Class Analysis Gender Inequality

In the wake of critical scrutiny from the polemic works of Bauman (2004), Beck (2000), and Giddens (1992), the relevance of class analysis in understanding the expression of inequalities in contemporary society has been called into question. The concept of class analysis postulates that “individuals’ interest, tastes, attitudes, and dispositions, are linked to their social economic class positions” (Eidlin, 2014, 1), and that this position in turn relegates conditions of social, cultural and political relations. The foremost criticism level at traditional disciplines of class analysis is its advocacy of the primacy of class over other forms of social structure (Wright, 2000, 115) thereby producing a rigid and inflexible framework of analysis.

However, in response to stratification theories second wave feminists have countered that through the example of gender inequalities, class analysis still maintains its relevance (Crompton, 1989, 564). Baxter (1988, 106) validated this stance by arguing that gender based inequalities are an inherent feature of class systems whereby “women’s position in the class structure is determined both by class exploitation and by gender domination, and class theory needs to take both into account”. Thus, the intersection of class analysis and gender advocates a micro-sociological perspective that seeks to discuss perpetual contemporary societal inequalities in a manner that has been largely unobtainable through traditional class analysis. By first understanding the incorporation of gender and class analysis it can be argued that through the domains of family, the workforce, and society, a revised intersectional class analysis can be used to understand the reproduction of inequalities in contemporary

Traditionally, class analysis positions the family as a single hegemonic unit, justified on the premise that the male contributes the most to labour market (Goldthorpe 1983, 470). While it is easy to see how this served as a practical solution to conceptualise a large amount of data, and the rational was understandable given historical epistemologies of the family unit, this manner of class analysis is no longer relevant. Baxter (1988, 107) and Carter (2006, 368) argue the feminist perspective and deduce that the traditional division of household labour requiring the majority of childrearing and domestic chores to be delegated to women is also responsible for producing inequality by putting women in a position of financial dependence on men, thereby constructing class relationships within the family. However, the functionalist Marxist perspective cites the appropriating of certain tasks based on gender as a product of the feudal system whereby a distinction was wrought between occupational labour and household labour (Barker, 2015, 431; Mandel, 2009, 695). Yet, this theory is empirically rooted in traditional family structures, whereas the modern family has a diversified structure and thus different forms of inequalities. Therefore, while this approach is useful for distinguishing between sexist assumptions and sexual inequality as the root of