I would like to recommend Richard Wilkinson's ‘Mind the Gap - Hierarchies,
Health and Human Evolution’ in the Darwinism To-day series (70pp). It is a
very well expressed essay. The evidence he calls upon covers a great deal
of standard work on the social consequences of inequality. However, the
value of his work is in the way he uses the evidence to argue the
interrelation of fundamental social dynamics represented by a world which
has in a few thousand years of its modernity created a wide range of
inequalities and hierarchies. He very cogently draws together, the
continuity of damaging differences in social status which underlie the
endocrinology of bad health and the psychology of violence. My view is that
he usefully extends Marxist and Freudian scholarship in the context of the
modern world.
He concludes ”If we are to improve health and social capital, if we are to
free ourselves of anti-social prejudices and create a more inclusive society
the reduction of inequalities must surely be a key political objective.”
He seems to realise, by analogy, that just as say experimental psychology
would itself do little to change human nature neither will numerate science
or social science change society without organised pressure. In a phrase
he quotes, one can’t leave “resource holding power” undisturbed.
“Mind the Gap” is a polemical statement where conviction and the problem
openly predominate and the conclusion is far from anodyne because it well
expresses the force of argument
Ray Shapiro.
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