A General Framework for Studying Class Consciousness and Class Formation | SOC 621, Study notes of Introduction to Sociology

Download A General Framework for Studying Class Consciousness and Class Formation | SOC 621 and more Study notes Introduction to Sociology in PDF only on Docsity! Class Counts Student Edition Erik Olin Wright CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY PRESS Maison des Sciences de [Homme 10. A general framework for studying class consciousness and class formation In one way or another, most class analysts believe that at the core of class analysis is a relatively simple causal structure that looks something like the diagram in Figure 10.1. There is, of course, much disagreement about precisely how to conceptualize the arrows in this causal stream. Do they mean “determines” or “shapes” or “imposes limits upon’? Is there a clear sense in which the horizontal causal stream in this structure is “more important” or “more fundamental” than the unspecified “other causes”? At one extreme, orthodox historical materialism ctaimed that one can broadly read off patterns of class struggle directly from the class structure, and these, in tum, determine the fundamental course of history; in the long run, at feast, ass structures are thought to determine class struggle and class struggles (in conjunction with the development of the forces of production) to determine trajectories of social change. At the other extreme, most non-Marxist class analysts as well as some Marxists view the class structure as at most providing us with the vocabulary for identifying potential actors in class struggles; class structure does not, however, necessarily have a more powerful role in determining actual patterns of class struggle than many other mechan- isms (ideology, the state, ethnicity, ctc.}, and class struggles are only one among a host of change-producing factors. In this chapter we will explore the elements on the left hand side of Figure 10.1: “Class structure — class struggle.” J will propose a generat model of the relationship between class structure and class struggle which captures both the core traditional Marxist intuition that class structures are in some sense the fundamental determinant of class struggles, but nevertheless allows other causal factors considerable potential weight in explaining concrete variations across time and place. The core of the model is an attempt to link a micro-conception of the 185 186 Class counts Other causes Other causes. | [ctass structure |-— [ctass struggle |} ——> [ Social change Figure 10.1 Simple core model of class analysis relationship between class location and class consciousness with a more macro-level understanding of the relationship between class structure and class formation. In section 10.1 of this chapter we will set the stage for this model by briefly elaborating the contrast between micro- and macro-levels of analysis. Section 10.2 will discuss the definitions of a number of the core concepts which we will use, especially class formation and class con- sciousness. This will be followed in section 10.3 by a discussion of the micro-model, the macro-model and their interconnection. 10.1 Micro- and macro-levels of analysis The contrast between micro- and macro-levels of analysis is often invoked in sociology, and much is made about the necessity of “moving” back and forth between these levels, but frequently the precise concep- tual status of the distinction is muddled. | will use the terms to designate different units of analysis, in which macro-levels of analysis are always to be understood as “aggregations” of relevant micro-units of analysis. The paradigm for this usage is biology: organisms are aggregations of interconnected organs; organs are aggregations of interconnected cells; cells are aggregations of interconnected cellular structures; cellular Structures are aggregations of interconnected molecules. The expression are aggregations of” in these statements, of course, does not simply mean, “haphazard collections of,” but rather “structurally interconnect- ed sets of.” A given macro-level always consists of relations among the relevant constituent micro-units. What precisely do we mean by “relations” among micro units? This term is often imbued with arcane meanings. I will use it in a fairly straightforward way to designate any systematic pattern of interactions among the micro-units. Relations can thus be strong, well ordered and systematic, involving intensive and repeated interactions among con- stituent micro-elements, or weak and rather chaotic, involving few and A general framework 187 Table 10.1 Logic of micra- and macro-levels of social analysis Levels of Constituent Nature of Examples of analysis sutb-units relations relations Micro-social individuals inter-individual friendships, level relations point-of-production class relations Meso-social interindividual bounded organizations firms, families, and networks unions, schools (relations among inter- individual relations) level telations Macro-social organizations _ relations among nations, economies level organizations erratic interactions among those elements. To analyze any unit of analysis, therefore, is to investigate the nature and consequences of these relations among its sub-units. In specifying any hierarchy of nested micro- to macro-levels, therefore, we need to define the relevant subunits and the nature of the relations among them. One way of understanding the hierarchy of units of analysis in sociology is represented in Table 10.1 and Figure 10.2 The micro-level of sociological analysis consists of the study of the relations among, individuals. Individuals are the constituent elements within these relations, but it is the relations as such that are the object of study of micro-level sociological analysis. The study of interactions among siblings or between bosses and workers are thus both micro-level social phenomena. The individuals within these relations, of course, can also be consid- ered “units of analysis,” and the relations among their constituent “parts” can also be studied. The study of such intra-individual relations is the proper object of human biology and psychology. The analysis of individuals-qua-individuals is thus at the interface between sociology — in which the individual is the unit within micro-relations — and psychology — in which the individual is the macro-level within which relations of various sorts are studied. The meso-level of social analysis consists of the investigation of relations among interindividual relations. The units characteristic of such relations-among-telations are normally what we call “organiza- tions,” although looser units such as social networks would also consti- 192 Class counts of class interests is an instance of class formation. Informal social networks, social clubs, neighborhood associations, even churches, could under appropriate circumstances be elements of class formations. The extensive research on the role of social clubs in coordinating the interests of the ruling class, for example, should be regarded as documenting one aspect of bourgeois class formation. Class formations should not be thought of as simply in terms of the forming social relations among people within homogeneous class loca- tions in a class structure. The forging of solidaristic relations across the boundaries of the locations within a class structure are equally instances of the formation of collectively organized social forces within class structures. Class formation thus includes the formation of class alliances as well as the internal organization of classes as such. For example, “populism,” to the extent that it provides a context for the pursuit of certain class interests, can be viewed as a form of class formation that forges solidaristic ties between the working class and certain other class locations, typically the petty bourgeoisie (especially small farmers in the American case). Class practices Class practices are activities engaged in by members of a class using class capacities in order to realize at least some of their class interests. “Practice” in these terms implies that the activity is intentional (Le. it has a conscious goal); “class” practices implies that the goal is the realization of class-based interests. Class practices include such mundane activities as a worker selling labor on a labor market, a foreman disciplining a worker for poor performance or a stockholder buying stocks or voting in a stockholders’ meeting. But class practices also include such things as participating in a strike or busting a union. Class struggle The term “class struggle” refers to organized forms of antagonistic class practices, i.e. practices that are directed against each other. While in the limiting case one might refer to a class struggle involving a single worker and a single capitalist, more generally class struggles involve collectivities of various sorts. Class formations, not atomized individuals, are the characteristic vehicles for class struggles. Class struggles, there- fore, generally refer to relatively macto-phenomena. Given the antago- A general framework 193 nistic nature of the interests determined by class structures, class practices of individuals will have a strong tendency to develop into collective class struggles since the realization of the interests of members of one class generally imply confrontation against the interests of members of other classes. Class consciousness I will use the concept of class consciousness to refer to particular aspects of the subjectivity of individuals. Consciousness will thus be used as a strictly micro-concept. When it figures in macro-social explanations it does so by virtue of the ways it helps to explain individual choices and actions. Collectivities, in particular class formations, do not “have” consciousness in the literal sense, since they are not the kind of entities which have minds, which think, weigh alternatives, have preferences, etc. When the term “class consciousness” is applied to collectivities or organizations, therefore, it either refers to the patterned distribution of individual consciousnesses within the relevant aggregate, or it is a way of characterizing central tendencies. This is not to imply, of course, that supra-individual social mechanisms are unimportant, but simply that they should not be conceptualized within the category “consciousness.” And it is also not to imply that the actual distribution of individual consciousnesses in a society is not of social significance and causal importance. It may well be; but a distribution of consciousnesses is not “consciousness.” Understood in this way, to study “consciousness” is to study a particular aspect of the mental life of individuals, namely, those elements of a person’s subjectivity which are discursively accessible to the individual's own awareness. Consciousness is thus counterposed to “unconsciousness” - the discursively inaccessible aspects of mental life. The elements of consciousness — beliefs, ideas, observations, information, theories, prefer- ences — may not continually be in a person’s awareness, but they are accessible to that awareness. This conceptualization of consciousness is closely bound up with the problem of will and intentionality . To say that something is discursively ' This is by no means the only way that class consciousness has been understood in the Marxist tradition. In particular, Lukdcs (1971 [1922]) seems to attribute the category “class consciousness” to the class of workers as a collectivity, not to the empirical individuals who make up that class. For a discussion of Lukécs' views on this see Wright (1985: 242). 194 Class counts accessible is to say that by an act of will people can make themselves aware of it. When people make choices over alternative courses of action, the resulting action is, at least in pat, to be explained by the particular conscious elements that entered into the intentions of the actor making, the choice. While the problem of consciousness is not teducible to the problem of intentionality, from the point of view of social theory one of the most important ways in which consciousness figures in social explanations is via the way it is implicated in the intentions and resulting choices of actions by actors. This is not to suggest, of course, that the only way subjectivity is consequential is via intentional choices. A wide range of psychological mechanisms may directly influence behavior without passing through conscious intentions. Nor does the linkage of consciousness to intention- ality and choice imply that in every social situation the most important determinants of outcomes operate through consciousness; it may well be that the crucial determinants are to be found in the processes which determine the range of possible courses of action open to actors rather than the conscious processes implicated in the choice among those alternatives. What is being claimed is that in order to fully understand the real mechanisms that link social structures to social practices, the subjective basis of the intentional choices made by the actors who live within those structures and engage in those practices must be investi- gated, and this implies studying consciousness Given this definition of “consciousness,” “class” consciousness can be viewed as those aspects of consciousness which have a distinctive class character. To speak of the class “character” of consciousness implies two things. First, it means that the beliefs in question have a substantive class content — in one way or another, the beliefs are about class issues. For example, private ownership of means of production is a distinctive structural feature of capitalist class relations; the belief in the desirability of private ownership, therefore, could be viewed as having a class content. Secondly, the class character of consciousness refers fo those aspects of consciousness which have effects on how individuals actually operate within a given structure of class relations and effects on those relations themselves. The class dimensions of consciousness are impli- cated in the intentions, choices and practices which have what might be termed “class-pertinent effects” in the world. Both of these aspects of the “class character” of consciousness — the content of the beliefs and the effects of beliefs — are necessary if one is to describe something as “class consciousness.” Beliefs about gender rela- A general framework 195 tions, for example, could have class pertinent effects if, for example, stereotypical beliefs about masculinity undermined solidarity between men and women in class struggles. Yet it would not be useful to describe gender ideologies as aspects of class consciousness, although they might certainly be relevant for explaining aspects of class consciousness and class struggle. To count as an aspect of class consciousness, then, the belief in question must both have a class content and have class-pertinent effects. If class structure is understood as a terrain of social relations that determine objective material interests of actors, and class struggle is understood as the forms of social practices which attempt to realize those interests, then class consciousness can be understood as the subjective processes with a class content that shape intentional choices with respect to those interests and struggles. A potential point of terminological confusion needs to be clarified at this point. It is common in Marxist discussions to distinguish between workers who “are class conscious” from those that “are not class con- scious.” The generic expression “class consciousness” in such usage is being identified with a particular type of class consciousness. In the usage of the term I am proposing, this would be a form of class consciousness in which individuals have a relatively “true” and “consistent” under- standing of their class interests. | am thus using the term class conscious- ness in a more general way to designate ail forms of consciousness with a class content and class-pertinent effects, regardiess of their faithfulness to real or objective interests. In order to specifically indicate the presence of a particular type of class consciousness, therefore, it will be necessary to employ suitable adjectives: proworking-class consciousness, anticapitalist class consciousness, revolutionary working-class consciousness and so forth. When ] use the unmodified expression “class consciousness” it will always refer to the general domain of consciousness with a class content relevant to class practices. There will be no implication that such consciousness can always be evaluated as “true” or “false.” This way of understanding class consciousness suggests that the concept can be decomposed into several elements. Whenever people make conscious choices, three dimensions of subjectivity are implicated:? 1. Perceptions and observations In one way or another, conscious choice involves processing information about the world. “Facts,” however, are always filtered through categories 2 These three dimensions are derived from Therborn's (1982) analysis of ideology as answers to three questions: what exists? What is possible? What is good? 196 Class counts and beliefs about “what exists.” Some workers believe that their employers worry about the welfare of employees, while others believe that employers are only interested in their own profits. Such beliefs about the motivations of employers are an aspect of class consciousness because they are implicated in the way workers are likely to respond to various Kinds of class practices of their employers. “Class conscious- ness," in these terms, involves the ways in which the perceptions of the facts of a situation have a class content and are thus consequential for class actions. 2. Theories of Consequences Perceptions of the facts by themselves are insufficient to make choices: people also must have some understanding of the expected conse. quences of given choices of action. This implies that choices involve theories. These may be “practical” theories rather than abstractly for- malized theories, they may have the character of “rules of thumb” rather than explanatory principles. One particularly important aspect of such theories is conceptions of what is possible. Workers may decide that there is no point is struggling to establish a union because it is impossible for such a struggle to succeed. “Impossible” does not mean, of course that one could not try to form a union, but simply that the consequence of such an attempt would not be the desired outcome. Historically working-class rejections of socialism and communism have as much to do with the belief that such radical alternatives to capitalism would never work or that they are unachievable because of the power of the dominant classes, as with th i SSeS, ¢ belief that alternatives to capita undesirable. piatiem ore 3. Preferences Knowing a person’s perceptions and theories is still not enough to explain a particular conscious choice; in addition, of course, it is necessary to know preferences, that is, the evaluation of the desirabilit of those consequences. “Desirability,” in this context, can mean desirable in terms of the material benefits to the person, but there is no necessar restriction of preferences to selfish or egotistical evaluations. Preferences can also involve deep commitment to the welfare of others based on a sense of shared identity and meaning. “Class identity” may therefore figure as a salient aspect of class consciousness insofar as it shapes the extent to which an individual’s Preferences include a concern for th well-being of other members of a class. mes A general framework 197 With this understanding of class consciousness, one can begin to develop fairly complex typologics of qualitatively distinct forms of class consciousness in terms of the ways in which perceptions, theories and preferences held by individuals advance or impede the pursuit of class interests. Tt is possible, for example, to distinguish between “hege- monic,” “reformist,” “oppositional” and “revolutionary” working-class consciousness in terms of particular combinations of perceptions, the- ories and preferences. This is essentially what the more sophisticated typologies of class consciousness have tried to do. In the present study I will not attempt to elaborate a nuanced typology of forms of class consciousness. The data that we will employ could potentially be stretched to operationalize such typologies, but my general feeling, is that the limitations of survey research methodology make it preferable to adopt relatively simple and straightforward vari- ables. The measures of class consciousness which we will use, therefore, are designed to tap in a general way the extent to which individuals have attitudes that are consistent with working-class or capitalist-class interests. Limitation, selection and transformation In elaborating a micro-model of class consciousness and a macro-model of class formation we will describe the causal relations among the various elements of the models in terms of three different “modes of determination’: limitation, selection and transformation. Let me first explain limitation and transformation. Figure 10.3 illustrates the general abstract relation between limitation and transformation: structures impose limits on practices; practices transform the structures that so limit them. Limits, in this context, does not simply mean that given the existence of the social structure in question certain practices are absolutely impossible, ie. they are “outside” of the limits. {n the extreme case, certain forms of practice may become virtually impossible given the existence of a particular structure, but the concept of limits is meant to refer to the effects of the structure on the probabilities of all types of relevant practices occurring. The sub- stantive claim being made when it is said that structures — limit prac- tices is that the structures impose on the actors within those structures various kinds of obstacles and facilitations, sanctions and incentives, tisky options and easy opportunities, which make certain kinds of 202 Class counts themselves while they are producing commodities. This is one of the central themes of Michael Burawoy’s numerous studies of workers on the shopfloor (Burawoy 1979, 1985, 1992; Burawoy and Wright 1990). The norms and values of workers, he argues, are not mainly the result of deep socialization outside of the sphere of work, but are gencrated within production by the practices workers adopt in their efforts to cope with the dilemmas of their situation. Of particular salience in these terms are the ways in which individual participation in class struggles of various sorts contributes to the formation of solidaristic preferences, More generally the claim is that the perceptions of alternatives, theories and values held by individuals situated in different class locations is not just shaped by where they are but by what they do. Our empirical objectives in the next chapter are Particularly concerned with the relationship between class location and class consciousness. In this micro-model, class location affects class consciousness through two routes: one via the direct impact of being in a class location on conscious- ness, and the other via the way class locations affect class practices which in turn affect consciousness. One way of thinking about these two causal streams is that in the former concerns things that happen to people and the latter concerns things people do. By virtue of being in a class location (understood both as direct and mediated locations in the sense discussed in chapter 7) a person is subjected to certain experiences with greater or lesser probability. Insofar as class location determines access tu material resources, being in a class location shapes the mundane material conditions of existence — how comfortable is daily life, how physically and mentally taxing is work, how hungry one is. Class jocation significantly determines the prob- ability of being the victim of different kinds of crime. Class locations shape the kind of neighborhood onc is likely to live in and the nature of the social networks in which one is embedded, and ail of these may have an impact on class consciousness. Above all, class locations impose on people a set of trade-offs and dilemmas they face in the pursuit of their material interests. Capitalists have to worry about challenges from competitors, how to extract the maximum labor from their employees, and alternative uses of their investment resources. Workers have to worry about finding a job, about unemployment and job security, about skill obsolescence and job injury, about making ends meet with a paycheck. ‘To say that members of a class share common class interests means that they objectively face similar strategic choices for advancing Ageneral framework 203 their material welfare. Such a strategic environment continually gener- ates experiences which shape a person’s beliefs about the world. People do not, however, simply live in a strategic environment; they also adopt specific strategies. And what they actually do also shapes their consciousness. Managers do not simply confront the problems of eliciting, work effort from subordinates and impressing their superiors. They also issue orders, discipline subordinates and suck up to higher management and owners. Workers do not simply face the strategic problem of individually competing with fellow workers or solidaristi- cally struggling for higher wages; they also join unions, cross picket lines and quit jobs to find better work. Class consciousness, then, is shaped, on the one hand, by the material conditions and choices people face (class location —limits-+ consciousness) and, on the other, by the choices people actually make (class location — limits practices —fransform— conscious- ness). Consciousness shapes chvices; choices change consciousness. Both of these causal paths have a crucial temporal dimension. Class consciousness is not the instantaneous product of one’s present class location and class practices. At any given point in time, consciousness about anything is the result of a life-time history of things that happen to people and things they do, of both choices faced and choices made, of interests and experiences. Most obviously, there is the life-time biogra- phical trajectory of the individual's locations within the class structure (the classical sociological problem of inter- and intra-generational class mobility), but other experiences such as unemployment or strikes are also relevant. A fully developed theory of consciousness formation would also include an account of the psychological mechanisms through which interests and experiences actually shape perceptions of alternatives, theories and preferences. It is not enough to identify a salient set of experiences and interests through which class locations limit class consciousness; it is also necessary to understand how these limits work through psychological processes within the individual. Jon Elster’s (1985: ch. 8) accounts of such cognitive mechanisms as wishful thinking and adaptive preference formation (cognitive dissonance) would be examples. 1 will not attempt to elaborate an account of these psychological mechanisms; they will thus remain largely a “black box.” Implicitly in my arguments, however, is a fairly naive form of learning theory which underlies most sociological accounts of the effects of social conditions on consciousness. The basic assumption is that the probability that people  204 Class counts will hold beliefs congruent with their class location depends upon the extent to which their life experiences reinforce or undermine such beliefs. All other things being equal, the more a person's life is bound up with a single, coherent set of class experiences, the more likely it is that this person’s consciousness wiil be imbued with a corresponding class content. Perceptions, theories and preferences are the result of learning from experiences, and, to the extent that one’s class experiences all push in the same direction, class consciousness will tend to develop a coherent class content.> But, it might be objected, a set of class experiences, no matter how consistent, is not enough to predict a form of consciousness. Experiences are not translated directly into consciousness; they must first be inter- preted, and interpretations always presuppose some kind of political and cultural context. The same micro-class experiences and interests with the same psychological mechanisms could generate different forms of con- sciousness depending upon the broader historical context of politics and cultuce, To understand these issues we must now turn to the macro- model and then to the interaction between the macro- and micro-levels of analysis. 10.4 The macro-model In the macro-model our object of investigation is no longer individual class consciousness as such, but collective forms of class formation and class struggle. The model is illustrated in Figure 10.6. As in the micto- model, the causal logic revolves around the way structures impose limits on practices and practices in turn transform structures. In the macro- mode] class structures impose limits on class formations and class struggles. Within those limits, class formations select specific forms of * This implicit learning theory of the black-box of consciousness formation is quite similar to Therborn’s (1942) view that “ideological interpellation” is the result of the patterns of subjection and qualification which an individual experiences by virtue of the affirmations and sanctions connected to different social positions. It is also close to Bourdieu’s (1985) view that daily lived experiences constitute a set of common condilions that generate common conditionings, although Bourdieu is more concerned with the formation of nonconscious dimensions of subjectivity (“dispositions”) than conscivusness as such. Bourdieu’s concept of class habitus is meant to encompass the full range of nonconscious subjective effects on actors that result from such common conditionings/experiences. A class habitus is detined as a common set of dispositions to act in particular ways that are shaped by a common sct of conditionings (stbject- forming experiences) rooted in a class structure. A general framework 205 Class struggle Class structure Ciass formation Figure 10.6 Macro-model of class structure, class formation and class struggle. class struggle. Class struggles transform both class formations and class structures. Let us look at each of these connections. 1. Class structure —limits— class formation To say that class structures impose limits on class formations means that the class structure imposes obstacles and opportunities with which any agent attempting to forge class formations must contend. Within any given class structure, certain class formations will thus be relatively easy to create and are likely to be stable once created, others will be more difficult and unstable, and certain class formations may be virtually impossible. As Przeworski (1985: 47) puts it: “Processes of formation of workers into a class are inextricably fused with the processes of organi- zation of surplus labor. As a result, a number of alternative organizations of classes is possible at any moment of history.” Three kinds of mechanisms are central to this limiting process: (1) the nature of the material interests generated by class structures, (2) the patterns of identities that emerge from the lived experiences of people in different locations in the class structure and (3) the nature of the resources distributed in the class structure which make certain potential alliances across locations in the class structure more or less attractive. The first two of these are closely tied to the micro-analysis of class locations while the third is more strictly macro- in character. Material interests. The argument about material interests is the most straightforward. The central thesis of the Marxist theory of class struc- ture is that the underlying mechanisms of exploitation in an economic structure powerfully shape the material interests of people in that structure. Consider the matrix of locations within the class structure which we have adopted in this book. This matrix can be viewed as a map of the degree of inherent antagonism of material interests of people located in different places in the structure: locations relatively “close” to 206 Class counts each other will have relatively overlapping material interests whereas more distant locations will have more antagonistic interests. All things being equal, class formations that link locations with relatively similar material interests are thus easier to create than class formations that link locations with quite disparate interests. From the vantage point of working-class locations in the class structure (the lower right-hand corner of the matrix), as you move towards the upper left-hand comer of the matrix (expert managers among employees, and capitalists among property owners) class interests become progressively more antagonistic, and thus class formations joining workers with such locations more and more difficult to forge. This does not mean, it must be emphasized, that material interests alone determine class formations; but they do define a set of obstacles with which parties, unions and other agents of class formation have to contend in their efforts to consolidate and reproduce particuiar patterns of class formation. identities. The second mechanism through which class structures shape the possibilities of class formations centers on the ways class affects the class identities of people, the ways people define who is similar to and who is different from themselves, who are their potential friends and potential enemies within the economic system. As in the case of material interests, it would be expected that class formations that attempt to bind people together with similar identities are likely to be easier to accomplish and more stable than class formations which combine highly disparate and potentially conflicting identities. All things being equal, it would be predicted that class identities would more or less follow the same contours as class interests, and thus common identity would reinforce common interests as a basis for forging class formations. However, it is rarely the case that all things are equal. Class identities are heavily shaped by idiosyncrasies of personal biographies and by historical patterns of struggles, as well as by the intersection of class with other forms of social collectivity (ethnicity, religion, language, region, etc.). Thus, while it is plausible to argue that there shoutd be some rough association between the objectively given material interests of actors and the kinds of class identities they develop, there is no reason for these two aspects of class to be isomorphic. Class interests and class identities, thereforc, may not reinforce each other in linking class structures to class formations. A general framework 207 Resources. The third mechanism that underlies the ways in which class structures limit class formations centers on the effects of the macro- attributes of class structures, in particular the distribution of resources across classes which are relevant for class formations and class struggles. For working-class formations, probably the most important resource is sheer numbers of people, although organizational and financial re- sources may also be important. As Przeworski (1985, ch. 3) and Prze- worski and Sprague (1986) have stressed, in deciding which potential alliances to nourish, the leadership of working-class electoral parties pays particular attention to the potential gains in electoral strength posed by forging different sorts of alliances. The attractiveness of worker-peasant alliances in revolutionary movements in Third World countries or of worker-petty bourgeois alliances in nineteenth-century North American populism is significantly shaped by the power of numbers. Numbers, however, are not the whole story. Financial resources may also be crucial to the strategies of actors attempting to build class formations. The financial resources available to the middle class give them considerable leverage in forging particular kinds of alliances and coalitions. One of the reasons why working-class parties may put more energy into attracting progressive elements of the middle class than in mobilizing the poorest and most marginalized segments of the population is that the former can potentially make greater contribu- tioris. The combination of these three class-based mechanisms — exploitation material interests; lived experiences in a class structure—class identities; distribution of class resources~attractiveness of potential alliances ~ determines the underlying probabilities that different potential class formations will occur. Figure 10.7 illustrates a range of possible class formations that might be constructed on the same basic class structure. The first two of these follow the contours of the central tendencies generated by the class structure itself: class formations directly mirror the exploitation generated interest configuration. In the first model, a middle-class formation is a buffer between working-class and bourgeois- class formations; in the second model, a pure polarization exists between two “camps.” In the third model, the structural division between workers and contradictory locations has been severely muted in the process of class formation: workers have been incorporated into a middle-class ideological block. The fourth and fifth models are perhaps 212 Class counts Class struggle Pe, LoS Class structure a Class formation mediates constitutes Class practices £3 SS Class location fens Class consclousness Figure 10.8 Macro-micro linkage in class analysis. the whole can then be identified as properties resulting from the interaction of the parts, not simply their serially aggregated individual Properties. To study the micro-foundations of macro-phenomena is thus to study the ways in which wholes are constituted by the sum and interactions of their parts. Consider class structure. Class structures are constituted by individuals-in-class-locations and ail of the interactions among those individuals by virtue of the locations they occupy. To study the micro- foundations of the class structure, therefore, is to explore the ways in which attributes of individuals, their choices and actions, help explain A general framework 213 the nature of these locations and interconnections. Workers do not own means of production and thus seek employment in order to obtain subsistence; capitalists own means of production and thus seek em- ployees to use those means of production in order to obtain profits. The class relation between worker and capitalist is constituted by the actions of individuals with these attributes (owning only labor power and owning capital) and these preferences (seeking subsistence and seeking profits). The totality of such relations, resulting from these intercon- nected individual attributes and choices, constitutes the macro-phenom- enon we call “class structure.” In a similar way, class formations are constituted by the participation of individuals with varying forms of class consciousness in collective associations organized to realize class interests. Studying the micro- foundations of such collective organization involves understanding the process by which solidarities, built around different forms of conscious- ness, are forged among individuals, and the ways in which this facilitates their cooperation in the collective pursuit of class interests. Different kinds of class formations are grounded in different forms of individual consciousness and solidaristic interdependency. Finally, to study the micro-foundations of class struggles is to explore the ways in which the attributes, choices and actions of individuals, occupying specific class locations and participating in specific class formations, constitute the collective actions that are the hallmark of class struggle. Take a prototypical example of a class struggle, a strike by a union. The search for micro-foundations insists that it is never satisfactory to restrict the analysis to the “union” as a collective entity making choices and engaging in practices directed at “capitalists” or “management.” Since the union as an organized social force (an instance of class formation) is constituted by its members and their interactions, to understand the actions of a union — the decision to call a strike for example ~- we must understand the attributes, choices and interactions of the individuals constituting that union. This would involve discussions of such things as the free rider problem within unions, the conditions for solidarity to emerge within the membership, the relationship between rank-and-file members and leadership in shaping the decisions of the union, and so on. Class struggles can thus be said to be constituted by the class practices of the individuals within class formations and class structures and all of the interactions among those class practices. Exploring the micro-foundations of macro-phenomena is only one half  214 Class counts of the micro/macro linkage in Figure 10.8. The other half consists of the ways in which macro-phenomena can be said to mediate the effects of micro-processes. To say that the macro- mediates the micro- means that the specific effects of micro-processes depend upon the macro-setting within which they take place. For example, at the core of the micro. model of consciousness formation in Figure 10.5 is the claim that the class consciousness of individuals is shaped by their class location. These micro-level effects, however, are significantly shaped in various ways by macro-level conditions and processes. Occupying a working-class loca- tion in a class structure within which the working class is collectively disorganized has different consequences for the likely consciousness of individuals than occupying the same class location under conditions of the cohesive political formation of the class. This is more than the simple claim that macro-conditions of class formation themselves have effects on consciousness; it implies that the causal impact of individual class jocation on consciousness is enhanced or weakened depending upon the macro-conditions. In formal terms, this means that the model argues for the interactive effects of micro- and macro-factors rather than simply additive effects. Suppose, for example, we wanted to represent in a simple equation the effects of class location and class formation on class consciousness, The simple additive model would like this: Consciousness = a + B,[Class Location] + B,[Class formation] where B, and B; are coefficients which measure the linear effects of these variables on consciousness, The interactive model - the model of macro- mediation of the micro ~ adds a multiplicative term: Consciousness = a + B,[Class Location] + B2[Class. formation] + B;[Location x formation] where B3 indicates the extent to which the effects of class locations vary under different macro-conditions of class formation. It could happen, of course, in a specific empirical setting that Bs is insignificant, indicating that the effects of class location are invariant under different forms of class formation. 10.6 Using the models in empirical research The modet laid out in Figure 10.8 is incomplete in a variety of ways. First, the model is highly underelaborated in terms of the specification of A general framework 215 the relevant range of variation of some of the elements in the model. Thus, while I have proposed a detailed account of the variations in “class locations” in the micro-model that are relevant for explaining class consciousness, the discussions of the relevant range of variation of “individual class practices” in the micro-model or of “class formation’ or even “class structure” in the macro-model are quite underdeveloped. Even more significantly, there is no specification of the actual magni- tudes of the causal relations included in the model. For example, class location is said to impose “limits” on individual class consciousness, but the model itself leaves open the nature and scope of these limits. The macro-processes of class formation are said to mediate the micro- processes of consciousness formation, yet the model is silent on the precise form and magnitude of these interactive effects There is thus nothing in the model which would indicate what the relative prob- abilities of procapitalist or anticapitalist consciousness would be for people in different class locations, nor how these probabilities would themselves vary under different macro-conditions of class formation. Finatly, the model is incomplete because it restricts itself to class-related determinants of the elements in the model. A complete theory of class consciousness and class formation would have to include a wide range of other causal processes ~ from the nature of various nonclass forms of social division (race, ethnicity, gender), to religion, to geopolitics. Given these limitations, these models should not be seen as defining a general theory of class consciousness and class formation, but rather as a framework for defining an agenda of problems for empirical research within class analysis. tn the multivariate empirical studies of class conscious- ness and class formation in chapter 11, therefore, we will not directly “test the models as such. The models constitute a framework within which a range of alternative hypotheses can be formulated and. tested, but the framework itself will not be subjected to any direct tests.