Inequality, Power and Change

Week 15 · Society, Power & Collective Action

How unequal resources, status, institutions, and voice shape opportunity and the possibility of change.

Time to set aside
6-8 hours: 2 hours reading, 1 hour concept map, 2 hours evidence audit, 1 hour synthesis.
Progress
Ready to begin

Your AI study mentor

Sofia's briefing

Why this week

Inequality is not only a difference in outcomes; it can also mean unequal resources, risk, voice, credibility, and power to shape the rules. I placed this after governance so you can ask not only what rules exist, but who shapes them and absorbs their costs. The mechanism map helps trace how ordinary procedures can reproduce inequality without reducing the explanation to a single villain.

What to watch for

A visible gap is not yet an explanation. Trace the rules, resources, beliefs, and feedback loops that could reproduce it.

Which ordinary rule or procedure most strongly preserves the unequal outcome?

  1. 1
    Orient

    Start with the aims and questions so the readings have a purpose.

  2. 2
    Read actively

    Use the prompt under each source to produce notes, not highlights alone.

  3. 3
    Apply

    Test the ideas through observation, analysis, or a small intervention.

  4. 4
    Demonstrate

    Save the deliverables and check your work against the completion criteria.

Questions and aims

Define what you are trying to understand before deciding that you have understood it.

Study Aims

  • Distinguish income, wealth, status, power, and opportunity.
  • Explain how institutions can reproduce inequality without a single malicious actor.
  • Separate a distributional claim from a causal claim.
  • Evaluate one proposed reform for effects, feasibility, and legitimacy.

Guiding Questions

  • Which resource is unequally distributed?
  • Through which mechanism does inequality persist?
  • Who has the power to define the problem and the acceptable solution?

Before you read

Use the readings to revise the case study you began in Module 2. Add exposure, options, voice, and dignity to the analysis, not only prices or incentives.

Core material

Reading plan

4 guided readings, in the order shown.

  1. 90 min

    Introduction to Sociology 3e: Social Stratification Opens in new tab

    Nathan Keirns and contributors · OpenStax

    Why it earns a place

    An accessible introduction to social stratification, class, status, mobility, and the institutional reproduction of inequality.

    How to study it

    Read the introduction and sections on stratification, global inequality, and social mobility. Build a mechanism map rather than a list of terms.

  2. 60 min

    Justice Opens in new tab

    S. Matthew Liao · Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy

    Why it earns a place

    A survey of justice as a central problem in ethical and political philosophy, including distribution, rights, and fairness.

    How to study it

    Return to distributive justice and equality. Identify which conception of fairness your case currently assumes.

  3. 45 min

    An Introduction to the Science of Social Psychology Opens in new tab

    Noba Project contributors · Noba Project

    Why it earns a place

    An expert-written orientation to how social psychologists study the ways other people affect thought, feeling, behavior, and relationships.

    How to study it

    Return to social identity and group sections. Note how status beliefs and categorization may support or challenge institutional patterns.

  4. 75-90 min

    Capital, Volume I: Selected Chapters Opens in new tab

    Karl Marx · Penguin Classics

    Why it earns a place

    Marx's analysis of commodities, value, labor, capital accumulation, and the social relations hidden inside economic exchange.

    How to study it

    Read chapters 1 and 4. Reconstruct Marx's account of commodities, exchange, and the social relation hidden inside a market transaction.

Apply and demonstrate

7 study actions turn the reading into observable work.

Practice

  1. Choose one inequality relevant to your collective problem. Define the unit: income, time, health, access, voice, risk, or status.
  2. Trace one causal chain from an institutional rule to an unequal outcome. Mark each link as evidence, assumption, or hypothesis.
  3. Identify who benefits, who pays, who decides, and who is missing from the debate.
  4. Compare a reform that changes resources with one that changes power or voice.

Deliver

  • A causal mechanism map.
  • An evidence-and-assumption table.
  • A 600-word reform comparison that names winners, losers, and implementation risks.

Confirm

  • You have defined inequality precisely enough to measure or observe it.
  • You have not presented correlation as a complete causal explanation.
  • You can describe a power relationship, not only a gap in outcomes.

Additional Resources

Optional resources for going further after the reading plan.