{"id":97263,"date":"2023-03-21T14:27:00","date_gmt":"2023-03-21T18:27:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/?p=97263"},"modified":"2023-03-31T09:32:27","modified_gmt":"2023-03-31T13:32:27","slug":"centralization-of-power","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.shortform.com\/blog\/centralization-of-power\/","title":{"rendered":"The Centralization of Power: How the People Lost Control"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Do you feel powerless to impact politics? Does it seem like the major decisions are made by powerful people far away?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

You\u2019re not alone\u2014and things haven\u2019t always been this way. In The Power Elite<\/em>, American sociologist C. Wright Mills discusses how a small group of corporate, military, and political leaders has taken over a vast majority of American political and economic decision-making<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Continue reading for Mills’s exploration of how the centralization of power progressed in America at the expense of the people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n

The American People and Power<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

Mills argues that, due to changes in media and political organization, many Americans feel powerless to influence their political circumstances\u2014a situation that has contributed to a broad national sense of unease and loss of control. Mills suggests that this sense of unease can eventually lead to large-scale political violence.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

We\u2019ll explore how the American people have traditionally exercised political power and how they\u2019ve lost this influence over time as the centralization of power progressed. In particular, we\u2019ll look at the three main institutions that define the relationship between the American people and their political circumstances: <\/p>\n\n\n\n