The Power Elite: Just Plain Folks

by Vaustein

THE POWER ELITE: JUST PLAIN FOLKS

- by Vaustein

We do not doubt the existence of a power elite of government and business leaders, nor that the powerful protect each other. Implicit in all conspiracy theories are two premisses to which we take exception. The first, that the interests of the powerful attack the ideals of a free society. Secondly, that in protecting each other, the powerful limit freedom. Ironically, it is the most responsible and scholarly conspiracy theorists who quite accidentally make our case.

There is such a thing as a responsible conspiracy theorist, especially when one considers the suspicion aroused by the secretiveness and outright deceit often practiced by heads of state and their executive offices. No responsible conspiracy theorist attempts to peg conspiracy upon one political party or another. Official records, interviews, and other abundant sources of investigative information point to the inescapable conclusion that while ideologies differ sharply between political factions, elected officials feel compelled to maintain popular stability to retain their jobs.

As an aside, we find offensive the idea that Republicans tend to favor big business while Democrats favor the poor and organized labor. Big business drifts to whomever is in power or stands a likely chance of attaining power. Labor unions relate to each other as cartels, and are heavily influenced by organized crime.

Indeed, the national leadership of labor unions are analogous to corporate executives whose customers cannot choose whether or not to purchase the product. The reader who has studied sociology or social psychology should be familiar with the famous "Ideal Bureaucracy versus Iron Law of Oligarchy" debate. The point is, labor unions are neither accountable to their membership nor or are they democratic institutions. We make this point to deflect counterarguments to our thesis that are rooted in partisan ideology.

To our first exception, that the interests of the powerful are necessarily in conflict with the interests of a free society. Note the phrase "free society" not "democracy". Democracy is really the Marxist ideal of the stateless society, where everyone rules but no one leads. If a Communist nation ever gets the formula right, then we can take democracy seriously. Until then, we dismiss the notion of democracy as the straw man of demagogues at the top and insurgents at the bottom.

Implicit in conspiracy theory is the image of the smoke-filled room that has replaced the legislative chamber in the realm of social order. This charge stems from the tendency to dehumanize the powerful. Regardless of wealth or influence, a human being is reflexively a human being, with the same basic tendencies, motivations, rational self-interest, and vulnerabilities as everyone else. Heads of state prop up other heads of state with the expectation of future favor. Generally, future favor works to our advantage.

After all, diplomats and elected officials define themselves by their ability to procure advantage for those who invested them with public trust and power. This is critically important; even the most cynical and evil leaders the world has even seen had a basic human need to justify their human evil with human good. Current world leaders have the same need. When Bill Clinton negotiates with Tony Blair on behalf of Enron, it serves corporate American interests at that point in time. When George W. Bush bribes his Russian counterpart Putin with promises of foreign aid to remain silent about U.S. missile defense, the U.S. is ostensibly better off.

As for business, their self-interest is to predict market trends, loosen or avoid the regulatory controls of local governments, and maintain the free flow of capital. The U.S. electorate at least does not seem to mind when national banks very publicly negotiate with each other. Since banks have all the money, it stands to reason that they should keep abreast of each other's business. The other businesses that benefit the most from collusion with government tend to be low-cost producers of goods or services that would become more costly if the particular market were more competitive. Local governments realize that their interest lay in playing low-cost producers against each other. This generally results in soft-money contributions, quasi-legal gifts, and illegal graft to elected officials.

This is morally wrong, and it limits the crebility of elected officials. However, it does not support a case for a power elite controlling the world. It supports a case for how government regulation and oversight of business, and how interference by business in affairs of state promote avarice and deceit. As long as government remains so large, and elected officials are granted so much contact with and oversight of business, then big business will manipulate the relationship based upon their own rational self-interest.

This segues nicely into the second exception, that these activities limit freedom. If the objective of the Trilateralists is to control the destiny of nations, they have failed laughably. In a free society, a person with a good education, or ambition, or both, can become a successful enterpreneur. A mass-enterpreneur class is the virulent bane of a dominating power elite. The leaders of a free society cannot pass a blanket law to crush small business. The best they can do is to make an example of renegades, such as Microsoft, or subtly discourage risk-taking through taxation. One point where conspiracy theorists are dead-center accurate is how tax increases that are imperceptible over time can shift the economic balance of power from the middle class to the corporate oligarchy.

It is only when the government exercises these options that the power elite are able to limit freedom. The tech sector exploded without goverment assistance. Consumer electronics and software are rapid-pace and highly competitive industries for whom government involvement would tend to create inertia and confusion. The Clinton Administration attack on Microsoft was shot through with total ignorance of how a fiercely competitive market with upscale, educated participants ought to operate. It can be argued that in trying to force the issue of how the tech sector "ought" to operate, the Clinton Adminstration thwarted its own self-interest by triggering the decline in tech sector investment on the NASDAQ.

To cap the argument, consider that while big business attempts to influence the economic destiny of nations in pursuit of dubious human good and rational self-interest, they cannot arrest citizens and they cannot make war, at least not in the developed nations. We argue that while big business influences the official policy of developed nations toward their neighbors, the state makes the life-and-death decisions and will not surrender this power. I would ask the science fiction enthusiast to please desist from thumping her copy of Neuromancer and to accept reality as it now stands.

The human evil of big business is to gain advantage over competitors. The human good of big business is to be able to pay their employees. The human evil of government is to regulate big business then to accept payment for favors. The human good of goverment is to get the best deal for its businesses and electorate and to maintain stability. The alternative is totalitarian Communism, which crushes enterpreneurs and integrates business with government to a greater degree than is allowed in a free society.

If it seems a choice of evils, bear in mind that mankind is basically good and evil, but not rooted in integrity. If integrity and establishment values ruled the thinkingof most individuals, corruption and injustice would become exceptional. To the degree that people behave like peasants, they will be treated as such. To the extent that the reader willfully engages in evil or deceitful acts and justifies them, no matter how trivial such acts may seem, the reader is no less responsible for the unfairness and loss of idealism in our society.