A Critique of the Ruling Elite Model
A Critique of the Ruling Elite Model
复制标题
对统治精英模式的批判
DOI：
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发表时间：
1958
影响因子：
6.8
通讯作者：
R. Dahl
中科院分区：
文献类型：
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作者：
R. Dahl
很多人似乎相信是“他们”掌管着一切：老一辈人、银行家、市政厅机器，或者幕后的党魁。这种观点显然具有强大的多方面吸引力。它简单、引人入胜、戏剧性、“现实主义”。它让一个人站在一个内在的二倍体。对于有强烈受挫理想主义倾向的个人来说，它恰好带有一种顽固的愤世嫉俗。最后，与许多其他解释相比，这一假说有一个非常大的优势：它可以以一种几乎不可能反驳的形式出现。考虑一下最后一点。有一种准形而上学的理论，由可以被称为无限回归的解释组成。执政精英模式可以这样解读。如果一个社区的显性领导人似乎不构成统治精英，那么可以通过辩称在显性领导人背后有一组秘密领导人构成统治精英来挽救这一理论。如果随后的证据表明，这个秘密集团并不是统治精英，那么可以通过辩称第一个秘密集团背后还有另一个秘密集团来拯救这一理论，以此类推。
A great many people seem to believe that “they” run things: the old families, the bankers, the City Hall machine, or the party boss behind the scene. This kind of view evidently has a powerful and many-sided appeal. It is simple, compelling, dramatic, “realistic.” It gives one standing as an inside-dopester. For individuals with a strong strain of frustrated idealism, it has just the right touch of hard-boiled cynicism. Finally, the hypothesis has one very great advantage over many alternative explanations: It can be cast in a form that makes it virtually impossible to disprove. Consider the last point for a moment. There is a type of quasi-metaphysical theory made up of what might be called an infinite regress of explanations. The ruling elite model can be interpreted in this way. If the overt leaders of a community do not appear to constitute a ruling elite, then the theory can be saved by arguing that behind the overt leaders there is a set of covert leaders who do. If subsequent evidence shows that this covert group does not make a ruling elite, then the theory can be saved by arguing that behind the first covert group there is another, and so on.