John Higley is one of the key figures behind the revival of elite theory in social science.
He is Emeritus Professor of Government and Sociology at the University of Texas at Austin. He was chair of the international Political Science Association’s Research Committee on Political Elites. He writes about political elites and how they operate in democracies, autocracies, and other kinds of regimes as well as the history and philosophy of elite theory.
Higley’s books include The Endangered West. Myopic Elites and Fragile Social Orders in a Threatening World (2016) Elites, Non-Elites, and Political Realism (2021), Western Elites and Societies in Twenty-First Century Politics. Avoiding Calamity (2023). He was a senior editor of The Palgrave Handbook of Political Elites (2018).
So, how did you first get exposed to Elite Theory?
John Higley: As a postgraduate student during the turbulent 1960s, I was influenced by C. Wright Mills’ book, The Power Elite, published in 1956. Born in Waco, Texas in 1916, Charley Mills, as he was known by friends, was a Texas populist. Mills eventually joined Columbia University’s Sociology faculty, which was dominated by theorists of functionalism who prevented him from teaching graduate students lest his denunciations of “the higher immorality” of American elites pollute their minds. Mills applied Gaetano Mosca’s depiction of a tiny “ruling class” in early twentieth century Italy to American business, military, and executive political leaders during the 1950s. He showed them so tightly interconnected as to constitute a coherent power elite. Like Mosca, Mills accepted the inevitability of elites, but in assailing them in moral terms he was a forerunner of today’s populists. During the 1970s I published two books applying Mills’ power elite thesis to Norwegian and Australian elites.
What was the reputation of Elite Theory at that time?
JH: Elite theory was greatly overshadowed by Marxist theories of ruling classes and by theories of democracy. To the extent it was mentioned, Elite Theory was frequently portrayed, erroneously, as proto fascist. It was a niche area of study and in important respects this is still the case.
Did you ever get swept up in the New Left movement in the 1970s?
JH: Despite having been an Army officer during the early 1960s, I strongly opposed the Vietnam War and most other foreign adventures of the Johnson and Nixon administrations. As a Research Fellow in Norway at the decade’s end, I attended lectures by well-known French, German, and other European New Leftists but thought them abstruse nonsense.
What is your philosophical outlook, or do you prefer to avoid philosophy and look towards the more material study of politics?
JH: I think of myself as a political realist. Political thought concerned with ideals, the stuff of philosophy, is poorly suited to the analysis of what happens in politics. Yet ideals have been and are crushingly dominant in Western political thought. They presume that the great differentiation of statuses and interests in a complex society like the United States or Britain is nevertheless compatible with adherence to a single set of ideals and goals — that what is good for one is somehow good for all. I presume, instead, that politics are shaped by the judgments of self-interested persons and groups as to what claims and actions are and are not expedient, and that, in the final analysis, it is only the efforts of somewhat more broadly oriented leaders — political elites — to manage and limit conflicts and prevent a war of all against all.
Which elite theorist do you find most convincing?
JH: Vilfredo Pareto (1848–1923), albeit less for his sweeping million-word 1916 treatise on the rise and fall of societies (translated in 1935 as The Mind and Society) than for his contention that “democracies” (he always punctuated the term) are in reality “pluto-democracies” ruled by the wealthy with democratic trappings. They take two basic forms: “demagogic” and “military”. Each is a phase in a plutocratic cycle. During a demagogic phase, the wealthy maintain a democratic façade and employ demagogy to shape public opinion and electoral outcomes. This is a pattern never more evident than today as American politics contend with Donald Trump’s pluto-populism. Whether Trump will usher in a “military” phase, of Pareto’s plutocratic cycle, in which the wealthy rule by coercion and force through repressive laws and actions that cripple opponents and rely heavily on police and the military to maintain order remains to be seen.
Why do you think Elite Theory is so unpopular?
JH: Partly because many mistakenly believe it venerates elites, and partly because the political machinations on which Elite Theory focuses are unsavoury to those who believe in untrammelled democracy. Elite Theory is primarily concerned with why and how some elites succeed and other elites fail, and with consequences of success or failure for political stability or instability, political order or disorder.
Many elites in power now talk, ironically, in an anti-elitist tone. Could you comment on this?
JH: Because Marxism has lost credibility and democracy has failed to meet its enthusiasts’ expectations, “elites” is now a term du jour. It’s a handy epithet for political opponents and a bogeyman to blame for shortcomings in modern societies. Nearly all who fling the term around have no knowledge of Elite Theory.
What do you think of current discussions of British elites?
JH: In Britain and the United States hardly a week goes by without some new book or article assailing “elites”. It’s impossible to keep up with this outpouring, which I tend to regard as normal sniping of political leaders and factions at each other when jockeying for the upper political hand. An exception is Peter Turchin’s book End Times. Elites, Counter-Elites and the Path to Political Disintegration. An expatriate Russian ecologist turned sociologist; Turchin is exceedingly pessimistic about the near future of the United States. He attributes its grim prospects to an over-production of elites and aspirants to elite status, together with the increased immiseration of many Americans since the Great Recession of 2007–08. Other than in passing, Turchin doesn’t discuss Britain, though there is no doubt his bold applies there too. Turchin defines American elites as consisting of the top 10 percent of income earners, i.e. the millions of Americans in professional and other highly prized occupations. He defines counter-elites as disappointed aspirants for a relatively fixed number of elite positions. The swollen number of aspirants prevents many of them from obtaining such positions, which motivates them to attack the elites. The result, Turchin contends, is likely to be political disintegration.
I have no license to declare what is and is not Elite Theory, and Turchin’s theory, buttressed by prodigious research, is an important work drawing attention to elites. I will say only that, because of his exceedingly broad definitions of elites and counter-elites, and because he doesn’t distinguish systematically between basic and persisting pattens of elite behaviour and each pattern’s distinctive consequences for political order or disorder historically and today, his theory is distant from mine.
Are there any modern elite theorists who you enjoy? William Domhoff seems to be the most prominent and one of the most persuasive.
JH: Bill Domhoff’s Who Rules America?, now in its eighth revised edition since first published in 1967, has certainly been influential. Bill is a friend and we’ve traded views of American elites — or Bill, the ruling class and its most important component, the corporate elite — for many years. Bill Domhoff leads research on American power structure and is easily the most important scholar doing this.
Where do you think Elite Theory is heading in the future? Do you see any fascinating developments, or will it remain a largely niche area of study?JH: Just as few Marxists actually read Das Kapital and few enthusiasts of democracy have read John Rawls’ Theory of Justice, it is unrealistic to think that many people will steep themselves in Elite Theory. It will probably remain a niche area of study. On the other hand, as climate change, disease pandemics, the weakening of international order, and plights of many non-Western populations become still more dire, serious political observers and participants will be forced to abandon what’s left of their generally benign political and social outlooks. Tenets of Elite Theory may come to colour their outlooks.
In your book Western Elites and Societies in Twenty-First Century Politics. Avoiding Calamity, you note how close we have come in recent times to a state of anarchy. How likely do you think societal collapse is? Do you think we came close to that during the height of the Coronavirus pandemic?
JH: Despite the rise of far-right populists and parties in nearly all European countries, their lapse into anarchy is unlikely. Populists often seem to presage a kind of anarchy, but they have no serious solutions for today’s perplexities. As populists engage in electoral competitions, they will trim their rhetoric and vows to win votes.
You also note the failures of the elites in dealing with major economic and social challenges. Yet, you argue in favour of a centrist model of governance. Is there not a risk of centrism that it irritates both sides of a political debate, and thus leaves their elites in a weary position?
JH: No doubt both left and right elites will be irritated by centrist elites and governance policies that refuse to further a general equalisation or a thoroughly de-regulated economy. But if successful, centrist elites and policies will correct some inequities and mollify elites on the left and right. If centrist elites fail and calamity duly occurs, drastically reduced well-being for most persons through chaotic declines in productivity and widespread immiseration will undercut both left and right elites.
How does the remoteness of the elite impact society? Haven’t the elite always had different cultural, physical, and mental lives to the masses?
JH: There is a compelling need to change the content and mood of intellectual life in Western societies deliberately and rapidly. An overriding requirement is for elites to reconstitute a sense of self and other in how they think of themselves and their roles. A more self-consciously elitist frame of reference is essential if elites are to stem conflicts within and between contemporary societies. The problem is not the remoteness or isolation of elites, which is in fact not great; rather, it is the reluctance of elites to see themselves as persons and groups with distinct political and social roles to play.
In your book you say your theory’s “fundamental contention is that elite action and functioning are so basic in modern societies that the structure and behaviour of elites constitute the most fundamental distinction between political systems. Do you think those who would disagree with you are simply misguided?
JH: Most who disagree with my diktat are staunch believers in democracy. They think that countries “choose” democracy when popular sentiment for it becomes sufficiently widespread. The more assertive among them delegitimate attempts to achieve democratic government by indirection and stealth on grounds that such manoeuvres are undemocratic! Yet it was by indirection and stealth that representative-cum-democratic institutions based on broad suffrage were for the most part established in the Western countries now termed democracies. What stands out is the inability to explain major political outcomes with the stock of ideas and preferences that constitute democratic belief. Focusing on elite action and functioning overcomes this.
Some commentators have argued that the abundance of university-educated young people is leading to an “overproduction of elites”. What do you make of these arguments?
JH: This is Peter Turchin’s thesis, as discussed in my response to your earlier question. He portrays many young university graduates as aspirants for relatively fixed numbers of elite positions, some of whom become counter-elites. Although I think Turchin’s definitions are too broad, I do think this is a problem. In my 2016 book, The Endangered West, I discuss at length how growing numbers of persons with university credentials and often leisured upbringings become “outsiders” in our societies. They find life prospects distasteful, an outlook that makes them nearly as unemployable as those with outlooks shaped in deprivation, poverty, or cultural exclusion. The proliferation of outsiders weakens the already fragile and tenuous social orders of American, British, and other post-industrial societies.
