Transnational migrants and theorising stratification: Towards new paradigms of inequality

This paper considers how the experiences of transnational migration in the contemporary period problematise the theorisation of stratification. Drawing on research data from two comparative research projects in Europe it discusses how migration and experiences of racial and ethnic exclusion, as well as counter-strategies by migrants, need to be incorporated into the analysis of social stratification in modern societies. It looks particularly at the revival of class analysis found in the more culturally inflected approaches and suggests how ethnicity, racism and their intersections requires moving away from a traditional class based paradigm. In addition the paper looks at conceptions of cultural and social capital and how they need to be embedded more carefully within approaches to inequality and hierarchy. In this way the paper attempts to contribute to the important debate on the ways in which social identities and hierarchies can be understood.