The Power Elite and the State

Front Cover
G. William Domhoff
Routledge, 2017 M09 29 - 315 pages
This volume presents a network of social power, indicating that theories inspired by C.Wright Mills are far more accurate views about power in America than those of Mills's opponents.Dr. Domhoff shows how and why coalitions within the power elite have involved themselves in such policy issues as the Social Security Act (1935) and the Employment Act (1946), and how the National Labor Relations Act (1935) could pass against the opposition of every major corporation. The book descri bes how experts worked closely with the power elite in shaping the plansfor a post-World War II world economic order, in good part realized during the past 30 years. Arguments are advanced that the fat cats who support the Democrats cannot be understood in terms of narrow self-interest, and that moderate conservatives dominated policy-making under Reagan.
 

Contents

1 Social Networks Power and the State
1
2 Does it Matter Who Governs?
17
3 Business Leaders Experts and the Social Security Act
29
4 The Wagner Act and Class Conflict 18971948
65
A Critique of Krasners Theory of American State Autonomy
107
The State Autonomy Theory of Fred Block and the Origins of the International Monetary Fund
153
An Empirical Attack on a Theoretical Fantasy
187
A Challenge to Pluralists and Structural Marxists
205
9 Which Fat Cats Support Democrats?
225
10 The Decline of Disruption and the Return to Conservatism
257
Envoi
283
Bibliography
287
Index
309
Copyright

Other editions - View all

Common terms and phrases

Bibliographic information