Types and types of social stratification. Coursework social stratification Types of stratification of society

It is the most accurate structural indicator of social inequality. Thus, the stratification of society is its division into various levels, or strata.

Terminology

It is believed that the term social stratification was first used by the American social scientist Pitirim Sorokin, who has Russian roots. He also developed this theory, based on strata as a phenomenon in society.

The word has the following definition: "a structured hierarchy

Reasons for P. Sorokin

Pitirim Sorokin was inclined to single out such reasons why society is "stratified":

• First of all, these are rights and privileges. Because, as we know, the noble idea of ​​just communism does not work in reality.
• Secondly, it is duties and responsibilities. After all, in the end it turns out that there are individuals who are able to take them on themselves and cope with what others will call a "burden" and which, most likely, they will try to avoid at an opportunity.
• Thirdly, it is social wealth and need. Different people need different things, and the results of their work are at different levels.
• The fourth point is power and influence. And here it is appropriate to recall Fromm's theory of wolves and sheep: no matter how you talk about equality, people are divided into those who are born to command, and those who are used to living in obedience. This in no way means slavery, which mankind has already passed as a stage in its development. But at the subconscious level, the leaders and the followers remain. The former subsequently become leaders who "move, roll" the world, but what about the latter? They run side by side and wonder where he, in fact, is heading.

Modern reasons for the stratification of society

To this day, stratification in social science is an urgent problem of society. Experts identify the following reasons for its occurrence:

• Separation by gender. The problem of "man" and "woman" was acute at all times. Now in society there is another wave of feminism, which requires equality between the sexes, since the system of social stratification is based on the same.
• Differences in the level of biological abilities. Someone is given to be a technician, someone - a humanist, someone - an expert in the natural sciences. But the problem of society also lies in the fact that these abilities in some people can be so obvious that they will be geniuses of their time, while in others they will practically not appear at all.
• class division. The most important reason (according to Karl Marx), which will be discussed in detail below.
• Privileges, rights and benefits related to the economy, politics and the social sphere.
• A system of values ​​based on which certain types of activity are deliberately placed above others.

Stratification in social science is the subject of discussion and reasoning of great pundits. Sorokin presented it in his own way, Weber, developing the theory, deduced his own conclusions, as well as Marx, who eventually reduced everything to class inequality.

Ideology of Marx

The conflict of classes, in his opinion, is a source of changes in society and directly causes such a phenomenon as the stratification of society.

So, according to K. Marx, antagonistic classes are distinguished according to two objective criteria:

• commonality of the state of the economy and relationships based on the means of production;
• powers of authority and their manifestation in public administration.

Weber's opinion

Max Weber made such an important contribution to the development of the theory of social inequality that when considering the topic: "The concept of" stratification ", its origin and essence" it is impossible not to mention this name.

The scientist did not quite agree with Marx, but did not contradict him either. He relegated property rights as reasons for stratification to the background. Prestige and power were brought to the first place.

Levels of social stratification

Based on the prevailing factors, Weber identified three levels of social stratification:

• the first of them - the lowest - related to property and determined the classes of stratification;
• the second - the middle one - relied on prestige and was responsible for the status in society or, using another definition,;
• the third - the highest - was the "top", in which, as you know, there is always a struggle for power, and it is expressed in society in the form of the existence of political parties.

Features of social stratification

The structure of stratification has distinctive features. The stratification primarily occurs by ranks, all depending on the reasons for which it occurred. As a result, privileged members of society are at the top, and the lower "caste" is content with little.

The upper layers are always quantitatively smaller than the lower and middle ones. But the proportion of the last two to each other can vary and, in addition, characterize the current state of society, "highlighting" the position of one or another of its spheres.

Types of social stratification

Developing his theory, Pitirim Sorokin also deduced three main types of social stratification, relying on the factors that cause it:

• based on the criterion of wealth - economic;
• on the basis of power, degree of influence - political;
• based on social roles and their performance, status, etc. - professional stratification.

social mobility

The so-called "movement" in society is called It can be horizontal and vertical.

In the first case, this is the acquisition of a new role that does not involve moving up the social ladder. For example, if another child is born in the family, the existing one will receive the status of "brother" or "sister" and will no longer be the only child.

Vertical mobility is movement along social levels. The system of social stratification (at least the modern one) assumes that one can "climb" or "descend" along it. The clarification was given, given that such a structure in Ancient India (castes) did not imply any mobility. But the stratification of modern society, fortunately, does not set such a framework.

Linking mobility to stratification in society

How is mobility related to stratification? Sorokin said that stratification in social science is a reflection of the vertical sequence of layers of society.

Marx, Weber, and Sorokin himself gave various reasons for this phenomenon, based on the reasons for stratification discussed above. In the modern interpretation of the theory, the multidimensionality and equivalence of the positions proposed by scientists are recognized and a constant search for new ones is carried out.

Historical forms of stratification

The concept of stratification is not new. This phenomenon as a stable system has been known for a long time, but at different times it had different forms. Which ones, we will consider below:

• The slave-owning form was based on the forcible subordination of one group of society to another. There was a lack of any rights, let alone privileges. If we recall private property, then the slaves did not have it, moreover, they themselves were it.
• Caste form (already mentioned in this article). This stratification in social science is a vivid and illustrative example of stratified inequality with clear and precise edges, frames drawn between castes. It was impossible to move up this system, so if a person "descended", he could forever say goodbye to his former status. The stable structure was based on religion - people accepted who they were because they believed that in the next life they would rise above, and therefore they were obliged to play their current role with honor and humility.
• Estate form, which has one main feature - legal division. All these imperial and royal statuses, the nobility and other aristocracy are manifestations of this type of stratification. Belonging to the estate was inherited, a little boy in one family was already a prince and heir to the crown, and in another - an ordinary peasant. Economic position was a consequence of legal status. This form of stratification was relatively closed, because there were few ways to move from one class to another, and it was difficult to do this - you could only rely on luck and chance, and then one in a million.
• The class form is also inherent in modern society. This is a stratification at the level of income and prestige, which is determined in some almost unconscious and intuitive way. At one point or another, in-demand professions come to the fore, the payment of which corresponds to their status and the product produced. Now it is the IT sphere, a few years ago it was economics, even earlier it was jurisprudence. The influence of the class on modern society can be described with the simplest example: to the question "who are you" a person names his profession (teacher / doctor / firefighter), and the questioner immediately draws the appropriate conclusions from this for himself. The class form of stratification is characterized by ensuring the political and legal freedom of citizens.

Types according to Nemirovsky

At one time, Nemirovsky supplemented the above list with several more forms of dividing society into layers:

• physical-genetic, including gender, other biological characteristics, qualities inherent in the personality;
• ethnocratic, dominated by powerful social hierarchies and their respective powers;
• socio-professional, in which knowledge and the ability to apply them in practice are important;
• cultural and symbolic, based on information and the fact that it "rules the world";
• cultural and normative, presented as a tribute to morality, traditions and norms.

• Companies with a closed and open structure

In sociology, four main types of stratification are known (social structures of society) - slavery, castes, estates and classes. The first three characterize closed societies and the last type - open ones.

Closed is considered to be a society in which social movements from the lower strata to the higher either completely banned or severely restricted. open called a society where movement from one stratum to another is not officially limited.

• Slavery

Slavery- economic, social and legal form of enslavement of people, bordering with complete lawlessness and extreme degreeinequalities.

Slavery has historically evolved. There are two forms of it: patriarchal and classical. At a mature stage, slavery turns into slavery. When people talk about slavery as a historical type of stratification, they mean its highest stage. Slavery is the only form of social relations in history when one a person is the property of another and when the lower stratum is deprived of all rights and freedoms.

caste system not as ancient as the slave, and less common. If almost all countries went through slavery, of course, to varying degrees, then castes were found only in India and partly in Africa. India is a classic example of a caste society. It arose on the ruins of the slaveholding in the first centuries of the new era.

Castoy called a social group (stratum), membership in which a person owes solely to his birth. A person cannot move from his caste to another during his lifetime. To do this, he needs to be born again. The caste position is fixed by the Hindu religion (now it is clear why castes are not widespread). According to its canons, people live more than one life. Each person falls into the appropriate caste, depending on what his behavior was in a previous life. If bad, then after the next birth, he should fall into a lower caste and vice versa.

In India 4 main castes: Brahmins (priests), Kshatriyas (warriors), Vaishyas (merchants), Shudras (workers and peasants). At the same time, there is about 5 thousand non-core cast and semi-cast. stand out untouchables. They are not included in any caste and occupy the lowest position.

In the course of industrialization, castes are replaced by classes. The Indian city is becoming more and more class-based, while the village, in which 7/10 of the population lives, remains caste-based.

Estates precede classes and characterize the feudal societies that existed in Europe from the 4th to the 14th centuries.

• Estates

estate - social group with enforced by custom or legal law and hereditary rights and obligations.

The estate system, which includes several strata, is characterized by a hierarchy, expressed in the inequality of position and privileges. Europe was a classic example of a class organization, where at the turn of the XIV-XV centuries. the structure of society was divided into upper classes (nobility and clergy) and an unprivileged third estate (artisans, merchants, peasants). In the X-XIII centuries. There were three main estates: the clergy, the nobility and the peasantry.

In Russia from the second half of the seventeenth century. approved class division into nobility, clergy, merchants, peasantry and philistinism(middle urban strata). Estates were based on landed property.

The rights and obligations of each estate were determined by legal law and consecrated by religious doctrine. Membership in the estate was inherited. Social barriers between the estates were quite rigid, so social mobility existed not so much between as within the estates.

Each estate included many layers, ranks, levels, professions, ranks. So, only nobles could engage in public service. The aristocracy was considered a military estate (chivalry).

The higher in the social hierarchy an estate stood, the higher was its status. In contrast to the castes, inter-class marriages were quite allowed. Sometimes individual mobility was allowed. A simple person could become a knight by purchasing a special permit from the ruler. But the term "estate" is eventually replaced by a new concept of "class", which expresses the socio-economic status of people who are able to change their status.

Class is understood in two senses: broad and narrow.

IN broad meaning under class understand a large social group of people who own or do not own the means of production, occupying a certain place in the system of social division of labor and characterized by a specific way of earning income.

Since private property arises during the period of the birth of the state, it is believed that already in the Ancient East and in ancient Greece there were two opposite classes: slaves and slave owners. Feudalism and capitalism are no exception. Here, too, antagonistic classes existed: the exploiters and the exploited. This is the point of view of K. Marx, which is still adhered to today. Another thing is that with the maturation, the complication of the versatility of the social organism, it became necessary to isolate in society not one or two classes, but many social strata, called strata in the West.And correspondingly the stratification of society - its stratification (the appearance of many elements in the structure of society).

Social stratification, its essence and content.

sociological concept stratification (from Latin - layer, layer) reflects the stratification of society, differences in the social status of its members. social stratification - this is a system of social inequality, consisting of hierarchically arranged social strata (strata). A stratum is understood as a set of people united by common status features.

Considering social stratification as a multidimensional, hierarchically organized social space, sociologists explain its nature and causes of origin in different ways. Thus, Marxist researchers believe that the social inequality that determines the stratification system of society is based on property relations, the nature and form of ownership of the means of production. According to the supporters of the functional approach (K. Davis and W. Moore), the distribution of individuals into social strata occurs in accordance with their contribution to the achievement of society's goals, depending on the importance of their professional activities. According to the theory of social exchange (J. Homans), inequality in society arises in the process of unequal exchange of the results of human activity.

To determine belonging to a particular social stratum, sociologists offer a variety of parameters and criteria. One of the creators of the stratification theory, P. Sorokin (2.7), identified three types of stratification: 1) economic (according to the criteria of income and wealth); 2) political (according to the criteria of influence and power); 3) professional (according to the criteria of mastery, professional skills, successful performance of social roles).

In turn, the founder of structural functionalism T. Parsons (2.8) identified three groups of signs of social stratification:

• qualitative characteristics of members of society that they possess from birth (origin, family ties, gender and age characteristics, personal qualities, innate characteristics, etc.);
• role characteristics determined by the set of roles that an individual performs in society (education, profession, position, qualifications, various types of work, etc.);
• characteristics associated with the possession of material and spiritual values ​​(wealth, property, works of art, social privileges, the ability to influence other people, etc.).

In modern sociology, as a rule, the following main criteria for social stratification are distinguished:

• - income - the amount of cash receipts for a certain period (month, year);
• - wealth - accumulated income, i.e. the amount of cash or embodied money (in the second case, they act in the form of movable or immovable property);
• - power - the ability and ability to exercise one's will, to determine and control the activities of people using various means (authority, law, violence, etc.). Power is measured by the number of people affected by the decision;
• - education - a set of knowledge, skills and abilities acquired in the learning process. The level of education is measured by the number of years of education (for example, in the Soviet school it was accepted: primary education - 4 years, incomplete secondary education - 8 years, complete secondary education - 10 years);
• - prestige - public assessment of the significance, attractiveness of a particular profession, position, a certain type of occupation. Professional prestige acts as a subjective indicator of people's attitude to a particular type of activity.

Income, power, education and prestige determine the total socio-economic status, which is a generalized indicator of position in social stratification. Some sociologists offer other criteria for identifying strata in society. Thus, the American sociologist B. Barber stratified according to six indicators: 1) prestige, profession, power and might; 2) income or wealth; 3) education or knowledge; 4) religious or ritual purity; 5) the situation of relatives; 6) ethnicity. The French sociologist Touraine, on the contrary, believes that at present the ranking of social positions is carried out not in relation to property, prestige, power, ethnicity, but in terms of access to information: the dominant position is occupied by the one who owns the largest amount of knowledge and information.

In modern sociology, there are many models of social stratification. Sociologists mainly distinguish three main classes: the highest, the middle and the lowest. At the same time, the share of the upper class is approximately 5-7%, the middle class - 60-80% and the lower class - 13-35%.

The upper class includes those who occupy the highest positions in terms of wealth, power, prestige, and education. These are influential politicians and public figures, the military elite, big businessmen, bankers, managers of leading firms, prominent representatives of the scientific and creative intelligentsia.

The middle class includes medium and small entrepreneurs, managers, civil servants, military personnel, financial workers, doctors, lawyers, teachers, representatives of the scientific and humanitarian intelligentsia, engineering and technical workers, highly skilled workers, farmers and some other categories.

According to most sociologists, the middle class is a kind of social core of society, thanks to which it maintains stability and stability. As the famous English philosopher and historian A. Toynbee emphasized, modern Western civilization is primarily a middle class civilization: Western society became modern after it managed to create a large and competent middle class.

The lower class is made up of people with low incomes and mainly engaged in unskilled labor (loaders, cleaners, auxiliary workers, etc.), as well as various declassed elements (chronic unemployed, homeless, vagrants, beggars, etc.).

In a number of cases, sociologists make a certain division within each class. Thus, the American sociologist W. L. Warner in his famous study "Yankee City" identified six classes:

• top - top class (representatives of influential and wealthy dynasties with significant resources of power, wealth and prestige);
• lower - upper class ("new rich" who do not have a noble origin and did not have time to create powerful tribal clans);
• upper - middle class (lawyers, entrepreneurs, managers, scientists, doctors, engineers, journalists, cultural and art workers);
• lower-middle class (clerks, secretaries, employees and other categories that are commonly called "white collars");
• upper - lower class (workers engaged mainly in physical labor);
• lower - lower class (chronic unemployed, homeless, vagrants and other declassed elements).

There are other schemes of social stratification. Thus, some sociologists believe that the working class constitutes an independent group that occupies an intermediate position between the middle and lower classes. Others include highly skilled workers in the middle class, but in its lower stratum. Still others suggest distinguishing two strata in the working class: upper and lower, and three strata in the middle class: upper, middle, and lower. The options are different, but they all boil down to this: non-basic classes arise by adding strata or layers that lie within one of the three main classes - rich, wealthy and poor.

Thus, social stratification reflects the inequality between people, which manifests itself in their social life and acquires the character of a hierarchical ranking of various activities. The objective need for such a ranking is related to the need to motivate people to perform their social roles more effectively.

Social stratification is fixed and supported by various social institutions, constantly reproduced and modernized, which is an important condition for the normal functioning and development of any society.

Table of contents.
Introduction…………………………………………………………………………………2-4

1.1 The nature of social inequality and its consequences… …….……… …….5-11
1.2 Inequality trend…………………………………. ……...12-15
CHAPTER 2. THE PROBLEM OF POVERTY
2.1 Theoretical aspect of the concept of poverty…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….
2.2. Quantitative assessments, causes and consequences of poverty in Russia…...24-34
2.3 Ways to overcome poverty in modern Russian society.....34-39
Conclusion………………………………………………………………..............40-41
List of used sources and literature………………...................... ...... 42-43

INTRODUCTION
Social stratification is one of the central social and economic problems; a lot of scientific and ideological disputes have been and are being conducted around it. Differences in this case are the main ones in property, status and power. Social researchers have asked questions: why are some groups in society wealthier or more powerful than others; what is the manifestation of inequality in modern societies; why poverty persists in today's wealthy society.
Stratification - a synonym for the term "stratification" recognized in world sociology - reflects the development of social inequality and the hierarchical grouping of people at social levels that differ in prestige, property and power.
The term "stratification" means a vertical cut of the social structure, which reveals the place of certain social groups in the system of social hierarchy. A stratum is a social stratum of people who have similar objective indicators on four scales of stratification. Each stratum includes only those people who have approximately the same income, education, prestige, power. Societies are seen as consisting of "strata" arranged in a certain hierarchy: groups with the highest status at the top and the lowest status at the bottom.
Russian scientists Zhuravleva G.P., Vidyapin V.I., Dobrynin A.I., poverty is a situation in which needs cannot be sufficiently satisfied. Poverty is a complex social phenomenon with economic, cultural and psychological roots. Its features are also associated with the historical conditions of development of a particular country.
In Russia, the rapid increase in the level of poverty was due to a decrease in employment and the emergence of unemployment and a sharp decline in labor incomes at the initial stage of cardinal socio-economic reforms of the late 20th century in the context of an inefficient system of social protection of the population. The situation is complicated by the fact that in recent years the level of poverty has remained high, and for some segments of the population the problem of life support has even worsened. Poverty is especially typical for those employed in the public sector of the economy, in rural areas and in small towns, for large families and families with incomplete composition.
Until the 90s. 20th century in Russia, the poor included people with certain individual or family characteristics: advanced age, poor health of the individual, loss of a breadwinner, absence of a spouse (for single mothers), large families. A certain role was played by territorial differences in the standard of living: inequality in the economic development of regions, as well as cities and villages; low qualifications, although the latter was not necessarily accompanied by low incomes. Over the past decade, Russia has experienced massive impoverishment of the population, caused by two factors: an unprecedented decline in output and the stratification of society.
Economic reforms have seriously changed the social structure of society. There was a rapid social stratification, there were layers of very rich and extremely poor citizens. The vast majority of people have lost the social protection of the state, and faced the need to adapt to life in conditions of market instability. Under these conditions, the emergence of a large number of poor people was inevitable. All this determined the choice of the topic and its relevance.
The purpose of this work is to study Russian poverty and inequality in the economic aspect, their features and ways to overcome them. The objectives of this course work:
· to explore the features and characteristics of poverty and social stratification in Russia;
consider the implications of poverty for the Russian economy;
identify possible ways out of the current situation.
Social stratification has become one of the most widespread and most painful phenomena in modern Russia. Currently, about 40% of citizens live below the poverty line. All this determined the choice of the topic and its relevance.

CHAPTER 1. SOCIAL GRADATION
1.1 The nature of social inequality and its consequences
Social inequality has existed throughout almost the entire reasonable history of mankind. However, differentiation in income and consumption of the population has been and remains one of the main characteristics of modern society. Moreover, income differentiation is seen by many economists as a factor that stimulates labor activity.
Before the revolution in Russia, the official division of the population was class, not class. It was divided into two main classes - taxable (peasants, petty bourgeois) and non-taxable (nobility, clergy). Within each estate there were smaller estates and layers. The state granted them certain rights enshrined in legislation. The rights themselves were guaranteed to the estates only insofar as they performed certain duties in favor of the state (they grew bread, were engaged in crafts, served, paid taxes). Officials regulated relations between estates, this was the benefit of bureaucracy. Naturally, the estate system was inseparable from the state. That is why we can define estates as social and legal groups that differ in the scope of rights and obligations in relation to the state.
According to the 1897 census, the entire population of the country, which is 125 million Russians, was divided into the following classes: nobles - 1.5% of the total population, clergy - 0.5%, merchants - 0.3%, burghers - 10, 6%, peasants - 77.1%, Cossacks - 2.3%. The first privileged estate in Russia was considered the nobility, the second - the clergy. The rest of the estates were not privileged. The nobles were hereditary and personal. Not all of them were landowners, many were in the public service, which was the main source of livelihood. But those nobles who were landowners constituted a special group - the class of landowners (among the hereditary nobles there were no more than 30% of landlords).
Many modern scientists see the origins of social inequality in the natural differences of people in terms of physical data, personal qualities, internal energy, as well as the strength of motivation aimed at satisfying the most significant, urgent needs. Initially emerging inequality is usually extremely unstable and does not lead to the consolidation of social status. One of the sources of social tension in any country is the difference in the levels of well-being of citizens, their level of wealth.
The level of wealth is determined by two factors:
1) the amount of property of all types owned by individual citizens;
2) the amount of current income of citizens.
People earn income as a result of creating their own business (becoming entrepreneurs) or providing the factors of production they own (their labor, capital or land) for the use of other people or firms, and they use this property to produce the necessary goods. In such a mechanism of income formation, the possibility of their inequality was initially laid down.
The reason for this:
1) the different value of factors of production owned by people (capital in the form of a computer, in principle, is able to bring more income than in the form of a shovel);
2) different success in the use of factors of production (for example, an employee in a firm that produces a scarce product may receive higher earnings than his colleague of the same qualification working in a firm whose goods are sold with difficulty);
3) a different amount of factors of production owned by people (the owner of two oil wells receives, other things being equal, more income than the owner of one well).
Various indicators are used to quantify income differentiation. The degree of income inequality is reflected by the Lorentz curve (Fig. 1), in the construction of which the abscissa shows the shares of families (in % of their total number) with the corresponding percentage of income, and the ordinate shows the income shares of the families under consideration (in % of total income) . The theoretical possibility of a perfectly equal distribution of income is represented by the bisector, which indicates that any given percentage of families receive a corresponding percentage of income. This means that if 20, 40, 60% of families receive, respectively, 20.40.60% of the total income, then the corresponding points will be located on the bisector.

Figure 1. Lorenz curve

The Lorenz curve shows the actual distribution of income. For example, the 20% of the population with the lowest income received 5% of the total income, the 40% with the lowest income received 15%, and so on. The shaded area between the line of absolute equality and the Lorenz curve indicates the degree of income inequality: the larger this area, the greater the degree of income inequality. If the actual distribution of income were absolutely equal, then the Lorenz curve and the bisector would coincide. The Lorenz curve is used to compare the distribution of income over different time periods or between different populations.
In 1918, the first Soviet studies of the working budget and everyday life were carried out, as well as the first attempts to calculate the subsistence minimum. The subsistence minimum was calculated as a physiological one and the main item of expenditure in it was the cost of food. In the early 1930s, subsistence minimum calculations were discontinued for ideological reasons and resumed only in the 1960s.
Until 1990, socio-economic sciences, for ideological reasons, avoided using the term "poverty" and instead used the term "poor". The severity of social tension in Russian society is not relieved by material subsidies to the poor or periodic wage increases for low-paid state employees. For the majority of society, the very model of social inequality, which has become established in modern Russia, is unacceptable. The negative consequences of growing social inequality continue to be reproduced in the political sphere. Large segments of the population are excluded from the political process and find themselves in a state of "political poverty". And not only the unemployed, the homeless or low-skilled workers, but also many representatives of the intellectual strata - teachers, doctors, university professors, scientists. They are not only consumed by concerns about survival, but also discouraged by the inattention of the authorities to their urgent needs. The consciousness and behavior of the masses of people is dominated by passive adaptation to the existing order, social pessimism and apathy, distrust of the ruling bureaucracy, focus on their own problems, deaf hostility and intolerance towards the powerful worlds of this. All this determines their attitude to the state and society, the low level of civic engagement.
According to polls conducted at the end of 2004, during the previous three years, only 1.2% of citizens took part in political rallies, demonstrations or protests, and only 0.5% - in strikes. Discontent, sometimes bordering on indignation, accumulates under the shell of civic passivity, only from time to time it breaks to the surface, as was the case with the monetization of social benefits. In such an environment, the power structures and the parties supporting them seek to seize the initiative and put protest moods under their control within the framework of “managed democracy”. Rallies, demonstrations, marches, pickets and other mass actions are increasingly being held by "obedient" trade unions, youth and other organizations. The electoral activity of the population is declining, especially in the elections of regional structures and local governments. There is a widespread opinion in society about the uselessness of participating in elections - "the way people vote will not change anything in the country."
According to a survey of electoral behavior between the presidential elections of 2000 and 2004, the proportion of Russians who share this opinion increased from 37.9% to 40%, while the proportion of those holding the opposite point of view decreased from 42.9% to 35.9%. The social discontent of the poor and low-income strata often results in a protest vote "against all" or in a vote on the principle "the worse, the better." As a result, elections lose their significance as a means of seeking mutual understanding and achieving tolerant relationships in society. The abolition of the minimum threshold for the participation of citizens in elections is a confirmation of their transformation into a formality.
Poverty and inequality are closely related concepts. Inequality characterizes the uneven distribution of the scarce resources of society: money, power, education and prestige among different segments of the population - this is social inequality. The most common and easy-to-calculate way to measure inequality is to compare the lowest and highest incomes in a given country. Another way is to analyze the share of family income spent on food: the poorer the individual, the more he spends on food, and vice versa. Inequality characterizes society as a whole, while poverty concerns only part of the population. Thus, poverty is the economic and socio-cultural condition of people who have a minimum amount of liquid values ​​and limited access to social benefits. The boundaries of the concept of poverty vary. If there are too many poor, then government spending increases, which will immediately affect the well-being of other segments of the population. The definition of poverty as a condition in which a person's essential needs exceed his ability to satisfy them is of a general nature, because it does not specify what essential needs are.
The stratification of society leads to the most negative consequences. Layers of people are being created who are below the poverty line, which is unacceptable in a developed society. There is a moral stratification of society into "us" and "them", the commonality of goals, interests, a sense of healthy patriotism is lost. As a result of the division of society, the population of regions and individual citizens into rich and poor, interregional and even interethnic contradictions arise, which leads to the destruction of the unity of Russia. There is an outflow of skilled workers to areas that do not require appropriate knowledge, abroad. As a result, the educational and professional potential of society is deteriorating, science-intensive industries are degrading. As a result of a low standard of living, the labor activity of the population decreases, health deteriorates, and the birth rate decreases, which leads to demographic crises.

1.2 Trend in inequality
Property and social inequality is a fact of social life in recent years. The destruction of the economic, and with it the value system of Soviet society, led to the construction of a new scale of significant attitudes and ideas, in the context of which inequality is perceived as a social norm. Different ages and life experiences, unequal personal adaptability and professional demand in the new labor market determine not only economic differentiation, but also the value heterogeneity of society. It is socially expedient and necessary from the point of view of the preservation of society so that the observed differentiation does not turn into a pronounced polarization, does not lead to a split and destructive, destructive consequences.
Sociologists have studied a wide variety of statistical data in order to identify historical patterns of fluctuations (fluctuations) of inequality in the distribution of various benefits (primarily economic, but also power) among members of society over several millennia. The result was somewhat unexpected: no distinct trends could be identified. Periods of growing inequality were accompanied by its smoothing, and then inequality increased again. The only curve that could approximate the studied trends was a sinusoid. This does not mean, however, that such tendencies cannot be revealed over the course of historical periods comparable to the life of several, and even more so of one or two generations. Two parameters can be considered a measure of inequality in different societies:
1. The height of stratification, which is understood as the social distance between the highest and lowest status of this particular society;
2. Stratification profile, which shows the ratio of the number of places (social positions) in the social structure of society as the status rises.
Numerous empirical studies reveal the following historical trends. The higher the level of development of society, the lower the height of stratification - that is, the social distance separating the highest levels of social positions in a given society from the lowest - is noted in the most backward societies. And vice versa - the higher the level of development of society as a whole, the smaller the size of the height of stratification. In other words, in backward societies, an abyss of impenetrable dimensions separates the social top from the social bottom, while in advanced societies, representatives of the lower strata can treat their elite, if not as equals, then not as unattainable "gods", then eat quite calmly.
There are different points of view on the development of differentiation processes and the strengthening of social inequalities in modern Russia. Some researchers talk about the consolidation of existing inequalities and the reduction of opportunities for social mobility, about the formation and hereditary transmission of a kind of "poverty subculture". Some scientists believe that the higher the social status of the family, the higher the adolescents rate their life chances and the more among them those who are willing to take responsibility for their lives. This leads to the notion that poverty is fundamentally insurmountable, which means that children are doomed to inherit the poverty of their parents. Real material inequality is fixed among low-income people at the level of consciousness. This is the beginning of the formation of a specific subculture of poverty. Family poverty narrows the number of life chances for children, and the likelihood of children "inheriting" the poverty of their parents is very high. This applies even to that stratum of the "new poor" who have some social and cultural resources.
The profile of stratification, that is, its shape, also reflects the level of inequality in a given society, although in a slightly different way. Thus, as this level rises, the profile becomes more and more “sharp”, and as the level of inequality decreases, it “flattens out”. In most traditional societies, where the level of inequality is extremely high, the stratification profile takes the form of a pyramid with steep slopes. For modern advanced societies, this shape approaches the diamond shape. In the pyramidal profile, as we approach the bottom, the number of layers increases. In the rhomboid layer, the middle layer is the most numerous, while the “bottom” stratum is inferior to it in size. Of course, the pyramidal and rhombic stratification profiles are rather "ideal types", while the real stratification profiles of advanced societies look somewhat different.
The social structure of Russia in 1992, despite the beginning of market reforms, on the whole reproduced the type of social structure common to all the countries surveyed. In general, this form of social profile corresponded to the “normal” one. The situation changed markedly after the default reform announced by the government in August 1998. The stratification profile noticeably “dipped”, approaching a cone, more characteristic of traditional societies. The “wings”, in which the middle class was localized, seemed to sink into those strata of the population that previously considered themselves to be the middle class, passed into the composition of the lower strata. As a result, the main characteristic feature of the newly emerged type of social structure was the "humiliation" of the social statuses of the bulk of Russians.

CHAPTER 2. THE PROBLEM OF POVERTY
2.1 Theoretical aspect of the concept of poverty
Poverty is the economic and socio-cultural condition of people who have a minimum amount of liquid values ​​and limited access to social benefits. Poverty is not only a minimum income, but also a special way and style of life, that is, norms of behavior passed from generation to generation, stereotypes of perception and psychology. So sociologists talk about poverty as a special subculture.
The essence of social inequality, as already mentioned, lies in the unequal access of various categories of the population to socially significant benefits, scarce resources, and liquid values. The essence of economic inequality is that a minority of the population owns most of the national wealth. In other words, the smallest part of society receives the highest incomes, and the majority of the population receives medium and smaller incomes.
One of the first authors of the concept of poverty was the American scientist Peter Townsend. He took into account the satisfaction of not only physical, but also social needs. After all, often people are provided with vital items and services, but they cannot lead the way of life accepted in their society. The emphasis on the quality and conditions of life makes it possible to determine the gap between the social position of an individual (or family) and his standard of living.
There are two types of poverty:
1. Absolute poverty is associated with the need for vital resources that provide a person with biological survival. We are talking about the satisfaction of the most basic needs - food, shelter, clothing. The criteria for this type of poverty do not depend much on the time and place of a person's residence. The specific set of products consumed at the dawn of the development of human society and modern man differs significantly, but you can always unambiguously judge whether a person is starving or full. Thus, criteria for absolute poverty are related to biological characteristics.
2. Relative poverty is determined by comparison with the standard of living that is considered “normal” in a given society. The average standard of living in the developed countries of the West is obviously higher than in the developing countries. Therefore, what would be considered poverty in the countries of the developed West is regarded as a luxury for backward states. So, for example, those people who do not experience difficulties with food, but cannot afford to satisfy higher level needs (education, cultural recreation, etc.) fall into the category of relatively poor in the West. Thus, the criteria for relative poverty are based on social characteristics and vary greatly in different eras and in different countries.
In addition to this basic classification of types of poverty, there are other approaches. So, they distinguish primary poverty (these are families that lead a rational household, but do not have sufficient financial resources) and secondary poverty (families that have sufficient financial resources, but need it because of irrational housekeeping). Finally, there is a division into “sustainable” poverty (“inherited” poverty) and “floating” poverty (some poor individuals find an opportunity to reach a higher standard of living, but at the same time people with average incomes go bankrupt and become poor).
Depending on the level of economic development of the country, poverty covers a significant or insignificant part of the population The share of the population living below the poverty line in Russia, according to preliminary estimates for 2011, rose to 12.8%, according to the head of Rosstat Alexander Surinov.
The highest level of poverty was recorded by Rosstat in 1992 - 33.5%; this figure fell below 20% only in 2004. Throughout the 2000s, the proportion of the poor has been declining rapidly. Then the crisis intervened, seriously hitting the level of salaries and incomes of Russians. The level of poverty increased in 2008, but already in the next crisis year, the department again recorded a decrease - the government indexed pensions several times, and inflation decreased.
In the next two years, those whose incomes do not reach the subsistence level, according to the forecast of the Ministry of Economic Development, will become more and more. A break in the trend may come only in 2014.
To measure the scale of poverty, sociologists identify the proportion of that part of the country's population (usually expressed as a percentage) that lives near the official poverty line, or threshold. The terms “poverty rate”, “poverty ratio” and “poverty line” are also used to indicate the scale of poverty.
The poverty threshold is the amount of money officially set as the minimum income that an individual or family needs only to buy food, clothing and housing. It is also called the "poverty rate". In Russia, it was called the subsistence minimum. The latest available data on the cost of living in the country is 6,913 rubles for an adult, 6,146 rubles. - for a child, 5020 rubles. - for a pensioner.
This border is quite flexible. Even 40 years ago, a black-and-white TV in the USSR was considered a luxury item available to a few. In the 90s, color TV appeared in almost every family, and black-and-white is considered a sign of modest prosperity, or relative poverty. Already, those who cannot afford to buy a Japanese TV or computer have moved into the category of relative poverty.
The lower limit of relative poverty is the subsistence minimum and/or the poverty threshold, and the upper limit is the so-called decent standard of living. A decent standard of living reflects the amount of material wealth that allows a person to satisfy all reasonable needs, lead a fairly comfortable lifestyle, and not feel disadvantaged. The richer a person, the higher his claims. Poorer people have rather modest ideas about how much money they need to "live normally." The rich have ambitions and pretensions inevitably growing. Another trend: the younger the age, the more money is required in order to live normally. Another trend: the higher the education, the higher the level of claims. For those who do not have a secondary education, this level is 2 times lower than for those who have a diploma of higher education. Finally, residents of Moscow and St. Petersburg have a level of claims 3 times higher than residents of rural areas. Thus, rural residents believe that they need much less money than city dwellers. This is explained by the fact that life in the countryside is largely based on the products provided by subsistence farming - meat, vegetables from the garden. In addition, the farther from the direct production of vital goods, the more diverse intermediaries, and hence the higher the price of consumed goods. However, the traditionally lower level of claims of the inhabitants of the province and the lack of influence of the so-called conspicuous consumption due to the nature of the dominant subcultures (for example, visits to the theater, gym, cafes) play an equally important role here.
State funding for education is decreasing. If in 1992 the share of spending on education in the federal budget was 5.85%, then in recent years it has been steadily declining, amounting to only 2.45% in 2007. This means that education in Russia is increasingly moving to a paid level. In prestigious secondary special, secondary technical and higher educational institutions, there are up to 45 applicants for one budget place.
The national education is faced with the task of determining what kind of cultural competence is required by the current and subsequent generations of Russians, that is, what kind of socio-cultural type of society with the appropriate parameters of social solidarity and personal identity should our education provide. Russia's desire to enter the world community of developed industrial states should be supported by the high availability of quality education. Indeed, in modern society, for professions requiring low qualifications, it is declining, and the proportion of professions requiring high qualifications is increasing. The dynamics of increasing demands on a member of a modern developed society leads to the expansion of a cultural pattern characteristic of the most progressive social stratum through the educational system. At the same time, the traditional status markers of a person: social origin, nationality, religion are gradually losing their social significance for the formation of sociocultural identity.
The degree of accessibility of educational services to different segments of the population and the difference in consumer standards of social strata when using elementary educational services is approximately as follows:
- businessmen with a high level of income;
- small and medium entrepreneurs;
- professionals engaged in intellectual work;
- manual workers in industry;
- employed in agriculture;
- workers in the service sector;
- employed in temporary, casual work.
As shown by a survey of educational authorities on the problems of accessibility and effectiveness of educational services, conducted in 9 federal districts of Russia by employees of the laboratory for approbation and implementation of innovative educational technologies, there are already restrictions on access to high-quality preschool and school upbringing and education in the country.
Thus, the children of high-income businessmen, small and medium-sized entrepreneurs, professionals engaged in intellectual work are the main contingent of child development centers. In this type of preschool educational institutions, 100% of children are covered by medical and pedagogical diagnostics, and over 60% of children and parents receive qualified psychological assistance. The children of businessmen also make up the main conti
etc.................

Where it denotes the location of the layers of the earth. But people initially likened the social distances and partitions existing between them to layers of the earth, floors of located buildings, objects, tiers of plants, etc.

Stratification- this is the division of society into special layers (strata) by combining various social positions with approximately the same social status, reflecting the prevailing idea of ​​social inequality in it, built horizontally (social hierarchy), along its axis according to one or more stratification criteria (indicators of social status). The division of society into strata is carried out on the basis of the inequality of social distances between them - the main property of stratification. Social strata are lined up vertically and in strict sequence according to indicators of wealth, power, education, leisure, consumption.

IN social stratification a certain social distance is established between people (social positions) and a hierarchy is built from social strata. Thus, the unequal access of members of society to certain socially significant scarce resources is fixed by establishing social filters on the boundaries separating social strata. For example, the allocation of social strata can be carried out according to the levels of income, education, power, consumption, the nature of work, spending free time. The social strata identified in society are evaluated in it according to the criterion of social prestige, which expresses the social attractiveness of certain positions.

The simplest stratification model is a dichotomous one - the division of society into elites and masses. In some of the earliest, archaic social systems, the structuring of society into clans is carried out simultaneously with the implementation of social inequality between them and within them. This is how the "initiates" appear, i.e. those who are initiated into certain social practices (priests, elders, leaders) and the uninitiated are "profane" (profane - from lat. pro fano- deprived of holiness, uninitiated; profane - all other members of society, ordinary members of the community, fellow tribesmen). Within them, society can further stratify if necessary.

As society becomes more complex (structuring), a parallel process occurs - the embedding of social positions into a certain social hierarchy. This is how castes, estates, classes, etc. appear.

Modern ideas about the stratification model that has developed in society are quite complex - multi-layered (polychotomous), multidimensional (carried out along several axes) and variable (sometimes allow the existence of many stratification models): qualifications, quotas, attestation, status determination, ranks, benefits, privileges, other preferences.

The most important dynamic characteristic of society is social mobility. According to the definition of P. Sorokin, "social mobility is understood as any transition of an individual, or a social object, or a value created or modified through activity, from one social position to another" . However, social agents do not always move from one position to another, it is possible to move the social positions themselves in the social hierarchy, such a movement is called "positional mobility" (vertical mobility) or within the same social stratum (horizontal mobility). Along with social filters that establish barriers to social movement, there are also "social lifts" in society that significantly speed up this process (in a crisis society - revolutions, wars, conquests, etc.; in a normal, stable society - family, marriage, education , property, etc.). The degree of freedom of social movement from one social stratum to another largely determines whether a society is closed or open.

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