D2.Soc.17.9-12: Why Power and Inequality Can Lead to Conflict
In plain English: D2.Soc.17.9-12 is the C3 Framework sociology indicator for grades 9-12 that asks students to analyze why the distribution of power and inequalities can result in conflict. Students separate who gets what from who decides, and trace how a sense of injustice, blocked channels, organization and force can turn inequality into open struggle.
Analyze why the distribution of power and inequalities can result in conflict.
C3 Framework for Social Studies (NCSS) · Dimension 2: Applying Disciplinary Concepts and Tools · Discipline: Sociology · Stratification and Inequality · Official standard
D2.Soc.17.9-12 asks students to analyze why the distribution of power and inequalities can result in conflict. Inequality is an unequal share of resources such as income, land or access; the distribution of power is who makes, interprets and enforces the rules that decide those shares. Conflict here means an open struggle between groups, from protests and strikes to lawsuits and, at the extreme, violence. Analyzing why conflict arises means asking when people judge an unequal share to be unjust, whether those with less power have a way to change the rules, how groups organize around a grievance, and what the stronger side does in response.
The sources are four passages from the 1915 Final Report of the U.S. Commission on Industrial Relations, which Congress created in 1912 to find "the underlying causes of dissatisfaction in the industrial situation." The report discusses strikes of 1912-1914 at Lawrence and Paterson and in West Virginia and Colorado. The commission's members disagreed, and the passages give three views: its research director's list of causes (Sources 1 and 2), Commissioners John R. Commons and Florence J. Harriman on class conflict and government (Source 3), and Commissioners Harris Weinstock, S. Thruston Ballard and Richard H. Aishton on strength, the public and industrial peace (Source 4). An invented case about a community garden (Source 5) lets students apply the analysis to a small modern conflict.
Learning Objectives
By the end of this lesson, students will be able to:
Distinguish an unequal distribution of resources from an unequal distribution of power over the rules
Explain how a sense of injustice, blocked channels for change and organization can turn inequality into open conflict
Analyze a historical source's explanation of the causes of conflict and evaluate the evidence it offers
Compare how sources with different viewpoints explain the same conflicts
Apply the analysis to a new case and support each step with evidence
Prior Knowledge Required
Students should already be comfortable with:
Interpreting the effects of inequality on groups and individuals D2.Soc.16.9-12
Identifying common patterns of social inequality D2.Soc.15.9-12
Assessing how well a text's reasoning and evidence support its claims RH.9-10.8
"Invented situation: two teams share one practice field. In Town A, the teams get equal hours, and a coach from each team sets the schedule together. In Town B, one team gets most of the hours, and its own coach sets the schedule alone. In which town is an argument more likely, and why? Name two separate reasons."
Students usually name the unequal hours first. Push for the second reason: in Town B the team with fewer hours also has no say in the rules. Write the two words on the board, inequality (who gets what) and power (who decides), and tell students that today's sources argue that conflict grows where the two combine.
Direct Instruction20 minutes
Key terms.Inequality is an unequal share of resources among groups. The distribution of power is who makes, interprets and enforces the rules. Legitimacy is the belief that a rule or a share is fair and properly decided. A grievance is a complaint that a group shares. A channel is an accepted way to press a grievance and change a rule, such as a vote, a court, a hearing or bargaining. Conflict is an open struggle between groups.
A working model for this page. Built from the sources, not taken from any one of them: conflict becomes more likely when (1) a group judges an unequal share to be unjust, (2) it lacks power or channels to change the rules, (3) it organizes around the grievance, and (4) the stronger side answers with refusal or force instead of discussion. Diagram 1 draws the model. The model describes tendencies, not certainties, and the sources disagree about how much weight each step deserves.
Background. Congress created the Commission on Industrial Relations by an act of August 23, 1912. The act required at least three members who were employers and at least three representatives of organized labor among its nine members. Source 1 comes from the report of the commission's director of research and investigation, Basil M. Manly. Chairman Frank P. Walsh and the three labor members signed Manly's report. The three employer members, who wrote Source 4, declined to endorse it: they wrote that it placed "practically all the responsibility for the causes of industrial unrest at the doors of one side" and backed the report of Commissioners Commons and Harriman (Source 3) instead. Read Sources 1 and 2 as one viewpoint within the commission. Source 1 names strikes at Lawrence and Paterson and in West Virginia and Colorado, and the I. W. W. (the Industrial Workers of the World, a labor organization).
1It is presumed that Congress had in mind, in directing the Commission to inquire into the "causes of dissatisfaction in the industrial situation," something far different from that "dissatisfaction with the present which is the hope of the future," that desire for better things which drives men forever forward. Such dissatisfaction is the mainspring of all progress, and is to be desired in every nation, in all walks of life.
2It is believed that Congress intended the inquiry to be directed to that unrest and dissatisfaction which grows out of the existence of intolerable industrial conditions, and which, if unrelieved, will in the natural course of events rise into active revolt or, if forcibly suppressed, sink into sullen hatred.
3Of the existence of such unrest ample evidence has been found. It is the basis of the establishment and growth of the I. W. W., whose card-carrying members number only a few thousands but which, as "a spirit and a vocabulary," permeates to a large extent enormous masses of workers, particularly among the unskilled and migratory laborers. But entirely apart from those who accept its philosophy and creed, there are numberless thousands of workers, skilled and unskilled, organized and unorganized, who feel bitterly that they and their fellows are being denied justice, economically, politically, and legally. Just how widespread this feeling is, or whether there is imminent danger of a quickening into active, nation-wide revolt, none can say. But no one who reads the papers from which the workers get their ideas and inspiration; no one who has studied with care the history of such strikes as those at Lawrence and Paterson, in West Virginia and Colorado, and has understood the temper of the strikers; no one who has associated with large numbers of workers in any part of the country, can fail to be impressed by the gravity of the situation.
4This sense of tension and impending danger has been expressed by numerous witnesses before the Commission, but by none more forcibly than by Mr. Daniel Guggenheim, a capitalist whose interests in mines and industrial plants extend to every part of the country. Chairman Walsh. What do you think has been accomplished by the philanthropic activities of the country in reducing suffering and want among the people? Mr. Guggenheim. There has a great deal been done. If it were not for what has been done and what is being done we would have revolution in this country.
5The sources from which this unrest springs are, when stated in full detail, almost numberless. But upon careful analysis of their real character they will be found to group themselves almost without exception under four main sources which include all the others. These four are: 1. Unjust distribution of wealth and income. 2. Unemployment and denial of an opportunity to earn a living. 3. Denial of justice in the creation, in the adjudication, and in the administration of law. 4. Denial of the right and opportunity to form effective organizations.
Basil M. Manly, Director of Research and Investigation, U.S. Commission on Industrial Relations, Source 1: The Commission's research director on the causes of industrial unrest (1915) (1915). Public domain (published 1915). Source text.
Source 2 continues the same report: its first cause of unrest, the distribution of wealth and income.
1The conviction that the wealth of the country and the income which is produced through the toil of the workers is distributed without regard to any standard of justice, is as widespread as it is deep-seated. It is found among all classes of workers and takes every form from the dumb resentment of the day laborer, who, at the end of a week's back-breaking toil, finds that he has less than enough to feed his family while others who have done nothing live in ease, to the elaborate philosophy of the "soap-box orator," who can quote statistics unendingly to demonstrate his contentions. At bottom, though, there is the one fundamental, controlling idea that income should be received for service and for service only, whereas, in fact, it bears no such relation, and he who serves least, or not at all, may receive most.
[...]
2In the highest paid occupations among wage earners, such as railroad engineers and conductors, glass-blowers, certain steel-mill employees, and a few of the building trades, the incomes will range from $1,500 to $2,000 at best, ignoring a few exceptional men who are paid for personal qualities. Such an income means, under present-day conditions, a fair living for a family of moderate size, education of the children through high school, a small insurance policy, a bit put by for a rainy day — and nothing more. With unusual responsibilities or misfortunes, it is too little, and the pinch of necessity is keenly felt. To attain such wages, moreover, means that the worker must be far above the average, either in skill, physical strength, or reliability. He must also have served an apprenticeship equal in length to a professional course. Finally, and most important, he or his predecessors in the trade must have waged a long, aggressive fight for better wages, for there are other occupations whose demand for skill, strength and reliability are almost as great as those mentioned, where the wages are very much less.
[...]
3Between one-fourth and one-third of the male workers 18 years of age and over, in factories and mines, earn less than $10 per week; from two-thirds to three-fourths earn less than $15, and only about one-tenth earn more than $20 a week. This does not take into consideration lost working time for any cause.
Basil M. Manly, Director of Research and Investigation, U.S. Commission on Industrial Relations, Source 2: The same report on the distribution of wealth and income (1915) (1915). Public domain (published 1915). Source text.
From resentment to an argument: Source 2, paragraph 1
Source 2 says the sense of injustice takes "every form from the dumb resentment of the day laborer" to "the elaborate philosophy of the 'soap-box orator.'" Why does that range matter for analyzing conflict?
Result: "Dumb" here means unspoken. A private, unspoken resentment does not by itself make a conflict. When a speaker turns the same feeling into a public argument, backed by "statistics," many people can recognize a shared grievance and act on it together. The passage shows one step of the model: an inequality becomes a group grievance when it is named and explained in public.
Measuring the gap: Source 2, paragraphs 2 and 3
Convert the report's figure for the best-paid wage earners, $1,500 a year, to a weekly amount and compare it with the $15 a week that, the report says, two-thirds to three-fourths of adult men in factories and mines did not reach.
Result: $1,500 / 52 is about $28.85 a week, which is about 1.9 times $15. Yet the report says even $1,500 to $2,000 bought "a fair living" and "nothing more." If the top of the wage scale bought only a modest living, most workers earned far less than that, while others "who have done nothing live in ease" (paragraph 1). The comparison, not only the low wage, feeds the sense of injustice.
Who controls force: Source 3, paragraph 2
Commons and Harriman write that since 1877 the contest between capital and labor has often brought "the army or militia called in to suppress one side or the other, according to the will of the executive." Analyze what this says about power.
Result: The outcome depended on which side the governor or president chose to support, not on a hearing of the facts. A group that sees force used against it, without a fair process, has more reason to judge the result unjust and to fight again. Unequal access to state power keeps the conflict going.
Same cut, different channels (invented example)
Invented example: two invented factories cut pay by the same amount. Factory A has a joint committee of workers and managers that meets every month; Factory B has no committee and no grievance process. Where is open conflict more likely, and why?
Result: In Factory B. The inequality is the same, but in Factory A the workers have a channel to press the grievance and possibly change the decision. In Factory B the only ways to be heard are outside the rules, such as a walkout. The difference is in the distribution of power, not in the pay cut.
Guided Practice15 minutes
Read Sources 3 and 4 together. Florence J. Harriman and John R. Commons wrote one report; Harris Weinstock, S. Thruston Ballard and Richard H. Aishton wrote that they "concur in the report prepared by Commissioner Commons" but dissented on two points, and Source 4 is the second point. Pause at each question and let pairs answer from the text before discussing.
Source 3, paragraph 1: what kinds of contests does the paragraph list, and what did Congress do about each?
Source 3, paragraph 3: whom do the authors blame for agitation, and what do they say must happen before "mere unfounded agitation" gives way?
Source 4, paragraph 1: what do the commissioners say about the right to strike and the right to a lockout?
Source 4, paragraph 2: according to the commissioners, what decides a contest between two sides of equal strength, and what problem do they see with it?
1There are, of course, criticisms and objections raised against industrial and other commissions. It is not claimed here that they always work well. But they work better than the system they have displaced and they have been found to be the only alternative where legislation attempts to regulate the relations of great conflicting and hostile interests. Many States and Congress have been forced by actual conditions to create railroad and interstate commerce commissions in order to take the details of the contest between railroads and shippers as far as possible out of the legislatures and the courts. Congress has been compelled, after twenty-five years of futile antitrust legislation, to turn over the contest between trusts and their competitors or customers, to a Federal Trade Commission. The contest between bankers and the commercial and business classes that depend on credit for their existence, has been turned over to the Federal Reserve Board.
2The contest between capital and labor is more serious than any of the other contests. Since the year 1877 it has frequently resulted practically in civil war, with the army or militia called in to suppress one side or the other, according to the will of the executive. It is claimed by some that this contest is irrepressible and will end in revolution, and at least it is plain, when the military power is called upon to decide a contest, that the ordinary machinery of government, which is fairly successful in other contests, has broken down.
3It is not a solution of the contest to claim that these outbreaks are caused solely by agitators and have no foundation in conditions that need remedying. Such a solution, carried to its limit, means the suppression of free speech, free press, and free assembly, which can be accomplished only by military power. That there are conditions which need remedying is shown by the enormous amount of labor legislation of the past three decades, and the enormous amount of new legislation proposed. This legislation has come from the free discussion and investigation of actual labor conditions, and, if there is no effective way for this discussion to be carried on and the alleged facts to be verified or disproved, then the result must be an excess of unfounded and impractical agitation mixed up with real grievances. There are unbridled agitators of this kind on both sides of the contest, and it is only when the two sides are brought together, and their charges, countercharges, and alleged grievances are boiled down by investigation to the residuum of facts, that mere unfounded agitation can be expected to give way to deliberations on remedies for recognized evils.
4This does not mean that both sides can be made to agree on remedies for all evils and grievances, even after they have agreed on the facts. It means only that there is found to be a much larger field than was supposed where they can agree, and it is worth while for legislation to provide the means for bringing both sides together for a continuous search after the common points of agreement. When they have agreed upon and disposed of less disputatious points, they are in a position to go on to those disputed points which had been thought irreconcilable. This is the main reason for creating Industrial Commissions with adequate powers of impartial investigation, with conferences and discussions by both sides, and with power to decide on regulations and then to enforce them.
John R. Commons and Florence J. Harriman, U.S. Commission on Industrial Relations, Source 3: Commissioners Commons and Harriman on commissions and class conflicts (1915) (1915). Public domain (published 1915). Source text.
1Second. We further dissent from said report in its limitation of public inquiry in labor disputes only to cases where both sides invite such inquiry. We believe that in the public interest there are times when compulsion in labor disputes is thoroughly justified. We feel, with organized labor, that there should be no restriction put upon the right to strike, realizing as we do, that the strike is the only weapon which, in the interest of labor, can be effectively and legally used to aid in bettering its conditions. We feel, also, that there should be no restriction placed upon the employer in his right to declare a lockout in order better to protect what he regards as his interest, and we therefore would not favor any plan that would inflict penalties upon the worker or upon the employer for declaring a strike or lockout.
2Where the two sides to a labor controversy are fairly well balanced in strength, the winning side must depend, in the last analysis, upon the support of public opinion. Public opinion, therefore, becomes a most important factor in the interest of industrial peace. Such public opinion, however, to be of value, must be enlightened. Under prevailing conditions this is almost impossible. All that the public is now able to get, as a rule, are garbled and ex parte statements, more or less misleading and unreliable, which simply tend to confuse the public mind.
3Where strikes and lockouts take place on a large scale, and more especially in connection with public utilities, the public inevitably becomes a third party to the issue, in that it has more at stake than both parties to the dispute combined. For example, if the street railways of a large city are tied up, the loss to the railway companies in the way of revenue, and to the workers in the way of wages, is great, but this loss becomes insignificant compared with the loss inflicted upon the rest of the community, to say nothing of the annoyance, inconvenience, and menace to life and property, which not infrequently occur in such industrial disputes. The public, therefore, as the third party to the issue, is justified in demanding that an investigation take place, and that the facts be ascertained and presented in an impartial spirit to the general public, so that ways and means may be found of adjudicating the dispute or of throwing the influence of a properly informed public opinion on the side which has the right in its favor.
Harris Weinstock, S. Thruston Ballard and Richard H. Aishton, U.S. Commission on Industrial Relations, Source 4: Commissioners Weinstock, Ballard and Aishton on strength, the public and industrial peace (1915) (1915). Public domain (published 1915). Source text.
Close by placing each source on Diagram 1: which steps of the model does each one stress? Diagram 2 shows the wage ranges from Source 2.
Independent Practice15 minutes
Read Source 5, an invented case with invented numbers. It is one small case, so it can illustrate the model but cannot test it.
1Invented case, written for this page. The town, the people and every number are invented. The invented town of Millrace has a community garden with 60 plots on city land. A five-member garden committee assigns the plots and sets the rules. Committee members are chosen at a meeting of current plot holders held each January on a weekday at 2 p.m.
2All five committee members live on Hill Street, beside the garden. Hill Street households hold 44 of the 60 plots, although they are about one-fourth of the households within walking distance of the garden. Every plot near the garden's only water tap is held by the family of a committee member. Thirty-eight households from the Flats, a neighborhood of apartment buildings across the river, are on the waiting list; some have waited four years.
3Last spring, Flats families asked the committee to move the January meeting to an evening and to give out open plots by lottery. The committee refused, saying that long-time gardeners had built up the soil over many years and had earned their places. In June, several Flats families began planting on an unused strip at the edge of the lot without permission. The committee asked the city to fence the strip. The next two garden meetings ended in shouting.
4A committee member said: "We do the work, and the people who show up get the plots." A Flats parent said: "We can't come at 2 p.m. on a weekday; we're at work. The rules are made by the people they help."
SVHS (invented scenario), Source 5: The Millrace community garden (invented case) (2026). Original passage written for this page.
Task: write an analysis of the garden conflict in four labeled parts: the inequality (with one number you compute), the distribution of power, why the conflict broke into the open, and the strongest point on each side. Use the quiz and homework with Sources 1-5.
Closure5-10 minutes
Exit ticket: "In two sentences, explain the difference between inequality and an unequal distribution of power, and give one reason the two together make conflict more likely."
Teacher notes. (1) The 1915 commission was divided, and its members' reports disagree; this page presents three of them and does not take a side. Source 1 was written by the commission's research director, and Sources 3 and 4 by commissioners. Sources 1 and 2 come from Manly's staff report, which the chairman and the three labor members signed and the three employer members rejected as one-sided, so present it as one viewpoint, not as the commission's verdict. (2) The sources write "men" and "workmen" for workers in general, as was usual in 1915, and use period terms such as "capitalist," "agitators" and "soap-box orator." (3) Source 2's wage ranges are the report's summary; the passage does not say which surveys they come from, so treat them as the commission's estimates for 1915. (4) Source 5 is invented and is one case. Keep the discussion historical and analytic; this page does not ask students to judge any current labor dispute, union or company.
Differentiation Strategies
For Struggling Students
Give a four-box organizer for the model (unjust share, no channel, organized grievance, refusal or force) and have students place one quotation from Sources 1-4 in each box
Pre-teach the period words: unrest, adjudication, agitator, lockout, boycott, ex parte (from one side only)
Provide the frame: "Conflict grew because ___ had less ___, and they could not change the rules because ___."
For Advanced Students
Read the Walker testimony omitted from Source 2 in the source file and explain how it supports the report's claim about the "fundamental, controlling idea"
Write a paragraph testing the working model against Source 4: does the commissioners' point about balanced strength fit the model, or does it add a step the model leaves out?
Compare the commission's three views with the invented garden case and argue which view explains the garden conflict best
Assessment Guidance
What to Look For
Strong analyses separate inequality (who gets what) from power (who decides), explain at least one mechanism that turns a grievance into open conflict (a sense of injustice, a blocked channel, organization, or force), support each step with a quotation and paragraph number, and treat the sources as viewpoints, not as settled facts. Watch for students who assume any inequality automatically produces conflict, who blame one side without evidence, or who repeat a source's claim (for example, that conflict will "rise into active revolt") as if it were a finding.
02
Classroom Activities
3 Activities
1
Resources or Rules? Sorting the Causes
15 minPairs
Pairs sort the four "main sources" of unrest in Source 1, paragraph 5, and six invented grievances, into two columns: unequal resources (who gets what) and unequal power over the rules (who decides, judges or enforces). Some items fit both; pairs must explain their choice.
Items to Sort
Source 1, cause 1 (wealth and income)
Source 1, cause 2 (unemployment)
Source 1, cause 3 (justice and the law)
Source 1, cause 4 (the right to organize)
Invented: a town's two pools are in the same district, and children elsewhere must take two buses
Invented: a homeowners' board is elected only by owners, though half the residents rent
Invented: the night shift is paid a dollar less per hour than the day shift for the same work
Invented: a club's rules can be changed only by its three founders
Invented: a school's newest laptops all go to one program
Invented: only people who live within the city limits can vote on the water rates that county residents also pay
Answer Key
Unequal resources: 1, 2, 5, 7 and 9. Unequal power over the rules: 3, 4, 6, 8 and 10. Five and five, 10 in all. Accept 2 in both columns if the pair argues that losing a job also removes a worker's voice at work, and accept 9 in both if the pair notes that someone decided the laptop policy.
Discussion
Which pairs of items, one from each column, would be most likely to produce open conflict if they occurred together? Ask pairs to explain using the working model.
2
Mapping Three Invented Conflicts
15 minGroups of 3-4
Each group maps one invented case onto the four steps of Diagram 1 and marks the step where the conflict could most likely have stayed inside a channel. Groups then report to the class.
The Cases
Case A: Harbor permits. In the invented port of Gull Point, a city board issues 40 fishing permits. Permit holders sit on the board, and new permits go first to their relatives. Younger fishers have formed an association and have twice asked to address the board; both times the request was tabled. Last month they blocked the boat ramp for a morning.
Case B: Market stalls. In an invented city, vendors who have sold at a weekend market for years pay $20 a day for a stall; newer vendors are charged $60 for the same space. A vendors' council includes members from both groups and votes on fees each fall. Newer vendors brought the fee to the council, which voted to phase in one fee over two years. Some vendors still complain, but no protest has followed.
Case C: Club budget. At an invented high school, the student council divides club funds. Three large clubs receive 80 percent of the money, and the council's members all belong to those clubs. Smaller clubs started a petition and organized a walkout from an assembly after the council refused to put the budget on its agenda.
Answer Key
Case A: unjust share (permits go to relatives), no working channel (requests tabled), organized (an association), refusal (tabling), so the conflict moved outside the rules: the ramp blockade. Case B: an unjust share was felt, but a shared council gave a channel and a decision, and the conflict stayed inside it. Case C: unjust share (80 percent to three clubs), power held by the same clubs, organization (petition), refusal (not on the agenda), then open conflict. A and C reach step 4; B stops because of the channel.
Discussion
Case B still has complaints. Why is complaint inside a channel different from conflict outside it? Which step would the commissioners in Source 3 say matters most?
3
Structured Academic Controversy: Is Open Conflict a Sign of Failure?
20 minGroups of 4 (two pairs)
Question: When inequality leads to open conflict, is that mainly a sign that a society's institutions have failed, or can it be a normal way for groups to press their claims? Pair 1 argues the first position, Pair 2 the second; then they switch, and finally the group writes the strongest points of agreement. Either position can be argued well from the sources, and the rubric scores the reasoning, not the side.
Evidence Students May Use
For the first position: Source 1, paragraph 2 (unrest that may "rise into active revolt"); Source 3, paragraph 2 (the contest has "frequently resulted practically in civil war"). For the second: Source 1, paragraph 1 (dissatisfaction as "the mainspring of all progress"); Source 4, paragraph 1 (the strike as "the only weapon" labor can use "effectively and legally"). Both: the invented cases in Activity 2.
Steps and Scoring
Step 1 (5 min): each pair prepares two reasons with quotations. Step 2 (6 min): each pair presents for 3 minutes; the other pair restates the argument before responding. Step 3 (4 min): pairs switch positions and add one new point. Step 4 (5 min): the group writes a consensus statement. Score each student 0-2 on: accurate quotation with paragraph number; reasoning that links the evidence to the question; fair restatement of the other side.
Variation: Written Version
For online or absent students: write one paragraph for each position, then a third paragraph stating which is better supported by the sources and why.
03
Diagrams & Visual Aids
2 diagrams
Diagram 1: A Working Model of Inequality, Power and Conflict
A model built for this page from Sources 1-4, not a finding of any one source. Unequal resources and unequal power feed four steps: a share judged unjust, no channel to change the rules, an organized grievance, and refusal or force from the stronger side. The dashed arrow shows the alternative the sources discuss: when a channel opens, the conflict can be carried on through bargaining or hearings instead of in the open.
Diagram 2: The 1915 Report's Wage Ranges
Drawn to scale for this page from Source 2, paragraph 3. The report gives ranges, not single figures: one-fourth to one-third is 25 to about 33 percent, and two-thirds to three-fourths is about 67 to 75 percent. The passage does not say which surveys the ranges come from, so they are the commission's estimates.
04
Homework Assignment
~30 min
Homework: Why Inequality and Power Lead to Conflict
Directions: Sources 1 and 2 are printed in Direct Instruction, Sources 3 and 4 in Guided Practice and Source 5 in Independent Practice. Quote sources with paragraph numbers and show every calculation. Problem 5 is planned on paper only: do not survey or interview anyone.
Part 1: The 1915 Commission (Problems 1-3)
Source 1, paragraphs 1 and 2 separate two kinds of dissatisfaction. Explain the difference in 2-3 sentences, quoting each, and say why the difference matters when analyzing whether inequality will lead to conflict.
Source 2, paragraph 3 gives ranges for men 18 and over in factories and mines. For an imagined group of 1,200 such workers, how many would the ranges put below $10 a week, and how many below $15? Then convert $10 and $15 a week to yearly amounts (52 weeks) and compare each with the $1,500 at the bottom of the best-paid range in paragraph 2.
Source 3, paragraph 3 says the two sides must be "brought together" so their charges are "boiled down by investigation to the residuum of facts." Explain in your own words why agreeing on facts might reduce conflict, and use paragraph 4 to explain what agreement on facts does not settle.
Part 2: Applying the Analysis (Problems 4-6)
Source 5 (invented): explain why the garden conflict broke into the open in June and not years earlier. Use at least two steps of the working model in Diagram 1 and quote paragraph 3.
On paper only, plan a study of whether the way a garden committee is chosen relates to how often disputes break out. Use invented records from several towns' community gardens: name the two groups of gardens to compare, two kinds of records, and one reason a small number of towns would make the result weak.
Write a paragraph of 150-200 words analyzing why the distribution of power and inequalities can result in conflict. Use at least two of Sources 1-4 and Source 5, and include one point from a source that complicates the working model.
Rubric
Criterion
Full Credit (2 pts)
Partial Credit (1 pt)
No Credit (0 pts)
Concepts
Separates inequality (shares) from power (rules) and uses both
Uses one concept well, or blurs the two
Concepts missing or confused
Analysis
Explains how a grievance becomes open conflict through at least one step (injustice, channel, organization, force)
States that inequality causes conflict without the steps
No analysis
Evidence
Quotations carry source and paragraph numbers; Problem 2 is computed correctly
One claim unsupported or one error
No evidence, or several errors
Perspective
Treats the 1915 reports as viewpoints and includes a complicating point; Problem 5 is a workable plan on paper
Viewpoints noted but not weighed, or plan incomplete
One source treated as fact, or plan missing
05
Quiz: 20 Questions
Interactive, with answers
Instructions
Sources 1 and 2 are printed in Direct Instruction, Sources 3 and 4 in Guided Practice and Source 5 in Independent Practice. Source 1 is used in Questions 1-5, 16 and 20; Source 2 in Questions 6-9; Source 3 in Questions 10-12, 17 and 19; Source 4 in Questions 13, 14 and 16; and Source 5 in Questions 15, 18 and 19. Question 19 uses a new invented situation together with Sources 3 and 5. Questions 1-14 are multiple choice; 15-20 are short answer.
Multiple choice: pick an option to check it. Short answer: write your answer, then reveal the model answer.
0 of 20 answered · 0 correct
Question 1 of 20 · Multiple Choice
According to Source 1, paragraph 2, what will unrest from "intolerable industrial conditions" become if it is "forcibly suppressed"?
Answer: B
The paragraph says such unrest "if unrelieved, will in the natural course of events rise into active revolt or, if forcibly suppressed, sink into sullen hatred." A is the outcome if it is unrelieved. C and D describe the other, healthy kind of dissatisfaction.
Question 2 of 20 · Multiple Choice
Source 1, paragraph 2 says the I. W. W.'s card-carrying members "number only a few thousands." Why does the report still treat it as evidence of wide unrest?
Answer: A
The report says the I. W. W., "as 'a spirit and a vocabulary,'" permeates "enormous masses of workers." D contradicts the next sentence, which describes "numberless thousands of workers" who feel denied justice "entirely apart from those who accept its philosophy." B and C are not in the passage.
Question 3 of 20 · Multiple Choice
Which limit on its own evidence does Source 1, paragraph 3 admit?
Answer: C
The report writes: "Just how widespread this feeling is, or whether there is imminent danger of a quickening into active, nation-wide revolt, none can say." Its evidence is newspapers, the history of certain strikes and contact with workers, not a count. B and D contradict the strikes it names in four places.
Question 4 of 20 · Multiple Choice
Why does Source 1, paragraph 4 quote Daniel Guggenheim, "a capitalist whose interests in mines and industrial plants extend to every part of the country"?
Answer: D
The paragraph says the sense of danger was expressed "by none more forcibly than by Mr. Daniel Guggenheim," who told the chairman that without philanthropy "we would have revolution in this country." A witness from the employers' side confirming the danger strengthens the claim. A confuses him with Chairman Walsh, who asks the question. C reverses his answer.
Question 5 of 20 · Multiple Choice
Source 1, paragraph 5 lists "Denial of justice" as the third source of unrest. In which three parts of law does it say justice is denied?
Answer: A
The third source is "Denial of justice in the creation, in the adjudication, and in the administration of law": how laws are made, how courts decide cases, and how officials carry laws out. That is about power over the rules, not shares of income. B, C and D are not in the passage.
Question 6 of 20 · Multiple Choice
According to Source 2, paragraph 1, what "fundamental, controlling idea" lies beneath the workers' sense of injustice?
Answer: C
The paragraph says: "there is the one fundamental, controlling idea that income should be received for service and for service only, whereas, in fact, it bears no such relation." The complaint is that reward does not follow work, not a demand for equal incomes (A). B and D are not in the passage.
Question 7 of 20 · Multiple Choice
Source 2, paragraph 2 says the best-paid wage earners made $1,500 to $2,000 a year "at best." About how much is $2,000 a year per week?
Answer: D
$2,000 / 52 weeks is about $38.46. A divides by 365 days, giving a daily amount. C divides by 12 months, giving a monthly amount. B is the "$20 a week" from paragraph 3, which only about one-tenth of men exceeded.
Question 8 of 20 · Multiple Choice
Source 2, paragraph 3 says "between one-fourth and one-third" of the men earned less than $10 a week. For an imagined group of 600 such workers, how many is that?
Answer: B
600 / 4 = 150 and 600 / 3 = 200. A uses one-sixth to one-fourth. C misreads the fractions as 25 to 33 percent of 1,000. D is the range for less than $15 a week (two-thirds to three-fourths of 600).
Question 9 of 20 · Multiple Choice
Source 2, paragraph 3 ends: "This does not take into consideration lost working time for any cause." What follows for a reader?
Answer: A
The weekly figures are rates for weeks worked. If workers lost time to layoffs, illness or slack seasons, their yearly totals were below 52 weeks of pay, which makes the gap the report describes larger, not smaller. B reverses this. C and D are not in the passage.
Question 10 of 20 · Multiple Choice
Source 3, paragraph 2 says the contest between capital and labor "has frequently resulted practically in civil war." What do Commons and Harriman conclude when "the military power is called upon to decide a contest"?
Answer: A
They write that "it is plain, when the military power is called upon to decide a contest, that the ordinary machinery of government, which is fairly successful in other contests, has broken down." Force replaces the usual channels. B, C and D are not claims in the passage.
Question 11 of 20 · Multiple Choice
Why do Commons and Harriman, in Source 3, paragraph 3, reject the explanation that outbreaks "are caused solely by agitators"?
Answer: C
The paragraph says "Such a solution, carried to its limit, means the suppression of free speech, free press, and free assembly," and points to "the enormous amount of labor legislation" as proof that real conditions need remedying. A contradicts their statement that there are "unbridled agitators of this kind on both sides." B reverses their argument. D is not in the passage.
Question 12 of 20 · Multiple Choice
According to Source 3, paragraph 1, why have Congress and the states created commissions such as the Interstate Commerce Commission and the Federal Trade Commission?
Answer: B
Commissions were created "to take the details of the contest between railroads and shippers as far as possible out of the legislatures and the courts," because they are "the only alternative where legislation attempts to regulate the relations of great conflicting and hostile interests." A overstates: the contests continue, but in a new channel. C reverses the paragraph, which names the Federal Reserve Board as one such body.
Question 13 of 20 · Multiple Choice
In Source 4, paragraph 2, what do Commissioners Weinstock, Ballard and Aishton say decides a labor contest when the two sides are "fairly well balanced in strength"?
Answer: C
"Where the two sides to a labor controversy are fairly well balanced in strength, the winning side must depend, in the last analysis, upon the support of public opinion." B is the outcome Source 3 describes when the military is called in, not these commissioners' claim. A and D are not in the passage.
Question 14 of 20 · Multiple Choice
Why do the commissioners in Source 4, paragraph 3 call the public "a third party" in large strikes and lockouts, especially in public utilities?
Answer: D
They write that the public "has more at stake than both parties to the dispute combined," with the example of a street railway tie-up, where the loss to the community is greater than the losses of the company and the workers. A, B and C are not in the passage.
Question 15 of 20 · Short Answer
Invented data (Source 5): compute the share of the garden's plots held by Hill Street households and compare it with Hill Street's share of nearby households. Then explain two ways the distribution of power in the garden keeps that inequality in place, and how that helped the conflict break out.
Model answer: 44 / 60 is about 73.3 percent of the plots, against about 25 percent (one-fourth) of nearby households, so Hill Street holds almost three times its share. Power keeps the share in place in two ways: committee members are chosen only by current plot holders, so people on the waiting list have no vote (paragraph 1); and the meeting is "on a weekday at 2 p.m.," when Flats parents are "at work" (paragraph 4). When the committee "refused" the request for an evening meeting and a lottery (paragraph 3), the only channel was closed, and families acted outside the rules by planting on the strip. Rubric: correct percent and comparison; two power mechanisms with evidence; the link from a closed channel to open conflict.
Question 16 of 20 · Short Answer
Compare Source 1 and Source 4. What does each say turns inequality into conflict, or decides how a conflict ends? Quote each.
Model answer: Source 1 stresses grievance: workers "feel bitterly that they and their fellows are being denied justice, economically, politically, and legally" (paragraph 3), and unrest grows from "intolerable industrial conditions" (paragraph 2). Source 4 stresses the balance of strength: when sides are "fairly well balanced," the outcome depends on "public opinion," which is now poorly informed by "garbled and ex parte statements" (paragraph 2). Source 1 explains why conflict starts; Source 4 explains what decides it and why it may drag on. Rubric: one accurate quotation from each; a clear statement of each view; a comparison.
Question 17 of 20 · Short Answer
Source 3, paragraph 3 warns that if there is "no effective way" for discussion and for alleged facts to be "verified or disproved," the result "must be an excess of unfounded and impractical agitation mixed up with real grievances." Analyze how, in the authors' view, the lack of a channel makes conflict worse.
Model answer: Without a channel, neither side can test the other's charges, so real grievances and exaggerations stay mixed together. The side with the grievance has no place to prove it and turns to agitation; the other side can then dismiss every complaint as agitation, which the authors reject because it would mean "the suppression of free speech, free press, and free assembly." Each side's distrust grows. This fits step 2 of the working model: when no channel exists to change rules or settle facts, a grievance is more likely to break into open conflict. Rubric: the mixing of real and unfounded claims explained; the link between a missing channel and escalation; one quotation beyond the one in the question.
Question 18 of 20 · Short Answer
In Source 5, each side claims that the garden's rules are fair. State each side's claim, and analyze why two sincere claims of fairness can make a conflict harder to settle.
Model answer: The committee argues from effort: long-time gardeners "had built up the soil over many years and had earned their places," and "the people who show up get the plots." The Flats families argue from voice: the meeting time keeps them out, so "The rules are made by the people they help." Each side sees its own claim as a principle (reward for work against a fair say), not as a preference, so giving ground feels like accepting an injustice. The conflict is then about the legitimacy of the rules, not only about plots. Rubric: both claims quoted fairly; an analysis of legitimacy; no side declared right.
Question 19 of 20 · Short Answer
Invented situation: in an invented town, a fairly elected council holds a public hearing on closing a park's pool on weekdays. Residents near the pool speak against the plan; the council votes 5-4 to close it. Many residents are unhappy. Using the working model and Source 3, paragraph 4, analyze why open conflict is less likely here than in the garden case (Source 5), even though one group lost.
Model answer: The residents lost, but the process gave them a channel: they could speak at a hearing before a council they help elect, and the vote was close and public. So step 2 of the model (no channel) is missing, and the outcome is more likely to be seen as legitimate even by those who dislike it. In the garden, the Flats families had no vote for the committee and could not attend its meeting, and their request was refused. Source 3, paragraph 4 warns that a fair process does not mean "both sides can be made to agree on remedies for all evils and grievances"; the residents may keep pressing their case, but inside the rules. Rubric: the channel and legitimacy explained; a contrast with Source 5; the paragraph 4 limit quoted.
Question 20 of 20 · Short Answer
Evaluate the evidence Source 1 gives for the existence of widespread unrest. What kinds of evidence does it use, and how strong are they?
Model answer: Source 1 uses the growth of the I. W. W. and its "spirit," the workers' own newspapers, the history of strikes "at Lawrence and Paterson, in West Virginia and Colorado," contact with "large numbers of workers," and the testimony of witnesses such as Guggenheim. These show that unrest existed in several places and that even an industrialist feared "revolution." But the report has no count of how many workers felt this way and admits that "none can say" how widespread the feeling is. It is strong evidence that serious unrest existed, weaker evidence of how general it was. Rubric: at least two kinds of evidence named with quotations; a judgment of strength; the report's own admitted limit cited.
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06
Frequently Asked Questions
10 Questions
What does D2.Soc.17.9-12 mean?
D2.Soc.17.9-12 asks high school students to analyze why the distribution of power and inequalities can result in conflict. It belongs to the Stratification and Inequality group in the C3 Framework's sociology companion (Appendix C), after the indicators on patterns and effects of inequality.
What is the difference between inequality and the distribution of power?
Inequality is about who gets what; the distribution of power is about who decides. A town can divide park hours unequally (inequality), and one group can also control the schedule alone (unequal power). The sources on this page suggest conflict is most likely when the two come together.
Does inequality always lead to conflict?
No. Many inequalities last for years without open conflict. Conflict becomes more likely when a group judges its share unjust, cannot change the rules through an accepted channel, organizes, and meets refusal or force. Where a channel such as bargaining or a hearing exists, disputes are often carried on inside it.
Why use the 1915 Commission on Industrial Relations?
Because its report is a public-domain federal document in which commissioners with different views explained the same conflicts. Congress created the commission in 1912 to find "the underlying causes of dissatisfaction in the industrial situation," and required employers and representatives of organized labor among its members, so students can compare viewpoints from one source.
Does this lesson take a side on labor unions or business?
No. The page presents three views from the 1915 report, including commissioners who supported both the right to strike and the right to a lockout, and the structured controversy in Activity 3 is scored on reasoning, not position. The page does not discuss any current union, company or labor law.
What is a channel, and why does it matter for D2.Soc.17.9-12?
A channel is an accepted way to press a grievance and change a rule, such as a vote, a hearing, a court or bargaining. When a group has a channel, a dispute can be argued and decided inside the rules; when it has none, the group may act outside them, as the Flats families do in the invented garden case.
Is conflict always harmful?
Not according to all the sources. Source 1 itself calls the desire for better things "the mainspring of all progress," and the commissioners in Source 4 defend the right to strike as a legal way to better conditions. The analysis separates conflict carried on through channels from conflict that breaks into violence.
How is D2.Soc.17.9-12 different from D2.Soc.16.9-12?
D2.Soc.16.9-12 asks what inequality does to groups and individuals; D2.Soc.17.9-12 asks why inequality, together with unequal power, can lead groups into conflict. The first is about effects such as health or schooling, the second about the struggle that can follow.
Why are the wage figures in Source 2 given as ranges?
Because the report summarized many wage studies in round terms such as "between one-fourth and one-third." The passage does not name the surveys behind the ranges, so the page treats them as the commission's estimates and asks students to compute with both ends of each range.
What comes after D2.Soc.17.9-12?
D2.Soc.18.9-12 asks students to propose and evaluate alternative responses to inequality. The channels discussed here, such as commissions, hearings and bargaining, are among the responses students can evaluate there.
07
Related Standards
5 standards
These standards connect to D2.Soc.17.9-12: prerequisites to review first, parallel standards at the same level, and next steps that build on it.
Before this lesson
D2.Soc.16.9-12Prerequisite
Interpret the effects of inequality on groups and individuals
Standard text: National Council for the Social Studies (NCSS), The College, Career, and Civic Life (C3) Framework for Social Studies State Standards: Guidance for Enhancing the Rigor of K-12 Civics, Economics, Geography, and History (Silver Spring, MD: NCSS, 2013). NCSS was not involved in the production of this lesson and does not endorse it.
