ARTICLE AD BOX
"It is odder still that this particular social class should be anonymous and invisible, because it is large, loud, unashamed, and bossy. It is the most powerful class in society. It is the class that constitutes the Establishment. It is nothing less than the ruling class. And it is the most formidable and zealous enemy of free-market capitalism and individual freedom.
"The problem of this missing class first occurred to me in the late 1990s, when I visited an anti-capitalist ‘climate’ rally in London. ... According to the Socialists, it is ‘the working-class’ who have most to gain by the overthrow of capitalism. ... But where, I wondered, at this anti-capitalist ‘climate’ jamboree, were the heroic, muscle-bound, lantern-jawed proletarians? ...
"The protesters cannot simply be labelled 'middle class' because ... the commercial middle class had failed to send a single delegate. ... These practical grafters I guessed were too busy doing capitalism. ... quite out of sympathy with these high-minded, anti-capitalist radicals. So what social class are we left with?
"There is, in fact, a name for the group assembled at the Climate rally, though it is rarely used. The protesters were members, or on their way to becoming members, of the New Class. ... not easily defined but may be vaguely described. It consists of a goodly proportion of those college-educated people whose skills and vocations proliferate in a 'post-industrial society' ... We are talking about scientists, teachers and educational administrators, journalists and others in the communication industries, psychologists, social workers, those lawyers and doctors who make their career in the expanding public sector, city planners, the staffs of larger foundations, the upper levels of government bureaucracy and so on. It is by now, a quite numerous class …a disproportionately powerful class, it is also an ambitious and frustrated class. ...
"Members of this class are remarkably conscious of their affinity with other members, they strongly identify with one another politically, culturally and intellectually, and they act, as a class, in a co-ordinated and determined way to pursue their goals. They consider themselves separate from and opposed to other classes. The ideology and worldview of this group, taken as a whole, is consistent, predictable and intractable. And those of us who value individual freedom and property rights, whether we know it or not, are at war with this class. ...
"Th[is] New Class ... has a ‘voracious and insatiable’ hunger for power. ... No other class in history has been as cohesive and single-minded in defending itself and controlling that which it holds. And this includes control of speech and thought. ...
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As government spending has grown so has the number and size of groups relying directly and indirectly on State funding. These groups, which comprise the core of the New Class, naturally tend to look favourably on their own activities, would like to see their powers increased and their responsibilities extended over greater areas. ...
"The New Class maintains that society needs expert analysis, expert advice, direction, guidance and regulation, and they are the people who will do it. ... They demand more public spending, regulation and planning as naturally as a stream flows down a mountain, because public spending pays their wages and they are the regulators and planners.
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Members of this class encounter one another, in the workplace and socially, and their views become honed and hammered out. ... and over time they become a coherent, distinct, moral view of the world. ...
"Members of this New Class will always call for something to be done, to solve a perceived problem, in the form of another enquiry or review or committee or institute or ministry, for more research into this or that area, for more laws and statutes and official guidance or the funding of more support groups. If there is no problem to justify an extension of their activities, a problem, or threat, or risk must be found. The problem can never be Big Government (this would be to blame themselves), it must always stem from unregulated activity, and the solution must be more State spending and control.
"To this planning class, freedom itself is an affront. ...
"But grumbling resentment and vague animosity towards the New Class is not enough. The nature of the battle must be spelled out. The need to fight must be underlined, the reasons for waging war explained, and distilled into memorable slogans.
"Most of all, the enemy needs to be clearly identified. Our failure to do so has allowed the New Class to grow and grow, and to escape responsibility for the chaos and misery it has caused. The first step must be to pronounce and advertise, loudly and repeatedly, that the New Class exists. The immense power of the New Class, as we have seen, lies in its anonymity - in the fiction that its members are neutral and disinterested experts, well-meaning ‘concerned’ scientists, high-minded intellectuals, impartial planners and regulators, rationally ordering us and our world, in our best interests. This sham neutrality must be exposed, the selfish motives called out. This invisible class must made visible. This anonymous class must be given a name."
~ Martin Durkin, from the first chapter to his forthcoming book on The New Class
English (US) ·