The European Administrative Elite. by John A. ArmstrongReview by: Michael Patrick AllenSocial Forces, Vol. 53, No. 3 (Mar., 1975), pp. 515-516Published by: Oxford University PressStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2576604 .

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Book Reviews / 515

their personal histories; current activities, both professional and extra-curricular; patterns of as- sociation (e.g., "With what three people in the last month have you most often discussed im- portant questions of general significance?"); and opinions on sensitive issues (e.g., "What in your opinion are the basic disadvantages of workers' self-management in theory and practice?" or "What percentage of Yugoslavs [do you think] are satisfied with [the recent decision to lengthen] the work period for getting pensions?").

One cannot begin to do justice to this remark- able volume in an ordinary review. One can only sketch in its basic outlines and note a few of the more intriguing findings, hoping this will convey the importance of the contents and stimulate readers to read the book in its entirety. The book begins with a chapter by Denitch in which he de- scribes the design of the study and the various pre- cautions that were taken to insure its success, such as the problem of finding qualified inter- viewers who would be minimally threatening to cautious respondents. Then a chapter by Lenard Cohen compares the Communist political elite with the pre-war, non-Communist elite. The third chapter, by Radomir Lukic, provides an introduc- tion to Yugoslav social structure, with special at- tention given the six types of elites singled out for interviewing. Following this, Denitch has a chap- ter on the social origins of the Yugoslav elite, emphasizing such factors as party seniority and in- volvement in the partisan movement. Vesna Popovic extends this analysis in a number of ways in Chapter 5, tracing the origins of the present elite back to their grandfathers, for example.

Chapters 6 through 9 are the highpoint of the book, in my opinion. They link structural and at- titudinal data in ways we have rarely seen done with national elites, in either Communist or non- Communist countries. Chapters 6 and 7, by Kadushin and Peter Abrams, offer interesting sociometric analyses of relations among the various categories of elites (i.e., who interacts with whom, who is influenced by whom, etc.). Not surprisingly, mass organization leaders emerge as the most influential, but legislators run a surprisingly strong second (partly a function of the exclusion from the sample of the top twenty mass organization leaders). They also compare formal and informal leaders, with interesting re- sults. Chapter 8, by Barton, is a report on the opinions and attitudes of the elites, and their determinants. He offers data on the attitudes of the various elites toward egalitarian ideas (intel- lectuals are the most egalitarian, with the mass media elite, the federal bureaucrats and the economic administrators the least), the importance of economic growth (intellectuals are least in- terested in it), the performance of the press (in- tellectuals are the most critical, mass media elite the least), and the public's acceptance of current conditions (intellectuals are the most likely to think the public dissatisfied, mass organization leaders least likely). Chapter .9, by Mladen Zvonarevic, is notable for a striking table which compares the ability of the various elites to assess public opinion on a series of subjects. Intellectuals were collectively the least accurate in their judg-

ments, being strongly biased in a pessimistic (and critical) direction; mass media elites and economic elites were the most accurate. The last two chap- ters are "think-pieces" by George Fischer of CUNY and Rudi Supek of the University of Zagreb, recent president of the Yugoslav Socio- logical Association.

It is hard to praise this book too highly. It is an important contribution to the growing number of excellent empirical studies of socialist societies in Eastern Europe. These deserve to be read not only by political sociologists but also by students of social stratification, industrial sociologists, and others. Another recent example of impressive re- search from Yugoslavia that deserves attention in this country is a multi-volume series entitled Participation and Self-Managemnent, edited by Eugen Pusic, which emerged from the First In- ternational Conference on Participation and Self- Management held in Dubrovnik in 1972. Papers by Goricar, Zupanov, Jovanov, and Obradovic in Volumes I and II are especially worthy of atten- tion. Studies like these are laying a solid founda- tion for a sociology of socialism based not on utopian ideals, but on demonstrable empirical realities.

THE EUROPEAN ADMINISTRATIVE ELITE. By John A. A rmstrong. Princeton: Princeton Uni- versity Press, 1973. 406 pp. Cloth, $20.00; paper, $9.75.

Reviewer: MICHAEL PATRICK ALLEN, Washing- ton State University

This book deserves a subtitle, for its content is rather more specialized than the title alone sug- gests. As the author is quick to point out, "the focus is narrow: it is not the administrative role in all its richness and ambiguity, but the special relation of the administrative role to economic development."

But this is a most ambitious book, despite its narrow conceptual focus. Specifically, it is a study of those factors which socialize government ad- ministrators to accept an interventionist role in the process of economic development. It is both com- parative and historical, encompassing four major European nations over the past two centuries. The four nations are Great Britain, France, Germany, and Russia during four stages of economic de- velopment: preindustrial, take-off, industrial, and postindustrial. Moreover, the theoretical focus of the study is upon the socialization of administra- tors during five stages of their individual develop- ment: familial, adolescence, higher education, in- duction to administration, and administrative service. As the author admits, this approach repre- sents an unusual combination of "a method and a subject matter resembling historical sociology with a conceptual focus derived from social psy- chology."

The real strength of the book lies in the wealth of information it contains on the social origins and career patterns of administrative elites in the four European nations. Despite the inevitable

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516 / SOCIAL FORCES / vol. 53:3, march 1975

limitations of such historical data, the author at- tempts to present and interpret these data in a systematic manner. Indeed, the deluge of informa- tion and interpretation seem almost to displace any theoretical discussion. It is not until the last chapter that the author raises the "nomothetic implications" of the study which "transcend purely historical interpretation." Although he is appro- priately tentative in his conclusions, the author does identify five "constant factors" which are positively associated with development interven- tionist role perceptions. They are metropolitan in- fluence, territorial experience, administrative in- tegration, scientific and technological education, and systematic ecomomics training. Of course, the importance of each of these factors varies both with the stage of elite socialization and the stage of economic development.

Unfortunately, these same conclusions point to the major flaw in the analysis. Although the de- pendent variable is development interventionist role perceptions at the individual elite level, the five independent variables or factors involve empirical data at the aggregate or societal level. Given the manner in which the author qualifies his conclusions, it would be unfair to accuse him of committing an "ecological fallacy" or any similar methodological misdemeanor. Still, it is difficult to apply historical data at the aggregate level to social-psychological theories at the in- dividual level and arrive at many entirely con- vincing conclusions. Surely socialization theory is relevant to an interpretation of elite origins and career patterns but it is virtually impossible to assess the empirical adequacy of such a theory with aggregate historical data.

Despite these problems and reservations, this is a valuable book in many respects. Although the price is somewhat prohibitive, it deserves the at- tention not only of specialists in the area of economic development but also of those interested in the more general study of elites. This book has important policy implications inasmuch as it in- dicates ways in which the individual development of elites subtly influences their participation in the development of the larger society. If it fails to provide any entirely satisfactory answers, at least the book does ask some genuinely important ques- tions and suggests the methodological problems that must be resolved if these questions are to be answered by empirical research.

EMERGING PATTERNS OF RURAL LEADERSHIP. By Shiv Rattan Mehta. New York: Halsted (Wiley), 1972. 156 pp. $6.95.

Reviewer: HAROLD F. KAUFMAN, Mississippi State University

This book dealing with village leadership struc- ture is based on the author's doctoral dissertation done at Punjab University. The Indian Council of Social Science Research, which has a practice of supporting publication of studies in basic research, especially Ph.D. dissertations, provided financial assistance for this publication. A reader critical of

how the book is written might notice some awk- ward sentence structure, a tendency toward a thesis-like format, and some British-Indian words and phrases not common to American readers. This should not detract, however, from the sub- stantive contribution of the book. In the scope of its data and analysis, it is one of the more sub- stantial field studies to date on Indian village leadership.

The locale of the study was "three average- sized villages" (450-750 popul-ation) in one de- velopment block in the Punjab state of northwest India. Persons were designated as leaders who re- ceived choices from at least 10 percent of the household heads in a village in at least one of four interests, namely, the panchayat or village council, recreation, the school, and the coopera- tive. From 9 to 14 persons were designated as leaders in each village. The reputational definition was verified by the positional technique-the hold- ing of an office in a local organization. Persons designated as leaders were described and often compared with non-leaders in terms of their rank in the caste and the occupational hierarchies, participation in local organizations, their relations with each other, and their concern for local prob- lems and development activities.

The conclusions of the study are that "the leadership pattern is diffused rather than specific," that participation in the panchayat is a prominent contribution of most leaders, and that this fact "implies a favorable trend for leadership to get oriented to the new political goals of the com- munity." The writer might have attempted some interpretation of his findings for both policy and theory. Theoretically his findings could have con- tributed toward the concepts of generalized leader- ship and community development organization. With regard to policy, his data support the posi- tion that the community development movement in which village panchayats play a prominent part is not "counter-revolutionary," but rather is both changing the traditional power structure and facilitating social mobility.

IMMIGRANT WORKERS AND CLASS STRUCTURE IN

WESTERN EUROPE. By Stephen Castles and Godula Kosack. New York: Oxford Univer- sity Press, 1973. 514 pp. $17.75

Reviewer: CAROLYN ROSE, University of Min- nesota

This study-a revision of the authors' joint D. Phil. theses accepted by the University of Sussex in 1971-investigates the effects of immigration on the class structure of four Western European countries: Great Britain, France, Germany, and Switzerland. The authors chose these highly in- dustrialized countries both because their economic structures were similar, and because data on im- migration were available for each of them, even if they were not strictly comparable.

The first eight chapters, mainly descriptive, are the most useful. They trace the history of immi- gration in each country and describe the situations

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