Book Review: Social Class in the 21st Century
| Author | Laura Piacentini |
| Published date | 01 October 2017 |
| DOI | 10.1177/0964663917710975a |
| Date | 01 October 2017 |
| Subject Matter | Book Reviews |
exercise in using law to explore the utopian imagination or using a utopia n imagination
to explore the law.
The case for the need to explore utopianism in relation to law is made clearly and
convincingly in the The case for the need to explore utopianism in relation introduction
and the book produced is both an interesting and engaging contribution to that field.
However, perhaps reflecting the difficulties of disciplinarity (and perhaps, implicitly
pointing to the capacity of utopian theory and literature to offer an appeal beyond
disciplinary boundaries), in making the case for the importance of their text, one wonders
if more recognition by the editors might also be given to aligned areas in which interest
in utopianism has been growing in recent years, such as criminology (see, e.g. Malloch
and Munro, 2013). Not only would this help provide a richer understanding of the ways
in which the concept of ‘utopia’ and utopian theory has been deployed as an antidote to
the anti-utopianism of previous decades, it would also help situate this text as part of a
broader shift in contemporary social theory and research while not disputing the original
contribution it makes in its particular focus on legal theory.
This would necessarily be a trade-off between appealing to a specialist legal theory
audience and a more general readership, and it is a strength of the collection that there is,
in a sense, something for everyone: both legal theorists and scholars of utopia alike.
However, as a means of inviting legal theorists into a consideration of utopia, this seems
a timely, necessary and genuinely interesting collection of papers. As a means of inviting
scholars of utopia into the world of legal theory (which is the perspective to which this
reviewer belongs), it is, perhaps, less satisfying – not because the ideas are not interesting
or relevant or important, but because disciplinary assumptions sometimes shape the ideas
presented, making them less accessible to the uninitiated reader. That said, in any case, it
is perhaps an exercise to explore the various definitions of utopia or applications of the
utopian theory, that, for this reader at least, this text finds its greatest appeal.
LYNNE COPSON
The Open University, UK
Reference
Malloch M and Munro B (eds) (2013) Crime, Critique and Utopia. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
M SAVAGE, N CUNNINGHAM, F DEVINE, S FRIEDMAN, D LAURISON, L MCKENZIE,
A MILES, H SNEE, and P WAKELING, Social Class in the 21st Century. London: Pelican Books, 2015,
pp. 480, ISBN 9780241004227, £8.99 (pbk).
There is a passage in Savage et al.’s Social Class in the 21st Century that sums up rather
nicely why the subject of class vexes, energizes and divides so many. Savage describes
the topic as a ‘lightening conductor for anxieties ...between economic realities and
beliefs ...’ (p. 7). The fascination with class comes in many forms, but it is this sense
of anxiety about status, about engagement with the world, with homes, post-codes and so
on that has generated an obsession with classification particularly among the ‘middle
652 Social & Legal Studies 26(5)
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