What are the best ML arguments against “great men” or a tightly organized elite being the drivers of history, who allegedly drive “the masses”? I am struggling to see how so many revolutions would have succeeded merely by waiting for the masses to rise up by themselves? I am still trying to learn and can’t understand why ML condemns elite theory, or am I not getting something? Sorry still a bit new and trying to learn, thank you in advance!
To put it simply, Marxists use a materialist framework to analyze history. “Historical materialism” was developed by Marx and Engles who analyzed the material conditions of people, groups, institutions, etc. and how those conditions gave rise to historical events. Elite Theory posits that individuals, often rulers or small groups of powerful people, shape history by enacting their will. This analysis is often linear, with delineated actions of elites and responses by other elites. It rarely accounts for the other factors that do not pertain directly to the elites.
An Elite Theory analysis of Osama Bin Laden would likely land on simple terms (jihadist, terrorist) and motivations that are divorced from his own personal history or the material conditions of his life (he hates America for its freedom because he is a Islamic fundamentalist). A Historical Materialist analysis would investigate the economic and societal structures that informed Osama bin Laden’s (ie, his material conditions). What you find with historical materialism is that even elites arise from the interaction between economic and societal forces, and that really anyone with their same material conditions could affect history, albeit with their own motivations and outcomes that nonetheless can be analyzed through a materialist framework.
Elite Theory is simple history, often prescribing powerful men’s actions as the only force behind history. It’s an old, ahistoric theory that doesn’t hold up to scrutiny, even if you don’t use historical materialism.
Interesting example, thank you!