Oligarchy and leader are twin brothers

Abstract

The article is a review of the famous book by Robert Michels (1876-1936) published in 1911 but only recently translated into Russian, Political Parties. A Sociological Study of the Oligarchical Tendencies of Modern Democracy (Moscow: Publishing House “Delo”, 2022. 448 p.). This is its first translation from German into Russian by I. Ivakina under the scientific editorship of D. Karasev. Based on the analysis of the main ideas of the book related to the concepts of ‘leader’, ‘party’, ‘democracy’ and ‘masses’, the author considers the phenomenon of the power of oligarchy not only in traditional and conservative systems but also in the modern radical, democratic and socialist ones. Thus, the so-called “iron law of oligarchy” formulated by R. Michels remains topical.

Keywords

• leader
• oligarchy
• iron law of the oligarchy
• organization
• democracy
• bureaucracy
• socialist party
• michels