White-collar worker

Japanese: ホワイトカラー（英語表記）white-collar worker

A general term for employees in the non-operational departments of a corporation, such as middle and lower-level managers, professional workers, clerical workers, and sometimes sales workers. In modern society, the development and organization of science and technology, as well as the advancement of bureaucracy, have expanded departments such as management, sales, and information that are not directly involved in production. As a result, they do not own the means of production or sales themselves, and are employees, but are evaluated based on a certain level of education and ability. They have also been produced in large numbers as a social class that reaches the level of the middle class in terms of economic power and standard of living. For this reason, white-collar workers are called the new middle class, replacing the old middle class. Unlike the old middle class, where the bases of life for work and residence are the same or adjacent to each other, white-collar workers are separate, so their orientation toward local society and political consciousness have usually been defined as "indifferent type." However, from the perspective of the rights consciousness of residents = citizens, they can also be said to be a class that has acquired the idea of the so-called civil minimum, which is to secure the minimum necessary living base as residents = citizens, and the idea of modernization. This is different from the sense of community often seen among the old middle class, and at the same time, it also shows a clear break with the consciousness of the power elite and large business owners. This is a clear manifestation of the fact that the quantitative increase in the white-collar class has led to its stratification, with many people experiencing a relatively lower status, and is the reason why the disintegration of the new middle class, centered around white-collar workers, is often pointed out.

Source: Encyclopaedia Britannica Concise Encyclopedia About Encyclopaedia Britannica Concise Encyclopedia Information

Japanese:

企業体の中・下級管理者，専門職従事者，事務，ときに販売にたずさわる非現業部門の雇用労働者の総称。現代社会における科学技術の発展と組織化，さらに官僚制の進行によって，直接生産にたずさわらない管理，販売，情報などの部門が拡大され，その結果，それ自体は生産手段，営業手段を所有せず，被雇用者であるが，一定の学歴や能力によって評価される。また経済力，生活水準においては中産階級のレベルに達する社会層として大量に生み出された。ここからホワイトカラーは旧中間層に代る新中間層と呼ばれている。職住の生活拠点が一致または隣接している旧中間層に対し，ホワイトカラーではこれが分離されていることから，地域的社会への志向や政治意識は「無関心型」と規定されるのが通例であったが，住民＝市民の権利意識という観点からみれば，住民＝市民としての必要最小限の生活基盤の確保という，いわゆるシビルミニマムの発想や，近代化の発想を身につけている層ともいえる。それは，旧中間層にしばしばみられる地域共同意識と異質であると同時に，権力エリートや大企業主の意識とも明白な断絶を示す。これはホワイトカラー層の量的増大がその階層分化を生み，相対的にその地位の低下した者が多くなったことの端的な現れであり，ホワイトカラーを中心とする新中間層の分解化がしばしば指摘されるゆえんである。

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