SOCIAL-STRUCTURE IN SOUTH-EASTERN EUROPE SOCIETIES AND THE BOUNDARIESOF CLASS-THEORETICAL CATEGORIES

Moving on from both the older and the more modern arguments concerning the usefulness and limitations of the categories employed in class th eory analysis, Sterbling brings together historical and recent discove ries on social structure which clearly support the hypothesis that the principle of class creation has not come to dominate the structure in any of the South-East European societies subjected to closer examinat ion. Instead, social structures in these societies are to a considerab le extent characterized by a complex combination of three other struct ural principles, namely political exclusion, meritocratic and function al differentiation and traditional exclusion based on sociocultural, i n particular ethnic affiliation.