The Vibe debate: Does class really make a difference?

(c) ell brown

In our third debate on The Vibe, Simon Stiel once again comes back to argue against the notion that class dominates in modern Britain. Given the recent back and forth politicking between David Cameron and Gordon Brown over the latter’s accusation that the Conservative leader’s tax plans were ‘dreamt up on the playing fields of Eton’, this debate has been thrust into the forefront of the political agenda. With Labour very decisively demonstrating their desire to make class a key dividing line in the upcoming general election, this issue will be one of the most crucial in the coming months. John Spence steps up to give the counter argument that we live in a Britain more divided than ever, in which class dominates in all too many professions…

John Spence: Forget the politicians, class will always matter

Roll up! Roll up!  Ladies and Gentlemen! Proles, chavs and guttersnipes!  Welcome to the Westminster Circus!  Plenty of hypocritical posturing about the class issue to go around!  Come and watch one party’s privately educated front-bench have a pop at another party’s privately educated front-bench – because they were privately educated! 

Sorry to sound flippant, but New Labour’s attacks on David Cameron’s Old Etonian background, and the revelations regarding the ‘de-toffing’ of the likes of Conservative PPC Annunziata Rees-Mogg (now plain, old, run-o’-the-mill ‘Nancy Mogg’) are a degenerate sideshow to a proper debate about the role of ‘class’ in politics, and society as a whole.

What it means to be from one class or another is notoriously difficult to pin down.  Is to do with wealth?  Is it to do with notions of privilege?  Is it to do with where you went to school?  Is it to do with who you vote for?  The answer, as everyone knows, is that it has to do with all these things, and more, which combine from birth to largely determine what opportunities are available to us, first when we begin education and equally importantly, when we leave education.

That there is a strong class disparity at work in Britain should be beyond dispute; in August, the Panel on Fair Access to the Professions published the ‘Unleashing Aspiration’ report.  The report showed the Britain is one of the least socially mobile countries in Europe; it accused the ‘professional classes’ of having a ‘closed shop mentality’ and of ‘opportunity hoarding’ and, most damning of all, it showed that although only 7% of the population attends independent schools, 75% of judges, 70% of finance directors, 45% of top civil servants and 32% of MPs were privately educated.

British society has somnambulated into the current status quo where there is a clear differential between the class of the governing and the class of the governed.  This is not a democracy we live in; this is a plutocracy with votes.  THAT is why class matters

Simon Stiel: An Eton Mess about Social Mobility

We have become obsessed with things dying. It could be about Parliament and our politicians with the Vote for a Change campaign inviting people to pose as zombies during Halloween. In recent months, there have been reports and articles about the death of social mobility. 

Closer and more careful analysis reveals there is life in the old dog yet. John has defined class as encompassing life opportunities that “determine what opportunities are available to us when we begin…and when we leave education.”  

I don’t want to sound too much like an academic treatise but there is something called absolute mobility, where everyone can gain better jobs than their forefathers. In the 1930s, less than 10% of the general population was in the professional and managerial class, now it’s 40%. Even nowadays, 65% of sons move upwards from the backgrounds their fathers grew up in. Sociologist Paul Gregg has looked at GCSE students born in 1991 and found that their family backgrounds had less impact than children born in 1970. The LSE study that is quoted regularly, about comparing cohorts of 1958 and 1970, showed that 16% of children born to the poorest 25% of adults were among the richest 25% 

Certainly it is moving that Barack Obama has become President of the United States, but he became president of a society that is far less mobile than Britain, Australia, Denmark, Sweden and Canada.  

International comparisons would help before we write that Britain has become a “plutocracy of votes” and any proper debate must be well informed.  The current status quo in Parliament is ever changing with more black and ethnic minority MPs and possibly after the next election, the first Chinese born MP. In a Britain that has become more relaxed regarding different races and different sexualities, talking about class is itself reactionary.

The Debate

John

I would challenge the notion that the identity-prejudicial credibility deficit applies here; or rather I’d argue that while it does apply to individuals, I don’t believe it applies to a group.  If the likely make-up of a Cameron cabinet is made up of mainly Old Etonians, as is expected, then this would merely be a pro-capitalist reworking of the old Orthodox Marxist belief that a supposedly enlightened cadre of like-minded people is necessary to lead the people.

Simon

The prejudicial deficit can apply to a group; it is asserted that there are too many members and that whatever organisation they’re part of is “contaminated.” John supposes it is “likely” that Etonians would dominate a Cameron Cainet. At the moment, only 2 members of the Shadow Cabinet are Eton pupils; nearly 40% went to state schools. 

As for the “echo chamber” idea, witnessing the Shadow Cabinet’s division over the Lisbon treaty shows otherwise. The fact that Cameron has angered many traditional Tory MPs, (Etonians among them), by insisting on all-women shortlists and getting more ethnic/ LGBT candidates to stand shows the lack of a “group mindset.” 

John briefly touched upon international comparisons but it’s worth going into them in greater detail. Britain is more mobile than Germany and Italy regarding occupational mobility. It is moving that Barack Obama became President, but he presides over a society that is less mobile than Denmark and Sweden. 

In the past, prejudice about your racial or sexual background could also determine what your opportunities were. Today Britain is more comfortable with politicians being of different race, gender and sexuality. Henceforth, class shouldn’t be relevant about whether someone is fit to govern or not. Our debate would be more mature without the objections being raised: “Oh, he went to Eton.” 

John

If we consider the lack of social mobility to be wrong in Communist China, then it is equally wrong in democratic Britain; the only difference here is that we get a vote.  This selection of the like-minded means the Cabinet will be little more than an echo chamber; the same ideas batted around and reinforced because everyone believes the same thing.  However, because this group mindset only comes from a narrow stratum of society, how can this be a positive thing for a government supposedly of us all?  This doesn’t only apply to the Conservatives; it applies almost as equally to New Labour and the Lib Dems, but as the Tories are likely to form the next government then it is appropriate there is a great level of scrutiny on them.

Simon

A cadre of Etonians would be dreadful if Britain really is doing badly regarding social mobility. Prospect magazine discussed this last year with the Sutton Trust. It showed that the family background of GCSE students who were born in 1991 had less impact for those born in 1970. Without sounding too academic, there is a form of mobility called “absolute mobility” where everyone ascends to a better job. In the 1930s, only 10% of the population was of the professional and managerial class. Now it’s 40%. John talks about professions and the number of independently educated people in them. Yet you can still have a good level of mobility. Today, 65% of sons move upwards from their father’s background. 

John

I would agree that those born to wealth don’t choose their circumstances, just as those born to poverty.  However, how should we view, for example, the likes of Zac Goldsmith likely to be a leading light in a future Tory government, when he and his ilk would be a part of a government demanding tax from the citizens from the UK, but whom are tax resident in other countries themselves; a status afforded only to a certain class of people?  As I argued earlier, social class, and everything that comes with that, determines opportunity.  We have discussed this previously on this website, on a variety of issues and topics, but the root of it all remains, even in 21^st Century Britain, social class.  To say that class is no longer relevant is to be blind to reality.

So, who is right? Is John’s argument all too true and resembling the Britain you know, where the privately educated come to rule and dominate the major professions? Or is Simon correct to suppose that actually, Britain is a more mobile country than some of its biggest rivals on the world stage, and one in which social mobility is on the increase? It’s time to have your say…