Bio: (1929-2014) British sociologist. David Lockwood studied at the London School of Economics, and taught at that university, and also at the University of Cambridge and, the University of Essex. Lockwood is best known for his study of classes and class mobility.

In the book The Blackcoated Worker (1958), Lockwood, from a neo-Weberian theoretical point of view, states that there was no proletarianization of office workers in Britain. He believes that there are three aspects of the class situation: the market situation, the work situation, and the status situation. The market situation includes wages, job security, and prospects for advancement. The work situation includes social relations at work between employers and subordinate staff, primarily in the context of the scope of supervision. The status situation refers to the level of prestige that some types of employees have in the company. Lockwood concluded that, except in terms of salaries, employees kept most of the advantages in all three aspects of the class situation in relation to skilled manual workers.

The book The Affluent Worker in the Class Structure (1969), presents the results of large empirical research on the rich manual workers in the industrial city of Luton. That study was conducted jointly by Lockwood and John Goldthorpe, Frank Bechhofer, and Jennifer Platt. The authors found that there were big differences between this group of rich workers and traditional manual workers. Traditional workers lived in tightly-knit working communities and worked in traditional industries. They lived in isolation and had a great sense of solidarity and group affiliation, while individualism was rare. They had a fatalistic and passive outlook on life and were focused on the immediate and direct satisfaction of needs. On the other hand, rich workers were characterized by individualism and the instrumental view of work. The same study argues that the rich individualized instrumentalist worker will replace the proletarian traditionalist. 

In his book Solidarity and Schism (1992), Lockwood presents a macro-sociological theory of social order. He believes that theories that emphasize integration and consensus (e.g., functionalism), as well as conflict theories of society, such as Marxism, are wrong. There is always integration in society through common cultural norms and social statuses, but there are also class conflicts that arise over the allocation of scarce resources. The material substratum, where the distribution of power and resources happens, forms the base for social division and schism. Norms and values, on the other hand, limit conflict by creating solidarity and consensus. The difference between two distinct levels of social – „social integration“ and „system integration“ - is crucial for his view of the problems of social order. Social integration refers to social interactions that are carried by norms that people use to define situations where interaction is happening and the resources they use in those interactions. System integration refers to material relations and institutions through which norms and resources are organized.

Main works

The Blackcoated Worker (1958);

The Affluent Worker in the Class Structure (1969);

Solidarity and Schism (1992);

The Destruction of the Soviet Union (2000);

Moral Rules and Political Action: A Rule-Consequentialist Account of the Relationship between Ethics and Politics (2012).