Miles Jackson wrote:
>
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I agree; that was my original argument in this thread. But if the
> economic sector is the ultimate power, then the bourgeoisie and the
> ruling class are just synonymous terms, right? --Bourgeoisie who make
> money and pay no attention to politics are still part of the ruling
> class, because politics in a capitalist society is predicated on their
> interests, even if they do nothing to actively "direct" political action.
You never can tell. Perhaps there can actually develop more of a shared viewpoint on this than is is usually the case with debates on LBO. (I'll later want to debate more the status of the "power elite," but I'll let that pass for now.) I would like to expand a bit the concept of "'direct' political action" as used here.
Power, including specific political decisions, of course includes the process by which decision makers form that policy. What Jim, Justin, and others have said about the "wise men" points to this process. But the "wise men" don't drop from heaven or spring up from the earth, and the _social_ process that generates them is part of the exercise of class power, in and out of government.
Let's take the latter first. There have been a number of instances in u.s. history where an ad hoc committee as it were of big capitalists got together to aid or discipline one of their own. This happened when John D. Rockefeller, Sr. more or less by accident ended up owner of much of the iron land in northern Michigan. His fellow big capitalists instructed him that no one man was going to control _both_ the oil _and_ the iron ore. But such an event is much facilitated by, perhaps only made possible by, there already having been established a network of 'invisible' and unofficial relations within the the ruling class. And that is where schools, clubs, coming-out balls, weddings, funerals, resorts, boards of charitable and cultural organizations, etc. become crucial. And that is where we can see the role of daughters and wives of the ruliing class (and _their_ connections through schools, etc) as well as rentiers (most of whom are only a generation or two from active involvement, and many of whom can and on occasion do reenter active engagement in busines or politics).
As to decisions in government involving informal processes as precondition, didn't Alice Roosevelt for decades constitute quite an important part of the ruling of the u.s.?
I don't know whether the following is relevant or not, but might be of interest to those concerned with ruling-class psychology. A friend of mine almost got killed in WW2 because of the misfortune of having a Vanderbilt as commander of the PT boat he served on. Said Vanderilt thought maybe he could win a Congressional Medal by taking a certain risk (even though there were standing orders against it). Does the comfort of second or third or fourth generation wealth create some kind of tendtency to advenurism in policy making also? I know that when the British Cabinet was debating support of Zionism back in the early '20s, Balfour's crowning argument was "why not go on an adventure once in a while."
Carrol