Janine Wedel - Shadow Elite - How the World's New Power Brokers Undermine Democracy, Government, and the Free Market

In my quest to explore how societies work—in contrast to how they are supposed to work—I have found common ground with people from many walks of life and professions, scholars from a variety of disciplines (not only anthropologists), journalists, government researchers, and investigators. Several sociologists were especially astute observers of the movers and shakers who positioned themselves at the nexus of state and private power amid the ruins of communism (sometimes in conjunction with global operators who descended on the region like carpetbaggers). These players, of course, were operating in an environment where new rules were being invented—and sometimes even inventing them themselves. In Poland I am grateful to the scholars who offered insights and opportunities for discussion, in particular Antoni Kamiński, Joanna Kurczewska, and Jacek Kurczewski. Alina Hussein of NIK, Poland’s equivalent of the U.S. Government Accountability Office, helped provide important trend-line data, in particular about appropriation of the state budget to private, unaccountable organizations through the 1990s and into this decade. Grzegorz Makowski and Barbara Pomorska pulled together supplemental materials on these trends, as well as on the Rywingate scandal that publicly illuminated under-the-table, yet pervasive means of influence. I thank them all.

I am also grateful to the many experts and informants (far too many to name) who assisted me in recognizing drivers of transformation beyond Poland as I traveled to other parts of central Europe, Russia, and Ukraine after the fall of the Berlin Wall and into this century. I tracked a new generation of operators who seemed to have internalized the worst of the Wild East (even when they had never set foot there), such as financial wizards playing on the latest innovations. For providing opportunities to further explore and discuss these players and phenomena, I am indebted to British sociologist Paul Stubbs. Based in Croatia, he invited me to workshops he organized there in 2006 and 2007 that brought together dynamic local and international scholars and practitioners to explore changing systems of governing, power, and influence. These trips were learning opportunities of the best sort, and enabled me to give lectures and get feedback from those steeped in law, economics, and other fields.

The networks of interlocking players I charted at the nexus of state and private in eastern Europe, as well as those operating in and around global grey zones, are what led me to explore the networks and modus operandi of certain players in the United States. When, in the early part of this decade, prominent neoconservatives were regularly in the news, I began to look into the social networks and overlapping connections in government, ideological initiatives, foundations, think tanks, business, and family ties of a small set of neoconservatives who have been working together for as long as thirty years to put their ideology into action. I was struck by the similarity of the modus operandi of this “Neocon core”—a dozen or so interconnected players with Richard Perle as their linchpin—with many influential groups that had shaped government, politics, business, and society in transitional eastern Europe. In both contexts, players straddled official and private organizations, were remarkably successful in achieving their group goals even at the expense of the institutions they supposedly served, and skillfully skirted liabilities resulting from their activities.

I studied the activities of the Neocon core first by delving into the wealth of material published on them and then by interviewing people associated with them (including “defectors” from the group); frequenting meetings, lectures, and gatherings in which they participate; and, eventually, interviewing some of the key players themselves. In this exploration, I thank Steve Clemons for his excellent blog (thewashingtonnote.com) and steadfast support, as well as members of the “Garden Club.” I am especially indebted to Jim Lobe, a journalist who has long tracked and written about neoconservatives, read multiple drafts of my chapter on the subject, and loaned me a boxful of books and resources. Eli Lake may not agree with the conclusions I have come to, but I greatly appreciate his perspectives and willingness to engage in conversation. Although studying the Neocon core helped me to identify influencers and their workings in their American habitat, the book draws on examples from across the political spectrum.

Observing the achievements of players and networks led me, in turn, to explore the contexts in which they operate. Seeing firsthand the machinations at the nexus of state and private in eastern Europe, as state-owned resources were being privatized, led me to wonder what “privatization” in the United States is about, especially given America’s history of contracting out government services, and, increasingly, functions. Reams of GAO reports, inspectors general findings, and other government documents, as well as scholarly treatises, provided the background needed to grasp the import and extent of the changes under way. Countless hours were spent talking with experts, investigators, and participants in contracting out (in sectors ranging from military and homeland security to energy and education) and other aspects of U.S. governing, including the drain of brains, information, and authority away from government. For guidance on these issues, I am especially indebted to Richard Loeb and Richard Miller, as well as to Scott Amey of the Project On Government Oversight.

My subject is replete with theoretical issues. I am very fortunate to have had the generous help of Ted Lowi and Bob Jervis, both of whom read parts of the manuscript multiple times and provided detailed and supportive critiques. I am eternally grateful to both of them. I also thank Simon Reich, who illuminated crucial perspectives on American government and reviewed my work, and James Galbraith, who highlighted important economics perspectives.

I am grateful to Teresa Hartnett for stimulating my conceptualization of the project early on, and Stacy Lathrop, who did the same in the latter stages. Both reviewed and edited drafts and provided incisive suggestions. Other readers, including John Clarke, Des Dinan, Jeff Dumas, Carol Greenhouse, Jeanne Guillemin, Jessica Heineman-Pieper, Antoni Kamiński, Don Kash, Ted Kinnaman, Leonid Kosals, Wendy Larner, Charles Lewis, Michael Lind, Barry Lynn, William Odom, Steven Rosefielde, Dorothy Rosenberg, Louise Shelley, Irena Sumi, Susan Tolchin, Ty West, and Anne Williamson provided valuable feedback on the manuscript. Adam Pomorski, as usual, offered keen guidance throughout the project.

I am also indebted to a number of scholars for offering fora that enabled me to get feedback on papers I delivered, including: James Galbraith, for an American Economics Association panel on “The Abuse of Power” (2005) and a Communitarian Summit session on “Working Toward a Criminology of Economics” (2004); Carol Greenhouse and participants in 2005 workshops at Princeton University on “Ethnographies at the Limits of Neoliberalism”; participants in my panels at the 2006 Civil G-8 Conference in Moscow; Hugh Gusterson and Catherine Besteman (organizers) and Jeanne Guillemin (commentator) at a 2006 MIT workshop; Susan Wright and Cris Shore for the 2006 panel on “Policy Worlds” at the European Association for Social Anthropology meeting in Bristol, UK; Winifred Tate and participants in the 2007 workshop at Brown University on “Ethnographies of Foreign Policy”; Don Kalb and others at the Central European University in Budapest who organized my 2007 talks there; Jon Abbink, Sandra Evers, and Tijo Salverda for the Anthropology of Elites conference at Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam, in 2007; Monique Nuijten of Wageningen University, the Netherlands, in 2008; and the organizers of sessions where I delivered papers on topics relating to this book at annual meetings of the American Anthropological Association, the American Political Science Association, and the American Economics Association.