Social moblity – The Making of Indian Engineers

Jules Naudet, Entrer dans l’élite. Parcours de réussite en France, aux Etats-Unis et en Inde. Paris: PUF, 2012

“Cet ouvrage analyse la manière dont des personnes originaires de milieux modestes et ayant accédé aux positions les plus prestigieuses du secteur privé, de la haute fonction publique et de l’université, parviennent à s’ajuster à leur nouveau statut social. Réussissent-elles à se « convertir » à leur nouveau groupe ? Cherchent-elles à conserver des liens forts avec leur milieu d’origine?? Comment gèrent-elles la contradiction de cette double appartenance ? Jules Naudet répond à ces questions en s’appuyant sur une enquête menée en France, en Inde et aux États-Unis, où il a recueilli près de 160 récits de vie de personnes ayant connu une ascension sociale exceptionnellement forte. Tandis que les Indiens témoignent avant tout d’un attachement profond à leur milieu d’origine, les Américains minimisent le contraste, donnant l’impression que la réussite « va de soi ». Enfin, les Français opposent deux mondes profondément différents, voire irréconciliables. Pour mener à bien l’analyse de ce riche matériau empirique, Jules Naudet propose un renouvellement de la problématique de la mobilité sociale et des outils théoriques traditionnellement mobilisés par les chercheurs travaillant sur cette question.”

Bérénice Girard

S. M. Dubey, Social mobility among the professions: study of the professions in a transitional Indian city, Bombay, Popular Prakashan, 1975

“This was a pioneering work on the sociology of professions in India based on a study of three hundred members of six professions (Free professionals : lawyers and medical doctors ; Salaried professionals : Civil and Railways officials, engineers and overseers, doctors (in service), university teachers, college teachers, bank managers ; Semi-professionals : journalists) from Gorakhpur, in Uttar Pradesh. The extent of mobility in three generations and its causes and consequences have been examined in terms of the major variables of occupation, education, income, caste and family.

In his analysis S. M. Dubey covers a wide range of topics, such as the theoretical framework of class, status, mobility and professions; the nature of the transitional city, the growth of professions and their social composition and nature of physical, educational, occupational and psychic mobility among the professions. The author has maintained a good balance between the stratification concepts and approaches that are fashionable among the Western sociologists and the unique forces and conditions that influence the structure of the Indian society.

At the final phase of the study, the author touches upon some of the basic issues of stratification. He believes that in their formulation, the functional and conflict theorists of stratification as well as the liberal democracies and communist societies have equally fragmented the ideas of equality which needs a careful treatment in its totality.

The members of the professions are modern elites of India; a study of their growth and mobility is, therefore, of the highest importance for understanding the direction of social change in India.”

S. M. Dubey was Professor and Head of the Department of Sociology and Centre for Sociological Study of the Frontier Region at the University of Dibrugarh. He was a product of the Department of Sociology, University of Lucknow. He had been previously lecturing to the Post Graduate students at the University of Gorakhpur since 1959. He was awarded the Doctorate by the University of Gorakhpur, in 1967, on his work ‘Social mobility among the professions in a city in Transition’ which was considered as the first major and systematic work on the Sociology of Mobility and Professions in India. The present book, is the revised version of his Ph.D. thesis. He joined the University of Dibrugarh in September 1968 and later on has been elected V. C. of the University.

Jules Naudet, Entrer dans l’élite. Parcours de réussite en France, aux Etats-Unis et en Inde. Paris: PUF, 2012

See Also:

Bérénice Girard

Roland Lardinois