Robert Castel: Selected Summaries: SELECTED SUMMARIES

By MAURICIO ENRIQUE FAU

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We have summarized the essentials of the following texts: THE LOGIC OF EXCLUSION, chapter 1 and THE METAMORPHOSIS OF THE SOCIAL QUESTION, prologue and chapters 5 and 7.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BOOKS AND SUMMARIES BY MAURICIO FAU
• Release date: Oct 1, 2021
• ISBN: 9798201905842

MAURICIO ENRIQUE FAU

Mauricio Enrique Fau nació en Buenos Aires en 1965. Se recibió de Licenciado en Ciencia Política en la Universidad de Buenos Aires. Cursó también Derecho en la UBA y Periodismo en la Universidad de Morón. Realizó estudios en FLACSO Argentina. Docente de la UBA y AUTOR DE MÁS DE 3.000 RESÚMENES de Psicología, Sociología, Ciencia Política, Antropología, Derecho, Historia, Epistemología, Lógica, Filosofía, Economía, Semiología, Educación y demás disciplinas de las Ciencias Sociales. Desde 2005 dirige La Bisagra Editorial, especializada en técnicas de estudio y materiales que facilitan la transición desde la escuela secundaria a la universidad. Por intermedio de La Bisagra publicó 38 libros. Participa en diversas ferias del libro, entre ellas la Feria Internacional del Libro de Buenos Aires y la FIL Guadalajara.

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Robert Castel: Selected Summaries

SELECTED SUMMARIES

MAURICIO ENRIQUE FAU

Published by BOOKS AND SUMMARIES BY MAURICIO FAU, 2021.

While every precaution has been taken in the preparation of this book, the publisher assumes no responsibility for errors or omissions, or for damages resulting from the use of the information contained herein.

ROBERT CASTEL: SELECTED SUMMARIES

First edition. October 1, 2021.

Copyright © 2021 MAURICIO ENRIQUE FAU.

ISBN: 979-8201905842

Written by MAURICIO ENRIQUE FAU.

Table of Contents

Title Page

Copyright Page

SUMMARY OF TEXTS BY ROBERT CASTEL | INTRODUCTION

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Further Reading: Gilles Lipovetsky: Selected Summaries

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About the Author

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SUMMARY OF TEXTS BY ROBERT CASTEL

INTRODUCTION

We propose to review selected texts of the French sociologist Robert Castel.

We will analyze some of the key texts of this author, namely:

- THE LOGIC OF EXCLUSION, chapter 1

- THE METAMORPHOSES OF THE SOCIAL QUESTION, prologue and chapters 5 and 7

THE LOGIC OF EXCLUSION

I. Marginality and exclusion, a historical perspective

The concept of marginality comes from margin (frontier), and refers to all those who are not integrated into the networks that produce wealth and social recognition. They are at the margin of the dominant values, although linked to them, since they are the opposite of the integrated.

a. The marginalized, a stigmatized universe

The term marginalized appeared at the end of the 1960s, although it refers historically from the 14th to the 18th century to social groups that had an atypical and frowned-upon way of life, ranging from vagabonds and prostitutes to travelers of all kinds (monks, soldiers, thieves, etc.). The characteristics of these were:

- Rejection of regulated work and the possession of a patrimony: that is, they survived as beggars but were apt to perform any type of work. To put an end to this, repressive measures were implemented that penalized leisure.

- The marginalized, not having a steady job, is a wanderer and therefore wanders and has no link with society. Here a distinction arises: marginality is not poverty, since the poor is linked to an order, the marginal only circulates.

- Affective, sexual and social instability: marginality represents a universe different from the established social order. The marginal alters the good people.

b. Marginality, exclusion and social vulnerability

Marginality is an ambiguous representation, this is because it presents two faces:

1. It is a concerted exclusion

2. It marks (stigmatizes) those who cannot find a place.

1. Exclusion is not marginalization

All EXCLUSION is based on the judgment of an official body. This can take many forms, as was the case with the Inquisition throughout Europe, which not only condemned to death, but expelled and imprisoned those it considered heretics.

MARGINALIZATION is not necessarily exclusion, as it can be a personal attitude towards a given society. For example, the story of Lazarillo de Tomes in the 16th century serves as a model, since it is about an outcast who wanders through the cities looking for a way to survive as a thief or servant, but who after a while is integrated into that society. Marginality is on the border between the world of crime and the world of work, between misery and the desire to improve.

The situation of the vagabond from the fourteenth to the eighteenth centuries shows, in most cases, a tendency to be uprooted from his home; a break with the original ties that protect him, so that he is forced to wander and to maintain an unstable and unpredictable life. The marginal comes from the most impoverished social strata. However, we should not rule out people from better-off sectors (a kind of luxury marginality).

c. Marginality and social change.

Marginalization is a social product that has its origin in the social structure, the organization of work and the dominant value system. All these factors provide a space, a hierarchy that the marginalized do not possess, and are therefore frowned upon. However, these same marginalized people have been the protagonists of innumerable changes in pre-industrial societies.

Thus, the industrial and political revolution of the eighteenth century destroyed but at the same time generated new forms of marginality, since all those who were uprooted from a territory (the well-known expulsion suffered by thousands of peasants in the transition from feudalism to capitalism), wandered until they reached the cities, joining the first industries as workers. The new working conditions were not only miserable but also precarious and socially marginalized, until well into the 19th century.

According to A. Comte, they were proletarians who camped in the midst of Western society without locating themselves in it. And although these proletarians cease to be marginalized to integrate into industrial society, new forms of marginality are born associated with the society that is being born, reproducing the old association between misery and crime.

This same situation can be compared with what is happening today, as long as it is understood that the whole process of transformation of the productive apparatus, that is, the incorporation of new technologies, globalization and the recomposition of labor relations (labor flexibilization) lead to the emergence of a new marginality. On the one hand, unemployment and the precariousness of working conditions (short-term contracts, low wages, etc.); and on the other hand, the difficulty of entering into regulated labor relations leads large sectors to feel displaced. This is the case of young people who have to support themselves in different ways: undeclared work, delinquency, social assistance, etc. For it is not they (or any other marginalized people, such as those over 50 years of age) who have chosen and brought about the transformations in the productive system.

We are witnessing the development of a new culture of randomness and in-between spaces, where new marginalized people appear, seeking, like Lazarillo, to insert themselves into society.

II. Social vulnerability

For there to be social inequality, a society must cease to be divided into heterogeneous blocks and become a set of groups in competition with each other for the distribution of social wealth. Therefore, INEQUALITY IMPLIES A STRUGGLE WITHIN A SYSTEM characterized by the central presence of work and the idea of progress. THE EXCLUDED HAVE NOT WHAT TO FIGHT WITH, nor to be proud of.

A) Social inequalities and wage continuum

The struggle against inequality and the increase in the number of wage earners in industrial society was marked by two stages:

(a) From class confrontation to the reduction of social risks.

In the history of the struggle against inequality, those who held a radical position (against