The Managerial Revolution: What is Happening in the World

by James Burnham

The historically anticapitalist nature of the extension of governmental ownership and control is the only basis from which we can plausibly explain the attitude of the capitalists themselves. Leninists are forced to the most complex and devious psychological fairy tales to get around the difficulties. When the capitalists, almost en masse, object, say, to some New Deal extension of the government into the economy, the Leninists are compelled to say that the capitalists, with their complaints, are only trying to “deceive” the people or are deceiving themselves about “their own best interests.” Such explanations are logically possible but most unlikely, especially when there is a simpler one that fits the facts directly: the capitalists object because the measures are against their interests.