Summary of Christopher Lasch's The Revolt of the Elites and the Betrayal of Democracy

Please note: This is a companion version & not the original book.

Sample Book Insights:

#1 The threat to social order today comes from those at the top of the social hierarchy, not the masses. The elites who control the international flow of money and information, and who manage the instruments of cultural production, have lost faith in the values of the West.

#2 Upper-class liberals have a difficult time understanding why their hygiene-obsessed lifestyle doesn’t appeal to everyone. They have tried to sanitize American society, but they fail to understand why people don’t want to be sanitized.

#3 The new elites, the professional classes, view the masses with both contempt and apprehension. They are both arrogant and insecure, and they regard the masses with mingled scorn and apprehension.

#4 The global disparity between wealth and poverty is clear evidence of the historic reversal. The crisis of the middle class, and not simply the growing chasm between wealth and poverty, needs to be emphasized in a sober analysis of our prospects.