10. Class, Race & Opportunity Hoarding

10. Class, Race &
Opportunity
Hoarding
Reading:
Tilly, Durable Inequality, Ch. 5
Dunk, It's a Working Man's Town, Ch. 5
Workshop #9: Comprehending racism categorically
1. What is opportunity hoarding? How does it differ from exploitation? What
are its consequences?
2. Describe the informal group of 'the boys' in network terms: how does it
operate? what are its boundaries? What beliefs, practices and stories
sustain its boundaries?
3. Does this network support opportunity hoarding? List the components of
opportunity hoarding & assess whether the boys’ network fulfills them. Who
do they exclude from opportunities and how?

Soci 220 2009-10 Week 10 —
Opportunity hoarding
I. Opportunity hoarding defined
“When members of a categorically bounded network
acquire access to a resource that is valuable, renewable,
subject to monopoly, supportive of network activities,
& enhanced by the network’s modus operandi, network
members regularly hoard their access to the resource,
creating beliefs & practices that sustain their
control” (Tilly, 91)
II. Relation to exploitation
• a secondary mechanism of durable inequality
• complements exploitation
• done mainly by members of non-elite (i.e. those who are not
exploiters, not powerholders, not owners)
• benefits accrue to members of categorically bounded network
that practices opp. hoarding (conversely, losses to members who
leave the category)
• differences:
• exploitation enlists efforts of others
• opportunity hoarding excludes others
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Soci 220 2009-10 Week 10 —
Elements of Opportunity hoarding
I. categorically bounded network
a. categories
b. boundaries:
i. lumping, splitting & defining
c. network
i. its activities & routines
II. access to a resource
a. valuable
b. renewable
c. subject to monopoly
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Soci 220 2009-10 Week 10 —
Elements of Opportunity hoarding
III. beliefs & practices that sustain their control
a. beliefs
• stories that remind members of affiliation
• negative attributions to other side of boundary
• providing reasons for exclusion
b. practices
• that monitor conduct of members & sanction deviance
• rituals that mark belonging & create emotional bonds
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Soci 220 2009-10 Week 10 —
Examples of opportunity hoarding
I. Italians in New Jersey vs. Lyon (Tilly, ch. 5)
II. ‘The boys’
III. Professions & occupations
IV. Settler Colonies - nationalism from above
V. Politically mobilized excluded ‘minorities’ -
nationalism from below
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Soci 220 2009-10 Week 10 —
Analysing opportunity hoarding
II. ‘The boys’ (fill in the information yourself for workshop)
a. categorically bounded network
i. categorical pairs —
•
from whom do the boys try to distinguish themselves?
ii. network: transactions & social relations, and their limits
•
who do they interact with? who don’t they interact with?
iii. boundaries
• how do they mark the boundary between themselves & others?
b. to what extent do they have access to resources that are
i. valuable
ii. renewable
iii. subject to monopoly
iv. supportive of network activities
v. enhanced by the network’s modus operandi
c. what are the beliefs & practices that sustain their control?
i. beliefs: stories, negative attributions, reasons
ii. practices: monitoring, rituals
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Soci 220 2009-10 Week 10 —
Two approaches to racism
I. Dunk: cultural symbols
a. “The ‘Indian’ is employed as a symbol through which
the Boys establish their own moral worth and their
difference from the perceived dominant power bloc.
They ‘imagine’ their own community in opposition to
others, and racial and ethnic characteristics provide
easily discernible markers upon which such divisions
can be constituted.” (Dunk, 102)
b. “The Indian is perceived as an inferior other against
whom white define themselves. The Indian is also a
powerful symbol in the whites’ understanding of
their relationship to other whites, especially those in
the metropolis located in the southern part of the
province.” (Dunk, 102-3)
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Soci 220 2009-10 Week 10 —
Two approaches to racism
II. Dunk: ethnic categories
c. ethnic divisions within the European working-class of
Fort William / Port Arthur were important at one
time, with some evidence of concentrations of ethnic
groups in particular industries.
i. “The elevators had been a Scottish preserve in the
early years of their existence” (p. 106).
d. but they became practically insignificant by the
1970s:
i. although stereotypes remain, ethnicity plays no role in
qualifying or disqualifying for membership in the Boys, or in
their choice of female companions; it has little significance for
employment, class or social status (p. 107)
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Soci 220 2009-10 Week 10 —
Two approaches to racism
III. Dunk: racial categories
e. “… when discussions of Indians arose … Physical
markers, such as relatively dark skin, straight black
hair, high cheekbones and so on become significant
in relation to a cultural, social, and economic
context” (102)
i. ethnic categories: based on perceived cultural differences
ii. racial categories: based on perceived physical differences
f. Where does racial categorization come from?
i. The Boys’ “racism is rooted in the immediate experiences of
their everyday lives and in the prejudices and practices which
are widely present in the culture of the Anglo-Saxon
world” (107)
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Soci 220 2009-10 Week 10 —
Two approaches to racism
IV. Dunk: from racial categories to racism
g. Negative attribution
i. For the Boys “the Indian stands for negative personality
traits” (107): Indians are lawless (110), don’t respect possessions
(111), are hostile to whites (112), their culture is unsustainable
because the land can no longer support it (112), they have
special privileges (‘we give them too much’ — 113).
h. Boundaries on social relations
i. they avoid places where Indians hang out such as ‘Indian
bars’ (108), and they avoid Indian women (109)
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Soci 220 2009-10 Week 10 —
Two approaches to racism
V. Dunk: deeper into culture
i. images of Indians in the boys discourse:
• noble savage
• backward simpleton
• victim of outside forces
• degenerate, uncivilized, immoral
• welfare bum
• Indian women: sexually ‘easy’, victims of Indian men (p.
113-115)
j. deep cultural roots
i. images of the other in European ideas of “the wild man and
woman” (122)
ii. alternating images of the noble or the depraved savage (123-4)
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Soci 220 2009-10 Week 10 —
Two approaches to racism
VI. Dunk: from culture to social relations
a. “The Indian is not only an image against which local
whites define themselves. It is also an important
symbol in their understanding of the hinterland/
metropolis relationship between the region and the
centre of political and economic power in the
South” (115)
b. The Boys feel exploited by the South (118-9), and in
competition with Indians for the benefits of the
welfare state (who pays and who receives) (122).
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Soci 220 2009-10 Week 10 —
Two approaches to racism
VII. From Dunk to Tilly
‘the Boys’
northern white
working class
‘the South’
political &
economic elite
exploitation opportunity hoarding
opportunity hoarding
boundary
‘Indians’
northern
First Nations
& Métis
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Soci 220 2009-10 Week 10 —
Two approaches to racism
VIII. Tilly: opportunity hoarding by colonial state
(settler colonialism):
a. excluding natives from land - treaties
b. legal definition of categories
c. definition of ‘Indian’ in Indian Act of 1876
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Soci 220 2009-10 Week 10 —
Two approaches to racism
IX. Tilly: From opportunity hoarding to exploitation
to opportunity hoarding
a. state’s opportunity hoarding sets stage for
exploitation
i. “powerful, connected people command resources from which
they draw … returns by coordinating the efforts of outsiders
whom they exclude from the full value added by that
effort” (Tilly, 10)
ii. metropolitan - hinterland relation in which resources are
extracted from the hinterland
iii. working-class whites like the Boys benefit from settler colonial
opportunity hoarding, but are exploited, & relatively powerless
compared to the political and economic elite
b. the Boys engage, wittingly or unwittingly, in informal
opportunity hoarding “… a process of informal
exclusion which insures that Natives do not learn of
opportunities in areas such as employment …” (p. 120)
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Soci 220 2009-10 Week 10 —
Two approaches to racism
X. Tilly: opportunity hoarding in response to
opportunity hoarding
a. treaty rights & aboriginal rights as renewable
resources
b. nationalism ‘from below’: opportunity hoarding to
preserve
i. benefits: welfare benefits, health care, housing, access to jobs,
resource royalties
ii. power to determine their distribution, including who is eligible
to receive them — categorical boundaries
• e.g. Bill C-61
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Soci 220 2009-10 Week 10 —
Two approaches to racism
XI. Conclusions
a. Two forms of opportunity hoarding?
i. by organizations: “a well-bounded set of ties in which at least
one site has the right to establish ties across the boundary…”
ii. by informal networks: triads + categorical pairs
b. Critique of Dunk, Ch. 5
i. Dunk starts to put the Boys racism in a relational context, but
keeps sliding into its cultural roots instead
c. Tilly’s approach
i. social structure of durable inequality: opportunity hoarding &
exploitation,
ii. culture as a repertoire of stories and beliefs that justify
categorical inequalities of class and ‘race’
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Soci 220 2009-10 Week 9 —
Next week — December 3
11. Class, Knowledge & Opportunity Hoarding
Reading:
Dunk, It's a Working Man's Town, Ch. 6
Workshop #11:
Categorical inequalities, education and occupation
Questions:
1. Why are 'the boys' so anti-intellectual? Why is common sense
highly valued?
2. Can the stories the boys tell about intellectuals and
professionals best be understood in terms of exploitation,
opportunity hoarding or adaptation?
3. Do their stories contribute to creating categorical boundaries
or to solidarity?
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