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IN A RECENT paper Mr. Runciman concludes by inviting replies to his argument that it is logically and conceptually useful to employ the tripartite distinction between `class' `status' and `power' in the analysis of social stratification. Mr. Runciman does not, of course, deny the existence of links between these three dimensions, but suggests that such links must be seen contingent empirical relationships and not necessary logical ones. I hope that the following paper will provide such a reply. It must be clear that the following criticism is directed, in the main, to those parts of the paper in which Mr. Runciman is concerned with the logical and conceptual problem. The essay in question also contains a clear and valuable assessment of the problems encountered in any attempt to measure the three types of inequality. In the first part of the paper I propose to give a critical assessment of certain central aspects of Mr. Runciman's argument and, in the second part, I will put forward a very brief formulation of what I consider to be a more meaningful alternative view of the relationships between class, status, and power. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper discusses the small groups literature on status organizing processes in decision- snaking groups whose members differ in external status. This literature demonstrates that status characteristics, such as age, sex, and race determine the distribution of participation, influence, and prestige among members of such groups. This effect is independent of any prior cultural belief in the relevance of the status characteristic to the task. To explain this result, we assume that status determines evaluations of, and performance-expectations for group members and hence the distribution of participation, influence, and prestige. We stipulate conditions sufficient to produce this effect. Further, to explain the fact that the effect is independent of prior cultural belief, we assume that a status characteristic becomes relevant is all situations except when it is culturally known to be irrelevant. Direct experiment supports each assumption in this explanation independently of the others. Subsequent work devoted to refining and extending the theory finds among other things that, given two equally relevant status characteristics, individuals combine all inconsistent status information rather than reduce its inconsistency. If this result survives further experiment it extends the theory on a straightforward basis to multi-characteristic status situations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

It is argued and illustrated that conceiving and measuring social mobility in the conventional way, as a difference between two statuses, may lead to gross misinterpretations of evidence. These difficulties may be avoided by considering individual status measures and their causal relationships. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]