Social inequality in the modern world

Abstract

This article presents the results of a study of new forms of social inequality, as well as the features of their manifestation in modern Russia, carried out by employees of the Department of Modern Sociology of the Sociology Faculty of Moscow State University named after M.V. Lomonosov. Social inequality as a whole is defined as a specific form of social stratification in which individual individuals, social groups, layers or classes are at different levels of the vertical social hierarchy and have unequal opportunities to satisfy their material, social or spiritual needs. Much attention is paid to the analysis of the ideological foundations of global social inequality, which also includes national states in the vertical hierarchy of individuals, social groups, classes, and layers, which are accordingly ranked within the framework of the world community. It is proved that global social inequality is based on “market fundamentalism” — a special type of political thinking that elevates the principles of the “invisible hand of the market” and “non-interference of the state in the economic activities of economic entities” to the level of a totalitarian type of dogma. The practical embodiment of this dogma entails the reproduction of social inequality and extremely unfair social relations on a global scale. Among the forms of global social inequality, the leading role is played by resource inequality, however, along with the resource inequality, relatively new forms of social inequality are quite clearly manifested, which the Swedish sociologist G. Terborn singled out — vital inequality and existential inequality. Vital or biological inequality captures the basic characteristic of human existence, since it refers to categories such as, for example, environment and health. Existential inequality outlines a system of hierarchies based on inclusion / exclusion categories (social inclusion / exclusion). The article discusses in detail the features of the manifestation of all these forms of social inequality both within the world community and in Russia. In addition, a new methodological approach to the analysis of inequality from the standpoint of social constructivism was substantiated, when the question of what constitutes the basis of social inequality was supplemented by the question of how people themselves produce and reproduce social inequality in the usual practices of everyday social life.

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