Topic > The Importance of Slavery in the Slave Class System

One of the most important aspects of class societies is their industrial economic base. In Europe, the old nobility lost its position of economic and political dominance. A stratification system was needed that could respond to the need for an educated and more qualified workplace to operate in the more complex industrial economy. The stratification system allows for class placement in terms of ability or merit, rather than in terms of the ascriptive criteria of previous stratification systems. Its major degree is related to achievement rather than attribution. The normative emphasis is placed on the inequality resulting from the existence of equal opportunities or free competition. In early class systems the most important form of inequality was economic. Both ownership of the means of production and professional skill brought high economic reward that influenced political status and power. Economic inequalities are not as important today as inequalities in bureaucratic power. Top positions in corporate and government bureaucratic institutions are the most important forms of class superiority in advanced industry