INEQUALITY GAP BETWEEN THE RICH AND POOR IN POLITICAL ENGAGEMENT

There are obvious differences between the rich and the poor. But how does this affect us politically?

Does your social class influence your political engagement? I believe so.

Inevitably different social classes are likely to have varying poltical levels of engagement.

It is commonly thought that your social economic class determines the political party you are likely to identify with. Typically , the middle and upper class identify with right- wing conservatives, whilst the working class associate with left-wing labour party(Taylor 2017). A comparison of the British electoral vote in 1997 and 2017,aligns with this idea(Figure 1).We can see that ‘AB’ and ‘C1’, which is representative of professions that are generally occupied by the upper and middle class, voted largely for the conservative party.On the other hand, a higher proportion of the ‘semi-skilled’ and ‘unskilled’ working class voted for the labour party.

 

 

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Could it be that opportunities to engage in political learning are more restricted depending on where you can afford to study. Speaking from an individual standpoint, it isn’t difficult to see how the upper class are subject to favourable circumstances of which they are better able to politically engage.  Dempsey and Johnston(2018), suggest that individuals with lower socio-economic status, are less likely to have a broad knowledge of political matters as oppose to other social class groups.They unlike individuals from upper class backgrounds aren’t  able to afford the expenses of private schools and so miss out on opportunities provided at these schools that would expand their political knowledge, such as mock elections and debates .Ramesh(2011) suggests that this inequality between classes is ‘self-replicating’ and so individuals remain in the same class,as knowledge and cultural ideas are transferred within the family from one generation to the next. This evidently provides more benefits for upper class.

 

 

 

 

Source:https://cpb-eu-w2.wpmucdn.com/eportfolios.roehampton.ac.uk/dist/9/3358/files/2019/02/CBP-7501-zt8x4z.pdf

Figure 2:Proportion of social grade within the general population.

According to , Tiller and Evans(2017) , a shift occurred following on 1980s of which perceptions of certain parties changed, and these shifts caused certain social classes to vote for different political parties. In particular the perception of labour party being centred on ‘workers’ changed to ‘families’. Consequently, the middle class became more labour party orientated rather than conservative. By indicating that this is the reasoning as to the decrease in working class votes. By doing so, they offer a reasonable explanation as to why poltical engagement between social classes differ so much?

Growing up, I can honestly say my political awareness and involvement was minimal to say the least. As someone who has grown up in a working class household it is easy to agree with perspectives, that suggest your class limits how likely you are to engage politically. Some families like my own parents are people that are big on keeping up to date with what goes on in the political world and this slightly rubbed off on me. However, not everyone’s families are like this. Moreover, political representations such as, Labour MPs don’t play much of a role in bettering the situation. In fact, the percentage of labour MP’s that had working class jobs prior to them joining parliament has dropped from 40% to 10% since 1959.How can the working class be expected to engage more politically, if they dont have MPs in the political spectrum they can identify with or relate to?

Ultimately, children from private schools, are at an advantage. Private schools more often have better environments for learning such as more open rooms since they are more heavily funded and students are likely to have more one on one attention. Therefore, this increases their chances of advancing their political knowledge. It’s comes as no surprise that in 2017, 1% of private schools were free to attend(Ryan 2018).

We may now ask what can be done to change these social  inequalities in political engagement?

Well first of all, we can start by making learning environments more open. not just for certain social classes but to all. This enable more equal opportunity among students across numerous social classes to widen their political knowledge. Also, implementing policies to reduce poverty, as it could help provide structural motives to engage politically(Frey 2016). For instance by equipping them with money and resources to boost their likelihood participate politically as sense of attachment to the government in terms of well-being is created(Frey 2016) .Lastly, by simply making political learning mandatory  for students to engage in.

It is apparent that a lot still needs to be done to close the gap in difference of political participation that varies upon social class. Perhaps it would be better to take notes from countries such as, Finland which completely abolished school fees, and in turn made them an ‘educational global success’.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Taylor, B. 2017 .In 20 years,British poltics went from being about class to being about age .[online]Available at: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2017/06/14/in-20-years-british-politics-went-from-being-about-class-to-being-about-age/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.3871071b879a (accessed on:4/03/2019)

Dempsey,N.& Johnston, N.,2018.Political disengagement in the Uk, who is disengaged?[online]Available at:http://researchbriefings.files.parliament.uk/documents/CBP-7501/CBP-7501.pdf (Accessed on:03/03/2019)

Ramesh,R.2017.Private schools fuel division in society,poltics and pay, says study.[online]Avaialable at:https://www.theguardian.com/education/2011/dec/07/private-schools-divide-society-politics (Accessed on:04/03/2019)

University of Oxford ,2017.Why the working class voter may be turning away from[online]Available at: labourhttp://www.ox.ac.uk/news/2017-02-22-why-working-class-voter-may-be-turning-away-labour (Accessed on:4/03/2019)

Ryan,F.,2018.Private schools don’t act like charities, so dont strip them of the benefits.[online]Available at:https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2018/aug/16/private-schools-charitable-status-strip-benefits( accessed on:4/03/2019)

Frey,E.2016.How to encourage better and more  meaningful political participation in the US.[online]Available at:https://www.fordfoundation.org/ideas/equals-change-blog/posts/how-to-encourage-better-and-more-meaningful-political-participation-in-the-us/(accessed on:4/03/2019)

Benn,M. 2018.The only way to end the class divide:the case for abolishing private schools .[online]Available at:https://www.theguardian.com/news/2018/aug/24/the-only-way-to-end-the-class-divide-the-case-for-abolishing-private-schools(accessed on:4/03/2019)