Class and causation in bourdieu

Abstract

Bourdieu has long refused to affiliate himself with any of the isms deriving from the classical figures in sociology, asserting that, inevitably ptu'ased in either/or terms, they tend to function according to a logic of accusation rather than the logic of science (1990a, pp. 27-28). Of the oppositions to which the isms give rise, it is no doubt the confrontation of Marx with Weber, potentially founded on any one of various divergences, which most frequently offers him the opportunity to voice this refusal. And, even if one is inclined to doubt Bourdieu's rather complete withdrawal of meaning from such categorical formulations, there is no reason to deny the possibility that, in addition to their substantive content, these oppositions may serve as indicators of underlying confusions. It is this vein that we might reach across time and space in order to establish a confrontation between two verdicts offered on Bourdieu's work itself. First, we can note the judgment of Poulantzas, who in the course of a discussion of the class position of managers, associates Bourdieu with a perspective similar to that of Miliband and Mills. The concept of cultural capital, it is asserted, merely captures the status unity of various elite sub-groups, and the