Class notes
Full notes, lectures 1-10
- Course
- Institution
This document contains all the lecture material, well-structured and divided, with headings and subheadings, following the chronological order of the lectures.
[Show more]
Seller
Follow
annacarboni
Content preview
INTRODUCTION TO SOCIOLOGY OF WORK- Micro-rela*on in the workplace
o Experience of work
o Interac*ons, strategies and power
- Macro-forces shaping the workplace
o Technological development
o Interna*onal compe**on and globalisa*on
o Investment decisions
o Ins*tu*onal forces
▪ The state, industrial structure
▪ Class, gender, race
- The main focus of this module is JOB QUALITY
o How can we explain the differences in inequality between different
countries?
o Analyse the module through the perspec*ve of stakeholders; mainly workers
- Compare with economics
o Invisible hand: every firm in the market can ac*on their own interest and this
will collec*vely add up to self-regula*ng economy
o Focus on individuals, incen*ves, markets
OCED (OrganisaGon for Economic CooperaGon and Development)
- Club of rich countries
- Most developed
KEY CONCEPTS OF SOCIOLOGY OF WORK
- Work
o Human labour that transforms nature into something useful
o Physical or mental, paid or unpaid, employed or self-employed, waged or
non-waged
o Any*me you transform labour into something useful
- Employment
o A contract between two par*es, an employer and employee
o Generally, for a specific wage
- Economy
o System of produc*on, exchange, distribu*on and consump*on
o Goods and services
o Occupa*ons and industries
- Society
o Family and domes*c life
o Religion
o Poli*cal sphere and civil society
o Cultural ins*tu*ons, norms
, ▪ Gender, race, ethnicity, na*onality
o The state
o Society is fundamental to the way the economy works
KEY CONCEPTS OF INSTITUTIONS
- Defini*ons
o “seRled habits of thought” – Thorstein Veblen
o “rules of conduct” – John R Commons
o “durable social structures based in rules, norms and/or cultural beliefs” – W
Richard ScoR
- Characteris*cs
o Basis of stable paRerns of interac*ons; reason why society is so stable isn’t
because of the free market, but ins*tu*ons provide stability
o Have the appearance of naturalness
o Formal or informal
▪ Formal: the state, corporate governance, educa*on systems, the stock
market, use of banks
▪ Informal: gender, race, logics of corporate organisa*on
- Basic Societal ins*tu*ons:
General Religion Corpora*on Gender Race
Types
Specific Protestant ethic Western Dual breadwinner Slavery;
Forms and capitalism; corpora*on; (both in the Apartheid;
Islamic finance Japanese workplace)/ US prison as a
Keiretsu; female care (US); labor market
Korean Chaebol Male bw/ ins*tu*on;
female care (FRG); Racial
Dual bw/ state care occupa*onal
(Sweden) segrega*on
KEY CONCEPTS OF EMBEDDEDNESS
- Economic ac*vity is shaped by, and dependent on, non-economic social rela*ons
o Economic ac*on is embedded in social networks and social ins*tu*ons
- Not just individuals ra*onally maximising u*lity in market exchange, but
o Economic ac*on shaped by cultural and poli*cal ins*tu*ons
o Individual iden**es shaped by family and communi*es, rela*ons of power
(class, race, gender), ideas and goals other than maximising u*lity
o That’s why you get German firms ac*ng differently to American firms,
because they’re embedded in their ins*tu*ons and cultural beliefs
,KEY CONCEPTS OF SOCIAL CONSTRUCTIONISM
- The economy is cons*tuted through the social and poli*cal
o Social and poli*cal ins*tu*ons not separate from economy; they’re
fundamental to the economy
o Economy is built based upon socie*es and ins*tu*ons
- Ideas, ins*tu*ons and ideologies provide meanings that are assigned to events,
people and social rela*ons
o Shape goals, means and prac*ces
o Socially constructed ins*tu*ons: race and gender, the purpose of
corpora*ons, na*onal ins*tu*ons
- There is no natural form of market economy
- Different na*onal economies have developed along dis*nct trajectories
o Based on different cultures, ideologies and ins*tu*ons
- Some economies marke*zed than others, but none is more natural than another
- Social interac*on ! rou*nes, rules and shared understandings
o Rou*nes, rules and shared understandings become “social facts” or cultural
ins*tu*ons
o Taken for granted understandings of the way things are
- Cultural ins*tu*ons passed down to subsequent genera*ons ! become seemingly
objec*ve to reality
o Cultural beliefs of race and gender doesn’t seem formal or has any real effect
but it does, like gender wage gap
- Regionally: different ins*tu*ons ! dis*nct development trajectories
- Historical
o Gender and race in the labour market
▪ Social construc*on of gender: men are beRer than women in the
workplace so there is a process of gender discrimina*on and bias
▪ Gender gap / gender earnings ra*os where men were earning much
more than women ** gender/race discrimina*on topic for coursework
essay
▪ Tested that women are more skilled than men and do beRer in school
and university, but s*ll there is this social construct of them doing
worse than men
▪ Study in trying to get a job; applying for a job with black sounding
name vs white sounding name – white people automa*cally get the
call back – there is systema*c discrimina*on in gender and race. It
happens in all corpora*ons at low levels and has cumula*ve nega*ve
effects
o Logics of the corpora*on
- Cross-na*onal
o Compara*ve ins*tu*onal analysis
, SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION OF GENDER
- There are no essen*al male or female characteris*cs
o Inequality and occupa*onal segrega*on not a result of innate differences
o It’s all a social construc*on
- Gender is not determined by biological difference
o Bodily material is the same for females and males, except for hormones and
sex organs
o Male and female genitalia develop from the same fetal *ssues
o Combina*ons of incongruent genes, genitalia and hormones are common
o Much more fluid construc*on in present day
- The main difference between men and women is testosterone, but even this does
not exclusively determine behaviour
SOCIAL CONSTRUCTION OF RACE
- Race is not a gene*cally or biologically meaningful concept
o Race is constructed through cogni*ve schemas, cultural frames and poli*cal
projects
o No such thing as innate, biological racial difference
- Biological features through to delineate racial groups (ex. Skin colour, hair texture,
facial features) do not co-vary
o Sets of features for certain races we have constructed and aligned, they’re
made up and not real biological differences
o They vary independently
o Different traits exhibit dis*nct paRerns across geography
- Racial categories vary across place and over *me
- The range of socio-historical varia*on in racial difference cannot be explained via
biology
o Biology will not explain the outward appearance of race
COMPARATIVE INSTITUTIONAL ANALYSIS
- Comparing the ins*tu*onal configura*on of na*onal economies
- European social model vs Anglo liberal model
o An old dis*nc*on
- Varie*es of capitalism (VoC) model
o A new, influen*al theore*cal approach
o Heavily economis*c (ra*onal choice)
o Cri*cized for being too sta*c and proposing an oversimplified binary model of
capitalism
o Economis*c, tries to describe ins*tu*ons in a ra*onal way
o ** used in BBC tutorial video
The benefits of buying summaries with Stuvia:
Guaranteed quality through customer reviews
Stuvia customers have reviewed more than 700,000 summaries. This how you know that you are buying the best documents.
Quick and easy check-out
You can quickly pay through credit card or Stuvia-credit for the summaries. There is no membership needed.
Focus on what matters
Your fellow students write the study notes themselves, which is why the documents are always reliable and up-to-date. This ensures you quickly get to the core!
Frequently asked questions
What do I get when I buy this document?
You get a PDF, available immediately after your purchase. The purchased document is accessible anytime, anywhere and indefinitely through your profile.
Satisfaction guarantee: how does it work?
Our satisfaction guarantee ensures that you always find a study document that suits you well. You fill out a form, and our customer service team takes care of the rest.
Who am I buying these notes from?
Stuvia is a marketplace, so you are not buying this document from us, but from seller annacarboni. Stuvia facilitates payment to the seller.
Will I be stuck with a subscription?
No, you only buy these notes for $27.04. You're not tied to anything after your purchase.
Can Stuvia be trusted?
4.6 stars on Google & Trustpilot (+1000 reviews)
52355 documents were sold in the last 30 days
Founded in 2010, the go-to place to buy study notes for 14 years now