’s part’. This participant observation approach, she argued, allowed a direct exploration of experiences of education and also of the cultural discourse that reworked these experiences (Weis, 1985, p. 171).

Gaining access to Urban College took six months and involved a considerable amount of bureaucracy. This was tied closely to educational politics and concerns over future funding. ‘Since the press had been unfriendly to Urban College in the past, suspicions surrounding my initial presence were understandable’ (Weis, 1985, p. 172). Weis constantly reassured all involved that her study was not in any way intended to prejudice the future development of the college and that, indeed, she was not interested in Urban College per se but in life in an urban institution. In the end she got co-operation from the college administration and all but two of the college academic staff. As a favour to the college Weis administered ‘several survey questionnaires to present students, former students, and alumni’ the data from which were incorporated into the Middle States Accreditation Report; and this also provided some

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demographic data for her study but in the main this material seems to have been little used by Weis.

Weis argued that, in general, participant observation work involves gaining and retaining the trust of subjects in order to facilitate a free exchange of information. Thus the researcher should operate so as to become an unobtrusive, non-threatening, part of the scene, taken-for-granted by the participants. This was initially difficult for her given that she was white in a predominately black college and that she was interested, in the first instance, in black culture. However, she adopted the role of a student, taking classes and examinations and like other students ‘suffered through the crowded elevator, limited number of telephones, cafeteria food and generally poor physical facilities’. Other students, she claimed, began to see her everywhere and increasingly black students interacted with her as she was not part of a white clique. Weis spent four months taking classes before conducting any in-depth interviews. Over time she became trusted, as the detailed information given her reveals, and once students became aware of her ‘intentions as a researcher’ they were ‘more than happy to “tell their story”’. The systematic collection of in-depth interview material took six months. The interviews were openly tape-recorded, often in the local bar, and were structured around a set of ‘open-ended probe questions’ that encouraged the student to express their own views. The schedule of eleven probe questions included: ‘If you could change anything at Urban College, what kinds of things would you like to see changed’; ‘What kind of job would you like to obtain’; ‘Do you think that you studies here will prepare you to get this job?’. The interviews lasted from forty-five minutes to three hours. Similar interviews were conducted with staff and alumni, although with different sets of probe questions.14

The analysis of her vast amount of data was clearly a problem and one she managed by ‘systematically constructing themes’ in the post-fieldwork stage. This was dependent on the extremely time-consuming transcription of taped material and the assembling of field notes. Following Bogdan & Taylor (1975) she duplicated and cross-coded chunks of transcripts and field notes and ‘placed them into manila folders according to topic’, in a similar way to the ‘pile-building’ style described above in section 1.4.2. This process enabled her to ‘systematically identify salient cultural categories for both students and

faculty. The virtue of this form of analysis is that such categories were suggested by the data themselves’. This enabled the identification of core cultural elements in Urban College ‘as well as to identify factors both within and outside the institution that contribute to the rise of located cultural form’ (Weis, 1985, p. 174).

After reporting the ethnographic study in detail Weis, like Willis, develops a more theoretical analysis of the rationality and dynamic of the observed cultural processes, which are thereby linked to the social structure. These lead on to a praxiological concern and consequent consideration of political action.

4.4.3 Black student culture

Weis (1985, p. 7) adopts a hegemonic view of culture, which sees culture as semi- autonomous (Gramsci, 1971). Thus she sees educational establishments as sites ‘where cultures and ideologies are produced in ongoing interactions rather than places where ideologies are imposed upon students’. Schools and colleges do not directly reproduce dominant ideology but embody a process characterised by contradictions. Weis concentrates on race in the production of culture and ideologies. Although people like Willis have noted

14 Weis makes reference, in a footnote, to her ‘two research assistants’ and in the acknowledgements lists five people who ‘acted as my research assistants, spending countless hours collecting data without which this book could not have been written’. It is not clear, however, what role these people played nor exactly what they did. The only clue offered is that the interviews with graduates of the college appear to have been ‘conducted by a person other than LW’ according to Weis’ system of extract annotation (although the interviewers’ interjections are still labelled as ‘LW’).


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race as important and others have undertaken studies of ‘raced persons’ in schools, there have been, she argues, no detailed analyses of race as a factor in the production of culture.

Urban College students, like their parents exhibit characteristics that destine them to become part of a permanently trapped population of poor people; the industrial underclass. The students are aware of this and see the college as between two worlds; the ghetto and the cultural mainstream. Urban College is designed to promote equal educational opportunity. Its main aims are to provide institutional programmes that parallel the first two years of a four-year programme, providing vocationally oriented teaching aimed at preparing students for employment as graduates with an associate degree. In many senses, the college is seen as a ‘second-chance’ institution by both staff and students. Attendance at the college is, in part, a rejection of street life and an attempt to embrace ‘legitimate society’.

Weis notes gender differences in her study, in particular that women tend to have primary responsibility for children and frequently see giving their children enhanced opportunities as their escape route from the ghetto. However, it is this black culture that concerns Weis rather than its gender tensions, which she refers to only when the cultural process works differently by gender. She argues that both black men and women share the lived reality of urban poverty.

They share entrapment in the urban ghetto and racist America. These shared experiences lead students to forge a collective culture within Urban College that is not strictly bound by gender. The culture produced in the college ensures that the vast majority of the students will return to the ghetto streets. It is these shared aspects of existence that give rise to this culture—a culture that helps to ensure the continued structural bases of their own “superexploitation” as blacks. (Weis, 1985, p. 26)

With the use of substantial testaments taken from the in-depth interviews, field notes and student essays, Weis outlines the elements of black student culture that are created at Urban College.15 Blacks drop in and out of class, arrive late, use drugs and generally engage in activities that slow the pace of learning. All of this results in low success rates in conventional academic terms. This is not, as with Willis’ counter-school culture, a function of the dismissal of the relevance of knowledge nor a direct attack on teachers. Indeed, the college, in principle, is seen positively as providing a second chance. Elements of the students’ lived culture are contradictory and ‘students embrace and reject schooling at one and the same time’ (Weis, 1985, p. 48). The economic pressures of day- to-day survival in a racist society and the impact of the non-college cultural milieu in which students daily engage are in conflict with the requirements of full academic involvement.

This is most clearly seen in the very different perceptions of black and white students at the college. The black Urban College culture is hard for the minority white students to grasp and they feel disadvantaged by it. Although there is no overt hostility, black and white students do not mix much and deeply rooted antagonisms, Weis claims, are recreated in the institution. In short, existing antagonisms in the wider society are reproduced in the college. The ethnographic study aims to explore the interrelationship between institutional structures, student culture and the wider social milieu.

A key example is the question of time. Students at Urban College are constantly reminded about the appropriate use of time and the institution has a fairly rigid attendance policy and an associated but less rigid policy on lateness (which Weis refers to as part of the hidden curriculum). Students are ‘bombarded with dominant time’ (Weis, 1985, p. 78), that is, standard industrial chronological time. This differs radically from the ‘street time’ predominant in the urban ghetto. Clock time is seen as ‘white man’s time’ (Horton, 1979) and as irrelevant to street values and activities. Street time is personal time, there is no

15 Weis’ approach is to introduce approximately quarter page long blocks of verbatim material from four or five sources one after the other and then summarise it by reference to key phrases. This approach while contextualising comments does lead to repetition. However, this is a stylistic concern rather than a substantive concern about the nature of her critical ethnography.

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synchronisation, and being ‘on time’ is meaningless. This use of time is not deficient but oppositional and a positive affirmation of black street culture.

Street time is, without question, embedded within the broader class/race subculture from which students at urban College come. They are part and parcel of the community which created and re-created it since black Americans were first enslaved. (Weis, 1985, p. 78)

In the main students resent control over their time and the imposition of an attendance policy that has direct effect on their chances of graduation despite their positive affirmation of the content of school knowledge. They ‘waste time’ and contradict regulations that demand attendance and prompt arrival and departure. The college policy on time ‘emerged dialectically in relation to both student culture and demands from the state, as well as the way in which these demands are mediated by institutional personnel’ as a means of control of students. The contradiction between affirmation of knowledge and disregard for the dominant time structure in which it is located is partly accounted for by the view that college knowledge is ‘white not black’ and therefore ‘not ours’. This is reinforced by the fact that ‘faculty in the academic areas are overwhelmingly white’ (Weis, 1985, p. 79). Thus student culture and the ‘hidden curriculum’ interact to constantly produce and reproduce one another. ‘In the final analysis, student lived culture at Urban College strengthens the collectivity and reinforces aspects of black collective experience, ultimately reproducing and deepening class/race antagonisms that lie at the very heart of American society’ (Weis, 1985, p. 82).

4.4.4 Penetration—unmasking the ideology of equal opportunity

The shape and form of student culture differs, Weis argues, by class race and gender. The basic cultural processes of penetration and limitation described by Willis (1977) operate in Urban College but the lived cultural forms differ from that of the ‘lads’. This is not surprising ‘given that race has its own dynamic in the United States’ which results in different positions for white and black workers, with the latter forming a ‘caste-like’ minority (Ogbu, 1982).

Basically, the Urban College students have an understanding that although college knowledge is legitimate the community college system is not designed to help them as a class or group.

Gloria: I figure that what they did was put the school right in our community— they said ‘we’ll give them this and this may satisfy them’. ...This was...convenient, but we were shortchanged as far as the education itself was concerned.

I think they teach Optics out there at [the suburban campus].... We’re definitely cheated. I think what they’re doing is ‘let’s give the blacks a place in their own neighborhood, then we can give them as little as possible and maybe they’ll be satisfied with it.... We’ll give them as much as we can and they’ll keep their mouths shut. (Student quoted in Weis, 1985, p. 139)

Not all students are as articulate or overtly aware of the nature and role of community colleges but all at least unconsciously understand that the type of education offered them is second best and thus penetrate the ideology of the community college. Student culture ‘unmasks an ideology which offers everyone an opportunity to attain elite status while simultaneously justifying an unequal distribution of rewards’ (Weis, 1985, p. 136). The college operates to deflect attention from ‘questions of distributive justice’, which are central to the black struggle in the United States. The students are aware of this and know the college does not herald the destruction of class society but, at best, offers a way out of the underclass for the individual.

This escape requires that students alter their own culture and adopt the dominant culture. Ghetto culture is of necessity a collective culture. Day-to-day survival in the urban ghetto is dependent on an obligation and exchange network of which kin relationships are a major part. Urban College students are part of the ghetto and are enmeshed within similar co-operative arrangements (notably in relation to child care). Such students do not enter college ‘embodying a spirit of possessive individualism’. This is a characteristic of the staff and the


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white students. Teachers define good students as those who operate within faculty categories, that is, ones who operate outside the ‘group logic’. Those who do not accept the ‘teacher’s definition of the situation’ (Keddie, 1971) simply fail. Those who succeed make a break with the underclass collective community, but this means a break with the only form of security most students have.

Success is thus a function of the relationship of individual to the student culture and the risk run by an individual in breaking with the collective. This risk is not an intellectual or psychological one but is materially based. The exception is older women returners who have raised their families and who opt for traditional female occupations such as childcare or secretarial. A woman who chooses one of these low-paid options can

remain a part of the collective and succeed at Urban College; she is not confronted by the contradiction of trying to escape the ghetto.

Breaking out thus involves not only putting their security at risk but also engaging in the risky process of educational attainment. Given that most black ghetto-based students possess the wrong educational ‘decoders’ to begin with they are disadvantaged vis- -vis the student who already possesses the ‘correct’ cultural capital.16 Thus legitimate (college) knowledge acts to maintain those who are already on top, rather than to ‘push people up’ as the official rhetoric suggests.

In the end, given the racist nature of American society and the segmented market process, the community college degree, if attained, will be of little benefit for black students. Student cultural forms recognise that education at this level does nothing for the group and even at the individual level is less advantageous for blacks than whites. The insights, communicated through the culture, thus clearly link the education system to American economic structures. The residual question is why, given that the collectivity is reaffirmed at the cultural level, is this awareness not manifested in overt political action?

4.4.5 Limitation—political inactivity

The answer is, for Weis, the partiality of the penetration and the limitations within student culture. Insights are prevented from going further by contradictions within the lived cultural form itself. Ironically, the partiality is linked to a collective faith in education. Education is seen both as a potentially liberating force yet acknowledged as essentially individualistic in practice. On the other hand, the affirmation of education reproduces a group oppositional culture that goes back to the prohibition of education for slaves. Thus student culture which understands how individual and group logics are confounded in the educational process reproduces the wider structural contradiction of blacks in seeking education/knowledge in order to raise them above slavery while at the same time acknowledging the legitimacy of white/capitalist knowledge, which reproduces the unequal and oppressive social structure.

The partiality of the insights leads students to blame themselves despite a raised consciousness among blacks of structural inequalities. Students hold their own circumstances responsible. Dominant ideology (Wright, 1975; Apple & Weis, 1983) reinforces this self-blame given that most formal barriers to equality have been removed. Dominant ideology takes for granted the intrinsic value of education and relentlessly and noisily proclaims education as the key to ‘success’ available to all. This contrasts sharply with the silence of the disorganised cultural form and thus student culture reaffirms the value of education. ‘While the collective culture produced in the institution sees through ideology, ideology “confidently strides” (Willis, 1977, p. 166) into the space between the disorganized cultural level and political action’. It is this ‘combination of blocks and ideological effects that limits cultural insights and prevents the development of a collective consciousness geared towards transformative potential’ (Weis, 1985, pp. 151– 2).

16 Note the use of the concept of cultural capital way before its vogue in the first decade of the 21st century.

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In addition, there is a feeling of despair in student culture given the economic recession in the north-east United States and the massive loss of jobs in the city in which Urban College is located. An estimated 50 per cent of black youth were unemployed and the problem was getting worse. Students want to escape but feel the situation is hopeless. Unlike the 1960s, the hopelessness and frustration is not linked to a broader political

movement. Rather, students inculcate a well-developed sense of structural subordination, which the dominant ideology relating to educational opportunity reinforces.

The existence of a distinct black culture has impeded rather than enabled blacks to engage their structural ‘superexploitation’ as part of an underclass (Omi & Winant, 1983). ‘In spite of its richness and strength, the existence of a distinct black culture contributes to the fractionalized nature of the working class—a fractionalization which ultimately benefits the capitalist class.’ Such fractionalisation is not simply attributable to culture: racism is fundamentally based on colour. However, it is furthered by class and cultural tensions within the black community and these are also reproduced within the Urban College setting (Weis, 1985, pp. 156–7).

Students enter Urban College with a desire to escape poverty but within the college they create a collective culture that ensures the majority will remain on the streets. The collective college culture reflects the necessary collectivity of the ghetto. However, Weis has shown that ‘failure’ at Urban College is not simply the importation of successful street practices into the college environment where they are inappropriate. The failure of students to make the leap from street culture to mainstream culture is much more complex and revolves round a number of contradictions within student culture, which reflect wider structural contradictions.

In conclusion, Weis suggests possibilities for action for those who want students to ‘succeed’ and are opposed to the unequal and oppressive social structure. The suggestions relate to policies on staffing, time, and standard English, as well as the development of a radical pedagogy and a critical appreciation of their own position by students. She admits that changing institutional policies and practices will not be adequate because of the structural factors. However, given the semi-autonomous nature of culture it is possible that student cultural forms might come to develop the transformative potential currently lacking.

4.5 Gideon Ben-Tovim, John Gabriel, Ian Law and Kathleen Stredder—The Local Politics of Race

4.5.1 Introduction The Local Politics of Race is an action research study that examines the political processes that give rise to and maintain racial inequalities. Gideon Ben-Tovim, John Gabriel, Ian Law and Kathleen Stredder focus, as the title suggests, on local politics and the analysis is developed through their five-year involvement in local organisations in Wolverhampton and Liverpool. Local organisations rather than individual cases provide the opportunity to address institutionalised racism as they allow for ‘discussion and action on important and specific race-related issues’ (Ben-Tovim et al., 1986, p. 65).

The researchers developed their research against a background of mounting evidence of racial inequality. Despite legal constraints on racial discrimination and the increasing awareness and take-up of race issues, black people are discriminated against and disadvantaged in various spheres including education, employment and immigration (Townsend 1972; Home Office, 1981; Tomlinson, 1983; Commission for Racial Equality, 1983, 1984; Brown, 1984; Swann, 1985; Race and Immigration). ‘It was clear that the “politics” of racial equality weren’t working.’ Thus, ‘underlying the whole project was a commitment to


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producing knowledge which would be “of use” in the struggle for racial equality’ (Ben-Tovim et al., 1986, pp. 1–2).

The researchers, however, deny prioritising any one form of intervention and are opposed to sectarian notions about the authenticity of any one form of anti-racist activity (for example, activity on the streets by black people alone). They define three types of organisation committed to the elimination of racial inequalities: first, explicitly anti-racist organisations that grew up in response to the National Front in the 1970s; second, community and project groups for Afro-Caribbean, Asian and multi-racial groups; third, policy-related campaigning groups. The researchers concentrated on campaigning and pressure groups, especially the Labour Party and Community Relations Councils, which, they argue, have ‘provided important political contexts for those committed to work actively for racial equality’ (Ben-Tovim et al, 1986, p. 95).17 In addition they contacted two local anti-racist groups: the Merseyside Anti-Racialist Alliance (MARA) and the Wolverhampton Anti-Racist Committee (WARC).

The book focuses on the politics of racial inequality and the role played by political forces in both reinforcing and reducing those inequalities. They do not address race relations by focusing on culture or biological differences. Nor do they use class inequalities or capital accumulation to explain race relations. What they are concerned with is the ‘secondary’ role of politics. Rather than treat the political as a residue of

autonomous activity as the cultural-, biological- and class-determinant approaches tend to, Ben-Tovim et al. are primarily interested in the machinations of politics and the wielding of power as it effects local struggles for racial equality. This focus is not, however, blind to the structural limitations. They are not interested in, for example, minority culture per se but locate it within the discussion of minority rights and demand for institutional provision.

Their conception of politics is not restricted to formal governmental institutions ‘but refers to a mode of analysing institutional structures and relations in general’. Within these institutional contexts, they focus ‘on sites of struggle and conflict’ where the outcome is not known in advance. In short they address power. They see power as something other than ‘fixed quantities ascribed to individuals on the basis of some preconceived hierarchy of the state’. On the contrary, they needed to establish what the conditions are that make the exercise of power possible. Such conditions relate to the law, control over the administration of policy, access to material resources, the nature of prevalent ideologies, and the political struggles. They, therefore, ‘conceive race policy initiatives not as necessarily tokenistic or correct solutions but rather as resources whose outcomes depend on the mobilisation of forces for and against racial equality’ (Ben- Tovim et al., 1986, p. 99).

4.5.2 Action research

The project, started in 1978, became a piece of action research not least because of the reluctance of both local and central government to provide information through the standardised structured interview research instruments. The original intention was to examine the impact of central government policies on race on local communities. Part of this was to examine the scope for local differences in policy and organisational practices. The plan was to interview Whitehall officials and to examine policy documents and Hansard in order to determine central government policy. Interviews with Home Office and Department of Environment officials proved to be ‘uninformative and inadequate for

17 Reviewing the role of the Labour Party the researchers note that despite the broad ideological commitment the role of the party in both Liverpool and Wolverhampton has been limited. Liverpool, dominated by Militant has tended to confine anti-racism to slogans while in Wolverhampton positive, although superficial, initiatives have uncovered more profound problems. Nonetheless, despite these initiatives there is a resistance to extending action which is not just a reflection of a commitment to anti- racism, nor the absence of mandatory participatory mechanisms within the party but is also ‘in part a reflection of the absence of any clear conception of socialist policy and its implications for the local state’ (Ben-Tovim et al., 1986, p. 82).


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examining central government’s relationship with local authorities or for building up a detailed knowledge of how race as an issue was “handled” in Whitehall’ (Ben-Tovim et al., 1986, p. 3).

A survey of local officials and politicians in Wolverhampton and Liverpool was intended to find out the influence of central policy on local policy-making processes. However, the principal officers in Liverpool and Wolverhampton refused access to the administrators/local officers in the town halls and thus the researchers were deprived of a main source of information.

The third stage was to assess the impact of local political and community organisations through interviews and direct active participation. The involvement in these areas provided the researchers with ‘a wealth of detail’ about the operation of local government. Such involvement also allowed the researchers to study the relationship between central and local government on race issues and to look at ‘the role of central legislation in promoting racial equality’. In the circumstances a revised plan was developed that involved assessing the problems and possibilities created for local organisations and local struggles for racial equality by local and central policies.

For example this mean that we did not rely on data from the Home Office or Liverpool’s chief executive for an understanding of the 1976 Race relations Act.

Rather we came to understand the Act through our active involvement in local anti-racist struggles. In this way our knowledge of central and local policies was linked to the research process through action. (Ben-Tovim et al., 1986, p. 4)

The researchers regarded their direct involvement in local organisations as not just a fortuitous means of gaining information. On the contrary, they regarded the ‘action’ aspect of their research as of key importance. ‘We were able to use our energy and efforts (for the purpose of research) to support local struggles for racial equality’ (Ben-Tovim et al., 1986, p. 3). The kind of action the researchers were involved in included:

attending meetings to engage in debates about strategies and objectives; writing policy papers and using them for discussion and lobbying; doing local research for the use of organisations and attending and organising conferences. (Ben- Tovim et al., 1986, p.3)

Ben-Tovim et al. argue that the relationship between local government and local organisations concerned with racial equality, such as the Community Relations Councils and the Labour Party, was ‘consistently tested over a wide spectrum of issues’ and with them ‘acting in a variety of capacities’. They thus argue that their findings are ‘valid and reliable’ and ‘furthermore that they are detailed and specific, as well as explanatory in their content’ (Ben-Tovim et al., 1986, p. 4). The researchers argued that they were thus able to ‘take research out of its ivory tower’ and to develop academic research in the context of a committed fight for racial equality. Operating in a different social and academic context they are unequivocal in the face of the dilemmas that fifteen years earlier had plagued Ladner (1971).

4.5.3 Conventional and integrative action research

The researchers point out that there is a substantial ‘if unfashionable’ tradition of action research in the social sciences, which includes the War on Poverty Programmes in the United States and the Education Priority Areas Project and the Community Development Project in the United Kingdom, during the 1960s and 1970s. More recently, action research has been associated with initiatives ‘designed to combat the effects of urban deprivation and disadvantage’. These initiatives, however, were all characterised by a distinction between action and research with a corresponding distinction between ‘those who researched and those who acted’ (Lees and Smith, 1975). The result is that action research has frequently failed to take account of its political context with corresponding implications for the programme of action.

Ben-Tovim et al. (1986, p. 6) argue that social science has always been surrounded by controversy about the relationship between the various social scientific disciplines on the one


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hand and political action on the other. At one level this is seen as an issue of value freedom. In the area of race relations there has been, contrary to notions of value- freedom, a clear commitment by most authors to particular standpoints, such as the elimination of racial discrimination or the promotion of racial harmony. However, despite the intrusion of such values there has been little systematic attempt to develop the political implications of these positions.18 Such depoliticisation of the issue within social science, the authors claim, is fatuous and unrealisable. Any research, let alone that related to racism, is political from beginning to end. Subjects are not selected and studied

neutrally. More to the point, social scientists cannot expect their research to be taken up by politicians or organisations. ‘The tendency to divorce research from its would-be political context and to abstain from research based interventions in politics has only served to sanction the political status quo and in some instances no doubt to actually exacerbate inequalities themselves’ (Ben-Tovim et al., 1986, p. 5). The depoliticisation of the research process, they argue, undermines any direct challenge to institutionalised racism.

They suggest that in the 1980s both ‘mainstream social science’ and Marxism have effected a consensus that divorces research from political practice. Mainstream social science they argue tends to disregard the political significance of its research activity through its commitment to objectivity. Much Marxism, they suggest disengages social science from politics ‘by focusing debate on the ideological purity of Marxism’s contemporary forms and their fidelity (or lack of it) to the classical Marxist tradition’. This is reinforced by an insistence on economic and class structures as the primary focus of analysis. The authors thus project a ‘purist economistic’ view of much Marxist analysis of race, which is hostile to ‘reformist’ intervention in existing social structures.19

Rather than pursue ‘objective’ research the authors are concerned that the sociology of race should be overtly politicised and reflect the ethical commitment condemning racism. Ben-Tovim et al. explore ‘political action in terms of viable strategic options’ with the intention of providing ‘a more complex explanation of the limits of reform without pre-empting it altogether’.

What Ben-Tovim et al. propose is a dissolution of the distinction between researchers and activists. They note three consequences of this approach. First, policy implications are an integral part of the research, not an appended afterthought. That is, the implications of the research on policy becomes an object of investigation in their own right. The implementation and use of the research is built into the analysis from the outset. Second, the analysis of the

18 Ben-Tovim et al. argue that the analysis of race has been compartmentalised into studies of policy or class analyses of racism and that this has meant that policy issues have been divorced from their political context while political analysis has lacked a policy dimension. To overcome this, they argue, policy analysis must ‘accommodate the notions of anti-racist and black struggles’, that is, address the mechanism for achieving identified reforms and ensuring that overall objectives will be monitored and maintained. Further, policy must be evaluated on the basis of its contribution towards reducing racial inequalities. Finally, the relationship between policy and the ‘realities of the political system’ must also be explored. 19 The accounts of research practice in this book have been presented without specific critiques, because all of them represent useful case studies. However, these comments by Ben-Tovim et al. are rather too generalised and misleading to pass without comment. ‘Mainstream sociology’, which presumably refers to the dominant modes of non-critical research highlighted in part one of this book, is not as nai# ve or confused about its political significance as the researchers suggest. Indeed, there are explicit accounts that explore political considerations (for example, Denzin, 1970). What mainstream sociology tends to do, however, is, as the researchers suggest, disengage their analysis from any praxiological concerns. Equally, some Marxist research tends to be less explicit about praxiological concerns than one might expect given the revolutionary tradition. Not all Marxist analysis is, of course, economistic, as this book consistently reiterates. Nor is all Marxist analysis disdainful of direct action within prevailing social structures. Such action is not uniformly regarded as reformist by Marxists, as Ben-Tovim et al. suggest. Indeed, most Marxist analysis informed by Gramscian hegemonic notions tends to be concerned to get involved directly in social action, here and now, rather than await the revolution, as the examples in this book make clear. In the final analysis, whatever straw models Ben-Tovim et al. construct, there is, as this book shows, a critical tradition that is directly concerned with praxiological issues.


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organisations (both statutory and campaigning) that are concerned with political change is not neutral but represents an evaluation of their effectiveness in realising their objectives. Third, the knowledge gained from the research is not the ‘relatively superficial, external and ephemeral’ knowledge of the social surveyor or in-depth interviewer but is knowledge that is ‘constructed out of political practice, for which there is no substitute’. Such knowledge ‘demands a continuous interplay of calculation and testing through struggle within a political context’. What this means is that:

Questions asked can be tested against past performance and if necessary asked again. Policy statements can be measured in terms of their impact over time, as well as influenced directly through collaborative political intervention. Organisations can be understood not just in terms of their constitutions or the basis of selective and guarded statements of their leaders but through direct and sustained involvement over relatively long periods of time. (Ben-Tovim et al, 1986, p. 9)

This they have attempted to do in their work in Liverpool and Wolverhampton.

4.5.4 Politics and policy Ben- Tovim et al. use the term ‘racism’ to refer to ‘a process the outcome of which is

racial inequality’. Racism operates overtly by design, or indirectly by the effects, of laws, polices and administrative practice. Thus racism operates positively through policies, rules and their interpretation or negatively through a failure to do anything about racism or even recognise it. Universalism, for example, which suggests everyone should be treated equally denies positive discrimination to correct imbalances as a result of prior racist practices.

They argue that institutionalised racism is deeply embedded and that an analysis of it should go beyond the analysis of the immigration policies of post-war governments. It is to ‘racism’s low profile’ that they wish to draw attention, both to reveal further layers of institutional racism but because of the contribution it can make to the understanding of the politics of race and racism.

In broadening the notion of the state in relation to racism Ben- Tovim et al. propose three interrelated sets of political forms and processes. First, a set of public institutions (ultimately accountable to an electorate), including central, regional and local government and their administrations. Second, the relationship between these public institutions and those outside the formal apparatus as mediated by laws, policies and administrative practices (including marriage, taxation, social security, race relations, etc.) Third, the state is seen as ‘a site of struggle where the object is to change the role of public institutions in terms of their status and/or their relationship to bodies outside their formal institutional boundaries’ (Ben-Tovim et al., 1986, p. 23). They argue that understanding struggles requires this broader conception of the state. It is then possible, they suggest, ‘to indicate how struggles themselves can serve to redefine the boundaries of the state and its internal/external relations’.20

Reviewing forms of discrimination in local policy they note four categories of policies and practices: those that fail to redress racial injustice; those that create and maintain racial inequalities; those that abuse the cultural differences of racial minorities; and those that assume negative racial stereotypes.

They draw on case study material from their own political experience to illustrate these various occurrences. For example, the abuse of cultural difference is illustrated in the 20 Ben-Tovim et al. argue that focusing on legislative amelioration (that is, on the various Race Relations Acts, local government grant aid, inner city policies) is too restrictive because it fails to differentiate positive and negative effects. Further, looking only at high-profile political opposition to racial inequality (for example, the Anti-Nazi League; The Organisation of Women of Afro-Caribbean and Asian Descent and other black groups) centres concern on overt discrimination rather than insidious aspects of racism. By addressing and identifying the modes of operation of policies on such things as housing, taxation, education, families, and so on, political action could be initiated to challenge them. This would also allow the critique of mainstream policies on, for example, housing (rather than marginalised inner-city policies) to ensure that racial minorities are not excluded either by positive or negative discrimination (for example, failure of councils to provide large houses for extended family groups).


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absence of adequate provision of leisure and recreational facilities for Asian girls. They make virtually no use of statutory youth-service provision for various reasons including the absence of girls-only provision. Despite clear implications for policy, and the scope under the 1944 Education Act granted to local authorities, the youth service has continually failed to develop a positive policy to meet the needs of this group of young people.

Part of the action initiative was to refer to models of good practice in order to convince local authorities of the respectability and efficacy of policy initiatives. For example, two of the researchers undertook research of the Inner London Education Authority Youth Service (Gabriel & Stredder, 1982), which showed that, among other things, the London authority had: an explicit commitment to combat racism; had introduced self-help project work outside its traditional youth club provision; involved young people in planning provision; and had substantial black representation within the youth service. These results were used in branch committee meetings to show officers and politicians that what they regarded as impractical had worked elsewhere and that

what they regarded as extreme demands had been written into the philosophy of the London youth service. While the point was made, it is indicative of the nature of the local politics of race that this did not result in any immediate fundamental shift in practice in Wolverhampton.

The authors conclude that their case material shows that there is a complex set of processes at work linking policy, administrative practice and various interested organisations. Racial equality is a political struggle marked by slow and unpredictable shifts. There is strong resistance to racial equality in local government bolstered by racial stereotypes and the refusal to acknowledge the existence of racism. This is mainly manifested in the persistence of colour-blind ideologies that draw for support on the ambiguity of central policy initiatives. Anti-racist organisations, through planned political initiatives, have engaged the forces of resistance through a re-definition of the problem. To avoid charges of extremism, the organisations with which the researchers were involved have built broad alliances and have attempted to break down resistance through the ‘democratic’ processes of negotiation and representation.

4.5.5 Conclusion

The research has focused on concrete struggles over racial inequalities. They have developed a research process that takes into account local conditions. Their action approach contributes to change in a direct way.

Although this has not ruled out the possibility of producing objective research evidence, for example surveys and case studies of institutionalised racism, what we have done is to allow local conditions to dictate research priorities and to use findings to press for institutional change. Our intervention has served to facilitate and develop our political analysis. (Ben-Tovim et al., 1986, p. 97)

Their approach is clearly informed by Marxism (although sceptical of much Marxist commentary) but rather than rely on Marxist economic theory at the expense of a political analysis they have drawn on Marx’s political framework. In their analysis of local struggles aimed to secure greater equality, justice and power for racial minority communities they integrate theory and practice ‘through an analysis of a highly specific and complex set of historical conditions within the context of a broadly based set of socialist objectives’ (Ben-Tovim et al., 1986, p. 97).

They conclude their analysis of the political context in which policies related to racial equality have been implemented by providing a straightforward framework for intervention. The action researcher should identify or construct a problem, analyse the political means by which the problem is reinforced or created, and then undertake a political challenge to the problem. This is not a detached analysis but an ongoing lived experience through action research that provides the basis for ‘a constant reformulation, elaboration and development of research problems and analysis’ with the political objective of the elimination of racial

4. Race 4.6 Mark Duffield—Black radicalism and the Politics of De-industrialisation.

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inequality. Research and political action become fully integrated. The efficacy of research material is linked directly to an understanding of policy constraints, administrative machinations and political processes. 4.6 Mark Duffield—Black radicalism and the Politics of De-industrialisation.

4.6.1 Introduction Mark Duffield (1988) examines immigrant labour in Britain by focusing on foundry workers, particularly those from the Indian sub-continent who came to work in the West Midlands. He asks the question ‘how and why did the West Midland ironfoundry industry become characterized by relatively large concentrations of Indian workers? (Duffield, 1988, p.1). To answer this he undertook an extensive and detailed historical analysis of the industry and the incorporation and role of Indian workers. His approach is to call in to question preconceptions about the nature of the immigrant workforce; their attitude to, and receptivity of, demanding manual labour; their role in the retardation of mechanisation of the foundry industry; and their ‘docility’ and involvement in collective action. The analysis of these myths is undertaken by locating them within a wider framework of myths about the nature of labour shortages, deskilling and the demand from capital for low paid immigrant labour.

Duffield’s history outlines the processes of the industrialisation of the ironfoundry industry in the immediate post war period through the industrial concentration of Indian workers and their self-representation, to the development of corporate management and rationalisation of the industry and its decline in the recession years of the 1980s. The rise and fall of the Indian shop-floor movement is charted and its fortunes linked to wider political processes.

Underpinning the Gramscian hegemonic analysis is the central notion of the political reality of racism. Rather than see racist practices as simply determined by capital’s short- term economic imperatives, Duffield proposes that they represent a paradigmatic instance of the destruction of worker autonomy. A contradictory alliance between labour and capital served to undermine the radical potential engendered by the immigrant black workers and further the fractionalisation of the working class.

4.6.2 Sources

Duffield’s historical analysis uncovers the hidden history of the black foundry workers by focusing on the practices and actions within the foundry industry as well as the wider context of racist immigration policies and hegemonic destruction of labour autonomy. This hidden history is revealed by his extensive use of archival material, which provides the basis for his critical examination of taken-for-granted assumptions about migrant labour. He lists seven archive sources: those of the Amalgamated Union of Foundry Workers (AUFW);21 the Transport and General Workers Union (TGWU); the Engineering Employers Federation (EEF); the West Midlands Engineering and

Employers Association (WMEEA); the Public Records Office (PRO); The Race Relations Board (RRB); and the Banner Theatre Tape Archive.

The AUFW archives, which includes material from its component unions, was consulted at the Machester and West Bromwich offices. The journal Foundry Worker and the reports of the Annual Delegates Meeting were extensively used. Duffield notes that this source was very detailed and useful up to 1960 but that since that time there is far less detail on the state of the industry, the composition of the workforce and the internal debates within the union. The same tendency occurred with the material located in the TGWU archives (consulted at

21 The AUFW later became the Foundry Section of the Amalgamated Union of Engineering and Foundry Workers (AUEF).


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the West Bromwich offices). The useful Biennial Delegate Conferences reports and the Regional Secretary’s Quarterly Reports (and their forerunners) of the 1950s were extremely informative unlike the virtually useless contemporary records. The EEF archives, housed in its London headquarters, do not permit public inspection of recent files but material from the 1960s and earlier is accessible. Such files contain a lot of information on ‘post-war labour policy, foreign and black worker agreements’ and the ‘effect of immigration and racial legislation’. Information on the local implementation of foreign labour agreements and racial legislation were available from the WMEEA archives housed in Birmingham. Details of disputes, union-employer meetings and correspondence were also found in this source. Case notes on investigations by the RRB in the area and lodged at the Birmingham offices of the Commission for racial Equality (CRE) provided ‘an invaluable insight into attitudes and conditions within the industry during the late 1960s and early 1970s’. For reasons of space, Duffield notes, these files are currently being destroyed by the CRE. The Banner Theatre Tape Archive, lodged at the company’s premises in Lozells, Birmingham, contained taped interviews with ‘local political figures, trade unionists, pickets, striking workers, and so on, dating from the mid-1970s and covering many of the major industrial disputes in the area’. Finally, the thirty-year rule meant that files up to the mid-1950s were available for inspection in the Public Records Office. Duffield located some ‘extremely interesting material on post-war labour policy, foreign workers and, especially, government responses to black immigration’ (Duffield, 1988, pp. 208–9).

A large number of published books and articles on both the foundry industry and the issue of migrant labour in general, plus various newspaper reports, are used to supplement Duffield’s primary data.

sume! of the history of the period up to 1965 gives an indication of the way Duffield develops a critical historical account, using these various sources to engage myths about the particular history of the industry and, more importantly, the industry as a case study of black migrant labour effected by wider social structural and political processes.

4.6.3 Historical case study

Mechanisation of the industry, that came to a head during the Second World War and took on a new impetus with the development of the automotive industry and its demand for standardised components, caused a crisis amongst skilled ironfoundry craftsmen.22 Their response, through their union, was to create a new skill hierarchy for machine work. For example, the ‘Report of Proceedings of Special Emergency Conference’ of the AUFW in August 1946 (page 13) clearly indicated the need for this hierarchy when it claimed that ‘the skilled labour force would be adequate if the foundries were properly

staffed with labour to serve the craftsman’. In the event, high-status, high-earning, machine workers on piece-rates were serviced by groups of specialised time-paid labourers. Although both types of worker were initially white, Duffield suggests that this hierarchy defined, in advance, the place that blacks would come to occupy in the industry.

A prevalent myth is that Asian workers took jobs that whites did not want. There is, Duffield asserts, no empirical evidence for this truism. The popularity of the myth arises from its naturalisation of the incorporation process. In particular, it naturalises skill distinctions rather than analyses ‘skill’ as a social construct. An equally convincing, and empirically sound, analysis of the incorporation of Asian workers in the labour force is that they concentrated in areas where union were weak. Trade unions in expanding industries able to meet labour requirements could keep concentrations of black workers from forming. This was notable in the automotive industry in the West Midlands.

The incorporation of Indian workers into the foundry industry corresponds to a period of decolonisation (1940–60). This was a politically sensitive period and overt immigration

22 Duffield refers to men throughout probably because the industry had no women workers.


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policies were resisted. In addition, Britain suffered labour shortages and migrant labour from Europe and the old Empire was required in the short term. A clear government policy was, however, developed to avoid concentrations of black migrant labour. Documents in the Public Records Office show clearly that the government was developing a policy of dispersing black labour, through the agency of the Labour Exchanges, from the ports to the inland areas and to jobs in industries where there was no opposition from workers or employers and where no white women were employed. The TGWU seized the opportunity to increase its membership by recruiting black members but exploited the situation by imposing foreign-worker type restrictions (including exclusion from promotion to supervisory grades and from piece-rate paid jobs) in exchange for its consent to allow black migrants employment opportunities. This kind of collaborative practice between trade unions, employers and government, both formal and informal, continued to affect the distribution of black workers throughout the 1950s.

During the 1950’s, the racial practice of the TGWU and other general unions could be summarised as one of acceptance providing it could control and restrict black employment. ‘This not only enhanced their own interests, it also enabled employers to fill pressing vacancies and satisfied the government’s desire to disperse and incorporate colonial immigrants’ (Duffield, 1988, p. 29). The concentration of Indian workers in the West Midlands foundry industry was, then, not simply a result of labour shortages and unpleasant work. The industry was characterised by a low level of trade union organisation. That alone is not, though, the reason for an anomalous concentration of Indian workers. Rather, large concentrations in the industry were a managerial initiative enabled by lack of trade union power. Employers in the industry in the West Midlands had, for some time, been concerned about the attempts by government and trade unions to press for restrictive agreements covering the employment of foreign workers. Indian and West Indian workers, because of their citizenship status, were not subject to employment licensing regulations (unlike European migrants) and so became attractive to employers unhampered by strong trade union opposition. Thus the concentration of Indian workers, aided by self-recruitment which by-passed the Labour Exchange policy of dispersal, was a function of individual employers flouting the social democratic consensus.

This strategy also benefitted employers who paid the Indian workers low rates of pay for their labouring work and afforded the workers no security, knowing they were unable to improve their situation. By the end of the 1950s access to the industry was almost exclusively through intermediaries who usually demanded bribes for their services. The situation was thus one of a hard working, undemanding, and thoroughly exploited labour force in many of the foundries; a situation that fuelled the myth of the ‘docile Asian’ worker.

The 1960s saw a radical change. At the beginning of the decade the Midland ironfoundries were racially segregated on the basis of the division in the technical organisation of work. By the end of the decade, Indian workers had begun to take over machine work. The struggle of Indian workers against racial oppression gathered momentum during the first half of the 1960s. Central to this was the self-representation of Indian workers through the election of their own shop stewards. The growth of an autonomous Indian shop-floor movement had a significant effect on the unions then competing for members in the ironfoundry industry.

A new racial hegemony, no longer based on ‘skill’ but on cultural differences, emerged. The Smethwick election result of 1964 clearly signalled that the informality that had characterised the anti-immigration sentiments within the labour movement was about to come to an end. The AUFW had a racist leadership locally who were out of line with the official liberal union line on immigration. The union made an unsuccessful attempt to gain control of the industry in the Midlands including recruiting black workers. However, the leadership hesitancy on migrant workers was reinforced by the Smethwick result and the union made no further serious attempt to recruit Asian workers in the West Midlands after 1964. Officially the AUFW was vehemently opposed to racial discrimination, which it


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equated with fascism and demanded legislation to outlaw the practice. Nonetheless, the union began to explain its own failure to recruit Indian workers as indicative of cultural, rather than simply social, differences. These cultural differences meant that Indian workers would undermine existing work conditions.

The TGWU had, since 1955, accepted the need for some form of immigration control while simultaneously declaring itself against racial discrimination on humanitarian grounds. The TGWU saw the cultural difference of Indian workers not as inherently likely to undermine existing conditions but as a factor employers could exploit. It did not set out to recruit Indian workers but found that they self-recruited through the emerging shop-floor movement.23 The TGWU provided a legitimate forum within which Indian workers could organise themselves and escape the domination of the AUFW and other oppressive practices, such as labour touts. The growing militancy of the Indian workers was seen by the TGWU as indicative of self-education and righting the wrongs imposed on them by the employers.

The notion of cultural difference was at the root of a new form of hegemonic discourse, from the-mid 1960s onwards, which depoliticised the race issue. The mid- 1960s also saw an all-party consensus on the need to control immigration that was ‘an essential ingredient in the overt racial polarisation which developed in the ironfoundry industry towards the end of the 1960s’. The Indian shop-floor movement developed a radical critique of social democracy and was met by a corporate approach to the ‘race issue’ from both management and unions. The latter provided a ‘concrete link between base and superstructure’, translating the ‘struggle of Indian workers into fragments of

hegemonic knowledge, established links with other institutions and acted as a source and conduit for policies aimed at containing and defusing this struggle’. Unions and management came together in the definition of the race issue as a problem of cultural difference ‘giving rise to industrial or technical difficulties’. The two sides fused into a dominant bloc aiming to neutralise the Asian workers’ struggle against racial oppression. Plans were laid and attempts made to disperse Asian industrial concentrations, or at least to reduce the spheres of influence by splitting them into smaller units with a proliferation of shop stewards, and cross-cutting the Indian workforce, thus lessening the move to self- representation. Management also acted to undermine the shop-floor movement by taking more active roles in establishing procedure, wage structure and training programmes. The economic restructuring of the industry in the period of decline of the 1970s strengthened the employers’ hand. In the event, the unions, ‘in their lust after power’, helped management engineer the defeat of the Indian shop-floor movement. ‘Defeat was an essential precondition of the wholesale closure and contraction of the ironfoundry industry in the West Midlands during the late 1970s and early 1980s.’ The first major closure came in February 1979. Within two years all that remained of Birmid’s ‘once huge ironfoundry complex in Smethwick’ was a single crankshaft department employing just 185 men. By the early 1980s most of the ironfoundries in which the Indian shop-floor movement had developed were gone. ‘The break up of Indian concentrations and their physical dispersal through unemployment had been accomplished. This was the final act in the rise and fall of the Indian shop floor movement’ (Duffield, 1988, pp. 193–4).

23 The Indian shop-floor movement was promoted by, among other groups, the Indian Workers Association. The IWA first appeared in Coventry in the 1930s. It was rooted in the Indian nationalist movement. In 1958, prompted by a new generation ‘matured during the upheavals of independence’ formed the IWA (GB) and successfully agitated to get the Indian government to ease the issue of passports and to provide Indians in Britain with valid documents. The Commonwealth Immigrants Bill of 1962 exacerbated the radical-conservative split in the IWA and provided the impetus for young Indian communists to consolidate their existing hold on the leadership of the IWA (GB). The final major split between the radical industrial-based group centred on Birmingham and the conservatives in Southall occurred in the mid-1960s. The Birmingham branch was highly active in campaigns against racial discrimination.


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4.6.4 Racism and the dominant bloc Duffield documents these processes in detail. The concentration of Indian workers in the

West Midlands ironfoundry industry represented an anomaly. To make sense of it, Duffield examined the case study material by locating it, as the brief re! sume! suggests, in a wider structural and political context. The research, as has been indicated, is underpinned by a hegemonic analysis. Duffield (1988, p. 202) is unequivocal that capitalism is an oppressive system that daily creates ‘poverty and misery’. Capitalism is controlled by a powerful dominant bloc. This bloc includes ‘society’s leading groups and classes, or more accurately the bureaucracies and organisations these classes have established.’ The dominant bloc divides those who enjoy the prerogative of power (the rulers) from those who do not (the ruled). The bourgeoisie retain control but is supported, ‘as we know from Gramsci (1971)’ by ‘all manner of experts, teachers, professionals, social workers, elected representatives, academics’ as well as the major bureaucracies of the labour movement (Duffield, 1988, p. 3).

Although representing different camps, or interests, the dominant bloc is united by common ideas that enable it to maintain power. If conflict is to be avoided the dominant bloc must act collectively in ‘attempting to manage the crisis’. In so doing it forges a collective ‘minimal agreement’ on the ‘condition of society, human nature, public moralty, and so on’. These positions may have a ‘left’ and ‘right’ version but they do not transcend the essential bounds of capitalism and simply provide scope for different ‘parties and professionals to vie with each other in trying to solve the problems of the day without, at the same time, risking the established order’. ‘Labour governments come and go’ but they ‘never once challenge the nature of oppression’. Hegemonic control, Duffield (1988, p. 202) asserts, allows the dominant bloc to ‘resolve the contradictions

among the subordinate classes’ in such a way as to ensure that their own ‘incomes, careers and life-styles are maintained. In the last resort these shared assumptions legitimate coercive action whenever it is necessary. Furthermore, within late capitalism, the dominant bloc is synonymous with the extended apparatus of the state.

This is the background to Duffield’s case study analysis of migrant labour. It is not a position that prefigures the analysis but one that grows dialectically out of the case study. He was thus able, ever more clearly, to reveal the machinations of the hegemonic bloc. The hidden history of the industry exposes the shared strategies, informal understandings and political collusion that linked labour movement, employers and government agencies into a common, yet contradictory, bloc against black workers. The presence and nature of this bloc was instrumental in the forging and shaping the democratic resistance of the Indian workers to racist oppression.

Crucially, Duffield sees the experiences of Indian workers as fundamentally influenced by the ‘collapse and rebuilding’ of hegemony which took place in the latter part of the 1960s. This period, he argues, marks a ‘crucial transformation in the manner in which power in society was organised and directed. The changes which took place constitute a definite break with the more liberal capitalism of the earlier post-war years.’ The political and ideological shifts of this period preface the so-called ‘radical’ departures from the mid-1970s, which simply reproduce tendencies already present in the earlier transformation (Duffield, 1988, p. 98).

Duffield, in outlining the historical case study, provides a good example of the interlinking of particular details and broader issues, within specific organisational frameworks. Prior to the mid-1960s, when the economy was characterised by welfare capitalism, both left and right viewed the immigration issue as one of scarce resources. ‘For the right, the scarcity of houses, hospital beds, school places, and so on, necessitated immigrant control.’ The left did not challenge the scarcity assumption and were thus easily able to move from opposition to acceptance of the need for immigration control once its liberal interpretation (which, inter alia, involved a demand for more schools and houses) was undermined by the emergence in the late 1960s of the individualistic market economy. The emergence of the latter occurred at a time of a shift of focus from the Empire to the EEC.,


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following the end of decolonisation, from full employment to mass unemployment; from politics of ‘broad social estates to that of the special group’. All of this, coincided with ‘a leap in the centralisation of state power that these transformations, engendered by the deepening crisis of capitalism, would make necessary’ (Duffield, 1988, p. 203).

A new set of shared assumptions emerged in the late 1960s prompted by the Powellist version of the New Right racism. This new view privileged the notion of cultural difference. While the right saw cultural difference as heralding violence and the breakdown of the established order because the indigenous population would not tolerate alternative cultures, the left did not see violence as an inevitable outcome and welcomed diversity. The left conceded that remedial action was necessary but this could be of a legislative and educative nature. This ‘left’ version has, Duffield claimed, remained the ‘the basic framework within which the state’s race relations industry has developed’.

The response of the Indian shop-floor movement was to actively engage the basic assumptions of the dominant bloc, which were manifested in relation to notions about skill, experience, suitability, and so on. A major plank in this opposition was the

establishment of all work to be open to anyone who wants to do it. ‘Promotion’ was then based on seniority not spurious notions about technical skill and ability, which had previously been used by unions and management to limit opportunities for Indian workers and enable management to hire and promote as it desired. In response to the anti- technicist seniority principle established by the shop-floor, employers and unions developed an apparently liberal equal opportunities policy. However, this policy reinforced, rather than denied, the socially constructed skill and eligibility criteria by taking them for granted and offering training to blacks to meet these socially created criteria.

Thus, not only is the whole oppressive edifice accepted, but through the screening and assessment possible whilst ‘training’ is taking place, management once again is able to assert its interests in the guise of liberalism. In the interests of stability, equal opportunity, rather than representing a liberating force, would seem to have as its sole object that oppression within society is equally distributed. (Duffield, 1988, p. 205)

The potentially liberating democratic force of the Indian shop-floor movement was eradicated through the closures during the recession and authoritarian centralisation won out. Equal-opportunities policies were central in the marginalisation of the black struggle. The liberal apparatus of equal opportunities, first tried out in the employment sphere, has spread since the ‘riots’ of 1981. Multiculturalism has become a growth industry, ‘ethnic posts’, local authority race relations units, racism awareness trainers, and so on are all involved in mystifying the ‘nature of power and the essence of the black struggle’. Political power is reduced to issues of colour while the black struggle is reduced to access to resources mediated by ‘sensitive’ social workers and fair housing policies.

Compared to the universalism of the black struggle, it is within the nature of the new racism that, in the name of equal opportunity, racial divisions are now taking on an institutional permanence which seems to become stronger by the day. (Duffield, 1988, p. 207)

4.6.5 The new racism

In order to undertake his research Duffield had to become thoroughly acquainted with the operation of the ironfoundry industry. He had to get to know both its organisational structure and to understand the various jobs that workers performed.24 This was important in providing a basis for deconstructing the technicist assumptions and revealing the socially constructed nature of skill criteria.25 Duffield’s deconstruction of abstract constructs fits neatly with the development of a totalistic analysis. The practices within the industry are constantly related to broader initiatives of the dominant bloc. Contradictions within it are 24 In this respect he reflected the intensive study of work practices and organisational structures undertaken by Grimshaw and Jefferson (1987) in their study of policework, (Section 2.7) 25 This demystification of skill reflects Cockburn’s (1983) analysis of print compositors (Section 3.4).

4. Race 4.7 Conclusion

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reflected in detailed accounts of contradictions within the industry, such as the conflict between the TGWU and the AUEF, which repeated the ‘left’ and ‘right’ approaches to immigration control.

Duffield uses a historical case study to analyse the depoliticisation of the black struggle. While of interest in itself, the rise and fall of the Indian shop-floor movement is a vehicle for examining the nature and ideology of the hegemonic order and the operation of liberal equal opportunities strategies to shore up the ‘new racism’. His critique is in

sharp contrast to studies that, in highlighting discriminatory practices against migrant workers, such as The Chicano Worker (Briggs et al., 1977), propose policy initiatives to address education and training needs and the unionisation of migrants intended to alleviate the more inhumane effects of discrimination and to assimilate migrants into the same sets of apparatuses as mainstream workers.

Duffield is unambiguous about his own position; he is clearly anti-racist and this informs his analysis. He would regard it as fatuous to adopt a ‘neutral’ position in order to analyse the struggle and any such attempt would inhibit a broader structural analysis. His political position is clear: capitalism is an oppressive system and the constituents of the organisational bloc that wields political power are all equally culpable. He unreservedly sees the union bureaucracies as being as much to blame as the employers and government in the racist treatment of Indian workers. The contempt in which Duffield holds the unions is summed up by his reaction to a spokesperson of the TGWU who bemoaned the successive closure of six plants. ‘Given that the unions helped engineer the political defeat which was a precondition of the closures, the pathetic and whining tone of such statements is all the more obnoxious’ (Duffield, 1988, p. 193).

He uses the analysis of prevailing myths as a way to start digging beneath the surface of the supposed relations within the industry and to unravel the hidden history of the racist hegemonic collusion. In so doing he draws some uncomfortable parallels between ‘New Right racism’ and left ‘multi-culturalism’. Duffield’s intention is praxiological, not just to reveal the machinations of the hegemonic state apparatus but to indicate the liberating potential of a democratic black movement as opposed to the legitimation of capitalism embodied in equal-opportunities strategies operated by middle-class professionals.

4.7 Conclusion

Once again it is not method but methodological approach that characterises these studies as critical. The methods vary from directed interviewing, participant and non-participant observation and action research to historical archive study. It is not the data collection but the way the resulting material is handled that is crucial.

Each of these studies deals with racial oppression. They essentially examine race as a construct of racism. They do not see ‘race’ as implying inherent characteristics but treat it as a socially constructed abstraction that becomes a concrete entity only as racist practices and structures are made explicit. Race as a social construct is thus not addressed by reference to any essential element but instead the nature of specific forms of racism are analysed: Ladner addresses the myth of Black culture; Duffield deconstructs the myth of workplace skill as it encapsulates racist practices; Ben-Tovim et al. fill out the empty abstract notion of local politics and anti-racism; and Weis similarly explicates taken-for- granted cultural concepts, such as ‘success’ and ‘time’, that are at the interface of the conflict between students and college authorities.

All the examples linked racism to institutionalised structures of oppression and adopted an essentially hegemonic view of ideology in which racism served the interests of a dominant power e! lite. Ladner, who operates within the limited horizons of 1960s American sociological theorising, does not address ideology directly but alludes to white middle-class hegemonic culture and defines institutionalised racism by reference to normative patterns.


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Despite this uncritical terminology, her analysis reflects an embryonic critical analysis of dominant ideology. Weis develops this by adopting a Gramscian view of hegemony and links ideology directly to culture. Like Ladner, she sees blacks as superexploited and black culture as dialectically linked to dominant culture. Duffield and Ben-Tovim et al. were less inclined than Ladner to see racism as determined simply by capitalist modes of production in which blacks are a superexploited underclass. They posit a much more complex process of hegemonic dominance, although not coming to radically different praxiological conclusions.

Praxis informs all these examples. Ladner wants to raise black consciousness against the norm of white-middle class culture and galvanise blacks into resistance in the face of further oppressive measures. Weis argues that by focusing on culture the ideology of the community college and the general attitude towards the education of blacks is exposed. She wants to do something about the community college system and suggests policy changes although admitting the limits of such intervention because of structural factors. Her hope is that with increased awareness to which her book contributes, the semi- autonomous nature of culture might make it possible for student cultural forms to develop

radical transformative potential. Ben-Tovim et al., rather than suggesting particular policy changes offered a basis for local political action to engage racism. Duffield, sceptical of the role of multi-cultural workers, intended his work as an example of the radical potential of Black and Asian workers.

All the examples approach race and racism from a totalistic perspective. Although asking what are the processes that are involved in the coming to womanhood of poor Black girls, Ladner addresses a much wider context than the socialising effect of the family. Indeed, she looks beyond the confines of the ghetto to assess the processes of institutionalised racism and forms of resistance that characterise American society. Weis, similarly, in asking why Black students have such little success in community colleges addresses not just the impact of college culture but, similarly to Willis (1977), its relationship to Black culture in general. Black (ghetto) culture is itself viewed by examining its relationship to dominant (white) culture. Ben-Tovim et al. in assessing the local processes that give rise to and maintain racial inequality did not just focus on the internal workings of the Labour Party in Liverpool and Wolverhampton but assessed the ways the local process responded to and drew on wider forms of legitimation stemming from central government and populist consciousness. Duffield, in asking why there was a concentration of Indian workers in the West Midlands foundry industry was not content to look at the internal workings of the industry but related it to broader issues of immigration policy and national trade union initiatives on migrant workers. He ultimately assessed the way the interests of a dominant bloc including government, employers and trade unionists coalesced to inhibit the radicalism of Indian workers.

History informs all the studies. For Ladner, blacks have a history from Africa through slavery that impinges on their culture and thus the way in which they cope with and engage oppression. For Weis, history is a background resource. The history of the education system out of which community colleges grew, individual biographies, and the general history of racial oppression provide a context although the focus of her attention is structural. Ben-Tovim et al. similarly document the history of immigration legislation and associated racist policy in order to provide a context within which local battles against racial discrimination have been and continue to be fought. Duffield’s study, on the other hand, is essentially an historical analysis of immigrant workers in which the West Midlands foundry workers are a case study.

Most of the studies were, in one way or another, critical of prevailing sociological approaches. The criticism was directed not just at particular theories but at the basic preconceptions (although, of course, they are not all in agreement). Ladner directly engaged the racism embodied in the ‘pathological’ model and the objectivism and hierarchy of the positivistic approach. Ben-Tovim et al. wanted on the one hand to assert, against ‘positivistic objectivism’, the validity of direct action to engage racism while on the other countering

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what they saw as the indifference of Marxists towards ameliorative action. Duffield reasserted the denial of the still prevalent ‘problem’ thesis of immigration but also attacked the whole sociological and political drift towards multiculturalism with its reification of cultural differences. Weis, alone, was less condemnatory of existing approaches and adopted an existing thesis (Willis, 1977) and applied it to a different set of circumstances.

All four reveal how, from very different traditions and using quite different methods, racial oppression can be engaged in an empirical critical manner. At the core of this is a

deconstructive–reconstructive process that, drawing on the critical elements, gets beneath the surface of appearances of oppressive social structures. In the concluding part of the book this dialectical process will be rehearsed.


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5. Conclusion 5.1 Empirical enquiry

It has been the intention of this book to show how empirically grounded critical social research can be accomplished. However, it is as much about reaffirming a way of thinking as it is about providing approaches to data. Indeed it is not data collection but the intrinsic critique of the interpretative framework that marks out critical social research from other forms of social scientific and cultural enquiry.

Critical social research is clearly not constrained by its data collection techniques. The empirical studies analysed above include the whole gamut of research tools: observation, both participant and non- participant; formal interviews with random samples; semi-structured, unstructured, and in-depth interviewing; key informant testimonies; analysis of personal and institutional documents; mass media analysis; archive searching; examination of official statistics; and reviews of published literature. Furthermore, critical social research also uses a wide variety of analytic techniques: ethnographic interpretation; historical reconstruction; action research; multivariate analysis; structuralist deconstruction; and semiological analysis.

It is not data collection devices nor analytic techniques that sets empirical critical social research apart from either explanatory or interpretive approaches. It is the way in which data are approached and the framework within which data are analysed that is crucial. Critical social research does not set out to find the ‘causes’ of observed social phenomena. Nor does it satisfy itself with the interpretation of the meanings of social actions. Critical social research is fundamentally critical because it aims to shatter the illusion of observed ‘reality’.

This book will have succeeded if, after reading it you are no longer able to watch a movie without being overwhelmed by the obviousness of its ideological coding; cannot sit through a news broadcast without being exasperated by the constant manifestations of oppressive mechanisms; become infuriated when you walk into a toy shop and see banks of girls toys packaged in pink and sporting smiling faces of pretty but inactive girls (unless they are performing housewifely chores). It will have succeeded if you are able to articulate this exasperation and fury through the generation of an empirical critical enquiry. In short the book succeeds if, on the one hand, you see, and are able to analyse, class, race, gender (sexuality, age and disability) oppression in every walk of life, and, on the other, have the confidence to undertake empirical critical research.

5.2 Getting beneath the surface

The critical studies examined all attempt to get beneath the surface of apparent reality to reveal the nature of oppressive social structures. They are not ethnographic, semiological, or multivariate analyses per se but are critical studies that make use of different data collection tools and analytic techniques. These studies aim to show what is really going on: how the worker is exploited by the capitalist; how the

public is turned into a manipulated mass; how working class kids get working class jobs; how advertisements really work; how the Western movie reproduces capitalist ideology in mythical form; how women make and remake their lives under conditions of capitalist patriarchy; how the women’s movement in India failed to take account of the impact of class and caste on women’s subordination; how the community college fails black ghetto students; and so on.

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In all these studies, the attempt to reveal the nature of oppressive social structures involves a process of dialectical deconstruction and reconstruction in some form or another. This process has been characterised as the interrelationship of a number of building blocks that form the elements of dialectical analysis. These elements are abstraction, essence, totality, praxis, ideology, history and structure. The different studies have revealed how they develop and interrelate these elements.

A critical methodological approach, as we have seen, involves a materialist conception of the world. Understanding requires the penetration of outward appearances through the methodological process of abstraction from the general category to the concrete, historically specific that is then related to the whole (totality). Comprehension of even the most apparently simple form requires a grasp of structure (made accessible through abstraction from the general category) and history. These are constantly interrelated through a process of deconstruction and reconstruction within a comprehensive methodological framework that seeks not to demonstrate final absolute truth but to present an approximate reflection of reality that is subject to continuous change.

The process of deconstruction and reconstruction has been illustrated in the studies. Broadly speaking, two focuses that facilitate the dialectical analysis have emerged from these studies: contradiction and myth.

5.3 Contradiction

Contradiction is the classical Marxist approach. It is encoded in the Engelian notion of thesis, antithesis and synthesis. Cockburn, for example, takes this as axiomatic arguing that all phenomena contain their opposites and that the form of the contradiction determines the nature of the synthesis. Westwood sees contradictions as inherent within the particular form of oppressive social structure that operates at any historical moment. In her research it is the inherent contradictions of women’s lives under conditions set by patriarchal capitalism.

Focussing on myth involves revealing the nature of taken-for-granted presuppositions. Myths about appropriate work for Asian immigrants (Duffield), myths about American democracy (Mills), myths about male strength and intelligence (Liddle & Joshi) and the myth of the ostensive sales message of advertisements (Williamson) all provided the focus for critical deconstruction.

In both cases ideology plays a central role. It is ideology that serves to conceal contradictions and it is ideology that renders myths natural. Ideology itself is transparent. It has to be made to appear. While ideology is taken for granted and equated, subconsciously, with common (non)sense the contradictions remain as anomalies and the myths as stereotypes. Only as ideology is revealed is the deconstructive- reconstructive process enabled. That is, the anomaly is linked clearly to the structural forms through which it operates by being shown to legitimate those historically specific forms. Thus the anomaly becomes a contradiction; an analytic concept that binds essence to totality. Similarly, a stereotype is transformed into a myth once the ideology that renders it natural is revealed as legitimating and reproducing oppressive social structures.

The process of dialectical analysis, though, requires more than an abstract and empty thesis on the nature of (dominant) ideology, it needs to materially ground ideology by locating it in particular practices. Vague abstract notions of capitalist ideology, of patriarchy or racism are as unacceptable to

critical social research as a means of deconstruction as the taken-for-granted abstractions of non-critical social research. One might, for example, begin with the abstract notion of patriarchy as an organising principle but it must be seen as empty and in need of filling, of being made concrete.

Westwood, for example, looks at the contradictions in the lives of women factory workers. She considers ‘anomalies’ that are manifested in the women’s collusion in their own


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oppression. She does not simply propose some abstract concept of patriarchy (or capitalism or racism) as somehow responsible for this. Instead, in transforming the anomalies into clearly visible contradictions she looks at specific practices in the light of structural processes. So, for example, the celebration of marriage, which is central to the collusive process of patriarchal domination, is seen as sensible in the light of access to (male) economic resources. Thus the contradiction between the resistance to capitalist patriarchy (embodied in the celebration of marriage) and the collusion (embodied in marriage itself) not only becomes apparent in itself, when thus empirically grounded, but also provides the focus for deconstructing the nature of working women’s lives. Contradictions become the pivot through which Westwood is able to dig beneath the surface of the lives of women factory workers.

Willis does much the same in his analysis of the resistance of ‘the lads’. The lads are able to penetrate educational ideology and yet indulge in forms of resistance that effectively enables capitalism to reproduce exploited unskilled labourers. This anomalous situation is transformed into contradiction when working-class culture is examined. Working-class culture provides a critique of capitalism that is only partial. Working-class culture is not wholly oppositional but, in its reification of labouring, its sexism and its racism, it absorbs and re-produces dominant ideology.

It is important to remember that using contradiction as the focus of deconstruction is not simply about spotting an anomaly and building an elaborate theory around it to explain it away. Contradictions emerge through dialectical analysis. An anomaly remains an anomaly until it is transformed. It becomes a contradiction as the result of a dialectical process that relates the historically specific anomaly (for example, accepting the housewife role while finding the tasks tedious) to the social structure (job market, nursery provision). This requires the revelation and clarification of the ideological processes at work (capitalist patriarchy) through specific articulated presuppositions (the nurturing role of women, women working for ‘pin-money’) that legitimate the contradiction. So contradiction is not just there waiting to be discovered but itself emerges as the result of dialectical analysis, a shuttling back and forth between anomaly, structure and ideology. Contradictions are not to be explained away nor are they the end in themselves but provide the focus for the whole deconstructive-reconstructive process that reveals the real nature, and ways of working, of oppressive social structures.

That this is the case is perhaps best attested to by looking at Cockburn’s study. Hers appears to be a hard-line assertion of the centrality of contradiction. She argues that everything contains its own contradiction, that the nature of the contradiction determines the synthesis, and that contradictions are the goal of her research. It thus seems that she denies that revealing contradictions is a dialectical process. Further it implies that she sees contradictions as in themselves the sufficient outcome of the research rather than as the focus for deconstruction. But, of course, she is not denying this at all. Just because all phenomena contain their own contradiction does not mean that discovering them is straightforward. She is not simply suggesting that the contradiction is empirically or theoretically apparent. While phenomena contain their own contradiction, discovering it is not like flipping over a coin and seeing the obverse, the contradiction is concealed behind an ideological screen. It is a dialectical task to reveal the contradiction, as her study of print compositors shows. Similarly, while contradictions are the ‘goal’ of her empirical work they are clearly not the end in themselves but provide the basis for a full dialectical deconstruction of the making and remaking of the lives of the skilled craftsman.

5.4 Myth

Laying bear myths also requires an analysis of ideology and the examination of its practical manifestations. Myths should not be confused with ideology. Myths are plausible ‘consensual connotations’ (Heck, 1980). Their plausibility and legitimacy is dependent upon the

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ideological support system. Identifying myths requires not merely asserting their presence but establishing it. This too is a dialectical process. The consensual connotation or stereotype is transformed into the analytic category of myth once the specific activity or process is related to the totality by reference to its ideological legitimation. The stereotype (of the compliant Asian worker) becomes myth once ideological presuppositions (racism) are revealed through concrete practices (work touts, insecure work). The myth then becomes the focus for the deconstruction of what is really going on (the exploitative processes of hegemonic racist capitalism).

The establishment of myth is developed in enormous detail in Wright’s study. Reflecting the work of structuralist anthropologists like Levi-Strauss he uncovered basic myths to which the myriad forms of the Western cinematic film could be reduced. Unlike structural anthropologists he saw myths as communications about appropriate behaviour. Revealing four versions of the Western myth was not the end in itself, nor indeed could the classification have emerged inductively from the analysis of fifty-four films. On the contrary, the identification of four varieties was only possible because, in the process of deconstructing and reconstructing the Western plots, they were related to the social totality in which they occurred. The classical Western structure, for example, provided insights into the nature of market economy, and dialectically, only worked as a myth and was therefore identifiable as such, in that totalistic context.

So contradiction and myth have both provided focuses for the deconstructive-reconstructive process of dialectical analysis. They give the critical analyst a handle to grasp in the complex process of shuttling back and forth between abstraction, essence, totality, ideology, history, structure and praxis. However, it must be emphasised that contradiction and myth should not be conceived of as something lying around waiting to be picked up. They must be seen as fundamentally dialectical constructs in themselves. Contradictions and myths must be established empirically not conjured out of the researcher’s presuppositions.

5.5 Knowledge as process

Critical social research is about a constant shuttling back and forth between concepts and data, structure and part, past and present, theory and practice, involving a continual process of reconceptualisation. The work is never done. At any point in time a dialectically developed understanding can be framed and communicated. However, the formulation and communication is not the knowledge; its not another grain in the bucket, but itself part of the continual process of knowledge development. Critical social research, in directing its attention to oppressive social structures sees the development of knowledge as intrinsically concerned with engaging prevailing social structures, ideological forms and taken-for- granted interpretations. It is this engagement and its impact on ways of looking and developing knowledge that is crucial, rather than the articulation of a set of techniques that can be mimicked.

The exploration of the case studies shows that it is undesirable, and even impossible, to disentangle method from theory and epistemology. Methodology is the interface of all three and to attempt an explanation of the methodic practice of critical social research independent of substantive theoretical concerns and underlying presuppositions is to ignore the interdependent nature of critical social enquiry.

There is no such thing as critical social method. There is, equally clearly, a way of working towards critical social research. This is a dialectic and totalistic approach that operates at the level of methodology.

However, as the case studies illustrate, critical social research makes considerable use of four approaches: critical case study; radical historicism; critical ethnography; and structuralist techniques. This is not, in any way, meant to delimit what approaches critical social researchers can adopt nor do these four approaches constitute a set of mutually exclusive alternatives.


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5.6 Critical case study

In critical (or theoretical) case study the researcher deliberately selects, for detailed empirical analysis, a case that provides a specific focus for analysis of myth or contradiction. Goldthorpe and Lockwood selected a case study that as far as possible provided the conditions to endorse the myth of embourgoisement. They undertook a detailed analysis of the workers in Luton with a view to exploding the myth. Grimshaw and Jefferson selected their theoretical case study in such a way that it provided the setting in which the contradictions of policing were most clearly exposed. The selection of a large metropolitan county force with a centralizes command structure and a range of specialist departments, located in a multiracial area of economic decline, brought into stark relief the way the legal, democratic and work structures are mediated in practice.

Although not necessarily referring to their work as critical case study, this approach is effectively adopted by other critical researchers. For example, Cockburn’s selection of a male white craft union in her analysis of the impact of, and resistance to, the introduction of new computerised technology constituted a critical case study as did Liddle & Joshi’s selection of professional women in India. Neither group was seen as in any way representative of a wider social group. On the contrary, they were selected as paradigm cases.

A variety of different data collection techniques can be adopted within a critical case study approach. Goldthorpe and Lockwood relied principally on structured interviews augmented by observation in ascertaining the interests, attitudes, social networks and lifestyle of their case-study group. Grimshaw and Jefferson used non-participant observation and document analysis. Cockburn preferred depth- interviewing and Liddle & Joshi used variety of questioning techniques in their repeated contacts with the case-study group. There is nothing inherently advantageous in any particular data collection method for critical case study. The case study is not the end in itself, rather it is an empirical resource for the exploration of wider questions about the nature of oppressive social structures. What is important is that the study is designed to critically address myths or contradictions at the level of actual practices that relate to broader questions about the operation of oppression.

So, critical case study takes abstract theoretical notions and deconstructs them as social practices and explores how these operate in relation to the social totality. Goldthorpe and Lockwood broke down the embourgeoisement thesis into three dimensions and examined each by reference to the actual aspirations, attitudes and work and leisure activities of the supposedly embourgeoised workers, which they compared to middle-class/white-collar workers. Grimshaw and Jefferson similarly broke down each of the abstract notions of ‘work’, ‘law’ and ‘democracy’ into its components and addressed each in the context of policing practices.

Crucially, the critical social researcher’s use of critical case study is directed at exploring wider social structural and historical issues. Goldthorpe and Lockwood, for example, were not simply concerned with the attitudes of workers in Luton, nor were they even concerned with simply endorsing or rejecting the embourgeoisement thesis. They were interested in the thesis in so far as it related to the question of the

revolutionary potential of the working class in advanced industrial society and the implications of this for labour politics. Cockburn was as much interested in showing that gender was as crucial as class in the analysis of the labouring process as she was in exploring the issue of the introduction of new technology into the workplace.

5.7 Radical historicism

Radical historicism presupposes that constructing histories is an interpretive process rather than the recording of ‘facts’. Although usually reconstructing the past through reference to the present it does attempt, in one way or another, to dig beneath the surface of the

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historical development of structural forms. This it does usually in one of two ways. First, as Marx did in Capital, to address the prevailing structural forms and deconstruct them. This structural analysis then logically guides the reconstruction of history. Rather than the taken-for-granted, apparent, social structure informing a presentist history it is the deconstructed social structure that is used as the basis for historical analysis.

The second approach is to adopt a critical perspective or world view that informs the reconstruction of history. The intention is to address the taken-for-granted current social structure not as self-evident but as having emerged from an ideological legitimation of oppressive structures. It presupposes that, for example, patriarchal or racial oppression exists and thus examines particular social practices in relation to the legitimating ideologies and economic structures that endorse it. Thus, Mumtaz and Shaheed undertook their study of women in Pakistan by initially focussing on the history of the embryonic Women’s Liberation Movement and progressively widening their study to situate the details of the history of women’s movements in the context of nationalist and religious struggles.

Radical historicism involves the uncovering of historical evidence but the meaning of the evidence depends upon a reconceptualisation of dominant social structures. The reconstruction of history takes place alongside the structural analysis: it both informs and is informed by it. Liddle and Joshi, for example, did not just document the stages in the curtailment of women’s freedom in India but related the particular practices, on the one hand, to economic considerations related to the concentration of wealth in upper castes, and on the other, to a concerted effort by males to undermine the female power principle.

5.8 Critical ethnography

Critical ethnography is a widely used technique in critical social research. The involvement and close attention to detail that characterises ethnography make it useful for rendering visible the invisible and for revealing anomalies and common-sense notions. A critical ethnography transforms the anomalies and taken-for-granted into contradictions and myths by situating them in broader social and historical analyses. Critical ethnography thus focuses on the way in which contradictions are negotiated and myths re-presented.

Critical ethnography differs from conventional or traditional ethnography in its attempt to link the detailed analysis of ethnography to wider social structures and systems of power relationships in order to get beneath the surface of oppressive structural relationships. In essence, critical ethnography attempts, in one way or another, to incorporate detailed ethnographic analysis directly into dialectical critique. For example, critical ethnographic study, in focusing on the way existing practices reproduce ideologies, reveals the way in which the subjects collude in, rather than engage, their own oppression.

Critical ethnography proceeds by raising substantive questions about structural relationships that the ethnographic study elaborates through actual practices. Like the critical case study, the detail of the

ethnographic work is a resource in the deconstruction of social structures.1 Critical ethnography makes use of the same data collection techniques as conventional ethnography (in-depth interviewing, participant observation) and is also reflexive. However, there is far less concern with ‘neutrality’ both in the interventionist role of the researcher and the presentation of a non-partisan perspective.

The intention is to go beyond the grasping of the subjects’ meanings. Critical ethnography asks how these meanings relate to wider cultural and ideological forms. Critical ethnography

1 There are similarities and overlap between critical case study and critical ethnography. However, critical ethnography clearly emphasises ethnographic techniques and forms of understanding that may or may not be the intention of the researcher using critical case study. The critical case study is also selected to best assess specific myths or contradictions. Unlike critical ethnography that approaches its subjects as typical of particular groups, as, for example, Willis did with his study of ‘the lads’, and as Westwood did in her study of women factory workers.


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involves keeping alert to structural factors whilst probing meanings. It involves seeing, for example, how cultural values impinge upon the being studied as Willis did in relating counter-school culture to working-class culture and Westwood did in relating shop-floor celebratory rituals to patriarchal notions of femininity.

Once again, the relationship between wider contexts and actual practices is not self-evident. It emerges as a result of a process of dialectical enquiry. The critical ethnographer works from two directions at once. In examining and sorting the ethnographic material the critical researcher engages the ‘explanatory’ frames through lateral thinking that call into question taken-for-granted presuppositions by proposing radical alternative analyses. Conventional ‘pile building’ (Bogdan & Taylor, 1975; Weis, 1985) of horizontally segmented field material (see Section 1.4) is a useful way of doing this if the segmentation process is guided by structural relations. The identification of pertinent structural relations requires a parallel analysis of the prevailing social, political and economic structure in which the detailed study is located.

These alternatives, grounded in empirical data, are guided by broader theoretical and conceptual analyses. In turn the emerging understanding of the nature of actual practices impinges on the guiding theoretical reconceptualisation. Totality and empirical detail constantly mediate one another in the emergence of a more perceptive understanding of the nature and operation of oppressive social structures. Assumptions about patriarchy are, for example, mediated by collusive practices. Engagement for marriage, as Westwood found out, is entered into by women knowing that it will adversely effect their social life, yet seeing it as a means to access an increased share of economic resources. In turn the nature of the practices, their legitimation, and the way they relate to broader mechanism’s of oppression are more clearly revealed. Engagement prefigures female and male role stereotypes that consign women in marriage to a nurturing role.

Through ideological analysis, critical ethnography aims to reveal both contradictions and myths. Inconsistencies, for example, between what people do and what they say are transformed from anomalies to contradictions. What, for example, black community college students had to say about time-keeping and what they actually did was anomalous. It became an analytic contradiction, for Weis, once it was explained as the notion of ‘white man’s clock-time’ within the culture of the Black urban ghetto. The students were paying lip-service to the white middle class meritocratic system whilst living in an everyday milieu that operated on a different sense of time.

5.9 Structuralist techniques

There are two main structuralist techniques incorporated into critical social research. First, semiological analysis, which attempts to uncover the connoted level of denoted messages. This approach is widely used in relation to the mass media but is applicable to, and derives from, a general approach to the analysis of any sign system (Barthes, 1974; Saussure, [1915] 1986).

Semiological analysis sees a sign as any cultural symbol that conveys a meaning. The sign is made up of two elements, signifier and signified. The signifier is sound or image that signifies something. For example, the sound ‘dog’ is a signifier for a ‘four-legged mammal that barks’. What is signified is the concept ‘dog’. Hence the sign is the concrete relation between concept (signified) and sound/image

(signifier). Signs are arbitrary. They have no intrinsic meaning but take their meaning from the relationship to other signs.2 The meaning of signs comes from their difference

2 To illustrate this, Saussure points to the analogy of a train timetable. The 8.10 from Paris is a relational concept. It is defined not in a positive sense but negatively through its relations to other trains and within the framework of a network of trains presented in abstract terms in the timetable. Nobody expects the 8.10 to comprise the same set of carriages each day, and it does not cease to be the 8.10 even if it leaves the station late every day. Identity, in short, is a function of the difference between units in a system.2

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from other signs. The key of semiological analysis is that signs do not have intrinsic meaning. Meaning is generated through the relationship of signs.

Barthes (1974) argues that signs are not innocent, self-evident, indicators but that they contain two meanings, the denotative (literal or face-value meaning) and connotative (underlying or interpreted message, the symbolic meaning). Put simply, the denotative level is what is ‘represented’ by the sign, for example, ‘rose’ represents a flower that grows on a thorny stem; and the connotative level is the inference that can be drawn from it, for example, the connotation of ‘rose’ may be ‘passion’. The first level sign ‘rose’ becomes a second level signifier for the signification, ‘passion’ (second level sign).3

The first stage of semiotic analysis is to examine the denoting sign through a deconstruction into signifiers and signifieds. The second stage involves a critique of these denoted signs to reveal the connoted symbolism. Finally, these connotations are examined and the taken-for-granted or myth which underpins these symbolic representations is elaborated.

The uncovering of connotations cannot be done simply at the level of the sign system (text, picture, sound). Connotations are contextualised meanings, they are not self-evident. The transparency of the connotation only becomes clear as the denotation is dialectically related to the totality. This requires engagement with the context within which the denoted message operates and the structures it draws on.

Judith Williamson’s decoding of advertisements clearly indicated how a secondary message operates beneath the surface of the ostensive message. She examined the text/image sign system that constituted the advertisement and showed how these related to wider structures through the appropriation of referent systems. For example, the naturalisation of nature to provide a common-sense framework for the encoding of the desirability of the ‘natural’. Thus objects of nature depicted in advertisements (mountains, fields, fruit) transfer

Denotation as a noun means that which is marked or signified. As a verb, to denote means to specify, signify or point out. Connotation as a noun means that which is implied. As a verb, to connote means to imply or to betoken. The two terms are used in philosophy as follows. Denotation to refer to particulars while connotation is an abstract (dictionary) definition. Denotation in literature is in effect the generalised meaning of a word. For example, ‘pig’ denotes ‘a domesticated animal grown for its meat’. This is contrasted with connotation where ‘pig’ might connote ‘pigginess’ and applied to chauvinist males or law enforcers. The difference between the philosophical and literary meanings can be shown by another example. The term ‘rose’ denotes (in the philosophical sense) all the existing roses while the connotation (in the dictionary sense) would be the abstract definition ‘flowering shrub with thorns’. Connotation in literature relates to implied properties of a denoted object. Connotation is thus sometimes referred to as a second-order construct. This means that whereas a symbol might ‘denote’ an object (as the symbol ‘rose’ denotes a flower on a thorny stem) the same symbol may connote something further (the connotation of ‘rose’ may be ‘love’). 3 This is represented in the schematic diagram, below, where lower case represents the denotative level and upper case the connotative level. Denotation 1st level Signifier (Meaning) Signified (Concept) CONNOTATION 2nd LEVEL

Sign SIGNIFIER (FORM)

SIGNIFIED (CONCEPT)

SIGN (SIGNIFICATION) Substituting ‘rose/passion’ in the same scheme we have Denotation 1st level ‘Rose’ attractive plant CONNOTATION 2nd LEVEL

Thorny-stemmed flower SIGNIFIER (FORM)

PASSION (CONCEPT)

PASSION-FILLED ROSES


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this taken-for-granted desirability and acceptability to the products with which they are juxtaposed.

The task of the semiologist, then, is to uncover the taken-for-granteds or myths that are implicit in the connotative level. This involves a constant engagement with apparently innocent denotations. The denotation is seen as a signifier at the connotative level, but this requires a totalistic perspective to reveal the transparent connotation. Connotations are rooted in common sense and can only be revealed if the structures of meaning that sustain common sense are specified and reconceptualised.

The second structuralist technique centres around the identification of binary oppositions and narrative sequences. The approach again draws on linguistics and presupposes that the structure of language is inherently dichotomous (Jackobsen 1962) and, consequently, that the symbolic meaning of an image is determined only by differences.4 When, for example, two characters in a story are opposed in a binary structure, their symbolic meaning is virtually forced to be both general and easily accessible because of the simplicity of the differences between them. This binary structure operates to provide conceptual differences and each society has a system of such oppositions and it is through them that myths are (unconsciously) understood by members (Levi-Strauss, 1963).

A second aspect of this approach is the deconstruction of narrative into a set of functions. Propp (1968), for example, in analysing Russian fairy stories, identified a set of shared functions that recurred in the same order. This structuralist approach is transformed into a critical social research process when the binary oppositions and the narrative functions are related to the prevailing socio-economic and political structure. It is then that their social meaning becomes manifest. Wright’s analysis of the Western is a good example. His transformation of the structuralist approach is predicated upon a view of myth as a communication from a society to its members about how people should act. He shows how Westerns, as contemporary American myth, are structured as binary oppositions that are easily grasped

and unambiguous. The narrative represents social types acting out a drama of social order. The narrative tells us what the characters actually do and this provides the meaning for the audience. Wright showed, for example, that the classic Western could be reduced to a set of shared narrative functions. However, the meaning of these functions and the binary oppositions only comes from locating them within a wider social structure. Thus, he demonstrated how the classic Western reproduced and legitimated the individualism of the market economy. Similarly, the development of the professional plot reflected the emergence of the planned corporate economy.

Wright’s analysis was not just a process of showing how specific functions or binary oppositions could be seen to reflect particular aspects of shifts in the nature of capitalism. The deconstructed story was related dialectically to the social totality through the notion of narrative sequence. Narrative sequences explain a change in social relationships in the myth and ensures that the narrative ‘makes sense’ to the reader who recognise their own situation. It is through the narrative sequence, which resolves social dilemmas, that Wright was able to link the deconstructed myth to the social totality.

5.10 The critical social research process By way of concluding remarks I will review and summarise what is involved in doing critical social research. In offering this sketch there is no intention of reiterating basic methodic practices such as how to enter the field as a participant observer, how to avoid leading questions in a structured interview, how to select a suitable case study, how to sample historical archives, or how to undertake multi-variate analysis. There are plenty of method texts that provide guidance on such issues. This sketch reasserts the view, that underpins the

4 This fits in with Saussure’s idea of the relational nature of language with which Jakobson concurred.

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analysis throughout the book, that methodology is not about data-collection methods in themselves but is about the whole process of enquiry.

Doing sociology is not just about selecting and constructing a data collection technique. On the contrary, it embraces conceptualisation of the problem; theoretical debate; specification of research practices; analytic frameworks; and epistemological presuppositions. Data collection is not a self- contained phase in a linear process. Rather, all aspects of the research process are interrelated and all bear on each other. There is no neat linear sequence of events as the idealised research report format would have us believe (that is, theoretical background, hypothesis, design of research instrument, data collection, test of hypothesis, findings, implications for theory). However much the idealised form of research design and presentation might be imposed on other forms of research, dialectical critical social research is not conducive to such manipulation.

Critical social research deconstructs and reconstructs. However, this is not like taking a house apart brick by brick and building a bungalow using the same bricks. The exact nature of the social edifice to be deconstructed is far from clear. Oppressive social structures do not come neatly labelled and ready for dismantling. Ideology serves to obscure the real nature of the oppressive social structure by naturalising it. Reconstruction is, thus, not just rebuilding but reconceptualisation. The nature of the reconceptualisation process emerges only as the illusion of the existing taken-for-granted structure is revealed. There is a shuttling back and forth between what is being deconstructed and what is being reconstructed. The nature of both emerge together. In short, critical social research is a dialectical process that cannot be broken down into successive, discrete stages.

So what do you do as a critical researcher (as opposed to what do you say you did when reporting the research)? You have to start somewhere and there is no better place than with the observation, concern, frustration or doubt that provoked the enquiry. Ask yourself why things are as they appear to be? But frame the question, not by asking ‘what are the causes?’ or ‘what does this mean?’ but rather by asking ‘how come this situation exists?’. Think ‘how has this come about?’ and ‘how does it persist?’. Ask ‘how come nothing is done about it?’ or ‘how come no-one notices’ or ‘how is it that people accept what

clearly is not in their interest’? Ask such questions and from there get a clearer picture of what you are really asking about.

Asking these kinds of questions will lead you to three related lines of enquiry. First, what is essentially going on? (Pink packaging of girls toys is not about ‘why is it pink’, but about ‘why are some toys demarcated as girls’ toys?’). Second, why has this historically been the case? (Why have girls traditionally had certain toys?) Third, what structures reproduce this state of affairs? (Why do firms manufacture, and people continue to buy, these toys for girls?)

Empirical enquiry will start to provide a clearer focus for the questions. (Find out what toys are currently marketed for girls. To what extent are they traditional toys? How long has the tradition been going? What changes have occurred over time? What leads people to continue to buy traditional gender- defined toys?) Through empirical enquiry, broad abstractions can be filled out and made concrete.

Start to broaden the enquiry. Make connections between myths or contradictions that emerge from the empirical enquiry and broader stereotypes or ideological constructs. (Assumptions about girls’ toys reproduce gender stereotypes. Why do these gendered myths persist? Even people who are aware of this stereotyping still buy gendered toys. Why does this anomaly occur?) Relate the myths and/or contradictions back to the empirical data, on the one hand and to broader social structures on the other. (Gendered toys are bought because children want them? Why? Because their friends have them? Because they read about gendered toys at school? Because they see advertisements for gendered toys on television? What role does the media play in reproducing gender stereotypes? How does marketing targets customers? How is gender created in the way advertisers refer to ‘already constituted’ subjects?).


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Do not just assume relationships as the enquiry develops but undertake further empirical enquiry. (Watch the advertisements, look at school reading books, ask manufacturers about marketing strategies.) Ask broader questions of the data (Do manufacturers stick to the same gendered toys because they are easier and safer to market? Why don’t people demand alternatives?) Begin to reveal the nature of ideological forms, how they impinge upon the area of enquiry, and whose interests are served by them. (The elision of toys and the psychology of femininity; nurturing roles and social status.) Gradually bring the specific and the societal, the immediate and the historical together in a totalistic analysis.

Avoid sweeping away the enquiry with grandiose but impotent explanations that implicate ‘socialisation’, ‘patriarchy’, ‘capitalism’, or ‘racism’. Don’t treat the world as though it is full of ‘cultural dopes’ (Garfinkel, 1967). Critical social research is praxiological so it is necessary to examine in detail how people collude in their own oppression, how they are persuaded to reproduce historical social structures. Critical social research is close and detailed study that shows how historical oppressive social structures are legitimated and reproduced in specific practices. Critical social research thus raises consciousness, subverts the legitimating processes and provides clear analyses of the nature and operation of the oppressive structures.

So, doing critical social research is about asking ‘how come?’. It involves a broad perspective. That does not mean that every study has to start with very wide view and attempt an analysis of ‘capitalism’ or ‘patriarchy’ or ‘racism’. On the contrary, it is far better if a particular and specific question informs the study from the outset and is the focus of the enquiry throughout. The wider, totalistic, perspective refers to the process of locating the empirical study as part of broader structural and historical processes. It is in contradistinction to studies that focus inwards in minute detail and detach and analyse the subject of study as an entity in itself.

Critical social research must be detailed if it is to be revealing and convincing. Empirical evidence is crucial. Such evidence may arise from asking people questions, or by watching and participating in what people do, or by reviewing what has happened in the past, or by analysing cultural products. Data may be aggregated or treated as unique testimony. It does not matter whether one computes the percentage of

toys that are gendered by being packaged in pink; ask children what they want for Christmas; watch them at school and at play; discuss toy purchases with parents; decode advertisements for toys; or do a semiotic analysis of children’s television. Do any or all of these things as appropriate to advancing the enquiry. But make sure that techniques are undertaken within a critical methodology. What is important is that nothing is taken-for-granted and that what is, or has been, done or said is related to historical developments and social structures.

Having done the study and gained an understanding, the production of a report is your chance to share that understanding with others. The ‘traditional’ approach to reporting empirical work should be avoided. This traditional approach to research reporting tends to a structure which idealises the research process as a logical sequence of discrete phases. It suggests an introduction that provides an overview of the context, a literature review, the identification of the theoretical concern of the research, the specification of hypotheses, a central block of ‘results’, an analysis of the results, the implications for theory and suggestions for further research.

Instead, the critical social research report should be presented as coherent argument; a story with a plot. The details included in the final report should be interwoven into the fabric of the plot. Critical social research is primarily concerned with analysis and reporting of substantive issues rather than the artificial logic of the research process. The substantive issue is the central focus of the work and any critical social research report must indicate what central question is being addressed. A central plot must be identified and this plot sustained throughout. In effect, the core argument remains as a skeleton that is filled out by empirical details. The details are not gathered together into an inaccessible block, which is

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subsequently interpreted for the reader, as in the conventional approach. There is no pretence, in the story approach, of inductive generalisability based on an ‘objective’ central block of data whose absence would be like tearing out the heart of the account and thus render the report useless. In the story approach, the data and the theory can be shown to have mutually influenced each other, the dialectical process emerges as the research angle is revealed in the plot.

5.11 An ending

In writing this book I started out with an idea of the nature of critical social research. The more I looked at critical studies and the more I tried to codify the practices the more this conception became modified. This evolving conception led me to select some studies and reject others that I had intended to use. The process of selection of studies, of analysis, of the determination of the nature of critical social research was itself dialectical. There is, however, insufficient space for me to represent this dialectical process but it is important for the reader to understand that my exposition of the nature of critical social research did not emerge inductively from the studies, nor were the studies selected to merely illustrate my preconceptions. Indeed more than half the studies included in the final document were selected and read after I had started writing the book. This meant, apart from other things, that the introductory sections were constantly re-written as my conception of critical social research became clearer.

This book is intended to reaffirm and to endorse a major social research tradition. Although not susceptible to simple methodic prescriptions critical social research lies at the very heart of emancipatory sociological enquiry. This book, through the use of case studies, gives a clearer indication than hitherto of the nature of this fundamental critical methodological process. Unashamedly, critical social research is about the development of a critical attitude. It is a process of constant engagement with ‘neutrally’ coded messages and taken-for-granted knowledge. The researcher is an active participant in the development of knowledge, not just a recipient of already-constituted knowledge. Fundamentally, the critical social researcher is dedicated to revealing and opposing oppression. If you have taken the trouble to read this book you should never rest easy again.