Leviathan and Its Enemies: Mass Organization and Managerial Power in Twentieth-Century America

"Leviathan and Its Enemies: Mass Organization and Managerial Power in Twentieth-Century America" by Samuel T. Francis presents a revision and reformulation of James Burnham's 1941 theory of the managerial revolution. The central argument posits that a new "managerial" elite emerged in the United States during the first half of the 20th century, consolidating power in the economy, government, and culture through mass organizations and displacing the older "bourgeois" elite. This new elite fosters an ideology of "managerial humanism," embracing scientism, utopianism, hedonism, and cosmopolitanism to rationalize its dominance and undermine traditional values like the bourgeois work ethic and individualism. The text also discusses the emergence of a "post-bourgeois proletariat" and other anti-managerial forces, such as entrepreneurial and intellectual critiques, which represent potential challenges to the established soft managerial regime characterized by manipulative control rather than hard coercion.