Political Elites Classes and Elites in Democracy and Democratization Edited by Eva Etzioni-Harlevy Ana-Maria Ducuta
Sabin Ciornea
SPE III
The three founding fathers of the mainstream of this school of thought:Pareto, Mosca and Michels Michels,, Pareto Pareto and Mosca Mosca are the three three foundin founding g fathers fathers of this this school school of thought. thought. Pareto Pareto distinguishes between a governing and nongoverning elite, adding that although in principle, elites are made up of people who excel, this is not always in practice. As long as a governing elite or class is composed of people with the proper qualities of excellence and is open to absorb into its ranks the most talented people from the nonelite , this ensures a circulation of elites that keeps society in a state of equilibrium and gradual change.When, however, this circulation is impeded, the social equilibrium is upset and society becomes prone to violent upheavals. For Pareto=those who govern=governing elite or class For Mosca: those who govern=the ruling class. In all societies, including democracies, there is a small organized class that rules, and a large unorganized class that is ruled. According to democratic theory majorities rule minorities. In fact, even in a democracy the domination of an organized minority over an unorganized majority is inevitable. Pareto+Mosca=agree that in all societies there are those who govern and those who are governed. BUT it has to be shown that the governing elite/class has some internal unity, which exacerbates its power.=> this is the theory of prominent postwar elite theorist, MILLS. Mills-sees Millssees democratic(especially American) society, as dominated by the upper political, 1
military and corporate economic personnel. These three groups : political, military and corporate economic personnel=>these three
groups are in a perpetual coalitin and they form a conglomeration of power or a power elite. Members of congress+trade unions+interest group leaders=the middle levels of power. At the bottom=the masses, the mostly passive and powerless receiving end of the power's
manipulation and rule. These classical elites theorists-have a common focus in viewing this type of democracies as divided into : -those who hold power and -those who are subject to it, who have little power of their own.=> they have little to say on what it is that still makes democracy a distinctive regime. OTHER classical theorists-known as liberal, democratic elite theorists= tried to fill this void.These are: Weber, Schumpeter, Aron and Mosca in some later developments of his thought. WEBER= (a contemporary of Pareto and Mosca)-he admits that even in a democracy the demos itself never governs.But democracy(embodied in elected charismatic leaders and parliaments) is still of prime importance as a counterbalence to the expanding rule of bureaucracy.Also frightening is the prospectr that democracy may give rise to leaders who gain the faith of the masses and power, by means of demagogy. Mosca: (Mosca lost out to Pareto in his paternity over elite theory): Mosca: while he sees a ruling class as inevitable in a democracy, later he stresses that democracy divides that class into separate branches: 1) that derived from bureaucratic appointment 2)that derived from popular suffrage, the popularly elected assembly. Mosca: the bureaucratic and judicial branches of the ruling class, if autonomous, fulfill an equally essential democratic role in curbing the corrupting power of elected politicians. Schumpeter: rejecting the notion that democracy ensures popular participation in the decision-making process, he sees its essence in the arrangement whereby leaders gain the power to make decisions through a competition for the people's votes. This implies considerable freedom of discussion, but it leads the electors only limited control over the elected.Hence the power of the elected must be limited through independent agencies or elites.These include universities or
academic elites. Aron=clearly distinguishes Western democratic from autocratic regimes is the dissociation
and independence of leading minorities or elites. Also distinctive to democracy is the free and legitimate mutual competition of the claimants to such positions, based on free elections and on consensus over the rules of the game.All this cannot ensure effective participation in the decisionmaking process for all, but it ensures some elite response to the needs and demands of the public. Democratic elite theorists =share the idea that the distinctiveness of democracy lies not only in free competitive elections, but also in the autonomy of elites from each other, which enables them to countervail each other's power. The governing elite in present-day democracy.Vilfredo Pareto Let us make a class of people who have the highest indices, in their branch of activity , and to that class we give the name of elite.We further divide that class into two classes:-a governing elite comprising individuals who directly or indirectly play some considerable part in government; -a non governing elite, comprising the rest.=>we get the strata into two population: 1)a lower stratum, the non-elite with whose possible influence on government we are not
just here concerned; 2)a higher stratum, the elite, which is divided into two:a) a governing elite , b)a non-
governing elite. The circulation of elites In moving from one group to another, the individual generally brings with him certain
inclinations, sentiments, attitudes , that he has aquired in the group from which he comes, and that circumstance cannot be ignored. To this mixing, in the particular case in which only two groups, the elite and the non-elite are envisaged, the term "circulation of elites" has been applied. ->The upper stratum of society, the elite, nominally contains certain groups of people, that are called ARISTOCRACIES.-there are cases when the individuals belonging to such aristocracies posses the qualities requisite for remaining here or when they don;t. 3
=>Aristocracies do not last.eg:France: where are the descendants of the Frankish conquerors? ->Aristocracies decay not only in numbers.They decay also in quality, they lose their vigour, that there is a decline in the proportion of the regimes which enabled them to win the power and to hold it. ->In virtue of class circulation, the governing elite is always in a state of slow and continuous transformation. ->Revolutions come about through accumulations in the higher strata of society of decadent elements no longer possessing the residues suitable for keeping them in power, while meantime in the lower strata of society elements of superior quality are coming to these, posseing residues suitable for exercising the functions of government and willing enough to use force. =>One finds everywhere a governing class of relatively few individuals that keeps itself in power partly by force and partly by the consent of the subject class which is more populous. =>A governing class is present everywhere, even where there is a despot, but the forms under which it appears are variable.In absolute governments a sovereign occupies the stage alone.In democratic governments it is the parliament How the Governing Elite in a Democracy maintains its power. The governing class uses individuals from the subject class, who is grouped in two divisions corresponding to the two principal instruments for holding power secure.One group uses force and is made up of soldiers, police. The other uses skill. Our democracies in France, Italy, England and the United States are tending to become demagogic plutocracies (Forms of government are not to be compared by reference to constitutions but to their operative practice. All are oligarchies. All govern by force and/or consent. But they differ from one another first by the relative proportions in which force and consent are utilized to maintain rule, and secondly, by the ways in which the force is exercised and the consent is obtained.-def Pareto). and may be following that road on the way to one of those radical
transformations that have been witnessed in the past. http://media.pfeiffer.edu/lridener/dss/Pareto/PARETOW7.HTML A political system in which "the people" expresses its "will" without cliques, intrigues "combines" "gangs" exists only as a pious wish of theorists.It is not observed in reality. It is to be noted that the defects in various systems of goverment may differ from each other but it cannot be held that one type of regime is very different in that respect from any other.The criticism that are levelled at modern democracy are not greatly different from those that were levelled at ancient democracies, the Athenian for instance. The Ruling Class in Representative Democracy. Gaetano Mosca.
In all societies two classes of people appear-a class that rules and a class that is ruled. =>The first class, always the less numerous, performs all political functions, monopolizes power and enjoys the advantages that power brings, whereas the second , the more numerous class, is directed and controlled by the first, in a manner that is more or less legal, more or less arbitrary and violent ->The management of public affairs is in the hands of a minority of influential persons. =>In every political organism there is one individual who is chief among the leaders of the ruling class as a whole. =>Whatever the type of political organization, presures arising from the discontent of the masses who are governed exert a certain amount of influence on the policies of the ruling, the political class.But the man who is at at the head of the state would certainly not be able to govern without the support of a numerous class to enforce respect for his orders and to have them carried out.He cannot be at odds with the class as a whole or do away with it. On the other hand, granting that the discontent of the masses might succeed in deposing a ruling class, inevitably there would have to be another organized minority within the masses themselves to discharge the functions of a ruling class. Why even in Representative Democracy Minorities rule majorities? 5
If it is easy to understand that a single individual cannot command a group without finding within the group a minority to support him, it is rather difficult to grant that minorities rule majorities. The dominion of an organized minority, obeying a single impulse, over the unorganized majority is inevitable. The power of any minority is irresistble as against each single individual in the majority, who stands alone before the totality of the organized minority. It is believed that the only free, equitable and legitimate government is a government based upon the will of the majority, the majority by its vote delegating its powers for a specified length of time to men who represent it. =>The truth is that the representative has himself elected by the voters , we might say that his friends have him elected. In elections, as in all other manifestations of social life, those who have the will and especially, the moral, intellectual and material means to force their will upon others take the lead over the others and command them.When very many wills are involved, choice is determined by the most various criteria, almost all of them subjective, and if such wills were not coordinated and organized it would be virtually impossible for them to coincide in the spontaneous choice of one individual.If his vote is to have any efficacy at all, therefore , each voter is forced to limit his choice to a very narrow field, in other words to a choice among the two or three persons who have some chance of succeeding;and the only ones who have any chance of succeeding are those whose candidacies are championed by groups, by committees, by organized minorities. How do these organized minorities form about individual candidates or groups of candidates?As a rule, they are based on considerations of property and taxation, on common
material interests, on ties of family, class, religion, sect or political party. The representative system results not at all in government by the majority.It results in the participation of a certain number of social values in the guidance of the state. =>the ruling classes are obliged to take account of mass sentiments. The most despotic of governments has to proceed very cautiously when it comes to shocking sentiments or prejudices of the majority of the governed.
The importance of checks and balances
The defects of parliamentary assemblies, and the evil consequences which their control of power and their participation in power produce in all representative systems, are as compared with the harm that would inevitably result from abolishing them .Under the conditions that prevail at present society, the supression of representative assemblies would inevitably be followed by a type of regime
that is commnly called "absolute".It
might better be termed"exclusively
bureaucratic"since its chief characteristic is that it alienates from public life all political forces, all social values, except such as are represented in the bureaucracy.It completely subordinates all other forces and values to the bureaucratic element. =>People of our time have come to take for granted the advantage of a system in which all governmental acts are subject to public discussion. Advantages:=> the representative system provides a way for many different social forces to participate in the political system and therefore to balance and limit the influence of other social forces and the influence of bureaucracy in particular. Disadvantages:=>the excessive and exclusive power that is given by many representative governments.The prime and real root of the evils that are being so generally lamented lies in the facts that where parliamentarism is in force the ministry directing the vast and absorbing bureaucratic machine issues from the ranks of the elected chambers, and more serious still, the fact that prime ministers and their cabinets stay in power as long as it pleases the majority of the elected chamber to retain them. =>the natural desire of governors to govern well is continuosly altered by their no less natural desire to serve their own personal interests. Because of a constant, flagrant and manufactured contradiction between the duty and the interest of the man who governs, and of the man who should judge and limit governmental action, the bureaucracy and the elective elements, which should judge and limit governmental action, the bureaucracy and the elective elements, which should control and balance each other, end by corrupting and denaturing each other. =>it is a matter of common knowledge that the defects of parliamentary government 7
in Europe almost all come down to improper interference with elections to central and local elective bodies by bureaucracies, acting mainly through prefects appointed by the ministries, and to equally improper interference with the bureaucracies by representatives elected to the national chambers. =>Specialization in the various political functions and cooperation and reciprocal control between bureaucratic and elective elements = two of the outstanding characteristics of the modern representative state.
Civil liberties in Representative Democracies => In all countries of modern Europe , the conception of political liberty has not been applied solely by instituting representative government. BUT IT HAS BEEN SUPPLEMENTED by a series of institutions that assure individuals effective guarantees as against holders of public power.+private property cannot be violated arbitrarly+citizens cannot be arrested unless rules are observed. ->These liberties may be looked upon as real limitations which the state imposed upon its own sovereign powers in its relations to individual citizens. THEY ARE NECESSARY COMPLEMENTS to representative systems, which would function very badly if all free political activity on the part of individuals were suppressed and if individuals were not fairly well protected against arbitrary acts on the part of the executive and judiciary powers.At the same time, those liberties find their maximum guarantee in the existence of the representative system, which provides the legislative power, which alone has the right to remove or restrict them, should emanate from the same political forces that are interested in conserving them. Conclusion:The achievements of representative democracy Majority government and absolute political equality=not achieved. The barriers that kept individuals of the lower classes from entering the higher have been either removed or lowered, and the development of the old absolutist state into the modern representative state has made it possible for almost all political forces, almost all social values, to
participate in the political management of society. =>This development has divided the political class into two distinct branches-1)one issuing from popular suffrage 2)the other from bureaucratic appointment. Democracy and the Countervailing Powers of Bureaucracy, Charisma, and Parliament-Max Weber
Bureaucracy inevitably accompanies modern mass democracy.What changes is only the way in which the executive leaders are selected and the measure of influence which the dmos, or better,which social circles its midst, are able to exert upon the content and the direction of administrative activities by means of "public opinion". Bureaucracy is the means of transforming social action into rationally organized action.Therefore, as an instrument of rationally organizing authority relations, bureaucracy was and is a power instrument of the first order for one who controls the bureaucratic apparatus. Where administration has been completely bureaucratized, the resulting system of domination is practically indestructible. Democratization of Charismatic Leadership =>In contrast to bureaucratic organization charisma is self-determined and sets its own limits.Its beareres seizes the task for which he is destined and demands that others obey and follow him by virtue of his mission.If those to whom he feels sent do not recognize him, his claim collapses:if they recognize it, he is their master as long as he "proves " himself.He does not derive his claims from the will of his followers, in the manner of an election;rather it is their duty to recognize his charisma. Problem: instability because of the desire to transform charisma and charismatic blessing from a unique, transitory gift into a permanent possesion of evreryday life. Problems for charismatic leadership: finding a successor to the prophet, hero, teacher or party leader.=>this channels charisma into the direction of legal regulation and tradition.Given the nature of charisma, a free election of a successor is originally not possible, only the acknowledgemnt that the pretender actually has charisma. ->The development from acclamation of the charismatic leader to popular election occured at the 9
most diverse cultural stages .However, only in the Occident did the election of the ruler gradually develop into the representative system. Bureaucratic rule and the countervailing power of parliamentary/political leadership
In a modern state the actual ruler is necessarily and unavoidably the bureaucracy, since power is exercised neither through parliamentary speeches nor monarchical enunciations, but through the routines of administration.(e.g:Even the modern higher-ranking officer fights battles from the "office"). =>the democratic state no less than the absolute state eliminates administration by feudal, patrimonial, patrician or other notables holding office in honorary or hereditary fashion in favor of employed civil servants. Question: in view of the growing indispensability of the state bureaucracy how can there be any guarantee that any powers will remain which can check and effectively control the influence of this stratum?How will democracy even in this limited sense be at all possible? =>Modern parliaments are representative bodies of those ruled with bureaucratic means. A certain minimum of consent on the part of the ruled, is a precondition of the durability of every , even the best organized domination.Parliaments are today the means of manifesting this minimum consent. Political action is always determined by the "principal of small numbers", that means the superior political maneuverability of small leading groups. =>Only a working, not a merely speech-making parliament can provide the ground for the growth and selective ascent of genuine leaders, not merely demagogic talents.A working parliament is one which supervises the administration by continuosly sharing its work. The bureaucracy failed completely whenever it was expected to deal with political problems. Politicians must be the countervailing force against bureaucratic domination. =>Effective supervision over the officialdom:depends upon preconditions: 1)techincal know-how in the widest sense of the word, through training
2)official information which is only available through administrative channels Mass Leaders /Demagogues and the Countervailing Power of Parliament. We are concerned with the issue of democratization in the social sphere, but only with that of democratuc suffrage in its relation to parliamentarism.Parliamentarization and democratization are not necessarily interdependent but often opposed to one another. Question:What are the consequences of progressive democratization of the means for the structure of the political enterprise inside and outside the parliament. Answer:The decisive point is that for the tasks of national leadership only such men are prepared who have been selected in the course of the political struggle., since the essence of politics is struggle. =>Active mass democratization means that the political leader gains the trust and the faith of the masses in him and his power with the means of mass demagogy.
The Power Elite C. Wright Mills In The Power Elite, American sociologist C. Wright Mills (1916-1962) describes the structure of power in post-World War II society. Mills makes the case that the powerful decisionmakers in modern society are members of three separate but interconnected parts: political elites, 11
economic elites, and military elites. Mills argues that American democracy is largely a fairy tale; while different factions within the power elite may have superficial disagreements on certain political issues, in critical moments, the elites will act in concert. In this vein, Mills is critical of the pluralist model of American society, which argues that power is ultimately owned by the public-atlarge. Through voting power and interest groups, the pluralist model argues that the will of the people is always followed. Mills views this as a sugar-coated view of the political process, and notes that this model itself is used by elected politicians to justify any action they decide to take while in office (in other words, because a politician is elected through the voting process, any decision they make can be seen as exercising the people's will). Mills is part of the sociological tradition of conflict theory, which is rooted in Marxism. Conflict theorists describe society in terms of struggles between social classes; in Marx's case, the struggle between the working class and the bourgeoisie. More contemporary conflict theorists, like C. Wright Mills, have offered more complex descriptions of class structures and divisions. For a better understanding of the terms, might I suggest a proper definition of the terms. Therefore, a power elite or The Grand Elite , in political and sociological theory, is a small group of people who control a disproportionate amount of wealth, privilege, and access to decisionmaking of global consequence. The term was coined by Charles Wright Mills in his 1956 book, The Power Elite,
which describes the relationship between individuals at the pinnacles of political,
military, and economic institutions, noting that these people share a common world view. The power elite is described as consisting of members of the corporate community, academia, politicians, media editors, military service personnel, and high-profile journalists. Individuals identified as belonging to the power elite include David Rockefeller , W. Averell Harriman and Robert McNamara. Mills argues in his book that the US power elite consists of members of society characterized by consensus building and the homogenization of viewpoints. This power elite has historically dominated the three major sectors of US society: economy, government, and military. Elites circulate from one sector to another, consolidating their power as they go. According to C. Wright Mills, the world is fundamentally divided in two different segments: the ruling world and the ordinary people. In this sense, the powers of the ordinary men
are circumscribed by the everyday worlds in which they live, yet even in these rounds of job, family and neighborhood they often seem driven by forces they can neither understand nor govern. But in this centralized world we live in, some men occupy positions in American society from which they can look down upon, and by their decisions can affect the everyday worlds of ordinary people (Jacob Burckhardt – “They are all that we are not”). In Mills perspective, the power elite is defined by those men whose positions enable them to transcend the ordinary environments of ordinary people. Due to this division, Mills also has a hierarchy: the power elite, the professional politicians, the professional celebrities. In his view, in every society, there must be a triangle of power: the economy, which is ominated by corporations, the political order, which is the executive establishment, an the military order, which is the largest and most expensive feature of the government. Elite Consolidation John Higley Two patterns of elite consolidation can be distinguished. In the first, all or most elite persons belong to a dominant party or movement and uniformly profess its ideology, religious doctrine, or other belief system. In the second, elite persons are affiliated with conflicting parties, movements and beliefs but still adhere to a set of procedures and share a tacit understanding of the operation of political institutions and the proprieties of political conduct. Elite consolidation of the first time may result from the victory of a specific elite group in a revolutionary upheaval. It may also occur when a foreign power imposes such a group. Elite consolidation of the second kind may come about in various ways. It may be the outgrowth of distinctive historical sequences and societal conditions, including comparatively benign colonial rule. Elites Elites derive from a fundamental and universal fact of social life, namely, the absence in any large collectivity of a robust common interest. While it is true that most large collectivities rest on a base of social and cultural understandings, these tend to be ambiguous and rough. The 13
satisfactions some of their members seek are only partly compatible with the satisfactions sought by other members. Members constantly claim statuses and other valued goods for themselves, their kin, friends, and allies that other members do not accept as fully legitimate. Acceding to these claims is often more a matter of judging that it is dangerous or inexpedient to resist them than of recognizing that the persons and groups making the claims have some right to do so. In large collectivities common interest is fairly minimal and must always be supplemented by authoritative decisions that dissenters and opponents dare not or find it inexpedient to resist. Elites may be defined as persons who, by virtue of their strategic locations in large or otherwise pivotal organizations and movements, are able to affect political outcomes regularly and substantially. Put differently, elites are persons with the organized capacity to make real political trouble without being promptly repressed. They consist not only of prestigious and “established” leaders – top politicians, important businessmen, high-level civil servants, senior military officers – but also, in varying degrees in different societies, relatively transitory and less individually known leaders of mass organizations such as trade unions, important voluntary associations, and politically consequential mass movements. “Counter-elites” are subsumed by this definition because they clearly have the organized capacity, although perhaps mainly through negation, to affect political outcomes regularly and substantially.
