From Revolting Masses to Revolting Elites

“Although reaching immense influence in the 20th century, the mass man is the ‘spoiled child of history,’ and when he goes in search of bread, says Ortega, he always does one thing, ‘He wrecks the bakery.'”

“If you want to lead the people, you must learn how to follow them.”

– The Tao te Ching

Spiritual Power

“Either I rule or I obey.” This is Spanish philosopher José Ortega y Gasset’s stark formulation for the elemental nature of human societies. But he immediately follows with, “By obedience I do not mean mere submission—that would be degradation—but on the contrary, respect for the ruler and acceptance of his leadership, solidarity with him, enthusiastic enrollment under his banner.” Beyond a certain size, societies tend to generate certain kinds of divisions of labor and, generally speaking, the larger the society, the more hierarchical it is. In a healthy society, all members more or less accept the reality and necessity of hierarchy; they accept that some will have more authority than others. The majority accepts the rule of what Ortega calls the “select minorities.”

The penultimate chapter of Ortega y Gasset’s 1930 classic Revolt of the Masses is entitled “Who Rules in the World.” Most of the book concerns the emergence of a way of thinking after World War I and its ascendance to power in Europe and Russia. Ortega dissects the nature and inadequacies of the “mass man,” whose ways of thinking and ideas of rule are fundamentally flawed and doomed to collapse. As Ortega speculates on the future rule of Europe and the world, he makes a number of observations about the nature of human societies and the nature of rule.