Against Inequality

Contributions to a Discourse of Social Emancipation

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In Against Inequality, the authors offer a theoretical and political proposal for social emancipation, seen as an opportunity to build conditions of equality in contexts of freedom, not only for ethical but essentially political foundations. To achieve this, the authors confront inequality in two ways: as a social phenomenon (and, therefore, historically situated and structured) and through critical reflection on the concepts, categories, indicators and frameworks of its understanding. In this sense, they propose a critical reflection of the ways in which it has been thought theoretically and politically at various times, with special reference to the way in which it has been conceived in modern, capitalist society.
Copyright Year:
2024
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978-90-04-68111-8
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16 Sep 2024
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978-90-04-68110-1
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19 Sep 2024
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Alejandro I. Canales, Ph.D. (1995), El Colegio de México, is Professor at the University of Guadalajara and Member of the Mexican Academy of Sciences. His recent books include Migration, Reproduction, and Society (Brill, 2019) and El malestar con las migraciones (Anthropos, 2021).

Dídimo Castillo Fernández, Ph.D. (2008), El Colegio de México, is Professor at the Universidad Autónoma del Estado de México and Member of the Mexican Academy of Sciences. His recent books include Precariedad y desaliento laboral de los jóvenes en México (Siglo XXI, 2019), and Capitalismo Digital después de la Pandemia (Siglo XXI, 2024).
Foreword

Preface

List of Figures

Introduction

1 New Perspectives and Imperatives in the Face of Inequality
 1 Imperatives of an Emancipation Strategy in the Face of Global Inequality
 1.1 An Ethical Imperative

 1.2 An Existential Imperative

 1.3 A Political Imperative


 2 Preliminary Reflections


2 Underlying Metadiscourses within Scientific Discourses on Inequality
 1 A Critique of Methodological Nationalism

 2 Methodological Androcentrism and Its Feminist Critique

 3 Development and Progress as Metadiscourses of Modernity

 4 The Discourse against Inequality as a Critique of Progress and Development in the Social Sciences

 5 Summary


3 Social Inequality: A Totality Approach
 1 Social Inequality: A Total Social Fact

 2 Critique of Individualistic Approaches

 3 Multidimensional Perspectives of Inequality

 4 Inequality and Society: Analysis Model from Its Totality


4 Debates on Inequality throughout History
 1 Inequality in Ancient Greece

 2 Inequality in the Christian Era and Feudal Society

 3 The English Poor Laws and the Transition to Capitalism

 4 Political Economy’s Critique of the Poor Laws and the Formation of the Capitalist Labor Market

 5 Social Inequality under Capitalism: Rousseau and Marx


5 The Debate on Social Inequality in the 20th Century
 1 Functionalist Sociology

 2 Neoclassical Economics

 3 Gunnar Myrdal and the Principle of Circular and Cumulative Causation


6 The Death of Class and the Historical Resilience of a Social Category
 1 The Death of Class

 2 Argument 1. From Class Structure to Social Stratification

 3 Argument 2. From the End of Class to the End of Marxism

 4 Argument 3. The Historical Obsolescence of Class

 5 Class Is Dead, Long Live Class!

 6 The Death of Class: Ideology or Theory?

 7 Critique of the Alleged Obsolescence of Class Analysis

 8 Against Determinism

 9 Class: Critical Function of a Concept


7 The Return of Class
 1 Giddens and Class Structuration in Contemporary Capitalism

 2 Erik Olin Wright: Marxism and Social Classes Revisited
 2.1 Discussion Points on Erik Olin Wright’s Approach


 3 Charles Tilly and Categorical Inequality

 4 Reproduction and Social Inequality in the Thought of Pierre Bourdieu


8 Social Classes and Inequality in Global Capitalism
 1 On Globalization and Class Inequality

 2 Neoliberalism and Globalization: Ideological Foundations in the Reconstitution of the Ruling Classes

 3 The Reconstitution of the Ruling Classes in Global Capitalism

 4 The Constitution of the Working Class in Global Capitalism

 5 Class Structure and Social Antagonism in Global Capitalism


9 Final Reflections: For a Project of Social Emancipation

References

Index

To all those interested in the critique of Social Inequality, understood as conditions of oppression and social injustice, this book offers a theoretical critique along with a political proposal for social emancipation projects.

A todos los interesados en la crítica de la Desigualdad Social, entendida como condiciones de opresión e injusticia social, este libro ofrece una crítica teórica junto a una propuesta política para proyectos de emancipación social.
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