The New Social Mobility

THE NEW SOCIAL MOBILITY
Contents
List of tables and figures
	Tables
	Figures
Acknowledgements
Preface: the confusing world of social mobility
1. ‘There’s a lot of it about’
	How much mobility is there?
	Categories and classes
	Mobility within a (class) hierarchy
	The consequences of mobility for winners and losers
	The political rediscovery of social mobility
2. Log cabins and field  marshals’ batons
	Mobility in political philosophy and history
	‘Traditional’ and ‘modern’ societies: the politics of immobility
	Multistage economic development and modernisation
	The opportunity myth and the safety valve
3. Politicians rediscover social mobility
	Early and long-term political concerns with social mobility
	Labour’s rediscovery of social mobility as a political issue
	Social mobility: the other parties’ rediscoveries
	The media and mobility
4. Documenting mobility
	The devil is in the detail: Labour’s White Paper
	The Liberal Democrats’ Independent Commission on Social Mobility
	The Conservative Party’s mobility documents
	The Coalition government’s official statement on social mobility
	Education and mobility
5. Tracing the origins
	Getting On, Getting Ahead
	The Aldridge Reports
	Relying on official documents
6. Why low, why now?
	The political usefulness of ‘low mobility’ to New Labour
	The political utility of ‘low mobility’ for opposition parties
	New challenges, new anxieties
	An immobile ‘underclass’?
	Exclusion and riots
	Voting instead of violence: Scottish separatism
	Voting without violence: England
7. The pessimism of earlier academic mobility analysis
	The LSE study: Social Mobility in Britain
	The Nuffield Mobility Study
	The economists’ income mobility
	The limitations of conventional mobility analysis
8. The emergence of a new society
	Industrial and occupational demographics: sectoral changes
	Occupational transition: the long-term picture
	Occupational transition: the recent picture
	Occupational transition: the new hidden hand
	Necessary but not sufficient
9. The new mobility regime
	Women, paid work and female class
	Gender differences in rates of occupational change and absolute mobility
	Gender differences in comparative mobility chances
	The problem with demonstrating trends in mobility rates
10. Misconceptions of schooling and meritocracy
	Connecting ability, education and occupational outcome
	Accounting for meritocracy: SAD or DIM
	Schooling inequalities
11. Tightening bonds and professional access
	Higher education for higher occupations
	Getting in, getting on
	Selection and selectivity
Twelve
12. Moving on
	Four kinds of class mobility prospects: the upper reaches
	Four kinds of class mobility prospects: the service class
	Four kinds of class mobility prospects: the middle of the pack
	Four kinds of class mobility prospects: the bottom of the heap
	A more pessimistic view of mobility prospects
	New Social Mobilities?
	An even newer social mobility
Appendix
	The mobility table
	Absolute and relative mobility
	Classes and categories

	Operational difficulties in comparisons
	The ‘Social Mobility Identification Kit’
	Alternative ways of seeing mobility: mobility between incomes
References
Index