#ASCRIBED STATUS DRIVER#

In such a way, protestants were motivated to accumulate wealth, which is the major driver of capitalism, whereas Roman Catholic Church discouraged the pursuit of wealth that slowed down the emergence of capitalism in Roman Catholic countries.

Max Weber explained the emergence of capitalism in protestant countries by the domination of the ideology of pursuing wealth in protestant countries, whereas Roman Catholic countries viewed pursuing wealth as unnecessary and, more important, unworthy of a true Christian (Weber, 1978). Social relations are determined by conflicts between different social groups and conflict theories justify the tension that exists in the society by contradictions and conflicts that exist between different social groups. Often standards of living imposed on individuals by the society fail to correspond to their real life and they commit crimes to achieve standards and goals that the society imposes on them or that the society views as ideal but that are not attainable for individuals committing crimes (Murphy, 1988). In such a way, an individual’s achieved status tends to match the ascribed status.Ĭonflict theories explain crime by social inequality, which forces oppressed people to rebel against existing social norms and commit crimes to reach a better condition of living (Paugam, 1998). Or, on the contrary, if ascribed social status is low, an individual may face substantial difficulties to achieve a higher social status. For instance, if ascribed status of an individual is high, then the individual strives to achieve the ascribed social status. Ascribed status can affect consistently the achieved status (Swedberg, 1999). In fact, ascribed is closely intertwined with achieved status. Achieved status is the status that an individual achieves in the course of his or her life through socially significant actions, such as career progress or participation in public organizations or movements, and so on. In fact, the ascribed status is very important because it gives insight toward the social status of an individual. Sociological imagination is a type of insight that sociologists can get through using their imagination in relation to issues related to sociology.Īscribed status is the social status that is attributed to an individual a priori but an individual may not hold the social standing or meet standards attributed to his or her presumable social status. Sociological imagination is the application of imaginative thinking to sociological theory and issues to answer sociological questions. Wright Mills develops the concept of sociological imagination. Wright Mills insists, imagination should back up sociological researches to help to shape sociological concepts and to make discoveries important for sociology (Mills, 2000).

At the same time, imagination cannot be dominant in sociology but, as C. In fact, sociology is virtually unthinkable without involvement of imagination. Wright Mills, who developed original approach to sociology and contributed to the emergence of such concepts as sociological imagination, ascribed and achieved status and others that are extremely popular in the contemporary sociology. In this regard, it is possible to refer to works by C. In actuality, sociology still has diverse views and approaches which lay foundation to numerous sociological theories. In fact, the development of sociology was accompanied by the emergence of diverse sociological theories.