ABBINK, J SALVERDA, T. (Ed) - The Anthropology of Elites (B-Ok - CC)

The Anthropology of Elites
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The Anthropology of Elites
Power, Culture, and the
Complexities of Distinction
Edited by
Jon Abbink and Tijo Salverda

THE ANTHROPOLOGY OF ELITES
Copyright © Jon Abbink and Tijo Salverda, 2013.
Softcover reprint of the hardcover 1st edition 2013 978-1-137-29054-0
All rights reserved.
First published in 2013 by
PALGRAVE MACMILLAN®
in the United States— a division of St. Martin’s Press LLC,
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this is by Palgrave Macmillan, a division of Macmillan Publishers Limited,
registered in England, company number 785998, of Houndmills,
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Palgrave Macmillan is the global academic imprint of the above companies
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ISBN 978-1-349-45060-2 ISBN 978-1-137-29055-7 (eBook)
DOI 10.1057/9781137290557
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
The anthropology of elites : power, culture, and the complexities of
distinction / edited by Jon Abbink and Tijo Salverda.
p. cm.
1. Elite (Social sciences) 2. Power (Social sciences) I. Abbink, J. II.

Salverda, Tijo.
HM1263.A59 2012
305.5⬘2—dc23 2012028023
A catalogue record of the book is available from the British Library.
Design by Newgen Imaging Systems (P) Ltd., Chennai, India.
First edition: January 2013
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
C on ten ts
Acknowledgments vii
Introduction: An Anthropological Perspective on

Elite Power and the Cultural Politics of Elites 1
Tijo Salverda and Jon Abbink
1 Researching Elites: Old and New Perspectives 29
Huibert Schijf
2 Land, Historicity, and Lifestyle: Capital and Its
Conversions among the Gentry in Poland 45
Longina Jakubowska
3 Continuity and Change as Two Identifying Principles
amongst Nepalese Nobility 71
Stefanie Lotter
4 Beyond Wealth and Pleasant Posture: Exploring Elite
Competition in the Patronage Democracy of Indonesia 95
Deasy Simandjuntak
5 In Defense: Elite Power 113
Tijo Salverda
6 Pupillage: The Shaping of a Professional Elite 139
Fernanda Pirie and Justine Rogers
7 Becoming Elite: Exclusion, Excellence, and Collective
Identity in Ireland’s Top Fee-Paying Schools 163
Aline Courtois
8 Financial Professionals as a Global Elite 185
Horacio Ortiz
9 Management Consultants at Work with Clients:
Maintenance and Contestation of Elite Status 207
Irene Skovgaard Smith
vi CONTENTS
10 Money Relations, Ideology, and the Formation of a

Cosmopolitan Elite at the Frontier of Transnational
Capitalism: An Ethnographic Study of African
Finance Professionals in Johannesburg 227
France Bourgouin
Notes on Contributors 249

Index 253
Ack now l ed gmen t s
This book is the product of a collective effort started in 2008 at the

Department of Anthropology at VU University in Amsterdam where
both the editors were then working. We are both fascinated by the
elites and their life styles and cultural patterns and organized together
with our colleague Sandra Evers a conference gathering many inter-
national scholars, both at senior and PhD levels. We were gratified
with the papers presented and the lively debates that followed and
took up the suggestion made by some colleagues to work on a book.
The final product is significantly detached from the original confer-
ence program but is similarly focused on a specifically anthropologi-
cal perspective on elites cross-culturally.
We are grateful to the Faculty of Social Sciences at VU University
for having facilitated the original conference and to the Royal
Netherlands Academy of Sciences in Amsterdam for having provided
a conference grant.
Above all, we owe a debt of gratitude to the contributors to this
book, whose patience was seriously tested but who were cooperative,
enthusiastic, and forthcoming throughout the project despite our
litany of editorial queries and suggestions. We also express our deep-
est thanks to our editors at Palgrave Macmillan, New York (Robyn
Curtis and Desiree Browne), for their excellent advice and support in
this venture.
Introduction: An Anthropological
Perspective on Elite Power and the
Cultural Politics of Elites
Tijo Salverda and Jon Abbink
Aim and Rationale of the Book

This volume is about the anthropological study of elites and addresses
anew the challenges of research and theoretical interpretation that
this social stratum evokes. On the basis of a fascinating array of case
studies and with reference to previously published work, we explore
the potential of anthropological approaches to elites and aim to
reconfigure their comparative study.
Providing a definition of the concept of “elite”—or “the elect,”
derived from the Latin eligere —is always a challenge, and ours is a
nominal one: an elite is a relatively small group within the societal
hierarchy that claims and/or is accorded power, prestige, or com-
mand over others on the basis of a number of publicly recognized
criteria, and aims to preserve and entrench its status thus acquired.
This definition avoids a moral qualification: the manner in which
elites acquire prestige or power can be violent, coercive, or benevo-
lent, and whatever form they take to assert their position, they are
societal frontrunners and usually the loci of dynamics and change,
because they are emulated and evoke admiration or rivalry and resis-
tance.1 Elites are dominant in some sectors of society on the basis of
certain (im)material characteristics, skills, and achievements, and this
can be in any socially relevant field, from crime to politics and from
military to entertainment. Elites usually form a numerical minority,
but their size can sometimes be very significant.2
Anthropological studies on elites are still relatively scarce com-
pared to those in sociology, history, or political science, which may
2 TIJO SALVERDA AND JON ABBINK
be partly explained by the historically strong focus in social science

on social stratification, political-economic power formations, and
the challenges of inequality in the emerging political systems in the
industrializing West since the mid-nineteenth century, rather than on
stratification and power struggles in non-Western settings. Among
the early sociological theorists regarding Western elites were Pareto
(1991 [1901]),3 Mosca (1923 [1895]), Michels (1911), Weber (1958
[1918]; 1985 [1922]; 1997 [1922]), and Mannheim (1940 [1935]).
As a theorist of stratification and class society, Karl Marx, of course,
also had much to say about the old (feudal) and the new bourgeois
elites in the mid-nineteenth–century Europe as part of his analysis of
class relations, and he inspired numerous studies on emerging elites
and their relation to hierarchy and class structures. Historical studies
on elites, including intellectual and religious elites, in the West and
elsewhere are thus well-developed.4
Among modern elite scholars in sociology and political sci-
ence, some of the most important have been Mills (2000 [1956]),
Dahrendorf (1959), Dahl (1961), Dreitzel (1962), Bottomore (1993
[1965]), Putnam (1976), Domhoff (1978), Etzioni-Halevy (1993),
Lerner, Nagai and Rothman (1996), and Bourdieu (1984 [1979];
1996 [1989]), and the more recent works are by Higley and Burton
(2006), Hartmann, (2007), Engelstad and Gulbrandsen (2007),
and Daloz (2010). Attention has also been grabbed by more popu-
lar, wide-ranging works about Western elites (notably in the United
States), such as Schwartz (1987), Rothkopf (2008), or Wedel (2009),
which stand in the line of C. Wright Mills’s classic The Power Elite
(2000 [1956]).5 These books constitute a popular genre notably in
the United States and are concerned with how the formation of rich
and powerful politico-economic elites may undermine the workings
of political democracy and limit real power to the one percent of
power-holders in society.6 Compared to these political analyses and
insights on Western elites (in democratic societies), it is remarkable
that we still know rather little of the emergence and functioning of
elites in the much more closed societies of China, Africa, and the
Arab/Muslim world, both in the recent past and in the contemporary
globalized era. Especially striking is the absence of recent anthropo-
logical monographs on elites, with most work appearing in journal
papers and book chapters.7
An anthropological approach to elites—in contrast to the more
standard political science and sociological approaches—sets itself
the task of studying and understanding them from within, try-
ing to chart the cultural dynamics and the habitus formation (the
INTRODUCTION 3
internalized behavioral routines and social ideas of a defined social

group) that perpetuate their rule, dominance, or acceptance. The
claim is often made that anthropological methods can reveal more
about the nature of elites as a sociocultural phenomenon and about
how they operate. Empirical attention is then paid to the internal
workings of elite cultures, to the way they construct, employ, and
perpetuate their power and influence, and to the social perception
and cultural valuation of elites among the larger public. In addition
to the more macro approaches of historians, political scientists, and
sociologists (cf. Dronkers and Schijf 2007), anthropology can make
specific, empirically rich contributions to elite studies in general, due
to its methodological and theoretical focus on the social routines,
cultural repertoires, and on the (self-)representations of elites. Related
to this, but perhaps not just an anthropological interest, is charting
the reactions and the behavioral strategies of nonelite people toward
elites. There are obviously significant methodological challenges,
because elites are seen to be rather closed and impervious to critical
researchers. In addition, the subject demands (self-)reflexivity on the
positioning of field researchers toward elites,8 notably of anthropolo-
gists, who due to the particular history of their discipline were not
particularly attracted to elites as such, but more to subaltern and mar-
ginal groups—they tended to study down rather than up (as Laura
Nader [1972] already noted).
In recent decades the study of elites in anthropology has there-
fore not been very fashionable, although empirical studies of leading
groups in non-Western contexts continue to be made. In previous
generations, anthropologists perhaps did field research mainly on
leaders, big men, religious dignitaries, or chiefs—all elites of a sort,
but they were not much theorized as such. A more self-conscious focus
on elites is a recent thing and therefore still scarce. The interesting
volume edited by De Pina-Cabral and Pedroso de Lima (2000) was
specifically concerned with recruitment, succession, and leadership
among elites. The last important general collection was that of Shore
and Nugent (2002), published a decade ago, an excellent overview
that put the issue of elites and their anthropological study again on
the agenda. In the present collection we pursue its lead and inspira-
tion by looking at new cases and new ways of doing field research and
theorizing on elites, trying to evaluate what we have learned since.
We thereby add to the empirical record by presenting a number of
well-chosen case studies of contemporary elite formations in their rise
or decline. A notable lacuna in the Shore and Nugent volume was the
absence of studies on emerging new economic elites or transnational
elite groups that have come to prominence in recent years and are
discussed here in three chapters (Horacio Ortiz, France Bourgouin,
and Irene Skovgaard Smith).9
In our view, elite studies should be directed at the processes,
mechanisms, and strategies of the reconfigurations of power in the
current global world (cf. Rothkopf 2008; Seidel 2010), as well as at
the changing symbolism of elite cultures (Daloz 2007; 2010) and at
the implications of transnationalism (Beaverstock 2002; Beaverstock,
Hubbard, and Short 2004; Hay 2013; Graz 2003; Robinson 2010).
Moreover, elites exist in relation to other social groupings, and under-
standing the latter’s role in constructing or confirming elite positions
is equally important. Among the central questions to be discussed
are the following: Why are elites considered inevitable in the social
order? What is the role of elites and of other social groupings in shap-
ing distinction? How do elites recruit and replace themselves? What is
their social and cultural cohesiveness? How do they define their legit-
imacy and manufacture consent, if any? How do they avert decline
and change? Di Lampedusa, in his unsurpassed novel on the declin-
ing Sicilian elite, Il Gattopardo (1958), has his main character say the
famous words: “If we want things to stay as they are, things will have
to change.”10 No contemporary elite has stayed the same, and the
perpetual challenge of renewal is incumbent upon them in the face of
shifts of power, mutating global production processes, and popular
challenges from below—at present not in the least via the new media
(blogs, social media). This is even apart from the emergence of new
elites of various kinds—from criminal to financial to entertainment
to sports elites in the postmodern world—and from the new global
dynamics in the developing world that have given rise to the reemer-
gence or adaptation of incumbent political and social elites (cf. Taylor
and Nel [2002] on Africa).
In trying to explain elite reconfigurations and thus reveal more
about the generative societal mechanisms that produce or change
them, a more interactionist perspective is useful, looking at infra-
structural and cognitive-symbolic elements, articulating upon each
other. A political-economy approach—focusing on the material inter-
ests, property relations, class bases, and power structures involved—is
a first prerequisite of analysis and requires basic quantitative and his-
torical research. But it seems to us not sufficient in itself, as it often
does not say enough about the social, cultural, and socio-cognitive
aspects of elite (re)production or about the processes and implications
of habitus formation involved.
INTRODUCTION 5
In this book, references are made to important previous anthropo-

logical work on elites by, for example, Cohen (1981), Marcus (1983),
De Pina-Cabral and Pedroso de Lima (2000), Shore and Nugent
(2002), Werbner (2004), and Wedel (2009) to chart the development
of elite studies as a distinct field and to emphasize the renewed rel-
evance of anthropological perspectives on elite formation, durability,
and transformation, where economic, political, and cultural factors
play an interlocking role.
On Locating and Defining Elites

We have given a definition of elite above and will substantiate it more
in this section. When the term “elite” is mentioned, most people have
an image of what this represents, even though this often remains con-
ceptually vague. In academic literature the term “elite” is often taken
for granted and barely explained. It seems to be a container concept.
Bert Schijf, in the first chapter, poses the question of who actually are
the elites in the society. He contends that the answer is still far from
easy: elites are often related to positions of power but also to the pro-
cess of social mobility. Moreover, as he shows, different disciplines use
different methods to define and research elites, consequently coming
to different outcomes. In a concise way Schijf thus demonstrates the
values and the limits of the different approaches to elite research.
If we say that an elite is a social group within the societal hier-
archy that claims and/or is accorded power, prestige, or command
over others on the basis of a number of criteria and aims to pre-
serve and entrench its status (see above), this refers to groups of per-
sons possessing certain resources, a fact that grants them a position
of command (cf. Dogan 2003a). Our perspective also implies that
elite members share a variety of interests arising from similarities of
experience, training, public roles or duties, and way of life (Cohen
1981, xvi). According to Scott’s sociological definition (2003), only
those collectivities based in positions of command should be seen as
elites—this, he writes, distinguishes an elite from privileged or advan-
taged groups. In the fullest sense, an elite is a social grouping whose
members occupy similar, advantageous command situations within
the social distribution of authority or social hierarchy and who are
linked to one another through demographic processes of circulation
and interaction (cf. ibid., 156, 157).
Many of these elites tend to control only certain resources that may
be mobilized in the exercise of power, since hegemonies, controlling
all resources, are very rare. Consequently, most elites are functional
elites, and a distinction can be drawn between, for example, business
elites, ethnic elites, military elites, political elites, religious elites, aca-
demic elites, entertainment/showbiz elites, and bureaucratic elites
(cf. Dogan 2003b, 1; Shore 2002, 4). Even Mills (2000 [1956])
acknowledged the existence of functional elites; yet he argued that
the political, military, and business elite in the United States shared
interests, tying them into a unified “power elite.”11 Needless to say,
such elites are always quite limited in number.
A further distinction is often made regarding the influence that
elites wield, to avoid defining every group with a certain prestige and
specific skills as an elite. Susan Keller (1963) argued that elites such as
sportsmen tend to be significant only to their specific field. Strategic
elites, however, have a much wider influence, as their power, deci-
sions, and control over resources have consequences for many mem-
bers of society. The “1 percent versus the 99 percent” metaphor in
debates in the United States, in this sense, is a striking example of
probing the (unwelcome) influence of a strategic elite. Although the
case studies in this volume are about so-called strategic elites, we want
nevertheless to state that we should be cautious not to be too narrow
in defining elites. How many people have to feel the consequences of
the decisions of an elite? In other words, where do we draw the line of
what is a strategic elite and what not? It would be counterproductive,
from our point of view, to limit our definitions, as new insights may
actually come from empirical research on elites other than the usual
suspects of political and economic elites, consequently increasing the
understanding of elites and elite-related issues more generally.
Also, we claim that an elite should not be narrowed down to a
group in actual possession and exercise of the commanding positions
only. Although an elite is indeed constituted of people in command,
as Scott mentions, linked to one another through, for example,
demographic processes of circulation, those in command are linked
to a wider group that does not only directly exercise command but
also shares a way of life and a variety of interests arising from simi-
larities. Arguably therefore, an elite includes more than just those in
positions of command. For example, and clearly illustrated by the sig-
nificance of education, the younger generation of a specific elite may
have privileged access to commanding positions at a future moment
in time. Widening the elite’s functioning beyond their occupying top
positions, moreover, is necessary because not everyone in the specific
wider social group may exercise command. But these people may nev-
ertheless have influence on the persons who are in those positions
INTRODUCTION 7
through, for example, the shared way of life or their sociocultural

frame of reference. Partners and families of the elite thus conceived
may impact on the construction and maintenance of this way of life.
It is therefore precisely the combined feature of possessing command-
ing positions and exercising control over particular resources along
with sharing sociocultural characteristics, customs, and modes of
life—in short, a habitus— with a wider group or a social (sub)system
that defines an elite. This, however, should not prevent us from ask-
ing new questions about what constitutes an elite, especially in an
age of increased global mobility. Ortiz’s chapter about professionals
in the financial sector perfectly illustrates this—and research on the
(global) operations of the super-rich is relevant in this respect as well
(Beaverstock, Hubbard, and Short 2004; Hay 2013).
The complexity of the term “elite” also relates to the fact that it
is usually a term of reference rather than of self -reference, as George
Marcus noted (1983, 9)—this is probably because those who look up
often see more homogeneity than the people at the top themselves
(Fennema and Heemskerk 2008, 29). Elite members may not use the
elite label defined according to the above-mentioned characteristics.
But when an elite downplays its leading role this does not automati-
cally deny its occupying the top positions. Identifying the aforemen-
tioned characteristics that define an elite does not need the approval
of the group itself. A critical approach will, therefore, combine the
analysis of the elite’s self-definition and of “probing their intimate
space rather than relying on their formal self-presentations” (Herzfeld
2000, 227).
Elite Phenomena: Some Behavioral Aspects

In many people’s daily lives contact with elites seems to play a mar-
ginal role. Their interactions are predominantly with people of a
similar (nonelite) background. Elites are usually distant, infrequently
discussed in detail, though ever present in the media and the enter-
tainment discourse that extends globally. Vague notions and popular
beliefs about the power and the influence of elites certainly abound,
but are rarely precise. A recurring theme is the mixture of envy and
respect for elites, notably the political and the economic elites with
tangible power over the lives of others. Elites are almost by definition
the object of contestation and challenge, and despite the deserved or
enforced prerogatives they have they can never be secure in their pos-
session of them. This also shows that elite is an inherently ambiguous
concept.
Issues of growing inequality in power, wealth, consumptive dis-

play, and prestige symbolism around the globe seem to indicate that
the role of elites at present might be more contested and challenged
than ever. A curious fact is that academic insights about the power,
influence, and behavior of elites have not run parallel with the fact of
their increasing global role and impact. Research on elites in social
science shows some significant lacunae.12 In a clear and concise
manner, Savage and Williams (2008) illuminate these omissions of
research and wonder whether this correlates with an increased focus
on quantitative data gathering in the social sciences. It may be that
due to their small size elites13 are easily underrepresented in quantita-
tive studies.
Anthropology, the study with a qualitative approach par excel-
lence, could have filled the gap; yet it has, generally speaking, con-
tinued to focus on the marginalized and the less powerful. However,
understanding the position of the latter is enhanced by better insights
in the actions and choices of elites. When elites are discussed in stud-
ies about the marginalized and/or other social groups, the analysis
of their choices and practices remains limited, often even simplistic,
framed usually in terms of easy antagonisms. One of the notable
exceptions in the ethnography of elites, Abner Cohen’s The Politics
of Elite Culture (1981) on the Creole elite of Sierra Leone, indicated
that there was much to gain from the combination of in-depth ethno-
graphic data with the theoretical interpretation of elite practices. Yet
this book already dates back three decades, and has few if any succes-
sors. In the earlier mentioned collective volume Elite Cultures (2002),
Shore and Nugent presented a rich array of field-based studies that
showed once more the great relevance of an ethnographic approach to
elites. Since then, however, with a few exceptions—such as Werbner
(2004)—mostly silence has reigned. Due to a number of institutional,
practical, and historical reasons, a field called the “anthropology of
elites” was not developed.14 As noted, this is not to say that many
studies have not dealt with elites and their power; yet they often do
not tend to take forward elite theory as such.
In the current era of growing (global) inequalities, altering geopo-
litical balances, sociocultural contestation,15 and mounting (popular)
resistance to the established political classes in much of the demo-
cratic world, it is timely and topical to (re)interpret elite behavior and
practices and consider them from a cultural point of view. In this vein,
the present volume tries to push forward the study of political, eco-
nomic, and social elites with a number of historical and ethnographic
case studies. They all shed new light on a number of theoretical and
INTRODUCTION 9
methodological issues, relevant not only to the discipline of anthro-

pology but also to social science more generally. Below, we identify a
number of common themes of relevance in this endeavor.
Elite Power
As we noted above, despite scant attention over the last decades, the
study of elites and elite-related issues has a long tradition in social
science, especially in sociology, history, and political science. In their
quest for understanding the complexities of emerging capitalist soci-
ety, social theorists in the nineteenth and early twentieth century paid
significant attention to the power and influence of elites, mostly as a
part of their wider analysis of class, society, and social stratification.
Mosca’s work in particular has given rise to a tradition of scholarly
theorizing on “democratic elitism,” which runs via Schumpeter to
Habermas (cf. Best & Higley 2010). Especially Pareto’s model of elite
circulation—that is between “foxes,” or cunning elites using manipu-
lation and diplomacy, and “lions,” elites not hesitating to use force—
has been seen as relevant to the understanding of different forms
of elite power (Higley and Pakulski 2007). And Antonio Gramsci’s
well-known work about hegemony has been relevant for understand-
ing the ways in which elites try to dominate the ideological concep-
tions of the order of societies (cf., for example, Fontana [1993]). While
Pareto praised the virtues of elites, on the other side of the spectrum,
Gramsci—as a Marxist—was highly critical of them and found this
reasoning about their virtues not valid as an analysis. According to
his more political than sociological analysis of this specific form of
power, the (ideological) control of the sociopolitical order by the elite
and the concomitant disqualification of dissidents not adhering to
this of course helped rulers to maintain the status quo but did not
by definition validate or confirm the legitimacy of their position. His
famous concept of “hegemony” referred to the social phenomenon
that elites could maintain control also ideologically, by declaring a set
of cultural values as normative or hegemonic so that they appeared as
common sense values of all. This line of reasoning foreshadows some
of Pierre Bourdieu’s work on elites.
In his well-known work of 1974 (2005 edition) on power, political
sociologist Steven Lukes took up key points of the Gramscian view and
argued that there were three views of power. The “one-dimensional”
view, the so-called concrete and actual exercise of power, is the most
striking and consequently first and foremost identified as power
(Lukes 2005 [1974]). His “two-dimensional view of power,” that is,
power as controlling the political agenda and keeping the potential

issues out of the political process, was based on a preceding analysis
of the political process (Bachrach and Baratz 1962; Dahl 1961). He
made clear that (elite) power is often applied in such way that unfa-
vorable issues are kept out of the discussion before they may lead
to head-on (“one-dimensional”) confrontations. Lukes’s third and
“radical view of power,” which posits that dominant ideologies tend
to work against people’s interests by misleading them, distorting their
judgment, and applying the ruler’s power in such an effective way as
to prevent conflicts from rising up (Lukes 2005 [1974], 13, 27), was
related to Gramsci’s arguments.
These theoretical approaches to (elite) power have been influential
and may still serve us well as a tool to deconstruct elite power in its
constitutive elements and mechanisms. However, Gramsci’s analysis of
hegemony may not always survive the scrutiny of empirical evidence,
because the interaction between elites and other segments of soci-
ety tends to be more diverse and complex than suggested. Dominant
ideologies may certainly serve the elite, but it should be realized that
they may equally believe in these ideologies as the unquestionable
truth. Moreover, dominant ideologies can indeed be very strong, but
are not always static and are adapted and altered under the influence
of social change.
The question of how elite power relates to the distribution of
power in the society more generally also needs to be raised. John
Scott (2008) rightly challenged the notion that elites by definition
are all-powerful and argued that their power must be seen as open
to challenge (see Salverda’s chapter for what this may entail in our
conceptualization of elite power).16 The relationships of elites’ vis-à-
vis counter-elites and/or other groups resisting elite power are two
sides of the same coin: the elite tries to maintain the status quo while
the opposing group pushes for change. Despite the great diversity
in elites, a shared trait among them is their resistance to change. In
their comfortable positions at the top change is suspect because obvi-
ously it may jeopardize status and privilege: “The highest classes, as
everyone knows, are the most conservative . . . No change can bring
them additional power, and every change can give them something
to fear, but nothing to hope for” (Simmel 1957 [1908], 99). At the
same time, however, it is argued that elites create crises (Dogan and
Higley 1998, 23, 24), such as political and economic rivalry, group
conflict, and repression, which often result in change.17 Since change
is part and parcel of human life and of the societal process, some elites
have inevitably disappeared and new ones have arisen (Cohen 1981,
INTRODUCTION 11
xiii), showing that their positions can never be taken for granted.
Elite formations in themselves are, however, a durable feature of most
societies.
Networks
A number of American political scientists in the mid-1950s stated
that political and economic changes were actually strengthening elite
power and in this vein made notable contributions to elite theory.
C. Wright Mills and his contemporaries G. W. Domhoff and R. Dahl,
who dominated the American academic debate around the study of
politics, elites, and power in the late 1950s and 1960s, emphasized
the importance of existing and emerging networks. In fact, their anal-
ysis of elite power was mostly based on assessing the structure and the
impact of the top-level networks. Mills (2000 [1956]) argued that due
to increased mobility and more centralized government in the United
States from Second World War onward, elites of different origins—
military, business, and political—were becoming interlocked through
the overlapping of top-ranking positions. In effect, he stated, differ-
ent functional and geographical elites were becoming merged into a
single power elite. But this analysis by Mills (and later also Domhoff
[1978]), who posited the existence of a power elite largely organized
with regard to common interests, was not shared by everyone. Dahl in
Who Governs? Democracy and Power in an American City (1961), for
example, put forward the existence of different elite factions, which
did not have enough overlap to actually constitute a unified ruling
elite.18
Their research has nevertheless been very influential in the
rethinking of the influence and power of elites, despite disagree-
ments about the presence of such a unified elite. Mills, Domhoff,
and Dahl’s contributions are clear examples of the need to unravel
the role of elite networks.19 The differences emerging from the
assessments of elite power undertaken by them actually show the
importance—and related difficulties—of assessing elite networks in
terms of how, where, and why elites constitute cohesive groups. The
range of possible networks, after all, is substantial: boardrooms and
educational institutions, ties of friendship, the openings of exhibi-
tions, official events, clubs, hunting parties, families, and so forth—
all these also tending to differ as to the scope and intensity of their
functioning and importance. Networks on the level of elites also can
serve to create culturally validated bonds of trust, which enhances
solidarity and commonality of interest (cf. Tilly 2005), which further
illustrates the usefulness of an anthropological approach, including

participant observation and qualitative methods.20 Considering the
variety of networks, critical comments often address the overreli-
ance on publicly available information about (formal) positions, such
as the positions on the boards of directors of business companies,
the guest list of the annual debutante ball, and so on. This often
proves insufficient and Savage and Williams argue that elites cannot
be understood adequately by only looking at, for example, interlock-
ing directorates (2008, 3). It seems likely that many scholars who
predominantly focus on these formal networks with a high degree of
visibility fail to spot the importance of informal networks and other
sources of interconnecting (Camp 2003, 149). Cohen, for instance,
has argued that in liberal societies adhering to the principle of equal-
ity of opportunity (usually upheld by their constitutions) the net-
working serving the particular interests of elites is often performed
secretly (1981, xvi).
Mills, despite his strong focus on formal networks, was not oblivi-
ous to informal networks and acknowledged that to understand the
group cohesion of an elite a whole series of smaller face-to-face milieus
needed to be examined. According to him, the most obvious histori-
cal case is the upper-class family (see also Schijf’s chapter for an analy-
sis of the elite family), although the analysis had to be extended to
secondary schools and metropolitan clubs as well (Mills 2000 [1956],
15, 61). That family and power are indeed in close connection in elite
circles, especially in businesses due to, for example, succession issues, is
clearly illustrated in the book Elites: Choice, Leadership and Succession
(De Pina-Cabral and Pedroso de Lima 2000). The old French (busi-
ness) elite families also show a strong focus on the family’s patrimony
and the family members’ role in transferring the patrimony to future
generations (Pinçon and Pinçon-Charlot 1998, 327–379). Similarly,
the long history of the Russian nomenklatura created a strong drive,
even a tradition, to reproduce itself across generations—a pattern of
reproduction that seems to be continuing in the postcommunist era
(Szelényi and Szelényi 1995, 631).
The fall of the statist communist regimes in Eastern Europe is
telling with respect to elite networks anyway, as many of the elites
could just swap functions, enabling them to maintain their elite posi-
tions. For example, in the Russian transition to postcommunism,
enduring networks facilitated elite maintenance (Dogan and Higley
1998, 132). Top Communist party people helped their family mem-
bers to launch successful private enterprises; even after they had lost
their commanding positions, informal ties were still able to facilitate
INTRODUCTION 13
special access to people and information (Böröcz and Róna-Tas 1995,

761; cf. Wedel 2010).
Resilience of informal ties, also other than family and kinship ties,
appears often to relate to a shared past, as elite members often share
similar educational backgrounds and attend the same schools and
universities. Networks may sometimes more or less originate in edu-
cational institutions: “The formative years are crucial in laying the
foundations for a network and concomitant social capital that lasts
one’s entire life” (Heemskerk 2007, 110). Consequently, schools and
universities are important for the education, training, and recruitment
of younger elite generations, as elaborately illustrated by Bourdieu.
“Capital”
In The State Nobility: Elite Schools in the Field of Power Bourdieu (1996
[1989]) addressed the importance of education in the reproduction of
elites. His rich, empirically based analysis of the influence of school-
ing on elite careers and of the reproduction of the elites as they pre-
pare their children by sending them to the same schools, has received
widespread recognition. Despite a predominance of data about the
French educational system, making certain of his findings difficult to
transpose, Bourdieu’s analysis has a general appeal for those research-
ing the socially reproductive role of education in advanced societies
(see for a comparative perspective Hartmann [2007], 61–88).
Bourdieu’s theoretical contribution to the understanding of elites
goes beyond recognizing the role of education, however. Especially
his analysis about distinction and different forms of capital has influ-
enced many scholars. The privileged, according to Bourdieu, not
only maintain their power by means of economic capital, but also
through cultural capital (for example, prestigious academic titles),
symbolic capital (for example, noble titles and membership to the
most exclusive clubs), and social capital (either inherited directly from
their family or acquired through marriage, or service on the board of
directors of a top-ranked company) (1996, 331). By means of these
different forms of capital the privileged have access to and construct
influential networks and contacts not accessible to the majority of
people (Westwood 2002, 49). Moreover, capital relates to maintain-
ing an elite position by dominating the cognitive map and the social
discourse: “Indicators of prestige and dominant taste originating at
the top become a hegemonic norm with regard to those tastes of
other classes—subject to ‘symbolic violence’—which can thus only
be interpreted negatively” (Daloz 2010, 35). In this context, Shore
argued that it is important to “analyse the language and practice

through which elites represent themselves and the techniques they
use to legitimise their position” (2002, 13).
Bourdieu’s approach with respect to the role of symbolic, cultural,
and social aspects of elite formations has been very influential in social
science; even though for anthropology analytically addressing such
aspects was certainly not new. Cohen’s The Politics of Elite Culture
(1981), which did not make a reference to Bourdieu’s work (and vice
versa), strongly emphasized the importance of rituals, symbols, and
mystique in the maintenance of elite power and as such is the culmi-
nation of a longer tradition of ethnographic research in non-Western
settings on the cultural aspects of power and hegemony. Symbolism,
then, tends to reinforce the elite position, especially because reference
to symbolic aspects may grant the elite (potentially) more power and
legitimacy than would be assumed on the basis of the resources it
controls. In France, for example, it is “the cultural elite [i.e. televi-
sion personalities, journalists, writers, etc.], which does not hold a
position of power, but which exercises indirectly a great influence on
those invested with power, and which is very visible, occupying an
enormous place in the media and in the mind of the masses” (Dogan
2003c, 64).
The Case Studies: The Culture of Elites

as Anthropological Focus
When elaborating on the contribution of anthropology to the study
of elites, the first thing that comes to mind is often elite culture. Few
concepts are linked as strongly to the anthropological discipline as
culture. Cohen’s work (1981) most notably showed the relevance of
observing the cultural patterns of elite strata. In 1983 Marcus wrote:
“The schematics of elite organization and its place in larger system
frameworks have been much more commonly addressed than its inter-
nal culture and practices” (1983, 10). Twenty years after Cohen’s pio-
neering work and Marcus’s comments, elite culture still has received
relatively little attention, Shore noted (2002, 10), but the case stud-
ies presented in this volume directly and indirectly help to better
determine the influence of the distinguishing cultural characteristics
of elites. They also raise issues of cross-cultural comparison. With
respect to the maintenance of elite positions, moreover, an anthro-
pological perspective may allow us to better see how and why certain
cultural patterns are transmitted whereas others are not. Educational
preferences, specific styles of self-presentation, and networks play an
INTRODUCTION 15
obvious role here. As Aline Courtois shows in her chapter on the Irish
elite, the construction of a collective elite identity begins at a young
age: with the recruitment process at elite schools. With a preference
for a very specific socially and culturally homogeneous clientele, and
restricted access maintained by, for example, high fees and admission
policies, the entrance of unwanted, exogenous elements is severely
limited. This subsequently contributes, as Courtois illustrates, to fos-
tering a collective sense of eliteness, leading to acquiring skills, con-
fidence, and rich social capital, beneficial to obtaining positions of
power later in life.
Cohen showed how cultural patterns and ritual expressions and
manners, function in the making of elite distinction, influencing the
complexity of interactions with other social groups. Being decidedly
different, an attitude emphasized through symbols of superiority and
distinction as theorized by Bourdieu (1984) and as meticulously ana-
lyzed by Jean-Pascal Daloz (2010), is important for elites. Stefanie
Lotter, in her chapter based on the Rana clan in Nepal, shows how
ways of distinction differ between cultures but can be transferred and
introduced cross-culturally. She illustrates how the emerging Rana
used unfamiliar ways of distinction as strategic tools to gain a status
otherwise unattainable. Introducing foreign ways of distinction does,
however, not come without complications. Customs have to be modi-
fied, the rules of religious obligations bent, and first-rate performance
is necessary to convince locals and foreigners that a new social hierar-
chy has been established.
Following up on more than a century of theoretical explanations of
elite power, behavior, status, and so forth, what more besides a focus
on elite cultures has an anthropology of elites to offer? Ethnographies
of elites offer the opportunity to illustrate the lives of elites more
richly and holistically, especially due to anthropology’s methodologi-
cal approach of deep hanging out. Ethnographic probing can help to
grasp the multidimensionality of elite culture, its internal relations and
power formations, its social history, and the elite’s relationships (histor-
ical and contemporary) with other social groups or classes. Apart from
its often more varied methodological strategies, this perspective differs
from sociological and political science perspectives in the sense that it
focuses more strongly on the sociocultural patterns and practices, the
symbolic aspects, the cultural play and display, the construction of
meaning, and the experiences of the actors (i.e., elite members) them-
selves. A greater sensitivity for grasping ambiguous and contradictory
behavior, not only of elites but also of other social groupings vis-à-vis
elites, moreover helps to unravel the complexities of distinction.
The case studies assembled in this volume show the dynam-

ics and mutations of elites rule and the (self)conceptions of elites,
as well as their specific behavior and their strategies. This will help
to push forward the understanding of elites on a number of fronts.
Ethnographies of elites clarify how differences between elites and
other social groups are constructed, marked, changed, and perceived,
integrating the analysis of political-economic factors (power, wealth,
control) with those of collective behavior and cultural patterning as
emergent properties.
The Other
An important contribution of anthropology indeed lies in making
sense of the relationship of an elite with other social groups, as the
other is part and parcel of elite positioning. Elites only exist vis-à-vis
other social groups—be they the marginalized, dependents, support-
ers, or the counter-elites. Addressing the relations between elites and
nonelites, then, is necessary because elites do not exist in a vacuum.
Elites and other social groups are commonly mutually dependent on
one another, and other social groups are the ones to challenge the
elite power. An anthropological perspective, in this respect, can help
to understand the complexity of this interdependency, for instance,
due to a strong focus on what Shore indicated, in a Malinowskian
vein, as “to understand the way social reality is constructed by actors
themselves; to grasp their conception of the world and the way they
related to it as self-conscious agents” (Shore 2002, 5). Even though
research on elites in other disciplines focuses less on perceptions,
or their conceptions, this approach is not exclusively anthropologi-
cal. Reis and Moore’s edited volume Elite Perceptions of Poverty and
Inequality (2005), for example, shows the relevance of grasping elite
perceptions of poverty in developing counties, and not just those of
the poor themselves. The editors note that elites usually control gov-
ernments and policies aiming at reducing poverty, and only by tracing
their perceptions and behavior vis-à-vis the poor, related to the emer-
gence of forms of social consciousness, we will enhance our under-
standing of the persistence of inequality and the chances of success of
countervailing policies.
As Cohen (1981) has cogently illustrated, the complexity of rela-
tionships between elites and other social groups emerges from ten-
sions between an elite’s universalistic functions, such as services to the
public, and organizing itself particularistically, that is keeping itself in
existence through distinctive traits (ibid., xiii). A relevant question
INTRODUCTION 17
regarding this balance is that of the potential differences among the

functional elites. The universalistic functions of business elites are of
a different order than those of political elites (in democratic states).
One could argue that business elites do not represent anyone’s inter-
ests other than their own and are therefore less dependent on the
support of other groups. There are, of course, still relationships with
other social groups, since the latter tend to be the customers, clients,
and employees of this elite. Business elites can obtain universalistic
functions for example through charitable work and by financially sup-
porting community and/or social work. Alliances with political elites
can also be used as a strategy to establish some sort of vertical loyal-
ties and universalistic aspirations. Such alliances can be shaped by
means of donations to political parties, lobby groups, and also direct
corruption. In this kind of scenario, politicians back the interests of
the business elites. An awareness of these aspects also gives insights
into how and why an elite position is maintained or lost.
As Irene Skovgaard Smith, in her chapter on management con-
sultants, shows, the relevance of an anthropological approach comes
also from recognizing the role that nonelites actually have in shap-
ing elite status and positions. Following them in action as they work
with clients, she shows how management consultants form a secre-
tive and closed profession, that few researchers have had access to.
This “opaqueness” is, as Shore (2002, 10) noted, part of what often
characterizes elites. In her observations of the consultants and their
clients, Skovgaard Smith observes a theoretically interesting pattern.
The status of consultants and their associated abilities are to a large
extent attributed to them by other actors in the context of the client
organization. This indicates that the elites’ position is also attributed
to them and constructed by way of differentiation in relation to other
social actors.
Change
The elites’ relationships with other social groups and their legitimacy
are not self-evident but must constantly be validated and are prone
to change. Considering the difficulties of maintaining the balance
between universalistic functions and organizing itself particularisti-
cally, elites cannot take their positions for granted. Elites have inevita-
bly disappeared and new ones have arisen. Anthropology can make a
strong contribution here by in-depth and close-up study of how elite
members face and/or cause change, and how they subsequently resist
or adapt to maintain their elite position. Fernanda Pirie and Justine
Rogers, in their chapter, investigate how the Bar of England and

Wales, one of the longest established professions in the UK, adapts to
changes, such as commercial forces and managerialism. With a focus
on trainee barristers, their rich ethnographic research gives interest-
ing insights into how an elite in twenty-first–century Britain tries
to bridge the particularism-universalism dilemma. They demonstrate
that while adapting to external controls, barristers are still effectively
fostering a remarkable sense of exclusivity and status among their new
recruits.
Since the universalistic tendencies of ‘functional’ elites and their
needs tend to differ, their functions are relevant also when it comes to
change. As Dogan noted: “In the case of abrupt regime changes, an
analogy has been noticed across countries: the economic and admin-
istrative elites resist better the upheaval than the political and mili-
tary elites” (2003b, 13). In this respect, the fall of the Communist
regimes in Eastern Europe is telling, as here the political elites were
most prone to change: “The revolutions of 1989 were political revo-
lutions, aimed directly at changing the institutional character of the
political sphere and removing the old political leadership” (Böröcz
and Róna-Tas 1995, 777). As illustrated above, many of the old
elites tended, however, to swap functions. Longina Jakubowska’s
chapter on the Polish gentry, which reemerged after the collapse of
Communism, offers a fascinating account of the process. The gentry,
in a way, experienced a double change: they lost their elite position
due to the Communist revolution and despite decades of erosion were
resurrected again when Communism collapsed. Or was it mainly the
elite’s identity that was changing? Jakubowska shows how the gentry
were quick to adapt to a new political order and honed the art of con-
version of capital—land, money, and skills, as well as lifestyle—into
a relevant resource in each era. After 1989, the gentry as a class used
history as a form of capital in such a way that they became guardians
of what it meant to understand and practice Polish ethnicity. Her case
helps our understanding of the processes by which a group maintains
its identity through time, not just as one identity among others, but
as dominant and dominating. The story is relevant, moreover, for
recognizing the techniques that elites use to legitimize their posi-
tion (Shore 2002, 13), for example, through altering their dominant
ideologies.
Relationships between elites and nonelites are often redefined
as a consequence of (intended and nonintended) change. Deasy
Simandjuntak, in her chapter on Indonesian decentralization, illustrates
INTRODUCTION 19
how new (political) power configurations were shaped after the sys-
tem was implemented in 1997. District governments could now choose
their own leaders, leading to new forms of relationships between
(newly emerging and local) elites and their constituencies. Reinforced
ethno-religious identities were a consequence of new patron-client
linkages that developed in the decentralized system. Simandjuntak,
however, shows that the clients were not mere passive followers. They
have the capacity to choose which patron is suitable for them, influenc-
ing what kind of elite characteristics are deemed attractive and relevant.
The clients, then, importantly contribute to how elites constantly shape
and (re)define their social capital.
Change in the lives of elites, obviously, relates to general social
developments affecting elites as well as other groups. General social
trends, for example, seem to influence the position of the Bar in the
UK. Political actors, however, also instigate change, of which the
Communist revolution is a perfect example. The position of elites thus
relates to how their behavior affects other social groups and the (poten-
tial) actions the latter undertake in response to this behavior. Hence,
as Scott rightly argues, the assumption that elites are all-powerful
is a false one, and he notes that “resistance is integral to power and
must figure in any comprehensive research agenda” (2008, 40). Tijo
Salverda, in his chapter on the Franco-Mauritians, the white former
colonial elite of the island of Mauritius, claims that for a better theo-
retical understanding of elite power we have to take into consideration
that elites often do not initiate power struggles but apply their power
defensively. In the case of the Franco-Mauritians, using their power
defensively has been effective in facing challenges and political changes
(especially the transition from the colonial period to the present) and
has contributed to the relative success of sustaining their (social and
economic) elite position in postcolonial Mauritius. Close observa-
tion of what really happens on the ground helps to understand the
multidimensionality of power relations between the elite and other
social groups. Moreover, the Franco-Mauritian case indicates that an
anthropological perspective with a focus on how social realities are
constructed or represented by actors themselves tends to enhance
knowledge about the exercise of power, potentially leading to new
theoretical insights (cf. also Salverda [2010]). Closely studying how
elites perceive and use their various kinds of power and are influ-
enced by other social groups and structures allows us to get a better
grasp of the relevant power configurations within a society and of
the counterforces it may evoke.
A Globalizing World
The value of an anthropological approach also shows in researching
the realities of globalization, especially the impact of global move-
ments, connections, and exchanges on the local, and vice versa. To
understand the operations of elites in relation to globalization, for
example, we have to raise questions on whether an elite is primarily
locally/nationally situated or whether it is more embedded in trans-
national elite settings, as well as what constitutes an elite. In this
book there are a number of studies on the phenomenon of new elites:
the emerging financial professionals and transnational consultants.
Such groups were not addressed yet, for instance, in the Shore and
Nugent volume (2002). Janine Wedel (2009) has referred to the new
top power brokers in the United States rather than to the classical
elite, the latter being slowly overtaken by the former, as a new supra-
national elite. Ortiz’s chapter below is based on fieldwork with stock
brokers, fund managers, and hedge fund consultants in New York,
Paris, and London. He shows that these professionals—given their
social networks, their specific skills acquired through formal educa-
tion and setting high barriers to entry in the group, and their funda-
mental role within the bureaucracies that carry out the distribution of
resources worldwide through financial flows—produce and reproduce
global social hierarchies defined by the access to credit and exchange.
Financial professionals’ organization in global commercial networks,
Ortiz argues, poses fundamental questions also as to the utility of the
concept of elite, in particular in what refers to a supposed unity of the
group and to its self-perception as homogenous.
Describing a case geographically far away from the Western finan-
cial centers yet involved in similar global economic networks, France
Bourgouin’s chapter deals with a transnational business elite of young
African businessmen and women living in Johannesburg. Through
an anthropological analysis of the activities, personal histories, and
professional ambitions of these businessmen and woman, Bourgouin
forges a new understanding of the processes of social reproduction
in a transnational space, on the one hand, and in the local setting of
Johannesburg, on the other.
Ethnographies of elites in developed, modern-industrial societies,
we argue, can enhance knowledge about how they operate between
the global and the local in general, and how globalization influences
elite behavior, in particular, because an elite might focus more on
the world beyond the local boundaries and thus neglect its relation-
ship with other local actors. A fundamental question in this respect
INTRODUCTION 21
is how far universalistic tendencies can be stretched, and/or whether

these change or become defunct in new global settings. Moreover,
globalization may have an impact on the nature and cohesion of elite
networks, which can also lead to new forms of eliteness, for example
as shown in Ortiz’s case. Global and regional developments should
therefore be taken into consideration from the start, because they
may be significant preconditions or variables for the maintenance of
an elite position or even play a decisive role in generating elite change
itself. In this respect, these multiple global influences could in due
course override any strategy of adaptation or transformation that an
elite, as a collectivity with a subculture of shared customs, traits, and
solidarity, may mobilize against them.
As to the traditional research settings of anthropology—non-
Western or nonindustrial societies and subcultures—there is also
plenty of room for studying elites in those contexts. Development and
globalization in the contemporary era are leading to the emergence
of new local elite strata among the so-called marginal, tribal, or pas-
toral societies, whose function as contact points or brokers in larger
networks and interest groups, connecting to state authorities, trans-
local power centers, or civic organizations like (foreign) NGOs or
international organizations should be the issue of research. Only an
ethnography of elites can get at the dynamics of change from within.
In conclusion, we would contend that anthropological approaches to
the study of elites are as relevant as ever (Schijf, in his chapter below,
highlights the growing rapprochement of sociology and anthropology
in elite studies) and can be reinvigorated by a sustained concentra-
tion on new global elite formations. The various financial, devel-
opmental, and even conservationist networks across the world link
the local and the global (via the national), and—as we have seen in
2007–2008 and 2011—are also highly influential in creating certain
conjunctures of crises that impact significantly on nonelite people.
As among other political power elites, the new global economic-fi-
nancial elites (cf. Rothkopf 2008) tend to develop a network culture
and a managerial lifestyle that floats above national societies and laws
and may subvert accountability pressures. This necessitates critical
scrutiny from the public media and from social science, including
anthropology. The methodological and personal-ethical challenges of
such anthropological research projects are great, because they would
demand some significant reschooling of anthropologists in the world
of finance, business management, etcetera for them to be taken seri-
ously (cf. the Skovgaard Smith, Bourgouin, and Ortiz chapters). But
this may be a profitable investment in a new genre of social research
with great social relevance. We hope that this volume will advance the
comparative anthropological study of elites and redress the relative
neglect that the subject has suffered in the past few decades.
Notes
1. Elites are probably a human universal and are also present in non-
industrial, acephalous societies, such as, the !Kung San in Southern
Africa, where spirit mediums formed an elite, having prestige
although not being rewarded for it in a political or material sense.
And in the society of the Suri agro-pastoralists in Southwest Ethiopia
(cf. Abbink 2000) two hereditary clans retained a position of ritual
(not executive) power and prestige, functioning as a descent elite in
an otherwise strongly egalitarian society.
2. Christopher Lasch, in his posthumous book The Revolt of the Elites
(1995), estimated that about one-fifth of the American population
belonged to the elite, or rather to a variety of elites or privileged classes.
3. Who offered a concise definition of elite as “a class of the people who
have the highest indices in their branch of activity.”
4. Some examples are: Durand-Guédy (2010), Roth and Beachy (2007),
Toru and Phillips (2000), and Henshall (2010).
5. For an interesting reconsideration of this book, see Alan Wolfe,
“The power elite now,” American Prospect 9, May 1, 1999 (http://
prospect.org/cs/articles?article=the_power_elite_now) [Accessed
September 24, 2011]. Dahrendorf (1959) criticized Mills’ approach
as exaggerating the cohesiveness and unity of the power elite. He
countered that although elites have a measure of sociopolitical and
economic autonomy and exercise influence, they rarely form a sol-
idary group advancing common interests.
6. Cf. also former World Bank economist Stiglitz’s comment (2011). For
France, see Genieys (2010); for Europe in general, see Seidel (2010);
for China, see Pieke (2009). Theoretically important is also Mizruchi
(2004) on US corporate rule. Wedel’s (2009) study also breaks new
ground on this minority.
7. A popular subject for the anthropological study of elite groups has
been the European Union bureaucracy: see Bellier (2000), Abélès
(2005), or Shore (2007).
8. Fumanti (2004) has reflected on the issue of agency of anthropologi-
cal fieldworkers among elites.
9. There was one chapter on this subject in De Pina-Cabral and Pedroso
de Lima’s book (2000) on elite choice, leadership, and succession—
that of Pedroso de Lima on contemporary Lisbon financial elites. But
here the idiom of kinship and family in the control and transmission
of elite resources was the main concern, not the functioning of these
elites as a new socio-economic formation.
INTRODUCTION 23
10. “Se vogliamo che tutto rimanga com’è, bisogna che tutto cambi.” (Di
Lampedusa 1958, 43).
11. Members from one kind of elite can move into another, e.g., religious
leaders into the political elite, such as in contemporary theocratic Iran,
where mullahs rule, or entertainment stars/actors moving into poli-
tics, such as Ronald Reagan and more recently Arnold Schwarzenegger
as ex-Hollywood actors moving on to become US President and
California State Governor, respectively. Schwarzenegger also married
into the American political elite. In other examples, media personali-
ties or businessmen often move into politics and famous pop sing-
ers (e.g., Geldof and Bono) become self-appointed global activists in
humanitarian or development aid ventures.
12. Cf. also “Anthropology of elites” (http://pagerankstudio.com./
Blog/2010/11/anthropology-of-elites) [Accessed August 10, 2011].
13. Rothkopf (2008, xiv), an elite insider, estimates the size of the really
important global political-financial elite as just over six thousand
persons only.
14. “Anthropology of elites”.
15. A recent collection of essays under the auspices of David Lane (2011)
illustrates the significant role of political elites (in postsocialist states)
in processes of identity formation.
16. For closed, theocratic societies, however, it might be tenuous (cf.
Saudi Arabia, Iran). Also for North Korea, as the society is almost
totally controlled (no free information flow or media access by citi-
zens) by an ideology-driven political-economic elite.
17. The 2007/2008 financial crisis was largely caused by (financial) elites
as well. This has certainly had an impact on their position, although
the verdict is still out as to what extent it will eventually affect their
power.
18. See also Wolfe, “The power elite now.”
19. Current discussions about the revolving doors between Wall Street’s
financial sector, on the one hand, and government and regulators
in Washington, on the other, illustrate the continuous relevance of
unraveling the workings of elite networks, notwithstanding whether
they are between functional elites or whether there is a power elite
indeed.
20. They have gained more influence in sociology as well; see, e.g.,
Undheim (2003); Rhodes, Hart, and Noordegraaf (2007), 3–4.
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Routledge.
CH A P T ER 1
Researching Elites:
Old and New Perspectives
Huibert Schijf
Defining Elites
The phenomenon of elites is ancient but the concept is relatively recent
and originally meant something else: “The term ‘elite’ was introduced
in the seventeenth century to describe commodities of an exceptional
standard and the usage was later extended to designate social groups
at the apex of societies” (Daloz 2010a, 1). Over the years the use of
the term has been extended. Reviewing literature on elites, the British
sociologist John Scott concludes that “at the height of its popularity
almost any powerful, advantaged, qualified, privileged, or superior
group or category might be described as elite . . . It was applied to such
diverse groups as politicians, bishops, intelligent people, aristocrats,
lawyers and successful criminals” (2008, 27). Scott certainly has a
point, but following his critique would make research on elites very
restrictive, as we shall see. Who then are elites in modern society? The
answer will turn out to be far from easy, as elites are often related to
positions of power and prestige but also to social mobility and com-
plex procedures of inclusion and exclusion. Needless to say that pres-
tige, power, and influence are relational concepts, as is indicated by
Salverda and Abbink (see the Introduction, this volume). Elites will
use a variety of resources to exert and maintain their positions.
Therefore, if resources and influence are the key concepts, the cru-
cial question is how they interact. Researchers on elites have spent
much time addressing the questions how certain resources can wield
this influence and how elites came into possession of these resources.
30 HUIBERT SCHIJF
The question that follows is how they are able to transfer them to
the next generation eventually. Particularly forms of reproduction,
such as education, have often been the topic of research by sociolo-
gists. Far less attention is paid to hereditary reproduction, both in a
biological and a social sense, because not even in largely meritocratic
societies where people are judged by their individual achievements
is everybody able to reach a top position without the proper social
background and helpful networks. In most societies people still gain
resources by benefiting from the resources of their parents, who in
their turn might have benefited from their parents’ resources. This
observation can be linked to the well-known sociological dichotomy
of ascription and achievement. Hence, an important research ques-
tion is how are people able to reach these highest strata, to maintain
positions, and to handover these positions to the next generation?
The nobility is a well-researched group, and lineages are described in
many biographies, where at least some qualities are ascribed, as they
are gained by birth (cf. also Jakubowska’s chapter, this volume).
Researching Elites
Political scientists and sociologists tend to define elites as the incum-
bents of top positions in decision-making institutions in both the
public and the private sectors. Scott (2008, 28) strongly argues “that
the word elite should be used only in relation to those groups that
have a degree of power.” The focus of their research is on individual
characteristics, such as gender, religion, level of education, or past
career. By doing so, many researchers use the implicit assumption that
people with the same social background will share the same opinions
and policies, which is not necessarily true as their behavior in parlia-
ments testify. Still, it can be argued that the majority of British politi-
cians who went to Cambridge or Oxford, all belonged to ‘our kind of
people’, whatever the political differences might be as can be said of
many French politicians.
However, as a consequence of defining elites as members of power-
ful institutions the problem who to select for investigation is trans-
ferred to the selection of particular institutions. Apart from obvious
political institutions such as Parliament and the cabinet or economic
institutions such as large corporations, what kind of institution is wor-
thy to be selected for further investigation of its incumbents? First, it
might be that traditional centers of decision-making, such as national
parliaments, have become marginal in the developing global world,
where new international organizations or multinational corporations
RESEARCHING ELITES 31
have perhaps gained more influence. Although in the nineteenth

century local elites were of much importance, national elites became
dominant in the twentieth century. Will global elites play such a role
in the twenty-first century?
Second, one might argue that families, that sometimes develop
into industrial or financial dynasties, are also institutions worth
researching, because as families they have influence and wealth. In
the above-mentioned definition by political scientists, characteristics
of families and kinship relations are not ignored but are included as
individual characteristics of the incumbents, whereas families as insti-
tutions do not form the subject for detailed research. Such an approach
with genealogical descriptions and marriage patterns between fami-
lies is familiar in historical research (e.g., Farrell 1993), but far less so
among social scientists. This chapter contends that there much is to
learn from how historians do research on elites.
Third, given the political definition of elites, would it be possible to
select orchestras with a reputation worldwide and to study their musi-
cians as incumbents? Or can only the incumbents of decision-making
positions in cultural organizations be called elite, whereas the per-
forming artists themselves are not, although they are universally rec-
ognized as top musicians? These comments are meant to show that
the method often used by political scientists and sociologists to define
and research elites has its limitations. Moreover, it also differs strongly
from the daily use of the term “elite,” often applied to a wide range
of people, such as a sports elite or an intellectual elite. Interestingly,
the Italian economist V. Pareto, who introduced the concept of elite
into the social sciences (1968), defined elites as those who are most
capable in any area of activity, although he did not explain how to
establish these qualities and how to compare them. His definition is
close to the original meaning of elite as Daloz indicates (2010a).
Theoreticians like Pareto and his compatriot Gaetano Mosca
emphasized the circulation or alternation of elites imbedded as they
are in society. They also hold strong opinions on how elites should act
and how their positions can be justified. The Italian society in which
Mosca and Pareto lived was politically very unstable, which makes
Pareto’s phrase that “history is a graveyard of aristocracies” under-
standable. However, Pareto and Mosca underestimated the possibili-
ties of members of elite families with a variety of resources at their
disposal to reach and maintain high positions, even in Italy at the
turn of the twentieth century. Today, it rarely happens that political
dynasties can hold such high positions for long as democratic rules
and voters’ whimsical political attitudes make a prolonged political
32 HUIBERT SCHIJF
career unlikely, let alone last for several generations. Therefore, it is

more plausible that elite families prefer careers elsewhere, such as in
business or law.
There are cogent arguments why political scientists prefer such
a focus on decision-makers, especially when it is used in compara-
tive research for several nations (e.g., Best and Cotta [2000] on
lawmakers), because many scholars of social science are interested
in changes of social mobility and stratification over time, whereas
political scientists are more interested in the workings of democra-
cies and political systems in general.
Sociological Perspectives
For many sociologists studying elites (or any other social group)
as a separate subject of research is very often beyond their interest,
because their research questions mainly are about the openness of
modern meritocratic societies. For them the focus is social mobil-
ity. Two types of social mobility should be distinguished: structural
and circular. The former indicates that in modern advanced societies
more positions are available at the top than in the past and this offers
more opportunities to men and women to gain a high-ranking posi-
tion. Multinational corporations with regional heads and sectional
managers offer more top positions than local ones run by just one
family. However, according to sociologists, it is circular mobility, that
is, the possibilities of people from lower strata of society reaching
positions in a higher strata, that matters as far as openness of a society
is concerned.
Many members of the elite follow a lifelong career by switching
from one sector to another, acting as universalists—a process known
as pantouflage in French political life (Charle 1987, 1115). It is also
known in other countries where, for instance, ministers of finance
might become bankers or vice versa, or a trade unionist becomes a
prime minister. The process indicates horizontal integration of the
governing elites; we can assume that at least they have some values
and ideologies in common, although it does not necessarily mean
that the governing class forms a closed entity. Research on vertical
integration of elites however focuses on questions such as, how repre-
sentative are these elites or how open are they toward newcomers.
In modern economic life some managers have a tendency to switch
from one corporation to another, regardless of their knowledge of a
branch of industry. Others become specialists and follow a career in
just one sector, or even one company. Many members of the economic
elite do not necessarily operate in their native country. The focus of

much research on elites is not only on the individual characteristics of
elites but also on the extent to which the characteristics correlate, or
the chance that people with certain characteristics are able to obtain
such an elite position. Defining power elites as incumbents of top
positions in three sectors, C. Wright Mills (1956) shows that govern-
mental, military, and business elites—all male, white, and Christian
in the United States in the 1950s—were highly interconnected. This
finding inspired many subsequent researchers to investigate over-
lapping networks of elites. The German political scientist Wilhelm
Bürklin (1997) and his coresearchers did something different when
they studied the elites in Germany, based on long interviews with
incumbents in various sectors, such as political, economic, religious,
and labor. They were not especially interested in the overlapping of
these elites, but whether elites from East Germany had started to
integrate with the local and the national elites from West Germany
since 1989.
On the border line between studies of corporate networks based
on linkages between corporations created through multiple func-
tions of members of the boards of executives and elite studies is the
exploration by the German sociologist Paul Windolf (2002). His area
of research was interlocking directorates, on which much research
has been done already (Fennema and Schijf 1979). Windolf is one
of the few who contributed a new element to this network research
by also investigating the ‘qualities’ of the persons who created the
network of interlocking directorates. At least in one way Mills’s semi-
nal study (1956) is outdated: over the following decades, women,
Afro-Americans, Latinos, and Asian Americans entered the American
power elite. Not always in large numbers, but the newcomers have
given a new diversity to the power elite and with it their cooperative
networks changed it (Zweigenhaft and Domhoff 1998).
Belonging to the tradition of research on social mobility is the
study by Hartmann (2002) who looked at the social backgrounds of
engineers, lawyers, and economists who defended their dissertation
in 1955, 1965, 1975, and 1985. Since German dissertations require a
brief curriculum vitae, it was easy to gather information on the social
background of the students. Using large-scale datasets and advanced
statistical methods, Hartmann then examined who had reached an
elite position later in life. As a sociologist he was interested in the mea-
sure of openness of German society. His concluded that although the
openness of the German educational system has increased, this is not
true for the chance of obtaining an elite position, which still depends
34 HUIBERT SCHIJF
much on an appropriate social background. Schijf, Dronkers, and Van

den Broeke-George (2004) offered another example of this type of
research where they focused on noble and patrician families in the
Netherlands. They compared the noble families with patrician fami-
lies as a kind of control group. Again, advanced statistical methods
were used to estimate the chance of noble daughters and sons to reach
an elite position not only in comparison to their parents’ chances but
also compared to their patrician peers. One remarkable finding was
that a noble mother is an important predictor to the chance to reach
an elite position, because of her role in inculcating specific noble sym-
bolic and cultural capital in her children. In contrast to the accepted
open and meritocratic character of modern Dutch society, Schijf,
Dronkers, and Van den Broeke-George demonstrated that the abil-
ity to obtain an elite position among the Dutch nobility, an ascrip-
tive elite based on birth, has hardly declined during the twentieth
century, although in Dutch public discourse nobility is often seen
as a relic from the past. Easily available printed sources were used to
process a large dataset for the purpose of this research.
Monique de Saint Martin (1993) elaborated the concept of “sym-
bolic capital” in her in-depth study on the French nobility. Although
a noble title no longer has a formal significance in modern France,
she argues that its symbolic value should not be underestimated.
Noble titles still offer symbolic capital as credit, supplementing or
even dominating the social and cultural capital of noble families.
Symbolic capital also represents a system of values sometimes sum-
marized as “noblesse oblige” (ibid., 25–27). Other forms of symbolic
capital, such as being well-connected with the art world or charity
organizations, or owning a Gulfstream jet or a huge country house,
also help.
Cults around kings and rulers also strengthen the symbolic capi-
tal of the person involved. Irene Stengs (2003) offers an interesting
case study in her work of the Thai royal family—how the family uses
symbolic power to justify and maintain its position vis-à-vis the popu-
lation as a whole. More in general, symbolic superiority and ostenta-
tious consumption among elite families are topics worth pursuing.
Families also tend to strengthen their present and future position “by
monumentalizing the past” (Herzfeld 2000, 234), by emphasizing
how old the family is or by showing a thorough knowledge of the
family tree. As Schijf, Dronkers, and Van den Broeke-George (2004)
show in their research, official sources establishing the pedigree of
Dutch noble and patrician families can be fruitfully used for advanced
statistical analyses.
Instead of defining elites as incumbents of positions of power and

influence, there are other ways of looking at them. For instance, we
can use concepts introduced by the French sociologist Pierre Bourdieu
(1980; see also Portes [1998] on social capital) and argue that elites
might differ from other people in terms of financial, cultural, social,
or symbolic capital, although that does not imply that differences
are defined by dichotomies. Moreover, Bourdieu’s concepts offer a
multidimensional way of determining elite positions, as it might be
more than likely these days that men and women scoring high on cul-
tural capital are not necessarily the wealthiest people in a society. This
approach to the definition of elites offers many more topics worth-
while to research than defining them simply as incumbents of top
positions. With this approach the word “elite” would almost be abol-
ished and we would just be speaking of the upper class with respect
to several types of capital. More would be brought into view than in
the research confined to the two mentioned paramount elements of
society, namely openness and the reproduction of the various forms
of capital. However, Daloz (2010b) argues convincingly that these
concepts cannot be seen as universalistic as is sometimes suggested,
because they are imbedded in a particular time and society—France
in the seventies and eighties in the last century—which makes them
less useful as a theoretical framework to apply to historical research in
non-Western societies.
Anthropological Perspectives
In their introduction to Elite Cultures: Anthropological Perspectives
(2002) Chris Shore and Stephen Nugent give the impression that
there is a wide scientific gap between sociological and anthropologi-
cal perspectives on elites. But is there? The edited volumes by De
Pina-Cabral and Pedroso de Lima (2000) and Shore and Nugent
(2002) offer many fine examples of anthropological research on
elites. Their authors present a variety of topics and elites from several
regions in the world. However, unlike some research done by soci-
ologists, they rarely employ systematic sampling methods let alone
that a statistical analysis is performed. However, anthropologists with
their detailed, contextualized descriptions show often more sensitiv-
ity to changing circumstances than most sociologists, who are mostly
dependent on large surveys, which frame a particular moment in
time.
For many anthropologists, intensive fieldwork is the character-
istic research method. There is no need to discuss the advantages
36 HUIBERT SCHIJF
and disadvantages of this method, but it is important to see to what

extent elites are accessible for such long and intensive fieldwork.
Several researchers have reported that exactly because of their lack
of status they were allowed to observe the affairs of particular elites
(see Pedroso de Lima 2000). Herzfeld elaborates on this experience
by pointing out that the status of the anthropologist is a kind of lit-
mus test of the wealth of his interviewees: “The genuinely powerful
new international business elite condescends . . . to admit the ethnog-
rapher, whose prying is just so much scratching on the granite rock
face of its empires” (2000, 229). The anthropologist as court jester is
not a role many researchers will have in mind, but playing it helps as
long as scholarly integrity is not at risk. However, “elites whose only
remaining capital is the symbolic capital of past glories are diagnosti-
cally defensive” (ibid.). Perhaps accessibility is not the main problem
for doing research among elites, but the interest of many anthropolo-
gists themselves.
Anthropologists, with their traditional focus on or concern for
the poor, have shown little interest in powerful people, which might
explain why anthropological research on elites is still relatively scarce.
It might also be the case that many anthropologists, and sociolo-
gists, find it easier to study down than studying up. But as Herzfeld
(2000, 230) points out: “Here the crucial methodological cau-
tion seems to be the importance of insisting that elites form parts
of encompassing cultures.” A holistic approach therefore would be
of great help to widen one’s interest in elites (cf. the Introduction,
above). Another point of comment is that sociologists will use pub-
licly available sources, or try to conduct a survey, as do journalists and
historians, and will try to supplement those data with interviewing
key informants. However, if fieldwork is successful, anthropologists
can offer more insights in the mechanisms of how elites benefit from
their resources and how they justify their positions.
According to Shore, what is important from an anthropological
perspective is the degree of self-recognition and consciousness that
exists among elites. “In order to constitute themselves as a group
rather just a category, an elite must develop a common culture that
is recognisable to its members . . . Understanding how that conscious-
ness is created and maintained lies at the heart of the project for an
anthropology of elites” (Shore and Nugent 2002, 3). No need to
argue with that. Without doubt this is an important question to
ask about elites. But is this a typical anthropological perspective?
The consciousness of elites and the way elites are interconnected, is
already exactly Mills’s central theme in his The Power Elite, as well
as in many other publications on elite networks or the reproduction

of elites.
The seminal research by two French sociologists (Pinçon and
Pinçon-Charlot 2006 and 2007) on the Paris bourgeoisie (among
French social scientists, this word is preferred over elite) shows how
insightful the results of this research can be. These two scholars used
quantitative and qualitative data; they not only paid attention to both
power and culture but also wrote about lifestyle and distinction. Their
method of selecting informants did not differ much from the way
anthropologists would proceed, that is, they used a subtle method of
snowball sampling. But they also had advantages not every researcher
possesses, namely the right qualifications and knowing some people
already. Pedroso de Lima (2000) reports that the families researched
in her study were quite curious about the results of the inquiries.
Moreover, those families were also severe judges of these results. For
this reason Pinçon and Pinçon-Charlot always took pains to write
carefully, fully aware that they even could ruin their future research
possibilities by misrepresenting the findings.
Although elites rightfully have the reputation of being reluctant in
providing information about themselves, this does not mean that their
way of life and operations are completely unknown, or that there is no
available information about them in easy accessible sources. Therefore,
to answer the point made by Shore above, the question in what ways
does anthropology differ from other social sciences can be answered
by saying that apart from its methods and attention to small groups, it
hardly does. Of course, one can notice a division of academic special-
ties, especially as far as regions are concerned, but the disciplines are
not exclusive in their empirical and theoretical approaches.
Families
During the first decades of the twentieth century, the economist
Joseph A. Schumpeter developed a general theory of social classes.
He formulated an interesting starting point: “The individual belongs
to a given class neither by choice, nor by any other action, nor by
innate qualities—in sum, his class membership is not individual at
all. It stems from his membership in a given clan or lineage. The fam-
ily not the physical person is the true unit of class and class theory”
(1955, 113). This general phrase can be made more specific by point-
ing out that the same is true for an elite family. Historians with their
sensitivity for changing contexts always worked that way. In histori-
cal research elite families are a popular subject and anthropologists
38 HUIBERT SCHIJF
and sociologists can benefit from the historical perspective, as a few

examples will show.
In his study on bankers in London, the French historian Youssef
Cassis (1994) has shown the importance of kinship relations among
Jewish bankers and among Quaker bankers in London in the nine-
teenth century. The American historian Betty G. Farrell (1993) points
out that the strength of family connections and marriages helps greatly
to explain why bourgeois families were able to remain in prominent
political, commercial, or cultural positions in nineteenth-century
Boston, because in that way capital remained within the family. Their
kinship networks represented large common interests and enabled
them to adapt to new circumstances and opportunities. The American
historian David Landes, in his Dynasties: Fortunes and Misfortunes
of the World’s Great Family Business, offers narratives of economic
dynasties in banking, automobiles, and oil companies. Well-known
families in these sectors are Ford and Rockefeller. In Landes’s defi-
nition dynasties are lines of blood relationship, often reinforced by
marriage ties and adoption (2006, 290).
Another example is Gary W. McDonough’s Good Families of
Barcelona: A Social History of Power in the Industrial Era (1986; see
also 1991). The study is not just another social history of a city, but an
excellent example of how historical anthropology should be carried
out. The author shows how an emergent industrial elite—after they
acquired the proper structure of consciousness, cultural values, and
symbolic power—subsequently coalesced with aristocratic rentiers in
Barcelona. Related to the idea of dynasties is the French concept of
grandes familles, as can be found in the work of Laurence Américi and
Xavier Daumalin (2010) on the fortunes of a group of families who
derived their economic elite positions from their trading companies,
which had a prominent position in running Marseille’s economic life
as a port city. They used their economic resources to gain political
influence as well. The families, however, never formed a monolithic
bloc, as competition was intrinsic to business as well as social life.
All these studies have various elements in common, such as a focus
on the lifestyle of the rich, how to keep capital within families, the
intermarriage between families, using kinship networks to gain trust
for doing international business, and creating a business dynasty. Not
all families were successful all the time, as misfortunes can happen,
but the general impression was that these families were amazingly
strong in their continuity. The power of families can usually be found
at the local or regional level, as the titles of many studies on elite
families testify. Still, we should not ignore the fact that in the past
there already existed families that operated as bankers or merchants

at an international level. Good examples are the international Jewish
banking dynasties, such as the still well-known Rothschilds and the
forgotten Bischoffsheims (both German migrants), that held influen-
tial positions in the European financial world in the nineteenth cen-
tury. They had family members in financial capitals as Amsterdam,
Berlin, London, Paris, and Vienna; they were highly intermarried
and through their kinship networks created trust with trading part-
ners abroad (Schijf 2005). In the Rothschild family, the percentage of
marriages among first cousins was high. But it seems likely that the
Rothschilds were the only banking family who had such an explicit
strategy of endogamy and these marriages always followed the male
line of the descendants and hence the continuation of the separate
banking houses was guaranteed (Ferguson 1998; Kuper 2001). The
Jewish banking families might be a thing of the past, but their strate-
gies might not. In the present burgeoning global world, far-rang-
ing kinship networks of migrants living in diasporas are of growing
importance.
Global Elites
According to the strong statement of the journalist Chrysta Freeland
we can see “the emergence of a global plutocracy—the hyper-educated,
internationally minded meritocrats who have been the chief benefi-
ciaries of globalization and the technological revolution” (Financial
Times, January 2/3, 2010). In the same vein David Rothkopf in his
journalistic book Superclass portrays an internationally mobile and
cosmopolitan power elite based on the new global world of finance
and information (2008, 221–254). However, so far the evidence
of a new global elite is inconclusive. Hartmann’s research (1999)
on the international orientation of top managers does not support
Rothkopf’s thesis. On the contrary, the majority of managers has fol-
lowed an education at national institutions, and operates and lives at
the national level. But because of the globalization they certainly have
no parochial disposition.
Based on formal analyses of networks created by interlocking
directorates William Carroll and Meindert Fennema concluded in
2002 that “there has been no massive shift in corporate interlock-
ing from a predominantly national to a predominantly transnational
pattern” (414). However, they show that there exists a small group
of corporations with many transnational ties. In contrast to national
networks that are organized around financial institutions, industrial
40 HUIBERT SCHIJF
corporations predominate at the center of the transnational networks.

This suggests that the transnational network is a kind of superstruc-
ture that rests upon rather resilient national bases.
Another topic would be how and in what way elites distinguish
themselves from local or lower people. They might fortify their power
through various symbolic domains, such as a different live-style or
by using a different language. David Brooks’s journalistic Bobos in
Paradise: The New Upper Class and How They Got There (2000) on
the lifestyle of the new upper class that lives in gated communities
should be an inspiring example of how to pursue this particular field
of research in a more scholarly way.
Little is known how important, prestigious international business
schools contribute to the formation of a global elite. This is also true
about international institutions founded to form a new international
academic elite. The European University Institute was set up by the
EU (European Union) to create “a European-minded or ‘transna-
tional’ academic elite, oriented not just to their own EU member
state” (Dronkers and Garib 2002, 3). Although their results are very
tentative, their main conclusion is that the majority of the graduate
students go back to their country of origin (ibid.). But it is unknown
whether the returning students will use their acquired international
networks at the national level.
Conclusion
Reading the literature on elites one might come to the conclusion that
there is no leading principle in doing research on elites, except perhaps
the difference between high and low. Would that be a sufficient reason
to abolish the concept once and for all? Or should research on elites
be restricted to themes like choice, leadership, and succession as sug-
gested by De Pina-Cabral and Pedroso de Lima (2000)? In an accepted
division of research projects between disciplines would that mean that
we leave elites in the narrow sense of incumbents of positions of power
and influence, as suggested by Scott (2008), to political scientists,
with their focus on decision-making institutions? In his analysis of the
changing nature of modern Indonesian elites, C. W. Watson (2002)
warned us not to give up the term “elite” too soon. But qualifiers to
the concept of elite, such as business elite, can be misleading in situ-
ations where “global shifts in international politics have such imme-
diate and dramatic consequences that it seems impossible to observe
continuities” (ibid., 122). To generalize from his specific Indonesian
context, Watson’s remark can be seen as a sensible warning against
ignoring changes at the local, regional, national, and international

levels. Elites have a great ability to adapt to new circumstances, and
switching from one sector in society to another is a common practice
among them. It is exactly the mutual influencing at various levels that
should be included when we study specific elites in an identifiable, but
constantly changing context.
For many sociologists and anthropologists Scott’s political science
position might be less appealing, or rather they would prefer a wider
range of topics to study elites. Would therefore a concept such as upper
class or, following French practice, bourgeoisie, offer more oppor-
tunities? Perhaps we should simply stop bickering about the mean-
ing of words and do the research we are interested in. Sociologists
and political scientists tend to restrict their research on elites in still
another way. Their research method is to collect individual charac-
teristics of incumbents and correlate these to find general patterns.
This methodological individualism has its own use and respectability
in academia. However, elites do not exist in isolation but in relation
to other people, and they cannot exist or be analyzed outside specific
historical, cultural, and societal contexts. Their spatial contexts might
be local, regional, national, or transnational. Elites can therefore be
seen as “a group of intermediaries whose power rests on being able to
forge connections and bridge gaps” (Savage and Williams 2008, 4).
This approach encourages a view of elites as existing within net-
works, webs, or constellations of relations that generate positions for
people as elites. As intermediaries, elites are not restricted to their,
for instance, local or national level; they also perform this function
between each of the various network levels. These different networks
alone already offer many ways to study elites.
Figure 1.1 tries to summarize perspectives in research on elites at
four levels. The cells on the diagonal summarize elite studies discussed
in this chapter at specific levels—local elite, regional elite, national
elite, and, finally, global elite. All other cells offer interaction among
the elites at two or more levels. Perhaps still much neglected are the
networks of elites interacting among several levels. The question that
might be posed is what the consequences of decisions made at the global
level are for the positions of the local elites. To give just one example:
Sarah Green (2008) offers an exciting glimpse of how decision-makers
at the top of the EU decide to fund programs aimed at encouraging
the sustainable development of a remote Greek region called Epirus.
The elite she describes would hardly see themselves as elite, they are
small-town lawyers, village presidents, civil servants, and similar people,
who take a leading role in applying and then managing a EU funded
42 HUIBERT SCHIJF
Elites
Local Regional National Global
Local Strict Local Interaction Interaction Interaction
Elites
Regional Strict Regional Interaction Interaction
Elites
National Strict National Interaction
Elites
Global Strict Global Elites
Figure 1.1 Networks at four levels
development project (ibid., 260). Their new role as intermediaries also

created new patronage networks and thereby more influence than they
ever had before.
Today, questions concerning the openness or the closeness of cer-
tain institutions or societies and the chance that a person with par-
ticular characteristics will occupy an elite position are high on both
the agenda of sociological and anthropological elite research. In
addition, the rise, preservation, and fall of elites will continue to be
interesting subjects of research. It can be argued that people at the
top offer multiple themes to investigate, as long as researchers real-
ize that elites, as everybody else, interact and are embedded in wider
societies with constant changing structures at the local, national,
and global levels.
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C H A P T E R 2
Land, Historicity, and Lifestyle:

Capital and Its Conversions among
the Gentry in Poland *
Longina Jakubowska
Introduction
The Polish gentry, both the aristocrats and the lesser nobility, have
reemerged in postcommunist Poland as something of a dominant
and dominating culture. Why and how, we might ask, is it possi-
ble for this group to do so after 50 years of communism? Further,
how can we understand the processes by which a group maintains
its identity through time, not just as one identity among others, but
as dominant and dominating? As we will see, historically the gentry
were quick to adapt to any new political order and honed the art of
conversion of the enabling capital—land, money, and skills, as well
as lifestyle—into a relevant resource in each era. As I shall also argue,
the gentry as a class use history as a form of capital in such a way that
they become guardians of what it means to understand and practice
Polish national identity. This case study illustrates social processes of
elite maintenance and reproduction in times of change but in pre-
senting it I also look at the specific methodological challenges that
such research poses. I contend that methodological issues may also
have an important bearing on the theoretical interpretation of elite
status and maintenance, as I hope this study will make clear.
Elites are usually defined as groups that control specific resources
by means of which they acquire political power and material advan-
tage (De Pina-Cabral and Pedroso de Lima 2000, 2). Anthropological
46 LONGINA JAKUBOWSKA
literature concerning elites concentrates on the power that they exert

in a given society, and subsequently the power they might exert on
the researcher and the research outcome. The latter is of importance,
and indeed occupies a significant space in discussions on method-
ologies and dilemmas inherent in elite studies, primarily because
of the asymmetrical relationship intrinsic to the bond between the
researcher and the subject of study. Another issue is that of the acces-
sibility of the elites. It is the very nature of elites to be exclusive and
inaccessible. Indeed, the aura of mystique and inherent worthiness
that surrounds them, and is even predicated upon it, and the reluc-
tance to engage in commonplace interlocution constitutes a boundary
marker. This is particularly true of hereditary elites, specially nobil-
ity, among whom kinship, descent, shared essence, and the power
derived from their place in history provide a basis for exclusivity that
makes the line that divides those who are in and those who are out
rigid. Yet there is certain vagueness about them; never flashy, always
low-key, they create an impression of easiness and informality and
still remain just slightly unattainable, producing a sort of glass-door
effect. Performance is here, of course, of essence. Just as a habit of
servitude is incorporated in the behavior of a servile group by way of
their body deportment, so is the habit of superiority among the elite.
A noble embodies authority and, more importantly, does it not by
mechanically executing codes but by ease of practiced performance.
This sets him apart from those of other classes, who, as hard as they
may try, are unable to embody the acknowledged model effortlessly
and gracefully (Connerton 1989). Whether the elites cultivate such a
demeanor with premeditated effect, or whether the reactions of the
outsiders are formed by their own class perceptions of self, the elites’
stance creates an obstacle to interaction. Since structures of author-
ity and prestige are embedded in all members of the collective social
body, Herzfeld’s analogy to bureaucracy is instructive here. “If there
are no clients to affirm their superiority,” he writes, “that superiority
has no grounds” (2000, 230).
And although considerable attention in the literature on elite
studies is paid to methodological difficulties in accessing elites—be
they political, economic, managerial, or noble (see the work De Pina-
Cabral and Pedroso de Lima [2000]and Shore and Nugent [2002])—
this was not my experience. This was possibly because Polish nobles
were in some respects different: they were once a large and powerful
force that formed the nation’s core and shaped its destiny perhaps
to a greater extent than their counterparts in other European coun-
tries but their fortune waned and the socialist regime made them
LAND, HISTORICITY, AND LIFESTYLE 47
disappear from the public forum. Forced into silence for half a cen-
tury, they had a powerful need to tell their story. Most importantly,
my research fit into their then current agenda.
The Multivocality of Capital:

Land and Patria
The gentry in Poland (szlachta) shared some features with other
European nobilities but were also in numerous ways distinct. These
differences gave form to their particular historical trajectory and
molded their ability to maintain cultural domination over other
groups in Poland. Like all nobilities in Europe, they originated in the
medieval practice of the sovereign granting landholdings in exchange
for political support and military assistance. Unlike them, however,
the Polish nobility were able to convert these land grants into lasting,
inalienable possessions; most importantly, they established a monop-
oly on land ownership. The sole right to own land—from which
other social groups were barred until the mid-nineteenth century—
enabled them to secure control over the political system. Extensive
judicial privileges and control over legislature weakened the kingship
and effectively paralyzed the system of central governance.
The economic and political hegemony that the gentry enjoyed
in Poland and the corresponding deep divide that has developed
between them and the rest of the population encouraged the inven-
tion of a myth of a separate origin. The myth served as a social char-
ter that explained, justified, and legitimated the gentry’s dominant
position. It alleged that they derived from the ancient Sarmatian
tribe of the Black Sea Steppe warriors who conquered indigenous
people and became their masters. They were supposed to be of a
different race, genetically separate and superior; their Sarmatian
identity was seen to be embodied in distinct features, practices, and
dress, even weapons.1 The origin myth took on messianic overtones.
The gentry asserted that nobility was bestowed upon them by God
and they were bound by a sacred covenant to defend the frontiers of
Christianity. Against the history of conflicts with Orthodox Russia,
Protestant Sweden, and the Muslim Ottoman Empire, Sarmatian
ideology fused with Catholicism, and religious mysticism converged
with political ambition. In essence, the gentry fashioned a union of
brotherhood, the membership of which was expressed through the
ownership of resources, the use of the Polish language, profession
of the Catholic faith, and the shared belief in messianic destiny. The
canon of equality among them was an essential element of that union,
so absolute that the gentry—as compared to other European nobili-

ties—resisted all attempts to introduce titles and orders. Clearly, the
origin myth and the ethos of equality bridged local and regional dif-
ferences as much as it masked considerable economic differentiation
among the gentry. After all, the Kingdom of Poland incorporated
Lithuania, Ruthenia, and Ukraine, and in the seventeenth century
stretched from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea, making it for some
time the largest state in Europe. It is not surprising then that what
gave Sarmatian ideology much of its potency was the demographic
weight of the gentry, the feature that distinguished them most from
their Western counterparts. It is assumed that they constituted about
10 percent of the total population and were thus far more numerous
than nobilities in any other part of Europe.2 Foremost, all szlachta,
whether rich or poor, shared the explicit understanding that the gen-
try constituted a nation, that the state had to be subservient to the
gentry because it existed to serve them, and finally, that Poland was
what the gentry embodied. Given that an indigenous bourgeoisie
was hardly present and the peasantry excluded, they did indeed con-
stitute a nation of equals. In fact, the state was divided into two
clearly defined classes: the gentry, who were the nation and had all
the rights, and the peasants, who were the serfs and had no rights.
“The nation was Polish, the peasants were peasants” (Narkiewicz
1976, 9). This structural duality became unsustainable in the course
of the nineteenth century largely due to the changes brought about
by the loss of statehood. As we will see however, it was not elimi-
nated altogether and neither was the gentry’s domination.
At the end of eighteenth century, Poland became subsumed by
the adjacent empires of Russia, Prussia, and Austria. The Partitions
(1794–1918) gave birth to a new definition of the nation. Although
the nobility had no choice but to allow the social others to join the
nation, the ideology of nationalism they espoused was grafted onto
earlier historic rights. The gentry came to view themselves as the
repository of state tradition and became the chief source of resistance
to the occupying powers. Indeed, nobles played a leading role in
the insurrections of 1830 and 1836. Both were unsuccessful largely
due to the reluctance of the peasants to join the nationalist proj-
ect; serfdom still intact, the latter had little interest in what they
perceived was a gentry’s cause. In fact, the lack of sovereignty did
not have the same impact on all social strata; it mattered least to
peasants—subjects of demesne’s Polish lords at whose hands they
suffered hardship and poverty. The gentry had a much greater stake
in the return of political sovereignty but in fact, the majority of the
gentry stayed away from active involvement in politics and only a

fraction, perhaps as small as 2–4 percent, resisted (Kieniewicz 1987).
The reasons were compelling: the rebels paid dearly with their lives,
personal freedom, and, most importantly, property. The latter form
of retribution was deeply wounding because land was at once mate-
rial and symbolic, the source of gentry’s livelihood and identity and
the locus of their superior social position. As a result, the land poli-
tics of the occupying powers and the emancipation of the peasantry
that they had decreed presented much greater danger to the gentry
than reprisals for political activities. The gentry found it difficult to
convert feudal estates into capitalist enterprises. It is at this point in
history that land became enshrined in patriotic mythology. The gen-
try perceived owning a piece of land as equivalent to owning a part
of the fatherland since every field was but a fraction of the national
soil. Holding onto it became elevated to the level of a patriotic duty
and many argued that defending property against bank foreclosures
was in the interest of the nation. Clearly, national interest was bound
to class interest. In effect, by regarding the two as indivisible, the
gentry transformed the meaning of landed capital. Once primarily
a material possession and a class signifier, land ownership became
entwined with nationalist ideology and as such was enshrined in cul-
tural tradition.
As the gentry were both the producers and the consumers of cul-
ture, its creators and its audience, they exerted a permanent mark
on Polish cultural heritage. Art and literature became the vehicle
for producing and disseminating meaning engendered with the
national imperative, providing ideals, models of behavior, and
heroes. The century of subjugation was unquestionably a period of
veneration of the gentry. They were glorified as the carriers of the
Polish national-religious traditions and their virtues immortalized
as part and parcel of what constitutes and signifies the essence of
the nation. The romantic bards of the nineteenth-century Polish lit-
erature enshrined the noble cause of armed struggle in pursuit of
freedom and endowed it with an intensity that rings familiar even
in modern times. In a similar fashion, historical paintings of the
great Polish masters figure as objects d’art and objects of national
culture at the same time. Paradoxically, while deeply enmeshed with
the nationalist discourse, the gentry also pursued extensive cosmo-
politan contacts in the era of Partitions. In looking after their eco-
nomic interests, they extended their networks beyond their region
and the state. Some took employ in the bureaucracies of the occupy-
ing powers and even accepted honorific titles from them; some were
either exiled or emigrated, but in any case took residence abroad

and bought property in other countries. Emigration and cosmo-
politanism had consequences for the whole group. The enormously
extensive kinship networks that they had cultivated for centuries—a
distinctive feature of gentry in general—connected the entire gentry,
directly and indirectly, to equivalent classes in Western Europe. As
class and class habitus have the capacity to bridge the differences in
political ideologies and national identities, the gentry socialized and
married across national lines, although rarely outside of their own
circles, and thus positioned themselves among supranational elites.3
As the future would show, the relations with noble houses of Europe
that have been established in the course of the nineteenth century
were of crucial importance in the times of wars and political crises
that followed;4 most importantly, emigration extended the gentry’s
resource base—social, cultural, and economic—beyond Poland and
was to be essential to their survival during the political upheavals of
the Second World War and the communist period that followed it.
Although some emigrated, many dispossessed or impoverished
gentry—whether due to political repression or economic failure—
migrated to cities, entered professions, and joined the growing ranks
of urban intelligentsia. When Poland became independent in 1918,
the state was restructured in line with democratic reforms sweep-
ing Europe. The hegemonic power of the gentry declined, but their
privileged position did not erode. Nobilities were in retreat almost
everywhere, but their relative wealth, status, and influence mattered
a great deal. In fact, nobles were still extremely wealthy and influen-
tial during the interwar period and remained important members of
the economic, cultural, and political elite.
Historicity and Lifestyle

The Second World War marked a watershed in Poland, for at the end
of it the country was left in the Soviet sphere of influence. The Polish
communist party had little following and the Soviet-backed govern-
ment installed in 1944 lacked popular legitimacy. In an effort to
secure the support of the majority of the population, that is peasants,
the government introduced a radical land reform as its first legislative
and administrative act. The land reform targeted the nobles; their
landed estates were nationalized and subsequently divided among
landless and poor peasants, or formed into state agricultural farms.
Since the lingering presence of the former masters was suspected to
inhibit peasants from participation in land distribution, they were
instantaneously evicted from their expropriated estates. In what

became their historical predicament, the gentry lost at once their
land and their homes. Most importantly, they lost their privileged
position in the society and this pained them the most as is evident in
the narrative of one such displaced gentry:
I was raised in a class, which for generations believed to be solely

responsible for all actions of social and national significance. I was
deeply hurt not only by my estate taken away from me but also by
being treated like an enemy, by being discarded, made irrelevant, by
being robbed of a voice. (Walewska nd)
The land reform successfully removed the gentry from the country-
side—their traditional stronghold and the locus of power, sentiment,
and identity. Manors became converted into schools, orphanages,
workers’ housing, or were simply left to deteriorate. Empty and
unguarded, many were taken apart piece by piece by the peasants
themselves: one needed shingles for a leaking roof, another bricks for
a stable. Decades later only ruins in a cluster of old trees give an indica-
tion of their existence.
This dramatic structural transformation of politics drove nobles
to the margins of public life. The gentry, however, quickly sought to
adapt to the new political order. Some fled the country or faced exile,
but majority migrated to urban centers where they forged new lives,
established new careers, and chartered new ways of holding to the
vestiges of their old status. Literate and educated in what was then a
largely illiterate country,5 they swiftly converted their skills into pro-
fessions. Education set them apart as intellectual elite, just as their
income from landed property had set them apart from those obliged
to earn their living in wages earlier. Bloodshed was a poor option in
a society with a historically weak middle class that had already suf-
fered a tremendous loss of its elite at the hands of the Nazi and the
Soviet forces during the Second World War. Hence at no time did the
communist government attempt to eliminate the gentry physically
in the manner of other revolutionary takeovers. Instead, they were
accommodated, co-opted, or coerced into compliance, thereby find-
ing a new niche in the society. Contrary to aggressive revolutionary
rhetoric, the dynamics and the reality of socialist transformation in
Poland demanded incorporation and collaboration of the gentry in
the process of gradual replacement of elites. For one, the gentry pos-
sessed the highly desirable agricultural expertise and skills in estate
management. In the initial stages of the recovering agricultural and
industrial economy, the state employed them in various supervisory

capacities. Ironically, many became managers of state agricultural
farms that were formed from expropriated gentry estates. And so
they found a new way to convert their capital: they lost land, but
possessed skills that the government needed to reconstruct the econ-
omy; in other words, they became indispensable to the regime.6
A domain that converted easily into marketable skills was general
cultural and literary knowledge. Editorial work, or work at editorial
offices of publishing houses, scientific journals, or newspapers became
a frequent field of employment. As reported by the informants in the
interviews and confirmed by the analysis of the published biographi-
cal data, translation,7 teaching languages, and academic tutoring
were a set of activities that the gentry commonly relied on, if not as
the main source of livelihood then in crisis situations. Having rec-
ognized the value of education as a means to preserve and maintain
privilege, the gentry made sure that the next generation attended
institutions of higher education, even if priority in admissions was
awarded to the working classes.8 Under the repressive bureaucratic
policies of the regime education continued to be an asset, becoming
the venue through which distinction was reproduced. As a result,
even if they did not ally themselves with the project of the socialist
state, the gentry became established as intelligentsia. But education
was not the only strategy employed to maintain distinction. They
also stayed cosmopolitan; those who had emigrated facilitated the
cosmopolitan outlook for those who stayed in multifaceted ways—by
providing financial assistance, social contacts, and knowledge of the
Western world, the access to which was limited for the rest of the
population.
Despite the loss of material resources, the corresponding social
superiority, and the leveling tendencies of an insurgent socialist state,
the gentry retained a certain eminence in the new society. How then
was distinction culturally reproduced? Although most scholarly lit-
erature and popular perception emphasizes rupture, I argue that
the apparent complete break with the prewar social structure was
largely nominal and the society remained essentially guided by the
same driving principles, symbols, and modes of identification and
that both change and continuity animated social history of postwar
Poland. The gentry continued to evoke intrinsic interest in the whole
population, retaining their appeal even after it was disempowered.
The gentry model not only persisted but was also followed by gen-
trification of the national culture and was adopted by the emergent
new classes formed from among the upwardly mobile peasants and
the party bureaucrats. Gentry members often reported in interviews

that zealous party officials aside, they received help from numerous
social others, especially from their former subjects who were either
persuaded by the grandeur that had surrounded the gentry in the past
or because the old loyalties that had developed between the manor
and its dependents were difficult to break. However, in the absence
of material embodiments of status, distinctions based solely on ori-
gins became more pronounced because origins were all that was left.
On the one hand, the regime encoded origins bureaucratically and
enforced them from outside; on the other, the gentry held them dear
as the quintessence of what separated them from the masses, the us
from them. These categories helped orient the gentry in the changed
social reality. Holding on to the image of privilege through birth
aided them in coping with the practices of the system that held them
in disadvantage. Elitism, emphasis on manners, and proper behavior
became at once characteristic of the whole group, rather than the
unlucky individuals who struggled against declassation.
Distinguished by their grooming habits, manners, speech pat-
terns, and the total way of presentation of self, nobility stood apart
from the common folk. The gentry found it impossible to shed, or
hide, the numerous traces of cultivated distinction inscribed onto
their bodies by centuries of tradition and lifelong practice. Their past,
as it were, was locked in habitual memory. Mnemonic of the body
manifested itself in practices of everyday life: the hats they wore, the
manner in which they sipped their tea, the gentility of their vocab-
ulary, and the fact that they kept nannies. These are won slowly,
passed on from generation to generation, and learned as a privilege
of birth. They manifest appreciation for things that last and affirm
the principle of hereditary transmission as the organizing principle
of social organization. Even impoverishment cannot deny the mem-
bership in an ancient group that, in the absence of collateral means,
becomes displayed through ceremonies of the body (Connerton
1989, 87). Just as the gentry can instantaneously recognize each
other, so are nongentry alert to the distinctions manifested in body
deportment. My question whether such-and-such was of gentry ori-
gin often elicited the answer that he must be because he looks the
part. The explanation that followed was as vague as the image itself.
This something so difficult to define is what distinguishes many
gentry from among others—a bearing worn as if second skin—is
what Bourdieu (1984) calls habitus and the gentry race (Pol. rasa).
Race connotes a demeanor and an attitude but most significantly
the physical appearance, separate yet inseparable from the sanguine
poise generated from within. Just what precisely this idealized purity
embodies is difficult to pinpoint but race certainly included regular
facial features, well-formed body, a resounding voice and vigorous
stride, a polite but arrogant air, a confident grace, and a sense of
authority, in brief, an entire habitus that marks the contrast between
the appearances of the mighty and the lowly that originate in socially
inherited differences in wealth, prestige, and power.
Although the past is continually and involuntarily reenacted in
the present conduct, that conduct is also intentionally retained, even
cultivated. In the absence of property to transmit, a code of conduct,
firmly regulated behavior, and strict manners become the social
badge that distinguishes the gentry from the common people. As
observed by G. Simmel, “The more precarious is the material basis
for one’s existence, the weaker the moral relevance of higher classes,
the more significant becomes the personal art of existence ” (1971,
209; italics in original). In the midst of an altered and at times hos-
tile environment, the maintenance of such conduct becomes ever
more important. Impeccably dressed with pressed shirts and polished
shoes, the gentry would sit down to a table decked with crested china
even if they were to be served a simple dish of potatoes. As recalled
by the informants, although this genteel poverty was resented, they
also took pride in what they called their historical predicament. The
self-imposed discipline and the insistence on preserving standards
of behavior and proper habits reminded them about who they once
were and informed the younger generation about how to be, ulti-
mately helping to assert and safeguard their social superiority. These
inherited and inculcated bodily practices of distinction perpetuated
class differences and challenged the overtly democratic and egali-
tarian social order. Even the necessity to work did not affect their
sense of decorum and every effort was made to appear dignified,
polished, and untainted by the growing influence of popular plebe-
ian culture. The latter was traditionally conceptualized as chamstwo,
an equivalent of common and uncivilized behavior, a property of the
masses. Categorical opposition between lord and plebs lay at the very
foundation of the gentry’s identity, and transgressing it was a mark
of declassation. Moreover, gentry believed that noble culture was
synonymous with culture tout court; guarding it against intrusions
of nonculture, or chamstwo, was vital to the integrity of the gentry
as a group—one, which also made a special claim on the national his-
tory and Polishness. Hence even their language register was thought
to protect the purity of Polish language both in style and in spirit—
through cultivating the correct grammar, vocabulary, and forms of
address—against sovietization, russification, or simply vulgarism.

Description of an adversary—an official of the regime, a communist
party, or agricultural collective’s member—in spoken or written nar-
ratives indicated every slip of grammar, incorrect use of a word, an
accent in an attempt to discredit the person as capable, qualified,
morally authorized, or even Polish (the equally damning alternatives
of which were Jewish or Russian). As an utter disapproval of some-
one with a high position in the socialist reality, ambition, and per-
haps education, which the gentry thought not commensurable with
class origins, many nobles used the expression of “straw still sticking
from his/her boots,” referring to the habit of the poor peasantry to
insulate their footwear in freezing weather.
The political transformation leveled and homogenized what
had once been an extremely diverse and stratified social stratum.
Economic debasement triggered by the land reform brought the
ancient ideology of equality at par with practice: once the gentry
lost their social, economic, and political foundations, disparities
among them ultimately diminished. This leveling of the class was
reflected in circles of sociability and, since people who could not
have met previously were able to do so now, affected marital choices.
Liberated from the rigid social structure governing hospitality, the
gentry mingled more easily with each other. Thus circles of sociabil-
ity now included aristocracy as well as people formerly not received
at great noble houses. The myth of one large kin group fostered by
the depth of vertical as well as horizontal genealogical memory and
compounded by shared cultural heritage and experiences of persecu-
tion made everyone a cousin. For one, a more extended social net-
work meant a larger pool of resources, a greater access to information
about procedures and ways to overcome them, availability of jobs and
housing, people to call upon for help or a favor, and a host of practi-
cal problems not encountered by the affluent before, which pestered
not only the gentry but also the society at large from the inception
of state socialism in Poland. As in other groups, the gentry relied
on the mechanism of networking for the procurement of essentials.
The socialist economy detached the process of production from the
process of consumption leaving the link between them obscured and
mystified in the space of informal economy. Since nothing could be
obtained and everything was arranged or organized, everyone par-
ticipated in the overlapping circles of dependence in acquiring the
basics in life (Wedel 1992). These operations rarely took the form of
a straightforward and explicit transaction but were instead bonded
by sociability. Thus the socialist structures of interdependency might
have diluted the gentry’s distinctiveness if it were not for their con-
scious resistance to the social mixing of classes. They might have
participated in the favors’ circuits but insisted on keeping the inner
circle a sanctum clear of cultural others. Although a medium gentry
found it easier to socialize with aristocracy, rarely did a gentry marry
a peasant or a working-class person. In the absence of other status
markers, purity of blood with its requisite correlate of endogamy pro-
tected against infiltration by class others and ultimately declassation.
Infusion of common blood was scorned as a dilution and therefore
a threat to noble superiority; the misalliance would erode the power
and the allure of the nobles. Indeed, when asked for the meaning of
declassation, gentry interlocutors gave precisely the example of mar-
riage with partners from lower classes.
Thus the endurance of gentry as a group was dependent on dimin-
ishing the internal hierarchy on the one hand, and, on the other, on
guarding the boundary against penetration by class others. Hence
the ability to recognize and place people in an appropriate social cat-
egory was essential to the preservation of group’s integrity. One first
had to establish grounds for interaction, know whether the person
s/he talks to, hears about, has common origins, or is of common
origin. The term “family” is commonly used to determine whether
one has origins in common, or is of common origin. Having a family
implies a place in the historical chain of ancestors, known predeces-
sors, a succession of persons who long after their demise still kept
their individuality, and hence corporeality, because their names were
registered in the records of memory, a text, a portrait. It is not that
working class people do not have ancestors but that their ancestors
had become lost in historical anonymity, their names had vanished
from records and memory, and hence they appear as if they had not
existed at all. They do not have family in the sense the gentry have it,
for their roots are erased, not traceable, lost in societal history, and
the memory of their descendants alike. An individual with a family,
that is, with a historically documented existence, stands in a different
relationship to the group. The longer the chain, the greater the psy-
chological comfort in crisis situations, as if the past longevity were a
guarantee of its perpetuity.
The gentry saw themselves as the carriers, the transmitters, and
the producers of memory. As a matter of fact, the significance of a
noble family lies entirely in its traditions, that is, in its vital memories.9
The articulateness of nobles is one reason why they yield the power
to claim, manage, and authorize their version of history. Family
records, some of which are centuries old—land grants, letters, diaries,
photographs, and such—have been meticulously collected, salvaged

through the ravages of war and the plunder of peasants, saved for
the future generations in a desk drawer as the tangible proof of the
historicity of being. So are genealogical charts whereby every birth
is recorded, every person recognized and given a place beyond their
death, adding another link and henceforth extending their collective
existence. Every one of them has a face, a life story, and a person-
ality with flaws, virtues, and idiosyncrasies. These personae are not
only real but also immortalized in art and literature, simultaneously
part of a family and a national heritage. Commissioned in the pri-
vate pursuit of perpetuation of family memory, they were often of
artistic excellence. Some of the fictional characters in literature were
idealized versions of real people. Family histories are interwoven, if
not synonymous, with national history. The palace in Wilanow, for
example—the property of the Branicki family10 that was nationalized
and converted into a museum by the socialist state—is simultane-
ously the site of private-familial memories for their former inhab-
itants and the site of events of great importance to the history of
the state. Built in early seventeenth century, this so-called Polish
Versailles, was a home to renowned aristocrats and Polish kings. Its
last owner was an avid art collector; his daughter, Anna Branicka,
recalls in an interview that as a child she was often asked to pro-
vide a tour of the gallery while receiving visiting foreign dignitaries.
Walking through the palace was like walking through the history of
Poland, the history that was dotted with anecdotes about her relatives
whose portraits were gazing at her from the walls. Although these
family histories are not the complete history of the nation, nowhere
else does one find such a continuity of practices and ideologies, nor is
the status of a family so clearly defined by what it and others know of
its past (Halbwachs 1922, 128). And so not only individuals coalesce
with a group, but also a group with the core of a nation as a historical
unit. What Malkki (1992) observed for ethnicity—that arborescent
tropes configure a genealogical form of imagining nations—applies
to the gentry in Poland as well. The idiom of kinship, shared blood,
botanical metaphors (such as roots, a tree) naturalize the relation-
ship and provide the substance necessary to create convincing and
lasting bonds between people who claim some form of unity and
separateness from others. To express their distinctiveness on the one
hand, and their continuity on the other, the gentry claimed in the
past Sarmatian origin; presently they use the term “race”.
The gentry commonly surround themselves with objects from
the past, a bricolage of anything and everything that is reminiscent
of life in a manor. The collection of old and seemingly random

objects—antique furniture of all styles, ancestors’ portraits regard-
less of their artistic merit, grandmother’s trousseau china, family
photographs, chandeliers rescued from the family mansion—crowd
the living space and overwhelm its inhabitants in their midst. It
is a style that features in dwellings of younger and older genera-
tions alike. The atmosphere these objects generate is indicative of
their expressive power and it is impossible not to note their perfor-
mative capacity and their effect on human behavior that sets those
who belong apart from those who do not. This cult of memorabilia
should not be mistaken for a passion of collecting alone. Each object
has a story, a family association; together they are like theatre props
that reveal the family’s position by situating it in its past, making his-
tory alive and relevant to the present. Fragments of the past, remind-
ers of bygone ways, memorabilia, if you will, they are also signifiers
of the gentry identity, statements of status, material manifestations
of intrinsic value that link the personal, the familial-genealogical,
and the class with the making of Polish history. The significance
of these objects is not located in their monetary value, but in the
fact of having been in the possession of the family, which in itself
bestows exceptional properties upon them, properties derived from
their origin in the family seat and the locus of the gentry’s identity—
the manor. Although they had been commodities once, they are no
longer such. They became transformed into signs in a system of signs
of status. By the virtue of their displacement and abstraction from
the context in which they had formerly existed, they acquired moral
value. These objects, locked in the life histories, and therefore the
memories, of those who possess them, represented what once had
been, the coherent social world to which they once belonged. They
are the witness to the past and the relics of it, the past that is at the
same time individual and collective. Not all such objects, however,
had to be necessarily in the ancestral possession but were instead
collected along the way. Some are just random old things, old and
worthless, which the gentry keep for its utility or aesthetics but
more notably—and given their relationship to history—for the sake
of having objects with historical memory. The gentry are, in fact,
obsessed with oldness, history, and with their own placement in his-
tory: they are the self-appointed collectors, the scribes, the memoir-
ists, and the keepers of memory.
Contemporary gentry prescribe to a model of social class that is
based on status and not on economics. Indeed, the self-referential
term most commonly used by them is srodowisko (Pol. milieu),

which obscures the history of economic privilege. But even when
they assumed an unostentatious lifestyle and came to terms with
the severely diminished economic means, their cultural and social
resources allowed them to maintain a higher standard of living than
the majority of the population. The gentry distanced themselves from
social others by a cultivated demeanor and insular networks of socia-
bility, be it through the practice of endogamy, the privacy of their
gatherings, or elusive places of recreation. How do then the protective
barriers that the gentry erect affect our ability to research them?
Interpretation and Method:

Challenges in Studying the Elites
Beginning in the 1980s, the shift to anthropology at home brought
a growing number of anthropologists to engage in the study of
their own society. Often writing for local audiences in their own
languages, they narrowed the gap between the researcher and the
researched and raised questions of reflexivity and the personal aspect
of fieldwork. Along the way this new approach to the practice of
anthropology problematized and deconstructed many categoriesthat
had been part of traditional epistemology since the inception of the
discipline. Among others, categories such as anthropologist—native,
or outsider—insider also collapsed. It is now generally agreed that all
ethnographers are positioned subjects constrained by their member-
ship in a particular society at a particular period in history; by their
gender, age, and class; and by the power inequality that often exists
between the observed and the interpreters of history and society
(Ohnuki-Tierney 1990; Jackson 1987; Okely and Callaway 1992).
My research on the Polish nobility fits in this wider epistemological
context.
Born and raised in Poland, I shared many features with the gen-
try that come about from living in the same country, understand-
ing its ideological and cultural underpinnings and the practices by
which they are governed. These commonalities, together with my
foreign credentials and academic standing, facilitated a flow of com-
munication (cf. Lotter 2004). Being educated in the United States,
where I also held a university appointment, positioned me within the
circuit of intelligentsia, a cultural niche of Polish gentry. Together
with worldliness and foreign experience, which have always been of
importance to them, it facilitated yet another point of intersection
of our respective identities. And yet there was a sea of difference

between us; my parents were middle class professionals and my fam-
ily does not have deep genealogical memory, which, given the near
absence of bourgeoisie in Polish society, made me suspect that my
ancestors must have been once the peasant subjects of the gentry I
studied.
Heavily relying on the discourse of victimization privileged after
1989, the gentry advocated resurrection of the group in the pub-
lic sphere, recognition of injustices inflicted upon them, and most
importantly, revision of the land reform of 1944–1945, which they
proclaimed, had been an unlawful act. With reprivatization high on
the national agenda, they lobbied for the return of the property unlaw-
fully, or so they argued, seized from them in the course of the land
reform. The subject proved to be more controversial than the gentry
had expected. Not surprisingly, peasants and parties who represented
them rejected the proposal. In an effort to deal with the resistance,
gentry representatives reduced their request for what, in the parlance
of land reform, became known as “residuaries”—mainly manors and
parks that surrounded them. Since these had been converted into rec-
reational, scientific, or housing facilities, the request put their former
owners in a direct conflict with those agencies and the local popula-
tion that made use of them.11 This created a situation in which gentry
became willing and even eager interlocutors, who used the interviews
as an opportunity to voice their views, rectify the negative image
constructed of them by the communist propaganda, and set their
personal and collective record straight. Thus nobility were willing to
speak and so the problem was not gaining access to informants but
the fact that they were all telling the same story ; what under other
circumstances would have generated enthusiasm, made me won-
der. Contrary to the practice of community-oriented anthropology
wherein ethnographers often become spokespeople on behalf of the
community they study, the challenge was to resist their agendas. This
is not to say that pursuing their agenda, controlling information, and
possibly affecting the research program is a unique situation. What is
striking about the gentry and what sets them apart is their belief in
the inherent worthiness of the story they are willing to share. This is,
perhaps indirectly, related to power. If one can control the story—its
content, flow, and ultimately its uses—they are then less vulnerable
than the one who has no such capability. Furthermore, the willing-
ness to impart one’s life story is related to the belief in the inherent
value of that story; the higher the position one presumes in the social
structure, the greater conviction this belief assumes.
As is common in elite studies, I pursued what Rosa Luhrman

(1996) called “appointment anthropology.” The gentry are dis-
persed, forming no residential community. To my surprise, aristo-
crats, descendants of titled families with old genealogies, were the
easiest to approach. First, they had become visible through the media
coverage. Second, their historically high profile prompted instanta-
neous name recognition whereas names of less distinguished gentry
might not be immediately identified as noble. If one met a Radziwiłł,
one knew it and was smug to point it out. In addition, Polish aris-
tocracy prides itself on its commitment and service to the country
and perhaps also for this reason they appeared amenable to grant-
ing interviews. Conversely, petty gentry were more difficult to trace
and less eager to relate their experiences; the more information they
revealed about themselves, the more apparent was their minor posi-
tion in the gentry’s hierarchy.12
Conversations took place in the gentry’s own environment—be it
an apartment or a house—mostly in the urban metropolis of Warsaw,
Krakòw, and Wrocław. They were distinct in their location—usually
in parts of the city that were fortunate to survive the ravages of war;
the buildings retained at least some of their former elegance, which
set them apart from the impersonal concrete and steel high-rises of
socialist apartment blocks. Each interview was taped, transcribed,
and, if requested, also authorized. Interlocutors often followed up
themselves calling with additional information or providing docu-
ments they thought useful to my research. Given the forum, the
gentry were in control of the content of the conversation, the story,
and the message they wanted to impart. It is worth noting that given
the subject of my research—that is, the gentry’s history during the
communist period—I had initially thought to start the interview at
the end of the Second World War, but all of them insisted to begin at
some other historical moment—as if they owned the narrative flow of
it—and then finally got around to answering my question. In effect,
they were directing the show to which I was an audience. Because
of the subject matter and the duration of the interview, conversa-
tions were emotionally and physically taxing. Nonetheless even the
eldest of them (and many were of advanced age) demonstrated great
presence, clarity of mind, and a remarkable endurance, on occasion
greater than mine. It was hard not to be impressed by their stamina
on the one hand, and the ambience of their residences on the other.
Unintentionally, this registered in the written text because, as one
of the readers of my manuscript remarked, I seemed to be in awe of
nobility. I was certainly bewildered by the parallel cultural universes,
that of the gentry and mine. The journal I kept during fieldwork
conveys this initial bafflement:
I was introduced to Mrs. S. by TH, a friend from my university days

in Warsaw. Of gentry’s origin himself, he knows her daughter profes-
sionally, for they both work at the Polish Academy of Sciences, as well
as socially because he is befriended with her grandson. TH made the
appointment for us on an afternoon a few days after Easter. This was
my first interview and I was not sure what to expect. I had to think
of what to wear, perhaps something elegant yet simple. Etiquette was
important here and I felt ill at ease. I had to live up to the expectations
of TH—his reputation was at stake. He was wearing a jacket and a tie.
We came to a three-story house with a gate and an intercom system.
The apartment was spacious, with a long entrance hall and rooms to
both sides. It looked warm and cozy but the variety of shapes surprised
me and the doors—so many of them—were mystifying. Where did
they lead and what was behind them? So different from the socialist
mass produced apartments with their predictability of spatial arrange-
ments and standard multi-purpose furniture, all of which one can take
in with just a single glance, the likes of which I grew up in. (Diary
entry, 1994)
The sitting room—a prerogative of the blessed few in Poland—was

round with large windows. I could not tell whether the furniture
was valuable or just had an air of antiquity about it; there was an
old-fashioned tiled coal burning stove, next to it a rocking chair
with a hand woven blanket thrown over its back, and heavy curtains.
We were seated at the tea table laden with delicate china. The lady,
who entered shortly and was introduced as Mrs. S., fit the environs
perfectly—old and distinguished looking. Her gray hair braided in a
bun, she appeared cheerful and dignified. I felt as if I entered a stage
set, or a film script about an old gentry family. Tea was served on
Wedgewood china accompanied by cakes, biscuits, and homemade
preserves. Her grandson entered and there was some exchange about
a letter she was helping him write in English.
We spoke of politics—local and worldwide. She was neither pleased
with Wałęsa nor Clinton. She had one good thing to say about the latter;
the word had it that he was about to appoint a Polish émigré aristocrat,
Mr. Rey, to the post of ambassador in Warsaw. Mr. Rey was “representa-
tive” (as in good-looking) and “well connected” (as in with good family
connections), Mrs. S. stated. He was a family relation of hers.
Mrs. S. was not an exception; my interlocutors were charming,
intelligent, and cultured people bearing the unmistakable marks of
gentry habitus. They exerted a commanding presence, a sense of
entitlement, and competence. History matters to us through individu-

als and indeed, talking to them was like rubbing with history, which
is why the appeal of personal histories and biographies is powerful.
Quickly it also became apparent that it was of importance to them
whether I was of gentry or not and, as my research progressed, I began
to expect a question to that effect. Most made an effort to locate me in
the gentry’s social scene, browsing through their memory to recall all
the Jakubowskis they have ever known as if to forge a bond, to spark
a connection, which when reactivated would comfortably place us in
the same milieu. In accordance with the gentry’s modus operandi,
interviews had a performative dimension, and the presentation of self
was highly ritualized. Acts of speech and even dress were a measure of
competence. Having to create an adequate persona through attentive-
ness to hypercorrect Polish, proper manners, and appropriate forms of
address, I never felt at ease, preoccupied by the stage and the perfor-
mance as much as by the content of the conversation.
As observed by Marcus (1983), elite research requires normative
distancing beyond the usual relativism and even then it occurs in an
ideologically charged atmosphere. The interview situation, the char-
acter of my visits, the nature of reminiscences about lives sketched
with broad strokes and shared with a stranger were not conducive to
establishing intimate relations with the informants and did indeed
not yield any beyond some sympathies and some antipathies. I empa-
thized with the traumas brought by the war—dispossession and dis-
placement. I felt saddened by individual tragedies that befell many
and was touched by the aging figures in the midst of spaces crowded
with objects of the past, their hands shaking while drinking tea from
the precious china cups, but was also irritated by their unyielding
claim over the definition of Polishness. Some statements made me
wince—such as disdain for their former subjects, unequivocal sup-
port of the ultraconservative Polish Catholic Church, and dormant
anti-Semitism. Although I could analyze and understand the dilem-
mas of the gentry, I was troubled by their request for reprivatization
and found ideological differences difficult to overcome. The task of
relativizing poses a special challenge when one is subject to the same
structures governing inclusion and exclusion.
Even if empathy does not become a personal problem for the eth-
nographer of elites and she manages to suspend normative judgment,
as noted by Marcus,
reactions of the readers are nonetheless just as likely to be normatively

based, since elite research of any kind has so routinely been received
in an ideological atmosphere. Working sympathy for one’s subjects
can be misconstrued as ideological sympathy; ideological distancing

from one’s subjects, to the point of disapproval, is a difficult condi-
tion of work in an ethnographic style of research . . . and ambivalence
or silence in judgment on subjects makes the ethnographer’s research
equally vulnerable to a charge of elitism, or conversely to its use in a
polemical condemnation of elites. (1983, 23)
Consequently, more so than in other studies, the art of the ethnog-

raphy of elites lies in being able to convey the humanity of individ-
ual experience without losing the sight of implicit agendas that the
elites pursue and avoiding methodological traps thus set up for us.
Conclusions
Contrary to the majority of communist countries, in Poland the
absolute domination of Marxism and strict ideological control of
the Communist Party lasted for a relatively short period of time
between 1948 and 1955. As history has subsequently shown, most
social research overestimated the stability of the regime, in the con-
sequence of which an accurate description of the extent of social
differentiation, cleavages, and conflicts that the society has under-
gone in the entire period of state socialism is largely absent from
scientific analysis. As aptly put by Best and Becker (1997, 7), the
largest part of the society “remained in grey obscurity, only occa-
sionally revealing bits of information about a social life distant from
the centers of power.” Therefore the case of the gentry in Poland
reveals an interesting dynamics that has developed between the old
elite and the regime that displaced it. The concepts of production
and reproduction of elites, and clashes between established elite and
counter-elite can be traced back to Pareto and Mosca. Some out-
comes of transition are however rooted in deep layers of history.
The Polish gentry’s identity is grounded in a historically privi-
leged class position acquired through the possession of land. Its
strength depended on the fortuitous conjunction with several other
components, above all a set of powerful historical myths combined
with a presumed biological endowment, and a penchant for messi-
anism blended with a nationalist ideology. The latter was of partic-
ular relevance to their reappearance in the postcommunist period
for they had exerted lasting hold on the definition of what consti-
tutes Polishness and Polish culture and tradition. Historically, they
created, defined, and dominated patriotic discourse and became
potent symbols of nationalism and standard-bearers of political
sovereignty; their collective historical memory formed the back-

bone of the state tradition in Poland. Although advocating nation-
alism, they stood firmly on the side of tradition, Church, and
Polishness, but more precisely, they were also cosmopolitans who
enjoyed privilege and knew how to preserve it.
Although the communist regime forged the gentry as a pun-
ishable category (they were variously labeled as “social parasites,”
“reactionaries,” and “imperialist agents”), in practice it made use
of the expertise and the prestige inherent in their historical capi-
tal employing these to its own ends. Paradoxically, they were dis-
credited in public and yet indispensable to the regime’s success. In
Poland, of low literacy and of deeply peasant culture, any group
that managed to get even a small amount of education and liter-
acy would find itself in a powerful position. The gentry became
politically invisible and socially marginal but, although they were
for some time barred from prominent positions, they reinvented
themselves as the guardians of culture and cultural tradition. The
intrinsic power which the Polish gentry enjoyed through periods
of privilege and oppression alike was derived from their historical
past and their ability to conceptually fuse notions of family, class,
and nation. Transfiguring class traits into national value and heri-
tage, and molding the core of the state patriotic tradition in the
process made them indispensable to the regime that needed legiti-
macy conferred by nationalism. Both the state and the gentry pro-
duced their own representation of the national past appropriating
selective traditions and transforming others through idealization
and sanitation. The past, which the state could not incorporate,
became consigned to the margins of the national and was denied
a public voice—a practice that in post-1989 parlor became known
as “white spots in history.” The degree of persuasiveness of the
official national history hinged on the power of the state to control
the means of distribution of social meanings. And since that con-
trol was not total and the influence of the gentry culture on the
national culture pervasive, the idea of historicity of the national
entity could not be established without acknowledging the gentry’s
presence. Cultural capital accumulated throughout the centuries
of advantage, prestige inherent in the name and the title, descent
from personages of historical significance, endowed them with an
agency that could not be denied even by the communist regime.
The gentry’s grip on the national symbolic heritage was a way to
bend the dogmatic rigidity of the system at the edges. The regime’s
incapability to undermine the gentry’s historical legacy generated
spaces of tolerance that, in becoming the sites of cultivated gentry

identity, ultimately perpetuated the group’s distinctiveness.
Notes
* The author and editors of this book wish to express their gratitude
to Ashgate Publishers for allowing us to use the material published in
L. Jakubowska’s (2012) chapter, “The straw in anthropologist’s boots:
Studying nobility in Poland,” in H. Hazan and E. Hertzog, eds.,
Serendipity in Anthropological Research: The Nomadic Turn (Farnham:
Ashgate), pp. 315–330. The full account of the research on which this
chapter is based appears in Longina Jakubowska (2012), Patrons of
History: Nobility, Capital and Political Transitions in Poland (Farnham:
Ashgate).
1. The Sarmatian myth was endorsed by the earliest state chroni-
clers, such as Jan Dlugosz or Marcin Bielski and in the course of
the fifteenth century gained popularity and became widely accepted
(Bogucka 1996). An alternative, although less popular myth, held
that the Polish nobles descended from the noble Japheth, as dis-
tinct from the ignoble sons of Ham (Davies 2001). As a matter of
fact, cham (Ham) has become in the Polish language a synonym for
moral and social ignobility. The belief in separate origin of nobles is
not restricted to Poland but rather a general feature of nobility who
are convinced of its inherent physical and moral superiority, which,
proven by the deeds of the forefathers, is passed on to the descen-
dants through blood and seed.
2. Frost (1995) cites the newly revised figures for the late eighteenth cen-
tury as 6–6.5% of a population of approximately 14 million for the whole
of Commonwealth before the First Partition in 1772, and 7–7.5% of
approximately 10 million thereafter. At 4.4%, the number of nobles in
Hungary comes closest to their counterparts in the Commonwealth.
3. Over 80% of marriages among the gentry were conducted endoga-
mously, that is within the same status group. To save waning for-
tunes, marriages conducted between the old gentry and the new
bourgeoisie occurred shortly after the emancipation of peasantry
during the worst of the economic crisis (Leskiewiczowa 1991).
4. The king of Italy and other aristocratic houses of Europe (the
Bourbons and the Hohenzollerns, for instance) mediated the release
of Polish aristocrats from German and Soviet captivity during the
Second World War.
5. Literacy rates in Poland were low. In the interwar period, 38% of
peasant population was completely illiterate and only 12% of peasant
youth attended secondary education (Inglot 1992).
6. One such example is the nobles’ sustained employment in the man-
agement of the horse-breeding industry, a realm of a recognized
gentry expertise, and a source of considerable profit and prestige for

the state.
7. The number of publications translated from Russian increased by
threefold with a corresponding decrease of translations from impe-
rialist languages, i.e. English, French, German (Paczkowski 1995,
284). Since there were few speakers of Western languages, their skills
were extremely valuable although their contribution was given a low
profile.
8. According to the official university admission records, the greatest
number of traditionally underprivileged students, that is students of
peasant and working class background, were enrolled in universities
in the academic year 1950–1951 when they constituted 62.2% of
all students. This means that about 40% of people of other social
origin made up the student body. The figure fluctuated only slightly
during the Stalinist period but sharply dropped afterward almost
reversing the trend. In 1958–1959, only 44% of the student body
came from working class and peasant families (Connelly 1997).
9. Cf. how Di Lampedusa expresses it in his novel, 1991, 189.
10. The Branickis were one of the most influential and affluent aristo-
cratic families. In the eighteenth century, Jan Branicki, the Field and
Great Crown Hetman, was the owner of 12 cities, 257 villages, 17
palaces, and 2 primeval forests.
11. Not all gentry supported reprivatization; many accepted their
redefined position in the national community, and although they
welcomed the revival of nobility, they also acknowledged the impos-
sibility of returning to the old social structure and the lifestyle that
it had facilitated.
12. In all, I have conducted 48 extended interviews almost evenly split
between men and women whose age ranged between 90 and 25.
Although conversations with the older generation concerned life
experiences and informed about memory formation and transfor-
mation, speaking with members of the younger generation allowed
insights into the process of enculturation among the elites. The fact
that members of elites are in the habit of writing memoirs, helped to
enlarge the research cohort. The gentry were indeed prolific writ-
ers and produced a wealth of material that recorded their lives. I
examined 49 such documents, either in published or unpublished
form; coached in similar style, focused on the same issues, and using
common rhetoric, they differed from the interviews merely in the
medium of presentation.
References
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Research in central and Eastern Europe. Opladen: Leske & Budrich.
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Regulator of Polish Social Life in Early Modern Times. Warsaw: Polish
Academy of Sciences.
Bourdieu, Pierre. 1984 [1979]. Distinction, A Social Critique of the
Judgement of Taste. London: Routledge and Kegan Paul.
Connelly, John. 1997. “Szkolnictwo Wyższe w Europie Środkowej i Wschodniej
w Epoce Stalinizacji.” In Skryte Oblicze Systemu Komunistycznego, edited
by Roman Backer and Józef May. Warszawa: Wyd. DIG.
Connerton, Paul. 1989. How Societies Remember. Cambridge: Cambridge
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Davies, Norman. 2001. Heart of Europe: The Past in Poland’s Present.
Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Di Lampedusa, Giuseppe. 1991 [1958]. The Leopard. New York: Alfred
A. Knopf.
Frost, Robert. 1995. “The nobility of Poland-Lithuania, 1569–1795.” In
The European Nobilities in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries,
vol. II, edited by Hamish M. Scott, 183–222. London and New York:
Longman.
Halbwachs, Maurice. 1922. On Collective Memory. Chicago: University of
Chicago Press.
Herzfeld, Michael. 2000. “Uncanny success: Some closing remarks” In De
Inglot, Stefan. 1992. Historia Chlopow Polskich. Wroclaw: Wydawnictwo
Universytetu Wroclawskiego.
Jackson, Anthony, ed. 1987. Anthropology at Home. London: Tavistock.
Kieniewicz, Stefan. 1987. “Jak być Polakiem pod zaborami.” Znak 11–12
(390–391): 35–43.
Leskiewiczowa, Janina, ed. 1991. Spoleczenstwo Polskie XVIII i XIX Wieku.
Warszawa: Wydawnictwo Naukowe PWN.
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mation in Nepal.” Anthropology Matters Journal 6 (2): 1–9.
Luhrman, Tanya. 1996. The Good Parsi: The Fate of a Colonial Elite in a
Postcolonial Society. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
Malkki, Liisa. 1992. “National Geographic: The rooting of peoples and
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Ohnuki-Tierney, Emiko, ed. 1990. Culture through Time: Anthropological
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Okely, Judith, and Helen Calloway, eds. 1992. Anthropology and
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Communism. New York: University of Columbia Press.
CH A P T ER 3
Continuity and Change as Two

Identifying Principles amongst
Nepalese Nobility
Stefanie Lotter
The King’s New Clothes

On May 28, 2008, the Kingdom of Nepal became the Federal
Democratic Republic of Nepal, ending the Shah monarchy that had
lasted for 239 years. The former king was asked to vacate the palace
and to move to a new state residence, a former hunting lodge, at the
outskirts of Kathmandu. Institutions were renamed and the “Royal”
as in Royal Nepalese Army removed from titles, signboards, as well
as letterheads and the image of the king was replaced by Sagarmatha
(Mt. Everest) in the newly printed currency.
The royal palace transformed in less than one year from a residence
into a museum, opening on February 27, 2009, holding in storage
and on display the former regalia of the kings’ office: crown, scepter,
military uniform, and throne.1 The Federal Democratic Republic, a
product of the struggle for democracy and a decade of Maoist upris-
ing, has not yet decided how to represent the material culture of the
country’s past. To date the palace museum, far from framing the Shah
monarchy as a historical period in a wider context, displays recently
used objects without offering an interpretation beyond the sensation-
alism with regard to the royal massacre on June 1, 2001, which had
contributed to the decline of the monarchy.2
The new government’s passive stance toward the tangible heritage
is contrasted by its marked attention to public performances. This
72 STEFANIE LOTTER
is surprising as the Nepalese nobility distinguished itself from com-

moners at first glance most obviously through their modes of con-
sumption. However it is the public appearance of the former king
Gyanendra Shah that draws attention and criticism, not his lifestyle
or display of wealth.
All his public appearances are observed carefully and controlled
as well as commented on by state officials and the media. Status and
royal privilege in Nepal are primarily based on performance, negoti-
ated between king and government, and only secondly a matter of
confirmation through a defined code of conduct and a set of privi-
leges. Unlike earlier, the former king is now expected to appear a
commoner at all events in the public sphere.
Bourdieu (2000, 19) states that “people can find that their expec-
tations and ways of living are suddenly out of step with the new social
position they find themselves in.” He goes on to link this personal
experience with the society and the modes of intervention available.
Social positioning is for Bourdieu a public negotiation within a struc-
ture of rules in which “the question of social agency and political
intervention becomes very important.” Especially where a new social
position is not performed convincingly and in public, the former sta-
tus lingers. Former royalty continues to appear noble, as cultural capi-
tal does not disintegrate with the removal of a title or office alone.
As a political intervention, the government now regulates the public
appearance of the former king to limit his agency. It does so because a
king remains to be identified as a king as long as he lives. Dixit (2008)
predicted correctly that after the abolition of the monarchy “Nepal
would not have a king, but there would still be a person hanging about
town who is identified as ‘the king.’”3Any sign of royal attitude or
continuity of accepted privilege can be interpreted as a claim to power
and a resistance to status change.4 It is not surprising, therefore, that
the government avoids facilitating an audience for the performance of
the former king and, likewise, that opponents of the monarchy use
public appearances to shout slogans or throw stones stating the end
of respect and privilege.5 The new social position of the king has been
outlined by the abolition of the monarchy; his standing however, is
negotiated in the interaction with the public. In other words, it takes
people who treat a former king as a king as well as a former king
who continues to accept honors and behaves like a king. Bourdieu
(1982 [1979], 238, 496) calls the persistence of status through crisis
the hysteresis effect. He explains it with the only partially conscious
habitual enactment of the past, “Body believes in what it plays at . . . it
enacts the past, bringing it back to life” (Bourdieu 1990, 73). It is
CONTINUITY AND CHANGE 73
the embodiment of a social position that facilitates elites to survive

through times of crisis and allows them to change positions within
the elites moving from political to military, economic, or other pro-
fessional positions.
Since the abolition of the monarchy, the king of Nepal has visibly
accepted his status change. Images appeared in the media showing
him with little royal attire—for example, unshaven and in an infor-
mal sports jacket. The media denied the king widely the chance to
enact the past by attending functions or ceremonies, by meeting state
guests, or by representing Nepal in any way abroad. The body of the
king had to incorporate the present convincing the public of the new
social position of the now commoner Gyanendra Shah. In recent less
defining images, he is seen in Western suit and tie or in daura suru-
wal, the Nepali official dress. The king’s new clothes are those of a
commoner, and any public enactment of the past would provoke and
result in official criticism.
Persisting Status
Invisible but far from insignificant, monarchies have also forged links
to the state and to the religious practices of its people. Not entirely
unlike the British monarch, who is also the supreme governor of the
Church of England, Nepalese monarchs ruled by divine grace though
not by divine rule or as high priests. This differs clearly from the
Tibetan Buddhist system whereby governance lies with the highest
lama who holds the highest political as well as spiritual power. In
the case of the Shah kings, divine grace has been granted according
to a folk legend for 12 generations to the first Shah king by God
Gorakhnath. In this respect the Shah kings followed the same pat-
tern as Indian royalty. Kings are here of the Hindu warrior caste and
called by divine signs to rule. Kantorowicz (1957) in his study of the
king’s two bodies explains that religiously legitimated kings possess
a body natural and a body politic. Whereas the former refers to the
mortal body of the human king, the second signifies the immortal
aspect of the divine kingship that is passed over generations. In the
case of the Shah kings an unusual situation emerged in which the
body natural of the king survived the body politics. For this to hap-
pen the two bodies of the king had to be separated and the concept
of the king’s body politics had to be deconstructed. In other words,
the divine gracing of the king had to come to an end.
In Nepal Shah kings have renewed the divine gracing as they played
a supreme role in major religious rituals, such as the Newar rituals of
74 STEFANIE LOTTER
Indra Jatra or Bhoto Jatra, that reinstated the divine protection for
Nepal and its people by public blessings of the king, the protector of
the nation. With the end of the monarchy the ritual significance of
the king as a protector of the country had to end too.
The image of the king as an incarnation of Vishnu6 that formerly
provided the legitimacy for his ritual involvement, now proved to be
an obstacle in the deconstruction of the kingship. No other Nepalese
state or religious leader could claim a comparative divine legitimacy
to perform rituals that renewed and protected the country and its
people in the same way as the kings of Nepal, who were for genera-
tions perceived as God’s incarnation. Furthermore, in a secular state
the general principle of the separation of state and religion would be
undermined if any state representatives would take over such a role.
Hence, to undo the ritual agency of the king and thereby the sec-
ond body of the king—the body politic—the government ordered
Gyanendra Shah, not to attend religious functions that ritually con-
firmed the king as a protector of the country.7
Following the logic of dismantling the divine link between the
king and the country, the government permitted the former king’s
public appearance especially in situations where it broke with tradi-
tion and served to undermine the belief in the former king as an
incarnation of Lord Vishnu.8 In this context it proved providential
that many Nepali citizens had kept images of the old king, King
Birendra, in their personal Hindu shrines. Here the previous king
received daily offerings as an incarnation of Lord Vishnu. It would
naturally have taken years for any new king’s image to be incorpo-
rated into these house shrines, as loyalty is part of devotion. After the
coronation in 2001, it has however been emphasized that people were
particularly reluctant to incorporate the image of this new king. This
publicly questioned whether Lord Vishnu had found a seat in King
Gyanendra and therefore contributed to the dismantling of a social
position maintained by divine grace. The status of the king as ruler
by divine grace lingered beyond the existence of the monarchy, it did
however not persist.
Having analyzed briefly the complex process of the undoing of
the monarchy in the public sphere, one cannot but be fascinated by
the tenacity of the institution of kingship. Despite the unpopularity
of Gyanendra Shah, whose reign was marked by despotic attempts
to impose order, it remained difficult to undo the institution of the
religiously legitimized king. Ultimately, the Federal Democratic
Republic of Nepal succeeded despite the enduring symbolic power of
the monarchy.
The dismantling of elites as well as their fall or slow decline is in

the social sciences to date still an understudied phenomenon. Studies
have mainly concentrated on the formation of power, status, and
class rather than the unlearning of social positions—the loss of influ-
ence, power, and prestige. Studying declining elites reveals however
as we have already seen, the mechanism, constitution, and cohesion
of power.
With the example of the Nepalese monarchy we are able to observe
the immediate actions taken by the government of Nepal to actively
dismantle the institution of royalty. The example however provides no
prediction over the long term development of the clan. Fortunately
it is possible to compare the decline of the Shah kings of Nepal with
the predating decline of another noble family, the Rana of Nepal.
This rivaling clan had established next to the institution of the Shah
kings a hereditary prime-ministership that they held for a century
until 1951 in a manner not unlike the Japanese shogunate.9 Although
the circumstances of their fall from power differed, the Ranas provide
us with an interesting comparative example that allows a long term
perspective on downward social mobility and to a degree a compara-
tive perspective.
Kings without and Administrators with Powers

Unlike the Shah, the Rana clan is a nineteenth-century invention that
came about when commoners by the name of Kunwar rose to political
power from a more marginal courtier position. Initially the Kunwar
clan seemed to pose little threat to the well-established Shah royalty.
They were neither of noble descent nor did they attempt to base their
power on religiously legitimized entitlement. The Ranas did not initi-
ate a democratic revolution or oust the established elites in a putsch
to gain status and power through regicide and military rule. They
did come close to the latter when in 1846 at the beginning of their
political influence a young courtier named Jung Bahadur Kunwar,
together with his brothers, killed most of the established nobility at
the court. The massacre followed a power struggle between the king
and the queen. One of the queen’s loyal courtiers was killed, which
led her to call a court assembly to find his murderer. The murder case
was not solved but the conflict between the two opposing fractions at
the court escalated in the worst possible way. Jung Bahadur Kunwar
was the only courtier who appeared followed by military personnel as
well as his six brothers to the assembly. When swords were drawn in
the heated atmosphere Jung Bahadur Kunwar dominated the scene,
76 STEFANIE LOTTER
quickly initiating a blood bath. His opponents were either killed or

fled the country. Now with little competition at the royal court, the
relatively inexperienced and very young man was instated as prime
minister while his loyal brothers became ministers.
The court massacre did not immediately touch the position of
the king, nor did it create a dynasty of the Rana. Initially, becoming
prime minister did not even serve to elevate Jung Bahadur Kunwar’s
social status into nobility. However the elimination of other nobility
propelled Jung Bahadur Rana into the position of effective political
power and from this position, a status change followed.
The Ranas, as the Kunwar clan came to be known when finally
being bestowed a noble title, soon found local and even international
recognition by applying a different and novel strategy to legitimize
their claim to power. Their ingenious approach was to introduce for-
eign forms of distinction to all areas of their engagement with the
established power structures. These bypassed the impenetrable local
social categorizations such as caste that were based on religion and
tradition. Acting the Oriental prince in London during an early state
visit and the Western statesman and gentleman in Nepal blurred cre-
dentials and traces of the common origin of the Ranas. Along with
a confident performance—which as explained above, is key to the
elites in Nepal—the self-representation of the Ranas hastened their
acceptance as an elite.
It is interesting to see how this strategy of applying foreign forms
of distinction commenced with the first defining foreign mission of a
Rana delegation in 1850, when a small window of historical opportu-
nities presented itself. Jung Bahadur, the first Rana prime minister of
Nepal, traveled to England and France as the official ambassador of
the king of Nepal. Would the Ranas have conducted this diplomatic
mission merely eight years later after the first war of Indian indepen-
dence (and the transfer of governance over India to the British crown),
the social impact would not have been nearly as compelling. This
is because prior to 1858 incumbent rulers of Indian princely states
were strongly discouraged by the East India Company to officially
visit London, and even envoys sent by Indian princes were not easily
given diplomatic status (Fisher 2004, 245). In this respect the offi-
cial Nepalese mission to England and France in 1850 was a remark-
able diplomatic achievement, underlining the independent status of
Nepal and providing the Ranas with a crucial outside recognition that
reflected well on the development of their elite status inside Nepal.
The status of the Ranas as political actors was further consoli-
dated when the recruitment of Gurkha soldiers into the British army
became common practice after Nepal had sided with the empire in
India’s first war of independence in 1857. Allowing Britain to enlist
Nepalese Gurkha soldiers secured the preferential treatment of Rana
government officials in London. Rana ministers were regularly deco-
rated with the highest British orders—until 1951, when the Rana
dynasty was overthrown by a democratic movement in Nepal that
had forged an alliance with the Shah kings who by then had lost all
political influence to the Rana clan.
Highly decorated with foreign orders, the Ranas in Nepal employed
a different strategy to secure the exclusivity of their social class. Once
in office, they did not initially fashion themselves as traditional
Nepalese nobility but introduced and monopolized from 1850 to
1950 all Western ways of distinction. To guarantee the continuation
of a new elite based on exclusive modernity, Nepal had to be isolated.
Foreign visitors who could have set the Rana lifestyle into perspec-
tive were barred from entering the country, while Nepalese citizens
were prohibited from traveling abroad. The measures of exclusivity
employed by the Rana elite as a means of distinction from royalty as
well as the people followed Eagleton’s (2003, 22) ideal of cosmopoli-
tanism, which he described as “the rich have mobility and the poor
have locality . . . the rich are global and the poor are local.”
To be fair, the primary purpose of isolating Nepal—as the Ranas
did—was of course to guarantee its status as an independent country
at the fringe of the British Empire. Emphasizing here that this also
facilitated the formation of the Rana as elite by forming an exclu-
sive group of cosmopolitan elites, is not to belittle this political cause
but to highlight its convenient side effect. Noticeable exceptions to
the isolation of the country were the exclusive hunting camps that
the Ranas held for visiting royalty and other honoraries, as well as the
international travel the Rana clan undertook (whether in their offi-
cial or private capacity).10 By closing Nepal to the outside world the
Ranas managed to keep the two worlds separate with only themselves
appearing at both sites. This gave them the advantage of being able to
emphasize different aspects of their identity at different places.
The Ranas became known as “traditional Hindu princes” in
the West—despite their humble origin and only recent elevation to
nobility—whereas they became autocrats who culturally resembled
Western gentlemen and British colonial elites in the eyes of the
Nepalese people who had no way to compare the Rana with their
role model. Unlike high-class swindlers however, the Ranas did not
make up entirely fictitious identities. They merely capitalized on for-
eign recognition and the introduction of foreign ways of distinction
78 STEFANIE LOTTER
to speed up the acknowledgement of their status rise as Nepalese

elite. It did not matter even at the court of St. James that the Ranas
were neither royal nor part of an old nobility; nor did it matter in
Nepal that their knowledge of Western ways of distinction was not
yet developed fully and their architectural taste, their fusion couture,
and their manners less Western than peculiar and inventive.
Contemporary transnational elites are less and less able to capital-
ize on similar cultural translations due to the high global visibility
via the international media. They cannot emphasize different aspects
of their self-fashioned identity at different locations because high end
consumption is now global and information over distinctions, hon-
ors, and degrees are easily available.
Transforming from Kunwars into Ranas was a major step toward
being on par with royalty. The strategy of complex status elevation
and recognition deserves now further attention.
Claiming Status through Introducing

Unfamiliar Distinctions
The formation of the Ranas may at best be described as a spiral move-
ment of self-representation and third party acknowledgement.
Their social rise involved initially a family of seven brothers, two
countries, and two very different ways of distinction. In the course of
their rise, the Ranas moved between Kathmandu and London whereby
status gained in one place was subsequently introduced and displayed
at another location. The Ranas managed to capitalize on the lack of
cross-cultural knowledge, rather than be hindered by it as in some ways
the Shah kings were. As orthodox Hindu kings the Shah were reluctant
to travel to Europe or the Americas, which could politically have ben-
efited them. For the Shah the loss of ritual purity and their caste status
would have destroyed the religious legitimacy of the godlike monar-
chy. In the nineteenth century, the belief that crossing the black waters
would pollute caste was still predominant (Whelpton 2005).
However, the innovative way of the Ranas to seek outside recogni-
tion had the advantage that a locally disputed status could be sub-
stantiated through foreign approval. The spiral movement of status
acquisition relied on a convincing performance of the Ranas in their
new role as upper class combined with a certain flexibility of fac-
tual interpretation. As a first step the Ranas had to somehow acquire
formally the status of Nepalese nobility. Considering that the caste
system does not normally provide for upward social mobility within a
single generation this was not easily done (Höfer 1979).
As explained earlier, Kunwars, the clan later known as the Ranas,

were within the local caste hierarchy considered to be ordinary Chetri,
that is, members of the warrior caste. Within the Chetri caste, they
did not belong to the prestigious subcaste of the Thakuri who tra-
ditionally ruled the little kingdoms, intermarried with Shah royalty,
and staffed the higher ranks of military and administration.11
In the mid-nineteenth century, the powerful clans amongst the
Thakuri (Pandey, Shah, Basniat, and Thapa) competed fiercely for
government positions, which resulted in a decade of political unrest.12
Jung Bahadur did not engage in the competition for positions but
eliminated his political rivals as discussed. In addition, rather than
trying to change the caste system, Jung Bahadur set out to reinvent his
family’s origin to align the past with the necessities of social change.
Shortly after the massacre that led him to power, Jung Bahadur
sent the ruling king and queen into what was termed voluntary exile
to Benares. Then he persuaded their son, the new king of Nepal,
under the pretext of national stability, to make the post of the prime
minister hereditary within the Kunwar family and to bestow a noble
title upon his clan as a reward for his services. Through this act, Jung
Bahadur, his six full brothers, and his elder half brother rose formally
into the status of nobility as Ranas. The document, a royal decree that
created the noble Rana clan, in the translation of Whelpton (1987,
163), reads as, “[Your] ancestors were called Kunwars until the pres-
ent day. Now [since] I am pleased with you, it seems to me that you
and your ancestors have been Kunwar Ranaji. Today again, I confer
on you the caste of Ranas.”
The royal decree managed to accommodate both. It confirms sta-
tus change while upholding the eternal nature of the caste order. It
introduced a previously unknown noble clan at the same time claim-
ing their previous existence. In a caste society, social positions are
determined by birth with no apparent flexibility to accommodate
change. In the above cited decree, the king explicitly included a sec-
tion barring the Ranas from intermarrying with royalty as he aimed
to retain exclusivity amongst the Thakuri caste. Becoming noble by
declaration as an act of invented tradition, these Kunwars rose for-
mally into high caste nobility, though this did not initially mean that
their descendants could intermarry with nobility or that their noble
status was accepted by other members of the Nepalese nobility. Facing
local resentment, they had to find other ways to confirm their noble
status and turned to the British Empire.
In the nineteenth century Britain developed a great fascination for
the Indian caste system in which they saw not a system of regulated
80 STEFANIE LOTTER
interaction but a form of hierarchical stratification. By the time the

Ranas came into power, the British government and the directors
of the East India Company had still a rather incomplete knowledge
of South Asian society. This, Fisher (2004) argues, made encounters
with South Asian dignitaries a matter of strategic maneuver rather
than strict protocol allowing de facto for status change through
superior performance. Fisher (2004, 189) states: “With the spread
of colonialism, Indians claiming noble status increasingly advanced
their causes in Britain. Men whose claims had been rejected in India
learned that London would consider their appeals from a fresh and
largely uninformed, albeit wary, perspective.”
A mere four years into power Jung Bahadur Kunwar Rana traveled
as the ambassador of the king of Nepal to London and Paris. This was
a strategic move for a number of reasons. First he established direct
contact with Queen Victoria instead of dealing with the East India
Company, which underlined Nepal’s independent status. He empha-
sized that Nepal had an independent foreign policy by continuing
the journey to Paris to meet Prince Louis Napoleon. For a coun-
try bordering the British Empire with its enormous territorial reach,
this alone was an important diplomatic statement to make, though
it should be kept in mind that the diplomatic mission was otherwise
unable to advance its causes.13 Nevertheless, traveling to Europe gave
the Ranas the opportunity to explore foreign powers with regard to
their military organization, governance, as well as social stratification
and ways of elite distinction.
For the duration of his stay in London Jung Bahadur Rana pre-
sented himself to the public as an exotic Oriental prince rather than a
government official. He visited public places such as Vauxhall Gardens
or Covent Garden flower market in full ornate and with his entire
delegation. This meant that he wore the extravagant bejeweled head-
dress of the prime minister of Nepal with its sweeping bird of paradise
feathers as a personal crown rather than as state regalia.
Public outings made the Nepalese delegation into highly visible
celebrities whose public appearances were preannounced in the press
where the delegation’s ostentation and charitable expenditure was
also recorded. While demonstrating apparently unlimited wealth
they made sure that the international press also reported the delega-
tions cultural sophistication and their Hindu high caste status.14 Jung
Bahadur had become aware that status came with the right appear-
ance and was measured in miniscule details. Consequently he was
not prepared to compromise on style under any circumstance, not
even if it meant to leave Queen Victoria waiting for two hours since
his escort, a cavalry of 22 soldiers as per his title as ambassador, had

not been sent by the British (Dhungel 2008). It was important that
the delegation reportedly observed caste purity as any violation could
have cost the members of the delegation their high caste status and
made the return to political office difficult. With regard to meeting
Queen Victoria this meant, that the Nepalese officers did not share
meals with the queen, a custom the Rana ambassadors later contin-
ued way into the 1930s.
Back in Nepal the status of the Ranas had risen through foreign
acknowledgement and association. Jung Bahadur Rana had met
Queen Victoria and had been treated by her with respect. He had
even received an order, something not even the king of Nepal had
received at that time.
Having climbed the social ladder himself by realigning the history
of the clan, Jung Bahadur now made sure that the modification of
caste and origin would become considerably more difficult. In 1854
he brought about the Muluki Ain, the first written law of Nepal that
took orthodox Hindu values as the dominant social order and listed
all groups hierarchically.15 As a written document the Muluki Ain
codified formerly customary and considerably more flexible social
relations. Although the main purpose of the code was to standardize
legal practice and regulate intercaste conflict, it made it practically
impossible for any group to invent a new clan name or to elevate
their caste status by introducing a new clan. As a by-product of the
new law, Western visitors, including colonial elites, due to their non-
conformity with orthodox Hindu values, were now at least officially
considered to be of relatively low status.
Members of the Rana family interpreted the Muluki Ain to suit their
needs. The few foreign visitors whom they granted permission to travel
to Kathmandu (such as some foreign aristocrats, the British residents,
several medical doctors, and a few researchers) were usually forbidden
from entering the residences of the Rana and were instead entertained
in the palace gardens. This was justified officially as a measure to guar-
antee the observation of ritual purity by preventing pollution of the
residences and especially their shrines and kitchens. However, it directed
the foreign gaze to the impressive architecture of the neoclassical Rana
palaces whereas their initially less impressive interior remained private.
Later the Rana clan and also the Shah loosened this rule and held
audiences for visiting foreigners in designated audience rooms that
were richly decorated. Reportedly the Nepalese nobility underwent
rituals of purification immediately after giving audience if it had come
to shaking hands.16
82 STEFANIE LOTTER
Over time, the Ranas introduced a lavish lifestyle and built about
40 neoclassical palaces, some of which held several hundred rooms.
They imported Western fashion, jewelry, furniture, decorative items,
art, and the latest technical inventions, including several cars for
which they built a few streets connecting their residences.17 As K. B.
Thapa (1981, 29) stated, the Ranas even turned down offers of the
British to initiate industrialization for fear of establishing a new mid-
dle class and thereby leveling social stratification. Being modern in
the Western sense of progress and change became the Ranas’ way of
elevating themselves above the established traditional elites in Nepal,
whose status had been culturally legitimized (Liechty 1997, 60).18
The kings of Nepal were traditional rulers by divine grace, and
had been regarded more or less widely as incarnations of Hindu
God Vishnu. According to legend they were granted rule over Nepal
by God Gorakhnath. Even until their recent replacement as repre-
sentatives of the state in May 2008, royalty remained symbolically
interwoven with the institution of the state of Nepal through several
protecting and cleansing rituals. The Rana, however, never aspired
to such godly legitimacy; they built their prestige solely on worldly
measures.19
Status Recognition as a
Negotiation Process
Although they instantly impressed Nepalese, who were used to less
ostentatious leaders, the few foreign visitors who were permitted to
enter Nepal were often less impressed by the display of what they
interpreted as mimicry. Laurence Oliphant (1852, 142), a writer who
accompanied Jung Bahadur to Nepal, complains, for example, that
the Ranas’ architecture looked as if a Chinaman had mixed together
a Birmingham factory and an Italian villa, every now and then throw-
ing in a strong dash of the style of his own country by way of improve-
ment. Oliphant disapproved of this new Westernized elite that mixed
styles so that “European luxuries strangely mingled with barbarous
inventions” (ibid., 165).
Despite the excitement for novelty, the Ranas must have been
aware of the unfavorable description of their inventive new palace
style, as they kept visiting aristocracy and their entourage as far away
as possible from Kathmandu, organizing luxurious big game hunting
in the Nepalese lowlands.20
Initially the Ranas found that they failed to convince Westerners
of their equally sophisticated Western styles—quite like they initially
failed to convince the established old Thakuri elites of their equal

caste status. This flaw was corrected over time.
Meanwhile, new grounds for favorable status negotiation were
found. At lavish hunting camps in the Nepali lowlands the Ranas were
able to demonstrate superior organizational skills and impressed the
Westerners with the luxurious conditions of the camps. They arranged
for several hundred elephants as well as a good one thousand staff. In
Veblen’s (1998 [1899], 56) sense, the Rana demonstrated conspicu-
ous consumption as a prerequisite of their high status by showing
off not their apparently still imperfect residences but especially their
unlimited resources.
Although the aristocracy was treated with opulence, the Ranas
pulled also ranks with less welcome guests of the British Empire.
Nepal had accepted a British resident after signing the Treaty of
Sugauli in 1816, long before the Ranas came to power. The British
resident to Nepal was hosted in a comfortable mansion that signified
status but clearly fell behind the extravagant residences of colonial
officers in India and was rather small by comparison to the newly
built Rana palaces. Landon, a British historian whom the Ranas had
invited to chronicle Rana history in the 1920s, remarked that the
legation contrasted “unhappily with the sumptuous homes of even
the junior members of the Maharaja’s family” (Landon 1928, 190).
The Ranas had by then become masters of perception and status
negotiation, especially when it came to showing visitors their pal-
ace. As Morris (1963, 26) who visited Nepal during Chandra S. J.
B. Rana’s rule (1901–1929) explains, condescending attitudes were
custom: “A visitor who had come to Kathmandu for the express
purpose of conferring with the Maharaja was often kept hanging
about for days.” Hassoldt, who visited Nepal with a film crew when
Juddha S. J. B. Rana (1932–1945) was prime minister, gives another
example of how impression management was also then standard
practice:
An automobile zoomed directly at us, passed by with an inch to spare.

The lights were on inside it, and there I could see three men with
jewelled turbans pretending that they weren’t looking at us at all . . . It
was painted gold, entirely gold, even to the spare tyre on the back.
(Hassoldt 1942, 186)
Despite the golden cars, foreign recognition even in Kathmandu was

still not sufficiently glamorous to make up for the lack of a proper royal
title that would pave the way to equal the Ranas with the Shahs.
84 STEFANIE LOTTER
New Kings under the King of Kings

Surprisingly, at the height of his diplomatic status upon returning from
London, Jung Bahadur Rana in 1856 had announced his retirement
from the post of prime minister. The king of Nepal accepted his resig-
nation and honored his services. He granted Jung Bahadur as a retire-
ment gift the royal title of a Maharaja, combined with land rights on
two of the little kingdoms within Nepal. Through this act the Ranas
had finally become landed nobility, becoming formally one of the little
kings under the king of Nepal. The spiral movement that had begun in
Nepal by gaining political power and claiming noble status had moved
to London for status confirmation and returned to Nepal.
Having achieving the coveted title of a Maharaja, Jung Bahadur
found his early retirement unsatisfying and returned when his brother
Krishna Bahadur died unexpectedly after only a month in office. In
June 1857 Jung Bahadur resumed office, now combining the title of
landed nobility as Maharaja with that of the political office of prime
minister of Nepal.
At this point, when combining office and royal title, the Rana
clan began to truly rival the powers of the established Shah dynasty.
Accordingly, and serving to solidify status, now several marriages
between the Rana and the Shah were successfully negotiated by Jung
Bahadur.21 Legend has it that Jung Bahadur pressured King Surendra
into these alliances, reminding him that his own ancestry was not
flawless either—being the great grandson of Queen Kantivati, a wid-
owed Bahun rather than a first marriage Thakuri (Bhattarai 2000).
With these marriage alliances the Ranas cemented their status, as
further public questioning of their caste status would now have meant
to also disgrace the established royal family. At this stage, the time
was ripe to press again for outside acknowledgement of high birth to
end the dispute over nobility once and for all. Jung Bahadur Rana
had established good relations with the British through his diplo-
matic mission, and more importantly through the offering of Gurkha
soldiers. During the First World War, one hundred thousand Gurkha
soldiers went to fight in British service, which meant that Prime
Minister Chandra S. J. B. Rana now had a firm stand to bargain
with the British for a favor. In an interview with the author in 1999,
R. Rana explained that a further move to have the Rana established
as an old noble clan fell into this time:
It is Chandra Shamsher who was trying to force the Maharana of

Udaipur. You know in India the Maharana of Udaipur is the highest
of the R ājput families, that is why he has the title maha-rana, which
means the great Rana. He refused: “These stupid fellows from Nepal,
they think that they should join our family?”—and this thing kept on
and on and on until Lord Curzon became the Viceroy of India. And
Chandra did a lot during the First World War—he really went out of his
way to appease the British, his wives were knitting socks for the British
soldiers and all that, just to impress Lord Curzon. So Lord Curzon
put pressure on the Maharana of Udaipur and then the Maharana of
Udaipur wrote one letter, one fine day, to Chandra Shumshere say-
ing (laugh) “dear Chandra” and we suddenly became sursudias and
sursudias means the highest form of the R ājputs, but we are noth-
ing! We are just a very common stock of people. I don’t believe in all
this—nonsense!
Now the Ranas had a certified noble origin. With no need for fur-
ther proof, it now became customary, especially within Chandra
S. J. B. Rana’s extended family, to find suitable marriage partners
amongst India’s nobility. That the Ranas however discouraged the
royal family to build equally favorable alliances is only logical, as the
control of the Ranas over the Shah increased further throughout
the regime.
Fundamental to their comet-like rise was not only to introduce new
ways of distinction at all places of engagement but also to seek ways
to further speed up the impression of historical time, a key ingredient
of old nobility.
Speeding Up Historical Time

The status rise of the Rana could not have been achieved in one cul-
tural setting only. If they had remained in Nepal, the Ranas would
not have succeeded to be recognized as landed nobility within such
a short time. The traditional caste system would have required 14
generations to accept upward mobility through Sanskritization, the
process of ritual alignment and orthodox conduct. The Ranas had
to become powerful outsiders and rule breakers to introduce a new
elite within the established caste system. By the time they were able
to force everybody to accept the invented noble Rajput origin of the
Ranas, they had already created marriage links with other nobility.
These links guaranteed the acceptance within the Nepalese upper
caste society as to question the Ranas ritual status would now have
meant to also question the status of all offspring of unions with the
Ranas. As this would have included all Shah kings from 1881 onward,
it was not likely. In terms of elite formation it appears that within
exclusive traditional systems of hierarchy the accumulation of social
capital is not sufficient. Conspicuous consumption, the distinction
86 STEFANIE LOTTER
through taste, and education form here only an entry point to elite
status. Modifying the past to conform to established rules, described
by Hobsbawm and Ranger (1983) as the practice of inventing tradi-
tions, has to follow to solidify a new status. One of the problem-
atic issues with an invented tradition is the relatively short period of
elite presence. New elites are per se not as valued as old dynasties. In
the case of the Ranas the perception of historical time has also been
manipulated.
Dynastic time is measured in generations and nobility generally
relies on distinguished genealogy with long family trees and at best
a line of descent that reaches into time immemorial.22 The Rana
rule lasted for 104 years and the duration of only four Shah kings
(Rajendra, Surendra, Prithvi, and Tribhuvan) who had passed power
from father to son according to the common law of patrilineal primo-
geniture (sons of a king before brothers of a king), the common form
of succession amongst landed nobility.
The Ranas however introduced an unusual fraternal system of suc-
cession. This lateral succession ensured that only mature Ranas came
to higher offices while the younger generation could be extensively
trained for their future.23 As a disadvantage, it complicated the role of
succession from the second generation onward, when numerous cous-
ins competed for posts. As a side effect of the fraternal succession,
the number of Rana prime ministers (12, or 10 if one does not count
Jung Bahadur’s three terms in office) implies a long history. The list
of hereditary prime ministers or the display of a gallery of portraits
gives the instant impression of an old dynasty.24 One tends to easily
overlook that the 12 Rana prime ministers represented brothers of
only three generations of the Rana clan.
Portraits of Rana officials show usually timeless gala uniforms
with civil and military orders as Toffin (2008) noticed. An early pho-
tograph of Chandra S. J. B. Rana (prime minister from 1901–1929)
shows him even curiously in some sort of a seventeenth-century
Western court costume. This visual backdating of historical time
though not a Rana invention facilitated the cause of elongating their
noble tradition.25 Both the visual backdating as well as the frater-
nal succession added to the perceived age and prestige of the Rana
dynasty.
The same holds for approximately 40 neoclassical Rana palaces in
the Kathmandu Valley most of which were built at the beginning
of the twentieth century—which is considerably later than most of
even the colonial architecture in India with which they are compared
today.26
Negotiating Ways of Distinction Cross-Culturally

Applying two very different sets of distinction between the estab-
lished Shah dynasty—ruling by divine grace and the emerging Rana
dynasty—accumulating power and ruling through outside recogni-
tion, was as demonstrated not a straight forward practice but a matter
of performance and negotiation skills.
Taste as a classical Western form of class distinction was also
employed amongst the Rana of the second generation. Michael
Peissel, who visited Nepal during Chandra S. J. B. Rana’s regency
(1901–1929), was probably the first to report that some of the Ranas
despite their caste prohibition toward alcohol were connoisseurs of
good wine—a marker of Western distinction but an unthinkable
way of distinction for an orthodox high-caste Hindu who should
not drink at all. Peissel (1966, 59, 60) wrote about Keshar S. J.
B. Rana:
[He] was every bit the image of a slightly Oriental Voltaire, but he
possessed the shrewdness of a Talleyrand allied to the intelligence and
culture of a French academician . . . The Field Marshal’s passion for
knowledge was equalled only by his love of refinement. A gourmet, he
had one of the best wine cellars in Asia. His taste for beautiful women
and fine food was as famous as his political and diplomatic ability.
Living with two sets of customs, the Ranas had to negotiate and,
with increasing foreign visitors, find compromises in protocol when
they wanted to socialize with foreign friends. When in the later years
of the Rana regime a banquet for a mixed audience was held, they
found a convenient way to do so without openly disrespecting caste
purity. The long table of the banquet would for example be composed
of several tables with slight gaps between, formally separating guests
and hosts according to their caste.27
Keshar S. J. B. Rana too received an inventive press coverage when
sent to discuss military matters in India, England, and the United
States in July 1939. With the now established image of an Oriental
prince it was apparently impossible to write about the Ranas without
emphasizing their high caste status. Charles Graves wrote:
It was off Jermyn-street that I encountered his Excellency Commanding

General Sir Kaiser Shumshere Jung Bahadur, who represented Nepal
at the Coronation two years ago. When he left, on that occasion, I
understood that he was of such high caste that he could never return
to this country; but the medicos in Kathmandu recently gave such
88 STEFANIE LOTTER
alarming report of his health that a special dispensation was granted

by the Maharaja to enable him to cross the “Black Water” for treat-
ment incognito. (Times, July 24, 1939)
The British Press was obviously keen to hold on to the image of the
exotic Oriental prince and the Rana of the twentieth century seemed
happy to play along, although the times had changed since Jung
Bahadur’s first visit in 1850.
The Decline of the Rana

For the duration of their role as prime ministers of Nepal, the Ranas
built and then retained their social high class and high caste posi-
tion. Although it provided stability, the system of fraternal suc-
cession also produced much conflict amongst competing young
officers. With the autocratic power of the prime minister Chandra
S. J. B. Rana and then Juddha S. J. B. Rana introduced a system of
distinction within the ever growing Rana clan. This did not solve
all conflicts over the role of succession but limited bloodshed. With
a quickly growing clan due to the many polygamous marriages of
the Rana patriarchs the Rana were able to fill all important admin-
istrative positions in the country and staff the upper ranks of the
military. However, as a result of the repressive role of succession
that did not allow excellence to advance faster through the ranks,
conflict was inbuilt into the system.
In 1951 King Tribhuvan, whose position had been kept solely rep-
resentational by the Ranas, sided with the political opposition to the
ruling Ranas that had formed underground in India, despite a ban
of political parties. Amongst the opposition were also several capable
young Rana officers who according to the established rule of succes-
sion would not have stood a chance to ever gain a noticeable adminis-
trative position.
As a consequence of the political unrest in 1950–1951 and the
mounting international pressure for a democratic solution, the Ranas
were forced to hand over power to the political parties and the king.
The bloodless revolution on a personal level meant that many Rana
families now had to vacate their palaces, as they were turned into
ministries and government offices. But few left the country to live in
India or the UK and most simply continued to live in Nepal as wealthy
but now less powerful elites. Very few Ranas went into party politics
and although some invested their wealth wisely, now holding some of
the largest companies of the country, most gradually declined. Living
off the land and paying tax they were unable to keep up the lavish
lifestyle of former generations. Within half a century their attitude
became less courtly and their styles and tastes less distinct.
The fact that the Shah Kings continued to intermarry with the
wealthy side of the Rana clan is an indication for their once well-
crafted elite status. Now that both clans are without state powers their
ties will probably remain strong. Amongst themselves the changes
within the society around them will not be as pronounced.
Conclusion
The Shah dynasty set the standard for a religiously legitimated roy-
alty who defied competition to their rule through a well-established
legend and accepted divine grace. The deconstruction of this concept
of kingship in the new era of Nepal revealed how kingship and state
had been conceptually fused in the two bodies of the king. Nepal
had to become a secular state to undo the institution of the Hindu
monarchy in the Hindu kingdom and to conceptually undo the body
politic of the monarch whose religious significance lingered in the
Hindu rituals protecting the state of Nepal. The Shah dynasty was
able to withstand severe crisis—including the 104-year-long compe-
tition of the Rana regime. Only the deconstruction of its religious
base and the performed reduction of the king to an ordinary citizen
without ritual powers allowed for the decline of the Shah dynasty.
Comparing this static religious elite foundation with the dynamic
approach the Rana dynasty took highlights the creative inventiveness
of the latter.
The Rana of Nepal in their quest for power played two systems
of distinction—the Western and the Nepalese—against each other.
They struck a fine balance between altering local rules and tradi-
tions almost unnoticed and making their international recognition
widely known. What makes the earlier creation of the Rana elite and
their cross-cultural application of distinctions so instructive is the
condensation of elite formation into a relatively short time span. The
self-enforced isolation of Nepal furthermore creates a unique envi-
ronment almost resembling a laboratory experiment in which the
Ranas write the rules and in which their successes and failings high-
light the underlying mechanisms very vividly. They used the trans-
national display of status and of symbols of distinction across two
separate cultural systems to utilize these in turn as stepping stones for
their status rise. In the times of Jung Bahadur they were in effect the
only translators between the two worlds and could exaggerate and
90 STEFANIE LOTTER
embellish almost at will. In later days they found themselves increas-

ingly scrutinized in these practices but by then their status was no
longer disputed. They had gained political military and economic
power in Nepal and had been perceived as cultured and distinguished
as well as men of high caste.
In their decline it seems the Ranas and the Shahs are not entirely
dissimilar. International support for the Ranas dwindled when their
repressive rule in 1951 lost its international backing after India’s inde-
pendence. The twenty-first century did no longer provide for a Shah
king who under pressure did not trust the democratic process but
opted for direct rule under the laws of the state of emergency. With
many urgent social problems to solve one would hope that the new
political system will be strong enough to withstand any attempt to
return to repressive rule. Members of both dynasties continue to hold
considerable economic powers in Nepal and individual members of
the Rana family are in high ranking positions in the military and the
diplomatic corps. The social decline of Rana and the Shah and their
current status as ordinary citizens within the Republic of Nepal is
however undisputable. The impression of a Nepalese upper caste and
class that matters beyond private family gatherings dwindles.
Notes
1. See “Nepal to save royal massacre home,” BBC News, July 23, 2009
(http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/8164597.stm),
and “Nepal’s cursed palace opens its doors,” Guardian, May 27, 2009
(http://www.guardian.co.uk/travel/2009/may/26/nepal-royal
-palace-museum).
2. On June 1, 2001, Crown Prince Dipendra murdered most of the
royal family, including his parents, siblings, and probably himself.
His uncle Gyanendra became king. The murder took place in the
Royal Palace, where to date marks of the shooting are visible.
3. K. M. Himal Dixit (2008), ”Fallen Majesty,” (http://www.himal-
mag.com/component/content/article/69/1025-fallen-majesty.
html).
4. “Last king attends prayer to restore Nepal as a Hindu State,” Indian,
March 8, 2010 (http://www.thaindian.com/newsportal/politics/la
st-king-attends-prayers-to-restore-nepal-as-hindu-state_100331626.
html).
5. “Nepal king target of stone-pelting mob,” Times of India, February 17,
2007 (http://articles.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/2007–02–17/
rest-of-world/27877710_1_pashupatinath-temple-king-gyanendr
a-mob).
6. “The death of Vishnu,” Times, June 11, 2001 (http://www.time.

com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1000067,00.html).
7. “Nepal government stops ex-king from religious programme,” India
Talkies, September 21, 2010 (http://www.indiatalkies.com/2010/09
/nepal-government-stops-exking-religious-programme.html).
8. “Last Nepal King breaks ancient taboo,” Hindu, February 9, 2010
(http://www.thehindu.com/life-and-style/religion/article103720.
ece).
9. See Totman (1966).
10. See, for example, Nina Bhatt (2003), “Kings as wardens and wardens
as kings: Post-Rana ties between Nepali royalty and National Park
staff,” Conservation and Society 1 (2): 247–268.
11. See the publications of the Rana family, such as Pancayan (1999) and
P. Rana, P. Rana, and G. Rana (2003).
12. Edwards (1975, 102) counts in 1843 amongst the 55 pagadi officials
of the Nepalese court 15 Pandey, 14 Shah, 12 Basniat, and 12 Thapa
but only 2 Kunwar.
13. Declared diplomatic aim of the first Nepalese mission to London was
the negotiation of an extended extradition arrangement, to employ
British engineers in Nepal, and to gain the permission to directly
correspond with the board of directors of the East India Company
and the Queen without previously consulting the governor-general.
None of the above requests was granted (Fisher 2004, 292).
14. The Ranas retained this practice into the twentieth century. In 1934
Reuters wrote that the Nepalese minister in London had lunch with
the king of Italy. Within two days Nepalese Minister Bahadur S.
J. B. Rana complained and Reuters gave out an official correction
printed in several newspapers such as the Statesman (August 20,
1934): The members of the mission preserved their religious custom
of refraining from taking meals with persons outside their commu-
nity and the King of Italy and the Italian Government, who were
well aware of this custom, refrained from extending any invitation to
luncheons or any other meals.
15. See for translation and interpretation Höfer (1979).
16. Interviews with J. R. L. Rana, S. Rana, and others.
17. The Ranas reserved the monopoly on Western commodities such as
motorized vehicles and European dress code (Leuchtag 1996, 63).
Commoners were also not allowed to build any house taller than the
Ranas’ house (Mr. Regmi for Kupendol/Patan, personal communi-
cation).
18. Liechty (1997, 60) writes: In a sense power is justified in an increas-
ingly material (materialistic) manner, and relatively less in moral,
genealogical, or divine terms. In the nineteenth century we see power
shift from the hands of the Shah kings—who were (are) worshipped
as incarnations of Vishnu—to those of the anglophilic Jang Bahadur
92 STEFANIE LOTTER
and his descendants who construct their authority increasingly in

secular, material, highly visual terms.
19. As shown previously (Lotter 2006), this did not mean that the Ranas
were at large agnostic. Divine support played a major role in the belief
of many Ranas, though this was a matter negotiated at the clan tem-
ple of the Kunwar-Ranaji.
20. King Edward VII visited in 1876, King George V in 1911, the Prince
of Wales and Lord Mountbatten in 1921, and Queen Elizabeth II
with Prince Phillip in 1961.
21. In 1854 Jung Bahadur’s son Jagat Jang had married Princess Tika,
followed a year later by Jung Bahadur’s second son marrying the sec-
ond daughter of the king. In 1857, the year Jung Bahadur had retired
but later returned to office, the most important marriage was formed.
Crown prince Trailokya married Tara, daughter of Jung Bahadur,
followed three years later by her sister Lalit, later the mother of King
Prithvi Bir Bikram Shah.
22. Chetri clans in Nepal belong to one of many different gotras (exoga-
mous kinship units) that traces the origin of a clan to a prehistoric
hero (Slusser 1998 [1982], 58, n42). The Kunwar and the Rana are
no exception to this, belonging to the sri badsa gotra.
23. At times these experienced administrators were paired with very
young kings whom they guided, which shifted power further toward
the Rana clan (e.g., Prithvi was six-years old when he became king in
1881 and Tribhuvan only five years when he became king in 1911).
24. First generation of Rana Prime Ministers comprised Jung Bahadur
Kunwar/Rana reigned from September 15, 1846 until August 01,
1856, followed by his brothers Bam Bahadur Rana, May 25, 1857,
and Krishna Bahadur, July 28, 1856; and succeeded again by Jung
Bahadur Rana, February 25, 1877, and his brother Ranoudip Singh,
November 22, 1885. The second generation comprised Bir S. J.
B. Rana who ruled until March 05, 1901, Dev S. J. B. Rana until
June 27, 1901, Chandra S. J. B. until November 26, 1929, Bhim S. J.
B. Rana until September 01, 1932, and Juddha S. J. B. Rana until
November 29, 1945. The last and third generation comprised Padma
S. J. B. Rana, who ruled until April 30, 1948, and Mohan S. J. B.
Rana, with whom the Rana regime ended on November 12, 1951.
25. The picture of Chandra shows him with the Order of Bath. In
eighteenth-century England members of the Order of the Bath dressed
up, especially to sit for painted portraits, in seventeenth-century cos-
tumes (see for example Nicolas [1842], vol. III, picture of Prince
Albert wearing the robes of the Order). As a member of the Knight
Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath, Chandra apparently only fol-
lowed this established tradition.
26. Speeding up historical time is also part of the narrative practice of
Rana self-representation. Some members of the Rana family refer to
the nineteenth century when speaking of the Rana period, putting a
century distance between the rule and themselves. Strictly speaking

this gives a further 50 years of age to the Ranas, as their rule lasted
from 1846 to 1951. See for example the self-representation at Baber
Mahal revisited.
27. Information of D. Rana, referring to the palace of Baber Mahal.
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[Accessed October 5, 2008].
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CH A P T ER 4
Beyond Wealth and Pleasant Posture:

Exploring Elite Competition in the
Patronage Democracy of Indonesia
Deasy Simandjuntak
Introduction
Sharing similar characteristics with many countries in transition
toward democracy, the Indonesian state has been portrayed as one in
which personalized governmental power exists in combination with
persistent elite factionalism, competition, and power struggle.
The new democratization process in Indonesia that began in 1999 did
not altogether eradicate the deeply entrenched patron-client networks
characterizing its politics; on the contrary, the new democracy seemed
to be supported by these dyadic relations. This was evident in the case of
local direct elections, which were initiated in 2005, during which for the
first time, Indonesians could directly vote for district heads. During the
preceding era of autocracy, district heads were assigned by the president
and supported by local parliaments, whose majority belonged to the
political party of the president. In 2005, as local people were given free-
dom to vote for preferred district leaders, many hoped that this could
be the initial step toward substantial democracy that prioritizes the
needs and interests of the people. Nevertheless, the new local elections
inflamed competition among elites in the regions to secure the district
head positions by exploiting money-politics; ethno-religious identities;
and elite symbolic power, such as wealth and charisma.
This chapter explores elite competition in Indonesia by elaborating
the functions of various behavioral and symbolic attributes attached
96 DEASY SIMANDJUNTAK
to the members of the elites. During elections, the elites used these
attributes to secure their power interest. To limit the scope of analysis,
this chapter focuses on the observation on higher-ranking officials in
the district governments in Indonesia, or those who aspire to achieve
the district head positions.
Members of the elites are distinguishable from the masses by their
wealth as well as their luxurious possessions and lifestyle, which is
also the case in Indonesia. In addition to these visible attributes, dis-
tinction may also be embodied. In the case study presented later in
the chapter, the wealth, image, and bodily posture of a candidate
were crucial in shaping peoples’ opinion of his characters. I therefore
argue that the signs of superiority, both in the forms of wealth and
embodied qualities, function to assist elites to further political inter-
ests. This is especially true in societies in which patron-client relations
are significant.
Also central in the discussion about the electoral campaign is the
development in the relations between elite patrons and common
people or clients. The 2005 Indonesian local election seemed to
have given the capacity to common people to choose which patrons
were suitable for them. Common people were finally able to choose
which elite characteristics were attractive and relevant to their needs.
Although the preferences of common people are influenced by the
cultural context and pragmatic needs, more importantly, these prefer-
ences contribute to the constant redefinition of the relations between
elite and common people.
To better understand the relations between elite and common people
in Indonesia, the chapter begins with an overview of the history of elite
in Indonesia and a note on patronage system with an emphasis on the
conducts of state officials. The case study on North Sumatra’s open rally
is presented as an example in which the interaction of elite patrons and
common people portrays a structure of patron-client relations. This case
is then explained in the discussion on the role of elite signs of superiority
and its relations to the structure of clientelism that exist in Indonesian
democracy. This discussion consequently sheds a light on the new devel-
opments in Indonesian local politics in which the preferences of com-
mon people clearly influence the behavior of elite members.
A Historical Note on the Indonesian Elite

The emergence of elite in Indonesia was influenced by the central
role played by the colonial state in the formation of social strata in
the society.
BEYOND WEALTH AND PLEASANT POSTURE 97
Colonial Java, for example, recognized a hierarchy linked to stan-

dards of cultural refinement, codifying sets of ethics, aesthetics, and
cultural values (Brenner 1998, 58). The concept of “refinement” is
observable through the dichotomization of alus and kasar qualities
(C. Geertz 1960; Brenner 1998). Alus refers to refined and civilized
that are considered the qualities of a higher class, such as desirable
grace and the usage of upper registers of language. Its ultimate repre-
sentation is found in the Javanese aristocracy. On the contrary, kasar
embodies unrefined, uncivilized, crude, and coarse qualities that
are associated with the lower classes and the poor. Farmers or vil-
lagers generally were considered as personifying kasar. Nevertheless,
although alus derives from the aristocracy class, Javanese ideology
expects every person, regardless of their background, to attempt to
achieve these qualities. Using these relative standards of refinement,
Javanese evaluate various dimensions of people’s characters, such
as command of language, types of occupation, behavior and back-
ground, or expression of art.
The Javanese elite are called priyayi. A traditional priyayi con-
sisted of nobility, as well as others who worked for the palaces and
the colonial government. Later on the term also included the people
considered well-born and having an understanding of refinement,
embodying alus qualities. These people might have white-collar occu-
pations or were considered elite professionals, such as doctors, teach-
ers, or administrators. Being wealthy was an expected attribute of
the members of the priyayi, although they should not demonstrate
an active pursuit of money (Anderson 1990). Wealth as well as other
symbols of superiority, such as having many followers, wives, or—in
the case of a ruler—having a large population, was considered a con-
sequence of power. Wealth was thus not a means to acquire power,
yet a result of it.
The general public’s acceptance of the priyayi as the guardians of
desirable qualities and refinement led to common people’s deference
and obedience to the priyayi class. This in turn led the Dutch, whose
sole interest was to safeguard the colonial order, to endorse the ele-
vated status of priyayi in Javanese society. In addition, the colonial
authority, in need of an educated and generally compliant class of
administrators, continued to employ priyayi in the government and
generally support the priyayi’s lifestyle and tradition.
Access to Western education that had been confined to the sons of
aristocrats was, however, opened up also to the children of well-to-do
parents.1 The aim was to generate limited Western-educated elite that
could be employed in administrative positions in the civil service.
Nevertheless, students studying law, medicine, and engineering in

the Netherlands soon encountered liberal values that made them
more conscious of the nature of colonial rule and its maintenance of
the structures of inequality between the rulers and the ruled.
Soon after Indonesian independence in the end of 1940s,
Dutch-educated young intellectuals shaped the new indigenous
nationalist government. They replaced both the obedience to colonial
authority and the deference to the traditional powers of the aristoc-
racy with a democratic and republican ideology. Yet, partly as a result
of the pervasive corruption within the civil service, the economy did
not experience significant improvement. The society continued to suf-
fer from inequality, generating further polarization between the rich
families and the poor masses.
Rich families continued to distinguish themselves from com-
mon people by adopting Western lifestyles, wearing Western clothes,
and speaking in foreign languages, mostly Dutch and English
(Selosoemardjan 1962, cited in Gerke 2000, 140). Some of them
became active in politics, whereas some others were established as
civil servants. Those who became civil servants copied the ideology
of the traditional Javanese aristocracy. This perpetuated the hierar-
chy of desirable qualities and blind deference, attributed now to the
relations between the higher-ranking bureaucrats and their inferior
counterparts.
The situation did not alter significantly after the violent regime
change in 1966. Politically, Indonesia saw an intensification of author-
itarianism during the three decades of Soeharto’s rule. Structurally,
the bureaucracy was expanded to accommodate a vast array of civil
service members. This in turn raised aspirations for upward social
mobility, gradually linked to the access to fixed salary, a capacity to
consume imported goods, and a lifestyle that accommodated leisure
(Gerke 2000, 142).
Hildred Geertz, one of the first observers of the Indonesian urban
rich in the 1950s, noted that they possessed symbols that were also
relevant to Indonesian contemporary elite: “. . . the acquisition of
higher education, facility with foreign languages, travel experience
abroad, and Western luxury goods such as automobiles” (H. Geertz
1963, 35).
Howard Dick (1985) dubbed the new elites as “urban middle class.”
He observed that among the most significant characteristics of this
class was the display of their material aspirations, leading to conspicu-
ous consumption, emphasizing the preference of privatized possession,
which contrasted with the old, communal way of living attributed
to common people in the kampung (village). (Cf. also Van Leeuwen

[2005]).
Elite-Common People Relations

in a Patronage System
Patron-client relationships are legitimated by traditional conceptions
of personalized power and by a system of political deference embod-
ied in religious and cultural values. Traditional patrimonial leaders
supply security and protection that is remunerated by the followers’
passive loyalty. More contemporary neo-patrimonial systems oblige
leaders to distribute material resources while the followers react with
providing active political support (Clapham 1982 and 1985). Thus a
patrimonial state consists of networks of patron-client relationships
sustained and legitimated by appeals to tradition and culture.
Indonesia’s politics is marked by pervasive patron-client relation-
ships. David Brown’s work (1994) on Indonesian patrimonialism
shows that patron-client relations were described as a result of three
dimensions in the society: the salience of a traditional conceptualiza-
tion of power as manifested in precolonial Javanese aristocracies, the
continued importance of patron-client linkages as a basis for social
relationships, and the continued prevalence of a culture of deference.
Elite rivalries are intensified during succession, or elections, since
contemporary patrimonialism lacks the legitimate succession mecha-
nism previously provided by hereditary monarchy.
When an electoral system is introduced, political support in the
form of the ballot becomes the currency of patron-client transac-
tions. This happened during Indonesia’s local direction that began in
2005. Upon receiving support, the patron (district head) is expected
to mediate between his clients (supporters) and the state, obtaining
for them jobs, licenses, welfare payments, other material benefits, and
providing protection. Not to be mistaken as policies, the services pro-
vided by patron are merely favors designed to benefit only a certain
group.
During the elections of leaders in a patronage system, wealth is
used both to procure votes and as a symbol for power. In Indonesia,
candidates, using campaign teams, distribute gifts to their potential
voters to entice sympathy, which would hopefully turn into votes on
the election. However, followers prefer leaders who are able to show
evidence of their possession of wealth. In the villages during the cam-
paign period, campaign teams2 can be observed grooming sympathies
from potential voters by distributing banknotes and various gifts,
such as fertilizers or seeds to the farmers. Money-politics, thus, touch

the basis of patronage politics: gift-giving in exchange for political
loyalty.3 The display of wealth was also aimed at assuring potential
voters of each candidate’s power that would in turn be a guarantee of
the patron’s capacity to supply and satisfy his/her dependents (Daloz
2003, 48).
New democracies tend to suffer from patterns of patron-client rela-
tions that continue to undermine efforts of democratization and the
establishment of good governance. Dubbed in various terms such as
“patronage democracy” (Chandra 2004; Simandjuntak 2010), “hybrid
regime” (Diamond 2002), “low-quality democracy” (van Klinken
2009), or a mix of the above concepts (Buente and Ufen 2009), the
condition in which electoral democracy is sustained by patron-client
networks is seen as the primary cause of the preservation of forms
of constitutional democracy in third world politics. According to
Kanchan Chandra (2004), patronage democracy happens when “the
state has a monopoly on jobs and services, and in which elected offi-
cials enjoy significant discretion in the implementation of laws allo-
cating the jobs and services at the disposal of the state.” Essential in
a patronage democracy are middle- and upper-rank civil servants and
business entrepreneurs whose coalition is enabled by the accommo-
dation of multiple centers of power advocated by the logic of liberal
democracy.
The present system in Indonesia perpetuates an entrenched
social hierarchy and the privilege of governmental official posi-
tions. Common people perceive jobs in the bureaucracy as luxuri-
ous. Patron-client relations in the government, therefore, begin when
common people aspiring to be civil servants are forced to seek out
insiders or middle-rank officers who would endorse their applica-
tion, more often in return for a lofty fee. People are aware of the
pervasive culture of bribery in the bureaucracy. It is precisely due to
the aspiration to benefit from this culture of corruption that many
endeavor to work for the state. This culture is no petty theft: money
gained through bribery can sometimes be five times more than their
monthly salary.
The rationale behind Indonesia’s decentralization that began in
1999 is to ensure that the local people participate in the political
process in their own regions as well as to make sure that the new lead-
ers are accountable to their constituents. With this democratization,
provincial and district administrations could conduct their own local
elections to choose district leaders and members of local parliaments.
However, the local elites vying to secure leadership positions in the
local government still utilized money-politics to gain support from

their clients. Who are these elites and how do they benefit from new
local autonomy?
As elaborated in the previous section, during the colonial period,
the Dutch used ethnic nobilities to control the ordinary people. In
the postcolonial period beginning in 1945, under centralized nation-
alist governments, these nobilities joined major political parties under
the authoritarian regimes. The most prominent party in the authori-
tarian era, Golkar, which managed to secure majority for more than
three decades, was a large pool of prominent individuals with power
interest and connections to the central state’s decision-makers. These
elite groups became the intermediate class who brokered between the
authoritarian central state and the resource-laden regions. They were
distinguished from the masses due to their education and wealth.
When the authoritarian era ended and regional autonomy was intro-
duced in 1999, the central state’s control over the affairs of the regions
was significantly reduced because local governments could make their
own policies. Many of the people who used to broker between the
central state and the regions readapted and found an opportunity to
gain political power in the regions by running for the leadership posi-
tions in the district or as local parliament members.
In the beginning of the decentralization process, political par-
ties could largely benefit from the local elections of district heads.
Regulated by Law No.32/2004 on local governments, aspiring elites
had to seek official endorsement from local branches of political par-
ties before they could be considered as candidates for district heads.
Each political party was allowed to endorse one pair of district lead-
ers, consisting of a candidate district head and a vice district head. In
practice, the regulation opened the door for money-politics between
the aspiring individuals and the leadership of parties at the local and
the national levels, in the form of application fee, which had to be
paid by the former to the latter to ensure the endorsement by the lat-
ter for the former’s candidacy.
In addition to this fee, if there was more than one pair of aspiring
candidates who sought endorsement from one particular party, then
they would have to compete for this endorsement by bribing the right
leaders to ensure the support of a majority of party members. The sum
of the application fee itself was not trivial: an elite individual aspiring to
be a candidate in Karo district, North Sumatra, claimed to have paid
100 million rupiahs (around 8,300 euro) in 2005 for an official party
endorsement, yet was rejected in the end. He alleged that this was due
to his refusal to bribe leaders in different stages of party processes.4
To avoid this corrupt practice between parties and aspiring elites,

the government passed a new Law No. 12 about local government
in 2008. Under the new law, aspiring individuals may choose to run
as independent candidates and do not need the support of political
parties. Yet this law does not necessarily erase money-politics during
the campaign.
One of the examples of money-politics was in the activity of cam-
paign teams. As elaborated earlier, each candidate had a campaign team
whose task was to continuously entice potential voters, often by giving
gifts to them. In one meeting of a campaign team in the district of
Toba Samosir in North Sumatra, for example, I saw that each team
member was assigned a particular village to influence. They were given
money by the head of the team in order to finance various informal
campaigns, for example, buying rounds in the coffee houses, giving
fertilizers to farmers, or simply distributing banknotes to villagers. The
money was also used to finance the travel expenses of friends and fam-
ily members who resided elsewhere but were still registered as residents
of the said district. Some campaign team members promised to sum-
mon their families to come home to vote for a particular candidate.
Nevertheless, although elite patrons may use various strategies
to realize their power interest, clients are by no means helpless. In
patronage democracies, due to the mechanism of election, clients are
enabled to designate which patron they would confer their allegiance
to. Whereas some would demand financial or other remuneration for
their political support, others would confer their allegiance to the
patrons that were considered as fulfilling specific forms of elite social
capital (Simandjuntak 2010). These forms of capital differed from one
context to another, pertaining to the traditions and culture of the
areas in which the elections were held. For the case of North Sumatra,
especially for the Batak ethnic group, there are basic requirements for
a member of the elite. First, an elite person must have a considerable
wealth (hamoraon). This wealth has to be displayed and distributed,
because a good leader is one who shares his wealth with his people.
A thrifty person would not be considered as superior as thriftiness is
seen as a bad manner. Second, an elite person has the signs of suc-
cess (hagabeon). Traditionally, the signs of success were connected
to having male heirs. In the past, kings who did not have a male
heir were considered unfortunate because power would be taken away
from his family line. Nowadays, the signs of success are seen from
the achievements in one’s career, the connection one has with other
elite individuals, as well as one’s ability to maintain a harmonious
family life. Lastly, an elite person has to attain glory (hasangapon). In
contemporary Batak, glory encompasses untarnished reputation and

ability to generate respect from his followers.
Open Rally: Celebrating Wealth

and Pleasant Postures
A curious excitement adorned the chilly air of Brastagi, a small town
in North Sumatra. Pak Sitepu,5 a medium-rank civil servant, was
hurriedly buttoning up his good shirt in front of the mirror. Down
on the street, strange noises were heard. A combination of machines
and horns of buses, people cheering, a man’s shouting summons over
a large, mobile microphone, and a maddening blare of traditional
dance music from car stereos seemed to agitate the otherwise calm
Brastagi morning. The open election rally of candidate district head
Sinulingga had just begun.
Pak Sitepu and I dashed outside and submerged ourselves into the
sea of people chanting support and shouting anticorruption slogans
that had become characteristic of this particular candidate. Many
believed he was an honest man. Moving gradually together toward a
large open field, the group was soon greeted by others coming from
different corners of the town. Sinulingga was one of the six candi-
dates running for the position of district head in Karo in 2005. This
was the first year that people could participate in local elections for
district heads and mayors.
After waiting for around ten minutes, the crowd finally caught a
glimpse of their beloved candidate. The rally ground instantly turned
into something like a rock concert as Sinulingga went up the stage.
Cheers and claps filled the air and could only be subdued when he
made a calm-down gesture with his hand. He then addressed his sup-
porters with a salute in the Karo language. This was followed by a
brief speech emphasizing that the district needed a leader who was
firm and clean. Using various rhetorical figures of good governance,
such as the eradication of poverty and corruption, Sinulingga, a retired
army colonel, added that if he became the district head he would
“bring back discipline, ensure safety and control on the streets.” This
was followed by a long applause and cheers.
Wearing a light brown safari suit,6 Sinulingga, standing taller than
many of his entourage on the stage, seemed to be in control of his
supporters. They cheered and clapped in rhythm to the intonation of
his speech. His military background was emphasized when he sang a
patriotic song in memory of the struggle of the Karo people against the
colonial power.
Outside the campaign venue, Pak Sitepu was chatting with people.
I recognized some as church dignitaries. They said they came because
they were curious, although the church itself was politically nonpar-
tial. A farmer who joined our conversation said that he was attracted
by Sinulingga’s slogan of cleanliness. He remarked, “We can evaluate a
person’s word by looking at his appearance.” He glanced at Sinulingga,
now waving and singing on the stage, and commented, “Look at him.
His clothes are neat and tidy. He has charisma and many followers. He
is respected, yet still cares to come on time, it means he respects us. I
bet his family is also clean.” Others nodded and added how they need
a clean leader. It was now clear that they made a connection between
Sinulingga’s neat, solid, clean appearance to his rhetoric on clean gov-
ernance and his plans to eradicate corruption. Another person clearly
remarked, “We believe that he is a trustworthy person because he looks
trustworthy. We need a person like him to protect us, to bring safety and
stability in this district, to clean the government, and provide jobs!”
A younger crowd next to a food stall eagerly waved their unworn
campaign T-shirts. They maintained that they would vote for a leader
who appeared firm so that he could bring discipline and safety back.
A college student among them added, “The most important is his
wibawa [charisma] of course. If a man has a leader’s charisma, then
that would already be something.”
I was inclined to conclude that people were really looking for a
leader who could portray righteousness, honesty, and firm charac-
ter, when my attendance to an open rally of candidate Kaban chal-
lenged this premature conclusion. This candidate was supported by
Golkar, the ruling party during the authoritarian era. He was also
a church elder. Yet most people would recognize him as owner of
a hotel and property businesses. Not a few mockingly remarked on
alleged prostitution, which they believed that he condoned in some of
his smaller motels. Nevertheless, his open rallies were almost always
well-attended. People were seen wearing his campaign T-shirts and
chanting their support quite enthusiastically. One of his supporters
hoped that he would win so that he could bring more business to the
district. “So my friends and I can get a job,” he added. Later that day
I saw some people loiter around the parking lot of one of his hotels
in Brastagi, which during the campaign period became his campaign
team’s headquarter. Apparently they heard that the team would dis-
tribute travel money for supporters who came from neighboring vil-
lages. In reality, the sum of money paid to the supporters was more
than the price of the bus ticket or gas; therefore more people were
attracted to queue up for a bit of the free money.
Indeed, money seemed to be the ultimate topic of gossip in

almost every corner of the town during the election. Travel money
became a familiar buzzword. Many made the amount of travel
money a decisive factor on whether or not to attend an open rally.
Each candidate’s presumed wealth and attitude toward money dis-
tribution adorned banters in all places, from coffee-houses to prayer
gatherings. Yet not everyone was pleased. One small political party
boss honestly admitted that his party had simply been bought. He
said that a candidate had paid for his party’s official endorsement
and that the candidate did not really care about the party’s ideologi-
cal platform. However, this did not bother him as much as the fact
that the entrance fee by which the candidate bought the endorse-
ment was entirely sent to the party’s central leadership in Jakarta.
“Jakarta gets the money. We’re just signing formalities here,” he
said mournfully.
A New Democracy?
The district head direct elections in North Sumatra indicated the
following features. First, whereas the notion of the state was abstract
during the authoritarian era, the new, direct elections allowed a per-
sonalization of it in the qualities of a candidate. By directly voting
for a known candidate for a district head, the local state was concret-
ized in living individuals and made visible to voters. Consequently,
the common people as voters had the opportunity to scrutinize the
qualities of these candidates based on social capitals that were con-
sidered relevant. For example, voters in Karo scrutinized whether
a candidate had a favorable reputation and a military background,
which connoted discipline. The direct election marked a milestone
in which constituents’ opinions are decisive in determining who will
be their leaders and influencing the course of local politics.
During the authoritarian era, owing to the centralized access to
power and resources, elites in the regions did not need to appeal to
the preference of their clients to gain political influence. They just
had to groom good relations with the central state’s policy makers.
Those who could maintain good relations with the center would
eventually gain political power in the regions. With the new local
election, this situation is changed. The power struggle, although still
manifest between local elites, is no longer aimed at winning solely
the sympathy of the central state’s policy makers, but also at mobiliz-
ing supporters from common people in the regions. Clients, then,
have become voters whose opinions influence the result of the power
struggle among their patrons. Clients’ preference on elite social capi-

tals is therefore crucial for the patrons.
Benefitting from the democracy euphoria already widespread in
the regions, the elites tried to use as much good rhetoric during their
campaign. Promises to eradicate corruption in the government, to
alleviate poverty, and to create more jobs seem to adorn campaign
platforms and speeches everywhere. Elites who used to not care about
the condition of the small farms and plantations, for example, now
created plans for better agricultural policies. Elites who had not paid
attention to jobless young people, now came up with various employ-
ment schemes and promises to bring more businesses to the district.
Elites who used to not care about what people think of their reputa-
tion now tried to portray how clean and dependable they were. The
effort to win the sympathy of the potential followers also varied based
on the preference of the latter. Sometimes the elites would appear
strong and righteous for followers who prefer their elites as firm and
disciplined; at other times the elites would hold extravagant rallies to
appeal to their followers who like their elites to appear wealthy and
generous.
On first glance, the local elections seem to fit with the logic of
good governance: the population determines their leader. Yet, making
popular preference an indicator of effective governance is not without
problems. Common people have always been distant from the state,
and government offices have always been seen as the place where the
privileged ones make a living. Civil servants are known to earn a con-
siderable sum from corruption. It is well known that civil servants at
various levels maintain unofficial networks of groups and cliques that
frequently maintain corrupt practices. Corruption is understood by
civil servants and many people outside of the bureaucracy as a benefit
of the job. The local election for district head, therefore, was partly
understood as a competition among the privileged elites to gain a
position that would allow them to follow corrupt practices to create
wealth for themselves and their followers. This explains how common
people can condone corruption during the campaigns, because they
also expect to benefit from it. Moreover, since the position of district
head is up for grabs in the competition, it also becomes a currency in
the personalistic exchange between the elite candidates and the vot-
ers. In turn, it explains why voters expect to receive remuneration for
their votes, mostly in the form of money and other gifts. The question
therefore remains: can we still treat an election, which is understood
by the constituents and politicians as a space in which personalistic
patron-client exchanges occur, as an indicator of democracy?
Money-politics, which constitute the second feature of the new

local politics, portrays gift-giving in exchange for political loyalty.
The distribution of banknotes among followers assured clients that
their patrons would attend to their needs. Money-politics manifested
in various stages of the election. In 2005, candidates of district head
had to be endorsed by a political party (or a coalition of political par-
ties) in possession of 15 seats in the district parliament. Benefitted
by this regulation, political parties regulated an application fee for
aspiring candidates seeking their endorsement. This gave birth to the
“political boat”: political parties functioned as a hired vessel to bring
aspiring candidates toward an election. The congruence of ideals
between the aspiring candidate and the political party mattered less
than the material benefits that the former could provide for the lat-
ter. In this system, the local branch of a political party would be the
official supporter for a candidate, yet the central leadership had the
power to approve of the candidate and collect the fee. The expense
outlaid would be an incentive for corrupt practices upon the candi-
date’s gaining office.
Employing Signs of Superiority

in a Patronage Society
The case of North Sumatra also illustrates the importance of signs of
superiority, in the form of wealth and physical appearance, in attract-
ing followers’ support during the campaign. Everywhere in this case
an elite individual was distinguished as somebody who was wealthy,
but did not refrain from generously distributing his money to his
supporters, and charismatic, which was judged by the way he looked
and spoke.
Jean-Pascal Daloz has elaborated on three strategies employed
by the elite to signal their prominent position in the society (Daloz
2010). They include the external signs of superiority, the embodied
signs of superiority, and vicarious display. The external signs of supe-
riority include elements of social eminence, such as attire, residence,
and vehicles. Their superior quality transcends their intrinsic purpose
into defining elites’ social status. In other words, these goods help
to maintain membership in the elite group. In countries in which
patron-client relations are rampant, the display of wealth is aimed at
safeguarding political power of the owner, such as in the case of big
men in sub-Saharan Africa (Daloz 2003). A display of wealth by an
elite patron is aimed at convincing potential followers of his capacity
to provide for his clients. This was also the case in Indonesia, where
wealthy candidates were supported solely on the assumption that they

could provide jobs and facilities for their supporters.
In Indonesia, higher-ranking civil servants, although refraining
from vicariously displaying their wealth (presumably in fear of cor-
ruption allegations), would still seek to use their wealth in pursuing
a luxury lifestyle, such as taking much time for leisure and visiting
expensive places for entertainment. Many observers of the Indonesian
elite dub this group as “middle class,” emphasizing the patterns of
lifestyle, political preference, and level of education, which are differ-
ent from the lower class (cf. Van Leeuwen [2005]; Heryanto [2003];
Gerke [2000]; Robison [1996]).
My observations also confirm that a lifestyle that accommodates
leisure is not solely attributed to the urban elite. In North Sumatra,
higher-rank bureaucrats and parliamentarians could be seen sipping
milk-coffee in various traditional coffeehouses during working hours
(Simandjuntak 2009), during which common people might have to
work on their fields. Yet in this case, leisure time also functions as a
space in which the elite members meet each other to share knowledge
and opinion relevant to the social and the political context of the
area. During the local-election period, for example, leisure time in
the coffeehouses served as the public sphere in which elite and com-
mon people met to discuss about the qualities of candidate leaders.
A more subtle marker of eliteness, the embodied signs of superi-
ority are not as easily obtained as luxury goods. Daloz listed these
elements as self-confidence and assertiveness, distinguished manners,
physical appearance and cultivation, and linguistic competence (Daloz
2010, 81–93). In the Indonesian context, charisma or wibawa plays
a significant role in designating superiority. The official Indonesian
Language Thesaurus (Kamus Besar Bahasa Indonesia, Ministry of
Education, 2008) defines wibawa as “the manner in which a person
carries himself, which portrays leadership qualities so that he may
influence and exercise power over other people,” or simply power.
A person with wibawa is considered to be feared, thus, obeyed by
others. Wibawa also refers to “the authority which is acknowledged
and obeyed.” These definitions connote two qualities: leadership and
power. It is therefore understandable that this term was used by peo-
ple to describe the desirable outward appearance of the candidates for
district heads in the North Sumatra’s election.
A candidate who could portray the fulfillment of these require-
ments, thereby vicariously displaying (future) power, would indeed
win the sympathy of many. My observations revealed that Sinulingga,
a man with military background, whose campaign was filled with
the rhetoric of clean government and eradication of corruption and

who was portraying himself as a firm and disciplined man, won the
most sympathy of Karo people. He eventually won the local election,
although not by a landslide, whereas the wealthy candidate Kaban
came third. My observations also revealed that a young candidate,
who could not even speak Karo fluently, did not get enough support
because people thought him too young and not charismatic enough.
Nevertheless, although charisma played a role in rallying support-
ers’ votes in North Sumatra, the elected district head was soon faced
by the reality of a dyadic patron-client society. This means, he had to
reward his loyal followers by providing them with jobs or other finan-
cial benefits. Several months after his ascendance as district head,
therefore, he replaced some district officials with people that were
said as close to him during the election’s campaigns or were members
of his campaign team. A former official recalled that some of the
newly assigned officials were not even from Karo and not familiar
with the situation in the district. Yet the former official also added
that, for a new district head, the practice of surrounding oneself with
people that one is close to is normal because he has probably prom-
ised certain positions for these people, in addition to also securing his
own position as district head.7
Elite in Local Politics:

Ambiguities of Expectation
The chapter has portrayed the transformation in the roles and per-
formances of elite members in Indonesia. It has provided a histori-
cal background of the gradual transformation, from the normative
role of members of Javanese aristocracy during the precolonial and
the colonial eras to the educated rich in the postcolonial era, to the
high-ranking bureaucrats in the central state during the authoritarian
era, and finally to the local dignitaries competing for political power
in the era of patronage democracy today.
Although the new democratic system is not without its qualities,
there are many dimensions attributed to the persistent patron-client
structure that continue to limit democratization. Pertaining to elite–
common people relations in the local election, we can discern two
ambiguities.
First, that common people expect their elites to be clean. At first
glance, this seemed to be supporting the notion of good governance
of democracy. The aspiration of common people that elites should
have a clean image was portrayed by the fact that rally-goers liked to
listen to the rhetoric of eradicating corruption or keeping the safety

during open rallies. They also liked the image of a strong government
portrayed by the ex-military candidate. They had the expectation that
leaders should guarantee good governance. In this manner, common
people ceased to be clients. They became voters with a resource to
give.
Nevertheless, when juxtaposed with their pragmatic needs, com-
mon people tended in practice to return to their previous position as
clients. When a person said “I choose him because I want a job,” it
was a simple desire that he and his family get a job as remuneration
for his vote in the new local bureaucracy, and not for an employment
opportunity for the people in general. Clients do not expect policies,
but favors. This means, the voter’s political support, although given
in a democratic setting through an electoral process, did not concur
with the much-echoed notion of democracy or good governance. The
election was then seen as another (state) project in which corruption
is inevitable and anticipated.
Second, in relations with corruption, although seeming to prefer
the image of a clean leader, common people still expected that their
leader distribute money to the potential voters who attended the open
rally. By doing this, elites also assured clients that they would attend
to their needs if the followers support them politically. Money-politics
also happened in the process of a candidate’s endorsement by parties.
Rather than good governance, this practice instead accentuated the
pervasive patron-client relations between the elites and the common
people.
On the façade, it seems that the local election has opened the
opportunity for good governance in the local level in which political
support will be remunerated by optimum bureaucratic performance.
Nevertheless, in a situation where patron-client networks are ram-
pant, treating elite popular performances as a yardstick for good gov-
ernance is not without complications.
Notes
1. Toward the end of the colonial period, education gradually became
a venue to acquire important cultural capital for children of rich
Javanese merchants. Education helped to improve the position of
merchants in relation to that of the aristocrats. The novel Student
Hidjo, published in 1919 and written by Marco Kartodikromo, pro-
vided a good portrayal of the lives of Western-educated children of
merchants and aristocrats, and illustrated the ideas of modernization
among Indonesian elites during colonization.
2. A campaign team is a group of people supporting a particular can-

didate, whose main task is to entice sympathy and votes for the said
candidate. Their background varies, from wealthy benefactors—who
are prepared to lend enormous sums of money to finance the can-
didate’s campaign—and agents—who distribute money and pay for
food and drink during campaign—down to the more humble, jobless
mass—who loiter around campaign headquarters seeking to do small
errands in exchange for a small fee. Their main purpose is similar: to
reap various benefits once their candidate becomes district head. The
benefits range from access to local government projects (for example
in the case of wealthy benefactors who are contractors of building
materials), jobs at the government office, or ease at getting financial/
material support from the government, etc.
3. Staffan Lindberg (2003, 121–140) records the importance of small
gifts, dubbed “chop money”, in what was widely considered a demo-
cratic parliamentary election in Ghana. This included paying individ-
uals’ electricity and water bills, funeral and wedding expenses, school
fees, or distributing agricultural tools.
4. Personal communication, I. S. (an anonymous informant), August
2005.
5. Not his real name.
6. In Indonesia, the safari, a light-brown or khaki-colored two-piece
suit, is indicative of upper echelon bureaucrats.
7. Interview with M. S. (an anonymous informant), October 2005.
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CH A P T ER 5
In Defense: Elite Power *
Tijo Salverda
Introduction
March 12, 1968, marked the collapse of almost two centuries of
Franco-Mauritian hegemony. That day the Indian Ocean island of
Mauritius gained its independence from the UK, which was the con-
tinuation of a process toward a multiethnic democracy that had begun
in the preceding decades. This was of disadvantageous to the white
colonial elite, the Franco-Mauritians, as the overlap between their
elite position and ethnic background was associated with colonial
domination. Franco-Mauritians had strongly opposed independence
as they feared that their position might be compromised, especially
since they only numbered about 1 percent of the population vis-à-vis
much larger sections of Hindus (52 percent), Creoles (28 percent),
Muslims (16 percent), and Sino-Mauritians (3 percent). Remarkably,
however, more than 40 years later, the Franco-Mauritians, who cur-
rently number about 10,000 out of a population of 1.3 million, can
still be considered an elite—albeit that they no longer constitute a
hegemon. In comparison, white elites in other postcolonial states,
such as a number of Caribbean islands, also retained postcolonial
positions of power. The relative success of securing their elite position
is, in my opinion, not sufficiently explained by existing theories on
(elite) power.
Democracy and independence in multiethnic states, as most former
colonies are, negatively impact upon ethnic elites in their confronta-
tion with much larger ethnic groups. At first sight, for such a minor-
ity elite opposing the power of larger ethnic groups appears a lost
cause. Franco-Mauritians, for example, could have decided that, over
114 TIJO SALVERDA
time, they would not stand a chance against a majority made up of,
specifically, Hindus. Yet they did not directly accept their (political)
defeat. Historical and ethnographic data used in this chapter suggest
that not accepting defeat in what prima facie appeared a lost battle
may have contributed positively to the capacity of this elite to main-
tain power and privileges in specific domains. By using their power
defensively, Franco-Mauritians could trade their political power for
the maintenance of economic power. This allowed them to continue
as an economic elite, which is an outcome that would have been less
likely had they directly accepted their defeat. Since this differs from
what is deemed resistance, I argue that this particular feature of elite
power, defensive power, should be made more explicit to enhance
the understanding of how and why former colonial elites have been
rather successful in maintaining their elite positions. This analytical
addition, derived from the Mauritian case, may be also applicable to
interpreting behavioral patterns of threatened elites more generally.
Power
The use of defensive power by elites appears to contradict simplified
analytical relations of power between the principal and the subaltern
(Scott 2001, 2). Weber (1968, 152) stated “‘power’ (Macht) as being
the probability that one actor within a social relationship will be in
a position to carry out his own will despite resistance, regardless of
the basis on which this probability rests.” Weber’s notion of “power
over” and the imposition of one person’s will on another (Westwood
2002, 133) defines one side as having power and the other as resist-
ing power. Since elites tend to be seen as the principal agents, this
assumes that they are all-powerful; this prevailing perspective of
domination from a ruler’s perspective has a long history in Western
thought (Brennan 1997, 92).
To a certain extent, this perspective ties with the hegemony of white
elites in the European colonies as they exerted political, economic,
ideological, and cultural power over subordinate groups; although
the British controlled Mauritius, the Franco-Mauritians could be
considered as the (proxy) hegemon. It is important to remember that
although “the Franco-Mauritian elite [not only] dominated island
politics despite the façade of British rule” (Storey 1997, 37), they
were also economically, ideologically, and culturally dominant. In
many colonies, though, this position was sustained by the capacity
to use force. Strictly speaking, Gramsci considered pure domination
and coercion the opposite of hegemony; as Fontana (1993, 140–141)
IN DEFENSE 115
suggests, “Hegemony is defined by Gramsci as intellectual and moral

leadership . . . whose principal constituting elements are consent and
persuasion.” It is argued, however, that Gramsci “refers to a psy-
chological state, involving some kind of acceptance—not necessarily
explicit—of the socio-political order or of certain vital aspects of that
order” instead of purely moral and prescriptive connotations of con-
sent (Femia 1981, 37). Colonial Mauritius, for example, was not free
from conflict (Allen 2011), yet the colonial hierarchy was ideologi-
cally dominant, even though this was also sustained by (the possibil-
ity of) using force. This possession of “coercive powers that provide
an ultimate last-resort back-up for [the elite’s] authority” (Scott 2008,
33) can be considered power as the capacity to use force, not the
exercise of that capacity (Lukes 2005 [1974], 12). With this in mind,
the concept of hegemony, albeit not literally in the Gramscian sense,
is in my opinion applicable to understand the history of the colonial
projects, and especially their collapse.
Regarding the workings of hegemonies and their (potential) disin-
tegration, it is worthwhile taking into consideration Lukes’s analysis
of three views of power. Under colonial rule the two-dimensional
view of power—controlling the political agenda and keeping potential
issues out of the political process (Bachrach and Baratz 1962; Lukes
2005 [1974], 20–25)—certainly applied to colonial elites. Lukes’s
third and radical view of power—which follows that dominant ide-
ologies tend to work against people’s interests by misleading them,
distorting their judgment, and applying the ruler’s power in such an
effective way as to prevent conflicts from arising (Lukes 2005 [1974],
13, 27)—has substantially contributed to the sustained domination of
colonial elites. Only gradually were these ideologies, thus the colonial
elites’ hegemony and power structures, challenged by overt opposi-
tion to the status quo. Overt conflicts, the first dimension of power,
became common, eventually resulting in independence and a prima
facie reversal of power structure. Yet, the old white elites maintained
much of their economic, and some of their status, position.
Power Sources
As a social group, elites require privileged access to, or control
over, particular resources that may be mobilized in the exercise of
power (Woods 1998, 2108). Often, however, elites only control cer-
tain resources. Numerous authors, consequently, have argued that
elites are not all-powerful by virtue of the fact that distinction can
be drawn between, for example, business/economic elites, military
116 TIJO SALVERDA
elites, governing/political elites, religious elites, academic elites and

administrative/bureaucratic elites (Nadel 1956, 418; Shore and
Nugent 2002, 4; Dogan 2003, 1). Hegemonies, in that sense, are
not self-evident, as in liberal and democratic societies one elite rarely
controls all resources, such as land, financial means, parliamentary
control, knowledge, and access to force (Dahl 1961). That said, Nadel
(1956, 418) states:
But let us note that this restriction to particular resources, interests

or talents indicates essentially . . . the domains in which [the elite’s]
pre-eminence is primarily established; it does not indicate in the same
manner the degree the actual influence it exercises. This [can still be]
of a broad and embracing kind; we might say, it spills over into other
domains of social life.
There is thus a symbolic aspect to power, granting the elite (poten-

tially) more power than would be assumed on the basis of the
resources it controls. This does not imply, however, that converting
power from one domain to another is a foregone matter—although
it is not impossible—as resources and the control over them tend to
be subject to different characteristics and strategies. Privileged access
to parliament and the state apparatus, which can be mobilized in
the exercise of political power, for example, is something else than
access to land and ownership of private companies, which can be
mobilized in the exercise of economic power. Elites dominating a spe-
cific domain, moreover, cannot rely automatically on their position
of power either. Access to certain resources can be subject to change,
shifting power from one group to another: “Possessions of power by
one agent are always potentially able to be countered. This means
that there are ways in which subordinate agents can seek to achieve
power over the dominant agent that would allow them to counter this
power” (Wartenberg 1990, 173).
Scott (2008, 38), therefore, rightly argues, “One of the errors
made in much elite analysis . . . has been to assume, or at the very least
to imply, that elites are all-powerful and that organisationally domi-
nant groups will hold all the other power resources of a society.”
Many elites seem to be aware that “power is intrinsically tied to the
possibility of resistance, and the power of the elite must be seen as
open to challenge from the resisting counteraction of its subalterns”
(ibid.). Numerous Franco-Mauritians, for example, asked me during
interviews whether I was writing for local newspapers. They seemed
anxious about too much public attention, something also noted in
IN DEFENSE 117
the case of the white Jamaican elite: “People in positions of power

may fear that information about them might be used against them
by their critics” (Douglass 1992, 37). Consequently, Dogan and
Higley (1998, 241) state, “Even the most dogmatic elite theorists
acknowledge the political importance of mass publics, the need of
elites for mass support, and the difficulties elites have in gaining and
maintaining that support.” In a way, this relates to the continuum
between the elite’s universalistic functions, that is its service to the
public, and organizing itself particularistically. As Cohen (1981, xiii)
writes, “In time, an elite may move from one end of the continuum
to the other, and history repeatedly records the rise and fall of elites.”
The position of elites can thus never be taken for granted, as in many
societies the particular interests of elites are often secretly performed
(ibid., xvi). This implies that we have to analyze power without the a
priori assumption that elites and/or other powerful groups use power
proactively and are the main driving forces behind the exercise of
power. To maintain their position they often have to defend them-
selves, and for a better theoretical understanding of the workings of
elite power the introduction of the concept “defensive power” is, I
argue, essential.
Defensive Power
Because of the view that elites, through their control over resources,
have the most power at their disposal, it is often assumed that they are
the ones exercising power proactively and expansively. But it needs to
be stressed that elites, especially in the face of change, tend to defend
their interests and privileges as a reaction to external challenges to
their position. The elite may apply its power to resist pressure to main-
tain the status quo, at least in certain domains. Hence, colonial elites
who have lost their hegemony—their initial dominance over virtually
all (public) spheres of life—have to move from exercising power over
others directly to more strategic uses of their remaining resources
to prevent them losing their power base and privileges. In Weberian
terms, the Franco-Mauritanian elite does things it would not other-
wise have done due to exercise of power by others. One could argue
then that the elite resists, as if it were subalterns, yet I argue that from
an analytical perspective a distinction ought to be made between an
elite applying power defensively and identifying an action as subaltern
resistance. As an analytical concept, the resistance of subalterns should
be considered as the means to try to undo an unbalanced situation—
the two principal forms of subaltern resistance, pressure and protest,
118 TIJO SALVERDA
are active forms to challenge the established power structure (Scott

2001, 27). The elite, however, applies power defensively to achieve
maintenance of the status quo instead of trying to alter the situation.
Thus, this kind of elite is more passive, instead of proactively using its
power. In the analysis of power and elites, one ought, therefore, to
closely examine which groups and/or individuals exercise power, who
exactly initiates a power struggle, what wider impact this has, and
whether elite power is used proactively or defensively. This becomes
even more pertinent when we look at how power and its use(s) are
perceived by elites themselves.
Perceptions
The elite classification tends to be eschewed by many Franco-Mauritians
and other elite groups; it is argued that elite is a term of reference
rather than of self-reference (Marcus 1983, 9). The aversion seems
to stem from the image that elites are all-powerful and in control.
Indeed, Mills (2000 [1956], 17) argues that, in the United States,
“more generally, American men of power tend, by convention, to
deny that they are powerful.” Social psychologists confirm that there
is a paradoxical misuse of power by those who perceive themselves as
powerless but who are actually in a socially recognized position of
authority (Bugental and Lewis 1999). In such cases, people’s subjec-
tive sense of power has more impact on their thoughts, feelings, and
behavior than their objective position of power. From this analysis
one could argue that elite members who feel powerless will think
and behave like powerless people despite the fact that objectively they
have more power than others. It could, of course, be that only when
elites feel threatened do they realize the workings of power, though
in a negative manner: they feel powerless, although they may be less
consciously aware of power (or see it as the natural course of events)
when they use it proactively and the burden is carried by others.
The potential use of force and violence by subaltern groups is also
a consideration in regard to elites’ perceptions of themselves. The vio-
lent expropriation of the land of white farmers in Zimbabwe shows
that their opponents could put their power into practice. As analyzed
by Chua (2003), this constitutes a threat that is taken very seriously
by minority ethnic elites more generally. Threats to use violence do
not appear empty. Thus, with respect to the elites’ perceptions, it is
important to take into consideration their opponents’ capacity to do
something (Lukes 2005 [1974], 12), even if that capacity is never actu-
alized. As argued by Scott (2008, 29), although the mainstream of
IN DEFENSE 119
power research focuses upon overt decision-making, power can only

be fully understood by taking account of perceptions of its potential
uses. Although former colonial elites may still have substantial power,
it has certainly declined since the end of the colonial period. This,
consequently, affects these declining elites’ self-perceptions of their
own power. Because they see themselves as under pressure and per-
ceive others as competitors vying for their privileges, their percep-
tion of their opponents’ potential use of power (imagined and real)
constitutes highly significant data. Such perception may, accordingly,
manoeuver an elite to adopting a position of defense, either by taking
a lower profile or by acting defensively in public. Interestingly, an elite
may also benefit from feeling powerless: elites who perceive them-
selves as challenged are likely to have a stronger internal solidarity.
Perceptions (and worldviews) of elites are, therefore, highly relevant,
as they have an impact on how elites balance their (or lack of) willing-
ness to share power with a desire to oppose change.
Establishing Power: Franco-Mauritians

in Colonial Times
Until five centuries ago, Mauritius was uninhabited—conversely,
the Caribbean islands and the African landmass were populated,
although on the Caribbean islands the indigenous populations were
quickly replaced by enslaved peoples (De Barros, Diptee, and Trotman
2006, xix). The first attested Europeans to land in Mauritius were the
Dutch in 1598. The Dutch occupation of the island, however, was not
very successful, and they finally abandoned Mauritius in 1710.
After the island had been left idle for some years the French
took possession of it and constructed a permanent settlement. The
Franco-Mauritians are in a way the living heritage of these early
settlers. It was not an easy task for the French colonizers to estab-
lish a self-sustaining colony, as they had to install themselves and
develop the infrastructure from scratch (Chaudenson 1992, 93–95).
For hard physical labor they imported large numbers of slaves from
Madagascar and Mozambique, quickly outnumbering the white set-
tlers (Ly-Tio-Fane Pineo 1993, 260–63). These slaves were obliged
to convert to their masters’ Catholic religion (Nagapen 1996, 13)
and, as will be shown below, this shared religion led to interesting
alliances at other points in the island’s history. The white community
was at the top of the island’s hierarchy, although the establishment of
a white elite was not a unilinear process: “While the consolidation of
an elite was undoubtedly taking place through marriage and business
120 TIJO SALVERDA
alliances, this was a process constantly disturbed by the influx of

newcomers, particularly at times of war” (Vaughan 2005, 80), often
whites from poor rural backgrounds in Brittany, France (Boudet
2004, 54). It was actually only during the British period that many of
the differences within the white community were bridged.
The Abolition of Slavery

In December 1810, the British arrived with a fleet of 70 ships and
ten thousand troops and forced the French out of Mauritius. It was a
relatively simple conquest, partly because the British had become the
dominant force in the region (Ly-Tio-Fane Pineo 1984). The British
chose not to take any prisoners of war and paid to send French troops
back to France. For those who remained, their property was not to
be confiscated and the inhabitants were given the guarantee that
they would be able to keep their religion, laws, and customs (Boudet
2005, 27). This accommodating British approach can be explained
by the fact that they recognized in the well-organized community of
planters a valuable asset (Eriksen 1998, 9).
Britons never settled in large numbers in Mauritius and most of the
sugarcane plantations remained in the hands of white French planters.
The estates were, however, increasingly backed by significant amounts
of British credit as sugar was mainly exported to London, leading
to a booming sugar industry from the 1820s onward. In a way the
Franco-Mauritians could maintain their hegemony, though under the
aegis of the British. Shortly after their arrival, the British nevertheless
posed the first real challenge to the Franco-Mauritian elite position by
abolishing slavery. This, however, was due to external pressure instead
of other Mauritians opposing Franco-Mauritian hegemony. One of the
paradoxes of the British occupation, according to Vaughan (2005, 261),
was that “Mauritius came increasingly heavy under the scrutiny of the
British abolitionists . . . Mauritian planters had come well and truly in
abolitionists’ limelight, and allegations of atrocities committed against
slaves were numerous. There is little doubt,” she writes, “that many of
these allegations were well founded, but it is also clear that Mauritian
slavery and Mauritian planters were coming to assume a symbolic role
within British abolitionist discourse as the epitome of evil.”
The intention to abolish slavery was met with much resistance
from the slave-masters. This led to the first serious power struggle
between the British colonial administration and Franco-Mauritian
slave-owners. Through practices of lobbying and political traffick-
ing, Franco-Mauritians used their power to try to halt the decline
IN DEFENSE 121
of their privileges. The main figure on the Franco-Mauritian side at

this time was the rich planter Adrien d’Epinay (Toussaint 1971, 85).
He went to London in person to argue the Franco-Mauritian case
since, due to their French background, the planters had limited direct
access to the political decision-makers in London. During this visit
he persuaded London to grant Mauritius freedom of the press, and in
1832 d’Epinay founded the first independent newspaper of the island,
Le Cernéen. The newspaper, accordingly, opposed the abolition of
slavery and would during its long life function as the mouthpiece of
the Franco-Mauritian community and, specifically, its interests in the
sugar industry.
D’Epinay was unsuccessful in his attempt to stop the British
from abolishing slavery, which took place in 1835, but he did man-
age to negotiate huge compensation for the slave-owners. Franco-
Mauritians, thus, did not have enough political clout to determine
the decision-making process, but their (economic) position still gave
them much influence to negotiate compensation. A side effect of
the power struggle, moreover, was to the advantage of the Franco-
Mauritians: they reinforced their elite position because they were uni-
fied not only by their shared economic interests but also by their joint
resistance to British interference in their affairs (Vaughan 2005, 262).
“The Mauritian plantocracy as a whole, therefore, did not suffer
drastic property losses from [slave] emancipation” (North-Coombes
2000, 23), and they remained powerful in the political and economic
domain. Equally, in most Caribbean colonies abolition seems to have
had little impact on the position of the whites. In the Dutch West
Indies, for example, “abolition did not have a major economic effect
and the social and cultural emancipation of the ex-slaves took place
only very gradually . . . slavery was replaced by a coercive paternalism
where colour determined one’s place in the social hierarchy” (Hoefte
2006, 173). Also, the white population of Martinique, the Békés,
remained in possession of the land even though the sugarcane indus-
try had to restructure substantially (Kováts Beaudoux 2002, 34–36).
However, this elite lost their hegemony, after the abolition of slavery
in 1848. “Whites in Martinique withdrew from public life. Mulâtres
moved in to take control of the political domain, while whites retained
control of the economic domain” (Vogt 2005, 263).
Indentured Labor
In Mauritius, as in many of the Caribbean plantation states, many of
the ex-slaves no longer had a desire to work for their ex-masters and
122 TIJO SALVERDA
established small coastal villages or moved to the towns. Nowadays

their descendants are part of the Creole community, which is often
considered at the lower end of the island’s socioeconomic hierarchy.
The main change for the Franco-Mauritians, then, was that they
had to look for new sources of labor. As a consequence of the nev-
er-ending need for labor to work the sugar plantations and the lim-
ited number of ex-slaves, the Franco-Mauritian planters and the
British colonial government had to turn to another source of labor:
India. This marked the start of a new episode in Mauritian history,
and the establishment of a potential counterforce: within ten years of
the arrival of the first indentured laborers one-third of the popula-
tion were Indians, whereas by 1861 they numbered two-thirds of the
population (Benedict 1965, 17).
Despite this large influx, the Franco-Mauritians were able to rela-
tively easily maintain their hegemony. The Indo-Mauritians (consti-
tuting a majority of Hindus and a smaller portion of Muslims) largely
adapted to the psychological state of the colonial hierarchy, even
though potential and actual use of coercion certainly helped. Only
as a consequence of plummeting sugar prices in the world market
did the Indo-Mauritians gradually become prominent in the island’s
affairs from the mid-1870s onward. The Franco-Mauritian estate-
owners had problems of capital and by selling land they were able to
extract substantial sums of ready cash from the Indian immigrants.
The latter then became land-owners and (small) planters themselves,
which allowed them to steadily increase their political power (Allen
1999, 73–74, 138, 141). But with support from the British, the
Franco-Mauritians prevented any change that would seriously jeop-
ardize their elite position, such as widening suffrage, for another half
a century. In line with the two-dimensional view of power (Bachrach
and Baratz 1962; Lukes 2005 [1974], 20–25), the Franco-Mauritians
successfully controlled the political agenda and kept potentially jeop-
ardous issues out of the political process.
1930s–1940s: Challenging the Hegemony

The strong position of the Franco-Mauritians within the plantation
economy gave them significant influence in the colonial administra-
tion of the island. North-Coombes stated (2000, 79): “The colo-
nial state was, moreover, predisposed to favour Mauritian planters
for reasons that can be roughly described as structural.” A harmoni-
ous relationship between the British colonial administration and the
planters was required since sugar represented, by and large, the main
IN DEFENSE 123
tax revenue of the colony. Besides, “harmony of interests was likely

for yet another structural reality, that is, the deep integration of the
island as a sugar exporter in the peripheral circuits of the world econ-
omy which linked colonial and metropolitan ruling groups” (ibid.).
At the beginning of the twentieth century, Franco-Mauritian
hegemony began to be steadily undermined. Initially, this was left
unnoticed, as shown in the case of the gradual emancipation of
Indo-Mauritians. “In 1901 Gandhi, returning to India from South
Africa, stopped briefly in Mauritius; six years later, at Gandhi’s behest,
Manilal Maganlall Doctor came to Mauritius to teach Indian immi-
grants about the traditions and heritage of their homeland” (Simmons
1982, 46). The idea was that they could only be emancipated if they
respected themselves. Partly due to the fact that the colonial authori-
ties paid relatively little attention to Manilal Maganlall Doctor’s
activities, he was relatively successful in increasing confidence among
Indo-Mauritians (ibid., 47). Through his activities, there was an
increase in cultural and religious organizations in the (Indo-Mauritian)
villages, where no Franco-Mauritians lived to observe the change.
Thus a cultural framework was laid down for the establishment of a
counter-elite.
From 1930s onward, the concrete exercise of power, one-dimensional
power, became increasingly used in resistance to white hegemony.
Observing the increasing influence of the European working classes,
who had already proved a substantial challenge to the establish-
ment (Hartmann 2007, 5–7), the Mauritian working classes, not-
withstanding their ethnic background, started to raise their voice.
This was fueled by dissatisfaction with their situation and the global
Great Depression of the 1930s that had devastated the economy of
Mauritius, which was solely reliant on its sugar exports. The situ-
ation further deteriorated when the sugar mills reduced the buy-
ing price for a specific cane mainly produced by small planters. The
sugar mills were in Franco-Mauritian hands, as was the control of the
island’s agriculture-related scientific research institutions, and “access
to sugar cane was a central grievance of protestors” (Storey 1997,
142). In August 1937, this led to a number of strikes and riots pitting
workers against their employers, the sugar plantations; they were the
first riots in Mauritian history where fatal casualties occurred. These
riots are considered a turning point in Mauritian history; the British
colonial government could not ignore the grievances of the working
classes anymore and as a result changes were made: “The Mauritian
government began to incorporate non-elite groups within the struc-
tures of the state, to guarantee the peace” (ibid., 149).
124 TIJO SALVERDA
As on the Caribbean island of Antigua where, around the same

time, large-scale strikes marked the start of increasing participation of
the masses in the island’s affairs (Richards 1983, 18–20), changing cir-
cumstances in the 1930s and 1940s led to a situation that the Franco-
Mauritians had never experienced before. Now that they no longer
had the unlimited support of the British, their position was “open
to the resisting counteraction of its subalterns” (Scott 2008, 38). A
counter-elite of Indo-Mauritian, especially the Hindu section, and,
to a lesser extent, upper-class Creole politicians campaigning for the
emancipation of the masses could no longer be stopped and in 1945
the drafting of a new constitution was suggested. Despite the Franco-
Mauritians’ defense, the British drafted a new constitution in 1947
that increased suffrage substantially. The Franco-Mauritians were furi-
ous with the British because, contrary to the past, the British colonial
administration virtually ignored their suggestions for the new consti-
tution. This new policy stemmed from the fact that the British now
thought that, for the well-being of the colony, the working classes and
the counter-elites should be given a voice. The changing attitude of
the British resulted in a clear defeat for the Franco-Mauritians and a
victory for the Indo-Mauritians. The 1948 elections, the first under
the new constitution, therefore marked the first serious challenge to
almost two centuries of Franco-Mauritian hegemony. They now no
longer controlled all spheres of power, since their community no longer
had unlimited access to resources that could be mobilized for political
power. The result was the emergence of plural functional elites, that is
distinct political and economic elites.
1968: An Independent Nation

The shifting power balance on the island increased the desire for
independence, predominantly among the largest ethnic group,
the Hindus. They had now firmly been established as a political
force to be reckoned with, adding tension, however, to the com-
plex ethnic balance of the island. The sharing of the Catholic faith
between Franco-Mauritians and Creoles, for example, served the
Franco-Mauritians well in their opposition to the Hindus because
their strategy for establishing alliances with other ethnic groups,
propagated by Le Cernéen, enlarged the opposition against indepen-
dence. This was certainly to the advantage of the Franco-Mauritians:
on the basis of their small numbers they could never make a differ-
ence in electoral terms. Yet the coalition seems not to have been com-
pletely orchestrated by Franco-Mauritians. There was a genuine fear
IN DEFENSE 125
among other communities, especially among (middle-class) Creoles,

that in an independent nation dominated by Hindus they would lose
their positions in the state apparatus.
The question of independence finally culminated in the 1967 elec-
tions. Partly as a result of the anti-independence campaign of the
newspaper Le Cernéen, it turned out to be a close call between sup-
porters and opponents of independence: the pro-independence block
won but received only a slight majority of the votes (Simmons 1982,
187). Apart from the Franco-Mauritians many more Mauritians had
been drawn into the anti-independence camp, apparently not having
much trust in an independent nation. They feared Hindu domina-
tion and the deterioration of the economy without the help of the
UK. They lost, however, and their most dreaded outcome became
a reality; in 1968, Mauritius was granted independence under the
leadership of its first prime minister, Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolam. It
was a clear sign that Franco-Mauritians could no longer sustain their
hegemony in a multiethnic democratic state, which had shifted the
political dominance to the Hindu elite, backed by the more numer-
ous Hindu community. Equally, in the Caribbean, emancipation of
the masses weakened the political power of the whites due to their
ethnic minority character (Stone 1983a, 42). It is important to note
that these comparative cases do not always specifically illustrate how
the white elites opposed their loss of power and to what extent they
applied their power defensively to face these challenges. But pow-
er-sharing could certainly constitute a fruitful avenue for an elite to
safeguard its position. In the case of Jamaica, for example, the tradi-
tional local white- and light-skinned planters and merchants opted
for power-sharing with, among others, the emergent brown and black
political directorate representing the interests of the overwhelmingly
black population (Stone 1983b, 238). They probably realized that it
was a lost battle to defend their hegemony and that violent suppres-
sion of the majority as an answer to opponents pushing for change
was not considered an option, contrary to South Africa and Rhodesia
(present-day Zimbabwe) where the whites forcefully defended their
minority rule.
Nevertheless, Franco-Mauritians appear to have been so accus-
tomed to their role as the ones in command, reinforced also by
the marginal loss of their anti-independence block, that even
after 1968 they tried to maintain this position. For generations
Franco-Mauritians had passed on their elite dominance, and com-
ing to terms with counterelites who successfully challenged their
power was not easy for them. Historical analysis suggests that the
126 TIJO SALVERDA
Franco-Mauritians only gradually came to realize that their direct

political role was over in a democratic Mauritius. After independence
was an established fact, they could no longer mobilize mass support,
as differences with other ethnicities were too large, and they lost
their (direct) political influence. In the columns of the newspaper Le
Cernéen, however, the Franco-Mauritians continued to make their
voice heard in public discourse—the newspaper had always existed
by the grace of Franco-Mauritian businessmen because they partly
financed the newspaper. However, around 1980, the newspaper’s
combination of defending the whites and the sugar industry came
to be perceived by many Mauritians as no longer opportune. The
symbolism of their white skin color was becoming a liability to the
maintenance of their power. Thus, what in the past had been a sym-
bolic resource was now a liability. Franco-Mauritian businessmen
realized that to maintain their control over the island’s economic
resources they should no longer interfere openly in the public debate.
These businessmen required good working relationships with the
government and consequently considered Le Cernéen’s rhetoric as an
embarrassment. Thus, the newly emerged elites increasingly claimed
politics, and the discourse surrounding political institutions, as their
exclusive domain.
Politicians, predominantly of nonwhite Mauritian signature, had
made it clear to Franco-Mauritian businessmen that it would be
appropriate to cease financing Le Cernéen. According to the last edi-
tor in chief of the newspaper, representatives of the sugar industry
never explicitly told him personally about their objections but, nev-
ertheless, he told me 25 years later, “I felt how I was an obstacle to
them” (interview with author, February 6, 2006, Mauritius). In the
new reality, the business community was no longer able to unite itself
behind a publicly voiced single communal message (Lenoir 2000,
204) and, therefore, saw, as a means of prolonging its elite position,
no other option than to stop financing the newspaper. After 150
years of existence the newspaper had to close its doors on May 15,
1982. This was symbolic of the Franco-Mauritians’ changing posi-
tion in Mauritian society. Most Franco-Mauritians seemed finally to
realize that their part in public debate was over. They withdrew from
politics, apart from a few exceptions as will be shown below and, as a
community, stopped voicing a public opinion in relation to their elite
and ethnic position. In that respect, they had become like the white
elite in Martinique who had already, and for a much longer period,
displayed a similar fear of every criticism, especially when in the pub-
lic sphere (Kováts Beaudoux 2002, 12).
IN DEFENSE 127
Franco-Mauritian adoption of a low-profile position in the pub-

lic debate proved effective in securing their economic interests.
Although the transition to independence was relatively peaceful, it
confirms that “in the case of abrupt regime changes, an analogy
has been noticed across countries: the economic and administrative
elites resist better the upheaval than the political and military elites”
(Dogan 2003, 13). With respect to independence another paral-
lel also seems at play: counter-elites who try to increase their power
with the support of the masses initially focus primarily upon political
participation. Initially, the Mauritian-Hindu elite wanted to increase
their political power, without targeting Franco-Mauritians economic
power. Even in Zimbabwe, resistance was initially driven by the desire
of blacks to establish majority rule and self-determination and not
so much by the desire to seize white farmland. After independence,
white farmers were actually encouraged to stay and contribute to the
nation (Shaw 2003, 80–81).
Present-Day Mauritius:
Defending Economic Power
Despite Franco-Mauritian hegemony permanently coming to an end
with the collapse of the colonial structure, they can still be considered
an elite. Paradoxically, this is partly sustained by symbolic power: on
the one hand, the symbolic aspect of white skin color has become a
liability, while on the other, however, the symbolism of white skin
color and association with French culture are resilient and contribute
to the maintenance of the Franco-Mauritian elite status (see Salverda
2011). Also, Franco-Mauritians have successfully expanded their
power by heavily investing in new economic domains, such as tour-
ism and the textile industry.
But Franco-Mauritian consolidation of their elite position is not
set in stone. Nowadays, the newly emerged elites, such as the Hindu
political elite(s), can no longer be considered the Franco-Mauritians’
subordinates. From their previously disadvantaged position they have
become equally powerful, if not more powerful. There is a certain level
of consensus among the elites, enhanced, from the 1980s onward, by
the economic prosperity the island has experienced, making Mauritius
one of the most democratically stable African states. Yet, power strug-
gles between the island’s functional elites remain rife. Franco-Mauritian
business interests, and the (Hindu-dominated) public sector and politi-
cians often clash, or at least the potential for a clash is always latently
present. Franco-Mauritians maintain a low political profile and have
128 TIJO SALVERDA
developed a remarkable tolerance of being targeted by politicians, espe-

cially during electoral campaigns. Political rhetoric is often about the
Franco-Mauritians’ disproportionate share in the island’s wealth, sym-
bolically stressed by referring to the white skin color.
An Easy Target
One of the strategies adopted by the Franco-Mauritians is not to defend
themselves publicly when targeted by politicians. Franco-Mauritians
appear aware of their role as easy target in electoral campaigns. They
argue that politicians, to gain votes, criticize Franco-Mauritian eco-
nomic power because, as a Franco-Mauritian CEO said, “There are
so few whites that if the [political] mechanism of ‘white-bashing’
doesn’t work for you it doesn’t work against you” (interview with
author, October 9, 2007, Mauritius). A widely shared perception is
that after the elections politicians tend to tone down their criticism
because in the end the private sector and the government need each
other. As a Franco-Mauritian businessman said, “When I’m having a
drink with politicians they tell me that [white bashing] was just talk-
ing politics” (interview with author, February 16, 2005, Mauritius).
This ambiguous relationship between public rhetoric and private
consent to the status quo, has gradually led to consensus among
Franco-Mauritian businessmen that it is best to support the govern-
ment in place and remain neutral during the electoral campaign. In
some instances, this is to such an extent that Franco-Mauritian busi-
nesses do not allow employees to engage in politics. To maintain their
neutrality, Franco-Mauritian businesses now make approximately
equal payments to different (large) political parties (see also Handley
2008, 123).
The Franco-Mauritian Paul Bérenger is an exception to the rule that
Franco-Mauritians are no longer actively involved in politics. However,
the political fate of Bérenger proves the rule that Franco-Mauritians may
be correct in their conviction that it is too risky to get involved in poli-
tics. Initially, Bérenger was not associated with the Franco-Mauritians,
because when he started his political career in the first decade after
independence, he strongly criticized Franco-Mauritian domination
in the private sector. This helped him to gain wide support among
Mauritians of all backgrounds. Many Franco-Mauritians, conversely,
disliked him. A retired Franco-Mauritian businessman told me, “I
wondered whether Bérenger’s attacks on [Franco-Mauritian] privi-
leges had to do with the fact that he was metissé [i.e. of ‘mixed’ blood]”
(interview with author, 2006, Mauritius). Clearly the insinuation was
IN DEFENSE 129
that Bérenger was driven by revenge on the white community because

he was allegedly not completely white himself.
In 2003, Bérenger became the first non-Hindu prime minister of
Mauritius. He was not elected directly as prime minister, but attained
this position during the last two years of his coalition-government’s
five-year term (2000–2005). It was a coalition arrangement whereby
the renowned Hindu politician of another coalition party served the
first three years as prime minister, and Bérenger the second two. That
a non-Hindu became the prime minister was thought to represent a
break with the past and it was considered a sign that Mauritius was
ready for decreased influence of ethnicity on politics. However, once
in government Bérenger found himself obliged to cooperate with
Franco-Mauritian businessmen, which made him an easy prey for
political opponents. Now his skin color suddenly became visible: he
was seen as a white favoring other whites. His background clearly con-
strained him in dealing with private sector matters. In reality, Bérenger
does not appear to have favored the Franco-Mauritians or showed any
racial preferences. Yet, his white skin color was a liability.
As a consequence of Bérenger’s position as prime minister, in the
ensuing 2005 election campaign there was a strong focus on the
Franco-Mauritians. As many ordinary Mauritians were of the cyni-
cal view that government, in general, represented the interests of the
Franco-Mauritians (Hempel 2009, 468), they easily accepted the
political rhetoric that Franco-Mauritians held all the economic power
and, through the figure of Bérenger, were becoming hegemonic.
This put the Franco-Mauritian community in a position of blame.
Subsequently, Bérenger lost the 2005 elections; although it may be
too simplistic to say that Bérenger cum suis only lost because of his
white skin color.
After his defeat, the association between Bérenger and Franco-
Mauritian economic privileges may have become less of an issue, since
this link had lost its political purpose. However, politicians have not
stopped criticizing Franco-Mauritian economic power and privileges
in general. Although this kind of rhetoric is common, especially
during elections, the fate of Bérenger confirms the general Franco-
Mauritanian perception that participating actively in politics is poten-
tially hazardous to the consolidation of their elite position.
Democratization of the Economy

Many Mauritians and Franco-Mauritians are particularly critical
of the present government (2005–present) because of their smear
130 TIJO SALVERDA
campaign against Bérenger during the 2005 electoral campaign.

Since being in power, the Labor Party–led government alliance has
been transmitting mixed messages. Government has approved a num-
ber of Franco-Mauritian–led projects, which they had promised to
oppose. Yet, at the same time, politicians have continued to challenge
Franco-Mauritian privileges in general and their sugar interests in
particular. The government is the clear initiator of the ensuing power
struggles, as the Franco-Mauritians have little incentive for change.
They prefer to retain a low profile, to keep things as they are. Only
when they felt their privileges and position being threatened do they
react, defensively.
The government, for example, challenged the Franco-Mauritian
position by introducing a policy designed to allow for the democrati-
zation of the economy. The idea behind this was to reform the econ-
omy, open it up internationally, break the economic monopolies, and,
especially, also to increase chances for other local players—hence, a
potential challenge to Franco-Mauritian economic power. The gov-
ernment’s proposal, which was initially presented as concerning issues
of concentration of wealth and unequal distribution of land, quickly
became increasingly ethnicized. Franco-Mauritians perceived them-
selves as victims and argued that their political opponents targeted
them out of resentment. Eric Guimbeau, another Franco-Mauritian
politician and an exception to the rule that Franco-Mauritians have
withdrawn from politics, though more of a typical Franco-Mauritian
and with much smaller support than Bérenger, resigned in 2006
from the government alliance because he disagreed with certain
government-allied politicians’ verbal charges made against the
Franco-Mauritian community. Guimbeau took a clear stand against
certain politicians by defending Franco-Mauritians. Guimbeau
remarked, “The politicians who attack the whites want to kick them
out [of Mauritius] and take their place. It’s revenge for the past”
(interview with author, October 12, 2007, Mauritius). Interestingly,
Paul Bérenger, now in the opposition, has largely held his tongue in
this issue.
Politicians of non–Franco-Mauritian descent often stress that their
intentions are not ethnically motivated and insist there is no white
bashing: “Cette politique ne constitue pas une considération raciale
et ethnique, un arbitraire idéologique ou une revanche sur l’histoire ”
(O’Neill 2007).1 However, the issue remains that Franco-Mauritians
still have an unequal share of the island’s wealth, and the intended
democratization of the economy is thus easily ethnicized. This is
comparable to the late 1970s and early 1980s when, as Simmons
IN DEFENSE 131
(1982, 195) argues, anticapitalism rhetoric in Mauritius appeared

antiwhite not because it was intended but because most whites were
capitalists. It is, nevertheless, difficult to avoid resorting to exploiting
resentment of the colonial origins of the Franco-Mauritian privileged
position for political gain. The electoral campaign of 2005 and the
attacks on Bérenger show how the present government, when it was
in opposition, used white bashing to gain votes. Contradictory state-
ments coming from the politicians involved further heightened these
suspicions. The prime minister, for example, took the opportunity to
associate Franco-Mauritian economic power with colonial injustices,
when giving a speech at the British bicentenary celebration of the
abolition of slavery in Hull in the UK:
In my own country, it has left us with a distribution of wealth that

is still skewed in favour of those who benefitted from slavery [empha-
sis added]. One of the legacies of slavery, that continues to hamper
development, is the concentration of ownership of assets. This con-
centration is unfair in a way but also gives rise to misallocation and
inefficiency in the utilisation of resources, and impedes growth. My
Government is aiming to reform the national economic structure and
open doors of opportunity to the population at large. We will achieve
this by enlarging participation in mainstream activities and opening
access to land ownership. As we see it, the key to economic democrati-
sation is empowerment. (Ramgoolam 2007)2
Obviously, this makes the sugar industry particularly vulnerable to

government pressure due to its (symbolic) associations with the colo-
nial period.
Pay Off
Traditionally sugar has been the “country’s cash cow” (Handley
2008, 108–109), which has even led to a pattern of applying economic
power in the form of financial contributions and donations paid by
Franco-Mauritian businesses to government-related projects. For
example, the Mahatma Gandhi Institute, founded by the Mauritian
government in collaboration with the Indian government in 1970,
which promotes (research on) Indo-Mauritian culture, is situated on
a plot of land donated to the government by a large Franco-Mauritian
sugar estate.
Today the sugar industry remains dominated by Franco-Mauritians,
and the Franco-Mauritian–controlled sugar estates continue to be in
a precarious political position. Despite the fact that the Mauritian
132 TIJO SALVERDA
economy nowadays relies far less on the sugar industry than before,
agriculture, of which around half is sugarcane-related, now makes up
only 6 percent of Mauritian GDP.3 In densely populated Mauritius,
land ownership, in particular, reinforces resentment—a general esti-
mation suggests that Franco-Mauritians own approximately 36 percent
of the total available land, whereas only about 10 percent of the
island’s land is state-owned. Hence, a Mauritian journalist close to
the Labor Party told me, “The unequal distribution of land is at the
center of the problem; without a change nothing will happen” (inter-
view with author, March 23, 2006, Mauritius). But the distribution
of land is a complex matter in Mauritius because initially it belonged
to no one. Land distribution through expropriation cannot be justi-
fied as the reason for unequal land ownership, and thus has little
(international) legal basis. In Zimbabwe, on the contrary, the land of
the white (farmers) elite has been expropriated on the basis of land
redistribution. Initially, there was a certain level of peaceful land dis-
tribution (Shaw 2003, 75–76), but once Robert Mugabe launched
his aggressive land distribution campaign there was little the white
minority could do. The Zimbabwean case, then, is illustrative of the
limits of (peaceful) defensive power when confronted with a violent
opponent.
In 2005, the sugar industry plunged into a recession. A reform,
which would involve the closing of mills and, subsequently, social
programs for laid-off workers, was required—in such cases the
government often demands land from the sugar industry to bring
these social programs to a successful conclusion. Initially, a deal was
struck between the sugar estates, the government, and the European
Commission (EC) (which was willing to contribute financially to the
reform). But the government stalled and brought the issue back to the
negotiation table, demanding extra compensation of two thousand
arpents (one arpent, an old French unit for measuring land, is about
half a hectare) to be paid by the sugar industry for social projects, as it
considered the deal to be too advantageous for the Franco-Mauritian
sugar industry.
The result was a deadlock. The Franco-Mauritian sugar estates
accused the government of making excessive demands and not
respecting the rules of fair play; at no point had the extra compensa-
tion been brought up in the (initial) deal. The Franco-Mauritians
defended themselves, but in the end they had to give in to govern-
mental pressure. Then the government came back with yet additional
demands. Again, the sugar industry said it could not possibly meet
these demands, before eventually agreeing to satisfy a substantial
IN DEFENSE 133
part of them. The two sides subsequently came to an agreement. The

final result: the sugar industry gave two thousand arpents of land for
social programs and opened up 35 percent of the shareholding of the
mills (Sooknah 2007). It was obvious that the Franco-Mauritians and
the government were highly dependent on each other and needed to
come to an agreement to safeguard the EC’s financial contribution
to the restructuring program, since the EC demanded it. (Roopun
2007). Arguably, the Franco-Mauritians conceded most, but not all
the government’s demands were met.
In essence, Franco-Mauritian economic power could not compete
with the mobilization of political power by the government. Ceding
(land) resources helped to appease the government, but government’s
latent pressure remains. In this conflict Franco-Mauritians perceived
their position to be openly under threat and felt that they had to
stand up for their rights. Therefore, they found themselves unable to
avoid direct confrontation. A Franco-Mauritian businessman, with-
out interests in the sugar industry, told me, “[The sugar estates] don’t
know what’s next; they wonder what happens if they give in, ‘will
the government then come with other demands?’” (interview with
author, October 9, 2007, Mauritius). In other words, their actions
were (are) influenced by their perceptions of the politicians’ potential
power.
Franco-Mauritians perceive the whole democratization of the econ-
omy and the deadlock with the sugar industry as unjust and directly
targeted at them.4 In private, many Franco-Mauritians argued that
there was a further hidden agenda to democratization of the econ-
omy, namely consolidation of the prime minister’s personal power.
According to this view, his intention was to take the wealth from
whites, to distribute it to his own community and other proxies. Many
Franco-Mauritians said that, in principle, they adhered to the idea
of the democratization of the economy, although this depended on
what exactly this implied. They supported the idea of sharing the cake
with everyone but opposed the idea of taking wealth from one person
(i.e. Franco-Mauritians) and giving it to another (i.e. the prime min-
ister’s cronies and supporters). With respect to this issue, repeated
comparisons have been made with Zimbabwe where Robert Mugabe
expropriated the white farmers’ land, causing the free fall of the econ-
omy. It is hard to know if this comparison constitutes a strategy to
instill anger against the government or a real fear. The rhetorical com-
parison with Zimbabwe could be being used by the Franco-Mauritian
to label government’s proposals as antiwhite. The few dissident voices
in the Franco-Mauritanian community who have pointed out the
134 TIJO SALVERDA
merit of some of the proposals are hardly heard. Franco-Mauritians

say they are in favor of true democratization of the economy but by
discrediting, rightly or not, the government’s intentions, they end
up simply resisting, without contributing, to this process. Playing
the victim, however, appears to be a common strategy used by elites
under siege. With regard to the situation in the Philippines, Billig
(2003, 156) writes, “One would think by talking to the planters that
they are the much-beleaguered objects of government conspiracy to
undermine them in every possible way.”
Conclusion
In terms of Weber’s actor-oriented analysis of power, Franco-Mauritians
primarily responded to the exercise of power by others, which forced
them to act in a way they would otherwise not have done. They
resisted relatively successfully the challenges to their dominance but
eventually had to accept their loss of direct political power because
they lacked the numbers and the popular support to maintain politi-
cal power in an independent democratic Mauritius. Nevertheless,
Franco-Mauritians were able to consolidate economic power by effec-
tively giving part of their power away, thus going from being a hege-
monic elite to constituting a functional elite. Consequently, their elite
position nowadays is remarkably different than previous times, and
prolonging their position at the top is not self-evident.
Elites’ use of defensive power, especially when they are an eth-
nic minority, appears mainly successful in the absence of violence—
Zimbabwe constituting the obvious example of the limits of defensive
power. Applying power defensively, however, is closely linked to the
elite’s perceptions of their opponents’ capacity to use power, which
may or may not be actualized. The Franco-Mauritanian elites, rightly
or wrongly, perceive themselves to be under threat and (re)act accord-
ingly. This reinforces their solidarity and elite cohesion, which, to a
certain extent, contributes to securing their elite position. They may
be losing power but their cohesion as an elite enables them, at the
very least, to negotiate further decline.
In conclusion, I would agree with Scott that making sense of resis-
tance is integral to understanding power and should figure in any
comprehensive research agenda (Scott 2008, 40). However, I would
also argue that the concept of defensive powers should constitute
an integral part of understanding elite power. The end of the colo-
nial period may, to a certain extent, be exceptional, as the overlap
between an elite position and a shared ethnic background associated
IN DEFENSE 135
with colonial domination makes the position of white elites par-

ticularly strained. However, the Franco-Mauritanian case could be
paradigmatic of declining, or threatened, elite power more generally.
When analyzing elites under pressure social scientists should be alert
to the possibility that an effective strategy for maintaining the status
quo is to use power defensively—be it overt, one-dimensional power,
or more subtle forms that entail the second and third dimension of
power.
Notes
* This chapter is a revised version of my paper “In defence: Elite power,”
Journal of (Political) Power 3(3) (2010). I am grateful to the editors and
publisher of this journal for permitting to reuse material published in
that issue.
1. Translation: This policy is not racially and ethnically based; nor is it
based on an arbitrary ideology or revenge for past history.
2. Prime Minister Navin Ramgoolam is the son of Mauritius’ first prime
minister, Sir Seewoosagur Ramgoolam.
3. See: http://www.gov.mu/portal/goc/cso/report/natacc/agri06/sumtab
.pdf (accessed December 7, 2009).
4. In 2006 the government also decided to change the conditions for the
lease of the campement (i.e., seaside bungalow) sites. The campements
and seaside life are a very significant element of Franco-Mauritian
elite culture, and Franco-Mauritians considered the new policy a
threat to their lifestyle. They argued that the increase in the lease
price was exorbitant and that the government proposal was targeting
them as whites.
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CH A P T ER 6
Pupillage: The Shaping of a

Professional Elite
Fernanda Pirie and Justine Rogers
Introduction
The UK professions have come under pressure, both commercial
and governmental, in the last decades of the twentieth century.
Commercial forces have had an impact on their structures and labor
processes, while what has been termed a new culture of “managerial-
ism” is evident in increased bureaucratization and regulation, both
internal and external. There is disagreement among analysts, as we
outline later in this chapter, over the extent and effects of such pres-
sures—some writers allege that they have resulted in deprofessional-
ization and loss of identity, whereas others emphasize the professions’
resilience and continuity in identity and professional commitment. In
anthropological terms, this raises the question of whether professions
can still be considered as elite groups, in the sense outlined by Cohen
(1981). In this chapter we take an anthropological approach to these
issues, in the case of the Bar of England and Wales (the Bar), one of
the longest established of the UK’s professions. We ask whether the
new managerial ethos has undermined barristers’ identity and status,
and whether commercial pressures have undermined their position
as legal professionals. We do this by examining recruitment and the
vocational training undertaken by new entrants, given that barriers
to entry have often be regarded as one of the most notable charac-
teristics of an elite or status group (Abel 2003). Our focus on pupils,
as the trainee barristers are known, demonstrates that while adapt-
ing to external controls, barristers are effectively fostering a sense of
140 FERNANDA PIRIE AND JUSTINE ROGERS
exclusivity and status among their new recruits. This, in turn, suggests
the continued salience, in twenty-first century Britain, of Cohen’s
analysis of the dilemmas faced by elite groups.
The Bar
Unlike most jurisdictions, England and Wales has a legal profession
divided between barristers (advocates) and solicitors. The historic dis-
tinction between the two was maintained through two conventions:
that barristers have exclusive rights of audience in the higher courts
and that their duties must be enlisted by a solicitor, not a lay client.
Although these conventions were formally abolished in the 1990s, a
solicitor is generally still the first port of call for lay clients. A solici-
tor assists and advises clients on legal matters, prepares for litigation,
and acts in the lower courts, but does not generally appear in the
higher courts. The solicitor retains the barrister to provide advocacy
and advisory work. Solicitors generally work in partnerships, law
firms, while most barristers are self-employed but work in a set of
chambers, which functions in many respects like a firm.1 The smallest
sets of chambers have fewer than ten practitioners, while the largest
have over sixty. The Bar has traditionally supplied all members of the
higher judiciary.
To adopt the definition formulated by Cohen (1981, xiv), barristers
have historically occupied a “commanding position in society”: they
have exercised effective control over important aspects of legal knowl-
edge and practice, being the recognized experts in many specialist
areas, as well as dominating advocacy in the higher courts; they are
regularly consulted by solicitors; and they provide most of the judges
in the higher courts of England and Wales. Barristers have also enjoyed
considerable status: they are generally accepted as performing an
important social role, one that is necessary for the functioning of soci-
ety at large, what Cohen would describe as a “universalistic function”.
Moreover, they maintain exclusivity, as we describe in this chapter, by
limiting and controlling the numbers and selection of those who can
enter the profession, thus safeguarding their particularist interests.
Among the elite groups described by Cohen, status is often ascribed
by birth. A mystique of eliteness may also be acquired and reinforced
through mystifying dramatic or symbolic performances (1981, 2).
The elite status of barristers is not, however, acquired by birth, but
on entry into the profession and it is maintained thereafter through
continued membership of the professional group. Moreover, their
position is well-established and explicit: there is no mystery about the
PUPILLAGE 141
fact of their control over legal knowledge, about individual barristers’

membership of the profession, nor about its exclusivity. Its symbols
and dramas are largely public: the physical grandeur of the Inns of
Court in London; the organization of the profession into chambers,
with lists of their members displayed on boards outside; their distinc-
tive dress; their particular modes of address; their elaborate and ritual-
ized roles in the court room; the structured collegiality of the Inns of
Court, with their dining halls, libraries, and bars; and the existence of
a professional body to represent their interests. Although these have
all, to some extent, been weakened during recent reforms and attempts
to modernize the profession, this is not a group that has to rely upon
mystifying dramatic or symbolic performances. Nevertheless, as we
describe in this chapter, the pupillage process continues to affirm the
unique qualities demanded of new recruits, the professional standards
subsequently expected of them, and certain indefinable qualities that
distinguish those suitable for professional practice. This subtly main-
tains the status and exclusivity identified by Cohen as markers of elite
groups. Our object, in this chapter, is to describe the inexplicit, indeed
often unconscious, ways in which this is done amidst the challenges of
modernity and ongoing professional reforms.
Challenges
The status and power of the Bar were notably challenged by the
Green Paper prepared for the Thatcher government in 1989, titled
The Work and Organization of the Legal Profession. This criticized
the profession’s mysterious recruitment systems, for new barristers
and Queen’s Counsel (QC), as well as its code of ethics and disci-
plinary procedures, as self-serving and anticompetitive. The paper
asserted, moreover, that “the legal professions should no longer be
divided . . . [they] should be as free as possible, consistent with safe-
guarding of clients’ interests, to offer their services in ways that they
find best meet their clients’ demands” (cited in Burrage [1997], 139).
As Muzio and Ackroyd (2005, 622) put it, “Professionalism was out
whilst the alternative ideologies of entrepreneurship and managerial-
ism were celebrated.” The subsequent Courts and Legal Services Act
of 1990 and the Access to Justice Act 1999 allowed the Law Society,
the solicitors’ professional body, to grant solicitors rights of advocacy
in the higher courts. This struck at the heart of the identity and spe-
cialism of the Bar.
These attacks on the ideological scaffolding of the professions
did not immediately undermine the Bar’s distinct identity, but were
followed by a series of reforms, which, according to Muzio and

Ackroyd (2005, 622), “sought to weaken professional monopolies,
dismantle restrictive arrangements and challenge entrenched privi-
leges.” These included a challenge to the autonomy and effective-
ness of the Bar Council, the Bar’s representative and regulatory body.
Government scrutiny continued with the Clementi Review (2004),
which led to the separation of the Bar Council’s representative and
regulatory functions in January 2006. Muzio and Ackroyd describe
this as “the product of a new ideological climate where professional
practices are demystified” (2005, 624). The Bar Standards Board
(BSB) is now the official regulatory body for the Bar, although it has,
itself, come under challenge in the Legal Services Act 2007, which
provides for the Legal Services Board, a super-regulator to oversee
the regulation of the legal professions, as well as a new Office for
Legal Complaints.
Although barristers continue to be regulated by their own internal
body, therefore, the autonomy of the BSB is under threat. The work
that it performs is strongly influenced by the opinions and require-
ments of government bodies and most of the regulations that it
imposes on the Bar, including those that are the subject of this chap-
ter, can be regarded as the requirements of an external, governmen-
tal body. Both the Bar Council and the BSB are undertaking more
regulatory and managerial activities than previously and the Bar is no
longer immune from external audit. It has had to adopt a culture of
performativity, to comply with objective systems of accountability and
measurement (Dent and Whitehead 2002, 2). These include a more
extensive Code of Conduct, an Equality and Diversity Code, vari-
ous pupillage regulations and guidelines, BARMARK—a voluntary
system that recognizes good practice management within chambers,
and more elaborate internal structures—and some twenty representa-
tive and five regulatory committees. In the current political climate
the Bar’s professional bodies feel they must prove the legitimacy and
expertise of the Bar to the state. As explained during interviews by
members of the BSB, instead of being able to rely upon traditional
forms of professional status, they must prove that the Bar’s special-
ist knowledge, delineated area of expertise, ethics, and skills serve
the public (market) interest. One way of demonstrating legitimacy
is through formalized, monitored training. This type of regulatory
activity helps render the Bar an identifiable, cohesive, and worthy
recipient of state protection. In this way the Bar is, at least pub-
licly, moving toward pragmatism, economic efficiency, standardized
knowledge, accountability, and diversity in recruitment.
PUPILLAGE 143
At the same time, new commercial pressures and orientations have

had an impact on the structures, labor processes, and relations within
many UK professions. Recent studies emphasize the extent to which
professions are forced or encouraged by the state and capital (business
and powerful clients) to adopt more commercial working practices.
This has resulted in more modern management structures, including
recruitment and training processes, within professional organizations
(Freidson 1994; Hanlon 1997; Muzio and Ackroyd 2005).
The Bar can, thus, be said to be facing two new forms of pressure:
regulatory managerialism, in the form of the regulatory activities
of the Bar’s professional associations; and pressure to become more
commercial, which primarily emanates from its clients, both solicitors
and their lay clients, who have their own commercial agendas and
pressures.
Academic Debates
Much has been written on the changes said to have been brought
about by these, or similar, pressures to the power and status of pro-
fessions in the UK. Academic writers disagree, however, on the ways
in which these changes should be interpreted. As Freidson (1994,
31) notes, scholars have come to “diametrically opposed” conclusions
about the extent to which professions have changed and what this
says about their power and status. A dominant theme has been that
new forms of managerialism have resulted in “deprofessionalization”,
with the consequence that some professionals have become little
more than passive instruments of state policy and their commercial
clients’ demands. Even before the reforms of the 2000s some had
concluded that the professions were, or would become, powerless to
control their work and to maintain their social status. These writers
highlight different features of the professions, including their increas-
ing dependence on state economic power, the corporate sector, public
skepticism, consumer activism, loss of work jurisdictions, and client
control (Abel 1988b, 2003; Flood 1989; Hanlon 1997).
Others have focused on the ways in which these developments have
affected the identities and ethics of the professions. Both manageri-
alism and commercialism have, to some degree, fostered a culture
of performativity, a belief in measurement and accountability, and
client-based (market) identities (Lyotard [1984], cited by Dent and
Whitehead [2002], 2). These writers emphasize the erosion of the
distinctive traditions, identities, and ethics that had previously shaped
the quality and commitment of professions and distinguished them
from other occupational groups. Commercialism, it is suggested, blurs

the lines between various service providers, with the effect that “‘cus-
tomer oriented’ values and expectations come to displace the privi-
leged knowledges and practices of the old elite” (Dent and Whitehead
2002, 3). This chips away at a profession’s sense of community (Goode
[1957], cited by Freidson [1994], 144). Commercialism comes at the
expense, some argue, of the professions’ public service ideals.
As against these theories other writers, most notably Freidson
(1994, 2001) and Muzio and Ackroyd (2005), argue that the economic
and psychological stability of the professions have been maintained
despite these changes, as have the material and symbolic rewards of
their members, including their sense of pride in, and responsibility
for, the integrity of their roles (Freidson 1994, 90). Other writers
have, they allege, failed to take into account the agency of the profes-
sions and their ability to retain a sense of collegiality, identity, and
professional commitment, despite the potentially divisive forces of
commercialism and managerialism (Muzio and Ackroyd 2005, 618).
Most of these studies discuss such phenomena as applying gener-
ally among the professions, particularly the medical profession. There
have been studies of the UK’s lawyers (Abel 1988a, 1988b, 2003;
Flood 1989; Lee 1992; Hanlon 1997; Muzio and Ackroyd 2005),
but their focus has been on solicitors, rather than the Bar, leaving a
gap that this chapter seeks to fill. It does so by studying on a form
of managerialism introduced to the Bar with the attempts by the
BSB, under governmental pressure, to change and regulate the pupil-
lage process. This has introduced new transparent procedures, made
explicit the criteria for selection, formalized guidelines for training,
and subjected the whole process to performance reviews by reference
to externally determined standards. This, in turn, could be seen as a
challenge, whether explicit or implicit, to the exclusivity and elitism
of the Bar, to its control over recruitment and training, and to the
mystifying ambiguities that previously surrounded these processes.
Indirectly, these moves could serve to undermine the professional
status of the barristers, forcing them to subject their recruitment and
training processes to the same standards of market efficiency, equal-
ity, diversity, and formalism as other professional and occupational
groups.
We suggest, however, that although pupillage has changed in very
significant ways, this has not led to a loss of control by the Bar or,
more crucially, by the individual chambers within it, over entry into
the profession and over the development of professional skills. The
BSB’s requirements attract ostensible compliance, but are largely
PUPILLAGE 145
ignored, or even derided, in practice, although the pupillage process

continues to emphasize the development of specialist skills and to
foster allegiance to the chambers and the community of barristers as
a whole.
This is not to say that the Bar has not been profoundly affected
in some of the ways the authors mentioned have suggested. In par-
ticular, commercial pressure from clients has had significant effects
on working practices. However in this chapter we focus on barris-
ters’ responses to the new internal regulations and suggest that pupil-
lage continues to reinforce a sense of exclusive qualities among new
recruits and the specialisms they must develop. This, when it is trans-
mitted by barristers to their clients, reinforces barristers’ professional
status within the commercial world.
Pupillage
Pupillage is the final stage of a barrister’s training and lasts one year,
made up of two six-month periods (known as “sixes”). New recruits
shadow their pupil supervisors, practitioners of at least six years’ expe-
rience. A chambers of 50 practitioners will take on between two and
five pupils each year, the smaller sets tending to take fewer. In most
cases pupils will have more than one pupil supervisor over the course
of the 12 months.
Competition for pupillage is extreme. Each year approximately two
thousand students undertake the Bar Professional Training Course,
the postgraduate training stage that precedes pupillage. The vast pro-
portion of these students intends to practice in the UK. Of these,
only some five hundred find pupillage positions. After pupillage the
new barrister must be offered a seat or “tenancy” in a set of chambers
to start practice. For this reason, pupillage serves as the chambers’
recruitment and assessment process for new tenants and is widely
regarded by the members of the profession as a year-long interview.
In recent years, there has been roughly the same number of pupil-
lages as tenancy offers. Pupillage is, thus, the primary point of entry
into the profession. It is also the means by which new recruits are
socialized, that is, provided with the formal and informal training
that enables them to be labeled and accepted as genuine members of
the Bar, as Anderson-Gough, Grey, and Robson (2000, 1155) have
described it for accountants. Pupillage is, thus, essential for reproduc-
ing and managing the Bar’s and chambers’ identity and solidarity,
as well as for defining and imparting the skills required of its mem-
bers (Freidson 1994, 84). Indeed, Harris (2002, 655) suggests that
pupillage is a principal reason that barristers tend to regard them-

selves as the elite.
Much of the structure of pupillage derives from its historical origins.
Pupillage started in the seventeenth century (Lemmings 1990, 1998),
and until the early eighteenth century it was common to apprentice
Bar students as clerks to London attorneys and solicitors. This fol-
lowed secondary schooling, university (often classics), and dining in
the Inns of Court, which ensured that new entrants had the right con-
nections, elite social background, and personal characteristics. During
the nineteenth century, with the rise of industrial capitalism and the
middle class, professions shifted from status professions to occupa-
tional professions, based on the specialization of knowledge and tasks.
In the twentieth century, as part of the move toward formalizing pro-
fessional knowledge, the Bar mandated a university degree, and then
required those who had read another subject to study law for a year
and pass an examination. Pupillage was made compulsory in 1959
and was divided into nonpracticing and practicing six-month periods
in 1965. However, a substantial proportion of pupils, in some years as
many as half, could not find tenancies (Abel 2003, 97–98) and in the
1970s professional committees, practitioners and academics became
vocal in their criticisms of pupillage, especially with regard to cost. In
response, the Bar Council abolished pupillage fees in 1975.
Subsequently, some chambers began offering small pupillage
scholarships, but they still recruited many more pupils than they
anticipated needing tenants. The next major change came in 2003,
amidst the wave of external pressures already mentioned, when the
Bar Council introduced compulsory pupillage payment. All cham-
bers were required to make an award of at least £5,000 for the first
six and an award or guaranteed receipts of £5,000 for the second six
months. As the head of the BSB confirmed, this was introduced, in
part, on fairness grounds to widen access to those from less wealthy
backgrounds who could not afford a year of unpaid pupillage. As a
result, the number of pupillages was drastically reduced.2
This chapter is based on research conducted at the London Bar in
2006 –2008, where Justine Rogers undertook participant observation
among pupils and their pupil supervisors and conducted interviews
with around 15 pupils and 40 practitioners, ranging from the very
junior to the very senior.3 We concentrate here on the data gathered
at the commercial Bar, the more (financially) successful side of the
profession, where the practitioners engage in predominantly commer-
cial work for a wealthy clientele. These chambers are more susceptible
to commercial pressures, but also the recipients of the substantial fees
PUPILLAGE 147
that can be afforded by commercial litigants, especially compared to

those sets that engage in family and criminal work, for example. It is,
therefore, far from representative of the Bar as a whole, but the entire
profession has been subject to the regulatory control of the BSB and
anecdotal evidence suggests that many of the patterns we describe are
found elsewhere.
Recruitment
The BSB Regulations
The priority of the BSB is to ensure that pupillage recruitment meets
the requisite standards of equality, diversity, and openness, via pro-
cesses that are transparent and objective. The regulations state that
discrimination by barristers on the grounds of sex, race, disability,
sexual orientation, and religion or belief is unlawful. They provide
chambers with recruitment guidance to avoid or reduce risks of alle-
gations (direct and indirect) of discrimination. All pupillage vacan-
cies must be advertised on a website designed by the Bar Council,
save in exceptional circumstances. Applications and interviews must
be fair and objective, based upon criteria related to the job. Chambers
are encouraged to self-check by collecting monitoring forms from
their candidates, “with a view to redressing observed discrepancies
and to achieving diversity in Chambers,” as required by and Equality
and Diversity Code introduced by the Bar Council in 2004. They
are also encouraged to use the common online pupillage application
scheme, OLPAS (Online Pupillage Application System) (subsequently
renamed the “Pupillage Portal”).
These regulations and guidelines have had a significant impact on
the recruitment process in the chambers where I undertook field-
work. They advertise their pupillage positions on the compulsory
website. They have all formalized both their paper rounds (where
the initial applications are sifted) and subsequent interview rounds.
Candidates are sorted at each stage according to prespecified ques-
tions and criteria. In one chambers, for example, these are uniformly
applied by practitioners on a recruitment committee, none of whom
is involved in every stage of the process. For the paper round, the
names and ages of the candidates are concealed from the assessors to
serve, as one practitioner said, as a “safeguard against discrimination
on the basis of age, sex and race.” The applications are scored out
of a possible hundred points on the basis of academic background,
grammar and spelling, demonstrable interest in commercial work,
clarity of thought, and general excellence. One practitioner told me
that candidates who would not have previously made it through to

the interview stage now do so because they “tick all the boxes on
the marking sheet.” Borderline cases are considered by a chamber’s
administrator to ensure that they are not cases of inadvertent discrim-
ination. If they are candidates from a minority racial group, they are
generally given an interview. In these chambers approximately 30 out
of 200 candidates are given an interview. In the first round candi-
dates are asked to respond to a question based on a topical issue, to
test their reasoning ability, articulacy, and presentation. A dozen can-
didates are invited back for a second-round interview, which involves
a mock brief, a set of papers sent by a solicitor on the basis of which
a barrister must prepare a court case. This interview is in front of a
different set of panelists, usually of higher seniority.
One senior practitioner stressed how different the system of
recruitment is compared to that of the 1980s: “Getting pupillage
has changed beyond recognition. The procedure is more formal
and stringent, with similar questions to each candidate so that there
can be comparison between them. It used to be a happy-go-lucky
approach.” Another senior practitioner described the way in which,
even in the early 1980s, joining the Bar involved asking a relative or
family friend to introduce you to someone they knew. He explained,
only half-joking, “You would share a drink of scotch and have a chat
in an inconsequential way . . . They would ask questions like, Do you
hunt? Do you play rugby? What does your father do?”
Most practitioners agreed that the stipulations of the BSB have led
to a more objective, transparent recruitment system in their cham-
bers. However, we would suggest that they still, essentially, control
their own recruitment process, in accordance with their own criteria.
A number of them do not use OLPAS, which was described to me
by one pupil supervisor as irrelevant to a thriving, commercial prac-
tice: “There are the criminal and common law sets who are fighting
for survival and who want regulation and their recruitment system
administered by the Bar Council, as opposed to sets like us who have
worked hard at their recruitment procedures and who can’t see why
they should adopt a common system.” Some chambers consider they
get a competitive advantage by conducting their recruitment processes
earlier than OLPAS and before other elite sets. One of the Queen’s
Counsel (QC) told me, “The profession tries to enforce uniformity
through OLPAS, but the top chambers don’t play the game. It’s mar-
ket forces: we pay the best, which means we get the best.”
In fact, chambers can make use of the BSB’s regulations as part
of a broader strategy to recruit the best people, in competition with
PUPILLAGE 149
other sets of chambers and the solicitors’ profession. One QC said,

“We have become more professional in targeting the people we’re
interested in . . . We offer money [now more than £40K/year], adver-
tise better, have a better interview and selection process.” Fairness
and objectivity, in conjunction with a high pupillage award, are pro-
moted as selling points for the chambers. He said, “We are selling
ourselves to [pupils]. We want to give the impression that we are a
serious and professional outfit.” Thus, broader commercial concerns
eclipse the BSB’s regulatory concerns for equality and diversity, and
the ethical values embodied in the regulations are, in turn, promoted
as evidence of professionalism. As Muzio and Ackroyd (2005, 620)
put it in relation to solicitors, management ideas and procedures are
still “subservient to professional conceptions of policy and practice.”
Competition and Skills

Competition for pupillage in the most prestigious commercial cham-
bers is intense. As far as the objective criteria go, few candidates without
straight As at A-level and a first-class honors degree at university make
it through the paper round. As one practitioner explained, “There are
so many first class degree applicants, so we now take [practically] only
first class degree holders.” The twelve successful first-interview appli-
cations I saw in one chambers included eleven male candidates and
ten Oxbridge students. They included combinations of the following:
eleven As at A-level, chairmanship of student-run companies, represen-
tative speaking for the London Boys’ Public Schools, a master’s degree,
publications, mooting experience, and published poetry. In addition to
the academic requirements, the central question on the application is
“Why us?” This can usually be satisfied by having completed a mini-
pupillage, a two to three day visit in that chambers or with one of its
competitors. Despite the intense competition in this chambers, on the
other hand, of the two current pupils, one was non-Oxbridge and had
a second-class degree. It is a set of more complex and less measurable
qualities that determines the final selection and indicates to the selec-
tors who is most likely to succeed at the Bar.
One of these could be said to be the projection of great confidence,
even entitlement, in the face of extreme competition. One practitio-
ner, giving feedback to an unsuccessful candidate over the phone, said
“What you wrote was not punchy and was almost apologetic . . . you
have to believe you’re the best . . . we are looking to be brutal and
exclude people.” One panelist told me that, “people who get through
to interview have perfect marks, a post-graduate degree, mooting expe-
rience and work experience at the UN. They’re hopeless over achievers,
and . . . they’re nice people.” Another panelist emphasized the quality

of the interviewee’s voice: “Part of getting the judge’s empathy relies
on your voice and how it sells your case.” He said that the Oxbridge
tutorial system cultivates a combative, confident style, which means
that the applicant is better equipped to deal with the interview, and
with the judge. One panelist, explaining why they tend to favor nonlaw
graduates, told me that classicists, for example, often possess “more
common sense and creativity . . . They tend to start with common sense
justice and then find the law. This isn’t cultivated in law school.” These
qualities were confirmed by another pupil supervisor, who I overheard
telling his pupil to “start with a common sense justice, a creative basis,
and then find the law, since this is what the judges do.” However, he
did acknowledge, somewhat regretfully, that “only those from certain
wealthy schools can go to universities [that offer classics].”
Another panelist said that one of the female candidates at his
chambers had a very good CV, but could not “present views with any
force.” As he explained,
“We’re looking for someone who is able to argue off the cuff because
a judge might have a completely different idea to them. They must
be able to command the courtroom. They must have presence. Is it a
measurable attribute? Is it fair to have an interview? Does it discrimi-
nate against women? [pause] In an adversarial system, there is a right
and wrong. There is a role for conciliatory attributes, but you need to
turn them on when needed.”
Barristers use a range of metaphors to explain who they are and what
they look for in their recruits. One of the most dominant is the “hired
gun.” One panelist said, for instance, “We’re hired guns. It’s skill-
ful to make your client appear credible, even if you don’t believe it,
because your duty is to fearlessly push for your client.” This personal
authority is required for interactions with clients and opponents as
well as judges. A junior told me that, “[the Commercial Bar] is a
bit egg-heady—you must be self-confident out of proportion to your
work. This is your role.”
Control and Status

A number of the barristers I talked to were reflective and thoughtful
about the qualities of equality, diversity, and fairness promoted by the
BSB’s regulations. Most explicitly support the general goals of equal-
ity and diversity, but regard them as the responsibility of the educa-
tion system as a whole. One practitioner said resignedly, “With a few
PUPILLAGE 151
exceptions, we’re totally Oxbridge.” Recruitment is only shaped by the

BSB’s agenda to the extent that it is compatible with other concerns—
first the economic interests of the set and, second, their sense of the
qualities required by the profession. This does not amount to defiance
of the BSB, since they are aware of its need to promote a particular
image for the profession as a whole. However, they were all clear that
not only academic achievement but also less definable qualities make a
good barrister. It remains within their power to demand and promote
them in their new recruits. As Cohen says, “Power groups seek to
validate and sustain their elite status by claiming to possess rare and
exclusive qualities essential to the society at large” (1981, 1).
Of course, one of the reasons they are able to do this is the intense
competition for pupillage and they can use this, consciously or not, to
enhance their status and identity. One practitioner told an unsuccess-
ful applicant, “Nobody should ever apply; if you look at the numbers
it’s ferociously competitive. The odds are stacked against you.” One
effect of this explicit competition is that it makes both the members
of the chambers and the successful pupils feel part of a very small and
successful elite and, as a consequence, more committed to the cham-
bers and the profession that has valued them so highly. The sense that
only those with special qualities can aspire to pupillage is dissemi-
nated more widely by both successful and unsuccessful applicants, as
they discuss their experiences and feedback among their peers, with
other potential applicants, and their tutors in law schools.
Individual chambers, therefore, still retain substantial control over
their own recruitment. As Abel (1988b, 2003) would put it, they
are maintaining the scarcity of professional recruits leading to the
social closure of their profession, thus retaining their economically
commanding position and social prestige. Abel’s focus is on the pro-
fession’s ongoing battle to maintain its economic privileges in the
face of market competition. He discusses social prestige primarily as
one of the mechanisms used to justify market privilege (1988b, 17),
without recognizing the tensions between public status and private
self-interest identified by Cohen (1981) and the subtle ways in which
they are negotiated. We suggest that during the recruitment process
the Bar is also shaping the professional identity and commitment of
both its new recruits and established practitioners.
Training and Socialization

Pupillage primarily involves the pupil shadowing his or her pupil
supervisor. The main activity of pupils is to sit in silence in the
supervisor’s room as they work. Pupils are given papers to look at

and sometimes asked to prepare drafts, such as an opinion or advice,
which is then marked or discussed. Pupillage is slow paced. The
words used by practitioners to describe how pupils learn were “mir-
roring” or “learning by osmosis.” These long periods may be broken
up with attendance at court or conferences (client meetings) where
they may be asked to take a note. The pupil supervisors I saw took
time to explain what they are doing to their pupils, they often con-
versed with clients on loud speaker so that the pupil could listen in,
and sometimes they gave them mini oral-tests to see whether they
understood a point of law or procedure. The pupils also took part
in social activities at chambers, including the daily tea and coffee
sessions and regular drinks in local wine bars or lunch in the Inns’
dining halls.
The BSB Requirements

The Bar Council and BSB have been active in managing the sub-
stance of pupillage. Their essential objective is to ensure that pupil-
lage serves as a fit for purpose training experience for pupils. The
BSB’s head of Education Standards told me that those purposes are to
assure the government, the clients, and the public of the (consistent)
competence of the profession’s members. The pupil supervisor must
meet certain professional criteria and attend an Inns’ briefing session.
The BSB provides chambers with an updated version of documents
relating to pupillage requirements each year, which covers areas such
as registration, pupil supervisors, changes in pupillage, assessment,
and appraisals. All chambers must have a pupillage policy document
that outlines the types of pupillages on offer, choice and number of
pupils, roles and duties of pupils and their supervisors, finance avail-
able, the pattern of pupillage, the method for fairly distributing work
amongst them, assessment and grievance procedures, and the policy
regarding recruitment of tenants and pupils who are not taken on as
tenants. All chambers are monitored every three years by the pupil-
lage review panels to ensure compliance with the Code of Conduct
and the Equality and Diversity Code and to promote good practice
in pupillage.
Both pupils and pupil supervisors are responsible for following the
curriculum of the pupillage, in the form of a check list. This is in five
parts: four that make up the common core and one devised by the
specialist Bar associations tailored to that area of legal practice. The
pupil supervisor has to sign and date the check list. It must be retained
by chambers for a minimum period of three years and produced when
PUPILLAGE 153
requested by the Bar Council. The BSB has also stipulated that each
pupil must attend an Advocacy Training course and an Advice to
Counsel course, both of which are provided by the Inns of Court and
the Circuits.
Several practitioners agreed that the BSB regulations and the Bar
Council guidelines have, combined with other social developments,
led to a more fair, structured, and educational pupillage. One senior
barrister told me that pupillage is now “about having a consistent
structure with a pupil master rather than doing work for various
members of chambers; pupillage is about training, not about being
cannon fodder.” From time to time pupil supervisors talk to their
pupils in terms of their training. Another senior said that taking on
smaller numbers of pupils with a view to training them for tenancy
instead of taking on “large numbers of pupils as useful-ish cheap
labor” was a result of the Bar Council and the “general climate.”
For him, the introduction of compulsory payment for pupils was the
most “ground-breaking” change in terms of creating a more equal,
unexploitative relationship between pupil and pupil supervisor. He
said, “There’s nothing [problematic] to see anymore. We’re good to
our pupils.”
However, many of the other requirements are treated with con-
tempt. Several pupil supervisors told me that the compulsory Inns’
training session (a single night) was poor. One said, it was “laugh-
able . . . you’re automatically eligible (to become a pupil supervisor)
unless you’ve cocked up.” In terms of content, “it’s political correct-
ness and the bleeding obvious. For example, they tell you not to have
an affair with your pupil, not to give them too much photocopying,
not too much tea-making, not to favor one pupil, that is it. It is more
about avoiding claims of discrimination or ill-treatment than incul-
cating an idea of what the role of the pupil supervisor is.” The check
lists were generally described as a hassle and awkward to use. One
tenant said they were unnecessary, especially in sets like his “where
the pupil supervisors are so good.”
Pupils are clearly aware of the attitude of the barristers in their
chambers and, themselves, find the check lists infantile and embar-
rassing. They find formal feedback less credible than informal
cues on the job and see it, one junior tenant said, as an example
of the “dumbing down” prevalent in the Bar Vocational Course.
Standardized training, formal feedback, and positive praise are
associated with lower intellectual standards. One junior tenant said
that learning to survive without praise or validation is part of the
job of being a barrister. Many practitioners described Bar Council
monitoring as a myth. This, along with the training night and the
check list are widely regarded as examples of the Bar Council’s regu-
lation for the sake of regulation, stemming from its need to pander
to the government. One QC said that it was difficult for the Bar
Council to gain access to the strange, unincorporated entity, which
is chambers.
A sense is, thus, imparted to pupils, and reinforced among barris-
ters, that they are the best guardians of their own professional stan-
dards, training procedures, and entry requirements. By denigrating
the requirements and the standards laid down by an external body
they affirm their own guardianship of the indefinable and exclusive
qualities required of those aspiring to professional status.
Chambers’ Control
The same impression is reinforced by internal exercises provided for
pupils at one of the chambers in which I conducted research. These
concentrate on advocacy and courtroom skills. These were only intro-
duced as pupillage became more regulated, but their rationale is to
evaluate the likely performance of the pupil in court. They are very
much geared to inculcate respect for the judge and the courtroom
skills and procedures that form the most prized expertise of the Bar.
These exercises are taken very seriously. One of the QCs in cham-
bers acts as a judge, while two juniors serve as assessors. The pupil
must make various applications to a purposefully irritable judge. The
QC told me afterwards, “If you can’t handle this exercise, you won’t
survive; the judge will push you up against the ropes if he senses
unconfidence.” The feedback is given to the pupil straight away and
is rigorous. One practitioner explained that they do not employ the
less rigorous method set out in the Inns’ training courses, “because
it’s not practical enough and it’s targeted to those without ability.”
Commercial concerns also dominate chambers’ management of
the pupillage process. One practitioner told me, “pupillage is a big
investment. We want someone who will bring in the money. It’s self-
interest.” This comes along with broader changes in the size and man-
ageability of chambers. A QC said, “The main factor driving a more
structured, formal approach to pupillage and to treating pupils well is
commerce. Having more formal work relationships makes a growing
set of chambers more manageable; it gives us more scope for dealing
with people.”
Several practitioners also commented to me on the extent to which
pupillage is a drain on the time and resources of the supervisors and,
hence, of chambers. One said that, “from a pupil master’s point of
PUPILLAGE 155
view, [a pupil] is an imposition.” Pupil supervisors are self-employed,

so, “one hour marking a pupil’s work is one less to bill. If it were
an organization, it would be part of the overheads.” They are, thus,
prepared to make personal economic sacrifices to ensure good qual-
ity in the next generation of barristers. It is clear that they do not
believe adequate training can be provided by externally run courses.
Specialist skills and dispositions can only be learnt, they consider, by
a pupil undertaking this type of training, and can only be judged by
the practitioners in their chambers. Pupils, themselves, are acutely
aware of these dynamics. They told me that they know they are being
paid for a role that is not practically helpful, in the way that a training
contract in a solicitor’s firm is. This serves to reinforce their sense of
privilege and commitment.
Hierarchy
Another of the functions that pupillage performs is to integrate pupils
into the internal hierarchy of chambers and, by extension, into that
of the Bar as a whole. All barristers are known and distinguished
by their seniority, measured in terms of years of call, and numerous
status markers distinguish those who have achieved the elevated rank
of QC. The centrality of chambers hierarchy to the pupillage experi-
ence is most clearly played out in the tea/coffee room, which is an
important space for pupils and practitioners in most commercial sets.
At the sessions I attended it was obvious that there were unwritten
rules about whose voices are privileged, what they can speak about,
and when. The seniors are able to speak the most freely. The others
must respond. A junior told me that during pupillage “you learn that
coffee [the morning break] is for juniors and tea [afternoon] is for
seniors.” Only certain topics are discussed: interesting cases, stories
and jokes about solicitors and judges, and a narrow range of other
social or political topics. Psychological affinities, as Mills (1956)
says, will soon manifest themselves in linguistic nuances, manner of
speech, dress, bodily movements, jokes and ideas, as well as in gossip,
and in the tracing of mutual friends. “All of this makes it possible for
them to say of one another: He is, of course, one of us” (Cohen 1981,
228, referring to Mills [1956], 283). More senior practitioners can
share knowledge, experiences, and, importantly, their frustrations.
One told me that coffee “would look ridiculous, sexist or offensive to
outsiders. But it’s about letting off steam.” Pupils learn quickly that
juniors are not allowed to use coffee/tea in the same way. As a junior
said, one of the lessons she learned was, “to talk only when you have
interesting cases to talk about.” However, pupils learn that there is a

network of people in chambers who can supply them with support in
the future.
One of the functions of these gatherings is to facilitate the sharing
of knowledge and expertise. It is here that barristers can learn about
the latest cases that are being heard in court, the latest judicial pro-
nouncements, who might be most up-to-date on a particular topic,
and what a judge might be like in court. As one of the juniors told me,
“It’s very useful. People will raise their problems [which are] generally
not a question of law, but some horrible procedural issue. So you pick
up from people with experience and you pick up a pattern, you pick
up that someone always talks about certain issues, subjects or courts
so you know who to approach about them.” Similar functions are per-
formed by the physical layout of the Inns of Court, which means that
practitioners meet and socialize easily, often dining together in hall or
meeting for drinks after work. Thus, the barristers’ special access to the
most up-to-date knowledge, particularly of procedural issues, is rein-
forced, and pupils, maybe unconsciously, learn to respect this privilege.
Although they must wait until they deserve the reward (real and sym-
bolic) of talking at tea, this process is one of the means by which they
internalize a respect for the hierarchy at the Bar and for the expertise
of their peers. Again, the emphasis on a hierarchy of skills and expertise
reinforces the idea that barristers have a specialist knowledge, which
continues to be developed only through long years of practice.
Mystique
Cohen (1981, 1) suggests that in liberal, formally egalitarian systems
the exclusive qualities claimed by elites “tend to be defined in vague
and ambiguous terms and objectified in mysterious, non-utilitarian
symbols, making up what amounts to a mystique of excellence.”
Although most of the symbols of the Bar’s elite status are unam-
biguous and the qualities it demands and fosters are relatively clear,
there is still a certain mystique about the pupillage process, which, we
would suggest, fosters a sense of exclusivity and excellence.
None of the practitioners or pupils described pupillage in terms
that wholly concerned the acquisition of either legal or technical
skills. Pupillage, as one pupil said,
“is about fitting in, being pleasant, not looking or sounding out of
place, to behave appropriately and to come across bright and on top of
things. When you’re noticed make sure you’re doing something good
PUPILLAGE 157
and clever. It’s about being aware of when you’re being assessed and
not assessed. You also have to get on with your supervisors. They’re
doing a stressful job and you’re in the way, so you’ve got to be able to
handle that and be good company.”
Its other important function, he said, is to “help you to know how

to look things up in books, the right tone to address people, things
courts like, the sorts of arguments that work, what they’re supposed
to look and sound like.” He also thought that barristers, socialized
in this way, were distinctly different from city solicitors and City of
London management consultants: “[Commercial] barristers, in par-
ticular, must be self-confident out of proportion to the work. That is
their role.”
Pupillage remains a form of training that distinguishes barristers
from solicitors, a process during which they also affirm that their
expertise transcends commercial values. As one pupil supervisor said,
it is a word that is “heavy with history . . . it’s a special sort of respon-
sibility that solicitors would never have.” For pupils, it is not just a
year-long interview, but a tie to a bygone era: “The feel of pupillage is
just so uncomfortable and fundamentally unpleasant. It’s a process that
wouldn’t have evolved in any other country. It’s like first day of pub-
lic school boarding—knowing you’re at the bottom of the hierarchy.”
Pupillage is a form of socialization that effectively unites the profes-
sion, in part because it is experienced, or at least explained, in terms
of a trial or an initiation ritual. One pupil said that it’s “difficult and
unpleasant,” like “a cross country run with a porcelain vase in a sealed
box that you have to carry and you can only open after you finish—and
for all you know you broke the vase on day one.” Although most of the
pupils I talked to at length stressed that they enjoyed their pupillage
and had not had the horrific experiences of some of their friends, their
experiences still gave them stories to share later. Pupillage is a shared
war story, which makes barristers feel unique. It is also significant that
many of the pupils and practitioners want this awkward, mystical form
of socialization to be maintained, rather than displaced by the Bar
Council’s interventions. As one pupil said, “You need to watch some-
one day in and day out to know who to aspire to.”
The intense discipline of pupillage means that the values of the
Bar—of being (and being seen as) clever, confident, polite, well-
presented, and respectful of the hierarchy of chambers and the pro-
fession—are readily internalized by the pupils. More than that, it
inculcates a sense of enormous achievement and superiority in suc-
cessful pupils and tenants over the many others they have competed
against. But when they achieve their goal, they still have the sense
that they have only just begun to acquire the set of very specialist
skills needed for professional practice—skills that they will continue
to refine over the long years ahead of them in chambers.
Conclusion
A new managerial ethos pervades the Bar and is particularly mani-
fest in the structure and organization of pupillage. Under pressure
from government scrutiny, reviews and threats of greater regulation,
the BSB has promulgated a myriad of regulations, standards, require-
ments, checklists, and monitoring procedures in an attempt to prove
to a powerful (government) audience that the Bar fulfils what are now
deemed to be the attributes of a modern profession. On the face of it,
these pressures and regulations and the imposition of external stan-
dards and requirements have significantly decreased the amount of
control exercised by individual chambers over their recruitment and
training processes. This has led scholars such as Richard Abel to sup-
pose that, like other professions, the Bar has become more manage-
rial and less professional. Forcing barristers to comply with the same,
externally determined standards as other professions and occupational
groups must tend, it has been hypothesized, to undermine profes-
sional status, the control over knowledge and the mystique of special
skills, all of which contribute to the elitism of the professions.
In this chapter we have described the myriad ways in which, despite
these new requirements and controls, the pupillage process contin-
ues to reinforce the barristers’ sense that they are selecting potential
recruits with particular qualities and inculcating exclusive, specialist
skills during the training process—skills that their recruits could not
acquire in any other context. The fact of intense competition, which
is emphasized during all stages of the process, promotes the image of
an elite with rare qualities, while the emphasis on advocacy reinforces
the distinctive skills claimed by the profession, particularly distin-
guishing them from solicitors, their nearest rivals. At the same time,
their condescending attitude to the external requirements (pander-
ing to the government) emphasizes the extent to which the profes-
sion itself is, and considers that it must remain, in control of its own
recruitment and training. The integration of pupils into the hierarchy
of chambers, which itself reflects the wider hierarchies of the profes-
sion, also fosters a sense of their participation in and commitment to
a close and closed community.
PUPILLAGE 159
Although this chapter has concentrated on the ways in which a

sense of status, exclusivity, specialist knowledge, and community are
fostered within chambers and transmitted to pupils, these are all ideas
that are liable to be transmitted to the wider society in a number of
ways: a conviction that they possess a set of specialist professional
skills necessarily affects a barrister’s interactions with his clients, the
way he or she presents an image to the world at large, and also the
attitudes of the higher courts judges (almost all former barristers)
toward those who appear as advocates before them.
Maybe the strongest evidence for the continuing elite status
enjoyed by the Bar was given by two of the pupils. When asked why
they had applied to the Bar, and this chambers, both said that they
were lured by the symbolic rewards dangled by the Inns of Court,
ideas of status, fame, and glamor, even more than the commercial
reputation of the chambers. One said, it was “the money, the glam-
our and the prospect of high profile cases, fame” that attracted him.
The other said, “Once you’ve decided you’re not going to do some-
thing you enjoy, then the next consideration is status. It’s embar-
rassing to admit, but you want to be taken seriously; and barristers
get taken seriously, out of all proportion to their importance.”
As Cohen (1981) describes, elite groups face the challenge of how
to maintain exclusivity, controlling and restricting their numbers,
while also retaining status in the eyes of the general public, accepted
as performing an important social role. These dynamics are more
complex and subtle than Abel’s (2003) analysis in terms of what he
calls their “market control” (i.e., control over the market for their
services) might suggest. Professional skills, expertise, and values are
at the heart of them, alongside the sense of superiority and impor-
tance inculcated in new recruits as they are drawn into the struc-
tures and hierarchies of the profession. This chapter has indicated
the ways in which these are maintained, at least for now, in the face
of reforms designed explicitly to undermine exclusivity and privilege
at the Bar.
Notes
1. The solicitors are by far the larger profession. There are more than
one hundred thousand solicitors in England and Wales, compared to
15 thousand barristers.
2. The number of pupillages on offer fell by more than a third, from
850 to 598, between 2000 and 2004.
3. The “I” of the subsequent sections, therefore, refers to Justine Rogers.
References
Abel, Richard L . 1988a. “England and Wales: A comparison of the profes-
sional projects of barristers and solicitors.” In The Common Law World,
edited by Richard Abel and Philip Lewis, pp. 23–75. Berkeley, CA:
University of California Press.
———. 1988b. The Legal Profession in England and Wales. Oxford:
Blackwell.
———. 2000. “In the name of the client: The service ethic in two profes-
sional service firms.” Human Relations 53: 1151–1174.
———. 2003. English Lawyers between Market and State: The Politics of
Professionalism. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Burrage, Michael. 1997. “Ms Thatcher against the ‘little republics’: Ideology,
precedents and reactions.” In Lawyers and the Rise of Western Political
Liberalism, edited by Terence C. Halliday and Lucien Karpik, 125–166.
Oxford: Clarendon.
Dramaturgy of Power in Modern African Society. Berkeley, CA: University
Dent, Mike, and Stephen M. Whitehead. 2002. “Configuring the ‘new’ pro-
fessional.” In Managing Professional Identities, edited by Mike Dent and
Stephen Whitehead. London: Routledge.
Flood, John. 1989. “Megalaw in the UK: Professionalism or corporatism? A
preliminary report.” Indiana Law Journal 64: 569–592.
Freidson, Eliot. 1994. Professionalism Reborn: Theory, Prophecy and Policy.
Cambridge: Polity.
———. 2001. Professionalism: The Third Logic. Chicago: University of
Chicago Press.
Hanlon, Gerard. 1997. “A profession in transition?—Lawyers, the market
and significant others.” Modern Law Review 60: 798–822.
Harris, Lloyd C. 2002. “The emotional labour of barristers: An explora-
tion of emotional labour by status professionals.” Journal of Management
Studies 39: 583–584.
Lee, Robert G. 1992. “From Profession to Business: The Rise and Rise of
the City Law Firm.” Journal of Law and Society 19: 31–48.
Lemmings, David. 1990. Gentlemen and Barristers: The Inns of Court and
the English Bar, 1680–1730. Oxford: Clarendon.
———. 1998. “Blackstone and law reform by education: Preparation for
the Bar and lawyerly culture in eighteenth-century England.” Law and
History Review 16: 211–235.
Mills, Charles Wright. 1956. The Power Elite. New York: Oxford University
Press
Muzio, Daniel, and Stephen Ackroyd. 2005. “On the consequences of defen-
sive professionalism: Recent changes in the legal labour process.” Journal
of Law and Society 32: 615–642.
PUPILLAGE 161
Other Documents
Documents produced and maintained by the Bar Standards Board:
Equality and Diversity Code for the Bar (introduced in 2004).
Guidelines for Chambers and Pupillage Training Organisations (introduced
in 2006 and revised in 2009).
Pupillage Checklist (introduced in 2006 and revised annually).
Current versions of all documents can be found at: www.barstandardsboard.
org.uk.
Clementi, David C. 2004. “Review of the regulatory framework for legal
services in england and wales. Final report.” London: Department for
Constitutional Affairs (http://webarchive.nationalarchives.gov.uk/+/
http://www.legal-services-review.org.uk/content/report/index.htm)
[August 6, 2012].
CH A P T ER 7
Becoming Elite: Exclusion, Excellence,

and Collective Identity in Ireland’s
Top Fee-Paying Schools
Aline Courtois
When we leave Castlerock, most of us will go on five-grand-a-term

private colleges, where we’ll be given qualifications without having
to sit exams. We’ll all get jobs through people we share a shower with
at the rugby clubs we play for. We’ll keep on scoring the birds . . . We
all have big futures to look forward to, because we are the élite.
Ross O’Carroll Kelly in Howard (2004)
Introduction
Against the backdrop of the present economic crisis, the connections
among various spheres of influence in Ireland have become the object
of much criticism. Recent corruption scandals have brought to the
forefront what is sometimes viewed as a collusion of political and
business interests, leading to an increased concentration of wealth
and power in the hands of a small minority (Allen 2007; Cooper
2009; O’Toole 2009; Ross 2009). The Irish business landscape is
indeed characterized by high levels of interlocked directorships, and
the political and business worlds are brought into close contact by
numerous consultative corporate bodies, frequent crossovers from one
sphere to the other, and consensus on the neoliberal ideology. These
connections are often prolonged in social life: high-profile social
events and exclusive golf clubs allow political, corporate, and social
elites, old wealth and new wealth, to mingle informally. The terms
164 ALINE COURTOIS
“Golden Circle” or “Old Boys Network”—evocative of power elite

theories (e.g., Mills 1956; Useem 1984)—have been coined recently
in the media in reference to a core group of Irish corporate leaders
and politicians. However, the part played by education in the cohe-
siveness and solidarity of Irish elites has been left largely unexplored.
This is partly due to the fact that there is no distinct elite third-level
institution in Ireland, and as a result institutional mechanisms of elite
reproduction are less visible than in some other countries such as
France or the United Kingdom. Besides, corporate biographies and
business literature praise the hard-working self-made man, and the
role played by family and educational background in their success is
largely played down. Again in contrast with other countries, Ireland’s
political leadership is not characterized by particular patterns of edu-
cation and at first glance the link between fee-paying education and
political leadership, prestige, and/or wealth seems rather tenuous.
However, an examination of Who’s Who in Ireland: The Influential
Irish (Phelan 2006) provides a different insight. This register includes
1,390 entries representing a wide array of elites across the political,
economic, and social spheres. An analysis of these entries shows that
1,051 people were educated in identifiable Irish schools, out of which
395, namely 38 percent, went to fee-paying schools. This propor-
tion is particularly striking when one considers that in 2007, only 8
percent of all secondary school students were registered in fee-paying
schools, and 6 percent in the early 1990s, before the economic boom.
When the entries are divided up in categories, it emerges that among
the politicians educated at identifiable Irish schools only 18 percent
are former students of fee-paying schools. This is a relatively low pro-
portion, consistent with the perception that fee-paying education
does not play a significant role in the formation of political elites in
Ireland. However, the proportion of former students of fee-paying
schools is 49 percent for business people and 62 percent for higher
professionals (legal and medical elites, and top architects). This sug-
gests that there is indeed a significant correlation between private,
fee-paying education and occupation of elite positions.
In the words of Cookson and Persell, the central question in stud-
ies of elite schools should not be “if” they contribute to inequality, but
“how” they do it (1985, 18). In this spirit, the next task is to examine
in what ways fee-paying schools contribute to elite reproduction.
Although it is acknowledged that fee-paying schools are not the
only route to wealth and power, their recruitment processes—who
they select, and equally importantly, who they exclude—deserve a
close examination and are the object of the first section. The next
BECOMING ELITE 165
section examines how an emphasis on collective spirit and loyalty to

the school contributes to the construction of a collective elite identity,
which may be the basis for class-wide solidarity. The final section
explores issues of social and cultural capital, and how they not only
equip students with skills that will enable them to effectively access
elite positions, but also, equally importantly, encourage them to envi-
sion themselves as elites.
Fee-Paying Schools and Elite Schools in Ireland

Before going further, it is necessary to define what constitutes an
elite school in the Irish context. There are 58 fee-paying schools in
Ireland today, and although they differ as a group from the other
postprimary schools (wider curricular and extracurricular offers, bet-
ter facilities, smaller teacher/pupil ratio, boarding facilities for 27 of
them, location in privileged areas), they are not equally prestigious,
and not all of them would qualify as an elite school. For instance,
some Protestant schools cater for Protestant families of relatively
modest means, whose fees are partly subsidized by a special govern-
ment fund for religious minorities.
Definitions of what constitutes an elite school are often vague and
elusive, as discussed by Gaztambide-Fernández (2009b). It is however
crucial to identify and isolate elite schools from the broader private
education sector. At the top of the fee-paying school hierarchy, three
superelite schools can be isolated, which combine the following char-
acteristics: boarding tradition, high fees, high number of past pupils in
the Who’s Who, and top positions in the annual league tables. All three
schools are Catholic schools for boys only, which is consistent with the
present power balance in Irish society. Another five schools can be char-
acterized as elite schools. These are also in many ways elitist, but tend
to cater for narrower sections of the elites or for a more local market in
comparison to the first group. These are followed by sub-elite schools,
whose clientele is less wealthy, but which offer an elite-style education
to socially ambitious middle-class families. The remaining are other fee-
paying schools and although they do also play a part in educational
inequality, they are of lesser concern to the present study.
The Recruitment Process:

Selection and Exclusion
Boarding fees in the leading British public schools sometimes exceed
30 thousand euro. The fees charged by Irish fee-paying schools are
166 ALINE COURTOIS
lower and vary widely, but are still considerable in some cases: for
tuition and boarding in the 2010–2011 academic year, five schools
charged over 15 thousand and two schools charged over 20 thou-
sand euro. Such schools are indeed beyond the reach of most Irish
families.
Ability to pay the fees, knowledge of the admission process, and,
in the case of day schools, residence in privileged areas, constitute
the first prerequisites to admission to elite schools. All fee-paying
schools—with the exception of the rare few, which are geared toward
the international market—share a common feature: they give prefer-
ence, if not automatic admission, to former students’ children and
current students’ siblings. This indicates a high level of loyalty to the
schools’ existing clientele over and above meritocratic criteria.
Thus, in several sub-elite and elite schools, applicants are not
interviewed: once the schools have automatically accepted students
with family connections to the school, they allocate remaining places
according to the date when the application was submitted—some-
times as early as the child’s birth. This particularity of the system
favors children, whose parents are aware of fee-paying schools and
their admission processes, and who tend to be former students of
fee-paying schools themselves. It also obscures the fact that the pool
of applicants is socially homogeneous anyway, and reinforces the
school’s symbolic power: they have maintained prominent positions
in league tables, in spite of not operating interviews or ability-based
entrance examinations.1
A particular elite school, which is reputed for its academic excellence,
has recently put in place a lottery system to select students for inter-
views. A former student mentioned his sister’s disappointment when
her son was rejected: his father was not a past pupil of the school, and
there was no uncle rule, so he could not apply for automatic admis-
sion and his name was not picked in the lottery. Convinced that her
son was eminently suitable, the mother was devastated. Indeed, some
schools have waiting lists extending far beyond their capacities—in
spite of the present economic downturn—and have considerable lati-
tude in deciding who to accept or exclude. This example shows that
money alone cannot buy a child a place.
All superelite and a number of elite schools interview all appli-
cants with no prior connection to the school. In the words of the
principals, this allows the staff to determine whether or not the child
would fit in, be suitable, be happy or flourish in the school, and
whether or not the child and his or her family share the values of the
school. For instance, the principal of an elite school is attentive to
BECOMING ELITE 167
the child’s body language, the way he or she sits (“are we slumped
in the chair . . . ”), and whether or not he or she makes “eye contact.”
She argues these indicate the child’s willingness to join the school.
According to Bourdieu (1989) and Bourdieu and Passeron (1970) the
school system reproduces inequality through the use of symbolic vio-
lence, namely a form of symbolic domination, which validates privilege
and is operated without the conscious knowledge of its agents. Thus,
although staff members use the language of psychology to rational-
ize their choices, they may be referring to class markers. Terms such
as “sociable,” “polite,” and “assertive,” as well as the body hexis the
staff is attentive to, can all be related to cultural privilege, character-
izing the dominant classes.
Two superelite schools (small-sized, all-boarding schools) have even
stricter screening processes. In one of them, the young applicants are
invited to spend a day playing games and having fun under the watchful
eye of the selection committee, and are selected, or excluded, accord-
ing to their behavior and the way they interact with their peers:
So a boy who would come in that day and maybe sit in a corner or sit
alone and not make friends, well that’s telling us that boy is not going
to, you know, maybe be suitable here. A boy likewise who’s extremely
active, and boisterous, and maybe shouting and breaking things, well,
he wouldn’t be suitable. (Vice-principal, Superelite school)
In the other superelite school, where the observation period extends

over a whole weekend, the child’s personality is evaluated:
The boy who is not capable of standing up for himself in any situation,
negative or aggressive situation, is going to have a difficult time in a
boarding school. That sort kind of personality, very fine, but quiet,
somewhat reserved you know, and not ready for the rumble and tum-
ble of boarding school. (Former principal, Superelite school)
Thus, the ideal candidate can be seen to be a boy who is well-mannered

and respectful of others, but also assertive and strong-willed, and
above all sociable. Furthermore, in these two schools, children are
assessed not only individually but also as components in a harmo-
nious group: as we will see below, building friendships and a sense
of mutual loyalty between students is central to the elite schooling
experience.
Another way into Ireland’s prestigious schools is the scholarship.
Secondary schools—fee-paying or not—are private, and therefore,
168 ALINE COURTOIS
not necessarily associated with a national project of elite formation.2

There is no centralized scholarship system in place, and school poli-
cies in terms of funding underprivileged students vary widely. Some
schools favor complete social closure and have no scholarship system in
place. The principal of one such school explains it would not be possi-
ble to implement a scholarship scheme in a girls’ school, because girls
are more clued into differences in accents and dress, and the young
scholars would feel different for this reason. Another school principal
confessed off the record that parents would oppose such a scheme as
they would not want their children to mix with working-class chil-
dren. Generally speaking, the inclusion of working-class children is
viewed as problematic, not only for the school, but also for the schol-
ars, who might feel uncomfortable and eventually be destroyed—as if
class barriers were indeed impassable, even in childhood.
In some schools, scholarships are reserved to members of the
school’s community. In a sub-elite school for boys, there is no for-
mal scholarship system, but former students are welcome to approach
the school if they want their child to attend it but cannot afford the
fees: fee reductions are awarded on a case-by-case basis. Although the
principal describes his school as atypical in the sense that it is open
to first generation fee-paying families—namely new wealth, as far as
bursaries are concerned—it operates as a closed shop.
In contrast, toward the top of the fee-paying school hierarchy, a
small number of schools award scholarships to disadvantaged children,
who are recommended to the school by charity organizations or social
services. In one superelite school, scholars are supposedly selected
according to their potential and character. Bourdieu (1979) writes that
the ideology of natural talent or gift is in fact a transmutation of class-
related cultural privilege. Indeed, as the conversation with the former
principal of one of the superelite schools (cited above, p. 167) went on,
it appeared that this notion of potential concealed, again, certain social
and cultural skills associated with class-based distinctions—children
from disadvantaged backgrounds being pictured as follows:
The most difficult is to assess whether this boy from a very rough crim-
inal uncultured background is going to be able to settle socially you
see, not just academically—if he got the scholarship it means he’s good
academically, and again whether the others will integrate him. His
accent is pretty rough, okay, his language is pretty crude, okay, you see,
and he’s never had a knife and fork to eat with you know, there are all
sorts of minor little problems, and whether those can be resolved easily
is what we have to try and assess. (Former principal, Superelite school)
BECOMING ELITE 169
Students from underprivileged backgrounds, selected according to this

process, are unlikely to be very different from the school’s traditional
clientele. In Bourdieu’s terminology, their families might lack eco-
nomic capital, but still be similar in terms of social and cultural capital.
In comparison, the scholarship program in another superelite school
is a well-meant attempt to insert children from untypical backgrounds
into the main student body. The scheme administrator is adamant that
the purpose of the scheme is not to track potential star students:
We don’t want to convert these children into nice middle-class boys,

you know what I mean, we’re not trying to change them we’re try-
ing to change ourselves here . . . This is not charity. This is not about
rescuing a few kids from poverty and changing their lives. (Scheme
administrator, Superelite school)
With very few exceptions, school representatives are reluctant to

admit that their schools are elitist, or that their selection process is
class-based. However, when it comes to discussing the insertion of
students from lower-class backgrounds, interviewees concede that
their schools are a different world, and that scholars are in many ways
unprepared for this experience:
A family coming from Blandchardstown3 to the school cannot be treated

the same as a family where there is a tradition of boarding, where they
might have been other brothers who came in the past, or where the
father came here. But even where there is a certain affluence, because
it’s easy for them to come in, and to accept this place as it is because it’s
part of their world. But if you’re coming from Blandchardstown it’s not
part of your world. (Scheme administrator, Superelite school)
According to the same person, the integration of these children is a

difficult process, and they need constant support to adapt to their new
world. Homesick and unable to adapt to the structure of the board-
ing school—according to the administrator, but perhaps also intimi-
dated by the symbolic violence exerted involuntarily by his wealthier
peers—one such scholar had left the school after two weeks.
Selective Isolation and the Construction

of a Collective Elite Identity
As a result of these selective admission policies and processes, the
population of fee-paying schools tends to be socially homogeneous,
170 ALINE COURTOIS
and this homogeneity is reinforced by family connections to the

school and family ties among students themselves.
Even in these schools, which do not interview first-year applicants,
children who apply for their second or any subsequent year are inter-
viewed systematically. This suggests that the first year in the school
is an important phase of adaptation and community building, at the
end of which students have effectively socialized into the school, have
absorbed its ethos and values, and have developed, in Bourdieu’s
terms, an esprit de corps (cf. Bourdieu [1989]). This makes it more dif-
ficult for students who did not go through this process to be deemed
compatible with the group produced.
The proportion of pupils with family connections to the school var-
ies and cannot be established with certainty. In one superelite school,
the vice-principal estimates it at 30 or 40 percent. The principal of a
sub-elite school is evasive as to what that proportion might be, but
jokingly characterizes her school as “incestuous.” In another school
in this category, where this proportion is supposedly 30–35 percent,
one of the corridors is decorated with rugby cup team photographs
dating back as far as the 1920s. Showing a recent team photograph,
the principal pointed out multiple connections between pupils across
various generations, the school being the focal point of these connec-
tions: several boys had brothers in the school, several had fathers who
had attended the school, one had both a father and a grandfather, one
was the son of the architect who had designed an extension to the
building, one was baptized by the principal himself, and so on.
Therefore, on their first day at school, children can find they have
a lot in common with their peers. Gaztambide-Fernández writes that
“the selectivity of an elite boarding school is crucial to the way students
who are admitted begin to identify themselves as elite” (2009a, 44).
It is the first step in the construction of a collective elite identity and
in some cases may be enhanced by the length and strenuousness of
the selection process. The consciousness of being part of a separate
and a superior group is reinforced by the fact that schools are akin to
microcosms, which seem to be sealed from the outside world. These
schools tend to be hidden behind high walls and separated from the
community by gates and long driveways, making them invisible from
the outside. The notion of a closed world is taken to the extreme in
boarding schools. Some of these are very isolated and secluded, inac-
cessible by public transport, and the term “cloistered élite” (Wakeford
1969) comes to mind.
Boarding schools have moved away from the total institution model
described by Goffman (1969) and are more associated with boarding
BECOMING ELITE 171
school education as described by Wakeford (1969) and Duffel (2000).

Isolating children from their parents and the corruption of city life at
a crucial time in their development was then considered as the best
way to shape them into ideal human types. Nowadays, children are no
longer isolated from their families. However, they have very limited
contact with other social environments than their own. The former
principal of a superelite school is aware of this isolation from the com-
munity, the social segregation it represents, and the legitimacy crisis
it might create:
I said unless in the year 2020 most of our pupils are coming from the
national school in [nearby town], we don’t have a future . . . I don’t
think that that can be prolonged, because it’s sociologically unaccept-
able to people, several thousand living at our gates, that there is a
school here that doesn’t welcome them, you know. (Former principal,
Superelite school)
Former students of such schools readily admit that they seldom had
contact with children from lower social backgrounds during their
school years. Even in areas where different types of schools coexist,
fee-paying school students lead separate lives. One former elite school
student explains that there were three girls’ schools in the immediate
vicinity, two fee-paying and one non–fee-paying, and that the boys
in his class would chat up their sisters’ classmates in the fee-paying
schools, but wouldn’t mix at all with those girls in the non–fee-paying
school. It is not uncommon that such exclusionary practices are pro-
longed into adult life. Students from the same school tend to keep
together in university and exclude outsiders:
I remember a couple of people because they had a hard time and they’re
still saying today they hated UCD when they first went, because all the
people from private schools would hang out together, really made big
gangs of friends, here they are coming from Donegal or Sligo, Mayo
or whatever, totally intimidating. Trying to meet new people and then
they see these gangs, Southside Dublin, you know, private schools
hanging out together and very hard to infiltrate and get in there. (Past
pupil, Sub-elite school)
As part of charitable initiatives, elite students may coach local chil-

dren for team sports or work for charities. These encounters with the
social other are highly supervised by school staff, and place students
in a symbolically dominant position. Former students’ comments on
such activities suggest that they might even have enhanced their sense
172 ALINE COURTOIS
of social boundaries, by making them aware of differences rather than

bringing them closer.
Social sameness, cultivated by this collectivism, contributes to
teaching children from the same privileged background to know,
recognize, and appreciate each other, to select appropriate friends,
spouses, or business partners in adult life. Social and cultural sameness
thus offers the conditions for an experience of the school as a “social
paradise” (Bourdieu 1989, 257), where natural affinities appear as
miraculous, and where students can “fall in love with themselves.”
Boarding school brochures make “friendships for life” a sell-
ing point, and friendship is indeed often prolonged into adult life.
Attending such a school is a common experience to be cherished in
adult life, and shared with peers. Even interviewees who say they did
not enjoy their time at school have kept friends from their school
days. Past pupils who enjoyed their experience most, and who are
the most appreciative of their schools, are often those who enjoyed
a high-status position such as prefect or team captain. These have
kept close ties with many of their school friends; for example, all of
Alison’s closest friends are her “old school friends.”
This is in no small measure due to schools’ constant preoccupation
with community building. The terms “community” and even “family”
are used recurrently by school principals to describe their schools. Staff
actively encourages and sometimes monitors the socialization process:
in one superelite school, the younger boys share three-bed alcoves and
a big communal space in their dormitory, to ensure that they “make
friends” (Vice-principal, Superelite school). Particular rituals reinforce
the uniqueness of the school and students are made aware of the past
(traditions, respect for seniority, knowledge of the school’s history and
cult of its founders, school slang, school songs, etcetera). Mass, team
sport matches, and various celebrations across the school calendar are
as many opportunities for bonding rituals. These reinforce the stu-
dents’ sense of belonging to a very special community. Students are
also made aware that they have a collective duty to uphold the school
tradition. In this elite school they are reminded of this frequently:
I’ve just spoken to the school this morning in assembly, at the start of
term, and reminded them of the obligations, and the duty they have to
uphold our tradition. (Principal, Elite school)
In a similar vein, in another superelite school, a notice from the

headmaster in the main corridor mentions that students were caught
BECOMING ELITE 173
shoplifting in the local shop, and reads that students should be aware
of the “shame it brings to the school”: individual’s actions affect
the collective body and its image as an elite group. Such practices
encourage a high level of loyalty to the school and its community.
Another consequence of social and cultural homogeneity and the
low staff/student ratio is that pupils develop privileged relations with
their teachers, which as well as enhancing their sense of self-worth
and their academic performances, brings them closer and also con-
tributes to community building:
I said that we operate here by co-operation and consent, not by coer-

cion and diktat. And we are a happy, fulfilled, successful community
of people, working together, young and old, respectful the one of the
other, and that is what you see if you walk around [school] between
lessons and during the day . . . you’ll see a phenomenal amount of inter-
action between young people and their teachers. The relationships are
very strong. (Principal, Elite school)
Boys’ schools are sometimes paired with girls’ schools for social or
cultural events. School principals claim that the days are gone when
schools played the part of matchmakers, but relationships sometimes
form on such occasions. Very often larger groups of friends are formed
between schools, which also facilitates friendship and romantic bonds
to develop after students have left the school. The friendship and
mutual loyalty developed along the years in such settings sometimes
impact on the elites’ matrimonial practices:
We find that they stay together hugely when they leave school. They
stay and connect even if they’re in university away, they really really
connect, socialize when they’re here in Dublin, they’re socializing
together even if they’re not in the same colleges, they’re marrying
each other, or whatever. (Principal, Elite school)
They have, because they form very close friendships, and these
friendships endure when they leave, they have dinners . . . It’s all very
sociable it’s not an old boy network in the effective sense of the “ha
ha we’ll sort you out with a job,” but it’s all nice and sociable and
they end up marrying each other’s sisters and cousins. (House master,
Superelite school)
Although this representative denies that the social capital generated

by “old boy networks” can have an impact on careers, he acknowl-
edges that it plays a part in bringing the group even closer, by favoring
174 ALINE COURTOIS
endogamy. By contrast, the principal of a superelite school is surpris-

ingly honest in this regard:
They network, well, that’s another thing, both in school and outside
school, they support one another, not to the extent of promoting peo-
ple above their station but encouragement, awareness, understand-
ing of what is required to make progress in the different spheres of
influence . . . I guess it’s, em, an innate ability but also being part of a
network. And it’s bolstered by that—their family, their community,
their membership—the past pupils’ union is a very strong feature of
[School], and for example they had a meeting for recent graduates
of [School] and graduates of third level institutions . . . about using
links, about supporting one another, sessions exchanging business
cards, ideas, how they can support one another. (Principal, Superelite
school)
Furthermore, community spirit and collective identity extend beyond

the school itself, and encompass a larger group including schools of
a similar standard, former pupils, and parents. As part of school life,
numerous sports, cultural, and social events bring together students
from different fee-paying schools. The Junior and Senior Leinster
Rugby Cups have long been the preserve of fee-paying schools. Over
the last decades, the strict partition between Protestant and Catholic
schools has been gradually taken down—class affinities overcoming
this ethnic and religious historical distinction.
Most fee-paying schools have very active past pupil unions, allow-
ing former students to expand their social networks. Parents, espe-
cially when they are former students as well, are actively involved in
running the school, and a very high level of interaction between staff
and parents can be seen when sport events are held for instance. Thus,
the school community is part of a larger, homogeneous, and cohe-
sive community including former students, staff, and parents. One
example of this high level of interaction across roles and generations
is given by the vice-principal of an elite school as he talks about the
school museum:
Again, it’s very good because it links the past to the present, and
there are people involved—that’s the other thing, there were teams,
that’s another thing about [School]—there were teachers, there were
students, there were past students, there were priest, and there were
experts—they were all involved in this project, getting the museum
together, so it’s been fantastic, it’s been fantastic. (Vice-principal, Elite
school)
BECOMING ELITE 175
If they were not acquainted before, children’s parents also have many
occasions to bond through their children’s friendship, which also rein-
forces cohesion within the larger group, beyond the school gates:
There’s a huge amount of communication with parents and then half

of the parents come here every Sunday for mass, and that the room
we’re sitting outside, the [reception] room—the room with the big
paintings and the chandeliers, there’s coffee there every Sunday so it’s
like the cocktail hour or something, everybody comes and chats, we
exchange news and parents ask you questions . . . usually they take out
not only their own children but their children’s friends, whereby it cre-
ates a bigger community, so a lot of these kids would be very pally with
their friends’ parents. (House master, Superelite school)
Past pupils’ reunions, debutantes’ balls, sport events, school functions

such as school anniversary celebrations or charity events are as many
occasions for collective effervescence, strengthening the ties between
members of the larger community around the school. In this sense,
fee-paying education enhances class cohesion and reinforces exclusion
mechanisms. This community provides very large amounts of money
when a school launches an appeal for funds; high-profile speakers
invited to the school are often past pupils or parents. This shows the
extent of economic and social capital schools can mobilize through
such networks, which the schools endeavor to protect and reinforce.
Excellence and Expectations

The collective elite identity fostered by selection, seclusion, and
bonding is upheld by students’ belief that they are, indeed, the
elite. Schools are officially not allowed to select students according
to academic criteria and as mentioned previously, not all fee-paying
schools perform spectacularly well in league tables. Whereas some
would be considered as highly academic schools, where reading and
learning are particularly encouraged, other schools are better known
for their performances in rugby, or in the words of their principals,
for the way they contribute to children’s “happiness” or ”personal
development”:
You know six hundred points is not that important really. It is impor-
tant, but it’s getting—I say to the pupils all the time, I really want
you to get your six hundred points, I’d be so proud of you, I’d be so
proud if you played hockey for Ireland, if you’re a star on the stage
or whatever, I’d be absolutely thrilled, but what I really want you to
176 ALINE COURTOIS
be is coming out of here a really decent person, and wanting to put

something back into life, that’s the important thing. (Principal, Sub-
elite school)
Most schools, and in particular boarding schools, pride themselves

on the fact that they provide a total education—offering to take care
of the transmission of social, cultural, and moral capital on behalf of
the family; educational capital being only one element and not always
the most important one:
We educate across five domains—academic, spiritual, cultural, pasto-

ral, social and a belief that they are all—the essence of a Catholic edu-
cation is building a sense of community and a sense of service, seeing
Jesus Christ as the role model, as the example of what we do, of reach-
ing out to others who are less fortunate. (Principal, Superelite school)
Although community building and the social capital it confers are

indeed central to most fee-paying schools, cultural capital is also
emphasized to a large extent, but not just for its academic value.
Cultural capital includes various elements such as particular uses
of language, body hexis, distinctive world views, expectations, and
tastes. The family environment fosters behaviors and values, which
are interiorized by the child and constitute a particular class habitus.
The ideology of gift comes into play: what is in effect the legacy of
cultural capital acquired in the family environment and derived from
a privileged class position is thus perceived as a natural gift, which
legitimates one’s position in society (Bourdieu and Passeron 1964;
Bourdieu 1979, 1989).
With very few exceptions, superelite and elite schools offer Classical
Studies, Latin, and in some cases Greek. Music, Arts, and French are
often part of their core curriculum. This is in line with the ideals of lib-
eral education—a concept connected to the ideals of freedom, leisure
pursuits, and ideas—and separated from notions of useful knowledge,
work, or practical activities (Peters 1970; Petitat 1982). In this and in
many other ways, Irish elite schools, whether Protestant or Catholic,
have largely adopted the public school model. Giving students a broad
education will also allow them to move from one sphere of influence
to the other easily. Besides, some of the extracurricular activities on
offer—such as art history, golf, cricket, horse-riding, or bridge, all
of which act as class markers—familiarize children with social doings
practiced in the higher circles of society. Sports play a part in shaping
BECOMING ELITE 177
the body while promoting both competition and team spirit, and they
are an important part in school life—all students being encouraged
if not forced to take part in team sports. Cultural visits and frequent
trips abroad are organized routinely, and the practice of music, drama,
and debating is strongly encouraged. Collins (1979) writes that in
education, the transmission of technical knowledge is less important
than the teaching of status cultures. As mentioned before, academic
excellence is not always at the forefront and what seems to matter most
in Irish elite schools is indeed the transmission of social capital, and
elite status culture.
In some cases, the buildings and surroundings give the school
an air of luxury and prestige, which strike the first-time visitor. Vast
expanses of land, historical façades, hallways adorned with portraits
of past teachers, sport trophies, and other school memorabilia also
contribute to the students’ self-esteem and sense that they are spe-
cial. Schools sometimes occupy estates, which used to belong to gen-
try families. In gentry families, the castle and estate act as physical
symbols of ancestry, a reminder of the successive generations who
were rooted in that space, and as such legitimate their dominant posi-
tions (Cannadine 1994; Dooley 2001; Pinçon and Pinçon-Charlot
1996, 81). By using such buildings, the schools symbolically inherit
some of the prestige and legitimacy associated with their history.
Although former students do not recall being particularly impressed
or intimidated by such settings, prospective scholars may have a dif-
ferent experience:
If you’ve got a family who have no experience of boarding and who

might have a certain weariness of the whole atmosphere of this place,
it’s essential that you can give them a lot of personal attention when
they arrive, make them feel at home and demystify the place. Because
when they come down the front avenue they say “oh my god,” right
and then you know, if the young lad has been reading Harry Potter
he’d say “it’s like Hogwarts,” you know. (Scheme administrator,
Superelite school, interview)
Thus, although the physical character of such schools may exert sym-
bolic violence on outsiders, for insiders it embodies, confirms, and
reaffirms their natural right to privilege.
Some schools are associated with the historical project of elite
formation, which contributes to their prestige and to students’
self-identification as elites. All three superelite schools were established
178 ALINE COURTOIS
with the explicit purpose to train future leaders of the nation. Thus,
the Protestant school Saint Columba’s, for instance, was founded in
1843 on the public school model and aimed explicitly aimed at “edu-
cating the sons of the gentry so as to fit them to take their place as
the national leaders of the Irish people” (Dowling 1971, 154). Saint
Columba’s is the most expensive boarding school in Ireland, and to
this day, it cultivates its likeness to Eton in various ways. Some other
Protestant schools owe their prestige to their association with the edu-
cation of the former Protestant ruling class: Protestants represent only
3 percent of the Irish population today, but out of the 57 fee-paying
schools, 21 are Protestant.
Clongowes Woods was established in 1814 by the Jesuits, to give
a distinctively Catholic, national education to upper-middle-class
boys, with a view to preparing the Catholic subelite to rival with
Protestants in the professions and the public services, and ultimately
to lead the country once the home rule would be granted (Bradley
2010). Its mission statement still states unambiguously that its goal
is “providing the wider community with resourceful and deter-
mined young men, with strong inter-personal skills and leadership
qualities.”
Another important aspect of elite education is the way it builds
students’ confidence and leadership skills. Bowles writes that differ-
ent types of schools replicate different types of social relations, which
correspond to the division of work. As a result schools located in
privileged areas differ from working-class schools in both their inter-
nal structure and curricular content (Bowles 1974, 35). In all three
superelite schools, the discipline and the atmosphere are relatively
relaxed, and in two of them, students do not have to wear a uni-
form—as long as they follow the smart-casual dress code, which they
are trusted to do. From a pedagogic perspective, dialogue, creativity,
and thinking outside the box are encouraged. Students are also given
many opportunities to assume positions of leadership. The prefect
system in operation in some boarding schools, and the principle of
“growth into privilege” (Vice-principal, Superelite school), by which
students are given more and more autonomy and responsibilities as
they progress from one year to the other, gradually familiarizes stu-
dents with dominant positions. Fee-paying schools perform extremely
well in national debating championships and often represent Ireland
in Model United Nations competitions—ideal arenas for the practice
and demonstration of public speaking and leadership skills. All these
factors reinforce students’ sense of self-worth and confidence, and
contribute to their self-perception as elite. Such beliefs are important
BECOMING ELITE 179
assets, which enhance students’ chances of success, as expressed by a

former student of an elite school:
Most importantly what elite schools do is to teach self-confidence.

And self-confidence, to me in this world is the most significant indica-
tor of yourself . . . so much of our lives is constrained by doubt, that’s
what stops you from doing it . . . people with a sense of total self-confi-
dence and entitlement think you know why shouldn’t I ask . . . you can
come up to anybody and ask whatever you want, it’s not unreasonable
to think that someone should give it to you. (Former student, Elite
school)
Principals gladly discuss their students’ confidence and the various

ways in which it is fostered by the school. One principal mentions all
the various aspects of school life, from liturgy to sport and counsel-
ing, which contribute to his students’ confidence:
And those sort of experiences bring the boys on, give the boys oppor-
tunities to develop, to grow, to work in teams, and it gives them the
confidence to realize that they can achieve things. The spiritual confi-
dence and development is very very important, you know . . . , the spiri-
tuality that gives you a realization that you have God-given talents.
(Principal, Superelite school)
Confidence is here elevated to the spiritual sphere and the belief in

one’s God-given talents. This is short of stating that students are the
chosen ones, and that the school helps them to embrace leadership as
their natural destiny. When asked about the balance between confi-
dence and arrogance, the principal goes on to suggest that confidence
is in fact a humble acceptance of one’s predestined position in the
world:
By and large for most of them it’s the sense of community . . . , the sense
of being part of something bigger than ourselves, which brings—and
you talk about arrogance, but it actually brings certainly humility.
(Principal, Superelite school)
Excellence, which legitimizes positions of leadership in the line of

thinking of early elite theorists, is not only academic, cultural, and
social, but also has a strong moral dimension in the discourse of school
representatives. The rector of another superelite school acknowledges
that it strives to produce leaders, but importantly Christian men and
leaders with a sense of social justice. This contributes to the notion
180 ALINE COURTOIS
that such schools produce legitimate leaders. Most schools encour-

age their students to do charity work at home and abroad. In some
schools, it can be intense and represent a lot more than tokenistic
excursions outside their little islands of privilege. However, philan-
thropy is a characteristic trait of upper-class culture (Pinçon and
Pinçon-Charlot 2007b), which reinforces one’s knowledge of their
privileged position in society while conferring a certain legitimacy to
wealth. The principal of a sub-elite school for girls marvels at her stu-
dents’ generosity and attributes it to the fact that “they’re very aware
of how privileged they are.” Thus, philanthropy goes hand in hand
with recognition of one’s status, and although it indicates a concern
for social justice, it is not in contradiction with support for the status
quo and can also encourage paternalistic class relations.
Conclusion
The high level of interconnectedness, cohesiveness, and solidar-
ity of the Irish elites can be attributed to a variety of factors, but
the contribution of elite schooling to such characteristics cannot be
played down. The construction of a collective elite identity begins
with the recruitment process: elite schools give preference to a very
specific, stable, socially, and culturally homogeneous clientele. High
fees, symbolic violence ensuing from a school’s elite reputation and
physical character, restrictive admission policies and sophisticated
recruitment processes allow these institutions to exclude unwanted
exogenous elements.
Once the ideal year group of students is constituted, a collective
identity is fostered by bonding rituals and various active community
building efforts. Loyalty to one’s school is more than the expression
of a sentimental attachment to the golden age of childhood and teen-
age years: it implies the preservation of strong connections, favoring
endogamous marriages, and appreciation of a common culture and
lifestyle. It extends beyond the school walls to encompass all those
who are similar in educational background, lifestyle, and culture.
In this respect, education at one of Ireland’s prestigious fee-paying
schools reinforces class cohesion and boundaries.
The elite character of this collective identity is reinforced by specific
pedagogic practices and extracurricular activities, which reinforce the
internalization of elite status and culture. Students familiarize them-
selves with leadership positions and become aware of their position
in society. They acquire the skills, confidence, and sense of entitle-
ment that will facilitate their access to elite positions, thus helping
BECOMING ELITE 181
to maintain class domination. They will also bring with them a rich
social capital, characterized by contacts across all spheres of influence
(business, politics, and also to some extent the media and clergy) and
networking skills: before they take up their leadership positions, the
elites are already connected.
Pinçon and Pinçon-Charlot argue that the French bourgeoisie
is the only surviving class in itself and for itself, characterized by a
high level of cohesiveness and solidarity, and ability to mobilize vast
resources of economic, social, cultural, and symbolic capital to pre-
serve its closure and its privileges (2007a, 2007b, and 2010). In a post-
colonial context, the notion that there is such a thing as self-conscious,
cohesive, and mobilized Irish bourgeoisie is often contested. However,
elite schools contribute to fostering all these class characteristics in the
future elites they produce. Thus, in the same way as the preparatory
schools described by Cookson and Persell (1985), these schools train
their students to become not only the elites, but maybe also, in a way,
soldiers for their class.
Notes
1. Officially, schools are not supposed to operate academically selec-
tive entrance examinations (Department of Education, M51/93
Circular) and are encouraged instead to give preference to “children
from their own communities and catchment areas” (Dáil Éireann
Report, October 17, 2000).
2. Elite institutions often have a mission to integrate new talented elites,
to contribute to a renewal of elites according to meritocratic ideals
and/or national efficiency requirements (Anderson 2007).
3. A notoriously underprivileged suburb of Dublin.
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CH A P T ER 8
Financial Professionals as
a Global Elite
Horacio Ortiz
Introduction
In the last 30 years, the issuance of stocks and bonds has become
the main source of financing for companies not only in the United
States and Europe, but also in India and in many other countries in
the developing world. In addition, the issuance of sovereign bonds
has become an unavoidable element of state budgets, as we know them
today. The financial industry, responsible for attracting the funds and
allocating them among these different aspirants to global credit, is
thus at the center of a global distribution of resources. In this chapter,
I will develop a notion of elite that attempts to grasp the specific rela-
tion of power in which the financial industry operates today. In par-
ticular, I will attempt to clarify how the professionals of the financial
industry, responsible for a global distribution of resources that they
effect through their everyday procedures, can be thought of as central
to a political process.1 To do so, I will draw on the work of Marcel
Mauss, in particular the way in which he attempted to understand
financial flows as constitutive of specific social hierarchies in a geo-
graphical space that went beyond that of official political groups, and
with a temporal horizon that, spanning generations, superseded the
limits of each individual’s life. This will help to explore the specific
place of the financial industry in a global social space in which it pro-
duces hierarchies in the access of credit. Yet, since the financial indus-
try is composed of a network of companies with a bureaucratic mode
of organization, I will also draw on the work of Michel Foucault
186 HORACIO ORTIZ
to explore the procedural application of specific financial imaginar-

ies that give sense to financial objects and to the social hierarchies
through which they circulate and which they contribute to define
and legitimize.
Today’s financial regulation and financial formulas and models
share a common set of concepts that are mobilized by professionals in
their everyday practices. Their procedures and their formulas to valu-
ate or to draw investment strategies are defined from the perspective
of a theoretical investor who owns his2 capital and attempts to maxi-
mize his profit by operating in efficient markets. These concepts are
at the basis of the regulation of the financial industry, in application
of a neoliberal project starting in the 1970s, according to which the
institution of market-based financial flows would lead to an optimal
allocation of social resources (Lee 1998, 215–249). This figure of an
independent actor, playing in open markets where anyone can come
in and go out, is officially enacted by employees who do not own the
money they manage, and who operate in bureaucratic and commer-
cial networks, the entry to which is restricted by regulation and by
the requirement of mastering a vast and sophisticated set of concepts
and methods of calculation.
Yet, if financial professionals act as investors it is because, con-
tractually, they are supposed to represent the interests of the official
owners of the money, who do not operate directly in the network of
exchange. This relation of representation, different to the classical
notion of political representation of liberal democracies, poses nev-
ertheless the question of what is it that these professionals represent,
both in terms of the interests in the name of which they act and in
terms of the figures and symbols that they enact or stage. To under-
stand the political role of the financial industry, it is thus necessary
to understand the meaning of the operations of the individuals who
carry it out and which make their practice desirable or at least accept-
able to those who are explicitly not at the top of the decision-making
process.
The chapter will start with an analysis of how the concept of
“elite” allows for asking questions that are pertinent to understand
the political role played by the financial industry. I will then show
that, although the professionals of the financial industry share social
markers of other elites, in particular their access and use of money
for themselves, it is the specific place in the global distribution of
resources that makes of them an elite. In conclusion, I will then
explore what this means for the more general acceptance of the place
that the financial industry occupies today in our lives.
FINANCIAL PROFESSIONALS AS A GLOBAL ELITE 187
An Anthropology of Elites: Global Flows,

Social Hierarchies, and Imagination
Since the global financial crisis erupted in 2008, increasing media
and political attention has been given to the financial industry and
to its professionals. The multiple definitions of the financial crisis
have been intertwined with several and not always compatible ways to
hold financial professionals responsible for it. Yet, since they are not
a representative political institution, and they are not even linked to
a particular jurisdiction, their liability remains elusive. In the mul-
tiple accounts, accusations, and justifications, it is not clear whether
some individuals, a group of people, an economic sector, a series of
distinctive professional or regulatory practices, or even some cogni-
tive mishaps are to be singled out, nor how all these factors are to be
considered together.
This elusiveness is at least partly linked to the fact that neither the
financial professionals nor the financial industry occupy a clearly rec-
ognized place in current political imagination. In the imagination of
liberal democracy, governments are considered liable of critique since
they are supposed to represent the wills of those who live under their
rule. Contemporary finance is today a network of companies defined
by the services they offer to individual clients, whose interests they
represent. In this account, financial professionals do not occupy a
position of power in relation to the rest of society; they are simply
acting on behalf of particular individuals and companies.
Georges Balandier proposes to define as “political” all the insti-
tutions that are explicitly set up as social space where the relations
of forces concerning all the members of the society are managed
(Balandier 1967, 43–50). The stress here is not on the existence of
individuals with wills who are more or less represented, but on the
fact that social hierarchies are produced, reproduced, and transformed
around common norms and ways to define the different social posi-
tions and their legitimacy. This can be expressed, as in liberal democ-
racy, in terms of a representation of wills by a government, but it can
also be expressed in many other terms.
In his famous essay on the gift, Marcel Mauss analyzed how the
objects of the kula rings were defined by a force that compelled their
holders to exchange them in a circulation of gifts and countergifts
(Mauss 1993 [1923–1924], 163). These objects existed within a hier-
archy of exchangeable goods, which corresponded to a hierarchy of
the people who were entitled to manipulate them and circulate them.
The imaginary that gave the objects their force was the same that
188 HORACIO ORTIZ
legitimized the social inequalities in the groups within which this

force made sense at all (ibid., 186–188). Thus, as Mauss remarked,
the value of the objects, and the hierarchy of the people who used
them, was to be understood within an imaginary that was at once
economic, political, moral, and religious (ibid., 188). Mauss therefore
remarked that the notion of the self, the persona (ibid., 206), as well
as the notions of liberty and justice, with which we tend to analyze
it and define it today, needed to be reintroduced as part of the rules
with which social hierarchies and entitlements gave different posi-
tions to different people in the distribution of resources and in the
multiple social identities that this distribution contributed to create
(ibid., 267).
In line with Mauss and Balandier, we can elaborate a concept of
“elite” that designates a social group occupying a central position in
the distribution of resources. This group manages a relation of forces,
since the distribution it carries out produces and reproduces inequal-
ity, giving different rights and duties to different people. This was,
for instance, the position of the “big men” formalized by Marshal
Sahlins (1963). These actors occupied a central role in the distribu-
tion of resources, by giving and receiving in a process that allowed
them for a minimal but fleeting accumulation. In Sahlins’ work, the
concept of the “big man” was explicitly aimed at analyzing the insti-
tutionalization of power relations without the concept of a state that
would embody the collective. This concept also pointed to the fact
that the position of power, although occupied by someone, did not
belong to the person or the group intrinsically. It was dependent on
the capacity of its occupant to perform the operations defined by the
position itself. As was already analyzed by Marcel Mauss, the holder
of the central position in the distribution of resources could lose it,
and even lose his life, if he did not follow the rules properly.
The analysis of power, credit relations, and big men developed
by these authors allows for studying exchange relations that expand
beyond the geographical boundaries of a single social group, and
beyond the temporal horizon of the living, as the circuits of exchange
only attain full circle after several generations. Yet, these concepts
have too often been restricted to what seemed to be exotic areas, in
particular to ones in which the modern state did not seem to exist.
Michel Foucault has nevertheless defined a very similar concept of
“power relations” to analyze the bureaucratic spaces that developed
in Europe at the end of the eighteenth century and came to define
the limits and the content of the self in the contemporary period.
Foucault defines “power” or “relations of forces” as a differential in
the capacity to act, defined by the relation itself (Foucault 1975, 37).
This capacity need not belong to a will or some other morally defined
instance of decision and imputation. The rules of the relation define
the differences and the power of each actor. The notions of “will”
or “subject” are just part of the definition of the rules themselves
(Foucault 1976, 124–125). It is therefore important to analyze the
definition of the possible positions, usually multiple, but also limited,
that is, the definition of the instances or the actors that are supposed
to engage in the relations.
Studying the social meanings that make monetary relations pos-
sible, Viviana Zelizer has pointed out that if money circulates, it is
because it makes sense in the everyday lives of those who use it. Because
it makes it possible to buy a gift within the family (Zelizer 1997),
to settle a divorce (Zelizer 2005), or to establish a specific relation
with death and inheritance in a life insurance contract (Zelizer 1979),
money is fundamental to the establishment of social identities such as
family and friendship. But, in turn, money and the banking system
itself cannot be understood without taking into account these prac-
tices through which they make sense (Zelizer 2006). Keith Hart has
analyzed this role of money beyond individual and affective relations.
He shows how different monetary arrangements belong, historically,
to different understandings of social hierarchies, defining our iden-
tity as members of the social group (Hart 2000). Today, the debates
around monetary policy constitute an important part of the definition
of what it means to be a citizen. It is in the context of nation-states
and global capitalism based on private property that we understand
ourselves both as individual units and as members of a collective that
transcends us. This duality is expressed even in the monetary symbols
such as the two sides of the coin, which express on the one hand the
liberating anonymous power of the number as an expression of indi-
vidual exchange and on the other the seal of the state as a mark of the
guarantee of individuality by the collective (Hart 1986).
As Mauss pointed out, the elite is thus not just the group of people
who have more access to money, but it is also the group that occupies
the social position where the social inequalities concerning the access
to money are determined (1993 [1923–1924], 265–273). This pro-
duction of social hierarchies needs to be understood as making sense
not only for those who are officially in the position to decide it, but
also by the fact that it is constitutive of the social identities of those
who occupy the different social positions that result from it. Analyzing
the elite means analyzing the imaginaries according to which its mem-
bers are instituted and recognized as such more broadly.
190 HORACIO ORTIZ
In the following pages, I will analyze the position of the profes-

sionals of contemporary finance, to highlight how, in a global space
without a single state overseeing it, they constitute the operators
of an unequal distribution of resources, whereby they produce and
reproduce social inequalities. The analysis of their everyday practices
will be useful to understand the imaginaries according to which the
objects they exchange and the social places they define make sense
and seem legitimate.
Financial Professionals and

the Markers of Social Elites
The usual salaries of the employees at the top of the hierarchy in the
financial industry—the front-office professionals that can be found in
brokerage houses, fund management companies, and the like—often
range between one hundred thousand and more than one million
US dollars a year. A very small portion of professionals earn quite
higher amounts, and every year the reports on bonuses by the press
highlight individuals who may have earned above a hundred million
dollars including their bonus. In interviews, stock brokers, fund man-
agers, and financial analysts often compared their salaries with those
of their fellow students who studied business management or engi-
neering and went to work in other sectors, earning much less. Their
consumption practices were usually discussed as specific relations to
money. Some purchased ostentatious goods such as rare cars, country
houses, or designer clothing, whereas others saved for the future to
retire young and live as rentiers. Depending on their socialization,
some even expressed a certain disdainful distance to money, which
was enhanced by money’s visible abundance. The director of Brokers
Inc., a 25 people brokerage company in New York, had an annual
income of around one million dollars in 2002. He would often work
in the open floor with the rest of the employees, and pause to make
ostensible comments about the progress of the construction of his
house in the Hamptons, the posh and fashionable area by the ocean
where the rich New Yorkers spend their weekends. His attitude was
recognized by many of his employees as a way to entice them to work
harder and aim for higher bonuses. In an interview with me, he would
nevertheless insist that he did not work for the money, which he did
“not need to make a living.” If he spent about 12 hours a day at the
office, that is, “more than with [his] family” (he was just married
and his first son was born a few months before the interview), it was
because he “love[d]” his job.
At Brokers Inc., there was a familiarity to certain luxury goods,

such as expensive suits or shoes, and to some activities, such as playing
golf or going hunting, that are an integral and explicit part of profes-
sional meetings (Ortiz 2005). These shared practices and references
create a social proximity that is enhanced, in the workplaces, by the
fact that these spaces are often shared with employees of lower rank-
ing and lower salaries. Although the relations I could observe between
the managerial levels of the front office and the junior assistants,
logistics personnel, cleaning companies’ employees, etcetera, could be
multifarious—going from disdain to strong friendships, alliances, or
competition—the income difference was always explicit and stark.
Other social characteristics are at play in the financial professional
milieus, which may be observed elsewhere, and which mark the exis-
tence of a group of power. There is a considerable majority of male
employees at the top level, and among the women occupying top
positions whom I interviewed, often long arguments developed con-
cerning the different strategies and gender roles that this male pre-
ponderance called and allowed for, not only in decision making but
also in salaries and bonuses. Marie, 35 years old, head of the team of
fund managers investing in asset-backed securities at Acme in 2004,
earned around four hundred thousand euro a year, including her
bonus. She oversaw a team of seven people and had the responsibility
to manage five billion euros, which was considered quite a respectable
sum for her age. She considered herself as one of the best profession-
als in her field in Paris at the time, and many of her male and female
colleagues would share this view about her in interviews with me.
Yet, she complained that her gender identity imposed a workload on
her that her male colleagues at a similar level of responsibility could
escape. She explained that male managers would avoid going on tir-
ing business trips claiming that their wives would complain. As she
remarked, their wives often did not work, although she would herself
never refuse going on a trip, in spite of having three children, because
“that is exactly the point where they will be waiting for me”, that is,
as soon as she would try to lighten her workload, it would be claimed
that it is because she is a woman and has to take care of her children.
Marie considered that her situation was a trap in which she put herself,
but from which she did not know how to escape (on a more general
critique of the “myth of meritocracy,” see Roth [2006], 179–195).
Louise Marie Roth (2006) and Karen Ho (2009) have extensively
accounted for gender and racist biases in the recruitment and the
careers of financial professionals. Ho stresses how these distinctions
exist already at the educational level, and how these social hierarchies
192 HORACIO ORTIZ
are partly legitimized through the rhetoric of being the smartest,

which is nourished and mobilized in the top universities from which
front-office employees are systematically recruited (Ho 2009, 39–72).
These analyses consider social markers that can be observed in the
United States, Europe, and probably elsewhere, but that can also be
very different in other places. For instance, it may be almost impos-
sible to be part of a big bank’s board of directors in China if one is
not recognized as Chinese and if one is not a member of the Chinese
Communist Party (Howson 2009). These very general categories add
with more diffused ones concerning the social background of the
front-office employees. Their educational trajectory usually already
performs the role of a filter so that, when observed in the offices of
contemporary finance, it is apparent that their parents are seldom low
class. These differences also play out in the sexism of the jokes that
are allowed, in the power struggles between employees attempting
to obtain higher salaries, in the friendships and the distances, which
could be based, for instance, in the books, films, or activities that were
discussed during coffee breaks, at lunch, or in passing comments.
Generational aspects are also important, not only because seniority is
often linked to experience and higher positions, but also for instance
in creating bonds between juniors (Ho 2009), or between young
seniors in their mid-thirties who have young children (Ortiz 2008).
These categorizations are certainly too broad to mean much by
themselves, but they are at play in the different activities that people
carry out and share (playing golf, tennis, going to the opera, hunting,
etc.), which have to be analyzed in the specific context of the people
observed (for instance, going hunting may have a different connota-
tion in Paris than in the Midwest). They point to a multiplicity of
rules of practice, of possible ways to act, that bring together, in a
continuous flow, having a management position, a high salary, being
white and male, of a recognizably elitist educational background, and
having developed a relation to money of the higher income or owner
classes since childhood. In my observations, this never worked as a
monolithic or even as an identifiable set of standards, but these ele-
ments were part of the process of recognition and self-recognition in
the constitution and the reproduction of differences in the interac-
tions, constituting more or less differentiated groups, with the front
office on top.
Yet, these social characteristics of front-office financial profes-
sionals could be found in the hierarchies of many other companies
and social organizations as well. The level of personal income of
these employees makes them only partially stand out in the social
hierarchies that organize labor relations at large in more or less

avowed ways. However, financial professionals do occupy a specific
position of power, due to their financial practices as employees of the
vast bureaucracies of contemporary finance.
The Financial Industry at the Center of

the Global Distribution of Credit
The development of states and global financial flows have been inter-
twined in a symbiotic and conflictive way (Hart 1986; Eichengreen
1996). After the Second World War, states occupied a central posi-
tion in the distribution of monetary resources. Since the nineteenth
century and the constitution of nation-states, this had not been the
case, and in the mid-1970s the situation changed again. The amounts
manipulated by the financial industry have strongly increased since
the 1970s, when governments in the United States and Europe started
changing the regulatory systems to enhance the distribution of credit
in the form of negotiable securities (Abdelal 2007). The funds come
today mainly from the savings of the middle classes and companies
of rich countries, in the form of pension and mutual funds, insur-
ance contracts among others. They are usually invested through a
delegation contract, which, in the United States, but also in many
other places, takes the form of the trusteeship. In this legal relation,
the financial industry is entrusted the money because it is supposed
to know better than its clients how to invest it. The latter are actu-
ally legally prevented from trying to influence the service provider
when it comes to deciding how to distribute the funds (Clark 2000;
Montagne 2006). The main leverage of the client is to change from
one service provider to another, or to pull out of the system.
The concentration of the funds in the hands of the financial indus-
try creates a global space of competition for credit, as the decisions
to allocate capital by the financial industry are explicitly organized
according to an analysis of all potential objects of investment, which
are integrated in a hierarchy defined by the returns expected from
each. Some activities manage to find financing at cheap prices, some
have to pay much higher rates, and some are simply excluded from
global financial flows. Thus, in the mid-2000s, trillions of US dol-
lars were being invested in US credit derivatives, used to finance
the access of lower and aspiring middle classes to home ownership.
These sub-prime based US asset-backed securities offered an inter-
est of around 3.5 percent, whereas the Brazilian state, for a similar
maturity, would only find financing through the global financial
194 HORACIO ORTIZ
industry if it was willing to pay a 10 percent interest. At the same

time, the Democratic Republic of Congo, in dire need of investment
in infrastructure and destroyed by war, with an external debt of a
mere ten billion US dollars, was excluded from the flows managed by
the financial industry.
This global competition to access the credit distributed by the
financial industry is organized by the procedures applied every day by
the employees of what have become vast bureaucracies. For a company
to access credit issuing new stock, it needs to make sure that managers
of investment funds will buy the securities. This, in turn, implies that
the assets have been previously evaluated by the financial analysts of
the rating agencies or by some recognized brokerage house. Thus,
issuing a document of financial analysis, including a stock or a bond
in an index that will be followed by fund managers or passing the
order to a trader to buy a stock, are ways in which the funds of the
final clients, for instance people saving for their pensions, would be
directed to finance the activity of the company.
No employee can claim to have a personal responsibility for the
distribution of credit besides that which is entailed in his follow-
ing the rules defined in his labor contract, which set out in a very
detailed and standardized way how he should operate. Nevertheless,
there are distinctions in the attributions of responsibility for the con-
duct of financial flows within the professional milieus that compose
the financial industry. These distinctions place on top of the hierar-
chy the front-office professionals, that is, the financial analysts, fund
managers, sales people negotiating the exchange of financial services,
traders, and those responsible for the definition of the strategies of
global asset allocation. To understand this social hierarchy, it is neces-
sary to analyze how the objects of investment and the agents operat-
ing with them make sense.
Regulation in most countries uses the terms of “qualified” or
“sophisticated investors” to designate essentially the employees of
the financial industry, who are allowed to perform operations for
their clients that the latter are often barred from performing them-
selves. The regulatory body legitimizes this distinction by citing the
expertise of these professionals. As Olivier Godechot has shown in
the case of traders, expertise is usually the main argument mobilized
by front-office employees to negotiate their bonuses, as they can
threaten their employer to resign and offer their knowledge to com-
peting companies (Godechot 2007). This expertise consists of several
things, but especially of a body of knowledge that most employees
learn in business schools and professional trainings.
Financial valuation and financial management as a professional

practice today—from mainstream indexed funds to commodity trad-
ing, securitization, or hedge funds—is organized along concepts that
can be observed not only in the everyday practice of the professionals,
but also in the manuals for finance, the contents of the courses in
masters in finance, and, crucially, in the laws and norms that con-
form financial regulation. In this set of concepts, there are two main
instances of decision, at a conceptual level, when it comes to valuation
and investment. The first considers that all valuation and all invest-
ment is made by a single actor, an investor who can freely define the
value of an object of investment (a stock, a bond, an asset-backed
security or other derivatives, etc.) and decide on buying or selling it,
i.e. on investing in it or not. When a financial analyst analyzes the
details of the accounting reports of a listed company to evaluate its
price, when an asset manager checks whether the funds under his
management are indeed tracking the index of reference given to him
by his director, they apply methods of calculation in which the opera-
tion is made by this single gaze, which they enact. The responsibility
for the money managed by the financial industry is directly linked
to these technical aspects, that is, to the imaginaries of the investor,
more or less incarnated or embodied (a metaphor that occurs often) by
the financial professional (Ortiz 2008). Obliterating from his speech
the fact that his procedures were only possible because there was the
work of the financial analysts as well as the commercial network that
attracted people’s savings to his company, a fund manager would for
instance, in an interview with me, put himself at the center of the
decision to buy or not a stock: “The idea comes from me . . . I start
from the assumption that I am the fund manager so . . . hum, I am the
one who presses the button. When I say ‘I buy’, it is my decision.”
The other main concept in financial professional practice is that of
market efficiency. A market is considered efficient if the price reflects
all the information available on the object to be exchanged. The
concept is embedded in the formulas used by financial professionals,
which are partly developed by academics. But in a way, the concept
of market efficiency stands in tension with the concept of investors.
The investors are necessary for markets to be efficient, since they
look for new information, which orients their bids and asks and is
thereby represented in the price. Yet, once the price reflects all new
information, no individual investor could find a better, that is, more
informed, price than the market price, so individual evaluation is
made redundant. In that case, investors should simply buy or sell
the asset at its market price. The representative character of the price
196 HORACIO ORTIZ
according to the concept of market efficiency has been interpreted

in financial theory and practice along the lines of positivist scientific
theories of the late nineteenth century. Stocks returns and prices
have been analyzed as natural phenomena with a normal distribu-
tion, which could be interpreted with probabilities (Maurer 2002;
MacKenzie 2009). In this frame, the standard deviation of one asset’s
returns is, by construction, bigger than that of a bundle. Thus, main-
stream financial theory implies that the rational investor should buy
the whole market (cf. Ortiz [2009]). The development of indexes at
the end of the nineteenth century was based on this presupposition,
which is implied by the widespread use of indexes today (De Goede
2005, 87–120). This does not solve the tension with the need to
have individual investors (Gitman and Joehnk 2008, 272–273). Thus,
fund managers are often asked to replicate a stock or a bond index,
as though the market was efficient, and to perform some form of
individual valuation to beat it by a few percentage points, as though
efficiency was still to come.
This representative character not only entails multiple, interpreta-
tive possibilities that are not always recognized by the practitioners
themselves (Muniesa 2007) but, crucially, it allows financial practice,
itself often analyzed through price movements, to benefit from the
prestige that the positivist conceptions of truth give to natural sci-
ences. The fact that some financial theorists have obtained the Nobel
Prize for the financial formulas they produced is part of this move-
ment. In this frame, the concepts of the investor and market efficiency
appear as technical tools. Yet, they also belong to the liberal philo-
sophical tradition, from which they were transposed to economic and
financial theory (MacKenzie 2006, 37–67).
According to the liberal tradition, independent actors exchanging
in free markets, where entry is not restricted and prices cannot be
controlled by a single actor or a group, perform a morally and politi-
cally desirable task. Morally, free markets allow for each actor to find
a social confirmation of her own value, defined in the price of that
which she seeks to exchange. Politically, the free circulation of infor-
mation between all the participants makes prices to be the best sig-
nal indicating the profitability of an activity. Thus, actors can orient
their capital and workforce to the most profitable activities, thereby
effecting an optimal allocation of social resources. Since the begin-
ning of this tradition, the figure of the political subject is linked to
the image of a free individual, owning his own work force as his own
body or as accumulated in capital, and for whom exchange comes as
a supplementary benefit. This benefit allows him to create wealth and
to be considered equal by the other free individuals with whom he

exchanges (Smith 1991 [1776]). This gives the concepts of financial
theory a moral and political content that is significantly mobilized in
the legitimization of the role of the financial industry in the distri-
bution of credit. The regulation of financial flows by states has been
explicitly oriented to create the conditions of market efficiency to
effect this optimal allocation of resources (Lee 1998; Abdelal 2007).
The employees of the financial industry thereby enact individual
investors, and recognize each other, and are recognized by finan-
cial regulation, as the social space where market efficiency occurs.
Financial professionals are thus endowed with the responsibility to
orient capital according to this project.
The Distribution of Resources as an

Everyday Application of Procedures
In Acme, I was an intern in the group directed by Marie, investing
in asset-backed securities. My job was to assist the fund managers,
looking for the documents they needed to perform the valuation of
the assets they bought, and writing reports about them, which were
sent to actual and potential clients as well as to the upper levels of
the hierarchy and to other colleagues deemed relevant or interested.
I was one of the three assistants working for the four managers of the
team, but I mostly responded to the orders of Juliette, the second in
the hierarchy.
After graduating from one of the best-rated French business
schools, Juliette, 35 years old, had worked for five years in a rating
agency, where she rated asset-backed securities. She then worked for a
few years in a bank, creating the credit derivatives, and then moved to
Acme, where she had been a fund manager for two years when I met
her. Just like Marie, her boss, Juliette’s expertise, which was supposed
to justify an income above two hundred thousand euro a year, was
thus based on analyzing the intrinsic characteristics of the asset, what
is called its fundamental value, and which is expected to give an idea
of how the asset is going to behave in the long run. After one or two
days reading several hundred pages and checking information with
brokers and other professionals, usually on the phone or by email,
she would decide to buy the security. This meant negotiating the
price with the bank that was selling it, something which, as she told
me, was very subjective, depending on the movements in the market
every day, that is, a temporality very different to that of fundamental
valuation.
198 HORACIO ORTIZ
Juliette’s decision to buy was made on behalf of her clients, in

this case mainly French insurance companies, who would receive the
income from the assets, minus the fee charged by Acme (which in turn
paid the fund manager’s salary and bonus). The money came from the
clients of the insurance companies, who would return it to them in
the form of indemnities in case the events stipulated in the insur-
ance contract occurred. And the money went to US banks, allow-
ing them to issue more credit for people buying a home. Although
the home owners and the people engaging in an insurance contract
were the official owners and beneficiaries of the money being lent
and received, they only existed as investors because professionals such
as Juliette carried out the procedures according to which profit was
supposed to be maximized.
During my field observations, the team profited from a change of
power in Acme, which meant that more funds would be allocated to
them, coming from the main clients of the company. This happened
at a time when the demand for the best rated asset-backed securi-
ties had made their prices go up, lowering the profit that could be
retrieved from them.3 This pushed the team to buy lower rated, more
volatile, and risky securities. This shift also meant that not only a
fundamental approach was needed, but that the fund managers had
to engage in shorter term, speculative approaches. They needed to
make sure that they did not lose because of the sudden changes that
affected these assets, and in the process, they could also try to benefit
from the fast price changes. Yet, this was more the specialty of traders,
and not of people with the expertise of Juliette and Marie. In long
interviews, Marie wavered between the need to adopt the new, riskier
strategy, and her attachment to what she called her “philosophy” of
investment, linked to long-term views. Juliette, on the contrary, told
me at length that although she would also not betray her expertise,
she felt ready to take on the new challenge, which she found more
interesting than to keep on doing what she had done so far.
Eventually, Marie found a job in a rating agency, which allowed
her to retain the expertise she “believe[d]” in, whereas Juliette took
her position as director. Until the crisis burst, the team raised its
funds under management up to seven billion euros, investing in
riskier assets and strategies, which it sold to insurance companies in
the form of Collateralized Debt Obligations.4 By the end of 2009,
these clients had lost more than two billion euros. Since Acme was
a big multinational, its top management decided to include the
losses in its own accounts, thereby protecting its clients and its own
name, whereas other banks that had been more exposed were facing
bankruptcy. Juliette’s procedures were defined along the very stan-

dardized norms of the profession, and she never departed from the
gaze of the investor that she was supposed to apply. The shift in the
investment strategy was between two possibilities for this gaze, both
considered legitimate by different people, or even by the same one,
such as Juliette. And although she would claim as much responsibil-
ity as she could when it came to negotiate her bonus, her decision
to buy riskier assets was only possible in the network of rating agen-
cies, financial analysts, and companies that brought her the funds and
offered her the securities.
The people who embody the investors are thus employees of vast
bureaucracies investing their clients’ funds along strict procedures
that they have to follow to retain their jobs and their bonuses, in a
network of commercial relations organized by financial companies—
the entry to which is restricted by labor contracts, regulations, and
educational background. The investors and the efficient markets are
only intentionalities, that is, the theoretical gaze and the assumptions
that define the aim of the formulas and the procedures (Foucault
1976, 124). The claim that financial employees are the ones that hold
the responsibility to realize the free subjects operating in free markets
is nevertheless usually strong when salaries and bonuses are negoti-
ated. Yet, it is diffused for instance at times when a crisis is declared
and political liabilities are negotiated. The questioning of power by
political anthropology can help raise questions that shed light on this
seeming paradox.
Conclusion
In a certain way, front-office financial professionals remind us of big
men, that is, powerful people who receive and redistribute resources
while keeping a relatively small amount for themselves, which never-
theless renders them rich. The prestige of their position comes from
their expertise in manipulating the concepts of the system of distri-
bution, as well as from the wealth that they accumulate and which is
supposed to bear some relation to this expertise. These concepts can
be those defining the power of the objects circulating in the kula
rings or those, which, in the contracts constituting stocks and bonds,
impose themselves to each financial professional attempting to retain
his social position. This metaphor echoes the fact that financial pro-
fessionals consider their own income very dearly and at the same time
must express an official and systematic detachment in relation to the
much higher amounts that they manipulate and which do not belong
200 HORACIO ORTIZ
to them (Zaloom 2006, 127–140). Officially, the expertise in the

manipulation of the concepts of financial valuation and investment
places the professionals at the center of a system of distribution of
resources. Their income is legitimated especially in terms of expertise,
that is, of them being the only ones, or the best, in the manipulation
of the concepts.
If the metaphor of the “big man” is interesting here, it is because it
was designed to ask important questions about power relations in gen-
eral. It shows in this case a significant specificity of the powerful posi-
tion of financial professionals in the global distribution of resources.
Indeed, the big man’s power is always challenged by the appearance
of other big men, by the end of the circuit of exchanges and, more
crucially, by his own ability to distribute resources in a way that per-
petuates or retains a certain social hierarchy (Sahlins 1963; Balandier
1967). This challenge is to the person of the big man himself, and it
can even cost him his life. Yet, this conditionality does not exist in
the concepts used by financial professionals. In financial theory, the
investor is not a broker, but the owner of his own money, and is always
free to enter and leave the exchange. He has no other social respon-
sibility than to look for his own benefit. It is with this horizon that
financial employees make their evaluations and investment decision
on behalf of their individual clients. In recognized cases of outright
fraud, which are rare, professionals are usually accused of betraying
their clients or employers. Otherwise, the responsibility of financial
professionals is often decided at the level of their employing company,
and the accountability or responsibility for the functioning of the sys-
tem of distribution is diffused in a network with no center.
The accountability and capacity of action of big men and other
redistributing institutions is often linked to a certain set of social
groups, often but not necessarily with a territory. These groups are
in part constituted as such by the relations of credit and distribution
between what come to be its members. As Mauss and others pointed
out, in the kula rings and in the potlatch, the survival of the group
as such can be at stake when its top hierarchy engages in exchanges
with other groups. The development of financial corporations and
financial markets worldwide in the last 30 years has meant that today,
a very important amount of the credit that is distributed, from a local
branch of the bank of a poor country to the issuing of stocks of the
biggest companies, is situated in a single global space of credit possi-
bilities that are managed by financial professionals. The group or the
political space created by these credit relations is thus the world itself.
The management of the current crisis by states only works so far as
states cooperate to establish rules that supersede them. This collabo-

ration is nevertheless shaky, as governments may have the tendency to
compete against each other to attract the financial resources that still
circulate in the network. The political locus of imputation of respon-
sibility and accountability for the global distribution of resources by
financial professionals is still to be built. In the midst of the crisis, this
lack of explicit political power is also working as an advantage for the
professionals, as is shown for instance by the relative little harassment
suffered by rating agencies, whose role in the several crises of the last
12 years is nevertheless crucial (on this vast subject, see in particular
Sinclair [2005]; MacKenzie [2009]).
Most definitions of the current situation as that of a financial cri-
sis are articulated within the liberal financial imaginary according to
which financial flows are the result of investors operating in markets
the efficiency of which is more or less problematic. The problematiza-
tion reproduces thereby the imagination that places financial profes-
sionals at the center of financial flows as the incarnation of its ideal
optimal realization. This poses a practical question for the observer:
What is it that we are observing when we observe financial profes-
sionals define financial value and distribute credit? The Foucauldian
approach consisting in analyzing how institutions distribute the fig-
ure of a philosophical subject in specific tasks whose result bears little
connection with the utopias in which it was engendered seems thus
a fruitful starting point. As I said it in the introduction, it related
quite well with Marcel Mauss’ insistence on not taking the concept
of the person, freedom, domination, and so on for granted, but to
analyze them as part of the rules of the exchanges and the social
orders in which they take place (Hart and Ortiz 2008). We are thus
not observing people who would correspond to the liberal definition
of an “investor,” operating in what could be defined, according to
that tradition, as “free markets” whose efficiency would need to be
protected. These concepts are important, but only because they are
central in the definition of the rules and the legitimization of the
practice of financial professionals.
The importance of the financial imaginary in the current global
distribution of resources is obvious as it founds financial regulation
and it pervades and defines the most mainstream financial tech-
niques, the application of which effects the distribution. The current
crisis shows the resilience of these imaginaries. Indeed, the differ-
ent elements that constitute financial professionals as an elite have
been mobilized in the media, the US presidential campaign, the G-20
and the European Union regulatory debates, and so on. Taken as a
202 HORACIO ORTIZ
group, financial professionals have been accused of a deviant relation

to money: greed and reckless risk taking due to irresponsibility and
the search for higher returns. The system itself has been also attacked
as not integrating enough rules of control for risk taking, and thereby
not controlling the few rotten apples within it. Certain professions or
tasks, particularly those related to credit derivatives, from which the
crisis expanded to the banking system, have also been under attack—
the rotten apples being not people, but parts of the system taken as
a set of rules. Renewed but still minority calls have been made to
reshuffle the system as a whole. Nevertheless, these calls now usually
concern the inefficiency of the system, as shown by the crisis, and not
the deeper and more long-term effects of it in the way of the repro-
duction of a very concentrated and unequal distribution of resources
worldwide. Thus, the events in the United States and Europe since
2008 have been deemed a crisis, most often without even addressing,
even in critical analyses, the long-term exclusion of poorer countries
from the funds managed by the financial industry, a fact that has
often been considered by the World Bank and the IMF as a normal
effect of market efficiency. The different responses to a search for
accountability in the crisis are not necessarily complementary, and
can actually contradict each other. But most of them tend to make
sense of the practices of financial professionals in terms of investors
whose interactions should ensue in a socially optimal allocation of
resources due to market efficiency. Thereby, they still put the profes-
sionals of the financial industry at the center of the process, with the
rest of the population occupying a subordinate role in it.
Mobilizing classical anthropological questions in this new context
is thus a fruitful way to pose new questions. An exploration of how
financial professionals can be considered to be a global elite shows the
powerful position they occupy. It is nevertheless not one that is con-
sidered to be classically political, that is, that of a government which
would act in representation of the will of its citizens. The political space
developed by the relations of power established by an unequal distribu-
tion of resources is not today a space of political representation (Maurer
2004). The social allocation of resources that the regulation of finan-
cial flows officially expects from the financial industry is supposed to
happen as the latter only represents the interests of its individual clients.
At the global level in which financial professionals operate that space of
representation does not exist at all, and does not seem likely to emerge
in the foreseeable future. Thus, it is often experienced as something
that is missing (Abélès 2006). But it can also be analyzed as a refram-
ing of what is understood by “political”. By uniting the aspirants to
credit of the whole world in its hierarchical gaze, the financial industry
contributes to the creation of a global political space. The existence of

this network spanning the whole world allows us to ask questions con-
cerning the institutions that should manage the relations of power that
take shape through its operations. For as long as it does not become a
catch-all category, the notion of “elite,” at least as I have used it here,
which does not presuppose a state or a territory, but only a more or less
durable relation of forces, is thus a good starting point to ask critical
questions about our current political situation.
Notes
1. This chapter is based on research done through participant obser-
vation during three internships that lasted four to five months in
Brokers Inc., a stockbroker company (New York, 2002); in Hedge
Consulting, an independent hedge fund (Paris, 2003); and with fund
managers investing in credit derivatives for Acme, a big financial
multinational corporation (Paris, 2004). I also carried out around a
hundred interviews, reviewed thousands of pages of financial docu-
ments, and learnt to perform some of the professional tasks of the
people I was observing and for whom I was working. The research
was furthered by obtaining a diploma of financial analyst in 2010 and
teaching finance courses in business schools between 2008 and the
present, in Paris and Shanghai.
2. In theoretical narratives I would use the feminine pronoun to talk
about abstract actors, if only to highlight the gendered biases of lan-
guage, but doing so here may be misleading, as it would probably veil
the fact that the most important positions in contemporary finance
are usually held by men (Roth 2006; Ho 2009).
3. Asset-backed securities are rated by rating agencies. The securities with
the best rating are considered safer and pay a lower interest rate to their
owners. When the demand for them rises, their price rises too, which is
equivalent to saying that they pay a lower return to their buyer.
4. Asset-backed securities are the product of securitization, whereby
bank loans are gathered into a single security. The buyers of the
asset-backed security are thus not owners of the bank loans, but of a
single asset. Collateralized Debt Obligations repeat this process, by
bundling asset-backed securities into a single asset. It was through
these securities that the banking system expanded in the early 2000s
in the United States, and through them that it nearly collapsed after
2007 (see for instance Tett [2009]).
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CH A P T ER 9
Management Consultants at Work

with Clients: Maintenance and
Contestation of Elite Status
Irene Skovgaard Smith
The modern form of management consulting first emerged in the

United States in the 1930s and as such it constitutes one of the world’s
newest professions (McKenna 2006). Ever since, the profession has
enjoyed rapid and phenomenal growth in size and scope to become
deeply embedded in all of the developed economies, and management
consulting is considered to be one of the fastest growing occupations
in the world. Business historian Christopher McKenna (2006) shows
how management consultants have come to exert an enormous influ-
ence on the modern world and their highly priced advisory services
are widely and extensively used by all kinds of corporate, public, and
third-sector organizations.
This chapter is based on fieldwork amongst management consul-
tants as they worked in two different client organizations; a hospi-
tal and a manufacturing company. In the hospital, consultants were
hired to implement Lean production principles in a day surgery unit
to increase productivity. In the manufacturing company, consultants
were hired to help with a major turnaround to save the company.
The fieldwork was carried out in Danish context where the manage-
ment consulting industry is relatively large, representing an average of
almost 1 percent of the total Danish gross national product according
to the Danish Management Association (DMR 2007). The purpose
was to study these professionals ethnographically by following them
208 IRENE SKOVGAARD SMITH
as they performed their daily activities in interaction with people in

client organizations.
This text explores how the status of management consultants is
constructed, maintained, and contested in concrete contexts by the
people in relation to whom consultants perform their activities. The
aim is to contribute to the anthropology of elites by showing how
elite status is also an attributed status and in this sense counter the
current tendency to focus mainly on how elite status is achieved and
maintained by elites themselves.
Management Consultants—
A Professional Elite?
The anthropology of elites is centrally concerned with the question
of what constitutes an elite and who can be said to “occupy the most
influential positions or roles in the important spheres of social life” to
use Shore’s working definition (2002, 4; cp. also the definition in the
Introduction above, p. 1). The problems of how to apply such a defini-
tion become particularly evident in the context of highly diversified
societies characterized by division of labor, occupational specialization,
and separate fields of activity of ever increasing variety. As anthropolo-
gists we could ourselves be seen to constitute a professional elite, as
Shore (2002) argues, but our status and influence is small compared to
other professional elites such as lawyers, doctors, politicians, company
executives, and possibly also other Western middle-class academics in
other fields. Thus the identification of elites is a contextual issue as
Harvey (2002) argues and qualifying terms such as “business,” “aca-
demic,” “bureaucratic,” “military,” etcetera might be useful in order to
distinguish elites (Watson 2002).
Management consultants constitute a category of professionals in
the field of business and management, but they do not figure on a
list of traditionally recognized professional elites. The profession is
young, precarious, and its status ambiguous. It is an emerging profes-
sion with no official or agreed upon professional standards or accred-
itation (McKenna 2006) such as those of lawyers and accountants
who similarly sell their services to organizations.
Nevertheless, there are other empirical indicators that management
consultants constitute some kind of professional elite in the context of
business and the management of work organizations. As I will show
in the chapter, these indicators include identification as elite, high
earnings, access to situations of potential influence, highly selective
recruitment practices, and cultivation of mystique. Whenever these or
similar indicators of elite status are present we should get curious, as
MANAGEMENT CONSULTANTS AT WORK 209
anthropologists committed to the project of “studying up” (Nader

1972), and engage with the empirical question of how and in what
situations a category of actors might achieve some kind of elite status
and what opportunities for influence are potentially created by way of
this differentiation.
Mystique and Secretiveness

Indeed, just the reactions to my study of management consultants
made me curious. The business media in particular found it intrigu-
ing that an anthropologist would get to observe what these consul-
tants are really up to. The headline of an article about my research in a
Danish business newspaper sums it up: “ Consultants under the mag-
nifying glass” (Børsen 2005). Apparently, as another Dr. Livingstone,
the anthropologist is on a fascinating expedition into an unknown
and mysterious world. The headline of an article in the Financial
Times (2005) about a research project in the UK, also involving
observation on consulting assignments, reads: “Less mystique, more
reality.”
In a large study on the work of management consultants, funded by

the Economic and Social Research Council, researchers at Warwick
Business School are for the first time being allowed to watch con-
sultants at work with clients, and even attend some meetings. “This
apparently murky world of consultancy turns out to be a bit less dra-
matic than all that,” says Andrew Sturdy, a professor at Warwick and
the leader of the study. (Financial Times 2005)
Clearly some kind of mystique surrounds this category of profession-

als making it compelling enough for the Financial Times to write that
researchers have gained access to have a closer look at this “murky
world.” The cultivation of mystique, which is often used by elites to
differentiate themselves, as Shore (2002, 2) notes, is thus also per-
formed by the media and other agents of public discourse. A case in
point is a popular book called Dangerous Company: The Consulting
Powerhouses and the Businesses They Save and Ruin (O’Shea and
Madigan 1997). Just the title alone affirms the mysterious status of
management consultants as great men with the power to both save
and ruin businesses.
The emphasis on “for the first time” in the above quote from the
Financial Times furthermore points to a lack of research on con-
sulting in action, which is closely related to the problem of access.
Management consulting has traditionally been a secretive and closed
profession that researchers have generally not had access to follow

as the former work with clients. This “opaqueness” is, as Shore
(2002, 10) argues, part of what often characterizes economic, corpo-
rate, military, and political elites who routinely restrict access to their
organizations and activities.
In my case the negotiation of access was indeed a long-winded
and difficult process due in part to this characteristic of organiza-
tional contexts where one cannot just show up and start participating.
Formal access has to be granted by top management and in my case
that involved both consulting firms and client organizations.
At the same time, the process also revealed how sensitive consul-
tants are about having a third party present as they work with clients.
One consultant for instance called my study “dangerous.” When I
asked what was dangerous about it, the response indicated fear of
unique “methods and techniques” and “ways of getting results”
being revealed.
My process of gaining access also highlighted interesting aspects
related to how this emerging profession attempts to increase its status.
I gained access not the least thanks to the DMR, a business organiza-
tion for consulting firms in Denmark, who supported my research.
They did this in the interest of what they called the “professionaliza-
tion” of the industry, and in this endeavor they viewed it as neces-
sary for the industry to open itself up to research. They marketed my
research project to their members with this message and it created a
lot of interest initially. Consulting firms seemed to like the idea of
being seen to be opening up to research. However, their concerns
with the kind of access I was asking for, that is, being there, meant
that most eventually declined. They wanted to be seen to be open
to research while maintaining secretiveness. Two consulting firms
agreed to participate in the end. The managing directors of both of
these firms were on the board of DMR. As such they were the sellers
of the message of openness and probably felt they had to put action
behind the words. Both consulting firms negotiated my access with
their clients, conditioned by confidentiality with regard to specific
details related to the content of the projects.
Selectivity and Elite Socialization

In the business world management consulting is considered an exten-
sively attractive career-path. McKenna (2006) sites surveys indicating
that management consulting has become the top career aspiration for
business school graduates in both the United States and Europe. The
attractiveness of a career in management consulting is related to high

salaries, expert status, and the prestige of belonging to an extremely
competitive world of intelligent, hardworking, and ambitious high-
flyers. The aspiration of becoming a management consultant is how-
ever only for the few.
Management consulting firms generally have high rejection rates
and they use them actively to signal their selectivity (Armbrüster
2004). They work hard to maintain the aura of elitism through rigor-
ous selection practices, placing high demands on candidates, preferably
graduates from leading business schools and prestigious universities
(ibid.). Consulting firms want only “the best and the brightest” as it
is commonly known (Alvesson and Robertson 2006). This is simi-
larly evident on the recruitment pages of the two consulting firms
that participated in my study: “Our employee policy means that we
employ only the best. Your future colleagues are among Denmark’s
best consultants. They all have profound professionalism within their
areas, and of course we also expect you to be among the best in your
area.”
On the other firm’s recruitment page the message is accompanied
by photos of beautiful, sharply dressed consultants who work at the
firm: “Are you one of the best strategy consultants in Scandinavia?
We believe that our success depends on the ability to attract, develop
and hold on to the best consultants in Scandinavia.”
As Armbrüster puts it, the highly selective recruitment of out-
standing individuals provides the consulting industry with “a touch
of intellectual elitism” (2004, 1259). Armbrüster shows how the
selection practices of consulting firms are based on ideas of “brain
power,” “intellectual superiority,” and other elite signifiers. It is a way
of constructing and disseminating the notion of an intellectual elite
to the world of business and management. The demonstrative use of
selection practices is thus not only about recruitment, but also consti-
tutes symbolic sources of legitimacy in relation to potential clients.
Having worked in consulting is also commonly seen as a springboard
for senior management positions outside of consulting (Armbrüster
2004). It represents an important source of reputational capital in the
managerial labor market (Sturdy and Wright 2008). The background,
expertise, and status of former consultants make them attractive to
employers. Sturdy and Wright (2008) explore the movement of con-
sultants into management as a “consulting diaspora” where former
management consultants attempt to maintain their elite identity. This
can be illustrated with the following example (cited in Sturdy and
Wright [2008], 439) of how a former consultant differentiates himself
in relation to his new colleagues: “In an environment like this, there’d

probably be about two or three people, my boss and a couple of oth-
ers, who’ve got brains. The rest of them park it at home when they
leave. Totally brainless!”
Such an identity of superiority is closely linked with the way con-
sultants are socialized as an intellectual elite in consulting firms.
The attractiveness of membership and elite status is emphasized in
most internal contexts as Kärreman and Alvesson (2009) show.
Consequently management consultants “tend to believe that they
are a chosen elite and belong to a collective of special individuals”
(ibid., 1128). The identity narratives of consultants revolve around
notions such as “bright,” “intellectual,” “expert,” “‘innovative,”
“progressive,” “leading edge,” “the best,” etcetera (Alvesson and
Robertson 2006; Alvesson and Empson 2008).
Other mechanisms used by consulting firms to construct an
elite identity include high pay and bonus packages, lavish company
events, impressive buildings, and distinctive locations (Alvesson
and Robertson 2006) that serve as tangible and material manifesta-
tions of privilege, exclusivity, uniqueness, and economic wealth, in
much the same way as financial elites such as investment bankers for
instance. Throughout the course of my fieldwork I was constantly
reminded of the importance of such material manifestations of elite
identity, particularly the very nice cars management consultants
tend to drive. They found my little red Polo Volkswagen of 1989
quite amusing and it became the target of much friendly batter and
joking.
Access to Situations of
Potential Influence
What fascinated me the most, however, was the extent to which man-
agers in both client organizations distinguished the consultants and
constructed them as special in different ways. Experienced senior
executives and other high-level managers for instance seemed to
expect consultants to know the answers to questions they did not
know themselves.
The following situation from the manufacturing company can
serve as an example. It was in a meeting with two young consultants
in their early 30s, the top management team, and the CEO. The
CEO had been headhunted a couple of years ago to save the company
by the investment fund who had bought it at the brink of bankruptcy.
As the consultants presented their analysis of the problems they had
identified and started sketching out some suggestions for possible

solutions, the CEO got impatient: “You consultants should learn to
skip all the power point slides, where you show how smart you are,
and just say what we should do. Tell us what it is going to take for it
to really make a difference.”
What is interesting about this situation is not just that the CEO
interprets the PowerPoint slides as a display of smartness, but that he
clearly expects these two young men to know what should be done to
turn the company around. He expects them to know what he, with
all his experience in executive positions, does not know. Indeed, as
Armbrüster (2004) similarly notes, this is the paradox of management
consulting. Young and managerially less-experienced consultants
advise senior executives who often have many years of experience in
management.
Paradox or not, it means in effect that management consultants
have access to situations of potential influence at the highest levels
of organizations. This indicates a form of elite status as a category of
professionals in business and management contexts where corporate
executives themselves constitute a professional elite.
In the following section I will explore some of the ways in which
consultants are categorized and differentiated by managers and
thereby constructed as social actors with special abilities to do things
we cannot do and know what we do not know.
Constructing Magical Others

In my interviews with managers at different levels, in both the manu-
facturing company and the hospital, particular perceptions of differ-
ence where consistently used to endow the consultants with special
attributes and abilities. Here is an example of how one of the top
managers from the manufacturing company describes what he values
about the consultants:
You have had some sparring and challenging of your views, in relation
to the company you are in, that you cannot get internally . . . Where
they [the consultants] come in, that is where they challenge the foun-
dations, when they say: “But is it really necessary to do [x]?” Those are
some of the questions the company is rarely good at posing itself. (Top
manager, Manufacturing Company)
We see here how the perception of what the consultants are good at is
constructed by way of a perception of what organizational members
are not good at. The consultants are in this sense seen as possessing
a particular kind of ability that insiders per definition do not have.
The other is able to do things we cannot do. In the context of the
hospital, a similar perception is expressed also by a top manager as
he talks about the consultants’ ability to ask stupid questions, an
expression he uses repeatedly throughout the interview: “An advan-
tage with the consultants is that they can permit themselves to be
ignorant about the content of healthcare knowledge, and that means
that they can keep asking the stupid questions until they get a satis-
factory answer.”
The consultants’ ability to ask stupid questions is all about what
they do not know as opposed to the members of the organization.
The consultants do not have healthcare knowledge and that, in itself,
is one of the reasons for hiring them. They are in this sense valued in
the context of change efforts simply because of their nonmembership.
Their valuable difference is constructed by way of a negation of the
everyday presence, familiarity, and knowledge of insiders. The consul-
tants, by contrast, can see as illustrated by the following statements:
. . . and where we maybe looked at it very much with blinkers on, he

could get another dimension into it and then say: “well could it be
a possibility to go in this direction? Why haven’t you thought about
[x]?” (Functional manager, Manufacturing Company)
He was really good at opening people’s eyes in order to say—“are
we actually doing it the right way?” Because a lot of the employees
have been sitting here for many years and didn’t believe it could be
changed, because this is how we have always done it. (Middle man-
ager, Manufacturing Company)
In all the above examples variations of the same perception is used,

namely, that members are somehow caught in and blinded by their
daily practice and collective habits, that is, by what is usually done.
And this perception is used as a repertoire for differentiating the con-
sultants. Being challenged by consultants seems to attain an almost
“magical and miraculous significance,” to borrow a phrase by Barth
(2000, 29). Consultants can open eyes for instance. In this way, a
transcendent agent is constructed—a magical other, who is positioned
above and outside it all and thereby is able to be an agent of change.
As the top manager at the hospital continues: “Here comes someone
from the outside, who is impartial—he is not a doctor. They [the
consultants] can take the liberty of asking stupid questions, because
they pose them according to objective criteria.”
The ability attributed to the consultants is not only about their

nonfamiliarity, but also perceived impartiality and objectivity. The
consultants are in other words constructed as impartial by way of
negation; they are not doctors. Attributing impartiality to consultants
makes it possible to use them as negotiators of conflicting interests
and convincers who can influence different groups within the orga-
nization. The others are constructed as being able to do things the
insiders are unable to do because they are all in some way burdened
with a specific internal position and associated relations. This can
be illustrated in the following statements by a nurse manager in the
hospital:
Doctors are the ones who have the right to call the shots and they are
the most important and only doctors can manage doctors, you know,
nobody else can say anything. There you can say it is quite good with
a project like this where someone comes and says: “Well this is how
it is going to be.” Someone who is NOT a doctor and NOT a nurse.
Because I wouldn’t have any power on my own. Really I wouldn’t have
been able to get through with anything, because they [the doctors]
just wouldn’t have it.
As this nurse manager experiences it, her opportunities for influence

are constrained by her internal position as a nurse, regardless of the
fact that she is a middle manager. The consultants however are neither
doctors nor nurses; they are not burdened by an internal position.
In this way it is possible, at least in certain situations, to construct
the consultants as free from internal position and use them in politi-
cal negotiations over change. As for instance in the following example
from the manufacturing company, where a top manager had a dis-
agreement with the rest of the team on a specific issue.
The issue was particularly hot at the time of the interview so the
top manager was talking about it in some detail when the consultant
(Hans) enters the story:
And now it has come up again with Hans’ recommendation . . . And I

would like to have a discussion [with him] about that. Precisely because
I respect him so much and since I am in the minority I have to say:
“o.k., what do you do then in order to become convinced that it is a
good idea.” And it might be that he could provide some good input so
I say, well o.k. I am maybe still not hundred percent in agreement, but
I can see that there are more advantages than disadvantages, so o.k.
let’s do it, right. We might do it anyway, but at least then I buy into it
more, right. (Top manager, Manufacturing Company)
This top manager is describing how he is planning to use the consul-

tant to convince himself to go along with the CEO and the rest of
the top management team, even though he does not agree. The top
manager feels he might have lost the internal battle already, but if he
lets himself be convinced by the consultant he has in a sense not really
lost, but merely been enlightened by an impartial and highly respected
external party. And indeed as he predicts it here, the decision he ini-
tially opposed, was agreed upon shortly after the interview.
What is striking about this situation is that the consultant is clearly
on someone’s side in this negotiation; he favors something in particu-
lar. Nevertheless, the top manager in the minority chooses to main-
tain the status and otherness of the consultant and attributes him
with impartiality for a purpose. In this way an apparently paradoxical
role performance becomes possible. The consultant is performing the
role as an impartial political agent.
It seems like an impossible balancing act that the consultant avoids
losing the attribute of impartiality and his status as someone who
is respected. Clearly this is only possible because his position is sus-
tained by the internal actors in question. This top manager needs the
consultant in the role of an impartial party he can be convinced by
and the top management team as a whole needs the latter in this role
of a mediator even though everyone knows that he supports a par-
ticular agenda. The consultant is socially constructed and positioned
this way for very practical purposes and the actors involved in this
particular negotiation agree on the terms.
Elite Perceptions as Repertoires of

Differentiation
The involved actors thus collectively create the social position of
consultants in specific social contexts and situations. However, the
repertoires for differentiating the consultants are not only related to
negation of insider characteristics but are also specific to each orga-
nizational context, and thus always influenced by perceptions of who
we are, they also draw on more general perceptions related to the con-
struction and maintenance of elite status performed by the consulting
profession and its commentators as described in the first section.
This can be illustrated by looking at another key role consultants
are expected to play; namely, the role of objective truth-tellers and
providers of proof and evidence. Consultants carry out activities of
analyzing and documenting, called “fact-finding,” by taking sto-
ries and other kinds of information and data, reconstituting it, and
rendering it visible and real through different techniques of represen-

tation. The consultants are collectively endowed with the ability to
define reality by being attributed with objectivity. Thus potentially
creating the conditions for a legitimate process of arriving at a com-
mon picture and an agreed upon version of reality.
The repertoires of differentiation used are more general ideals of
scientific objectivity and data analysis. Objectivity, superior analytical
skills, and mathematical-logical intelligence are precisely key signi-
fiers used in the construction and maintenance of elite status by the
consulting profession itself. Armbrüster (2004) for instance shows
how the signaling of “data-driven objectivity,” as he calls it, is indeed
one of the most important aspects of how the notion of an intellec-
tual elite is constructed through the selection practices of consulting
firms.
The way consultants are constructed to fulfill this function can
be illustrated with the following example from the manufacturing
company. It was a situation where the consultants were in the mid-
dle of presenting the results of their analyses of the problems in the
company to a group of middle managers from different departments.
The top manager who had the role as the project sponsor was also
present. As one of the consultants presented a model made to illus-
trate a particular finding, he said: “I am being diplomatic here, but
I believe there is something to it.” The top manager reacted imme-
diately, interrupting the presentation: “It is not a question of belief.
There is proof!” Clearly the top manager wanted to make sure no one
in the room interpreted what was being presented as anything other
than objective proof. Even though the consultant’s presentation was
otherwise thoroughly saturated with rhetorical and visual devices for
signaling objectivity, the single mention of the word “belief” trig-
gered his reaction.
The consultants themselves were of course acutely aware of the role
they were supposed to play, as illustrated by the way they talked about
it in the planning of this presentation. One of the consultants put it
like this: “We have to present the facts so they are value-free. So they
[the middle managers] can’t do anything but agree. And then move
on to the improvement initiatives that are directly related.” When the
top manager later joined the planning meeting he similarly reminded
them of their role: “If it’s just claim versus claim then it doesn’t mat-
ter. You have to make sure that what you demonstrate holds water.”
On this occasion the version constructed by the consultants seemed
to have been accepted as evidence. No one objected or challenged
the results during or after the meeting and a broad range of actors
sustained their status as objective truth-tellers in a context where sto-

ries, gut feelings, or intuitions were perceived as the attributes of the
insiders in contrast to the objectivity of the consultants. In this way,
repertoires of differentiation can draw both on general elite notions
of consultants as a category of professionals and specific local notions
of who we are.
Similarly the perception is that consultants possess state-of-the-art
knowledge and expertise that enables them to provide new ideas and
solutions to problems in organizations. As we saw it in the situation
described in the beginning, the CEO pushed for the consultants to
provide just that. Here is how one of the top managers in the manu-
facturing company describes one of the consultants:
John is an extremely skilled expert within production and logistics and

flows and stock and optimization on distribution and Lean and all
that. There he really outperforms everyone here in the company, right.
Because that is what he has worked with in all kinds of companies,
so he does of course have a template way of thinking that is sharp of
course. We don’t have that. (Top manager, Manufacturing Company)
The consultant is categorized as an expert who outperforms “every-

one here” and has a way of thinking that “we” don’t have. As a proj-
ect manager in the hospital similarly describes it: “They have some
knowledge that no one has here, or that any of us have at this point.
So just professionally we would not be able to do what they do. You
know, because we don’t know that way of thinking and things like
that, so we have to have someone with the expertise, right.”
The consultants are expected to bring expert solutions that are
new, that is, unknown and untried internally, but also superior and
advanced. Negation plays a role in how the differentiation is achieved,
but at the same time the idea of an “extremely skilled expert,” as the
top manager puts it, clearly draws on the elite image the profession
attempts to create of consultants as management experts.
Indeed this is precisely how consulting firms market their ser-
vices. One look at the websites of the two consulting firms in my
study is enough to indicate that their self-representation is all about
the superior content they claim to offer in the form of management
expertise, tools, and techniques. Their websites tell us that they are
selling state-of-the-art management expertise applied in the course
of change implementation processes where problems are solved and
results delivered in the form of increased productivity, improved effi-
ciency, better quality, better profitability, etc. Their consultants have
“high competences, solid knowledge and project experience” as one

of the firms states. The second firm emphasizes that their “trademark
is deep specialist expertise combined with knowledge of what makes
things happen.”
The Functions of Differentiation

The examples presented in this section illustrate how a specific posi-
tion is created for specific functions to be performed, functions that
are difficult for members of the collectivity to execute. Differentiation
creates the other who is attributed with a particular kind of agency.
As Barth (2002) argues, boundary drawing can separate actors for the
purpose of giving “shape to their interaction in a way that . . . positively
enables it, since it frames and defines the nature of the opportunity”
(28). Consultants, in this sense, are separated from organizational
members by the drawing and maintenance of a particular boundary
that has a special significance. It is in other words the separateness of
the position that creates the value as Mauss (2001 [1950]) argues in
the context of traditional magic:
The magical value of persons or things results from the relative posi-
tion they occupy within society or in relation to society. The two sepa-
rate notions of magical virtue and social position coincide in so far as
one depends on the other. Basically in magic it is always a matter of the
respective values recognised by society. These values do not depend, in
fact, on the intrinsic qualities of a thing or a person, but on the status
or rank attributed to them by all-powerful public opinion (148).
It is the status attributed to consultants that creates their potential

influence. However, it is important to emphasize that consultants are
also active agents who position themselves in particular ways in the
organizational contexts where they work. Thus their status is accom-
plished through the dialectic of consultants positioning themselves
and being positioned by different client actors simultaneously. Both
consultants and organizational members take part in creating the col-
lectively held definitions, or “working consensus” in Goffman’s terms
(1990 [1959]), that establish the status of consultants in relation to
organizational members, their attributed abilities, the functions they
fulfill, and their roles in interaction.
The social position available to consultants in organization implies
extremely high expectations of exceptional people both personally and
professionally, not the least because it draws in part on elite discourses
in the differentiation of consultants. The attributed elite status and

the expectations of magical effects implied are difficult to live up to in
practice as I will show in the next section. Performing the designated
roles implied in the status attributed to consultants is risky and far
from always successful.
Ambiguity and Contestation

As I have argued so far, the power and influence of consultants is a
function of the status attributed to them, but such magical powers are
only potential as Mauss (2001 [1950]) emphasizes. Attributed status
and special abilities function to create opportunities for influence, but
consultants are not always and not necessarily magical in practice.
Potentially, differentiation can be a source of both opportunities and
limitations for influence. In practice the status of consultants is highly
ambiguous, and it is continuously both maintained and contested in
interaction. This ambiguity and contestation was reflected in a range
of different ways in the two contexts where I experienced consultants
at work.
The consultants were sometimes undermined for political reasons;
it was for instance far from always in the interest of all actors in a par-
ticular negotiation to maintain the impartiality of consultants. It was
also not always in the interest of everyone to have their eyes opened and
being challenged on what is usually done. The stupid questions and
the challenges were also sometimes experienced as simply illegitimate.
Thus the very idea of ignorance and nonfamiliarity was potentially a
source of both positive and negative differentiation. Displaying lack
of knowledge and understanding of specific contexts, circumstances,
and conditions were not infrequently met with reactions such as “you
don’t understand what is going on here,” “you have not been out there
seeing what our day is like,” “too black and white,” etcetera. The facts
and objective evidence produced by consultants were also sometimes
contested in similar ways.
Another way the position of the consultants was contested played
out specifically in the hospital amongst doctors who identify strongly
with scientific values and ideals themselves and for whom objectiv-
ity is an insider-attribute and therefore by implication not something
that can be attributed to the others. There was in this case clearly
an element of the doctors using their own elite status to question or
undermine the consultants. Doctors would emphasize the lack of
validity of the consulting analysis and actively question the results in
meetings and workshops. They would assert that the issues had not
been thoroughly investigated making the implementation flawed as

well. They would engage in discussions with the consultants about the
nature of their expertise related to identifying and solving problems in
organizations. The consultants for their part tried to raise their own
status by comparing their expertise to a doctor’s expertise in diagno-
sis and cure of illnesses, but from a doctor’s perspective the claimed
expertise of consultants were far too unscientific and intangible.
Some doctors would even contest the status of the consultants sim-
ply with reference to years of education. Compared to consultants,
doctors have spent more years in education. Implicitly there seemed
to be a view amongst at least some of the doctors that they were intel-
lectually superior to the consultants and in this sense they used their
own elite identity to contest the status of consultants. Whatever elite
status consultants might enjoy in the world of business, it did not
count for much seen from a doctor’s perspective.
Either Too Different Or Too Similar

Across both organizational contexts there were clear indications that
one of the most ambiguous aspects of the status of consultants was
related precisely to the expertise, knowledge, and superior intellec-
tual ability the consulting profession identifies so strongly with as a
source of their elite status. It was an important aspect of how they
were sometimes constructed as magical in concrete contexts and situ-
ations, but the differentiation was also potentially marginalizing with
the consequence that they were undermined and their solutions con-
tested because they failed to be interpreted as useful, relevant, and
legitimate.
The management concepts consultants represent sometimes came
to function as a marker of problematic difference and incompatible
values. This was often the case in the hospital, for instance when clini-
cal management and staff reacted to aspects of the management con-
cept the consultants were implementing as irrelevant and problematic
in the context of surgery and patient care. Here is an example of how
a nurse manager expresses it:
As I have said to the consultants twenty million times—there are dif-

ferences between humans and machines and you have to accept that.
That you can’t within health care make it a hundred percent lean, you
can’t. You always have to go in and modify some things. You can have
the mindset and the ideas, but you really have to sometimes compro-
mise with some things. (Nurse manager, Hospital)
In the manufacturing company however, the consultants were under

constant risk of being experienced as too theoretical, flighty, too
know-it-all, out of touch with reality, rigid, etc. Signs of being too
intellectual and theoretical for instance often did not go down very
well. A middle manager experienced a consultant as “one of those
consultants again . . . they are so damned know-it-all, right.” As she
explains in the interview: “He could be a bit . . . that theoretical one
who didn’t listen to what we said.” Even a top manager talks about
how he thinks two of the consultants are too “theoretical.” Here with
reference to a particular situation in a meeting:
It was a waste of time, things took twice as long, because Sebastian

[consultant] had to philosophize about all kinds of things. And with
Tom [consultant] I just think it is so flighty the whole thing, so I just
couldn’t be bothered listening to it . . . So this thing, that they have to
go into all kinds of theoretical reflections, like this and like that, on and
on, you just can’t be bothered. Not for very long at a time anyway. Of
course there can be something of value in it, but that constantly has to
be weighed up—how theoretical should you be? But of course that is
not to say that they shouldn’t bring something new in from the outside.
Because they also have to do that. Obviously that is also, amongst other
things, what you buy. (Top manager, Manufacturing Company)
The ambiguity is quite clearly expressed here. Differentiation is

crucial; consultants should bring something new, something char-
acterized by otherness. But successful differentiation is in a sense a
two-edged sword where consultants easily end up being experienced
as too theoretical.
Paradoxically, there was also in the manufacturing company a
simultaneous tendency to often interpret the expertise of the consul-
tants as too similar to what we already know. Or in other words the
solutions consultants proposed sometimes had difficulty achieving
the status as new or superior enough. Many managers in private com-
panies already know the management concepts and ideas the consul-
tants use. Managers and consultants belong essentially to the same
world of business and management and they often have similar busi-
ness school education, read the same books, take the same training
courses, etcetera. The knowledge the consultants claim to provide is
not in any way protected, demarcated, difficult to get access to, or in
other ways inherently different from the knowledge of the managers.
If it looks, sounds, or smells too similar it is by implication also not
magical and it has no value for managers.
The content consultants provide have to be experienced as both

different enough and similar enough at the same time. Otherwise
the consultants will be contested or undermined. When a CEO for
instance pushes consultants to play their otherness role and tell him
what to do, they run the risk of being undermined if they comply.
If they tell a CEO what to do without having carefully crafted their
advice in collaboration with internal actors, taking internal knowl-
edge and experience into consideration, it is quite unlikely that their
status will be sustained. In the situation described in the beginning
of this chapter the consultants did not take the chance. They contin-
ued with their PowerPoint presentation as planned. But in other situ-
ations they did attempt to perform the otherness role when pushed to
do so and these attempts further highlighted the inherent ambigui-
ties of their position.
One example from the manufacturing company was a meeting
about a proposal for solutions in a production maintenance unit. The
proposal had been worked out in collaboration with the middle man-
ager of that unit and the consultants had sent the proposal to the
relevant top managers the day before. The response was a phone call
where the consultants were asked if this was the full assessment of
the consulting firm. Due to this phone call, the relevant consultant
had prepared some additional suggestions to present in the meeting
independent of the plan created together with the middle manager.
One of these suggestions was related to the level of maintenance of
the production facilities. The consultant argued that the current level
should be lowered and he used benchmarking data he had found to
indicate that other manufacturing companies do not maintain such
a high level. One of the top managers reacted immediately: “Now I
have to laugh a little. I have been other places and nowhere do they
do maintenance to such a low level as we do here.” The consultant,
in turn, expressed his disbelief, but the top manager maintained that
this was definitely the case and he closed the discussion and dismissed
the consultant by saying: “We have to be aware that it is not as black
and white as that!”
In this situation, the consultant was interpreted as displaying a lack
of understanding of the local context and being too “black and white.”
He had been pushed into a position of otherness where he was cut
off from the very thing that could potentially render his suggestions
legitimate—namely the mutual development of shared ideas. Since
the shared product (i.e., the plan created together with the middle
manager) was not distinctive enough, the consultant was pushed to
supply something more distinctively consulting firm. When he then

tried to play the otherness role in the way the top managers expected,
he was undermined. The top manager wiped the recommendation off
the table and rendered it irrelevant and illegitimate.
Conclusion
In this chapter I have explored some of the ways in which the par-
ticular kind of elite status of management consultants is not only con-
structed and maintained but also contested by the managers these
consultants interact with in the context of their work in client orga-
nizations. It highlights how attributed elite status can function to
make particular role performances possible in interaction and also the
inherent ambiguity of the status of management consultants. Their
influence is only potential and their position unstable and insecure in
concrete situations.
This might be specific for management consultants, but it never-
theless raises the question as to what extent similar mechanisms are
relevant in the context of other elites, particularly in many contem-
porary societies characterized by a variety of different kinds of elites
with varying status and influence depending on the situation and
the context. This emphasizes the need for studies focusing on the
everyday spheres of all kinds of elites, the conditions under which
they perform their activities, and the way they are categorized and
positioned by the actors they interact with.
As Barth (1969) insisted in the context of ethnicity, collective iden-
tity is constructed in interaction and is the result of processes of social
differentiation. Differentiation in turn is always a matter of mutually
constituting processes of external categorization and internal identi-
fication, that is, how we identify ourselves, how others categorize us,
and the ongoing interplay of both (Jenkins 2000). Status is similarly
the result of relational and dialectic processes of differentiation. Thus
we can never assume or take elite identity or status for granted, and
we similarly cannot rely solely on the self-representation of any elite.
Instead we have to explore the mutually constituting processes of dif-
ferentiation that produce distinctions and status differences and their
diverse social purposes.
The power and influence of some elites will be much more stable
and institutionalized than others, but in any concrete situation of
interaction, elite status is potentially both maintained and contested
depending on the context, conditions, and circumstances. The task
of the anthropology of elites is to study these processes in concrete
situations by seeking out the spaces where interaction and encounters

take place and where those who identify as elites are also the objects
of categorization by others.
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CH A P T ER 10
Money Relations, Ideology, and the

Formation of a Cosmopolitan Elite
at the Frontier of Transnational
Capitalism: An Ethnographic Study
of African Finance Professionals
in Johannesburg
France Bourgouin
Introduction
As we entered the elevator of his office complex in the northern sub-
urbs of Johannesburg, Kweku,1 an energetic and highly ambitious
36-year-old Ghanaian banker, continued to describe to me how diffi-
cult he found living in South Africa was. I had spent the day shadowing
him around his office, and his driver, a quiet and discrete middle-aged
man from the neighboring Alexandra Township, was now taking us to
the Saxon Hotel. Only a short drive from his office, this luxury bou-
tique hotel was one of Kweku’s preferred places to conduct business
meetings, have lunch with clients, or meet for a sun-downer on sum-
mer evenings. That day, we were going to meet a new Nigerian client
of his who had just arrived that morning from Lagos. Born in Accra,
Kweku’s father was involved in national politics and his mother was a
primary school teacher. He was educated in Boston before he took his
first job as a financial analyst on Wall Street. He moved to London
two years later where he worked with an investment consulting firm
228 FRANCE BOURGOUIN
for 18 months but said to me that he “didn’t spend much time there
at all” for he was “mostly traveling between Hong Kong, Singapore,
Dubai, Manila, Vienna, and Warsaw.” In 1996, at the age of 31, he
earned his MBA from a prominent business school, returned to the
Unites States, and began working with a New York–based bank in its
emerging markets business in India, Mexico, Russia, and Singapore as
a Global Emerging Markets Management Associate (GEMMA). By
then he owned a large apartment on the upper west-side, worked every
day of the week, never took a vacation, but every so often enjoyed
meeting his friends in New York’s trendiest nightclubs. In 1998,
Kweku was promoted to the head of the bank’s risk analysis unit for
Indonesia. He left the bank after being recruited by another American
financial institution and moved to Johannesburg in 2000, accepting a
position as director of African investment initiatives.
As we sat in the late afternoon traffic of the Sandton CBD, 2
Kweku presented me with his account of what made Johannesburg
an “unpleasant place to live.” He explained to me how he believed
“white South Africans were racists” and “wide-eyed about the rest
of Africa,” whereas black South Africans were “xenophobic.” He
described the people he worked with as “parochial” and “unworldly,”
and how he thus had not made many friends or acquaintances since
he arrived two years ago. In listening to him describe his perception
of Johannesburg and South Africa it was evident that he feared the
rising crime rates in the city and its suburbs, was skeptical about the
political stability and the economic prosperity of the country, and
spoke as though he would be willing to pack up and leave at any
moment. At this point in our conversation I could not help but ask:
“Why are you here then?” “Because this is an important place to be
for someone like me,” he replied.
This young and determined banker’s brief profile brings to the
fore important questions regarding the study of power and elite in
contemporary society. How do we understand status and the forma-
tion of new elite in light of the recent prominence of a highly com-
plex global neoliberal order in production and capital accumulation?
Kweku, with his fast-developing career focused on global financial
transactions, presents a unique opportunity to study up and advance
theoretical and empirical work surrounding the formation of global
elite by considering the nature of power in the deterritorialized space
of transnational capitalism. Who are these young finance profession-
als, do they belong to a global elite, and how do they come to be rec-
ognized as such? Although the most notable work on elites is focused
on the reproduction of power structures at the national level (Mills
MONEY RELATIONS, IDEOLOGY, AND THE FORMATION 229
1956; Cohen 1981; Domhoff 1967; Scott 2003; Shore and Nugent
2002), how do we define who are the elite in this stateless space of
the transnational level?
This chapter focuses on the daily lives of these young transna-
tional African financial professionals living and working in transna-
tional finance institutions in Johannesburg. The analysis of elements
of their professional and personal lives reveals what it is that defines
both their action of belonging and their distinction as an elite. In
contrast to anthropological literature on the reproduction elite, this
chapter will demonstrate how the formation of a new elite evolved
as individuals associated themselves with cosmopolitanism. The eth-
nographic accounts presented here focus intensively on the relation
between identity formation on an individual and group basis and spe-
cific strategies for elite distinction. Contrary to the understanding of
cosmopolitanism as a discourse that favors universality and equality,
this chapter argues that cosmopolitan being, as defined and practiced
by these business professionals in Johannesburg, in fact contributed
to the establishment of new social hierarchies. I demonstrate how
African transnational capitalists living in Johannesburg recognize
themselves as belonging to an elite, to show how that practices of
cosmopolitan distinction are not only about identity formation, but
also part of creating and maintaining new social hierarchies.
Through the anthropological study of international finance profes-
sionals, I seek to reconsider classical concerns within the discipline such
as the nature of social structures, ideology and consciousness, identity
and the practices of self-representation within this contemporary con-
text. My analysis in this chapter builds upon empirical data collecting
during extended fieldwork over a period of 18 months between 2002
and 2004 with a set of 37 men and women with very similar profiles to
that of Kweku. They are all successful business professionals of African
origin, from privileged backgrounds, and all are employed in middle
and senior management positions within a transnational or tertiary
sector private business institution or organization in Johannesburg.
As young transnational capitalists, they have lived in different cities of
the world; they were educated in Europe and the United State’s most
renowned universities; and they have recently launched their careers as
corporate professionals in the world’s leading financial centers. They
are very wealthy and they enjoy their affluent lifestyles. They are con-
sidered to be transnational because the nature of their work, as well
as their lifestyle: they are continuously moving from one country to
the next, in an attempt to gain more international work experience,
engage in transnational capitalist operations, and further their careers.
Though these men and women have been living in Johannesburg for
only a few years, they do not intend on living in South Africa indef-
initely. They nevertheless are unsure about when they will leave or
where they will move to next. One thing is for certain however; their
next move will also be guided by their drive to excel in their busi-
ness endeavors. As motivated and ambitious businesspeople, they have
always followed very determined career paths.
Empirical investigation also involved intensive observations and
recordings of a large number of different sorts of formal gatherings in
different spheres of social life. I attended business meetings in offices,
corporate lunches, seminars, and trade fairs. I was also able to attend
various social activities: I joined evening parties and informal meet-
ings with friends; I followed informants to nightclubs and to public
spaces around the city. Two headhunters provided me with a long list
of potential participants for my fieldwork and in fact became infor-
mants themselves for they helped me understand the recruitment of
foreign African business professionals to Johannesburg.
I refer to the formation of transnational elite as a process that puts
into question the understanding of how individuals come to distinguish
themselves from the masses;3 that is, how they operate and what prac-
tices they maintain to define and sustain their positional identity and
status in a capitalist system. I focus specifically on the theme of money
and the importance individuals attribute to how their wealth is made
and how it is spent as a means of differentiation and identification as a
cosmopolitan elite. I will thus begin by exploring their relation to money
in terms of their professional activities, the risks they assume with other
people’s money, and the influence they maintain over the distribution of
financial resources by making investment decisions. This analysis is then
complimented by an examination of their relation to money through
their high personal incomes. This includes their proximity to luxury
goods, their extravagant spending habits, and their handling of money.
I close this chapter by turning attention to the articulation between
these practices of self-identification and representation as transnational
capitalist elite and the ideologies of the institutions of contemporary big
business, namely Transnational Corporations (TNCs) and the presti-
gious business schools, which formed them.
Elite Status in the Context of

Transnational Capitalism
With the avid emphasis on transnationalism as a contempo-
rary phenomenon, coupled with the increased debate regarding
cosmopolitanism and the formation of a global elite,4 it is important

to unpack the processes of distinction and creation of social hier-
archies within this globalized world.5 The rise of the transnational
corporation of last century represents one of the major social trans-
formations of recent decades. It formalized a social strata of highly
paid managers and finance professionals with great influence on eco-
nomic possesses. The capitalist class, even the transnational capitalist
elite, are to a certain extent familiar to us: those who are considered
to occupy the upper tiers of society, who are part of what the jour-
nalistic term describes as a “jet-set” culture, and who belong to a
social group of wealthy world travelers, are not foreign to our every-
day understanding of contemporary society. How are new identity
politics playing themselves out in this arena? In returning to Kweku’s
statement, we need to ask: To whom is he referring to when he says
that Johannesburg is an important place for “someone like” him?
Moreover, how are certain notions of authority and influence being
reorganized along the imaginaries of emerging market economies and
value attributed to financial activities in places such as Johannesburg,
which is at the center of the distribution of credit into Africa?
As individuals who are in a position of influence at the apex of
transnational capitalist proliferation, they are actively working and
earning their wealth while also fulfilling a specific role and function
by contributing to the propagation of transnational capitalist. They
occupy the upper echelons of transnational capitalism and are in posi-
tions of power: they are the decision makers, and their choices influ-
ence the flows of investment and capitalist transactions. It is at this
articulation point between changing trends and patterns in transna-
tional capitalist propagation and the specific role and function cer-
tain people play in this propagation that transnational capitalist elite
formation takes place. For the men and women I interviewed, their
coming to work in Johannesburg was, as Kweku’s assertion implies,
a strategic move; they have come to this city as a means of fulfilling
very specific professional goals and aspirations.
Their move to Johannesburg coincided with the time the democ-
ratizing South African State was orchestrating various processes of
economic change such as the promotion of export-oriented growth,
the importance of FDI (Foreign Direct Investment) for economic
development, reforms in the Johannesburg stock exchange, the
South African capitalist proliferation throughout the continent,
and the promotion of the country as an emerging market economy.
Institutional motivations for profit and capitalist expansion, informed
by a neoliberal perspective, are instigating foreign and national TNCs
in Johannesburg to solicit African nationals such as Kweku to fill

upper-management positions.6 The recruitment of African corpora-
tions is about gaining skilled professionals who are believed to be able
to negotiate the cultural specificities of the targeted market. They
are versed in the industry’s way of doing things; they understand
the Euro-American way of doing business; and their Euro-American
superiors believe hiring an African—familiar with the places, the
sites, the people, the customs, and the language—will be better for
business. Informants were motivated to accept these important posi-
tions within their corporations and move to Johannesburg for to do
so was a means to reaffirm their identity as cosmopolitans, as ambi-
tious capitalist predators, as risk takers.
By looking at the practices of transnational capitalists, especially
those in positions of influence over the distribution of financial
resources, we can begin to explore the nature of power in the deter-
ritorialized space of global capitalism. In this particular case study,
we can also then begin to explore the nature of collective affiliation
and distinction and the particular set of interests, norms, and prac-
tices that have enabled these African transnational capitalists living in
Johannesburg to differentiate themselves not only from the masses,
but also from other capitalists in general, and thus reaffirming their
position as a global elite.
The narrative accounts and the ethnographic observations revealed
how informants differentiated themselves from others according to
the notions of world views, ambitions, and personal strategies. As
Kweku’s statement implies, there was an understanding of what it
was to be like them. To be like them is to think like them, to act
in similar ways, and to have the same attitude toward professional
advancement. It is about behavior and a manner of being, in public
and in private. To justify such behavior and values is to express a
similar ideology. This community exists because individuals express
a sense of groupness and as such it becomes recognizable through a
set of codes and practices representing a belief system or ideology.
Their attitudes and practices around wealth and money proved to be
important for their own self-representation and collective affiliation.
First, as financial professionals, their relation to wealth is primary
to their daily actions and professional practices. It is their handling
of wealth, other peoples’ wealth, in making important investment
decisions, that they maintain power in the transnational capitalist
system. Second, as wealthy individuals, they are able to maintain
various personal spending habits, have a close proximity to luxury
goods, and use their personal wealth as a means of reaffirming their
sense of self. These simultaneously occurring practices of money

and relation to wealth represent an important set of behavior and
codes that allow us to better understand these individuals as a new
global elite.
Certainly, the negotiation of action and my position as the
researcher in relation to the studied group were vital to the research
outcome. While living in Johannesburg and studying for my PhD,
I was also lecturing at the Johannesburg-based business school
affiliated with the University of Pretoria. As such, I had imme-
diate access to a small community of locally based business elite.
While emphasizing to them that I was a student of anthropology,
I realized that my connection to a business school was useful for
approaching the capitalist elite. In many ways, the social sciences
was a world quite foreign to them and my connection to the busi-
ness environment through my lecturing at a business school was
very important as it provided me with a sort of credibility: I was
considered a member of their community as an informant said to
me at our first meeting:
At least you have some understanding of the world of business and

have not just isolated yourself in the world of academia. When my PA
told me you were an anthropologist I couldn’t imagine what it is that
you wanted from me. I was going to tell her that I was not interested
[in your project]. But when she told me that you were connected with
GIBS,7 it made more sense to me . . . at least you have some under-
standing of how it really works.
Not only was my access to capitalist elite influenced by my involve-

ment with an institution respected by the business community in
Johannesburg, but I also soon realized that informants’ perceptions
of me were important to my ability to conduct this study. As busy
professional men and women, informants did not have a lot of time
for additional commitments such as an interview by a young stu-
dent. They were often in the company of their coworkers, clients, and
friends, and constantly maintained a professional profile in front of
others. As such, I too had to dress and behave in a manner that would
fit with the image they were striving to maintain. In other words, I
dressed and conducted myself in a way that I believe they expected me
to. For me, just the practice of having to build such an image con-
tributed to my understanding of informant-created hierarchies and of
various practices of consumption, wealth creation, and holding cer-
tain values as forms of distinction exhibited by them.
The Relation to Money: Social Markers in

the Context of Transnational capitalism
I play with money. I take risks. I gamble. I invest and hope that it will
turn out to be profitable but you can’t always know in advance. It is
not by taking the safe easy way with money that you are going to get
rich. You have to play big to win big. And sometimes you lose big too.
But if you are a good player, in the end, you always come out richer.
(Victor)8
Informants were very forthright about their desire to increase their

personal wealth. “I want to make money and I am not ashamed to say
it. I love being wealthy,” Anthony 9 says to me, “Does being wealthy
make me feel important—yes it does. I know that with money I can
access more that I want.” After listening to casual conversations they
had about money with their friends and having watched their behavior
toward money, I made money a set topic of discussion during inter-
views. Money practices concerned individual spending and handling
of personal wealth as well as the set of professional financial practices
informants were involved in. During such structured conversations
concerning money, two principle notions emerged: being a player and
developing a sense of worldliness about money. The notion of being
a player referred to personal attitudes toward money, whereas that of
worldliness related more to the nature of their work as transnational
capitalists. Worldliness concerned the nature of their work in trans-
national finance; a sector of capitalism that informants considered to
be complicated and sophisticated. They emphasized their role as the
negotiators and deal-makers in the realm of transnational capitalism;
specifying the importance of making money globally and knowing
foreign markets. In other words, the very nature of their work and
their daily activities in the office were considered to be a form of prac-
tice that served to reinforce their cosmopolitan identity. This is how
Kweku spoke of himself and his career: “I hunt money. That’s the
best way to describe what I do, that’s my job—I am a money hunter.
I make money for others and I want to do the same for me. I want to
make money and I am not ashamed to say it!”
In their discussions about money, transnational capitalist elite
would talk of investment schemes, different stock markets, hedge
funds, and money markets. They had a transnational knowledge of
money—which companies were best to invest, which stock markets
were most profitable, and so on. They had numerous offshore bank
accounts. Their monetary practices reflected their views; they were
unstructured and transnational. They worked with many different
people so that no one person would have full knowledge of their

wealth or their personal monetary activities. They did not divulge
their wealth to me and I was not privy to a full description of their
investment practices. The conversations I had revealed the importance
attributed to being financially implicated or involved in a country to
experience it as a place. It was not sufficient to live in a certain country;
to know a country was to have conducted business there. “To know
a place you have to do business there. To be a global citizen, I think
you have to be making money globally—doing business in India is
not the same experience as being on a yoga retreat” (Henry).10
Henry’s claim certainly offers us an important perspective on the
nature of differentiation among transnationally mobile people. We
can see that differentiation and distinction among transnational capi-
talists is not about those who lead transnational lifestyles and those
who do not; rather attention is given to a person’s specific engage-
ment with global capitalist activities.
Kemi11 offered a similar description of different types of wealth as
a means of establishing a form of capitalist worldliness or cosmopoli-
tanism in capitalism. Of course these conversations were structured,
as I had purposefully asked them to talk about their personal global
monetary practices. They expressed how their financial involvement
in Asia, Africa, Europe, North and South America made them “feel
cosmopolitan.” As Kemi said when expressing how she considers her-
self to be more cosmopolitan than her South African colleagues who
have not followed a similar career path of international mobility:
Everyone takes business trips, companies are expanding internation-

ally. But traveling on business or doing business “abroad” is not cos-
mopolitan. Once you see a place as “abroad” you think of a place as
home. That is a problem. You have to make this new place your home.
That is when you are living as a cosmopolitan. And to do that, you
have to trust a place, with your money. It is when you start playing
with your money transnationally, not when you get a job with a com-
pany and move around, that you become a truly a global person.
The above narratives reveal the importance attributed to one’s active

role in the global production of capital and wealth for reaffirming a
certain social identity. Henry and Kemi both indicate how their own
relationships with wealth and global capitalism give them a sense of
being cosmopolitan. As such, they set themselves against others who
may also be leading an international lifestyle, but are not engaged in
processes of contemporary global capitalism.
Informants emphasized that it was their role as money-makers for

their company that made their jobs fulfilling to them. The quest for
personal wealth is what pushed them to work long hours and made
their work enjoyable. They were constantly talking with their col-
leagues, clients, and friends about money, profits, and investment.
They said to me that making money is what they were good at, that
they knew how to manage the risks and uncertainty of emerging mar-
kets, and that they enjoyed working in unstable places because that is
often where the most money is to be made most rapidly.
They were capitalist predators. They were stalkers of money. They
watched and observed markets, read the financial pages daily, kept
themselves informed, and had trading partners throughout the world.
They knew currency exchange rates, commodity and share prices,
and could discuss the daily changes in the NASDAQ, FTSE100, the
Nikkei, Eurofirst 300, FTSE Global, the Hang Seng, the NYSE, and
equity market movements. They paid particular attention to smaller
trading markets, such as the Johannesburg Stock Exchange, South
African Futures Exchange, Bovespa, and the Bombay Stock Exchange.
They never had to look up a single fact or figure when meeting with
a client. They spoke with confidence, using the financial indices of
that day. They knew the daily share price of companies they were
involved in negotiating with. They could recite the economic history
of many countries with emerging economies, developments of the oil
industry, changes in mining practices, political influences, and offer
an explanation for any past successful or failed business endeavor.
They did not read business magazines for they believed such publi-
cations were for the layperson; their access to financial information
was made by watching the markets themselves. Such financial data,
they told me, helped them make both their corporate and personal
business decisions. Their wealth was made through engaging in busi-
ness risk and playing on stock markets and not through their salaries
at work. They differentiated themselves from others who played the
markets carefully, taking calculated risks. Rather, they were mavericks
in their investments and sought to make the most money possible in
the shortest amount of time.
Wealth, Money, and Differentiation:

Elite Identity of Transnational
Finance Professionals
I soon noticed that it was quite normal for informants to hold large
amounts of money and it was not considered brash to show it. They
all carried substantial amounts of cash; the men with a money clip and
the women in a leather purse, which they displayed when paying bills
at restaurants with just enough subtlety as to appear discreet yet vis-
ibly enough for their guests and myself to get a glimpse of their thick
fold of notes, which always appeared just as thick even after paying a
substantial bill. They not only seemed to enjoy holding cash, but they
also appeared to take great pleasure in spending it. On a Saturday
night’s social outing, it was not unusual for the bill to exceed two
thousand rand, sometimes reaching five to seven thousand rand,12
as they indulged with their friends in expensive whiskey, champagne,
cigars, and cocaine.
When men wanted to see their friends, usually a small circle of
five or six other men, they invited them to a nightclub. The host
would have booked the VIP room and would be paying for everyone
for that night. Bottles of whiskey and champagne were ordered until
last call, boxes of cigars were bought upon arrival, and cocaine was
provided for the night. As the host, they never poured themselves a
drink from the bottles brought to their table. These were only for the
guests; they always ordered their own drinks separately. They would
however share in the cocaine and cigars. There were always cigars left
over at the end of the night. These would be left behind as it would
appear parsimonious for the host to take them home with him. They
would often leave the nightclub after seven in the morning. The host
of the evening would then invite his guests to join him for breakfast
at a hotel in Sandton. These were not the same hotels where they held
breakfast meetings, entertained business clients, or joined work col-
leagues for evening drinks after work. The post nightclub breakfasts
were usually at less exclusive four-star hotels linked to the Sandton
City Mall. The same evening would be repeated, through the invita-
tion of one of the friends in the group, many weeks later.
These social gatherings represent a form of ritualized action of
reaffirming group identity and are a practice of sociality. They are
an identification practice among those with whom each individual
actively interacts socially. What I noticed was that these gatherings
and the set of repetitive symbolic action that accompanied them were
expressive or communicative in some way. What I mean by this is
that the performance of these practices—of reserving a special VIP
room in a club, of offering and sharing cocaine with their friends,
or offering a selection of expensive bottles of alcohol but ordering
their own drinks separately, and so on—was not simply a habit but an
attempt of making a statement about who they were as individuals.
This way of acting a set of behaviors in front of their friends was a
means of defining who they were. It related as much to their attitudes

toward money as it did to their views on personal relationships and
friendships. It was as much about the importance of these acts being
performed than it was about those which were being contrasted. Or
as Catherine Bell explains:
Acting ritually is first and foremost a matter of nuanced contrasts and

the evocation of strategic, value-laden distinctions. Viewed as practice,
ritualization involves the very drawing, in and through the activity
itself, of a privileged distinction between ways of acting, specifically
between those acts being performed and those being contrasted,
mimed, or implicated somehow. That is, intrinsic to ritualization are
strategies for differentiating itself—to various degrees and in various
ways—from other ways of acting within a particular culture. At a basic
level, ritualization is the production of this differentiation. (1992, 90)
In other words, this activity of meeting at a club on a Saturday night

had a function other than drinking, talking, smoking, taking drugs,
and sex. These gatherings represented a form of ritual or ritualized
action through the metafunction the action has: the bracketing that
occurs that identifies the activity as having a function other than
meeting at a club to drink, dance, and take drugs.13 It was not only
the expensive whiskey, the champagne, the dancing with new and dif-
ferent women at each party, the cocaine, and the breakfast party after-
ward that were of concern, but also how this set of acts and behaviors
was a form of producing differentiation. In my view, these acts were
not simply or solely a matter of routine but part of the reproduction of
a sense of collective identity. As their careers progressed, they sought
to associate themselves with a certain type of avant-garde capitalism
and not with expats, and in this regard, their public handling of cash
and their generosity in spending became an important part of their
identification and differentiation.
The above testimonies reveal money’s value as a means to identity
formulation, reaffirming social structures and hierarchies, with the
big players at the top, and the safe and prudent dismissed. They also
establish a sense of temporality structuring the existence of infor-
mants: they live for making tomorrow’s profits. The past is forgotten.
They are constantly looking forward to their next project, their next
job, their next investment. Furthermore, they specify in their descrip-
tions of the importance they attribute to money and wealth that they
belong with those who take risks and make their money in the mar-
kets, while differentiating themselves from those who have become
wealthy through savings, low-risk investments, or inheritance. Money
is about speculation and the future. Their behavior toward money

keeps them some place between the present and the future. This is
part of what differentiates them from the prudent and conservative
attitudes of small players.
The behavior these African transnational capitalist have toward
wealth is thus used as a means of reaffirming an identity as an
avant-garde, young capitalist, taking risks in emerging markets, with
ambitions to accumulate more wealth. It is a form of differentiation
between themselves, as an imagined community of capitalist preda-
tors, and other capitalists; between themselves and other transnation-
als; between themselves and other elite; and between themselves and
those who resemble them very closely, such as other business school
graduates. They and those like them are players, aggressive with their
money, and are money-hunters. It is about assuming a behavior that
will ensure that they are not mistaken for a member of the herd. Their
behavior with money is also a means of establishing a reputation as
a businessperson, someone with both status and power. One can see
the emergence of different identity-based practices of money within
an urban capitalist economic system. In other words, there exists an
instrumental value of wealth in relation to meanings and identifica-
tion, defining who the players are.
Perceptions of money maintained by transnational capitalist elite
also establish a sense of spatiality by making them feel they are
engaged on a world level with an intimate knowledge of global capi-
talism. Although such conversations were had with relative humor
and in a tongue-in-cheek manner, informants did use their involve-
ment with global money markets as a way of defining their degree
of transnationality and cosmopolitanism. My point here is not to
redefine the global citizen and discuss the essence of cosmopolitan-
ism. Rather, I am simply identifying a link between behavior and
attitudes toward money and processes of self and collective identifica-
tion. Within this context, money and meanings attributed to money,
become part of one’s self-identification as a transnational. From the
informants’ point of view, capitalism is just about money whereas
transnationalism is about big business and complex transactions. As
transnational players, these worldly transnational capitalists can dif-
ferentiate themselves from other expatriate capitalists and other for-
eigners or transnationals through their behavior toward money and
the social-cultural consequences it produces.
I will be considering the nature of elite formation within a broader
political-economic historical context. The aspects of this transition
that I believe to be most pertinent are those which have been informed
by the predominance of the neoliberal ideology in the world econ-

omy, which has brought about the belief that increased privatization,
fiscal rectitude, and export promotion are necessary for the prosperity
of developing economies, or newly democratized economies such as
South Africa’s. My more specific objective is to approach this trans-
formation from an anthropological viewpoint through the study of
a set of individuals who best personified these processes: a transna-
tional managerial elite; that is, those individuals whose professions
are oriented toward the functioning of productive apparatuses and
accumulation circuits that operate in a single global market.
Ideology in the Capitalist System:

Meritocracy versus Neo-Patrimonialism
For any businessperson who identifies himself or herself as being
transnational, self-identification is necessarily considered to be exte-
rior to the notion of the nation-state. We saw in the previous sec-
tion how informants considered themselves to be cosmopolitan; they
claimed to belong to a group of people who are worldly, well-traveled,
engaged in transnational practices of capitalism, and most impor-
tantly, privileging the notions of globality and transnationality over
those of locality and nationality. Informants explained to me how
the attainment and maintenance of their positions within the upper
echelons of TNCs necessitated a certain type of international mobil-
ity. They emphasized the importance of their skills in situ claiming
the need for them to be present at major meetings, affirming the
value of face-to-face meetings with colleagues and clients. They also
insisted upon the fact that their lives involved frequent traveling, and
how they moved to different cities and countries every five to ten
years. Their extensive travel experience was of primary concern for
their proclamation of a cosmopolitan lifestyle, which they sought to
maintain. They recounted to me the international nature of their edu-
cation and professional careers. In so doing, they proclaimed belong-
ing to this stateless space.
But those who can be identified as transnational capitalist elite are
not simply delocalized and embedded only in an intangible world of
transnational flows. Although informants may not have expressed a
sense of belonging to a specific place or nation or regional identity,
as young ambitious capitalists, focused on career achievements, they
are very much localized in the institutions of transnational capitalism
(see also Bourgouin [2011]). What I mean by this statement is the
following: despite their constant travel and displacements, informants
are nevertheless anchored to the various TNCs or banks in which

they are employed. It is within the implicit surroundings of trans-
national capitalism that these individuals learned to manipulate dif-
ferent resources to attain a superior position in the upper echelons
of management and became the holders of an attributed status and
authority, and thus emerge as transnational elite.
The collective nature of these individuals can be found in the
similar ways in which they behaved and spoke. However, it is not
only in their actions, vocabulary, and mannerisms. They tended to
discuss and talk about the same subjects and interests. Thus, they
bore a resemblance to each other through the ideas and opinions
they expressed. I found that informants described their professional
trajectories using a similar terminology: they were ambitious; they
were demanding of themselves and of those who worked for them;
they sought to succeed; they were each the best person for their par-
ticular job and strived for further promotion, recognition, or author-
ity within the corporation for which they worked for. They would
describe to me their work responsibilities while making constant ref-
erences to the particular terminology of contemporary management
theory—referring to such concepts as leadership management, critical
management, human interaction management, business process reen-
gineering, and performance prisms. As individuals, they appear to
form a professional group characterized by their incessant emphasis
on a meritocratic ideology by which rank and formal qualifications
can be used as a means of controlling group membership.
These young elites went to great lengths to emphasize the impor-
tance of being unattached and unburdened by family responsibili-
ties to be a good player. Such comments were directed at both their
reluctance to start families now or in the near future, as well as their
claimed disconnection from their kin. Indeed, time will only tell if
such detachment will be maintained for much longer. To what extent,
as informants, who were all mostly in their early thirties, may find
as they age an importance in starting a family? Will they be able to
maintain such disconnection from their family for much longer, or
will they soon engage in professional activities that involve some of
the patrimonial networks from which they come? What is of interest
from both a social anthropological and political perspective is their
deliberate positioning away from the fathers and uncles who financed
their studies at these reputable schools in the first place. Were they
not sent to these schools as a means of being trained in more legiti-
mate activities to then return and rule the country in their father’s
stead? Are they not representing a form of elite social reproduction in
Africa? We can begin to see how changing identification processes are

being informed by transformations in the larger world-system. Young
African capitalist elite like Kweku, are maintaining their distance
from the national African elite and claim rather to be cosmopolitan.
They use the language of meritocracy as a means of reaffirming their
own sense of self; they claim they are in the positions they are in and
enjoy the wealth they do because they earned it through hard work,
ambition, and skill, and not because of who their fathers or uncles
are. Certainly these questions set the scene for future research.
To understand the source of these similarities it is important to
consider how informants have shared in almost identical experiences.
They were from wealthy African families, they were sent as teenagers
or young adults to England, the United States, Canada, or continen-
tal Europe to pursue their studies and train to become businessmen
and businesswomen. They launched their careers in similar types of
corporations; large, well-established TNCs. And they have chosen to
live and work in Johannesburg for similar reasons.
The separate careers paths of this set of individuals can thus be
interpreted as being a form of shared experience. Beginning with the
prestigious business schools in which they were trained, informants
became part of a transnational managerial elite as they ascended the
hierarchies within the institutions they worked for. In this regard,
the specific language familiar to business schools and the corpo-
rate environment serves as the marker of social distinction and of
self-identification. Be it in the titles bestowed upon them by their cor-
porations, reference to the often multiple formal diplomas they hold,
or the importance attributed to working in large cities, the words
chosen to describe their rank in their corporation or their level of
accreditation, are used as a means of validating and confirming their
status. Although informants did not claim to be elite per se, narra-
tives nevertheless reveal their awareness of hierarchical stratification,
and more importantly, outline the means by which they associate
themselves as belonging to the upper strata of these hierarchies.
As transnational managerial elite, informants prided themselves on
their positions of influence as facilitators of transnational capitalism.
They were the ones who organized flows of investments, who nego-
tiated mergers and acquisitions, who were involved on a daily basis
with international bank transfers, and stock market speculations.
These individuals form part of a high-ranking core in the world of
transnational corporate capitalism—the elite within the realm of high
finance and capitalist accumulation. They have attained status based
not only on their positions, but also as symbols of authority within
the firm and throughout the business community. These individuals

are thus recognized as elite only in relation to their own self-position-
ing within implicit social hierarchical structures of capitalist corpora-
tions. As such, they could lose their elite status if they would change
their ideologies and aspirations, or where they live or work. This is
what differentiates them as elite, different from social aristocrats or
heirs entitled to rank.
Conclusion
This chapter has revealed the construction of self-understanding as a
process that is inextricably linked to social identification. I explored
the practices that served to reaffirm a cosmopolitan identity and a
distinction from the masses of a group of young transnational African
capitalists living in Johannesburg. I sought to provide a specific case
study as a means of illustrating how elite distinction and the staging
of wealth and power is part of the broader project of identification.
In the above discussion we see how African transnational capital-
ists living in Johannesburg define, represent, and, thereby, construct
themselves, in relation and opposition to others, and come to person-
ify the cosmopolitan elite. The construction of lifestyle, the material
representation of power in dress and home décor, and their generosity
in spending became an important part of their identification and dis-
tinction. How one represents himself or herself becomes an index of
social relationships and informs the relative positioning of individuals
in the social imagination. In other words, style and presentation of
self materially and behaviorally effectively acts as a measurement of
social worth. In this regard, distinction is not only about defining
and reaffirming collective affiliation and social identification, but is
also about the establishment of social hierarchies within the social
imaginary.
The narratives of these young African finance professionals such
as Kweku expressed a sense of groupness through their behavior,
attitudes, and values toward money and wealth. Their narratives
clearly revealed how money holds an instrumental value in practices
of self-identification and in maintaining social relationships. Money,
and discussions about money, become a means of differentiation
among transnational capitalists, where a sense of superiority and sta-
tus is associated with aggressive risk-taking for wealth generation.
Money can also be used as temporal reference for these transnational
capitalists. These ambitious capitalist predators focus on the future
and do not look to the past. I sought to build an understanding of the
spatial organization of this group. As transnational capitalists, infor-

mants locate themselves on a global scale, searching for similar trans-
national spaces in the many cities they travel to frequently. Indeed,
international mobility and travel is a fundamental aspect of their life-
style. Furthermore, these narratives also highlighted the importance
of one’s specific role in global capitalism as a means of distinguish-
ing between those who engage with transnational capital and those
who simply live a transnational lifestyle. Their sense of cosmopolitan
identity was a way of giving allegiance to a global community that
emphasizes detachment from local cultures that can then be referred
to as elite. However such a lifestyle did not promote multiple attach-
ments to more than one nation or community either. In bringing the
notions of transnationality and elite together into a single analysis, we
see the emergence of an apolitical and celebratory cosmopolitanism
that advocates consumerism and elite mobility.
These issues bring to the fore a variety of theoretical consider-
ations for the study of elites in social anthropology. Although tra-
ditional anthropological perspectives have emphasized the processes
of social reproduction and recruitment of elite groups, the potential
for studying the conditions influencing the rise and fall of new elites
also exists. I maintain that newly emerging capitalist elites provide a
unique subject of research in this regard. First, they do not face the
same issues of accountability and legitimization as the political elites
do. Second, although many certainly come from good families, we
see different sorts of associations taking place between business elite
members who are not necessarily kin-based. We thus face important
theoretical considerations on defining the boundaries of elite groups
and understanding positions of influence in contemporary society.
The analysis above also stresses the importance of linking identity
politics, the creations of social hierarchies, and the broader politi-
cal economy in which these processes are taking place. Thus, in the
context of simultaneously occurring transformation processes in
Johannesburg in the early years following South Africa’s transition
to democracy, we can see the formation of a sociopolitical field in
which a new transnational elite is emerging. The prestige of their
position comes with the mystery of the emerging market economy,
their ability to handle stress, and their expertise in manipulating the
concepts of the system of distribution. They earn very high incomes
and their authority is legitimized by their nationality and their exper-
tise. We can thus see the importance of the EME (Established Market
Economies) imaginary in the current global distribution of resources
and how those who are directly involved in these capitalist activities
identify themselves as elite along these imaginaries. In coming to

Johannesburg, these individuals see themselves as holding a specific
function within the realm of transnational capitalism, which empha-
sizes their ascension along the corporate hierarchy. But more impor-
tantly, their move to Johannesburg has also allowed informants to
reaffirm their identity as capitalist predators on the more peripheral
capitalist frontiers. As managers of a certain type of capital in the
context of postapartheid Johannesburg then, they identify themselves
consciously as risk-takers who make money globally. As informants
describe their jobs, their professional trajectories, and their reasons
for coming to Johannesburg, we can see how they have oriented their
practices in conjunction with their own interpretation of the nature
of the contemporary global capitalist system.
Notes
1. To protect the privacy of informants, I use pseudonyms throughout
this chapter.
2. The Sandton Central Business District, otherwise referred to as the
Sandton CBD or simply as Sandton, lies on the northern limits of the
greater Johannesburg metropolitan area. Sandton and its surround-
ing neighborhoods are considered to be the safest and wealthiest sub-
urbs of Johannesburg.
3. The very idea of elite implies an element of exclusivity and a distinc-
tion from the majority of society or the masses. But as Cris Shore
(Shore and Nugent 2002) points out in his introductory chapter in
Elite Cultures: Anthropological Perspectives, this separation is only
apparent because it is in fact the elite who create the masses against
which they distinguish themselves.
4. See especially Reifer (2004), and Friedman and Chase-Dunn (2005).
See also van der Pijl (1984 and 1989).
5. Indeed, the principal theorists on elites and elite culture of the sec-
ond half of the twentieth century presented their thoughts and evi-
dence within the context of national power structures.
6. See Bourgouin (2007) for a detailed overview of the recruitment
practices of African capitalists by both South African and foreign
TNCs based in Johannesburg. See especially Chapters 5 and 6 for a
discussion of these practices in connection with the changing politi-
cal economic conditions of postapartheid South Africa.
7. The Gordon Institute for Business Science, or GIBS, is the business
school of the University of Pretoria, but is based in the northern sub-
urbs of Johannesburg.
8. Victor, a 36-year-old Sudanese financial consultant, was recruited
by an agency to fill an executive position with a major South African
holding company in 1999. He currently sits on the board of directors

of a leading South African telecommunications company.
9. Anthony, a 37-year-old Nigerian banker, had been living in
Johannesburg for five years.
10. Henry, a 30-year-old Ghanaian investment advisor, was transferred
from Denver to Johannesburg in 2000.
11. Kemi, a 27-year-old Nigerian, is working in Johannesburg since 2001
for a Nigerian management consulting company.
12. Although in foreign currency terms 7,000 Rand may not appear to
be much local purchasing power, for one evening’s entertainment it
did represent a substantial amount. I asked informants if they were
as extravagant when in more expensive cities, such as Paris, London,
Tokyo, or New York, the answer was always: “Yes.”
13. For a more detailed discussion on collective ceremonial forms and
their social significance in secular contexts see the edited volume
Secular Ritual (Moore and Myerhoff 1977) and especially the
Chapter by Gluckman and Gluckman (1977, 227–243), “On drama,
and games and athletic contests.”
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———. 2011. “Des individualistes mondialisés? Ruptures et discontinuités
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———. 1989. “The international level.” In The Capitalist Class: An
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C on tr ibu t or s
Jon Abbink is a senior researcher at the African Studies Centre,

Leiden, and a professor of African Studies at VU University,
Amsterdam. His anthropological research has been in the Middle East
and in Northeast Africa, especially Ethiopia. He works on compara-
tive anthropology and political culture of Northeast Africa, religion
and politics, and Ethiopian studies. His most recent coedited book is
Land, Law and Politics in Africa (2011). (abbink@ascleiden.nl)
France Bourgouin is a project researcher at the Danish Institute
for International Studies. She has extensive fieldwork experience
in Africa, has been a lecturer at the Gordon Institute for Business
Science, Johannesburg, and Sciences Po, Paris. Her doctoral thesis
(2007) “The Young, the Wealthy, and the Restless: Trans- National
Capitalist Elite Formation in Post-Apartheid Johannesburg,” was
an anthropological study of African capitalist elite formation since
the new political dispensation in South Africa. Her current research
focuses on the interface between transnational capitalist elites and
state elites in light of the recent inflow of FDI in extractive industries
in Tanzania. (fbo@diis.dk)
Aline Courtois is a PhD candidate at the Université Paris 1
Panthéon-Sorbonne and at University College Dublin. Originally
French, she has been living and teaching in Ireland for a number of
years. Her thesis title is “Islands of Privilege. Fee-Paying Schools and
the Education of Irish Elites,” and explores the selection and social-
ization processes in Irish elite schools and their role in the reproduc-
tion of dominant positions in Ireland. (courtoisaline@gmail.com)
Longina Jakubowska, currently Anthropology fellow at University
College Utrecht, Utrecht University in the Netherlands, received her
MA in Anthropology at Warsaw University, Poland and her PhD in
the USA. She has worked with a Bedouin community in the Negev
Desert in southern Israel since 1981 and has published a number of
articles and chapters regarding processes of sedentarization, polygyny,
250 CONTRIBUTORS
and spirit possession. She has also published about privatization in

Eastern Europe post-1989, and her book on the Polish elite (Patrons
of History: Nobility, Capital and Political Transitions in Poland ) was
published in 2012. (ljakubowska@ucu.uu.nl)
Stefanie Lotter is an anthropologist and curator. She studied social
anthropology at Heidelberg University, at SOAS, London, and trained
in museum studies at the University of Leicester. Her fieldwork in
Nepal, India, and South Africa focused on upward and downward
social mobility as well as the material culture of transnational people.
She did her PhD work on the Nepalese elites. Recently she worked
as community curator at the Horniman Museum, London, contrib-
uting to the 2012 exhibition on Body Adornment. (stefanie.lotter@
gmail.com)
Horacio Ortiz is a researcher at the Centre de Sociologie de
l’Innovation, Mines ParisTech, Paris. He has a PhD in Social
Anthropology from the Ecole de Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales,
Paris. His research focuses on the financial industry, in particular on
the imaginaries of financial models, the organization of everyday life
in the work place, the distributive effects of contemporary finance,
and the understanding of financial flows as a global political issue.
He is currently carrying out research in Shanghai. (horacio.ortiz@
free.fr)
Fernanda Pirie is an anthropologist and lecturer in sociolegal stud-
ies at the University of Oxford. Formerly a practicing barrister, she
holds a DPhil in Social Anthropology from the University of Oxford
and has carried out fieldwork in Tibet since 1999. She is the author
of Peace and Conflict in Ladakh: The Construction of a Fragile Web of
Order (2007) and the coeditor of Order and Disorder: Anthropological
Perspectives (2008). She is currently engaged in research into the
London Bar. (fernanda.pirie@csls.ox.ac.uk)
Justine Rogers is a postdoctoral fellow in the Business School at
the University of Sydney. Her thesis, “Pupillage: The Professional
Reproduction of the Barristers’ Profession,” examined the appren-
ticeship of English barristers. Her research interests are the legal and
financial services professions, professional reproduction, professional
ethics, identity and the workplace, and research methodology. (jus-
tine.rogers@sydney.edu.au)
Tijo Salverda holds a PhD in Anthropology from the VU University,
Amsterdam. His PhD thesis titled “Sugar, Sea and Power: How
CONTRIBUTORS 251
Franco-Mauritians Balance Continuity and Creeping Decline of

Their Elite Position,” was based on anthropological research on
elites in Mauritius. After holding several teaching positions in the
Netherlands he now works as a research fellow with the Human
Economy Programme, University of Pretoria, South Africa. His cur-
rent research focuses on investors in large scale land projects. (tijo.
salverda@up.ac.za; http://tijosalverda.nl)
Huibert Schijf is a sociologist with a PhD from the University of
Amsterdam, where he teaches at the Department of Sociology/
Anthropology. His PhD thesis was a study on the networks of the
financial-economic elite in the Netherlands. He coauthored a book
on Dutch elites (2004) with M. Fennema, coedited a volume on eth-
nic violence (2009), and published many articles on modern and his-
torical elites. (h.schijf@uva.nl)
Deasy Simandjuntak earned her PhD in Social Science from the
University of Amsterdam in 2010 with a dissertation titled “Who
Shall Be Raja? Patronage Democracy in North Sumatra, Indonesia.”
She is currently affiliated with the Royal Netherlands Institute of
Southeast Asian and Caribbean Studies (KITLV) in Leiden as a
postdoctoral fellow. Her current research focuses on democratiza-
tion, local-politics, and the role of elites in new democracies espe-
cially in aspects such as state-society relations and policies on natural
resources. (deasysim@gmail.com)
Irene Skovgaard Smith was trained as a social anthropologist (BA,
MSc) and has a PhD in Organization Studies. She is currently affili-
ated with the Copenhagen Business School. Her research interests
revolve around the use of anthropological theory and ethnographic
methods in the study of organizational activities and relations. Her
PhD thesis was an ethnographic study of management consultants
working on change projects in client organizations. (irene.smith@
yahoo.com; www.ireneskovgaardsmith.com)
Inde x
aristocracy, 55–6, 61, 82–3, 97–8, collective identity, 163, 174, 180,
109, see also gentry; nobility 224, 238
commanding position, 6, 7, 12,
Balandier, Georges, 187, 188, 200 140, 151
Bar of England and Wales, 139, 161 Communism, 12, 18, 19, 50, 51,
Bourdieu, Pierre, 2, 9, 13–14, 15, 55, 60, 61, 64, 65, 192
35, 53, 72, 167, 168–9, 170, postcommunism, 12, 45, 64
172, 176 corruption, 17, 98, 100, 103, 104,
Brooks, David, 40 106, 108, 109–10, 163, 171
Bürklin, Wilhelm, 33 counter-elite, 10, 16, 64, 123, 124,
127
capital, forms of, 13–14, 18, 35, 45,
47, 52, 65, 176, 181, 211 Dahl, Robert, 2, 10, 11, 116
cultural capital, 13, 34, 35, 65, Daloz, Jean-Pascal, 2, 4, 13, 15, 29,
72, 165, 169, 176 31, 35, 100, 107, 108
economic/financial capital, 13, directorates, 12, 33, 39
38, 49, 122, 169, 175, 186, Domhoff, G. William, 2, 11, 33,
228, 235 229
social capital, 13, 15, 19, 35, 85, dynasties, 31, 38, 39, 76, 77, 84,
102, 105, 106, 165, 169, 173, 86, 87, 89, 90, see also elite
175, 176, 177, 181 families
symbolic capital, 13, 34, 35, 36
Carroll, William K., 39 education, 6, 11, 13, 14, 20, 30,
Cassis, Youssef, 38 33, 39, 51, 52, 55, 56, 86, 97,
caste hierarchy, 79 98, 101, 108, 150, 152, 153,
class, 2, 4, 8, 9, 10, 12, 13, 15, 18, 163–82, 191, 192, 199, 221,
32, 35, 37, 39, 40, 41, 45–65, 222, 240
75, 77, 78, 82, 87, 88, 90, 97, elite
98, 101, 108, 123, 124, 125, alliances, elite, 17, 84–5, 119–20
146, 165, 167, 168, 169, 174, competition, elite, 38, 76, 79, 89,
175, 176, 178, 180, 181, 192, 95, 106
193, 208, 231 contestation, elite, 7, 8, 207, 220
declassation, 53, 54, 56 culture, elite, 3, 4, 8, 14–16, 21,
clientelism, 96 36, 37, 45, 49, 54, 65, 99, 108,
Cohen, Abner, 5, 8, 10, 12, 14, 15, 177, 180, 231
16, 117, 139, 140, 141, 151, decline, elite, 3, 4, 34, 50, 71,
155, 156, 159, 229 75, 88–90, 119, 120, 134
254 INDEX
elite—Continued geographical elites, 11, 31, 39,

definition, elite, 1, 5–7, 29–30, 41, 42
31, 35, 36, 41, 45, 140, 208–10 global elites, 21, 31, 39–40, 185–
discourse, elite, 13, 60, 64, 126, 219 205, 228, 231, 232, 233
distinction, elite, 4, 13, 15, 37, national elites, 20, 31, 33, 41, 42
52, 53, 54, 76, 77, 78, 80, 85, political elites, 6, 17, 18, 50, 116,
87, 89, 96, 168, 229, 231, 232, 127, 164, 210, 244
233, 235, 238, 242, 243 power elite, 6, 11, 21, 33, 39,
families, elite, 7, 11, 12, 13, 31, 164, see also pantouflage
32, 34, 37–9, 56–9, 61, 62, 65, professional elites, 139–61,
75, 78, 79, 84, 85, 86, 88, 90, 208–9, 213
98, 102, 148, 164, 166, 169, religious elites, 2, 6, 23, 89, 116
170, 177, 242, 244, see also strategic elites, 6
dynasties transnational elites, 20, 41, 42,
identity, elite, 15, 18, 45, 51, 54, 50, 78, 230, 241, 244
58, 64, 66, 77, 78, 139, 141, ethnicity, 6, 18, 57, 101, 102, 113,
145, 151, 163, 169–75, 180, 118, 125, 126, 129, 130, 134,
212, 221, 224, 232, 236–40, 174
243, 244 ethnography, 8, 14, 15, 16, 18, 20,
networks, elite, 11–13, 14, 20, 21, 36, 59, 60, 63, 64, 114,
21, 30, 33, 37, 38, 39, 40, 207, 227, 229, 232
41–2, 49, 50, 55, 59, 164, 173,
174, 175, 181, 203, 241, see Farrell, Betty G., 31, 38
also informal ties financial sector, 4, 7, 20, 21, 39,
power, elite, 2, 5, 8, 9–11, 13, 185–205, 227–47
19, 30, 38, 41, 45, 46, 50, 56, Foucault, Michel, 185, 188, 189, 199
75–8, 86, 95, 97, 99, 102, 105,
113–38, 141, 163, 185, 187, gentry, 18, 45–69, 177, 178, see also
188, 189, 193, 199, 202, 220, aristocracy; nobility
239, 243 Goffman, Erving, 170, 219
self-presentation, elite, 7, 14, 118 Gramsci, Antonio, 9, 10, 114, 115
status, elite, 5, 10, 17, 18, 45,
53, 56, 57, 58, 72, 73–5, 76, habitus, 2, 4, 7, 50, 54, 62, 176
78–83, 86, 89, 90, 107, 115, Hartmann, Michael, 13, 33, 39, 123
127, 139, 140–1, 143, 146, hegemony, 5, 9, 10, 13, 14, 47, 50,
150–1, 155, 156, 159, 177, 113, 114, 115, 116, 117, 120,
180, 207–26, 228, 230–3, 121, 122–4, 125, 127, 129,
241, 242, 243 134
elites, forms of hereditary, 30, 46, 53, 75, 79, 86, 99
business/economic elites, 6, 7, 17, Herzfeld, Michael, 7, 34, 36, 46
19, 20, 33, 38, 40, 114, 124, hierarchy, 1, 2, 5, 15, 56, 61, 79,
233, 244, 251 85, 97, 98, 100, 115, 119, 121,
ethnic elites, 6, 113, 118 122, 155–6, 157, 158, 165,
functional elites, 6, 17, 18, 124, 168, 187, 188, 190, 193, 194,
127, 134 197, 200, 245
INDEX 255
Indonesia, 18, 40, 95–112, 228, 251 “one percent,” the, 2, 6

informal ties, 12, 13, see also elite pantouflage, 32
networks Pareto, Vilfredo, 2, 9, 31, 64
interactionist perspective, 4 particularism-universalism, 16, 17,
international business schools, 40 18, 21, 35, 117, 140
Ireland, 163–83 patrimony, 12, see also elite families
patronage, 42, 95–112
Keller, Susan, 6 Pedroso de Lima, Antónia, 3, 5, 12,
kingship, 47, 73, 74, 89 35, 36, 37, 40, 45, 46
performance, 15, 46, 63, 71, 72,
lifestyle, 18, 21, 37, 38, 40, 45–69, 76, 79, 80, 87, 109, 110, 141,
72, 77, 82, 89, 96, 97, 98, 108, 154, 216, 224, 238, 241
180, 229, 235, 240, 243, 244 performative, 58, 63
Lukes, Steven, 9, 10, 115, 118, 122 performativity, 142, 143
Pina-Cabral, João de, 3, 5, 12, 35,
management consulting, 207–26 40, 45, 46
managerialism, 18, 139, 141, 143, 144 Pinçon, Michel and Monique
Mannheim, Karl, 2 Pinçon-Charlot, 12, 37, 177,
Marcus, George E., 5, 7, 14, 63, 180, 181
118 plutocracy, 39
marginal, 3, 7, 8, 16, 21, 30, 65, Poland, 45–69
75, 125, 221 privilege, 10, 47, 53, 59, 65, 72,
marriage, 13, 31, 38, 39, 56, 84, 106, 114, 115, 117, 129, 130,
85, 88, 119, 180 142, 151, 155, 167, 168, 177,
Marx, Karl, 2 180, 181, 212
Marxism, 9, 64
Mauritius, 19, 113–38 recruitment, 3, 13, 15, 76, 139,
Mauss, Marcel, 185, 187, 188, 189, 141, 142, 143, 145, 147–51,
200, 201, 219, 220 158, 164, 165–9, 180, 191,
meritocracy, 30, 32, 34, 39, 166, 208, 211, 230, 232, 240
191, 240–43 reflexivity, 3, 59
Michels, Robert, 2 reproduction, 12, 13, 20, 30, 35,
Mills, C. Wright, 2, 6, 11, 12, 33, 37, 45, 64, 164, 192, 202, 228,
36, 118, 155, 164, 228 229, 238, 241, 244
mobility, 5, 7, 11, 29, 32, 33, 75, research method, 3, 5, 9, 12, 15,
77, 78, 85, 98, 235, 240, 244 21, 31, 33, 34, 35, 36, 37, 41,
Mosca, Gaetano, 2, 9, 31, 64 45, 46, 59–64
resources, 5, 6, 7, 14, 18, 20, 29,
Nepal, 15, 71–94 30, 31, 36, 38, 45, 47, 50, 52,
nobility, 13, 30, 34, 45, 46, 47, 48, 55, 59, 83, 99, 101, 105, 110,
49, 50, 53, 55, 56, 59, 60, 61, 115, 116, 117, 124, 126, 131,
71–94, 97, see also aristocracy; 133, 181, 185, 186, 188, 190,
gentry 193, 196, 197, 199, 200, 201,
Nugent, Stephen, 3, 5, 8, 20, 35, 202, 230, 232, 241, 242
36, 46, 116 Rothkopf, David, 2, 4, 21, 39
256 INDEX
Sahlins, Marshall, 188, 200 symbolism, 4, 8, 14, 15, 40, 49,

Savage, Mike, 8, 12 65, 74, 82, 95, 116, 120, 126,
Schumpeter, Joseph A., 9, 37 127, 128, 140, 141, 144, 156,
Scott, John, 5, 6, 10, 19, 29, 30, 159, 166, 167, 169, 171, 180,
40, 41, 114, 115, 116, 118, 211, 237, see also symbolic
124, 134, 229 capital under capital, forms of
Shore, Cris, 3, 5, 6, 8, 13, 14,
16, 17, 18, 20, 35, 36, vertical integration of elites, 32
37, 46, 116, 208,
209, 210 Weber, Max, 2, 114, 117, 134
Simmel, George, 10, 54 Wedel, Janine, 2, 20
social stratification, 2, 9, 80, 82 Werbner, Richard, P., 5, 8
South Africa, 123, 125, 223–47 Williams, Karel, 8, 12

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The Anthropology of Elites

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Jon Abbink and Tijo Salverda

1. Elite (Social sciences) 2. Power (Social sciences) I. Abbink, J. II.

Introduction: An Anthropological Perspective on

10 Money Relations, Ideology, and the Formation of a

Notes on Contributors 249

This book is the product of a collective effort started in 2008 at the

Tijo Salverda and Jon Abbink

Aim and Rationale of the Book

be partly explained by the historically strong focus in social science

internalized behavioral routines and social ideas of a defined social

In this book, references are made to important previous anthropo-

On Locating and Defining Elites

through, for example, the shared way of life or their sociocultural

Elite Phenomena: Some Behavioral Aspects

Issues of growing inequality in power, wealth, consumptive dis-

methodological issues, relevant not only to the discipline of anthro-

power as controlling the political agenda and keeping the potential

illustrates the usefulness of an anthropological approach, including

special access to people and information (Böröcz and Róna-Tas 1995,

argued that it is important to “analyse the language and practice

The Case Studies: The Culture of Elites

The case studies assembled in this volume show the dynam-

regarding this balance is that of the potential differences among the

Rogers, in their chapter, investigate how the Bar of England and

is how far universalistic tendencies can be stretched, and/or whether

Abélès, Marc. 2005. “Identity and Borders: An Anthropological Approach

Lerner, Robert, Althea K. Nagai, and Stanley Rothman. 1996. American

Weber, Max. 1997 [1922]. “Democracy and the countervailing powers of

have perhaps gained more influence. Although in the nineteenth

career unlikely, let alone last for several generations. Therefore, it is

elite do not necessarily operate in their native country. The focus of

much on an appropriate social background. Schijf, Dronkers, and Van

Instead of defining elites as incumbents of positions of power and

and disadvantages of this method, but it is important to see to what

as in many other publications on elite networks or the reproduction

and sociologists can benefit from the historical perspective, as a few

there already existed families that operated as bankers or merchants

corporations predominate at the center of the transnational networks.

ignoring changes at the local, regional, national, and international

Local Regional National Global

Local Strict Local Interaction Interaction Interaction

Regional Strict Regional Interaction Interaction

National Strict National Interaction

Global Strict Global Elites

Figure 1.1 Networks at four levels

development project (ibid., 260). Their new role as intermediaries also

Pedroso de Lima, Antónia. 2000. “‘How did I become a leader in my family

Land, Historicity, and Lifestyle:

literature concerning elites concentrates on the power that they exert

The Multivocality of Capital:

so absolute that the gentry—as compared to other European nobili-

gentry stayed away from active involvement in politics and only a

either exiled or emigrated, but in any case took residence abroad

Historicity and Lifestyle

instantaneously evicted from their expropriated estates. In what

I was raised in a class, which for generations believed to be solely

industrial economy, the state employed them in various supervisory

the party bureaucrats. Gentry members often reported in interviews

address—against sovietization, russification, or simply vulgarism.

photographs, and such—have been meticulously collected, salvaged

of life in a manor. The collection of old and seemingly random