The Alienated 'Knowledge Class' Could Turn Violent

 

“In the 1970s, Western democracies faced a wave of political violence. In the U.S., a radical left-wing group called the Weather Underground bombed federal buildings to protest the Vietnam War. In West Germany, the Red Army Faction waged armed resistance against what it saw as a fascist state. Italy's Red Brigades kidnapped and assassinated public figures, including former Prime Minister Aldo Moro. These groups shared a trait: Many members were highly educated, middle- or upper-middle-class young people. These weren't the oppressed proletariat of Marxist theory, but the disillusioned children of privilege and university lecture halls.

 

A similar dynamic could take root in the U.S. As the Trump administration downsizes public agencies, dismantles DEI programs and slashes academic research funding, it risks producing a new class of people who are highly educated but institutionally excluded. History suggests this group may become a source of unrest -- and possibly violence.

 

Historian Peter Turchin illuminates this possibility with his theory of "elite overproduction." When societies generate more elite aspirants than there are roles to fill, competition for status intensifies. Ambitious but frustrated people grow disillusioned and radicalized. Rather than integrate into institutions, they seek to undermine them.

 

Revolutions, in this view, are often fueled not by the downtrodden but by the downwardly mobile children of the elite.

 

This framework helps explain the rise of 1970s radical leftist groups. The Weather Underground emerged from Students for a Democratic Society, rooted in elite university campuses. Its leaders, including Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn, were educated at the University of Michigan and the University of Chicago. In Germany, Ulrike Meinhof of the Red Army Faction was a prominent journalist with degrees in philosophy and sociology. Many Red Brigades members in Italy held law or political science degrees. Their radicalization stemmed not from poverty but from moral outrage and estrangement from institutional power.

 

Today, a similar form of status frustration is building. The postwar expansion of higher education has created a surplus of advanced degree holders. People with doctorates far outnumber tenure-track positions. Many members of the American intelligentsia face precarious employment, rising debt and declining institutional pathways.

 

Meanwhile, the Trump administration's agenda has disproportionately harmed the "knowledge class": policy analysts, researchers, educators and civil servants who once found stability in public institutions.

 

This is more than a mere bureaucratic shake-up. When large numbers of educated, politically engaged people lose access to institutional influence, they often seek alternatives. For now, most are channeling their frustration through protests, digital activism and ideological writing.

 

But under certain conditions -- state repression, widespread disillusionment or charismatic leadership -- radicalism can escalate. We already see hints in environmental sabotage, anarchist organizing and violent clashes involving Antifa and far-right groups. These remain on the fringe, but so were the Weather Underground and the Red Army Faction in their early days.

 

President Trump's policies could intensify this dynamic. By hollowing out state infrastructure and devaluing educational institutions, the administration risks creating a surplus of ideologically driven people with no outlet for their talents. Many are trained in critique, moral reasoning, and systems thinking -- the very profile of earlier generations of radicals. Most won't resort to violence, but history shows that a small, committed vanguard can inflict enormous damage.

 

Granted, today's left is more fragmented and less doctrinaire than in the 1970s. Surveillance, polarization and the internet make underground organizing harder. Digital activism tends to favor symbolic over violent resistance. Yet political violence often originates from isolated cells of disillusioned idealists. The conditions for radicalization -- grievance, peer networks, ideological justifications -- are already in place.

 

The question is whether political leaders will mitigate or exacerbate the risks. Defunding and demonizing higher education may offer short-term political gains, but doing so carries long-term dangers. By targeting perceived left-wing strongholds, some on the political right may cultivate the very radicalism they fear.

 

The wiser course is reform, not demolition. Public universities and government institutions should become more ideologically diverse, publicly accountable and economically sustainable. But they must also be preserved as spaces for civic integration.

 

Societies that exile their intellectuals risk turning them into revolutionaries.

 

If today's political class fails to heed the lessons of the 1970s, tomorrow's insurgents may again emerge from the ranks of the overeducated and institutionally marginalized.

 

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Mr. Savolainen is a professor of sociology at Wayne State University.” [1]

 

1. The Alienated 'Knowledge Class' Could Turn Violent. Savolainen, Jukka.  Wall Street Journal, Eastern edition; New York, N.Y.. 22 May 2025: A17.