3 - The role of class analysis in the study of race relations – a Weberian perspective

Summary

The study of race relations, in common with a number of other politically charged areas in the social sciences, seems beset by feuds and conflicts of a quite theological intensity. Thus such approaches as plural society theory, rational choice theory, sociobiology, Marxism, Weberianism, the anthropological theory of ethnicity and psychological theories of identity all seem to be making imperialist demands to command the whole field to the exclusion of all other theories.

Closer investigation of these theories, however, reveals that they are in fact in large measure complementary. First, they may be dealing with different kinds of problems, as, for example, when Marxist writers deal with the question of class and race in South Africa (e.g. Wolpe 1976), while M. G. Smith deals with the forms of incorporation of ethnic groups in plural colonial and post-colonial societies (1965, 1974) and Barth deals with the problem of ‘boundary-maintenance’ when Pathans come into contact with other groups (1969a). Second, they may be looking at problems from the perspective of different social science disciplines such as political sociology, which is likely to be concerned with the macro-relation of groups within a social system, or cognitive anthropology, which deals with the belief systems of ethnic groups, or social psychology, which may be concerned with the role of identity concepts within the personality system.