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The Four Networks in the United States
How does the Four Networks theory apply to the United States? This section shows why it is plausible to suggest that there is class domination in the United States, especially compared to most other democratic capitalist countries. Economic elites have had no serious power rivals in the United States for a number of complex historical reasons.
When the United States is viewed in historical-comparative perspective as a fragment of the European system of capitalist nation-states, there is a prima facie case that leaders from the capitalist class are more powerful than in European nations and in comparison to any other group or the federal government. First, America did not have a feudal past, so its capitalists were not hindered by a rival economic class that had to be battled, assimilated, or deferred to in attempting to dominate the state. Conversely, the absence of such a rival economic elite meant that the state could not play off one strong economic class against another in an attempt to gain autonomy from the capitalist elites.
In Europe, the feudal landlords and state elites were able to limit the rise of corporate capitalism, and even to insist that capitalists had to bargain with organized workers. In the United States, there were no restraints on the rise of giant corporations from these sources, and the corporations were able to eliminate most attempts at union organization. That is a huge difference in terms of the wealth and income distribution, and in terms of the use of government to provide collective social benefits like health care insurance and a good retirement income.
By the late 19th century, the nationwide nature of the transportation and communication systems, and the commonality of language, education, and culture, meant that the bases for class solidarity were present for both corporate owners and their employees, although the corporate community was far more cohesiveness than the working class for a variety of reasons. Still, class conflict over wages, hours, working conditions, and other issues has frequently manifested itself since the late 19th century. Contrary to pluralists and state autonomy theorists, and in agreement with Marxists on this issue, I believe class conflict was the single most important factor (but not the only factor) driving American politics in the 20th century, even overshadowing the more visible and violent struggles over racial inclusion and exclusion.
But it was not just the absence of a rival economic elite (a feudal nobility rooted in the exploitation of peasant agriculture) that made it possible for capitalists to become dominant. There was no institutionalized church either, which meant that there was no ideology network that could rival them for power. Fragmented as it was from the outset into many rival Christian denominations, the ideology network has been subordinate to the economic and political networks. The historical role of churches also has been limited through the separation of church and state by the Founding Fathers, reflecting both the weak nature of the church network at the time and the Founders' own secular tendencies.
Since the 1960s, secular organizations like self-help groups and psychotherapy cults have enjoyed some success in providing meaning to the college-educated middle class, but churches remain the most important organizations in fulfilling this human need for Americans. Protestant churches in particular always have had an enormous role in producing American morality and culture. However, their constant splintering into new denominations, and then further schisms within the dominations, has limited them as a source of power.
True, the Catholic church was a power base in some urban areas in the late 19th and early 20th centuries through the Democratic party, often making alliances with local political machines. More recently its power has been limited to realms like abortion and school prayer, where it plays a potent role. When thinking of religious power today, it is conservative Christian churches that often come to mind, but African-American churches, especially in the South, are a significant power base. So, I can agree that ideological organizations have some political influence in the United States, but they are less important than in many other countries.
Furthermore, capitalists were able to come to power because the United States has not had a strong, independent, centralized state for a variety of historical reasons that are very familiar. First, the pre-revolutionary history of the United States as a set of separate colonial territories outside the context of the European multi-state system led to a federal form of government with many government functions located at the state as compared to the national level. The state level in turn ceded some of its power to the city level, where landed elites -- "place entrepreneurs" -- have been able to form growth coalitions that persuade local governments to protect and enhance their interest in intensifying land use (Logan & Molotch, 1987; Molotch, 1976; Molotch, 1979; Molotch, 1999).
The rivalries among the economic elites of the various states within the new United States were a second major factor in keeping the American national government limited in its scope until the 1930s at the earliest. The Founding Fathers created a system of checks and balances at the national level that has made the powerful legislative branch of the American government very accessible to elite economic groups. In particular, the rural agricultural party of Jefferson (the Democrats), which won out politically over the urban industrial party of Hamilton (roughly speaking, the Federalists/Whigs/Republicans) until the Civil War, worked very hard to keep the federal government small. It is my claim that the plantation capitalists of the South, after finding a few allies in the North, played an enormous role in restraining the growth of a strong centralized state that might challenge their domination of their African-American workforce, first through slavery, then through Jim Crow laws and the share-cropping system.
Even under these circumstances, the federal government has forced changes in power arrangements in the South twice, first through the Civil War in the 1860s, then through its support for the Civil Rights Movement in the 1950s and 1960s. These defeats at the hands of Washington reinforced the anti-government ideology of white Southerners, who refuse to forget what they see as a humiliation. Even today, the fiercely anti-government stance that pervades Southern white culture is a major barrier for those who would like to have the federal government take more responsibility for many social, educational, health, and science programs. This does not mean that wealthy white Southerners reject the many subsidies they have extracted from the federal government since the 1870s, but it does mean they have created an ideology that allows them to keep that government from helping ordinary citizens to any great extent.
The small size of the 19th-century American state meant there were powerful corporations before there was a large national government, another contrast of major importance with Europe (Mills, 1956, p. 272). The corporate elites that arose after the Civil War thus had a big impact on how the national government grew, contrary to what the pluralists and state autonomy theorists claim (Domhoff, 1970, Chapter 6; Domhoff, 1990, Chapters 4-6; Domhoff, 1996, Chapters 3-5). With the coming of World War II, and the Cold War, of course, there was no choice but to expand the state dramatically, but that expansion was completely controlled by the corporate capitalists (Domhoff, 1996, Chapter 6).
Finally, the lack of any dangerous rival states on American borders, along with the protection from European states provided by the British navy throughout most of the 19th century, meant that the capitalist class in the United States did not have to contend with a "permanent military establishment" until World War II ( see Mills, 1956, Chapter 8, for an excellent account of these matters). The American government most certainly had an army that played a large role historically in taking territory from Native Americans, Spain, and Mexico. However, it was never big enough for long enough until the second World War to be considered a serious contender for power. By that time civilian traditions were long established.
As for the many wars in which the United States has been involved since 1949, they were decided upon by elected officials and by corporate leaders appointed to important positions in the state and defense departments, not by military leaders itching for a fight. The 2003 invasion of Iraq is a perfect example. It was the product of assertive nationalists like Vice President Richard Cheney and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, both former corporate CEOs, and the neoconservative ideologues they brought with them to government from right-wing think tanks. Most, if not all, of these pro-war civilians had carefully avoided military service in Vietnam after their graduation from college. President George W. Bush found refuge in the Texas Air National Guard, from which he took an extended leave of absence (Schweizer & Schweizer, 2004, pp. 191-195).
The United States Army was so small after the Civil War that the increasingly ascendant corporations often created their own organizations of violence to break strikes or resist unions, or else hired private specialists in such work. The largest of the private armies in that era, the Pinkerton Detective Agency, "had more men than the U.S. Army" (Mann, 1993, p. 646). The American government did not even try to stop organized corporate violence until the 1930s. That's because most of the unionization efforts by workers were defined by judges as violations of property rights and/or of the right to freedom of contract. Employers thus had a legitimate right to "defend" their property and hire replacement workers. When it came to using organized violence to enforce the law, though, the corporate leaders had to hire private armies (Mann, 1993, pp. 645-48).
So, when we turn to the current power structure in the United States, and look into the details of class domination by the corporate community and its power elite, we have to remember that the absence of feudal economic elites, the fragmented nature of the ideology network, the weakness of the decentralized government, and the small size of the military -- each explainable in historical terms -- all contributed to this outcome. It's not that the capitalists were somehow stronger or better in the United States. Instead, they found themselves in ideal circumstances in terms of the relationships among the four major power networks.
References
Boehm, C. (1999). Hierarchy in the forest: The evolution of egalitarian behavior. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Domhoff, G. W. (1970). The higher circles. New York: Random House.
Domhoff, G. W. (1990). The power elite and the state: How policy Is made in America. Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter.
Domhoff, G. W. (1996). State autonomy or class dominance? Case studies on policy making in America. Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter.
Hamilton, R. F. (1991). The bourgeois epoch: Marx and Engels on Britain, France, and Germany. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.
Logan, J. R., & Molotch, H. (1987). Urban fortunes: The political economy of place. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Mann, M. (1977). States ancient and modern. Archives of European Sociology, 18, 226-298.
Mann, M. (1984). The autonomous power of the state: Its origins, mechanisms, and results. Archives of European Sociology, 25, 185-213.
Mann, M. (1986). The sources of social power: A history of power from the beginning to A.D. 1760 (Vol. 1). New York: Cambridge University Press.
Mann, M. (1993). The sources of social power: The rise of classes and nation-states, 1760-1914 (Vol. 2). New York: Cambridge University Press.
Mills, C. W. (1956). The power elite. New York: Oxford University Press.
Mills, C. W. (1962). The Marxists. New York: Dell.
Molotch, H. (1976). The city as a growth machine. American Journal of Sociology, 82, 309-330.
Molotch, H. (1979). Capital and neighborhood in the United States: Some conceptual links. Urban Affairs Quarterly, 14, 289-312.
Molotch, H. (1999). Growth machine links: Up, down, and across. In A. Jonas & D. Wilson (Eds.), The urban growth machine: Critical perspectives, two decades later (pp. 247-265). Albany: State University of New York Press.
Schweizer, P., & Schweizer, R. (2004). The Bushes: Portrait of a dynasty. New York: Doubleday.
This document's URL: http://sociology.ucsc.edu/whorulesamerica/theory/four_networks.html
How does the Four Networks theory apply to the United States? This section shows why it is plausible to suggest that there is class domination in the United States, especially compared to most other democratic capitalist countries. Economic elites have had no serious power rivals in the United States for a number of complex historical reasons.
When the United States is viewed in historical-comparative perspective as a fragment of the European system of capitalist nation-states, there is a prima facie case that leaders from the capitalist class are more powerful than in European nations and in comparison to any other group or the federal government. First, America did not have a feudal past, so its capitalists were not hindered by a rival economic class that had to be battled, assimilated, or deferred to in attempting to dominate the state. Conversely, the absence of such a rival economic elite meant that the state could not play off one strong economic class against another in an attempt to gain autonomy from the capitalist elites.
In Europe, the feudal landlords and state elites were able to limit the rise of corporate capitalism, and even to insist that capitalists had to bargain with organized workers. In the United States, there were no restraints on the rise of giant corporations from these sources, and the corporations were able to eliminate most attempts at union organization. That is a huge difference in terms of the wealth and income distribution, and in terms of the use of government to provide collective social benefits like health care insurance and a good retirement income.
By the late 19th century, the nationwide nature of the transportation and communication systems, and the commonality of language, education, and culture, meant that the bases for class solidarity were present for both corporate owners and their employees, although the corporate community was far more cohesiveness than the working class for a variety of reasons. Still, class conflict over wages, hours, working conditions, and other issues has frequently manifested itself since the late 19th century. Contrary to pluralists and state autonomy theorists, and in agreement with Marxists on this issue, I believe class conflict was the single most important factor (but not the only factor) driving American politics in the 20th century, even overshadowing the more visible and violent struggles over racial inclusion and exclusion.
But it was not just the absence of a rival economic elite (a feudal nobility rooted in the exploitation of peasant agriculture) that made it possible for capitalists to become dominant. There was no institutionalized church either, which meant that there was no ideology network that could rival them for power. Fragmented as it was from the outset into many rival Christian denominations, the ideology network has been subordinate to the economic and political networks. The historical role of churches also has been limited through the separation of church and state by the Founding Fathers, reflecting both the weak nature of the church network at the time and the Founders' own secular tendencies.
Since the 1960s, secular organizations like self-help groups and psychotherapy cults have enjoyed some success in providing meaning to the college-educated middle class, but churches remain the most important organizations in fulfilling this human need for Americans. Protestant churches in particular always have had an enormous role in producing American morality and culture. However, their constant splintering into new denominations, and then further schisms within the dominations, has limited them as a source of power.
True, the Catholic church was a power base in some urban areas in the late 19th and early 20th centuries through the Democratic party, often making alliances with local political machines. More recently its power has been limited to realms like abortion and school prayer, where it plays a potent role. When thinking of religious power today, it is conservative Christian churches that often come to mind, but African-American churches, especially in the South, are a significant power base. So, I can agree that ideological organizations have some political influence in the United States, but they are less important than in many other countries.
Furthermore, capitalists were able to come to power because the United States has not had a strong, independent, centralized state for a variety of historical reasons that are very familiar. First, the pre-revolutionary history of the United States as a set of separate colonial territories outside the context of the European multi-state system led to a federal form of government with many government functions located at the state as compared to the national level. The state level in turn ceded some of its power to the city level, where landed elites -- "place entrepreneurs" -- have been able to form growth coalitions that persuade local governments to protect and enhance their interest in intensifying land use (Logan & Molotch, 1987; Molotch, 1976; Molotch, 1979; Molotch, 1999).
The rivalries among the economic elites of the various states within the new United States were a second major factor in keeping the American national government limited in its scope until the 1930s at the earliest. The Founding Fathers created a system of checks and balances at the national level that has made the powerful legislative branch of the American government very accessible to elite economic groups. In particular, the rural agricultural party of Jefferson (the Democrats), which won out politically over the urban industrial party of Hamilton (roughly speaking, the Federalists/Whigs/Republicans) until the Civil War, worked very hard to keep the federal government small. It is my claim that the plantation capitalists of the South, after finding a few allies in the North, played an enormous role in restraining the growth of a strong centralized state that might challenge their domination of their African-American workforce, first through slavery, then through Jim Crow laws and the share-cropping system.
Even under these circumstances, the federal government has forced changes in power arrangements in the South twice, first through the Civil War in the 1860s, then through its support for the Civil Rights Movement in the 1950s and 1960s. These defeats at the hands of Washington reinforced the anti-government ideology of white Southerners, who refuse to forget what they see as a humiliation. Even today, the fiercely anti-government stance that pervades Southern white culture is a major barrier for those who would like to have the federal government take more responsibility for many social, educational, health, and science programs. This does not mean that wealthy white Southerners reject the many subsidies they have extracted from the federal government since the 1870s, but it does mean they have created an ideology that allows them to keep that government from helping ordinary citizens to any great extent.
The small size of the 19th-century American state meant there were powerful corporations before there was a large national government, another contrast of major importance with Europe (Mills, 1956, p. 272). The corporate elites that arose after the Civil War thus had a big impact on how the national government grew, contrary to what the pluralists and state autonomy theorists claim (Domhoff, 1970, Chapter 6; Domhoff, 1990, Chapters 4-6; Domhoff, 1996, Chapters 3-5). With the coming of World War II, and the Cold War, of course, there was no choice but to expand the state dramatically, but that expansion was completely controlled by the corporate capitalists (Domhoff, 1996, Chapter 6).
Finally, the lack of any dangerous rival states on American borders, along with the protection from European states provided by the British navy throughout most of the 19th century, meant that the capitalist class in the United States did not have to contend with a "permanent military establishment" until World War II ( see Mills, 1956, Chapter 8, for an excellent account of these matters). The American government most certainly had an army that played a large role historically in taking territory from Native Americans, Spain, and Mexico. However, it was never big enough for long enough until the second World War to be considered a serious contender for power. By that time civilian traditions were long established.
As for the many wars in which the United States has been involved since 1949, they were decided upon by elected officials and by corporate leaders appointed to important positions in the state and defense departments, not by military leaders itching for a fight. The 2003 invasion of Iraq is a perfect example. It was the product of assertive nationalists like Vice President Richard Cheney and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld, both former corporate CEOs, and the neoconservative ideologues they brought with them to government from right-wing think tanks. Most, if not all, of these pro-war civilians had carefully avoided military service in Vietnam after their graduation from college. President George W. Bush found refuge in the Texas Air National Guard, from which he took an extended leave of absence (Schweizer & Schweizer, 2004, pp. 191-195).
The United States Army was so small after the Civil War that the increasingly ascendant corporations often created their own organizations of violence to break strikes or resist unions, or else hired private specialists in such work. The largest of the private armies in that era, the Pinkerton Detective Agency, "had more men than the U.S. Army" (Mann, 1993, p. 646). The American government did not even try to stop organized corporate violence until the 1930s. That's because most of the unionization efforts by workers were defined by judges as violations of property rights and/or of the right to freedom of contract. Employers thus had a legitimate right to "defend" their property and hire replacement workers. When it came to using organized violence to enforce the law, though, the corporate leaders had to hire private armies (Mann, 1993, pp. 645-48).
So, when we turn to the current power structure in the United States, and look into the details of class domination by the corporate community and its power elite, we have to remember that the absence of feudal economic elites, the fragmented nature of the ideology network, the weakness of the decentralized government, and the small size of the military -- each explainable in historical terms -- all contributed to this outcome. It's not that the capitalists were somehow stronger or better in the United States. Instead, they found themselves in ideal circumstances in terms of the relationships among the four major power networks.
References
Boehm, C. (1999). Hierarchy in the forest: The evolution of egalitarian behavior. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.
Domhoff, G. W. (1970). The higher circles. New York: Random House.
Domhoff, G. W. (1990). The power elite and the state: How policy Is made in America. Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter.
Domhoff, G. W. (1996). State autonomy or class dominance? Case studies on policy making in America. Hawthorne, NY: Aldine de Gruyter.
Hamilton, R. F. (1991). The bourgeois epoch: Marx and Engels on Britain, France, and Germany. Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press.
Logan, J. R., & Molotch, H. (1987). Urban fortunes: The political economy of place. Berkeley: University of California Press.
Mann, M. (1977). States ancient and modern. Archives of European Sociology, 18, 226-298.
Mann, M. (1984). The autonomous power of the state: Its origins, mechanisms, and results. Archives of European Sociology, 25, 185-213.
Mann, M. (1986). The sources of social power: A history of power from the beginning to A.D. 1760 (Vol. 1). New York: Cambridge University Press.
Mann, M. (1993). The sources of social power: The rise of classes and nation-states, 1760-1914 (Vol. 2). New York: Cambridge University Press.
Mills, C. W. (1956). The power elite. New York: Oxford University Press.
Mills, C. W. (1962). The Marxists. New York: Dell.
Molotch, H. (1976). The city as a growth machine. American Journal of Sociology, 82, 309-330.
Molotch, H. (1979). Capital and neighborhood in the United States: Some conceptual links. Urban Affairs Quarterly, 14, 289-312.
Molotch, H. (1999). Growth machine links: Up, down, and across. In A. Jonas & D. Wilson (Eds.), The urban growth machine: Critical perspectives, two decades later (pp. 247-265). Albany: State University of New York Press.
Schweizer, P., & Schweizer, R. (2004). The Bushes: Portrait of a dynasty. New York: Doubleday.
This document's URL: http://sociology.ucsc.edu/whorulesamerica/theory/four_networks.html
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