The Internal Stratification of the Working Class: System Involvements of Auto Workers in Four Countries

Abstract

WILLIAM H. FORM University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign American Sociological Review 1973, Vol. 38 (December):697-711 The relevance of structural differentiation for social stratification has rarely been studied empirically. This research compares automobile workers of different skill levels for their involvement in the family, work group, union, neighborhood, community, and nation in four countries varying in industrial development. In the more industrialized countries,. compared to other employees, skilled workers participate more in work-related social systems and in systems which extend beyond family and neighborhood. The increasing differences in participation within the working class which accompany industrialization and the increasing social power of the skilled workers in the community partly result from their greater ability to link other systems to their solidary work groups. Industrialization and structural differentiation of society may not homogenize industrial workers but rather create internal cleavages which increase the social power of skilled workers and decrease the possibility of a unified or radical working class movement.

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