ABSTRACT
This conclusion presents some closing thoughts on the concepts covered in the preceding chapters of this book. The book discusses the work on inequality which reflects the appearance on the political scene of new and non-class based political movements. The study of inequality has been a central project of sociological enquiry, past and present, to the extent that it does not so much constitute an area or specialty within sociology as the very stuff of the subject itself. In the first place the ‘British tradition’ has been predominantly concerned with particular aspects of inequality; those of income, educational achievement and, to a lesser extent, wealth. The distinctive character of the ‘British tradition’ is not confined to its concentration on particular aspects of inequality but extends to the way in which these inequalities are conceptualised in distributional terms. The book focuses on the influence of conflict theories, which necessarily emphasise the relational nature of inequality.
