Illustrate from contemporary Indian experience the theory of circulation of elites. (1995)
Vilfredo Pareto held that a minority always rules and that history is the replacement of one governing elite by another. Elites stay alive by absorbing talent from below; when they close ranks, a counter-elite mobilises the masses and replaces them. Indian democracy shows all of these processes, but through elections rather than revolution.
Replacement: A New Social Base
- The Mandal decade brought collective circulation. The Samajwadi Party and the Rashtriya Janata Dal put Yadav-led backward-caste elites in charge of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar. Kanshi Ram built a Dalit counter-elite through BAMCEF (1978) and the Bahujan Samaj Party (1984), and Mayawati became chief minister in 1995. Christophe Jaffrelot calls this India’s silent revolution.
- The change shows in Parliament. Gilles Verniers finds that upper castes and OBCs each held about 26% of the 2024 Lok Sabha. It was the first time the two shares were equal, and the upper-caste share was the lowest since 1952.
Absorption: Keeping the Elite Open
- Pareto’s individual circulation describes how the Bharatiya Janata Party grew beyond its upper-caste, trader base. It promoted non-Yadav OBC and non-Jatav Dalit leaders, a pattern analysts call social engineering. The Congress in turn took up the caste-census demand to win back backward-caste voters.
- Absorption also weakens the counter-elite. Leaders taken into the ruling bloc stop leading their own groups against it, the defusing effect Pareto described.
Lions and Foxes
The coalition era (1989–2014) rewarded foxes, leaders who bargained, managed allies and compromised. The period after 2014 moved towards lion qualities: a leader with a large mandate, centralised command, and appeals to nation and faith (Pareto’s persistence of aggregates). After 2024 the BJP needed the Telugu Desam Party‘s 16 seats and the Janata Dal (United)’s 12, and the skills of the fox mattered again.
Counter-elites from Outside
- The Aam Aadmi Party, led by anti-corruption activists, replaced Delhi’s Congress elite in 2013–15 and then lost Delhi to the BJP in 2025, winning 22 of 70 seats against the BJP’s 48.
- C. Joseph Vijay‘s Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam, founded in 2024, won 108 seats in May 2026 and ended half a century of DMK–AIADMK alternation.
Blocked Circulation
Pareto warned that an elite passing power by birth decays. An ADR–National Election Watch study (September 2025) found 31% of Lok Sabha members from political families, and 93% of 2024 MPs are crorepatis. Wealth now filters recruitment across every caste. Yet 52% of the 2024 MPs were first-timers, so the churn of individuals remains high.
Limits of the Fit
Pareto’s residues do not explain what drove this change. Caste arithmetic, the Green Revolution and reservation did. Indian circulation has also been peaceful and electoral, not violent. As Yogendra Yadav‘s second democratic upsurge shows, the masses were not merely instruments: rising lower-caste turnout forced the change.
Conclusion
India has seen real circulation of elites without the elite disappearing. The political class now looks different, but it is not much closer to the people who elect it. Pareto explains that pattern well. What he cannot explain is that the Indian ballot has made circulation regular and open to challenge.