The Career of Status Crystallization: A Sociological Odyssey

Since it was first introduced half a century ago, Status Crystallization[SC] which is also know as Status Incongruence, Consistencyor Inconsistency has been used in over 200 research papers. Many have acceptedit and treated it as a potentially useful substantive construct and evengeneralized it somewhat. A few have tried to forge theoretical links between itand such related concepts as socialization and mobility. A third group has takena more combative approach and declared it either theoretically vacuous orempirically irrelevant. Much of the debate is apparently a failed attempt atcommunication between the innumerate and the a- theoretical. This paperevaluates both of these tendencies through the examination of a selection ofcontributions to the debate. The conclusions reached include, first, thatSC has never been appropriately measured or tested so thatany claims regarding its efficacy are premature and second that a coherentsociological paradigm must have a place for SC in it. Anysociological theory which cannot provide a meaningful place forSC is deemed too restricted to be of any lasting interest.From this second point the paper addresses the role that operationalization andempirical research play in the formulation and refinement of social theories andthe need for social theorists to become more methodologically astute. Buildingon insights derived from recent developments in chaos theory, the paperconcludes with a general discussion of SC as a dynamic conceptbest modelled with differential equations.