someone once asked me for a critique of Wright. here it is......you might find it helpful too, carrol for it lays out a different model of class that might be able to account for empirical class analysis in research, etc
Perhaps the most sophisticated recent attempt to specify a Marxist approach to class is the work of Erik Olin Wright (197l; 1978; 1979; 1985).
Wright brings the analytical theory construction, mathematical modeling, and statistical analysis to bear on the project of delineating or mapping out the contours of the contemporary class structure. As with earlier Marxist critiques of structural functionalist theories of stratification, Wright insists that class is a relational concept. Classes are always defined in relation to other classes, just as the concept of parent can only be defined in relation to the concept of child (1985: 34). The Marxist concept of class is antithetical to 'gradational' concepts of class which differ in the degree of some attribute such as status, income, or education. Thus, Wright argues that a relational concept of class must be defined primarily in terms of the processes of exploitation and subordination.
Where Wright has broken from some variants of Marxist sociology is in his insistence on utilizing the tools of mainstream social science: analytic theory construction, survey data and statistical analyses. He believes that a Marxist sociology can draw on survey sampling techniques and formal theory construction in an effort to revise Marxist theory an make it more adequate to the task of understanding and predicting class relations and the development of capitalism.
Hence, Wright has used large scale surveys in order to obtain indicators that will help build a theory of class structure. The concpet of class was operationalized through questions designed to identify respondents' locations in the class structure. These questions distinguished between classes on the basis of three determinants of an individual's relationship to the means of production: ownership of economic surplus, control over the physical apparatus of production, and control over workers (1978: 73; 1979: 24). Thus, Wright operationlizes class in terms of relations to the ownership, control, and command of the means of production. Those who effectively possess all three attributes are defined as the modern bourgeoisie or capitalist class. Those who possess none of these attributes are defined as the proletariat or working class. Wright admits a third class, the petty bourgeoisie, who generate and control surplus, operate and manage their own business, but do not employ workers. The class structure of the contemporary United States, then, is composed of three main classes defined in terms of their relation to the means of production.
However, the impetus behind much of Wright's work has been to deal with the 'problem' or 'embarrassment' of the middle classes: those who do not fit neatly into the class categories of bourgeoisie, proletariat, or petty bourgeoisie. Wright argues that individuals who possess some but not all attributes which signify exploitative class relations do not, strictly speaking, form classes. Instead, they occupy 'contradictory' locations arrayed between the three main classes: executive managers, supervisors and foremen, small to medium capitalists, and semi-autonomous wage earners such as professionals. These contradictory class locations are differentiated on the basis of skill levels and Wright argues that these are best operationalized through questions that indicate educational attainment (Wright 1987: 24-29).
There are two problems entailed in Wright's attempt to operationalize class. First, despite his protestations otherwise and his attempt to build a relational model of class structure, Wright's analysis is driven by methodological individualism and a distributional analysis of class, both of which are the defining features of the structural functionalist approach to class. This is because Wright operationlizes class by using statistical survey and variable modeling and this approach cannot account for the Marxist conception of class as a relational process. Nor can it account for the concept of social change, as Stolzman and Gamberg (1974) argue. Wright operationalizes class as an independent variable that is derived from an aggregation of data about individuals. But, on the Marxist theory of class, this operation cannot account for social phenomena, social relations, and social change or history (Stolzman and Gamberg 1974: 121-122).
Wright's operationalization of class also conforms to a distributional model of inequality. For example, his attempt to map the dimensions of exploitation along the lines of skilled and unskilled labor reveals that, despite his insistence on a relational conception of class, he is willing to discard this principle: There is no necessary relationship between those who are skilled and those who are not. That is, one can be skilled but this does not mean, at least theoretically, that one's possession of a skill or skills translates into a relationship of exploitation with those who are unskilled (i.e., skilled blue collar workers do not exploit 'unskilled' domestic workers; professors do not exploit dental hygienists.)
Thus, Wright's operationlization of this aspect of class depends on a distributive (and not a relational) model of skilled and unskilled labor. Wright recognizes the limitations in this aspect of his definition, conceding that different skill levels may well be a for of differentiation within classes and not between them (1985: 85, 95, 185).
As Burawoy (1989) and others influenced by labor process theories (Clegg 1994; Thompson 1989) have pointed out, a Marxist approach to the study of inequality and class structure seeks to understand how groups of workers are exploited and not merely how individuals are exploited. Bu focusing on distriubtional aspects of inequality, Wirght's theory cannot account for historical change (Carchedi 1987: 124-131). An historical analysis of class structure must conceptualize class in terms of production relations. A the center of Marx's theory is a concept of exploitation that is based on the alienation of workers from work and thus from their control over the process, product, and conditions of their labor. Marx's theory is not a theory of inequality 'per se.' Rather, inequality of income, education, or skill is symptomatic of the underlying structural relations and processes of historical change in the development of capitalist societies
kelley