Vilfredo Pareto's Sociology

A Framework for Political Psychology

Alasdair J. Marshall

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2016
• eBook ISBN: 9781317001836
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Sciences sociales
• Subtopic: Sociologie

Vilfredo Pareto is a key figure in the history of economics and sociology. His sociological works attempted to merge these two disciplines through a psychologistic analysis of society, economy and politics. This is the first book to rethink Pareto's contribution to classical sociology by focusing upon its psychological underpinning. The author locates the origins of Pareto's psychologistic approach both within the history of Italian thought and within Pareto's own experiences of business and politics. He evaluates Pareto's sociology through the lens of contemporary social science, examining whether its explanatory power is growing rather than diminishing as levels of social and epistemological complexity rise. The volume also explores Pareto's assumptions about personality through the lens of contemporary psychology. It concludes with a psychometric study of Westminster MPs which clarifies and attests to Pareto's contemporary relevance, and indicates that even practitioners of politics may gain much from reading Pareto.

Chapter 1

Introduction

The sociological thought of Vilfredo Federico Damaso Pareto has suffered neglect in recent years. Yet Pareto should rank beside Max Weber, Karl Marx and Emile Durkheim as one of the principal classical founders of the discipline of sociology. In order to understand this neglect, we should consider that Pareto’s writings, which spanned the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, are especially indebted to Niccolò Machiavelli, who had been the principal guiding spirit for Italian social theory since the sixteenth century. Machiavelli’s concern, famously articulated in his ‘The Prince’, had been to show how leaders may succeed in statecraft, by employing certain skills and facets of character which conventional ethical opinion would deem inappropriate. This seemingly amoral standpoint earned Machiavelli a reputation as an advocate of political cruelty and deception. It was to be no different with Pareto, whose similarly concerned writings not only fell under Machiavelli’s shadow, but provided intellectual ammunition for the darker political forces which threatened Europe during the early decades of the twentieth century.

This book focuses upon the core feature of Pareto’s sociology which distinguishes it and contributes most of its value: its assertion that certain psychological factors recurrently play a pivotal role within social, political and economic life. We will see that Pareto’s intuitions concerning the psychological aspects of politics, in particular, contain profound insights which still seem fresh. Diverse psychological theories and research studies, many of them produced within the discipline of political psychology, will be pulled together to assess his claims. This exercise will lay bare important nuggets of truth within Pareto’s sociology, and it will point towards others yet to be found.

By explaining what it means to take a Paretian approach to political analysis, this book seeks to raise Pareto’s status within the canon of classical sociology. In particular, it is hoped that his reinstatement will inspire the sociological imagination towards a greater engagement with political psychology, a discipline which now resides less on individual psychological levels and more upon sociological ground where it can root itself back into the classical sociological tradition.

This book will also draw the reader’s attention to many psychological theories and research studies which are fascinating in their own right. Key issues in political psychology will be elucidated so that almost any ‘political’ matter can be analysed on psychological levels typically missed or underappreciated by political commentators. A substantial part of the case for Pareto’s rehabilitation will rest upon the way in which his theoretical framework can help us access and organise this stock of knowledge. We will also see that Pareto leads us to think about why political psychology is important. It is hoped this in itself might energise efforts to apply Pareto today, and to look to classical sociology more generally as a source of inspiration for political psychology.

As we explore the theoretical framework set down by Pareto, we will discover that at its core rests a theory of personality which can be a little too convincing. We all rely upon what psychologists call ‘implicit personality theories’ to make unconscious judgements about how personality traits are bundled together in other people. These mental templates always remain vulnerable to change as we encounter new circumstances. Pareto’s ‘implicit personality theory’ is an ever-present feature of his sociology. As it appears again and again in subtly different guises, it can easily work subliminally upon us to transform our own assumptions about personality. The danger grows when we find ourselves productively applying Pareto’s theory to analyse all sorts of complex situations, becoming more impressed by its explanatory power on each occasion.

It is therefore worth stressing at the outset that Pareto’s sociology becomes dangerous where it succeeds most effectively. On the one hand, it gives us a very distinctive and elegant theory which we can operationalise in many ways; on the other hand, it provides exactly the kind of simplifying ideological system which is yearned for by those who would rather let their minds run in grooves, than tolerate the immense and growing complexity of the social phenomena which they would try to understand. Pareto was himself an aggressive critic of all ‘isms’, and it seems likely that he would have been the first to advocate that we regard his theoretical system as a valuable tool, which we may wish to put down once we are done with it.

Pareto remains well-known for his economic writings. Following his pioneering work in mathematical economics, we still hear of ‘Pareto curves’ and ‘Pareto optimality’. Pareto’s name has also travelled far beyond the boundaries of his own thought, thanks to his famous ‘80–20 rule’, which has been rearticulated within various professions towards very practical ends.1 Pareto’s own application of this rule is easily the most fascinating. His ‘law of income distribution’ claimed that in every society 20% of the population are likely to own 80% of the wealth. Pareto thus seemed to be providing empirical evidence for a natural distribution of talents. This invited the condemnation that his real agenda had been to contribute to the armoury of ideas used by the conservative right to assert its belief in natural inequality.

Although Pareto’s reputation as an economist endures, it is less widely known that later in life, he broadened his intellectual focus to become concerned less with economics and more with a grandiose sociological project which undertook to explain how economic processes knit together with social and political processes. Nobody could have undertaken such a mammoth task without becoming vulnerable to criticism from many angles. Each of the academic disciplines which Pareto straddled would later develop towards far higher levels of complexity than he could possibly have foreseen. When judged by the standards that would arise within these professionalised disciplines, Pareto could only appear as a dilettante. Psychologists have certainly tended to find Pareto’s sociological theory wanting. William McDougall claimed as a professional psychologist to feel ‘offended’ by Pareto’s decision to neglect the psychological literature almost entirely, and content himself with terms which conveyed only highly generalised and often vague psychological references throughout his sociological writings.2 This may seem a damning indictment indeed, particularly given Berger and Luckman’s (1971, 220) controversial estimation that Pareto stands out amongst early sociologists as having begun to develop ‘the most elaborate approach to the psychological pole within sociology’.

Berger and Luckman’s view is contestable with reference to various classical sociological texts. For example, we might consider Robert Michels’ sharper focus upon the psychology of leader-follower interaction within his (1915) ‘Political Parties’, a text which continues to inform analyses of political bureaucracy. We might also note that Pareto’s writings on psychology display much less academic knowledge of the (then new) discipline of psychology than is found within the psychologically-educated Georg Simmel’s even earlier work on psychological aspects of urban living and the money economy. Simmel’s greater usage of psychological literature is evident for example within his (1903) ‘The Metropolis and Mental Life’, a work which still remains a key sociological text on city life. Then there is Durkheim’s stronger focus upon the implications for social order of the cultural agon bound by a ‘conscience collective’ and threatened by feelings of anomie. This theory is associated primarily with Durkheim’s (1893) ‘The Division of Labour in Society’. Through Talcott Parsons it went on to exert a major influence upon the structural-functionalist paradigm within US sociology. On top of that, it might well be argued that Pareto’s orientation towards psychology lacked the very personal, curative significance which it held for Max Weber, whose convalescences from depressive illness in Italy at the close of the nineteenth century inspired him to think deeply about how subjectively-held, cultural meanings motivate individuals. This thinking is set out primarily within Weber’s ‘Objectivity’ essay. It is also famously applied within his classic work on the religious origins of work ethic, ‘The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism’, which was written alongside the ‘Objectivity’ essay in 1904–1905 (Whimster 2004, 7). Weber’s work on the protestant ethic still provokes debate concerning the extent to which capitalism has a psychological or religious dynamic.

We will see within this book that our concern to appreciate Pareto will lead us to consider all of these issues, to varying extents; yet they all relate back to the sociological classics in their own unique ways, and on each occasion to a thinker with more to say than Pareto. We will have cause to consider each of these issues because the scope for Pareto’s conception of social system was so wide as to allow him to either attend to them directly, or make relevant observations, at least to the extent that we can usefully measure Pareto’s contributions against other classical sources.

With this thought, Berger and Luckman’s estimation of Pareto as having taken a more elaborate approach to the psychological pole within sociology begins to make more sense. We can identify Pareto’s level of reliance upon psychological variables for the purpose of sociological explanation, right across the domains of political, economic and social life which together comprise his social system, as the chief distinguishing characteristic which sets him apart from other classical theorists. This heavy reliance means, of course, that Pareto’s theory stands or falls on the strength of its assumptions and claims about human psychology and its sociological role.

This book aims to convince the reader that Pareto’s theoretical template retains value and can still help us analyse many issues which are ‘political’ in the broadest sense. It will even be contended that this template is more readily applicable across industrialised societies now than it was in Pareto’s day. A key consideration here is that the current political climate is characterised by sophisticated and well-informed populations who have grown distrustful of politicians and political parties. That makes it an era to which Pareto’s sociology is pre-eminently well suited. Raymond Aron once commented that at the ‘living heart’ of Paretian thought we find the idea that ‘every political man is either selfish or naive’. He was echoing Pareto’s belief that the higher echelons of political elites are usually dominated by unscrupulous and devious types who are driven by the desire for wealth, whereas the lower echelons of political elites are generally filled with opinionated zealots who are easily animated by propaganda. Such aspersions are commonplace today as levels of trust in politicians plummet and election turnouts dwindle. To this modest extent, we can say that Paretian analysis is already a part of our political zeitgeist.

As our critical orientation towards politicians has deepened to become an inescapable feature of our political culture, it has impressed upon us a host of negative emotions and cognitions which may trigger whenever we contemplate the characters and motivations of politicians. Hence the argument arises that it must surely be in the interests of reason to use Pareto’s theory as a touchstone to help us discipline how we think about politicians. Pareto can help in two ways. Firstly, when we read him at his best, we can value his insight into the ways in which personality influences people to think and behave politically in certain ways. And secondly, when we read him at his worst, we can learn to be wary of some of his more malicious claims, particularly those involving character assassination, and avoid these ourselves.

Vilfredo Pareto’s magnum opus was his (1916) ‘Treatise on General Sociology’. This was written, for the most part, before the First World War, although it was not published in English until 1935, twelve years after his death. Writing in 1966, the political scientist Sammy Finer rated this as ‘the most pregnant work of political science in the last half century’, because be believed it provided a rich source of testable hypotheses for future researchers (Pareto 1966, 87). This was Pareto’s intention. He felt that it made good sense, for scientists and historians alike, to theorise with generalities before moving to specifics (Pareto 1935, §144, §540). Hence ‘general sociology’ had to precede the various ‘special sociologies’ such as political sociology. Pareto believed that once he had established a general framework theory for sociological investigation, social scientists following after him could begin to contribute detail to his theory at microsociological levels more amenable to empirical enquiry. He valued his own general theory with some humility, hoping others would rework its constituent parts to accomodate future research findings.

Charles Powers (1987) reaffirms Finer’s estimation that it is Pareto’s broad sociological framework theory which retains most value. He argues that this has a timeless relevance because it ‘provides lessons about the social structural dynamics which have operated throughout human history’ (Powers 1987, 11). As will shortly be explained, Powers tries to distil his theory and restate its key claims as a detailed set of empirical propositions. In doing this, he felt he was completing Pareto’s sociological project (Powers 1987, 12). Powers’ restatement of Pareto argues that ‘social sentiment’, ‘economic organization’ and ‘political organization’ are each characterised by cyclical change. His ‘elementary theory’ for each of these cyclical processes consists of a set of interlocking mechanisms. Each of these mechanisms has a similar structure, whereby it is claimed that one kind of change is likely to induce another kind of change (if ∆ A then ∆ B). Then Powers lists further mechanisms which explain how the endogenous dynamics of the social, political and economic cycles are likely to impact exogenously upon each other. In other words, we are given detailed explanations for how economic change is likely to influence the direction of social and political change, how social change is likely to influence the direction of political and economic change, and how political change is likely to influence the direction of social and economic change.

In accomplishing this, Powers lends some limited credibility to Pareto’s belief that the social, political and economic cycles tend to synchronise with one another to the extent that we can begin to think in terms of a grand ‘historical cycle’. One implication of Pareto’s cyclical approach to sociology is that it locates him within the long tradition of ‘historical pessimism’, which stands in sharp contrast to the eschatological visions of so many nineteenth century socialists and liberals and who had pinned great hopes upon ‘progress’, a word which Pareto frequently derided. What is more important for present purposes, however, is that Powers’ restatement of Pareto’s general sociology makes it immediately accessible. This, in turn, will make it much easier to understand both the decisive role for psychological factors which characterises Pareto’s general theory, and also the political sociology which Pareto nested within this broader framework.

At this point, the reader who is primarily interested in political psychology may well ask why effort should be dedicated to learning about Pareto’s general sociology. The answer is simple. The discipline of political psychology has increasingly recognised, over the last two decades or so, that it cannot hover at the level of individual psychology, and be concerned solely with attitudes, values, personality structures and the like; rather, it now emphasises the economic, political and social forces which influence, and are influenced by, the workings of the human mind. The English translation of Pareto’s treatise is entitled ‘The Mind and Society’ to reflect this same concern. We will see that what he wrote about this interaction is highly thought-provoking. It brings a degree of simplicity and elegance to a theoretical space which would otherwise be extremely difficult to fill.

The case for Pareto will unfold as follows. Chapter two will set the scene by explaining that Pareto’s sociological theory hinges upon general assumptions about two very different types of personality. It will show that these were influenced both by Pareto’s experiences of Italian political and economic life, and by that dual typology of ‘lions’ and ‘foxes’ which Niccolò Machiavelli had famously incorporated within his political writings. This chapter will also explore key concepts in Paretian sociology, as a prelude to closer consideration of his political-sociological thought, which deals chiefly with how these two personality types are distributed throughout political elites.

Chapter three will then look more closely at Pareto’s assumption that it is legitimate to describe political elites in terms of how his two political types are distributed throughout them. This idea will require considerable reworking before it can be taken seriously. It will be argued that Pareto was really concerned with describing political subcultures in psychological terms. In order to revive his theory, it will be argued that there are good grounds for supposing that members of political collectivities will often possess very similar personality traits which come together within dominative configurations to give each collectivity what might variously be termed its distinct ‘social personality’, its ‘ethos’ or ‘silent understandings’, or even, in some cases where the collectivity in question has a long history, its ‘central tradition’.

Some of these arguments will refer to socialisation factors which explain why individuals tend to accommodate themselves to collective personalities, thus ensuring these persist over time despite personnel circulation. It will also be argued, however, that collective personalities are likely to exist in order to fulfil a necessary function, which is to allow political collectivities to respond in relatively consistent and predictable ways – and hence with collective assent from their memberships – to decision-making problems characterised by cognitive indeterminacy. Cognitive indeterminacy, it will be argued, is not only endemic to political life but is also deepening and spreading throughout an increasing number of political issue areas as industrial societies grow more complex. This will give rise to the following suggestion: if cognitive indeterminacy increasingly characterises the problems faced by political decision-makers, then the personality traits which define political cultures and subcultures may exert increasingly decisive influences upon political elite behaviour. This thought will allow chapter three to run to the conclusion that the Paretian approach to sociology, which deals with how major personality traits are distributed throughout political elites, stands ready to become an increasingly useful tool for social scientists.

In chapter four, the focus will shift from sociology to political psychology. Pareto’s two very different kinds of personality pattern – which, to reiterate, follow Machiavelli’s ‘lion’ and ‘fox’ typology – will be explored more thoroughly. The various individual differences which distinguish these two psychological types will be laid together along a multi-trait person continuum and each will be analysed in turn. A large volume of psychological theory (much of it psychoanalytic) and correlational research evidence will be assembled for this purpose. It will become clear that, without exception, all of these individual differences correspond to widely researched psychological constructs. This theory and evidence will also help indicate whether these individual differences align along a multi-trait person continuum as Pareto envisioned. Here, Pareto’s insight as a lay psychologist will become even more apparent.

Finally, in chapter five, Pareto’s political sociology will be put to the test. This will involve looking to see whether personality traits are distributed within the Westminster Parliament as Pareto would have envisioned. We will see that psychometric techniques make it easy to measure differences at the level of social personality both within and between the Labour, Conservative and Liberal Democrat parliamentary parties. Here, we will see that Pareto’s psychological insight has real value by alerting us to axes of difference which exist therein at the level of social personality. Drawing once more upon chapter three’s argument that social personality might increasingly play an important ro...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Contents
• List of Tables
• Series Editor’s Preface
• Author’s Preface
• 1 Introduction
• 2 Pareto’s ‘Psychologistic’ Sociology
• 3 Social Personality
• 4 Pareto’s Psychology
• 5 Testing Pareto’s Theory
• Bibliography
• Index