though painfully short account of the individualrnmembers of the emerging oligarchy.rnNor does he try to make out thatrnthe oligarchy is always a unified force, asrnvulgar conspiracy speculation assumes.rnRothbard shows how conflict emergedrnbetween the declining Morgan interestsrnand the rising influence of the Rockefellerrnfamily, based on control of oil. Byrnthe 1930’s, the Rockefeller empire hadrnacquired a strong interest in Americanrnintervention in Asia against Japan but,rnbecause of close ties with German industry,rnwas considerably less fervent aboutrnintervention in Europe, while the Morganrninterests wanted peace with Japanrnbut favored war against Germany in Europernbecause of their close financial tiesrnto Britain and France.rnBy the end of the war, the Morgan interestsrnhad ceased to be the dominantrnforce in the new class, and Rockefeller interestsrnhad prevailed. Rockefeller representativesrnlike John J. McCloy—chairmanrnof the board of the Rockefellers’rnChase Manhattan Bank as well as of thernCouncil on Foreign Relations, a directorrnof the Rockefeller Foundation and RockefellerrnCenter, and “perhaps the mostrnpowerful single figure in foreign policyrnsince Wodd War 11″—have dominatedrnAmerican foreign policy ever since. Notrnonly McCloy but also Henry Kissingerrnand David Rockefeller himself have continuedrnthe tradition, as have a small armyrnof Rockefeller in-laws and satellites likernAllen and John Foster Dulles, ChristianrnHerter, Paul Nitze, Dean Rusk, C.rnDouglas Dillon, and others. Throughrnthe Trilateral Commission, essentially anrnextension of Rockefeller interests, the influencernof the family (or the powerfulrncomplex of interests the family led) continuedrnunabated at least through thernCarter administration,rnRothbard confines himself to diggingrnout the individual names and family andrninstitutional connections among theserngray eminences and to showing thatrntheir presence has infected all administrationsrnof both parties throughout thisrncentury. His monograph does not explorernin any detail the historical contextrnof the new class, and it is regrettable herndid not update and extend the work beforernhis death in 1995.rnNevertheless, a later essay by a scholarrnof the left, Thomas Ferguson, while lackingrnthe detail of Rothbard’s essay, doesrnoffer a view of the social and economicrnforces of the early 20th century that enabledrnthe new class to emerge. Writingrnin explanation of the coming of the NewrnDeal, Ferguson contends that “at therncenter of this coalition . . . are not thernworkers, blacks, and poor who have preoccupiedrnliberal commentators, butrnsomething else: a new ‘historical bloc’ (inrnGramsci’s phrase) of capital-intensive industries,rninvestment banks, and internationallyrnoriented commercial banks.”rnWhat Ferguson calls the new “multinationalrnbloc”rnincluded many of the largest, mostrnrapidly growing corporations in therneconomy…. The largest of themrndominated major American foundations,rnwhich were coming to exercisernmajor influence not only onrnthe climate of opinion but on thernspecific content of American publicrnpolicy. And, what might berncalled the “multinational liberalism”rnof the internationalists was alsornaided significantly by the spreadrnof liberal Protestantism; by a newspaperrnstratification process thatrnbrought the free trade organ of internationalrnfinance, the New YorkrnTimes, to the top; by the growth ofrncapital-intensive network radio inrnthe dominant Eastern, internationallyrnoriented environment; and byrnthe rise of major news magazines.rnFerguson’s historical analysis placesrnRothbard’s exposure of the individualrnand family connections of the emergingrnruling class in a larger perspective. Whatrnwas going on in the late 19th and earlyrn20th century was the social process thatrnVilfredo Pareto called the “circulation ofrnelites,” by which one elite displaces another,rnbreaks down or adapts the institutionsrnconstructed by the earlier elite, andrnreplaces those institutions with new onesrnof its own design and construction thatrnreflect its own interests. “Financial capitalism,”rncentered around commercialrnbanking and an economy based on it,rnwas displaced by a new “political force,”rn”power bloc,” or “historical bloc” consistingrnof managerial capitalism, closelyrnwedded to an enlarged and centralizedrnstate, deeply involved in global managementrnas well as in the reconstruction ofrnAmerican society and culture to suit itsrninterests, and operating through the appliedrntechnical and managerial skills ofrn”science” (whether in the hard sciencesrnon which its economic and technologicalrnpower depends or the soft sciences ofrnmass psychology and sociology throughrnwhich it seeks to engineer social relationshipsrnand cultural norms). It is interestingrnthat in the early part of Rothbard’srnmonograph the principal actors are thernfamily members and business partners ofrnthe emergent ruling class, but by the laterrnparts the main actors seem to have fewrnsuch personal relationships. They havernbecome something more like a true class,rnbound by a common outlook and a commonrnset of interests, and not simply anrnextended family or a cabal of big businessmen.rnFamilies like those of thernRockefellers persist and sometimes playrndecisive roles, but the interests of thernfamilies have altered and are now dependentrnon the managerial structures andrntheir imperatives. What is involved in arncirculation of elites is not so much therndisappearance of old families and theirrnmembers as the reorganization of thernmembers of the old elite in new powerrnrelationships with new interests thatrncompel new and different patterns ofrnconduct.rnHaving acquired the power to pourrnAmerican society into a new bottle fromrnwhich the ruling class may drink its fill,rnthe new elite has little reason to want tornretain the adversarial political systemrnaround which representative governmentrnrevolves. In its place, we have “bipartisanism,”rnwhich is extended inlandrnfrom the water’s edge of foreign policy tornthe minutiae of how you may raise yourrnchildren and what books and magazinesrnyou can display on your coffee tablernwithout the neighbors calling in the haterncrimes squad, and anyone who dissentsrnfrom or challenges the “bipartisan” consensusrnto which virtually no one everrnconsented is certainly an extremist andrnprobably is stashing six tons of fertilizerrnin his garage. Clearly, the only way tornmaintain the fiction of democracy in thernkind of system the ruling class has designedrnis to stage more meaningless debatesrnand false conflicts between morernmeaningless candidates representingrnmore meaningless parties and issues, inrnthe hope that enough voters will bernswilled by the charade to keep the machineryrnhumming and its operators inrnbusiness. So far the fiction has sold wellrnenough, but with very many more “conflicts”rnbetween candidates like Mr. Dolernand Mr. Clinton, the ruling class will bernobliged to find some other sideshow tornkeep American voters from paying morernattention to the men who stand behindrndemocracy’s increasingly transparentrncurtain. crn32/CHRONICLESrnrnrn