"Born to Rule
By Aaron Reeves and Sam Friedman
Harvard/Belknap, 328 pages, $29.95
Even the sturdiest heart must sink at the thought of a disquisition on "elites" by two progressive academic sociologists. In that limited (but fearful) sense, "Born to Rule," by Aaron Reeves and Sam Friedman, meets our expectations.
The book argues that Britain is as much in the grip of a tiny sociopolitical caste today as it was in the late 19th century.
It makes its assumptions clear from the get-go: Elites are undemocratic by nature. Inequality is inherently unacceptable. Whites are always privileged; ditto males. People of color are disadvantaged outsiders.
Meritocracy and upward mobility are myths spun by elites to prole-wash their privilege.
Wealth exists to be whittled down. And surely enough, a host of confiscatory remedies are imperative to fix the injustices that flow from Britain's social structure.
The authors express some sheepishness over their own privileges -- to wit, their race, sex and institutional affiliation: "There is a certain irony to two white male professors from Oxford [Mr. Reeves] and the London School of Economics [Mr. Friedman] writing a critical book about the British elite." And yet their book is (they say) a pressing extension of their previous work on "the long shadow that social class casts over people's lives" (Mr. Friedman's metier) and the uncovering of how "classed assumptions" are built into policies focused on the poor (Mr. Reeves's).
Who counts as elite, anyway? The authors cite John Scott, an English sociologist, who wrote in 2003 that "elite" is "one of the most misused words in the sociological lexicon." They sidestep the definitional quicksand by regarding as elite all those who've appeared in "Who's Who" -- Britain's biographical bible of noteworthy and influential people -- which has been published every year since 1897. If you're in it, you're elite; if you're not in it, you're not.
"Who's Who" gives the authors a lavish empirical resource, which they mine with gusto -- sifting, parsing and collating. They examine where people went to school and university, whom they're descended from, and how much money they have. The latest edition of "Who's Who" features 33,000 people, which may, the authors say -- puzzlingly -- "still feel too big to really represent a national elite."
So they draw on the theories of Karl Marx and others and compose an additional category, the "wealth elite." These people comprise only 6,000 of the 33,000 in "Who's Who," or 0.01% of the British population. The smallness of the fraction is, of course, intended to make us gasp.
Particularly compelling is the authors' focus on the "recreations" of the elite. Aristos hunt, fish and ride; the more educated types are highbrow, favoring opera and good literature. In recent decades, entrants in "Who's Who" list recreations that are, Messrs. Reeves and Friedman say, intended to take the politically insensitive edge off their elite status. Preferred activities include declasse things like spending time with family and pets and listening to pop music.
Older generations, Messrs. Reeves and Friedman note, were unabashed about their snobbishness and about the connections that got them a place at Oxford or a job at a big firm. By contrast, today's elites often insist that they got to the top by dint of effort and merit. Such claims, the authors say, are a "cosplay of ordinariness" designed to make wealth-inequality more palatable by giving a "meritocratic legitimacy" to privilege.
In chapter after empirical chapter, the authors show us that schools like Eton and universities like Oxford and Cambridge still furnish the country with a disproportionate quantum of people in "Who's Who." And there's much fun to be had in trawling through the numbers. Some confirm our suspicions: 23% of all the great officers of state (members of Parliament, home and foreign secretaries, chancellors of the exchequer) have come from Eton.
But did we know that in recent decades top scientists from working-class backgrounds are "almost completely nonexistent"? (Knowing that talent is equally spread in all sectors of society, what a waste... (K.))
So what should we do? Is Britain, the world's sixth-largest economy, really a bad place to live in if you're not a member of the magic circle? The numbers of (nonelite) people clamoring to emigrate there would suggest not. And it is just possible that the selection -- for college admissions, coveted jobs and much else in modern society -- does indeed measure merit, as the "elitists" claim.
Messrs. Reeves and Friedman won't have any of it. Under the spell of such inequality-obsessed economists as Thomas Piketty, they believe that Britain needs wholesale reconstruction. Its "patterns of elite reproduction" -- in which children follow parents into apparent privilege -- "demand urgent political attention." The authors would introduce harsh new property taxes on the rich, as well as an annual wealth tax. The tax would start at <pound>2 million -- about $2.6 million -- at a rate of 0.6%. It would raise around <pound>10 billion a year, the authors calculate. Capital flight would be discouraged by "robust enforcement procedures."
That's just the start. Messrs. Reeves and Friedman also offer a blueprint for social engineering. They would, by law, cap at 10% the number of students from private schools admitted to Britain's best universities. For Oxford and Cambridge -- Britain's acme of higher education -- they'd end all selective admission and replace it with a lottery system whereby the top 5% of students from all Britain's schools are randomly admitted. They'd also make it compulsory for all corporate boards to reserve 50% of seats for workers and revamp "voting rights connected to capital investment" to cripple the power of large shareholders (basically undoing capitalism as we know it (outside of Germany (K.)).
Oh, and the House of Lords -- Britain's upper house of Parliament -- would be replaced by a chamber of citizens selected at random. After all, the authors say, "democracies should work hard to ensure that everyone has the chance to become a politician." The chance to become a politician! Even Marx never thought of that.
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Mr. Varadarajan, a Journal contributor, is a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and at New York University Law School's Classical Liberal Institute." [1]
The proof is in the pudding. Western societies are badly run by such "elites", and should be reorganized.
1. The Oppressive Ruling Class. Varadarajan, Tunku. Wall Street Journal, Eastern edition; New York, N.Y.. 09 Oct 2024: A.13.
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