The Macro and Meso Basis of the Micro Social Order
7.4 The Meso Realm of Social Reality
7.4 The Meso Realm of Social Reality
7.4.1 The Cultural Beliefs
of Corporate and Categoric Units
7.4.1.1 Beliefs in Corporate Units
Within any corporate unit, a culture specifi c to that unit can typically be found, especially if the unit endures for a time and is embedded in insti- tutional systems. This corporate-unit culture is constrained by the institution within which it is lodged and, potentially, by several institutional domains in which it may also be partially embed- ded—thereby invoking meta-ideologies. The moral codes of these ideologies and meta- ideologies provide the moral force of corporate- unit culture, while the specifi c history, technologies employed, division of labor, distri- butions of authority, and goals of the organization provide other cultural beliefs that fi ll in around these moral codes. In this manner beliefs remain isomorphic with what is actually occurring in the corporate unit, but these beliefs are almost always moralized by ideologies and meta-ideologies.
7.4.1.2 Beliefs About Categoric Units As the literature in social psychology on status beliefs documents, members of categoric units (see Chap. 16 ) are almost always defi ned and evaluated by beliefs about their relative worth as defi ned by locations in the stratifi cation system.
These status beliefs generally get their power from the meta-ideologies legitimating the stratifi - cation system of a society because once individu- als are defi ned as distinctive and members of a category, they are often treated differentially and thus over-represented at particular points in the class system of a society. And once a correlation exists between class location and categoric-unit
memberships, the meta-ideology legitimating the stratifi cation system becomes the moral codings that are drawn upon to formulate status beliefs about, and evaluations of, members of categoric units. Not all status beliefs are connected to the stratifi cation system, but those beliefs carrying moral power to judge and evaluate members of categoric units almost always invoke implicitly the moral standards of meta-ideologies.
Cultural beliefs typically fl ow down to corpo- rate units from institutional domains, whereas beliefs about members of categoric units—some- times referred to as status beliefs in the social psychological literature (e.g., Webster and Foschi 1988 ; Berger et al. 1977 ; Berger and Zelditch 1993 ) disproportionately come from the meta- ideology legitimating the stratifi cation system.
Encounters embedded in corporate and categoric units are, and subsequently, directed by expecta- tion states that are derived from of these status that are often generated “on the ground” as encounters are iterated over time. Beliefs from corporate and categoric units, as well as the expectation states that they engender, are very much infl uenced by the structure of the meso realm because it is along the conduits provided by patterned relationships within and between structures that culture travels, much like trans- mission wires in older forms of wired communi- cation. The analogy to a more wireless network is also appropriate, because at times ideologies and the beliefs that they generate are free fl oating and are picked up in key structural “hot spots” where density of interaction is high. Thus, to understand how culture fl ows to the encounter from meso and often macro levels of social reality requires that we examine structure relations of corporate and categoric unit to, on the one hand, build up macro structures and their cultures and, on the other, constrain the structure and culture of focused and unfocused encounters.
7.4.2 The Structure of Corporate and Categoric Units
Cultural beliefs vary along a number of dimen- sions, the most important being (a) the clarity of,
(b) the consensus over, and (c) the regulatory power of these beliefs. In turn, if meso-level cul- tural beliefs are clear, widely held, and authorita- tive, the expectations on individuals at the micro level of social organization will also reveal these properties. The question then becomes what structural properties and dynamics increase clar- ity, consensus, and authoritative infl uence on meso-level beliefs. Some of the most important for a top-down theory of the micro order are explored below.
7.4.2.1 Successive Embedding
In general, the more embedded are micro-level structures in meso structures, and meso in macro structures, the more integrated is a society and the more likely are expectations at the level of the encounter to be derived from the ideologies and meta-ideologies legitimating, respectively, the particular institutional domains in which an encounter is embedded (via corporate units) and the system of stratifi cation. At the level of corpo- rate units, there can be additional successive embedding because groups are often embedded in organizations and because organizations are located in communities and in a particular insti- tutional domain, such as polity, economy, kin- ship, religion, law, education, etc. And so, the more there is successive embedding of (a) encounters in groups, (b) groups in organiza- tions, and (c) organizations in communities and institutional domains, the more readily will the culture of the larger units fl ow down to the level of the encounter and constrain the fl ow of inter- action. Moreover, because embedding imposes structural constraints on culture, this structural embedding increases the likelihood that higher- order cultural formations like ideologies and meta-ideologies will provide the moral underpin- nings for lower-order cultural. In so doing, the greater will be the clarity of, consensus over, and power of the expectations derived from beliefs in corporate units on micro-level interpersonal behavior.
For categoric units, embedding is sometimes less linear. Meta-ideologies legitimating the stratifi cation system establish moral evaluations for members of different social classes, with such
evaluations moving from high levels of stigma for those in the lowest classes to less stigma, if any, for those in higher classes, unless there exists open class confl ict in a society in which case the moral order of the upper classes in general is under assault. Memberships in identifi able cate- goric units are often correlated with class loca- tions in the stratifi cation system, and the more that such is the case, the more status beliefs will be additive, if not multiplicative, with the com- bined evaluation of class and categoric unit.
However, categoric-unit memberships often reveal an alternative scale of evaluation of moral worth from the ideologies of particular institu- tional domains. For example, membership in a stigmatized religion within a society can lower evaluations of persons and families, regardless of their class position. The same can be true also of highly stigmatized ethnic subpopulations (for various historical reasons not wholly related to class). But, if members of these categoric units are over-representative in lower social classes, then the effect of this double stigma is more mul- tiplicative than additive. And, if stigmatized memberships in categoric units are correlated with higher class locations, some of the prestige of these higher locations is deducted by virtue of other moral standards. For instance, Jews in Europe and even in the United States are among the most successful of religious/ethnic subpopu- lations economically but some of the prestige that normally would be associated with upper-middle and upper-class locations is lost because of preju- dicial beliefs about Jews. These intersectional dynamics will be discussed in more detail in the next section and in Chap. 2 as well.
Since class locations are the outcome of status locations in resource-distributing corporate units (e.g., organizations), with evaluations of people in lower, middle, and higher locations in divi- sions of labor of organizations generally correlat- ing with their class locations. However, a number of factors can distort this correlation. One is the particular corporate units from which individuals gain their resources. For example, a higher-level employee in an educational bureaucracy will not earn as much income and, hence, occupy the same class position as a high-level incumbent in
law or economy; and so under these conditions, there can be a complex interplay between pres- tige associated with locations in divisions of labor and class positions. The same might be true of an established artist or musician and a higher- class lawyer or business executive. Again, I will explore the complexity of consolidation and intersection of status shortly, as well as in Chap.
2 . Yet, even with these complexities, what is remarkable is that at the level of encounters, indi- viduals are usually able to sort sets of expecta- tions out during the course of the encounter, or even before the encounter because they have had previous experience with reconciling class loca- tions with markers of prestige in the divisions of labor in various types of organizations in diverse institutional domains, since many domains offer highly valued resources that do not always trans- late into more money and higher class locations.
7.4.2.2 Consolidation and Intersection An important property of corporate and categoric units that sets into motion important dynamics is the degree of consolidation or intersection of memberships in categoric units with locations in the divisions of labor in corporate units (Blau 1977 ; Turner 2002 ). If the distribution of mem- bers across both horizontal and vertical divisions of labor in corporate units is proportionate to their numbers in the general population, and if this proportionate distribution occurs across a wide variety of corporate units in a large number of institutional domains, then the salience of sta- tus beliefs about categoric unit members declines, and beliefs about individuals are derived from their status in the division of labor (rather than status beliefs about categoric-unit memberships).
Thus, only when the distribution of members of devalued categoric units across all social classes approximates their proportion of the total popula- tion will the moral codes, derived by meta- ideologies that stigmatize members of a categoric unit, begin to decline. For example, as women have moved into positions in divisions of labor once held only by men and once they are more proportionately distributed across class levels, the less stigmatizing are the status beliefs directed at them. There may still remain status beliefs that
distinguish men from women, but these will carry increasingly less moral evaluation. The same is true of members of ethnic minorities as they gain access to mobility across class lines.
As implied above, the converse of this gener- alization is also true: The more membership in categoric units is correlated with high, medium, and low positions in hierarchical divisions of labor in corporate units and with distinctive loca- tions in horizontal divisions of labor, the more salient will the evaluative content of status beliefs become. And, the more likely will the evaluative content of status beliefs about memberships in categoric units affect the beliefs about status locations in divisions of labor. As status beliefs about categoric unit have this effect, the power of status beliefs increases within any given corpo- rate unit, as well as in all situational encounters in the broader society.
Thus, while the distribution of resources within corporate units in institutional domains determines the basic structure of the stratifi cation system, the distribution of categoric-unit mem- berships across divisions of labor also has large effects on the culture of corporate and categoric units. When distributions consolidate member- ships in categoric units to particular types and levels of locations in corporate units, categoric- unit memberships and status beliefs about loca- tions in divisions of labor consolidate and harden (Turner 2002 ); and as a result, a society becomes more stratifi ed. Conversely, when high rates of intersection between memberships in categoric units and status locations in corporate units exists, the salience and evaluative tenor of status beliefs about categoric-unit memberships decline, relative to locational status; and as a result, a society becomes less stratifi ed since resources in general are distributed more proportionately across members of categoric units. Class as a cat- egoric unit, however, may persist even as resources are distributed across other categoric units, but once some intersection of categoric- unit memberships and diverse locations in divi- sions of labor occurs, social mobility in a society is likely to increase, with class memberships becoming less distinct, except perhaps at the very top and bottom of the stratifi cation system.
In sum, then, (1) the number of distinctive cat- egoric units, (2) the degree to which they are dif- ferentially evaluated, and (3) the degree of their consolidation or intersection with locations in corporate units will have large effects on the situ- ational expectations on individuals in micro-level encounters—as I outline below. Moreover, the degree to which categoric-unit membership is correlated or uncorrelated with social class and with locations in the division of labor will have large effects on the level of integration in a soci- ety across micro, meso, and macro levels of real- ity (see Chap. 2 ).
7.5 The Micro Level of Social