THE ELITE VIEW

- The most important theorists come from Italy;

- elire (lat.) = to choose;
- Elite = a minority group that has power and influence and that is somehow superior to the
rest of the people.

Vilfredo PARETO - “Mind and society” & Gaetano MOSCA

- They wrote about power and prestige….

- In the interwar period their works were used by fascists;
- Society should be ruled be ruled by elites;
- They counter argued the Marxist theory;
- A complete economic and political equality is actually impossible to achieve;

- Pareto was the one who actually started the elite school;
- he was not only a sociologist, but also an economist;
- the human behaviour is essentially non-rational;
- people justify their choices through various rationalizations;
- information shortcuts = “drunkard’s search”;
- How are moral and particular goods distributed so unequally in society?  residues
(instincts, drives) justified through “derivations” (myths, “social patterns”);
- In any society there are individuals that use force or deceit;
- There will always be a small elite governing according to its interests, the masses need to
be kept at order by means of force and kindness?! WTF, stupid course!!
- Sometimes these elites want to leave their positions to their offspring and sometimes this
might be a problem because the access to elites might become difficult;
- How does the new elite pop up?  the circulation of elites;
 Elections;
 Marriage;
 Talents;
- The elites should know how to use propaganda and how to manage the finances;
- An elite that is reluctant to use force might end up being intellectual;
- In order to endure, a political class should have the capacity of planning, it should know
how to react to new circumstances, it should have a sense of duty, as well as an awareness of
their own solidarity;
Gaetano MOSCA

- His approach is even more political than Posca’s and he also focuses on the issue of
legitimacy;
- How does a governing minority justify themselves in the eyes of the ruled? How do they
turn power into authority?
- The elite’s opportunity to get higher on the social scale is not related only to the ideology
an elite has to adapt itself;
- Mosca was accused of being too autocratic, but that is unfair because he speaks about
checks and balances, about the motives of having a plurality of various forces, about the need to
have the state separated from the church and from the political power;
- Domination in any society is unavoidable – hierarchy is essential to society;
- A political rule is based on a political formula given by myths, especially historical
myths;
- A parliamentary representative is not someone that people have elected, but someone
whose friends have a rage for him to be elected;

Robert(o) MICHELS – “Political Parties”  IRON LAW OF OLIGARCHY

- He was Mosca’s disciple;

- The theory he developed in his book does not only apply to political parties, but to all
forms of organizations;
- Distinguished the rulers from the ruled;
- Elites can be replaced by those who were among the non-elites, therefore there is a
certain fluidity of the membership;
- In any type of organized group, be it a state, be it a political party or a trade union, we are
dealing with a high level of lack of democracy; these organizations grow up like any organism;
the problem is that at a certain point the organization is so big that it cannot really cope with the
problems that arise; the best mechanism that can provide one with control is represented by
bureaucracy; a system needs bureaucracy in order to function, but the problem is that is the
bureaucratic dimension becomes too large, the structure of the organization becomes ossified,
too big, too static and too rigid and inevitably leads to the death of the organization;
- Those who are elected change what used to be the goals of the organization and replace
them with their own; therefore, the goals of any organization are not their own, but of those that
lead;
- Michels’ theory is similar to the one developed by two Dutch who used the terminology
of “cartel parties” – people with very similar backgrounds, common interests, bound by
solidarity, who share the same sources of funding (usually the state); the distinction of ideologies
is unimportant’
- Eternal democracy in impossible to obtain;
- “Whoever says organization, says oligarchy”;
 - As long as voters can freely chose, it doesn’t really matter if the organizations are
undemocratic in their inner rows;

Charles WRIGHT MILLS – “The Power Elite” (1956) – analysed the American political
system and the way power is controlled;

Military
“the warlords”

Economic Political
“Corporation chieftain” “Political directorate”

- 3 important distinctions between the ruling class, the political elite and the political class:
- A political class – executive, legislative, central and local administration representatives
and all people who have a certain degree of authority form together what we call a political class;
- A political elite is represented by political leaders and political professionals – those who
live for and through politics;
- A ruling class is represented by the elites who hold power;
- How do we measure class? The status itself? – through occupation etc.