In the last thirty years elites have been forgotten in social sciences but remembered as capitalism has come to reward them in ever more stark ways.
These essays from the ESRC Centre for Research on Socio Cultural Change (CRESC) bring together an interdisciplinary team including sociologists, anthropologists, political scientists and management researchers all arguing for and demonstrating the need to resume elite studies. The issues which this collection explores include:
- How to (re) conceptualise elites in present day capitalism?
- What methods do we need to study elites?
- How significant are elites as social and political agents?
- How has financialisation shaped elite formation?
- How are intermediaries important?
- What about cultural elites?
In pursuing these common issues, the book includes empirical studies of the UK, Canada, Greece, France, as well as various international institutions. A wide range of methods, from survey analysis through social network analysis, ethnographic research and documentary analysis is used to make this the most wide ranging and ambitious engagement with elite studies to have been published for many years.