Property, Bureaucracy and Culture: Middle Class Formation in Contemporary Britain

Description

"Property, Bureaucracy and Culture" places the British middle classes in their historical and regional contexts in order to explain how they exercise a powerful impact in present day British society. It develops a new theoretical perspective on the middle classes, criticizing fashionable but unhelpful theories of "the service class", and draws upon the works of Ohlin-Wright and Bourdieu to develop a theoretical realist perspective which is sensitive to the variety of ways in which middle class formation takes place. It argues that the British middle class have been split between a cohesive and well established professional middle class, and an insecure and marginal managerial and self-employed middle class. "Property, Bureaucracy and Culture" contends that recent changes in economic restructuring have enabled the professional middle class to consolidate its position of dominance. The managerial middle class are however becoming more marginal and insecure. The book explores the implications of this position by analyzing processes of social and spatial mobility, cultural practices and political mobilization. This book should be of interest to undergraduates and postgraduates of sociology, urban studies, cultural studies and political science.