Mapping the Social Class Structure: From Occupational Mobility to Social Class Categories Using Network Analysis

Research Assistant Jonas Toubøl from FAOS - Employment Relations Research Centre has co-authored the article 'Mapping the Social Class Structure: From Occupational Mobility to Social Class Categories Using Network Analysis' with his colleague from Copenhagen Business School Assistant Professor Anton Grau Larsen.

In line with Max Weber, their research is based on the notion that, if class boundaries do not inhibit social mobility then the class categories are of little value. In the article they present a new explorative method for deriving social class categories from patterns of occupational mobility. Thus, unlike dominant, theoretically defined class schemes, the article derives social class categories from observed patterns in a mobility network covering intra-generational mobility. The network is based on a mobility table of 109 occupational categories tied together by 1,590,834 job shifts on the Danish labour market 2001–2007. The number of categories are reduced from 109 to 34 by applying a new clustering algorithm specifically designed for the study of mobility tables (MONECA). These intra-generational social class categories are related to the central discussions of gender, income, education and political action by providing empirical evidence of strong patterns of intra-generational class divisions along these lines.

Jonas Toubøl, Mapping the Social Class Structure: From Occupational Mobility to Social Class Categories Using Network Analysis, Sociology: SAGE Journals, May, 2017.