I happened to pick up the first edition of sociologist G. William Domhoff's "Who Rules America?" in 1967 in a college bookstore. In that book Domhoff's explanation/description of the difficulties encountered in trying to study the "ruling class" (my language) was itself enlightening. I don't think that Domhoff considers himself a Marxist and he is certainly not a revolutionary socialist but he has kept up this line of study (along with other interests) through the years. (He is now 84 years old, a professor emeritus at UC Santa Cruz, and still maintains a 'who rules america?' website: https://whorulesamerica.ucsc.edu/ )
A few years ago i looked up the latest edition of "Who Rules America?" in preparation for a talk. I found that the seventh edition had been published in 2013 with a new subtitle: "The Triumph of the Corporate Rich." I quoted the first two paragraphs of Domhoff's introduction in my talk (so i have the text handy): "This new edition of *Who Rules America?* is completely updated to capture the full sweep of the dramatic changes that occurred in the United States during the first twelve years of the twenty-first century. These changes represent nothing less than the triumph of the corporate rich that own and manage the relative handful of large banks, corporations, agribusinesses, and commercial real estate developments that dominate the American economy and government. The new edition draws on recent studies by sociologists, political scientists and experts working for public interest groups and government agencies to update information on corporate interlocks, social clubs, private schools, and other institutions that foster elite social cohesion. It also contains new information on the tax-free charitable foundations, think-tanks, and policy discussion groups through which the corporate rich strive to shape public policy. "To update and extend information on the large flow of money from corporations and foundations to think-tanks, policy-discussion groups, and opinion-shaping organizations, the new edition draws on the grants section of the *Foundation Directory Online* for invaluable compilations. It presents new evidence based on public opinion surveys that better demonstrates the continuing disjuncture between the liberal policy preferences of low- and middle-income Americans on a variety of economic and foreign policy issues, and the lack of responsiveness to those preferences on the part of the federal government in Washington." Whether or not Domhoff would consider his research to be 'marxist' i think it is realistic, sensible sociology, i.e. imo along the same lines as 'marxist' research. On Fri, Apr 9, 2021 at 1:17 AM Ed George <[email protected]> wrote: > You see in revolutionary socialist propaganda constant references to ‘the > ruling class’, ‘the bourgeoisie’, ‘the capitalists’, ‘the capitalist class’ > and the like, yet I know of no study or investigation that goes into the > question of who exactly these people are. Academic Marxist-influenced > sociological studies that investigate the concept of social class in > Marxist theory, almost invariably focus on the difficulties of > conceptualising the *working class* theoretically and empirically, and also > concentrate on identifying and categorising ‘the middle class(es)’. There > is also abundant Marxist sociology that tries to look at the structures and > institutions of capitalist rule at the level of the state, including > ideological mechanisms of rule, but I know of not one, but I mean *not > one*, study of the *bourgeoisie* as a social class within the framework of > historical materialism at the level of the social structure of production > relations. (Literally the only thing I’ve found is this comment on David > Ruccio’s blog: < > https://anticap.wordpress.com/2016/02/24/who-are-the-capitalists/>). This > is surprising, apart from the obvious point that, given these people are > supposed to be the class enemy, it would be handy to know who they are, > because, if the whole notion of social class in Marxist theory is > problematic (and I think it is, not because either the notion or Marxist > theory are wrong – I don’t think they are – but because, given that Marx > left no unambiguous definition of the concept, people have subsequently had > to construct one inferring from what Marx did say and they don’t agree with > each other), then measuring the concept against the empirical reality of > the ruling class as a conceptual heuristic should be simpler than measuring > it against the working class because one would expect less social > variegation amongst the ruling class, in part because, almost by > definition, there can’t actually be that many of them. > > So my question is, have I missed something? Does anyone here know of any > serious theoretical/empirical studies of the actual contemporary > bourgeoisie from the optic of Marxist theory? > > -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=- Groups.io Links: You receive all messages sent to this group. View/Reply Online (#7839): https://groups.io/g/marxmail/message/7839 Mute This Topic: https://groups.io/mt/81962865/21656 -=-=- POSTING RULES & NOTES #1 YOU MUST clip all extraneous text when replying to a message. #2 This mail-list, like most, is publicly & permanently archived. #3 Subscribe and post under an alias if #2 is a concern. -=-=- Group Owner: [email protected] Unsubscribe: https://groups.io/g/marxmail/leave/8674936/21656/1316126222/xyzzy [[email protected]] -=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-
