Faculty Book: Stanley Aronowitz
How Class Works: Power and Social Movement
(Yale University Press, 2003; 272 pp.)
Although most Americans defiantly identify themselves as middle class, economic inequality is greater in the United States than in most Western nations. Written by prominent sociologist and social activist Stanley Aronowitz, How Class Works reconceptualizes the meaning and significance of class in modern America. Aronowitz shows that class should not be understood only in terms of socioeconomic stratification, but rather as the power of social groups to effect change. Groups from different economic and political positions become ruling classes when they make demands that alter the course of history, Aronowitz argues, and he analyzes the class struggles engaged in by labor movements, environmental activists, and feminists. "With this book Aronowitz puts the subject of social class squarely on the intellectual agenda...both intellectually exciting and morally challenging."—Barbara Ehrenreich. Aronowitz is a distinguished professor of sociology and urban education at The Graduate Center.
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Submitted on: APR 10, 2003
Category: Faculty Books, Sociology, Urban Education