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To: socgrad@csf.colorado.edu
From: TR Young <TR.Young@uvm.edu>
Subject: Forms/Levels of Inequality
TL Harvey asked me to explain/defend my contention that
        some forms of inequality were helpful to the 
        human project: here is my reply.       TRY

                **************

TLH: Good question...I did not develop that point; glad you
caught it...it is very important to specify levels and forms
of inequality if we are to institutionalize them.

The forms of inequality which I regard as helpful to the human
project include power, wealth and status.  The degree to which
they may, repeat may, be helpful depends upon the uses to which
inequality is put:

1. Power inequality:  

        a. socialization: I think power is essential to the
                socialization process as between parents and
                child; as between teacher and student; as between
                mentor and acolyte.

                Use of power inequality becomes a political crime,
                in substantive terms, when that power is used for
                privatized, non-social reasons.  Sexual exploit-
                tation, brutalization and degradation are case in
                point./

        b. necessary repression of adults: the social realism of
                marxist criminology does not see street crime as
                emancipatory/oppository...rather MSR requires it
                be suppressed; robbery, rape, assualt and other
                uses of physical power against the human process
                is, I believe, essential.


        c. control of formal institutions: corporate crime, genocide,
                pollution and other forms of organizational crime
                must be subordinate to the social power/interests of
                society in general.

B. Wealth: Gradients in wealth can be most helpful to the social 
      process:

        a.  capital accumulation:  provision for research, infra-
                structure and collective needs generally requires
                accumulation of capital.   Different communities,
                different countries, different groups have different
                priorities.  These differences result in differing
                levels of capital accumulation.

        b.  reward/motivation:  Economic planning requires different
                rewards assigned to jobs/programs for which there is
                little interest.  Teaching is much more rewarding than
                administration; its a dirty job but someone has to do
                it.

                Cuba and other socialist countries set a 5:1, 10:1 ratio
                between high and low paid jobs...I would go for that.

                Capitalism has no intrinsic limit of wealth inequality;
                last time I looked CEO's of major US corporations got
                over 1000 times as much income as basic workers...that
                kind of inequality is most dangerous to economic integrity
                of a society as to the political process.

        c.  status: Racism, sexism, ageism and ethnic 'cleansing' makes us
                suspicious, rightly so, of claims of social honor/social
                superiority.

                But there are other dimensions of social honor which might
                well be deployed to honor those whose art, music, science,
                drama and philosophy ennobles the human spirit.  In Japan,
                skilled artisans are treated as national treasure and so
                honored.

                I tend to think that each major form of endeavor should be
                organized to recognize exceptional effort/talent/work.  Nor
                should these be held to embody 'universal' norms of excellence;
                simply excellence which some people in some societies at some
                point in history see merit.

D.  What do you think??  What kinds/levels/domains would you suggest on the
       question??

                                                and do note my new email
address, TR

At 02:27 PM 5/26/97 -0700, you wrote:
>In your political crime model you list patriarchy, racism, national
chauvinism, class 
>exploitatin/alienation and agesim as the structures of domination.
>You then point that you didn't mentinon inequality because you recognize
>that, as Marcuse did, some inequality is necessary.  What form of 
>inequality do you have in mind that might be "necessary" which doesn't fit
>into one of your major categories?
>> 
>
>tl harvey
>
>>
TR Young
The Red Feather Institute
8085 Essex, Weidman, Mi.,
  48893  [517] 644 3089
  Email: tr@tryoung.com