The Rise and Fall of Elites: Application of Theoretical Sociology by Everett Lee Hunt

Author:Everett Lee Hunt [Hunt, Everett Lee]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Social Science, Sociology, General
ISBN: 9781351475082
Google: VKw0DwAAQBAJ
Publisher: Routledge
Published: 2017-09-08T05:00:00+00:00

4

The Rise of the New Elite

It is an illusion to believe that it is the people who stand at the head of the dominant class today. Those who stand there—and this is a very different matter—are part of a new and future elite which leans upon the people. Already there are some slight signs of contrast between the new elite and the rest of the people, which indicates that with the passing of time these signs will become similar to those which could be noticed in Rome as the contrast between the aristocracy of the plebs and the others; or in the Italian republics between the major and the minor crafts. These latter contests resemble, at least in part, those in England between the old Trade-Unions and the new ones.

Everywhere the workers who profit from lucrative trades try to exclude the rest of the population from these trades by severely restricting the number of those permitted to learn a particular craft. The glass blowers, the printers, and the workers of other similar trades constitute closed castes. Many strikes spring from the fact that organized labor rejects workers that are not organized. In short, one can observe how the amorphous matter separates and becomes stratified, the upper strata forming precisely the new elite.

It is noteworthy that until now the political leaders of the new elite have almost without exception been bourgeois; that is, they hail from the ranks of the old aristocracy, which is decadent in character, but not in intelligence. The reason for this is the misbehavior of our bourgeoisie, which compels its better part to be drawn to the side of the adversaries whoever they are, thus weakening the dominant class still more, so that it becomes impoverished and loses its strongest, most moral, and honest men. When, as happens in Italy, a gentleman is faced with the dilemma of either approving the malpractices of his class, such as embezzlements of banks and the facts of the Notarbartolo trial, or of his joining the socialists, he is irresistibly driven toward the latter.

It seems probable that the present proportion between the leaders of bourgeois origin and the leaders hailing from the working class forming the new elite, will be modified and that the number of the latter will grow, for the reason that the working class is now becoming more active, more educated, and stronger.

The present evolution could be foreseen from the very beginning of the nineteenth century. It is an unfailing law for living organisms and for social organisms as well, that a close relationship exists between the organs of nutrition and the general shape of the body.42 Nobody will believe that a carnivorous and an herbivorous animal should have entirely similar forms. Nor can anyone believe that a warlike and an industrial society should have the same social order. Our societies are certainly much more industrialized and less warlike than the societies of the past century, and so their order had to change. Where industry is highly developed, the working class is bound, sooner or later, to acquire great power.

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