[terminological nitpick]
His father was a minister. The Church of Scotland has never been keen on priests.
[/terminological nitpick]
In some fields certainly, but in science, education, public administration, the military etc. you can excel without becoming rich.
This is incorrect on several levels. First off, the ‘last’ ‘poor’ candidate was probably Nixon…who came from pretty humble roots and was by no means ‘rich’ when he became president (or when he ran and lost the first time). Before him (and LONG after Andrew Johnson) there was Truman…also by no means ‘rich’, though well off.
Neither of these two were ‘millionare’(s)…farmer or otherwise…when they became president. True, they weren’t exactly destitute, hat in hand and begging on a street corner for their next meal…but they were far from rich.
By the standards of the truely wealthy in this country neither Clinton or Reagan were ‘rich’ either…though both were more wealthy than either Nixon or Truman. Neither was anywhere in the same universe as, say, the Bush’s or the Kennedy’s.
-XT
Ah, fair play.
I’ve never been sure what the difference is between “Son of the Manse” and “Child of the Vicarage”!
It’s not my experience that it’s common for an uncle to subsidize your family. I mean, a wealthy uncle might if they’re generous pay for someone’s college tuition, but the idea of someone’s wealthy uncle deciding to give them enough hand outs to take them from “dirt poor” to “middle class” is a bit strange, at least in my personal experience. It’s my understanding that the uncle that owned the car dealership was actually his stepfather’s brother, and the stepfather owned an interest in the dealership as well. Yet despite his own stepfather being a partner in the dealership, Clinton went to Georgetown on scholarships and financial aid, so that doesn’t leave a strong impression that Clinton got any of that money for himself.
Interestingly a lot of our earliest Presidents lived very lavish lifestyles but were in pretty bad financial shape on paper. A lot of the Southern, plantation owning Presidents had huge amounts of debt, such that their net worth would be quite low or even negative.
A big exception, I believe, was George Washington. If you adjust the numbers to modern terms Washington was most probably our wealthiest President, some historians have put his net worth in current dollars at over half a billion dollars; he had significant business interests in all kinds of areas, not just farming (he owned a distillery at one point, for example.)
The Harriman Group was giving money to both the Bolsheviks and National Socialists, including funding the building of oil refineries in Siberia in the 20s even though it was illegal under US law. Hitler’s power base was the industrialists who ran the factories of his war machine. As for Mexico just recently I don’t know what you are referring to really, but regardless of party Mexico is pretty much owned by the Drug Traffickers.
Hitler’s power base was not industrialists. The Nazi Party was a party of street thugs, losers, unemployables, nihilists, and burned-out veterans.
Yeah, all those panzers and messerschmidts were merely stocking stuffers from the genocide fairy.
:rolleyes: This brings to mind a quote I recall from the new testament: (to paraphrase) ‘Forgive him…he knows not of what he speaks’.
-XT
Krupp, Hoechst, Bayer, Thyssen and Farben all seemed to get on board quick-sharp. Let’s not mention the German holdings of US and UK based companies that made money out of the Nazi war effort (of course, no money was made after any declaration of actual War), and God forbid there be any families who came to prominence as a result! That would be madness.
However, the answer to your refutation of what Lemur866 was saying is right there in the first line. “Krupp, Hoechst, Bayer, Thyssen and Farben all seemed to get on board quick-sharp.” They CAME ON BOARD…they weren’t part of the original Nazi base. They ONLY came on board, as you put it, once the Nazi pretty much had siezed power. The military did the same thing. However, neither group composed the original Nazi base…which Lemur866 (reasonably accurately) depicts as " party of street thugs, losers, unemployables, nihilists, and burned-out veterans." Oh, there WERE a few industrialist types in the mix…and some from the regular military and government as well. But overall they represented a VERY small fraction of the original Nazi movement.
-XT
Clinton’s family was not “white trash.” Clinton grew up in almost comfortable middle-class circumstances. His stepfather (the only father he knew) ran the parts department in his brother’s car dealership. His mother was a nurse with a master’s degree. There were only two kids in the family. If his stepfather hadn’t been an alcoholic, they would have been a fairly normal middle-class family. As it was, they were hanging on the borders of middle-class life.
Incidentally, there’s no way that an Arkansas car dealer could have any influence on Georgetown or Yale Law accepting his nephew, and there’s no way that an Arkansas car dealer could afford to pay for all the tuition at either one.
xtisme That’s sort of ridiculous though. Everyone always paints a revolutionary force in an unfavorable light. It’s kind of pat to use diminutives of that nature on the Nazis who were able to take power in one of the West’s traditional powers. They are only being painted this way because they are the ‘villains’ of the story. The fact of the matter is that Hitler was only able to accomplish what he accomplished because of his relationship with the industrialists, regardless of who his base of power was BEFORE the Nazis came to power. Revolutionary starts as rabble rouser, news at 11. The question isn’t how he came to power, he came to power in much the same way revolutionaries in Europe always have come to power. The question is how he stayed in power and maintained power, and how he used that power to conquer almost all of mainland Western Europe. If his reach had not exceeded his grasp there might be a mainland German power with hegemonic rule over mainland Europe today, all due to the ability to build tanks and warplanes.
It always makes me giggle when people on message boards try to make a statement that is basic and accepted by historians sound like it’s out of left field.
You guys are illustrating my point. You focus entirely too much on who the leader is. In the case of the United States, the wealth of the president before becoming president is barely relevant as to whether or not the US is a Chrysocracy, though the bulk of this thread is devoted to that triviality. What needs to be examined, is who has power regardless of elections and what level of influence those people can exert over the regulatory bodies of unelected officials that do most of the governance of the nation on a regular basis. How much power does Monsanto have over the FDA? How much power do ABC, NBC, CBS and Clear Channel have over the FCC? How much power do banks have over the Federal Reserve. We have a system where lobbyists from the industries being regulated have a lot of say in the regulations of the regulatory body of their industry. That’s where the chrysocracy can be found. Looking at a handful of celebrity politicians tells us practically nothing about the topic.
Without those industrialists the Nazis would have stayed street thugs and unemployables driving the country into the ground, rather than a group who ran one of the most successful and well-organized imperial governments in history. That is the difference between what made Hitler successful, rather than simply a tinpot dictator.
Before invoking the authoritative halo of historians, you ought to actually go and ask them.
Hitler’s power base did come, as has been so elequently put, “street thugs, losers, unemployables, nihilists, and burned-out veterans.” They formed a radical nationalist core around which everything else conglomerated. Nor were they unintelligent; just seriously disaffected.
It is true that a number of wealthy industrialists came to support Hitler. However, they did not join up until relatively shortly before he came to power, and their influence was minimal in the long run; the Nazi’s self-financed from donations and AFAIK, the indisutrialists had little if any political power. Their primary grant was to remove their support from the old-line conservatives. The big H really only got a hint of legitimacy from their support.
Hitler convinced them, along with the German public, that the old guard could not protect them from chaos (which he himself encouraged) or the Communists. It was an important victory for Hitler at the time, but a pretty small achievement in the grand scheme of things and certainly not nearly the most critical factor. They turned to Hitler only because he seemed the least-bad alternative, and Hitler took power through public demonstrations and back-room political deals.
But your argument that somehow the industrialists “made Hitler” is farcical. Hitler convinced millions of people he was the best (or at least least-bad) option, and these included not just a handful of industrialists but bureaucrats, factory workers, soldiers, and politicians. You could use your own argument to try and claim that Hitler came to power as a Demagogue, a Military Junta, a Mass Labor Leader, or a Political Conspirer. And none of these would be entirely incorrect. But like your power, mswas, they leave out too much by focusing on only one aspect.
And honestly, after he took poer, it’s the same story. If anything, big business and industry became subordinated to the state.
Pardon my ignorance, but what’s a chrysocracy? I tried www.dictionary.com www.m-w.com and a political glossary and I couldn’t find a definition. Cheers.
As BrainGlutton said it’s kind of a meaninglessly superfluous term. Plutocracy is a better one and has much wider recognition. It simply means “rule by the wealthy” or literally, “rule by gold.”
It is not true that only wealthy individuals can attain political office in Western democracies. It is true that the wealthy as a group wield political power, vastly disproportionate to their numbers, in Western democracies, which are indeed chrysocracies/plutocracies in the latter sense; and especially the U.S.
mswas writes:
> In the case of the United States, the wealth of the president before becoming
> president is barely relevant as to whether or not the US is a Chrysocracy,
> though the bulk of this thread is devoted to that triviality.
If this is so, it’s not the fault of most of the posters in this thread. The OP asked, “To what extent is wealth a prerequisite for success (i.e. becoming Prime Minister, President or Chancellor) in each of these models and why?” Most of the posters in this thread are answering that question. It’s hardly their fault that the question asked in the OP is different from the question in the thread title.
I don’t want to hijack things too far here…just going to respond to this and then let it go. If you want to discuss it further (after providing a few cites I request) then we can start another thread on it mswas.
Tell you what…why don’t you give me a cite for how large this relationship was between Hitler and the industrialists BEFORE the Nazi’s came to power? It will be a good learning experience for you as its obviously that you don’t know. Just to give you a hint, this would be the time period between the 1920’s and, say, 1933. Lets see how many industrialists supported the Nazi movement and Hitler during this period, ehe?
Then you are changing the goal posts basically (and then calling it ridiculous when you are called on it). Here is what you were originally disputing: “Hitler’s power base was not industrialists. The Nazi Party was a party of street thugs, losers, unemployables, nihilists, and burned-out veterans.” His ORIGINALY power base in fact did NOT include industrialists. Unless you want to show us that this statement is false…with like a cite or something.
It always makes me roll my eyes when someone on a message board makes a statement that his/her views are supported by experts (in this case historians) while not providing any support that this is correct. So…what historians support your theory that Hitlers and the Nazi’s BASE came support came from industrialists before they were in power? I would love to see a cite by a noted historian claiming this.
Simply put you are wrong. The Nazi’s were already a major power without the industrialists when Hitler was requested to become chancellor.
-XT
True – that should have been clarified earlier on. The combined Title/OP question would then be answered in two parts: No, you do not need to have come from within the moneyed class to achieve a position of power in the major Western Democracies, nor to be very personally wealthy to be competitive; but yes, to get to the point of being competitive you pretty neeed to have courted at least some segment of the social and economic establishment, if not for support at least to appease their fears, and yes, money exerts influence.
But that people and institutions with considerable social and financial capital can exert great influence, is not news to anyone.
Does that MAKE every representantive government a “plutocracy in disguise”? Or does it make it, well, *representative * of *how society is * (as opposed to of how we may widh it were)?