John Adams and the Concern of American Oligarchy

Why American founding father John Adams feared the political energy of the wealthy―and the way his concepts illuminate as we speak’s debates about inequality and its penalties

Lengthy earlier than “the one p.c” turned a protest slogan, American founding father John Adams feared the ability of a category he known as merely “the few”―the wellborn, the gorgeous, and particularly the wealthy. In John Adams and the Concern of American Oligarchy, Luke Mayville presents the primary prolonged exploration of Adams’s preoccupation with an issue that has a renewed urgency as we speak: the best way through which inequality threatens to corrode democracy and empower a small elite. By revisiting Adams’s political writings, Mayville attracts out the statesman’s fears in regards to the hazard of oligarchy in America and his distinctive understanding of the political energy of wealth―a stunning and largely forgotten concept that guarantees to light up as we speak’s debates about inequality and its political penalties.

Adams believed that wealth is politically highly effective in trendy societies not merely as a result of cash buys affect, but in addition as a result of residents admire and even sympathize with the wealthy. He thought wealth is highly effective in the identical approach that magnificence is highly effective―it distinguishes its possessor and prompts reactions of approval and veneration. Residents vote for―and with―the wealthy not as a result of, as is commonly stated, they hope to be wealthy in the future, however as a result of they esteem the wealthy and undergo their needs. Mayville explores Adams’s concept of wealth and energy within the context of his broader concern about social and financial inequality, and in addition examines his concepts about how oligarchy is perhaps countered.

A compelling work of mental historical past, John Adams and the Concern of American Oligarchy additionally has essential classes for as we speak’s world of accelerating inequality.