In all societies there are two classes, the ruling class and the class that is ruled.
The first class, always the less numerous, performs all political functions, monopolizes power and enjoys the advantages that power brings, whereas the second, the more numerous class, is directed and controlled by the first, in a manner than is now more or less legal, now more or less arbitrary and violent, and supplies the first, in appearance al least, with material means of subsistence and with the instrumentalities that are essential to the vitality of the political organism.
Our own country has such an arrangement and, as far as we know, so does every other country. There are two things to keep in mind:
First, there is always "one individual who is chief among the leaders of he ruling class... and stands... at the helm of the state." This individual is not necessarily the formal head of state.
Second, whatever the political setup,
pressures arising from the discontent of the masses who are governed, from the passions by which they are swayed, exert a certain amount of influence on the policies of the ruling, the political, class.
In addition, the man at the head of the state requires the support of "a numerous class to enforce respect for his orders and have them carried out." Moreover, in the case when the masses might overthrow the ruling class it would have to have a minority within them to replace the existing ruling class.
Currently, we classify states into three types: absolute monarchies, constitutional monarchies, and republics, as set up by Montesquieu. Of course, no two states of each type are exactly alike; "there are important differences between the political organizations of the United States and France, though both are republics." Aristotle classified states into monarchies, aristocracies, and democracies, although his democracies were really aristocracies with "fairly broad membership."
But Rousseau came up with a different definition of democracy, to mean a majority of people participating in political life under the notion of "popular sovereignty." It is Mosca's purpose in his book "to refute this democratic theory."
The first reason why the majority cannot rule is that the minority, the ruling class, is organized and it typically exerts its power against individuals in the unorganized majority one by one. The larger the nation the easier it is for the ruling minority to exert power, because it is smaller relative to the whole of society and more united.
Moreover, members of the ruling class are normally distinguished from the common herd by qualities that confirm their superiority, and if they don't have it themselves they usually inherited it.
In primitive societies the ruling class superiority is military valor as the distinguishing characteristic. This intensifies as societies progress from hunting to agriculture; "the warrior class gets to oppress the agriculturalists with impunity, and typically get to "acquire almost complete ownership of the land."
But as civilization progresses, land rent increases, and great centers of consumption -- the capital and other cities -- arise, and a very important transformation occurs.
Wealth rather than military valor comes to be the characteristic feature of the dominant class: the people who rule are the rich rather than the brave.
In this transformation social organization becomes perfected enough so that "the protection offered by public authority is considerably more effective than the protection offered by private force:" In other words it is not the power of the feudal lord that keeps the peace but the "efficacy of the laws" and their administration.
This comes about through a series of gradual alterations in the social structure whereby a type of organization, which we shall call the "feudal state," is transformed into an essentially different type, which we shall term the "bureaucratic state."
In the bureaucratic state "wealth produces political power just as political power has been producing wealth." Thus, even though the rich hesitate before "entering public life, and the poor [have] a certain aversion to choosing the rich for elective office," there is an unquestionable "music of clinking dollars" with respect to elections and public life.
And, the road to to social influence is easier for the rich than for the poor.
Where religious belief is strong there is a tendency for a "priestly aristocracy to obtain an important share of wealth and political power: e.g., ancient Egypt, Brahmin India and medieval Europe. There is a tendency for the priests to monopolize education and access to written books. Specialized knowledge and science only get picked up by the ruling class when they produce economic benefits to the public and the state.
In present day Europe and America the class that applies the findings of modern science to war, public administration, public works and public sanitation holds a fairly important position[.]
There are many examples of people with "practice in directing military and civil organization" developing a real art in governing "that is better than crude empiricism." Of course, only people of higher status are considered for higher stations, and it is seldom possible to determine who possesses such art before appointment to high office.
Some countries restrict the governing class to a hereditary aristocracy. Indeed almost every country has been ruled at some time by a hereditary aristocracy. Usually such aristocracies are established in fact before being enforced in law, by monopolizing all political power for a period. And it is obviously easier for the sons of the aristocrats to acquire the qualifications for office since they often enjoy "a certain familiarity with them since childhood."
And even absent a restricted access to high office, mere intellectual stature is not a sufficient qualification for powerful office. It is telling that aristocracies have always emphasized instead their "superiorities in character and wealth." And this makes sense, because high office often requires will power, courage, pride, and energy. It helps to be raised and live among people that prize these traditions.
We generally become indifferent to danger or, perhaps better, to a given type of danger when the persons with whom we daily live speak of it with indifference and remain cool and imperturbable before it.
Thus,
Courage in battle, impetuousness in attack, endurance in resistance -- such are the qualities that have long and often been vaunted as a monopoly of the higher classes.
However, the record of the 19th century indicates that people from all classes can obtain these leadership qualities, notably in the France of the Revolution and Empire, even though "such talent for command had been considered an exclusive prerogative of the nobility.
However the hereditary principle does not persist forever.
As soon as there is a shift in the balance of political forces... then the manner in which the ruling class is constituted changes also.
It may be a new source of wealth, the decline of an old religion, a new current of ideas, whatever, "far-reaching changes occur in the ruling class. "
[It] comes down to a conflict between the tendency of dominant elements to monopolize political power and transmit possession of it by inheritance, and the tendency toward a dislocation of old forces and an insurgence of new forces[.]
In other words, the stability of a ruling class is a measure of the lack of change challenging it. But once change comes, whether by "commerce with foreign peoples, forced emigrations, discoveries, wars" then new "beliefs come to the fore and upset" the status quo that had kept the masses obedient. In such an environment individuals who have started from nowhere and reach high positions and fire "new ambitions, new greeds, new energies" that rejuvenates the ruling class until a new stability takes hold.
And when the new stability takes hold,
those who belong to the [new] ruling class will begin to acquire a group spirit. They will become more and more exclusive and learn better and better the art of monopolizing their advantage... [in] acquiring power and holding it.
Are people happier "during periods of social stability" when everyone keeps their station from generation to generation? Who knows? Mosca is "careful not to venture any answer of our own" on this question. Besides, who knows what causes the ending of a ruling class or the beginning of a historical period and new rulers.
Next: Feudal and Bureaucratic Systems
Or, return to Contents.
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