Marginalization
This article is about the sociological concept. For the use of the word marginalization in probability theory, see marginalization (probability).Marginalisation or
marginalization (
US) refers to the overt or covert trends within societies whereby those perceived as lacking desirable traits or deviating from the group norms tend to be excluded by wider society and ostracised as undesirables.
The idea was amply expressed by
Louis Wirth speaking of
minority groups thus: "A group of people who, because of their physical or cultural characteristics, are singled out from the others in the society in which they live for differential and unequal treatment, and who therefore regard themselves as objects of collective discrimination."
[Wirth, L. "The Problem of Minority Groups." pp. 347â€"72 in R. Linton, ed., The Science of Man in the World Crisis. New York: Columbia University Press, p. 347, 1945.] In this respect, what is apparent first is a distinctive social group, with their own characteristic features, then the singling out or victimisation by the more numerically dominant members of the host society, and hence the subsequent unequal treatment leading to acts of discrimination, social ostracism, etc. This is the essence of marginalisation.
In the context of the term
marginalisation, common subjective terms can be better defined: "
war" is essentially the incarnation of a macroscopic social violence, aimed at the marginalization of a perceived enemy. The "enemy," in essence, is the
personification of a
peer as posing a threat of marginalisation; hence, either by "their own choosing", or by a choice of targeted
aggression, the enemy is a marginalised entity. Marginalisation is at the core of more general human social conflict issues, which have various terms for their aspects and incarnations:
racism,
ethnism, etc.
Eugenics was the name given to a set of so-called science-based ideas that advocated the marginalization of people deemed
inferior, by criteria of their race alone.
Within the
Developed World, racial, or ethnic
minority groups, stand out as being the most marginalized social groups. This also includes the elderly, the sick, the disabled, the obese, homosexuals and lesbians. All these groups tend to suffer from some forms of marginalization and a typical host of social ills;
poverty,
unemployment, poor
education and poor
health. They each tend to be ostracised and so suffer various forms of
social exclusion. In fact, much of the
progressive reform of the last century has been driven by the need for societies to mitigate damaging internal unrest, by a deliberate reversing of previous trends that engendered political and social marginalisation of racial and political minorities and to a certain degree women.
In terms of
free will and
self-determination, marginalisation comes in two distinct forms: by the chosen action of the marginalised, and by the wants (or claimed needs) of the society. At one extreme end, those in the
Third World, under impoverished conditions, through no choice of their own, being far removed from the protectionism that exists for people in the
First World, are often left to die due to
hunger,
disease, and war.
Conservatism and marginalization
The views of some people, often described as "conservative philosophy" are based on a concept that marginalization of other peoples is both a fact of life and therefore a necessary act. This view arises from the traditional and
survivalist perception that "limited resources leads to limited supportability"; therefore "by definition, self-preservation is inherently marginalizing" toward others. In essence, this
relativist aspect of conservative thought extends from the
individualist claim that "better
they perish than
I perish," which itself scales by
ethnic boundaries to the
collectivist view of "better
they perish than
we perish."
"
Conservatism" is a very subjective
political term, has subsequently any number of variants; many conservatives describe themselves as "practicalists" and among those there are differing views of human marginalization as "practical" or not, depending on the context allowed in the hypothesis. Thus, for the above description, "conservatism" refers to those general political views which claim that human conflicts are unavoidable, and the circumstances on which those conflicts are based are unchangeable.
*
marginalized group*
Social exclusion
