It's the economy stupid, or is it about power?

[howblackisyourflag]

I guess most of us are here because we believe that the economy being run by a tiny elite is the cause of so many of the worlds problems, and our own, and that this issue affects us more than any other.

But is it more about power than wealth?

Obviously the main source of power in a capitalist society is wealth, but has there ever been an analysis done of power realtions outside the realm of the economy?

For example, Foucault talks about power-knowledge, their interrelation and how they affect us, and basically benefit a small elite.

So he writes about how the modern prison came about. But this didnt just protect people wealth, it came about in a complicated way where...well, Ive just ordered the book his book so Im not fully sure myself yet! :D

But my point basically is, yes, the concentration of wealth and alienation and the rest of it is a big deal, but is there something else behind all this?

So the concentration of power rather the concentration of wealth, is that what affects us the most?

[¿Que?]

The not-so-Marxist sociologist Max Weber talked about status as well as class. He viewed status as often arising from "class situation" but sometimes against it as well. According to him, someone of the propertied classes and someone of the non owning classes could still have a similar status situation, because status is not solely determined by economic conditions, but also by values and mores. I guess he was somewhat challenging vulgar Marxism, in that he did not attribute all of the "superstructure" to merely an epiphenomenon of the base.

Then again, I have read that this was just a "classical" Marxist interpretation, that Marx himself was not a "vulgar" materialist either.