One thing quickly learned when studying tyranny (and lesser , more gradual, failures of states and societies such as observed in the contemporary United States) is that the ideological leanings of tyrants are largely superficial. Those are stances taken to win popular support, not sincere moral positions. Beneath the veneer, tyrants are essentially the same, whether fascist, communist, religious, or centrist in nature. Supposedly “right-wing” fascists and Nazis would readily deploy “socialist” innovations such as large public works projects and social welfare programs if it kept society stable in a way they preferred, while the supposedly “communist” elites in the Soviet Union and China were self-protecting, deeply anti-populist, and brutal– not egalitarian or sincerely socialist in the least. The U.S. upper class is a different beast from these and, thus far, less malevolent than the communist or fascist elites (although if they are unchecked, this will change). It probably shares the most in common with the French aristocracy of the late 18th-century, being slightly right-of-center and half-hearted in its authoritarianism, but deeply negligent and self-indulgent. For a more recent comparison, I’m going to point out an obvious and increasing similarity between the “boardroom elite” (of individuals who receive high-positions in established corporations despite no evidence of high talent or hard work) and an unlikely companion: the elite of the Soviet Union.

Consider the Soviet Union. Did political and economic elites disappear when “business” was made illegal? No, not at all. Did the failings of large human organizations suddenly have less of a pernicious effect on human life? No; the opposite occurred. What was outlawed, effectively, was not the corporation (corporate power existed in the government) but small-scale entrepreneurship– a necessary social function. Certainly, elitism and favoritism didn’t go away. Instead, money (which was subject to tight controls) faded in importance in favor of blat, an intangible social commodity describing social connection as well as the peddling of influence and favors. With the money economy hamstrung by capitalism’s illegality, blat became a medium of exchange and a mechanism of bribery. People who were successful at accumulating and using social resources were called blatnoys. The blatnoy elite drove their society into corruption and, ultimately, failure. But… that’s irrelevant to American capitalism, right?

Well, no. Sadly, corporate capitalism is not run by “entrepreneurs” in any sense of the word. Being an entrepreneur is about putting capital at risk to achieve a profit. Someone who gets into an elite college because a Senator owes his parents a favor, spends four years in investment banking getting the best projects because of family contacts, gets into a top business school because his uncle knows disgusting secrets about the dean of admissions, and then is hired into a high position in a smooth-running corporation or private equity firm, is not an entrepreneur. Anything but. That’s a glorified private-sector bureaucrat at best and, at worst, a brazen, parasitic trader of illicit social resources.

There are almost no entrepreneurs in the American upper class. This claim may sound bizarre, but first we must define terms– namely, “upper class”. Rich people are not automatically upper class. Steve Jobs was a billionaire but never entered it; he remained middle-class (in social position, not wealth) his entire life. His children, if they want to enter its lower tier, have a shot. Bill Gates is lower-upper class at best, and has worked very hard to get there. Money alone won’t buy it, and entrepreneurship is (by the standards of the upper class) the least respectable way to acquire wealth. Upper class is about social connections, not wealth or income. It’s important to note that being in the upper class does not require a high income or net worth; it does, however, require the ability to secure a position of high income reliably, because the upper class lifestyle requires (at a minimum) $300,000 after tax, per person, per year.

The wealth of the upper class follows from social connection, and not the other way around. Americans frequently make the mistake of believing (especially when misled on issues related to taxation and social justice) that members of the upper class who earn seven- and eight-digit salaries are scaled-up versions of the $400,000-per-year, upper-middle-class neurosurgeon who has been working intensely since age 4. That’s not the case. The hard-working neurosurgeon and the well-connected parasite are diametric opposites, in fact. They have nothing in common and could not stand to be in the same room together. their values are at odds. The upper class views hard work as risky and therefore a bit undignified. It perpetuates itself because there is a huge amount of excess wealth that has congealed at the apex of society, and it’s relatively easy to exchange money and blat on an informal but immensely pernicious market.

Consider the fine art of politician bribery. The cash-for-votes scenario, as depicted in the movies, is actually very rare. The Bush family did have their their “100k club” when campaign contributions were limited to $1000-per-person, but entering that set required arranging for 100 people to donate the maximum amount. Social effort was required to curry favor, not merely a suitcase full of cash. Moreover, to walk into even the most corrupt politician’s office today offering to exchange $100,000 in cash for voting a certain way would be met with a nasty reception. Most scumbags don’t realize that they’re scumbags, and to make a bribe as overt as that is to call a politician a scumbag. Instead, politicians must be bribed in more subtle manners. Want to own a politician? Throw a party every year in Aspen. Invite up-and-coming journalists just dying to get “sources”. Then invite a few private-equity partners so the politician has a million-dollar “consulting” sinecure waiting if the voters wise up and fire his pasty ass. Invite deans of admissions from elite colleges if he has school-age children. This is an effective strategy for owning (eventually) nearly all of America’s decision makers; but it’s hard to pull off if you don’t own any of them. What I’ve described is the process of earning interest on blat and, if it’s done correctly and without scruples, the accrual can occur rapidly– for people with enough blat to play.

Why is such “blat bribery” so common? It makes sense in the context of the mediocrity of American society. Despite the image of upper management in large corporations as “entrepreneurial”, they’re actually not entrepreneurs at all. They’re not the excellent, the daring, the smartest, or the driven. They’re successful social climbers; that’s all. The dismal and probably terminal mediocrity of American society is a direct result of the fact that (outside of some technological sectors) it is incapable of choosing leaders, so decisions of leadership often come down to who holds the most blat. Those who thrive in corporate so-called capitalism are not entrepreneurs but the “beetle-like” men who thrived in the dystopia described in George Orwell’s 1984.

Speaking of this, what is corporate “capitalism”? It’s neither capitalism nor socialism, but a clever mechanism employed by a parasitic, socially-closed but internally-connected elite to provide the worst of both systems (the fall-flat risk and pain of capitalism, the mediocrity and procedural retardation of socialism) while providing the best (the enormous rewards of capitalism, the cushy safety of socialism) of both for themselves.

These well-fed, lily-livered, intellectually mediocre blatnoys aren’t capitalists or socialists. They’re certainly not entrepreneurs. Why, then, do they adopt the language and image of alpha-male capitalist caricatures more brazen than even Ayn Rand would write? It’s because entrepreneurship is a middle-class virtue. The middle class of the United States (for not bad reasons) still has a lot of faith in capitalism. Upper classes know that they have to seem deserving of their parasitic hyperconsumption, and to present the image of success as perceived by the populace at large. Corporate boardrooms provide the trappings they require for this. If the middle class were to suddenly swing toward communism, these boardroom blatnoys would be wearing red almost immediately.

Sadly, when one views the social and economic elite of the United States, one sees blatnoys quite clearly if one knows where to look for them. Fascists, communists, and the elites of corporate capitalism may have different stated ideologies, but (just as Stephen King expressed that The Stand‘s villain, Randall Flagg, can represent accurately any tyrant) they’re all basically the same guy.