Social and cultural capital enable access to educational institutions. Social and cultural capital also offer access to positions of power within organizations. The menial labor jobs that the Lithuanian immigrants do thwart social mobility. The myth of the American Dream creates the illusion that capitalist social structures are beneficial and immutable. Immigrants like those depicted in the Jungle believe that hard work alone can lead to upward social mobility and a high quality of life. When Jurgis and Ona arrive in Packingtown they are filled with the idealism that characterizes the American Dream. Their idealism quickly dissolves in the face of social norms and institutions that support a hierarchical, stratified society. For example, the first home they attempt to buy ended up being a scam.

Immigrants in the Packington community end up using deviant behavior to fulfill their needs. Whether crime or corruption, deviant behaviors are a product of anomie, which is in turn a product of class conflict. Immigrant communities are stripped of their cohesiveness when their folkways and traditions become impossible to reproduce in the newly adopted environment. For instance, the Lithuanian community does not have enough resources to uphold traditions like bequeathing gifts on newlyweds. Social cohesiveness leads to political strength and power. The converse is also true. The Lithuanians in the Jungle have lost the emblems that form their identity: the rituals,...

Not realizing the power of migration in transforming whole communities, immigrants in the early 20th century sacrificed their lives to fulfill the American Dream.
Conflict theory also explains the evolution of social movements and revolutions. At the end of Sinclair's the Jungle Jurgis becomes aware of and involved in the socialist movement and correspondingly, the labor movement. The labor movement became Jurgis' new community, created in the vacuum created by migration. Moreover, the labor movement offered a realistic solution to the power imbalance and income inequities in American society. The labor movement empowered the immigrant communities, allowing individuals to work together and recreate the cohesive communities they left behind in the old country. The political power backing socialist organizations offered the potential for genuine transformation of legal and social institutions. Although Sinclair does not suggest what specific transformations might take place, the face that Jurgis joins the socialist movement suggests that the disenfranchised can resolve class conflict without resorting to criminal behavior. Any behaviors labeled criminal or deviant also stem from the social injustices and inequities that arise in a capitalist society. Upton Sinclair's the Jungle describes conflict theory in the context of early American immigration.

Works Cited

Sinclair, Upton. The Jungle.