The Sociology of Poverty

The sociology of poverty has many strands. Some studies focus on social class and gender biases, while others examine cyclical poverty. Whether an individual’s situation is a result of his or her own personal efforts, a sociology of poverty can help identify the root causes of poor conditions. Listed below are some of the most popular views of poverty. Let’s look at the two main approaches.

Social class

While a number of philosophies have tried to explain the nature of stratification and poverty, the two most common views are functionalist and conflict theory. The former focuses on how social class affects everyday interaction, while the latter takes a structural perspective. Both view the problems of stratification and poverty as the result of social and political structures. While functionalist theory emphasizes the importance of change through struggle, conflict theory overlooks the importance of stability in society.

While individualistic poverty is largely a result of a lack of motivation, structural poverty is a consequence of problems in society that prevent people from achieving their full potential. Those living in structural poverty lack resources, employment opportunities, and opportunities to improve their situation. Generally, people in these conditions experience more illness than those in higher-income groups. Whether a person is suffering from individualistic or structural poverty, they are more likely to experience the consequences of poverty and its effects.

The material conditions in which people are raised have lasting effects on their social identities and social behaviour. Lower/working-class individuals are less likely to define themselves in terms of their socioeconomic status, tend to have interdependence self-concepts, and tend to describe social events in situational terms. Their perceptions of control over their lives are largely determined by their social class. The latter group is also more likely to experience the negative consequences of poverty and inequality.

Gender biases

The feminization of poverty is a common phenomenon, with female-headed households being more likely to be poor than married couples. This phenomenon is also a manifestation of gender inequality in the United States. In 2009, 30% of female-headed households lived in poverty. The main cause of this feminization is the division of labour by sex, which limits women’s access to resources and participation in decision-making. Women have fewer material, social, and cultural assets. These conditions increase their vulnerability to poverty.

Gender-biased poverty research also highlights the need for more information about how gender gaps influence the distribution of household resources. A lack of data on the gender-biasing nature of poverty research may make these findings even more alarming. Moreover, the underlying mechanisms of gender discrimination may be more complex than previously thought. The aim of this article is to shed light on these issues by highlighting several research findings.

One major contribution of the gender perspective is the need to broaden the definition of poverty. Traditionally, poverty is measured according to the socio-economic characteristics of household members. Nonetheless, this approach is not able to account for gender differences in basic needs. For example, household surveys typically consider income and exclude social reproduction and time spent on household production. The gender perspective has forced researchers to reconsider the standard measurement procedures.

Cyclical poverty

The underlying cause of cyclical poverty in industrialized societies is fluctuations in the business cycle. During periods of recession or depression, people are left jobless and unable to make ends meet. Early industrialized countries experienced business panics and recessions, including the Great Depression of the 1930s. In the face of such turmoil, societies accepted the fluctuations as a natural process of market regulation and provided temporary relief for unemployed citizens to tide them over until the business cycle resumed.

These changes caused chronic joblessness among the inner city poor. Since the services industry has a greater proportion of skilled jobs, many people who lost manufacturing jobs cannot find jobs in the new economy. The result is a cycle of poverty in which the cycle repeats itself and affects more than three generations of a family. This means that social mobility is vital for economic development. It also helps to reduce the number of people living in poverty.

Although the causes of cyclical poverty remain largely elusive, sociological theory can offer valuable insights into the way society functions. While the study of social change tends to focus on institutions and changes in society, insights into economic structure may provide useful ideas for understanding poverty. Marx and Engels’ theories of class structure, for example, emphasized the stark difference between the rich and the poor in society. The impoverished working class possessed nothing to sell other than their labor, while the capitalist class possessed the means of production and exploited labour for profit.

Individualistic or structural view of poverty

Both individualistic and structural views of poverty in society have their merits. Both emphasize different aspects of poverty and the underlying causes of it. The structural view of poverty, on the other hand, focuses on the relationships between social institutions and the causes of poverty. It argues that poverty is the result of macro-level factors, such as economic conditions, education, and cultural values. In general, the structural view focuses on how social institutions affect the lives of individuals and the environment.

The findings of the study show that Americans tend to transform inequality and poverty into personal difficulties. Furthermore, Americans hold more individualistic values than people from other developed countries. Gilens 1999 and Sawhill and Morton 2007 examined this, while Isaacs and Lepianka (2010) studied the attitudes of college students studying to become social workers. These results are indicative of the general hegemonic perspective that many Americans hold.

One of the most common arguments for a structural view of poverty is that people fall into poverty as a result of macro-level conditions. Hence, individuals cannot be blamed for being poor, as they did not choose their circumstances. However, the lack of opportunity to achieve success in life is an inevitable result of structural defects in society. If you want to know which one of the two views of poverty holds more merit, you should study the evidence.

Impact of culture

The concept of culture has a complex history in the study of poverty, but the basic premise is that culture shapes human behavior. In the context of sociology of poverty, culture shapes behavior by making it probable or possible. Further, it extends the concept of frameworks into the idea of narratives, which individualizes the social and cultural factors that determine behavior. In other words, individuals act according to their own narratives and culturally constructed frameworks.

Similarly, the current understanding of the “culture of poverty” dismisses policy changes that might reduce the rate of poverty in the United States, or at least address the concentration of poverty among certain populations. Specifically, the current understanding of the concept of poverty suggests that policy changes will be ineffective in reducing poverty and addressing its causes. The theory also implies that policy changes will not be able to alleviate poverty, and therefore, will continue to aggravate existing problems.

The concept of individualism is another common explanation of the sociology of poverty in the United States. American culture is characterized by individualism, and it allows people to blame their own behavior for social problems. In fact, American individuals are more individualistic than those from other nations, as evidenced by the International Social Survey Programme (ISSP). In a survey of citizens in 25 countries, 61% of Americans believed that their efforts are rewarded, while the median response was 36%.

Stratification

The idea of stratification in the sociology of poverty is a key part of understanding global inequality. In most societies, people are stratified by wealth, which can be measured by gross domestic product. In the United States, for example, the rich control more than half of the nation’s wealth. In other countries, such as Japan, the poor control only a quarter of the nation’s wealth. In other countries, however, wealth is concentrated in the hands of a small number of individuals.

Researchers interested in stratification generally use official data to create categories and rank people based on preset objective criteria. Then, they survey people to determine how they fit into different layers and economic strata. The results show that the more a person’s income is, the lower their chance of achieving class consciousness. However, if a person is not aware of their class status, they cannot be said to be class conscious.

In the chapter on class and social mobility, we will examine how the concept of class affects poverty. Although we have been taught that there are two kinds of stratification in societies, we should also keep in mind the difference between them. One approach emphasizes symbolic interactionism, while another focuses on a functionalist view. In the former, stratification is the necessary consequence of financial reward. Ultimately, the problem of poverty is the same in any society. The question becomes how to make these differences less obvious.