Contenu du sommaire

With the prolonging of education, social inequalities in access to higher education have become a major concern in research on social stratification. This article provides an empirical description of how inequalities develop throughout secondary education with a view to explaining inequalities in access to higher education (he) in France. Based on the 1995 statistical sample of secondary school students, it estimates that inequalities in access to he are 81% the result of inequalities in attainment of the baccalauréat [end of high school diploma]. Confirming the cumulative aspect to education, the accumulation of negative academic results at secondary level strongly contributes to the under-representation of disadvantaged students among those who obtain their baccalauréat. The data also show that the educational careers of students with similar initial academic difficulties differ considerably according to their parents' level of education, confirming the hypothesis of compensatory advantage. Conversely, a reinforcement effect, leading to divergent educational careers among good students and depending on social background, is also highlighted where access to prestigious he tracks is concerned, further substantiating the hypothesis of compensatory advantage. These results underline the importance of considering interactions between school performance and social background in order to understand how inequalities develop throughout education.

While economic sociologists have produced a large literature on arrangements for guiding buyers when they face uncertainty, the way professionals choose their clients has not been studied much. Focusing on wealth managers, this article shows that, to channel a potential clientele, they also have to identify and select clients. Looking closely at the criteria that wealth managers are attentive to in identifying such clients brings to light these professionals' own representations of wealth. This empirical study proceeds by way of interviews with wealth managers and study of a journal focused on wealth management issues and aimed at a professional readership. We first analyze how wealth managers try to hide the market dimension of the relationship with clients to attract them. We focus then on two simple tools they use to identify the targeted clientele, showing that they are not sufficient to explain how clients circulate on markets. Last, we examine the race to attract a particular clientele—“new money”—presented as the most highly prized on wealth management markets.

While many studies in historical sociology have explored official statistics and their categories at the national level, including the role of statistical offices in the construction of the nation-state, statistics produced by international organizations, the standards and representations of the world that they transport, remain a field of research to be built. In the same way that national statistics have made the nation the frame of reference to observe labor relationships, in this article, we will develop the thesis that international occupational statistics play a key role in the construction of a globalized field of reference. Using the example of the evolutions of the category “family workers” in the ilo statistics between 1919 and 1982, this contribution uncovers the social and cognitive conditions for the emergence of a global comparative framework.

Sexuality is not widely explored in social science research on sex changes. Yet it plays a fundamental role in transition. Through a study based on interviews and a secondary analysis of a quantitative survey, this article argues that sexual orientations have gendered meanings that contribute to constructing or deconstructing social belonging to one sex category or another. Before transitioning, half of trans' women were heterosexual men, while trans' men were almost all previously lesbians. Over the course of the sex change many trans' women turn toward female heterosexuality, whereas many trans men turn to male homosexuality. Although heterosexuality shapes femininity more than masculinity, homosexuality provides greater emancipation from the former than the latter. However, sexual orientations also have class significations; for trans' men in particular, declaring oneself to be gay can be a form of social distinction.