Bobo blacksheep—have you any pull?

Tocqueville’s always celebrated, often quoted and rarely read tome is in many ways just as much about aristocracy in Europe as it is about democracy in America. Specifically, it concerns the fact that America lacks an Old World aristocracy, and thus offers observers on the Continent a unique futuristic glimpse at what one might expect, as democracy’s promise of “equality of conditions” spreads rapidly throughout Europe.

But the study of America’s lack of a traditional aristocracy, and the “providential” fact of its demise in Europe, would not be interesting or worthwhile if the aristocratic class did not itself serve some vital social purpose. In this respect, Tocqueville recognizes, without too much filiopietistic treacle, that the aristocratic class, among other things, served as a bulwark against monarchy, established codes of civility and functioned according to a shared understanding of obligation vis-à-vis the lower classes. Such benefits would not be possible were it not for the stability and confidence (“entitlement,” if you will) afforded by the fact that the old aristocracy was hereditary and “landed.”

The dominant class in America, says Tocqueville, was the middle-class, which is to say there was no dominant class at all. To be sure, there were rich people and poorer people, but the income gap between them was relatively small, and the cultural gap even smaller—most professed (if not lived according to) the ethos of equality. Most importantly, status/wealth gains were likely to be lost in a generation or two, swept up in the frenzy and phantasmagoria of hyper social mobility. “Shirt-sleeves to shirt-sleeves in three generations” is certainly no recipe for a stable aristocracy with its own distinct culture and obligations. Tocqueville identifies various intermediate institutions such as the church, guilds and community groups that filled the lacunae left by the missing aristocracy.

Charles Murray’s latest book, “Coming Apart,” is best understood in this Tocquevillian context. Although it is a complicated book, and I believe there are several faults, its main thesis is plausible and significant—for the first time, a hereditary aristocracy is quickly emerging in America. Murray is well aware of the Rockefellers, Kennedys and what used to be called the “Establishment.” The new aristocracy, which Murray calls the “cognitive elite,” is supposed to be much more systemic and of an altogether new sort.

Murray’s basic argument is simple. In the past 50 years, there has been a dramatic increase in the value of certain cognitive skills relative to, say, a strong back. Even more dramatically, there has been an increase in the efficiency with which institutions are able to identify and sort cognitive talent. Elite schools prior to World War II took most of their freshmen from the region’s socioeconomic elite, whose test scores were only modestly above the national mean of college students. By contrast, in 2002 “just 10 schools took 20 percent of all the students who scored in the top five centiles on the SAT.” Universities and similar institutions therefore tend to function (unwittingly?) as highly efficient match-making services for the intellectually gifted.

Upon graduation, members of this new “cognitive elite” tend to cluster overwhelmingly in a handful of neighborhoods in a handful of cities. The upshot of Murray’s picture is that cognitive ability and income are rapidly converging, and that the beneficiaries of this development, the “cognitive elite,” are leading increasingly isolated lives and are developing a distinct culture. One of the more amusing features of Murray’s book is a quiz designed to test one’s indoctrination into this elite “bubble.” A sample: “Who is Jimmie Johnson?” Don’t worry; you’re not supposed to know.

Although Murray provides considerable statistical support for his thesis, I tend to think he underestimates the degree to which barriers traditionally associated with “equality of opportunity” continue to play a significant role in American class structure. But this quibble is merely a matter of degree. The larger point is that, as we continue (rightly) to remove these barriers, we have good reason to expect diminishing marginal returns on social mobility and the reduction of inequality. Total “equality of opportunity” of the sort libertarians would prefer would very likely lead to an extreme version of the hereditary, cognitively stratified class structure Murray depicts, with all of the attendant results that Murray laments. Indeed, one bizarre feature of Murray’s book is the apparent mismatch between the diagnosis and the cure (Murray is a staunch libertarian).

Most of all, I worry about the dangers of an elite constituted solely or primarily on the basis of the ability to competently manipulate symbols. As far as I can tell, the preoccupations of this elite seem rather shallow and uninspiring, ranging from unappetizing health foods to ostentatious displays of “tolerance.” They are certainly poor custodians of high culture—if you don’t believe me, go to your nearest “poetry slam.” Indeed, the payoff from all of this brainpower seems to fit perfectly well with Kipling’s description of “a hideously bourgeois world of crass mammonism and philistine taste.” If this be the case, I say to hell with our new bobo elite, and bring back George III!