Why the “Ruling Class” Need Not Rule: Nicos Poulantzas and the Marxist Theory of the State
Articles
Why the “Ruling Class” Need Not Rule: Nicos Poulantzas and the Marxist Theory of the State
Articles

Why the “Ruling Class” Need Not Rule: Nicos Poulantzas and the Marxist Theory of the State

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Tony Chamas argues that Nicos Poulantzas offers a Marxist theory of the state that explains the inadequacies of both reformist politics and oversimplified conceptions of the relationship between the “ruling class” and state policy. 

Hannah Hoch, Untitled Collage (1964)

Just Get Money Out of Politics, Right? The Limits of Electoral Socialism

Rampant inequalities and the increasingly blatant influence of the billionaire class on electoral politics have been exacerbated since the 1970s amidst the destruction of the welfare state and the ascendancy of a global neoliberal order. Thus, it appears self-evident to many that the solution to socio-economic problems would involve campaign finance reforms to “get money out of politics” or a political purge to “drain the swamp.” After all, is it not evident that a state ruled by people from a privileged socio-economic class would prioritize the interests of people from said class? By this logic, couldn’t the state be governed for the interests of “the many” if it was ruled by “anti-establishment” individuals who did not belong to the privileged classes and rejected the financial support of corporations?  

There are two historical facts that problematize these assumptions. First, ever since property requirements have been lifted for electors and politicians, the capitalist state has often not been governed by the wealthiest individuals of society and has commonly been administered by officials who do not even own much capital and are not part of the “bourgoisie.” Second, there have been many cases of popular governments governed by people who explicitly reject corporate ties, with many “socialist” parties even being elected to government in countries like France, Italy, Spain, Sweden, and many others.1 There are also the relatively recent cases of Syriza in Greece, the socialist party of Portugal, and the various social democratic governments in South America that still exist today. Yet, in just about all these cases, the dominant property-owning classes maintained their positions in the class hierarchy despite short-term concessions (such as taxation and regulations). In certain instances, some of these parties even implemented austerity programs that were deeply unpopular with the working class, with Mitterrand and Hollande in France among the many examples.2 So what gives?  

What Left-Liberals and (some) Marxists Get Wrong About the State

Despite the increasingly blatantly close relationship between corporate power, the democratic process, and government policy, most notably in countries like the United States, the privileged classes of society do not need to “rule” a capitalist state directly or indirectly for it to still function disproportionately to the benefit of their long-term interests. In other words, there need not be a cabal of political elites or an all-powerful corporate “establishment” for a society of class domination to still persist. Identifying the class background and corporate ties of actors governing the system as the cause of the state’s biases toward the interests of the privileged classes presupposes that the removal of such corporate affiliations would entail the capitalist state no longer having this class disposition, allowing it to be wielded by the subordinate classes. This assumption is incorrect, and it is based on a mistaken conception of the state that identifies the system’s effects as its root causes. This is because the objective socioeconomic relations built into the capitalist economy and the institutional structures of the capitalist state reproduce each other and interrelatedly perpetuate the relations of class domination irrespective of the status or intent of the agents governing the state. The capitalist system (its mode of production and state) contains deeply ingrained structures that reproduce its overarching social relations of class domination and shape the individual actors who play its roles. This is a crucial insight elucidated by Nicos Poulantzas and his essential contributions to the Marxist theory of the state. The class theory of the state, when elaborated in detail and severed from the common simplistic misunderstandings of it, makes for a far more rigorous explanation of how class, politics, and the state function under capitalism.

Contrary to the overly simplistic “instrumentalist” conceptions of the state, which see the state as a mere instrument wielded by the ruling class to dominate the powerless majority, there exists a more nuanced version of the Marxist theory of the state in the works of Nicos Poulantzas, one of the most important and rigorous Marxist theorists of the 20th century. His sophisticated theoretical contributions to the Marxist theory of the state make for a far more rigorous explanation of how class society, politics, and the state function under capitalism. The major works of Poulantzas, similar to his contemporary Louis Althusser, can be extremely challenging to read. This article aims to help readers make sense of Poulantzas and his pivotal contributions to Marxist theory, not so much by providing a summary of his entire major texts, but by explaining his most important concepts in plain language through an analysis of an old (yet overlooked) political debate surrounding the state and the “ruling class” in capitalist society. 

Consequently, solutions involving the alteration of who governs the state, such as campaign finance reforms, the election of anti-corporate politicians, or merely purging the state of its bourgeois elites, do not address the core structures that perpetuate the social relations of capitalism and its consequences. The capitalist system and its consequences (inequalities, exploitation, encroachment of democracy, etc.), which so many people want their government to address, will persist so long as the fundamental structures inscribed into the capitalist state and mode of production are left unchanged.  

The Marxist Theory of the State and the Problem with the Category of the “Ruling Class”  

Marxists have often referred to the capitalist state as an “instrument of class rule” and declared that liberal parliamentarianism is ultimately a “dictatorship of the bourgeoisie.”3 This is an oversimplified characterization of Marxist state theory derived from Marx’s famous quote in The Communist Manifesto (1848), which famously stated that “the executive of the modern state is but a committee for managing the common affairs of the whole bourgeoisie.”4 Lenin’s State and Revolution also contains similar quotes that led to such interpretations, such as when he asserts that “according to Marx, the state is an organ of class rule, an organ for the oppression of one class by another.”5 Lenin also proclaims that Engels identified universal suffrage as an “instrument of bourgeois rule” which leads to the interpretation that liberal democracy is just a rigged system ruled by the bourgeoisie.6 However, as this essay will demonstrate through the work of Nicos Poulantzas, Marx himself and other key Marxist figures exhibited a far more nuanced analysis of class such as that found in works such as The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte (1852) and other classic Marxist texts. 

Still, this is a common point of confusion because many Marxists, including Marx himself, often use the terms “ruling class” and the “bourgeoisie” interchangeably. Non-Marxists often colloquially use vague terms like “ruling elites” to similarly designate a class of powerful people that determines society’s political agenda either directly or indirectly. However, both terms can be misleading. This has been a common point of attack by both opponents of Marxism and more sympathetic scientists on the left. In his book The Power Elite, sociologist C. Wright Mills made the good point that the “ruling class” is a badly loaded phrase because “class” is an economic term while “rule’” is a political one. Thus, the phrase, “ruling class” contains the implication that an economic class rules politically.”7 Many theorists far less sympathetic than Mills have dismissed Marxist state theory for supposedly claiming a necessary identity between the economically dominant class and the politically dominant class when in reality, this overlap is not always present.8 While this was true in feudalism, where there is no separation between politics and the economy, this is not exactly true for most capitalist countries.9 Many academics use this fact to reaffirm the myth that there is no classist disposition in the state, and that ruling governments are merely elected by the people through free elections with competing interest groups. Against this view, theorists such as Mills showed that this “competition” was practically rigged and showed how the state and the political process were disproportionately controlled by elite privileged circles – not the wealthy capitalist class in general – but by very particular elite circles. To designate this privileged political group that “rules” the American state, Mills rejected the phrase “ruling class” in favor of the term “power elite” – which comprised different factions but nevertheless shared a common socio-economic background affiliated with what he termed “the corporate rich.”10 This rejection of Marxism as an adequate theory for describing politics was based on the myopic interpretation of what the Marxist classics (those of Marx, Engles, Lenin) supposedly thought of as the “ruling class.” We shall return to the question of what constitutes a “ruling class” later in the essay in the sections that break down the distinctions between governing classes and the different types of dominant classes that are politically and economically relevant. However, it is useful to briefly highlight the key Marxist debates contextualizing the theories that will help answer this question. 

The Poulantzas-Miliband Debate

Many Marxist theorists accepted the criticism that the capitalist class does not necessarily govern the state yet contended that Marx was still ultimately correct about the state having class disposition. However, Marxists disagreed on how and why this class bias manifests, which sparked significant debates among Marxist intellectual circles during the mid-20th century. Most famous was the debate between Ralph Miliband and Nicos Poulantzas. The Poulantzas-Miliband debate was initiated after the publication of a 1969 article by Poulantzas published in the New Left Review titled The Problem of the Capitalist State, which was a review of Miliband’s book The State in Capitalist Society (1969).11 In it, he criticized Millaband’s analysis while acknowledging its value and the intentions behind it. Miliband, who was a Marxist (of the more reformist sort) believed it was undeniable that a privileged elite existed but acknowledged that the conception of the capitalist state as a “committee for the bourgeoisie” was quite inaccurate. There was no direct identity between this state elite and the “economically dominant class comparable to pre-industrial, aristocratic and landowning classes in feudalism”.12 When investigating the operations of government, Miliband noted that many politicians and bureaucrats governing capitalist states don’t actually own much, if any, capital and are often quite unaware of the system they are reproducing. They see themselves as “public servants” of the nation’s “general interest,” even if this is an ideological illusion. 

Neither Miliband was the first “Marxist” to make such points.13 Karl Kautsky previously stated that “the capitalist class rules, it does not govern.”14 While it may be evident to some that the capitalist class does not directly “govern,” this question as to how exactly capitalists indirectly “rule” is the more interesting question. Milliband insisted that while the state may not act at the behest of the capitalist class, it, for the most part, acts on behalf of its interests. Yet unlike liberals, Milliband believed this was indicative that the state still exhibited a class character, meaning that Marxist state theory was thus still relevant. Miliband sought to disprove the myths of “democratic pluralism” – that the state was simply a neutral power center governed by whichever party is victorious in the “free competition of ideas” and “free elections” and that what, in fact, existed was a process of “imperfect competition” managed indirectly (and often directly) by capitalists.15 To prove the class character of states such as the US and Britain, Miliband’s book contained an empirical analysis of the common social backgrounds of the state elite and their capitalist ties.16 Even though most of the officials who held public office did not possess the capital that wealthy businessmen had, they nevertheless both often went to the same elite schools, clubs, interacted in similar “higher circles”, and shared warm ties of kinship with them often as friends and/or strategic allies.17 Thus, they shared the same ideological dispositions, bourgeois proclivities, and the general political bias of the capitalist class. As a result, anyone elected to office was likely to subscribe to the ideological consensus of capitalist rationality that the national interest and the success of capital were one in the same. Miliband’s point was to show that capitalists still effectively “ruled” the state indirectly, not just through corporate finance in elections but also through ideological hegemony. 

In his critique of Miliband’s book, Poulantzas acknowledged the importance of what Miliband was trying to do and that he was correct about the class nature of the state, but for the wrong reasons. Poulantzas remarked that Miliband tried to attack bourgeois ideologies of the state while placing himself on their own terrain – being “unduly influenced by methodological principles of the adversary.”18 While Miliband rejected the notion that the state was an instrument directly exerted by the ruling class, Poulantzas implied that Miliband nonetheless still reinforced an “instrumentalist” conception of the state by reducing its class character to the interpersonal relations of individuals. The term “instrument,” as it pertains to the state, implies that it is actively wielded by a group of people for it to perform its supposed function.  Poulantzas’s whole point is that the capitalist state performs its functions primarily through its objective structures, with the subjects steering it playing a secondary role. Poulantzas argued that this was the real point Marx was trying to make and that the instrumentalist interpretation was a distortion. By neglecting this structural element and trying to argue against the bourgeois myths of democratic pluralism on their own terms, Miliband was unable to account for instances in which the capitalist state acted autonomously from the capitalist class, such as in fascism and social democracy, among others.19 The general argument of Poulantzas’s critique could be summed up in the following passage: 

Direct participation of members of the capitalist class in the state apparatus and in the government, even where it exists, is not the important side of the matter. The relationship between the bourgeois class and the state is an objective relation. This means that if the function of the state in a determinate social formation and the interests of the dominant class in this formation coincide, it is by reason of the system itself: the direct participation of members of the ruling class in the state apparatus is not the cause but the effect, and moreover a chance and contingent one, of this objective coincidence.20

Yet, perhaps the most striking claim of Poulantzas’s response is contained in this quote: 

Indeed, in the case of the capitalist state, one can go further: it can be said that the capitalist state best serves the interests of the capitalist system when the members of this class do not participate directly in the state apparatus, that is to say when the ruling class is not the politically governing class.21

Poulantzas does not expound on this much in this article, but it makes sense in the context of his major works, which show how the state needs to maintain unity among the different sections of the capitalist class. If there is too much nepotism going on in the state with only a few special factions exerting influence over state policy, then the state may act in irresponsible ways that generate instability and fracture capitalist unity, making the system vulnerable to upheaval.  

Poulantzas’s Synthesis of the Marxist State Theory

Poulantzas outlines his synthesis of Marxist state theory primarily in his book Political Power and Social Classes (PPSC) in 1968 and restates his main ideas while making some unorthodox changes to them in his final book State, Power, Socialism (SPS) in 1978.22 It is important to first clarify what is meant by a “synthesis” here. Although Poulantzas’ work may seem like an entirely new theory in and of itself, it is grounded in the classics of Marxist literature. According to Poulantzas, PPSC is a more systematic concretization of existing insights that can be found in the works of Marx, Engels, Lenin, and Gramsci.23 Poulantzas demonstrated that such works contained a Marxist theory of the capitalist state that was disparately scattered throughout their works. So Poulantzas fused these insights into a single coherent body of work that clarifies them while also accounting for nuances they couldn’t articulate. Thus, Poulantzas wanted to show that despite being incomplete, the Marxist classics contained a theory of the capitalist state that was ultimately valid. Although their insights needed further elaboration, Poulantzas insisted that Marx and Engels were correct in believing that the state’s purpose was to mediate class conflict and furnish the stability of the capitalist economy, thereby preserving the dominant class’s hegemony over the exploited classes. 

A Synopsis of Poulantzas’s Theory of the Capitalist State

Rather than an instrument of class rule, Poulantzas argues that what the Marxist classics were really describing with the capitalist state was an objective set of structures and functions that reproduce and are reproduced by the capitalist mode of production and the social relations already built into it. Let’s break this down step by step. Unlike the feudal system, where economic exploitation is explicitly political, the capitalist state uniquely has relative autonomy from the economy and its dominant classes. This relative separation between the economic and the political is conjoined with the state’s new impersonal form of legitimacy based on “the will of the people” as opposed to the divine right, allowing it to present itself as representative of the “nation’s general interests” and its laws take a seemingly “neutral” character. This obscures the class relations of the depoliticized capitalist “economy” which reproduces a division between those who live off manual labor, “intellectual labor,” and owners of capital who profit from it. From the very start, this division of labor (for the most part) effectively excludes the vast majority of powerless wage laborers from partaking in the ruling of the state, the creation of its laws, the enforcement of those laws, and the production of ideology and established “knowledge” that rationalizes this process.24 These “objective structures” of the capitalist mode of production that constitute what Poulantzas calls the “institutional materiality” of the state will be further elaborated upon with other components of his theory throughout this essay. Thus, an inherent class bias is built into the system that is ideologically veiled by the state’s neutral status as a guarantor of the nation’s “public interest” and its legal atomization of classes into individual “citizens” with formally equal rights. 

Yet, there are cases where the state must act in defiance of the short-term interests of the dominant classes and make material concessions to the interests of subordinate classes.25 This occurs with most, if not all, capitalist states to varying degrees, but the most notable examples are fascism and social democracy. In both cases, the state has been ruled by individuals who are not from the dominant classes, and in the case of social democracy, the state has, at times, been ruled by people who are not allied with the dominant classes and are even hostile to them. The former involves concessions to the dominant classes to ameliorate class tensions and stimulate economic growth while the latter evidently involves a dictatorship over capital and the dominant classes. Yet, in either case, the long-term hegemony of dominant classes over subordinate classes remains relatively unchanged. As a result, the state, in effect, stabilizes class conflict between the dominant and subordinate classes and safeguards the long-term interests of the dominant classes. In other words, the capitalist state does not directly represent the economic interests of the dominant classes but rather their long-term political interests – their overall dominance of the subordinate classes.26 Cases of big economic concessions “won over” by dominated classes, or the election of a political party not favored by dominant classes, cannot be seen as a real restraint on the political power of the dominant classes if it does not disrupt their fundamental power relation over subordinated classes.27 Although in such instances, it may appear as though the dominant classes have lost power; in a formation where the strictly political struggle of the dominated classes is possible, it is sometimes the indispensable means of maintaining the hegemony of the dominant classes.17 The capitalist state has a relative flexibility that allows certain concessions to the dominated classes within the limits of the system.28

One should not interpret this as saying that the autonomy of the state is a mere illusion and that it is really just a “tool” of the dominant class.29 The notion of the “general interest” of the “people” expresses a real fact. The state truly does have to look out for the interests of all sectors of society to a limited extent in order to maintain the system’s stability. The system is largely indifferent to the particular agents within a class. They may even implement policies that are actively detrimental to the short-term economic interests of particular agents within the dominant classes in so far as they are viewed as necessary for securing social cohesion – managing class conflict.30 In doing so, the state functions as the guardian of the capitalist mode of production as a whole by securing the conditions for its survival and thus the fundamental class relations of capitalist society, which in turn perpetuate the class dispositions of the state that help reproduce it. The overarching positions of domination of the dominant classes are secured even if some of the individuals occupying them are displaced. This is why Poulantzas defines the state as the “general function as the factor of cohesion or unity in a class-divided society.”31  Yet he tweaks this definition in SPS to say that “in relation to political struggles, the State must be conceived as a “condensation of the relations of class forces.”32 Poulantzas makes this slight alteration to acknowledge that the state is not a monolithic bloc and class struggle actually does take place within its various apparatuses despite still retaining its class character. While Poulantzas shows how the division of labor and framework of the capitalist state is effectively built on the “permanent exclusion of the popular masses, who are subjected to wage labor,” he also recognizes the dominant classes (mostly those who rely on “mental labor”) can still be integrated into various state apparatuses.33 However, Poulantzas maintains that even in the instances where the state does integrate members of the dominated classes into its apparatuses, “it retains them precisely as dominated classes.”34 What this means is that while members of the dominated classes may be allowed into spaces of public office, they are systematically obstructed from reversing the subjugation of their class while the hegemony of the dominant classes is preserved. 

Poulantzas asserts that even if there is a shift in class composition within state apparatuses in favor of the popular classes, “the state tends sooner or later to re-establish the relationship of forces in favor of the bourgeoisie, sometimes in a new form.”17 The capitalist state simply does not allow the dominated classes to hold power within its apparatuses to the same degree as the dominant classes.17 Rather than occupying a concentrated power of their own, the dominated classes are only allowed into apparatuses as disparate forces of opposition to the power of the dominant class. In contrast, the state helps crystalize the dominant classes into a contradictory yet unified power, which “shifts the centre of real power from one apparatus to another as soon as the relationship of forces within any given one seems to be swinging to the side of the popular masses.”17 In this sense, every capitalist “democracy” is managed in favor of the long-term interests of the dominant classes, not just by the interest groups representing these classes, but by the state itself. One of the intrinsic functions of the capitalist state is to organize the dominant classes while disorganizing dominated classes and preventing them from becoming a unified political force.35 This will be further elaborated in the sections on the power bloc of different class fractions. First, it is important to clarify how one is to define social classes. 

Social Classes: Dominated Classes vs Dominant Classes

Generally, in Marxist theory, class is defined principally, but not exclusively, by one’s place in the production process, i.e. by their place in the economic sphere.”36 Class, for Marxists, “is not based on relative sizes of income (a distinction between ‘rich’ and ‘poor’) a discrepancy that Marxists see as merely an effect of the relations of ownership.”37 Generally speaking, in Marxist class theory, if an individual derives most of their income from wage labor, they are working class/proletarian. If they derive most of their wealth from capital and are property owners, they constitute part of the capitalist property-owning class – the “bourgeoisie” who have their own separate fractions.  However, for Poulantzas, social classes cannot solely be determined by the relations of production. Class interests and class power can only be analyzed in relation to class practices.38 He sticks to the definition that “social class is defined by its place in the ensemble of social practices, i.e. by its place in the ensemble of the division of labor which includes political and ideological relations.”39 Poulantzas prefers to use the term “dominant classes” as there are a variety of factions amongst the capitalist class that often have conflicting interests. He also does not use the term “working class” often and prefers the term “dominated classes” as there are various oppressed classes, including the peasantry and the lumpenproletariat. There is also the ambiguous category of the “petit/petty bourgeoisie,” who often rely a lot on their own labor to conduct their small business but also exploit the labor of others. In chapter 2 of part 1 in PPSC, Poulantzas differentiates class fractions, strata, and social categories and delineates when they can constitute a “social force” (Ie: have pertinent effects). There are also obviously more nuances to social class that cannot be covered here.40

The Power Bloc: The Dominant Classes and Their Fractions

Contrary to popular belief, Marx did not see the “bourgeoisie” (the capitalist class) as a monolithic class, nor is there a constantly unified “ruling elite” class that can be considered “the establishment.” The capitalist class is divided into industrial, commercial, and financial fractions, among others.41 Additionally, although less prevalent nowadays, there are also dominant classes from older modes of production that still exist, such as the aristocracy, big landowners, and the nobility. In fact, still in England, many of the richest individuals are lords and/or fellows from aristocratic families.42 This is why Poulantzas prefers the term “dominant classes.” While the dominant fractions have important internal contradictions and struggle to occupy the hegemonic place, which can greatly determine changing social formations, Poulantzas regards these as secondary contradictions vis-à-vis the principal contradiction of the bourgeois/capitalist class (as they make up most of the dominant classes) vs the proletariat/working class (as they are the primary producers of surplus value).43 Throughout most of his work, Poulantzas tends to stick to the juxtaposition between the dominant and dominated classes because the latter’s role in production and society is characterized by subordination to another class. Dominant classes disproportionately possess the most power. Poulantzas defined political power as “the capacity of a social class to realize its specific objective interests.”44

 Within competing sections of the dominant classes, there are often huge tensions, not just due to competition but due to having very different economic interests. For instance, today, there are tensions between the fossil fuel industry (oil, gas, coal, etc.) and the “clean energy” industry (electric vehicles, solar panels, etc.) which demand very different policies from the government. One can also see tensions between big tech and the traditional news media, as well as tensions within big tech itself. Dominant classes and their fractions often cannot unify themselves and have the state serve all their interests, so the state comes in to perform one of its core purposes. As Poulantzas puts it:

With regard to the dominant classes, and particularly the bourgeoisie, the State’s principal role is one of organization. It represents and organizes the dominant class or classes; or, more precisely, it represents and organizes the long-term political interest of a power bloc, which is composed of several bourgeois class fractions… and which sometimes embraces dominant classes issuing from other modes of production that are present in the capitalist social formation.45 

The power bloc is the ensemble of the dominant class fractions that achieves a contradictory unity facilitated by the state, with one leading fraction being the hegemonic class fraction.46 Dominated classes are absent from the power bloc, as their interests are not prioritized by the capitalist system and are met with concessions only insofar as it benefits the long-term interests of the dominant classes. Within the dominant classes, the fraction that becomes the hegemonic fraction/leader of the power bloc is typically marked by their political power and economic dominance in the capitalist economy. Which fraction becomes the hegemonic fraction usually depends on its ability to frame its political interests as being those of the people and nation as a whole. The hegemonic fraction is the fraction whose interests the state’s policies correspond to the most and the one that guarantees the general interest of the alliance of the power bloc.43  

Manifestations of the power bloc will vary from country to country and sometimes amongst its regions. For example, we could decipher which dominant class is the hegemonic fraction by finding which sectors of capital are doing the best by looking at the SNP 500 and how the state serves their interests. From this, one can infer that the hegemonic fraction in America is finance capital (Wall Street), with big tech (Silicon Valley) and the fossil fuel industry being among the other dominant factions. This is seen in the infamous bailouts of the financial sector after the 2008 and 2020 market crashes. By revitalizing the stock market, the state replenished the diminished capital of the top companies in the economy. In doing so, the state served the dominant class fractions, with finance capital at the centre of the circuit of capital. It is not hard to justify such bank bailouts to the other dominant class fractions and to the broader public, as it is easy to claim that saving the financial sector amounts to saving the “economy” as a whole, given how many people are dependent on it. The organization of the dominant classes and unity of the power bloc is mainly facilitated by the state, although dominant factions may also organize themselves and create interest groups to facilitate shared interests and may also try to influence the political scene by encouraging political parties/politicians to represent their interests. The dominant classes cannot usually achieve unity by themselves. The state facilitates the contradictory unity of the power bloc both at the level of governance (policies, institutions, apparatuses, agencies, etc..) and at the level of political representation in government. The unification of the power bloc involves the continual negotiation of fractional interests in an “unstable equilibrium of compromises” (Poulantzas quotes Gramsci) that occurs both at the political level within the branches of government (legislature, executive, judiciary), and between the government and dominant fractions of the power bloc directly.47 Preserving the unity of the power bloc is crucial for securing the stability of the capitalist system. Tensions amongst dominant classes can be quite significant politically, and they can even lead to a transformation in the form of regime a capitalist system takes. 

The state can take different forms to unify the power bloc and/or mediate class conflict between it and the dominated classes. In liberal democracies, this unity is primarily facilitated through compromises. If there is a unity crisis between social classes and/or dominant class fractions behaving in ways that threaten the stability of the capitalist system as a whole, the state will reassert its relative autonomy to put them in check. This explains the policies of Franklin D. Roosevelt, which simultaneously saved the capitalist class from their self-induced misfortunes during the Great Depression and contained the burgeoning class conflict that ensued by passing the New Deal and imposing tax and regulation policies, which many rich people did not like. The bankers likely did not want regulations like the Glass-Steagall Act, yet the state imposed it on them “for their own good” which stabilized the long-term interests of finance capital. However, if compromise proves incapable of handling burgeoning conflicts, the state moves closer and closer to despotism and if this is paired with a political crisis of disunity within the power bloc, the state can reassert its autonomy from the dominant classes in the form of a dictatorship. Marx first described this phenomenon as “Bonapartism” in his analysis of the French Second Republic in The Eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Bonaparte (1852). Fascism and various military coups are modern examples, which Poulantzas explores in depth in Fascism and Dictatorship (1979).

In all such cases where the state reasserts its relative autonomy and appears to rise above class dispositions, neither the dominant class nor the hegemonic fraction of capital may not govern the state nor rule it indirectly. For example, under German and Italian fascism, the state apparatus was primarily governed by people from the petty bourgeoisie recruited through the fascist party, while big capital stood as the hegemonic class faction.48 Such cases involve a dislocation between the governing class and its party representation, with the party bureaucracy unwittingly playing the role of ‘clerks’ for a dominant class they do not belong to.49 This is why Poulantzas emphasizes that the hegemonic class fraction “should not be confused with the class or fraction which is “in charge” of the state apparatus.”50 Although the hegemonic class fraction of the bourgeoisie holds power in the sense that its long-term interests correspond with the state more than any other class fraction, it need not govern the state, and it may not even always constitute a “ruling class.” Here it is crucial to differentiate what is meant by the ruling class and the ways it differs from and overlaps with the hegemonic class fraction and the governing class.   

The Ruling Class, the Hegemonic Class, and the “Class in Charge” (Governing Class)

Precisely identifying what the “ruling class” is can be tricky. There are often confusing dislocations between the political interests of the dominant classes in the power bloc, their (often distorted) representation by parties in government, and the class composition of the political parties themselves.17 It is possible for the hegemonic class or fraction in the power bloc to be absent from the political scene, which can muddy the distinction between what might appear to be the ruling class fraction and the actual hegemonic class or fraction.17 By “political scene,” Poulantzas refers to the field of political class struggle as it pertains to the process of political representation, whereby political parties engage in open declared action, in parliament for example.51 This is why it is important to elucidate the distinction between the hegemonic class of the power bloc and the “ruling class” fractions, whose political parties occupy the dominant places on the political scene.50 Poulantzas identifies three class positions when it comes to setting the political agenda of society, which may or may not overlap with each other: First, there is the hegemonic class fraction of the power bloc, which has the most economic hegemony but also holds political power in the sense that it leads the power bloc and its interests tend to most often correspond with the state. 

Second, there is the ruling class, which is the class fraction whose political party (or parties) dominates the “political scene.”52  It includes the particular class fractions that dominate party politics at the level of representation.53 In this regard, the “ruling class” can in some cases, be close to what C. Wright Mills described as the “power elite” – the very particular class fraction that is exceptionally well-connected politically. There are many well-known cases of particular groups of wealthy individuals, not the entire dominant classes, who continually have their hand in party politics. There are cases of “political dynasties” or oligarchies where the ruling class is perpetually transparent.54 While in many countries, the composition of the “ruling class” frequently changes depending on who dominates the political scene. In the Trump administration, for instance, Warren Buffett and Jeff Bezos, despite being among the richest billionaires, would not be “the ruling class” but rather the class fractions who are represented by the politically dominant party.55 Yet, theories of the ruling class based on corporate kinship (such as that of Mills) cannot account for the cases where the state is occupied by a political party that does not have direct ties to the power bloc. This is seen in the cases of some social democratic governments and the Nazis, where conventional notions of the “ruling class” do not apply. In such cases, the party that dominates the political scene (and those who govern) is not affiliated with the dominant classes, even though there is still a hegemonic class fraction that continues to thrive. 

Third, there is “the class in charge of the state,” – the governing class,  which is the class (or fraction) “from which the upper personnel of the state apparatuses (political, bureaucratic, military, etc.) are recruited who occupy the ‘heights’ of the state.’”17 He refers to this class as the “reigning class” elsewhere.56 Often the ruling class is indistinguishable from the class in charge of the state, but in some cases, a political party may represent the interests of this class while recruiting the personnel of its bureaucracy from a different class, such as the petit bourgeoisie. In some cases, in the USA, the hegemonic class, ruling class, and people “in charge” all overlap quite a bit – for instance, with finance capital being the hegemonic fraction with direct ties to the dominant political party, who even recruits policy advisors and other officials from this class.57 However, there are usually dislocations between these classes. Poulantzas’ terminology can be confusing, but he also similarly distinguishes these class categories in other texts. In “On Social Classes,” he states that “the hegemonic class may be distinct from the reigning class.”58 

The Bureaucracy and The Basis of Political Power

The administrative state personnel in charge of managing the state’s affairs is bureaucracy. However, it is important to note that Poulantzas does not consider the bureaucracy (the reigning class/governing class) to be a “class” in the real sense of the term but rather a particular social category.59 That said, this is a hotly contested topic in Marxist theory.60 If the bureaucracy happens to be filled with capitalists or members of the dominant classes, their class position is constituted by their connection to the relations of production, not by virtue of possessing political power alone. The people who frequently occupy governing roles may seem akin to a “political elite” especially depending on their socio-economic background, but Poulantzas does not like this term as the status of the state elite can conceal who really has the most power in society. Theories that stress the exceptionality of a “political elite” or a “political class” assume that their very existence at the heights of bureaucracy gives them political power and thus unify them as a social class.61 Poulantzas argues that such theories mistakenly separate political and economic power without considering what the underlying foundation of power is.62 Poulantzas defines power as “the capacity of a social class to realize its specific objective interests.”63 This is a relational theory of power in that it does not see power as a “thing” that is seized – but one that is inseparably tied to both social class and political power.17 Poulantzas rejects theories of power that portray it solely as an interpersonal relation (Ex: the ability for X to get Y to do what X wants) as inadequate for explaining power relations at the level of society and politics.64 For instance, political representatives of particular social classes holding formal political power (I.e.: elected or appointed somewhere in public office) would not entail political power for those classes if they still lack the ability to actually realize the demands of those social classes.65 Still, the state bureaucracy and the professional managers within it are qualitatively different from dominated classes, making them a distinct social category. However, what constitutes the significance of the bureaucracy is not its formal position alone or even the class backgrounds of the agents that occupy it, but rather “the concrete functioning of the state apparatuses” and how it affects various classes.66 Poulantzas gives the example of the so-called “state bourgeoisie” in certain developing countries:

The bureaucracy may, through the state, establish a specific place for itself in the existing relations of production; or even in the not-yet-existing relations of production. But in that case, it does not constitute a class by virtue of being the bureaucracy, but by virtue of being an effective class.67

Dislocations Between the Ruling Class, the Governing Class, and the Hegemonic Class 

In cases where politics is heavily dominated by particular higher circles of dominant class fractions, the bureaucracy may appear as a unique class of its own; however, there are many cases where the officials in charge of the state may not identify themselves with the ruling class or fraction dominating the political scene.68 This may still seem unclear, but Poulantzas provides what is perhaps his most clear explanation of these class dislocations in the following quote: 

It is significant to remark that these hegemonic classes or fractions, ruling classes or fractions, and classes or fractions in charge are sometimes identical and sometimes distinct.” The hegemonic class or fraction may be both ruling and in charge of the state; but the ruling class or fraction may be in charge of the state without thereby being hegemonic.69

In the same paragraph, Poulantzas cites the case of Britain in 1832 which Marx wrote about. In this case, the hegemonic class fraction was the financial (banking) bourgeoisie, while the landed aristocracy occupied the political scene and provided the top bureaucratic-military personnel.70 This example, and other cases like it, show that a fraction of the bourgeoisie may play a dominant or even hegemonic role in the economy without having political hegemony. Furthermore, there are special cases where each of these three positions is occupied by a different class or fraction. For instance, Poulantzas states: 

The ruling class or fraction (and the fractions in charge) may not only not be hegemonic, but even on occasion may not be part of the power bloc: a class whose status is merely that of being allied to this bloc may for a brief period be the ruling class.71

According to Poulantzas, this has sometimes occurred with the petit bourgeoisie72 during social democrat governments, such as in France.73 In other texts, Poulantzas also highlights cases where social democratic governments in Austria, Germany, and Sweden, which were governed by cadres recruited mostly from the petty bourgeoisie, have ruled over economies in which monopoly capital was the hegemonic faction despite granting concessions to the working class.74 In such cases, the character of the governing class can mask the real political hegemony of big capital.17 A crucial takeaway to reiterate here is that the ruling class and/or class in charge need not be the hegemonic class and in some special cases, may not even be part of the power bloc or be allied with it, as seen in the examples of social democracy and fascism described earlier. By the design of the objective capitalist functions of the state, these classes end up serving hegemonic interests that don’t necessarily coincide with their own class interests.75 

Corporate-State Ties as a Symptom, Rather Than the Cause of The Problem

Poulantzas contends that “the correspondence between the interests of the hegemonic fraction (in this case the big monopolies) and state policy is not, in fact, based on any personal ties.”76 This might at first seem like a bewildering claim when considering the countless examples of instances where who governs the state is heavily influenced by which political actors get the most financial support from the dominant classes, and the policies implemented are often guided by lobbyists and professionals who are recruited by members these classes. For instance, G. William Domhoff’s Who Rules America contains in-depth research proving how a powerful section of the “corporate rich” impacts the electoral outcomes, writes public policies, and even advises governing officials at the executive level.77 Even in countries that have much stricter campaign finance regulations compared to the US, such as Canada and the UK, corporate lobbying still influences public policy, although to a lesser extent. Poulantzas’s point is not that the affiliation between corporate power and high state officials is “unimportant,” but rather that this relationship is more so an excessive effect of the capitalist system, not the root cause of the government’s bias towards the interests of the dominant classes. The variables of campaign finance and lobbying are nevertheless important. However, identifying the corporate-ties of individual agents as the causes behind why the state governs in favor of the dominant classes at the expense of everyone else rests on the assumption that if such corporate-affiliated agents were prohibited from manipulating the political process, then the state would no longer act in favor of these privileged classes at the expense of the working majority. Although such restrictions on corporate influence would certainly curb some of the excesses of the system, Poulantzas problematizes the assumption by posing the following question: 

Why, in general, does the bourgeoisie seek to maintain its domination by having recourse precisely to the national-popular State – to the modern representative State with all its characteristic institutions? For it is far from self-evident that the bourgeoisie would have chosen this particular form if it had been able to tailor a State to its requirements. While the bourgeoisie continues to derive many benefits from such a state, it is by no means always contented with it, any more than it was in the past.78 

In other words, if the top capitalists supposedly control the state, then they would probably design a system with far less restrictions and impediments to their immediate interests. Given the number of regulations, taxes, and other bureaucratic roadblocks to capital that still exist, the influence of the dominant classes on the state still has its limits. As shown in the cases of social democracy and fascism, capitalist economies have seen the rise of popular governments not ruled by the dominant classes, who often openly engage in openly hostile conflict with them. The important question to ask is, why then does the capitalist state, more often than not, still act in ways that benefit the long-term interests of the dominant classes even if those members of the capitalist class are not controlling the state? Is it that public officials surrender to the ideology of capitalist realism? Maybe so; however, the state’s reoccurring capitulation to capitalist social relations has a deeply embedded material basis.  As articulated by Poulantzas, the answer to this question is that capitalist relations and the political domination of the subordinate classes are already structurally inscribed into the capitalist mode of production and the “institutional materiality” of the capitalist state, irrespective of who governs. In other words, what fundamentally defines the class nature of the capitalist state is not so much the class affiliations of the politicians who govern it, but rather its objective structures. Here by structures, Poulantzas refers to – “the organizing matrix of institutions” – the impersonal systems that establish and uphold the rules and norms of the capitalist system.79  The following section will dig far deeper into what Poulantzas means by “institutional materiality” and “objective structures.”

 The Codes and Structures that Reproduce the Capitalist Matrix 

Poulantzas argues that class domination is entrenched into the organizational relations and institutional structures of the capitalist state, whose ‘institutional materiality’ is grounded in its turn in the relations of production and social division of labor in capitalist societies.80 Due to the separation of the direct producer from his means of production, the economic dominance of the capitalist class is already inscribed in the capitalist mode of production, and they do not really need the state to carry it out for them. However, they need a state to maintain the terrain in which they can accumulate capital without being overthrown via class warfare. So, they need the state to create social cohesion and prevent any such class conflict from disrupting the capitalist social relations where they maintain dominance over subordinate classes. This still does not explain why the capitalist state perpetually acts in their long-term interests by preserving such class relations. There are various reasons for this, which he explains in both PPSC and SPS, yet the latter perhaps contains the clearest explanation. In it, he divides the institutional materiality of the state into four inseparable categories: the division of labor, law, individualization, and the unity of the nation. These four inexorable factors are the foundational elements of capitalist reproduction that generate the class relations of the capitalist state which in turn perpetuates class domination in society. These things were discussed in the previous synopsis of Poulantzas’ thought but deserve further clarification. 

The Division of Labor, Power/Knowledge, and The Legal Code of Capitalism

The reproduction of the capitalist state starts with the capitalist mode of production (CMP) itself, which exists prior to the establishment of a capitalist state. In the capitalist mode of production, wage laborers – the direct producers, are totally dispossessed of their means of subsistence and own nothing but their labor. The emergence of wage labor and the rising class of capitalists who exploited value from it was a gradual and complex phenomenon. Still, it is safe to say that it secured its place as the dominant mode of production following the codification of marginally liberal states that reproduced capitalist social relations and through measures such as enclosures which forcefully dispossessed peasants from their land, forcing them into wage labor. The class divisions generated by the (CMP) between those who live off wage labor and those who live off the labor of others intensify a division of labor that essentially limits what type of people have access to governance of the state and enforcement of its laws. Poulantzas focuses particularly on the division between manual and intellectual labor.81 According to Poulantzas, virtually all apparatuses require intellectual labor while excluding regular manual labor.82  The state apparatuses and their agents (legal professionals, army, administrators, managers, bureaucrats, police, plus all of the ideological apparatuses, etc.) effectively have “a permanent monopoly of knowledge, which also determines the functions of state organization and leadership.”17 They are socialized into the prevailing ideological “knowledges” willingly, unconsciously, or reluctantly out of practical necessity.83 The same conditions apply to the game of representative democracy (political parties, parliament), which manual laborers are systemically precluded from influencing. Poulantzas eloquently sums up this process in the following passage: 

Capitalist law thus gives expression to the process whereby the agents of production are entirely dispossessed of their ‘intellectual powers’ to the benefit of the dominant classes and of their State. In this broad sense, every state agent – every parliamentarian, politician, policeman, officer, judge, barrister, lawyer, civil servant, social worker, and so on – is an intellectual to the extent that he is a man of law, who legislates, knows the laws and regulations, and applies them in concrete ways. “No-one should be ignorant of the law – that is the fundamental maxim of the modern juridical system, in which no-one but state representatives are able to know the law. This knowledge “required” of every citizen is not even a special subject of study at school, as if everything were done to keep him in ignorance of what his supposedly obliged to know. The maxim therefore expresses a relationship whereby the popular masses, whose ignorance of the law’s secrets is built into this law and juridical language itself, remain dependent upon, and subordinated to, state functionaries as the makers, protectors and appliers of the law.84 

Given that manual laborers are mostly excluded from legal state apparatuses (and to a large extent are even literally excluded from possessing “knowledge” of the law) it is not a coincidence that the law is intrinsically biased against manual laborers and tends to work in favor of the dominant classes. This reality is masked by the formal, impersonal character of the legal system that says all citizens are equal before the law and that “no one is above the law.” Many people intuitively know this is a myth yet act as though they believe it. Still, this does not take away from the fact that according to Poulantzas, a capitalist state could even be run by people with proletarian backgrounds and nevertheless retain its character as a “bourgeois” state. 

Furthermore, the socio-legal framework of capitalism divides the agents of production into individual “citizens” rather than members of antagonistic classes while giving these atomized individuals formal cohesion through the unity of the nation-state/ state of the people. This, on the one hand, involves an ideological function of masking class discrepancies and establishing a “public” and “private” sphere that goes hand in hand with the separation of the economic and the political. On the other hand, the state functions as an organizer of the labor process by establishing and regulating social-legal terrain “in which commercial encounters can take place.”85 Private property law and so-called economic “liberties” are engraved into most capitalist constitutions and institutions that are typically upheld by a separate judiciary capable of preventing sitting governments from changing them. The Code of Capital by legal scholar Katharina Pistor is an excellent contemporary study of the class bias of capitalist legal systems that includes many illustrative examples that Poulantzas was unable to cover. Although not a Marxist, Pistor demonstrates the crucial role of the legal code in systemically upholding the dominance of property owners and comes to the conclusion that it is virtually impossible to address the roots of inequality without radically restructuring the institutional legal framework of capitalist states.86 There are more complexities that Poulantzas describes with regard to the objective structures of the capitalist system, but for now, this suffices as a demonstration of the immense degree to which capitalist class relations are deeply baked into the system’s logic. 

Implications for Socialist Transition: Lessons for Social Democrats (and Leninists)

The logical conclusion of this Marxist analysis that Poulantzas has left us with is that any political project that attempts to address the enduring problems entrenched in the logic of capitalism (inequality, alienation, exploitation, lack of democracy, crashes, class domination etc.) cannot rely merely on changing the individual agents operating the capitalist state. The ship of capitalism will continue to cruise the earth’s sea and damage it along the way, regardless of who is manning the helm, so long as its underlying nuts and bolts are left intact. Any analysis that bases the classist nature of the capitalist state on its individual subjects and not its objective structures lead to the mistaken belief that a “popular government” could simply fix the class bias of the state by purging the state bureaucracy of its corporate ties, thinking that individual class identity and good political intentions are enough to address the problem. For Poulantzas, the real task is to change the very structures of the state and of society.87 This poses significant implications for debates surrounding the transition from capitalism to socialism, especially the reformist variants of so-called “democratic socialism,” for obvious reasons. He insists that it would be a serious error to base a socialist political project on the mere presence of the popular classes within the state without a radical transformation of that state.88

Yet, this carries warnings for Marxist-Leninists as well, which are laid out more explicitly in the final chapter of SPS titled “Towards a Democratic Socialism.” While Poulantzas in his PPSC era seemed to implicitly share Lenin’s conclusion that the institutional structures of the capitalist state must be “smashed” and that new institutions must be rebuilt for new social relations, in SPS, he moves away from this and advocates for a new form of “democratic socialism.” Albeit, this was a very distinct articulation of democratic socialism, radically different from the politics of the reformists he criticized. In this final chapter, Poulantzas reflects on the failures of reformist socialism and the degeneration of 20th-century communism. He also cautions against blind calls for “decentralization,” direct local democracy, and/or hastily replacing liberal parliamentary institutions with worker councils without regard to the specificity of structures and social relations of domination. There is no time to lay out the political suggestions for a way forward that Poulantzas poses in his piece. Nonetheless, some of his criticisms of Leninism are worth noting here. Poulantzas argues that Leninists also tend to exhibit an instrumentalist understanding of the state that places too much focus on individual agents as opposed to structures (but in terms of bourgeois vs proletarian agents): 

Accordingly, their logic follows that occupation of the state involves replacing the top leaders by an enlightened left elite and, if necessary, making a few adjustments to the way in which the existing institution’s function; it is left as understood that the state will thereby bring socialism to the popular masses from above. Then leads to the techno-bureaucratic statism of the experts.89

Lenin realized that despite the revolution, much of the repressive state from the Tzar era were still left intact. In Better Fewer, But Better (1923), one of his final writings, Lenin remarked:

Our state apparatus is so deplorable, not to say wretched, that we must first think very carefully how to combat its defects, bearing in mind that these defects are rooted in the past, which, although it has been overthrown, has not yet been overcome, has not yet reached the stage of a culture, that has receded into the distant past.90 

Questions of how capitalist structures can be destroyed and what socialist structures ought to look like are crucial questions far beyond the scope of this article, but they should nevertheless be of utmost concern for any proponents of an emancipatory politics for the 21st century. I personally think that theorists such as the heterodox Marxist Erik Olin Wright and his final book How to Be An Anticapitalist in the 21st Century (2019)  lead us in the right direction with regard to approaching such questions.  

Background of the Author: Tony Chamas is mainly known for his YouTube channel called 1Dime and his podcast 1Dime Radio. On his main channel (1Dime), Tony does video essays and mini-documentaries that involve history, political economy, geopolitics, philosophy, and theory to analyze various socio-political topics. His 1Dime Radio podcast focuses on similar subjects. Cosmonaut enthusiasts would most likely enjoy his docuseries on Post-Soviet Russia and his most recent videos on The American Separation of Powers. More recently, 1Dime has been getting attention most from his videos involving a mixture of Modern Monetary Theory (MMT) and Marxist thought, such as his videos “The Problem with Taxing The Rich.” Tony tries to create accessible and visually entertaining educational content on his YouTube channel while simultaneously developing as an independent scholar. He recently published an essay examining the lessons of the Chinese cultural revolution, which you can find in the new book Underground Theory, featuring Slavoj Zizek, Daniel Tutt, Chris Cutrone, and various authors.

 

 

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  1. For instance, see Mapping the West European Left (Verso, 1994) edited by Perry Anderson and Patrick Camiller.
  2. Joe Guinan, “Returns to Capital: Austerity and the Crisis of European Social Democracy,” The Good Society 22, no. 1 (July 8, 2013): https://doi.org/10.5325/goodsociety.22.1.0044, 44-57.
  3. Nicos Poulantzas, State, Power, Socialism (Verso, 2014) 12.
  4. Marx and Engels, Manifesto of the Communist Party, Marxists.org, 5.
  5. V.I. Lenin, The State and Revolution (1917/18) in Collected Works, vol. 25, Progress Publishers), 392.
  6. Ibid, 398.
  7. C. Wright Mills, The Power Elite (Oxford University Press, 1956), 277.
  8. Nicos Poulantzas, Political Power and Social Classes (Verso, 1978), 326.
  9. Ibid 326.
  10. Mills, The Power Elite, 147-160.
  11. Bob Jessop, “Nicos Poulantzas: Marxist Theory and Political Strategy,” Capital & Class 10, no. 3 (November 1, 1986): 234–35, https://doi.org/10.1177/030981688603000120., p 14.
  12. Ralph Miliband, The State in Capitalist Society (London : Quartet Books, 1973), 59.
  13. After there was also Fred Block and his article “The Ruling Class Does Not Rule” (1977)
  14. Miliband, The State in Capitalist Society, 55.
  15. Miliband, The State in Capitalist Society, 146-151.
  16. Miliband, The State in Capitalist Society, 37-66.
  17. Ibid.
  18. Nicos Poulantzas, “The Problem of the Capitalist State,” in The Poulantzas Reader (Verso, 2008), 172.
  19. Poulantzas, “The Problem of the Capitalist State.” 180.
  20. Ibid 178-179.
  21. Ibid 179. Emphasis added.
  22. Capturing the entirety of how Poulantzas’s thought evolved between these two texts is beyond the scope of this essay, however, the key changes he made in it regarding his theory of the capitalist state are incorporated into the exposition of his key ideas.
  23. Nicos Poulantzas, Political Power and Social Classes (Verso, 1978), 37-48.
  24. Poulantzas, State, Power, Socialism, 56.
  25. Poulantzas, Political Power and Social Classes, (190).
  26. Ibid, 191.
  27. Ibid, 173.
  28. Ibid, 172.
  29. Poulantzas, Political Power and Social Classes, 256.
  30. For example, Vladimir Putin’s expropriation of oligarchs and the “nationalization” of petrol helped stabilize the capitalist system in the name of the “national interest” but did not change its class nature.
  31. Poulantzas, Political Power and Social Classes, 44.
  32. Poulantzas, State, Power, Socialism, 123.
  33. Ibid, 56.
  34. Poulantzas, State, Power, Socialism, 143.
  35. Poulantzas, State, Power, Socialism, 189.
  36. Nicos Poulantzas, “On Social Classes,” in The Poulantzas Reader (Verso Books, 2008), 186.
  37. Ibid, 187.
  38. Poulantzas, Political Power and Social Classes, 57-59.
  39. Nicos Poulantzas, “On Social Classes,” in The Poulantzas Reader (Verso, 2008), 186.
  40. For further reference regarding these comexeties of defining class, see Poulantzas’s essay “On social classes” and his book“Classes in Contemporary Capitalism.” However, there is still quite a lot of debate on this subject. There are as many marxist theories of class as there are Marxists.
  41. Poulantzas, “On Social Classes,” in The Poulantzas Reader), 206.
  42. Cahal Milmo, “Aristocrats Double Their Wealth in a Decade as Titles Average £16m,” October 8, 2020, https://inews.co.uk/news/long-reads/aristocrat-uk-britain-families-double-wealth-empire-exclusive-study-316017.
  43. Poulantzas, “On Social Classes”, 206.
  44. Poulantzas, Political Power and Social Classes, 104
  45. Nicos Poulantzas, State, Power, Socialism, 127.
  46. Poulantzas, Political Power and Social Classes, 137.
  47. Poulantzas, Political Power and Social Classes, 192.
  48. Poulantzas, “On Social Classes”, 208.
  49. Poulantzas, Political Power and Social Classes, 250.
  50. Ibid, 249.
  51. Ibid, 247-248.
  52. Poulantzas, Political Power and Social Classes, 246-249.
  53. Ibid, 331-332.
  54. Russia and the Philipines are very obvious examples.
  55. See Jane Mayer’s Dark Money: The Hidden History of the Billionaires Behind the Rise of the Radical Right.
  56. Poulantzas, “On Social Classes,” in The Poulantzas Reader), 208.
  57. Finance Capital has appeared to play a heavy hand in the US government with Democrats and Republicans.
  58. Poulantzas, “On Social Classes” 207.
  59. Poulantzas, Political Power and Social Classes, 332-333.
  60. For further reference to Marxist debates surrounding classes, see Eric Olin Wright’s book Classes (1985).
  61. Poulantzas, Political Power and Social Classes, 329.
  62. Ibid 330, 104.
  63. Poulantzas, State, Power, Socialism, 147.
  64. Poulantzas, Political Power and Social Classes, 106-107.
  65. One need to look no further than the countless examples of populist social democratic governments lacking the power to realize the objective interests of the dominated classes that brought them to power and acquiescing to the power of big capital class. Syriza’s capitulation to the EU is an especially pertinent example.
  66. Poulantzas, Political Power and Social Classes, 333-335.
  67. Ibid, 334.
  68. Ibid, 335.
  69. Ibid, 248-249.
  70. Ibid, 250.
  71. Ibid 251.
  72. By “petty bougoisie”, Poulantzas is not referring to small business owners in this case. In his essay “On Social Classes” he differentiates between” two kinds of petty bourgoisie: small shop owners and non-productive wage owners such as workers who aren’t “exploited” but don’t own property (such as bureaucrats). See pg 198 of the Poulantzas Reader.
  73. Poulantzas, Political Power and Social Classes 250-251.
  74. Poulantzas, “On Social Classes.” 209.
  75. Ibid, 210.
  76. Poulantzas, “On Social Classes,” 210.
  77. G William Domhoff, Who Rules America?: The Corporate Rich, White Nationalist Republicans, and Inclusionary Democrats in the 2020s (Routledge, 2021).
  78. Poulantzas, State, Power, Socialism, 12. Emphasis Added.
  79. Poulantzas, Political Power and Social Classes, 115.
  80. Poulantzas, State, Power, Socialism, 14.
  81. Poulantzas clarifies that “this should not at all be conceived as an empirical or natural split between those who work with their hands and those who work with their head: instead, it directly refers to the political ideological relations prevailing within particular relations of production.” Poulantzas, State, Power, Socialism, 55.
  82. Poulantzas, State, Power, Socialism, 56-60.
  83. Throughout SPS, Poulantzas borrows Foucault’s vocabulary, particularly theories of “power/knowledge,” “discourses,”and the nature of power. Poulantzas incorporates elements of these ideas into his own theory while rejecting other aspects. His flirtation with Foucauldian ideas is difficult to parcel, beyond the scope of this essay.
  84. Poulantzas, State, Power, Socialism, 89-90.
  85. Poulantzas, Political Power and Social Classes, 53.
  86. Pistor, The Code of Capital: How the Law Creates Wealth and Inequality (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2020), 205-225.
  87. Poulantzas, “On Social Classes.”210.
  88. Poulantzas, State, Power, Socialism, 142.
  89. Ibid, 255.
  90. V.I Lenin, “Better Fewer, But Better,” Lenin’s Collected Works, (Moscow: Progress Publishers), 487–502.