Vanguard fantasies: The wealthy upper classes as politically spirited wealth elite establishment

Abstract

To contribute to studies on upper classes’ self-justification, in this article, we aim to develop a perspective to explore how the increasingly wealthy upper classes seek to morally justify themselves in the realm of politics. Drawing on Norbert Elias’s work, we suggest that amid the current economic and technological turbulence, the wealthy upper classes form dynamic wealth elite figurations that devise shared symbolics and programmes to coordinate and justify their political interests. By drawing on 90 interviews with the top 0.1% earners in Finland, we trace how old and new money – heirs to large family businesses, high-end corporate executives and up-and-coming nouveau riche entrepreneurs – craft, in Elias’s terms, an establishment fantasy as a melange of moral goods to justify the upper classes’ political views in an egalitarian society. The fantasy serves as a banner uniting the wealthy and supporting their societal interests. In the fantasy, the top earners resemble a resolute vanguard with a reformatory programme that utilises the strong bonds of we-ness in egalitarian Nordic solidarity while simultaneously questioning the core features of the Nordic welfare model to the advantage of the wealthiest stratum.

Introduction

As wealth has accumulated within the top of income brackets, the wealthiest groups have gained an increasingly focal role in societies. Scholars have examined upper-class positions and elite careers (Ellersgaard et al., 2019; Larsen & Ellersgaard, 2018; Wakeling & Savage, 2015) as well as education (Holmqvist, 2017, 2020). In this context, studies have explored how the wealthy upper classes seek to justify their role in society (cf. Hecht, 2017; Melldahl, 2017) by consecrating their elevated position (Holmqvist, 2017, 2020; Khan, 2011; Khan & Jerolmack, 2013), drawing moral boundaries with other social groups (Kantola & Kuusela, 2019) or emphasising their ordinariness (Friedman & Laurison, 2019; Friedman & Reeves, 2020; Sherman, 2017).

The studies of upper-class justification increasingly suggest that, rather than cultivating a stable and permanent entitlement of ‘who you are’, today’s upper classes and elites often mobilise a meritocratic discourse of ‘what you have done’, thereby demonstrating their capacity to achieve, lead, and make a change (Törnqvist, 2019, p. 563; see also Littler, 2018; Mijs, 2021; Mijs & Savage, 2020). Often, as Khan (2012, p. 481) has indicated, while such cultures advocate talent and meritocracy, they nevertheless often reproduce privilege (Khan & Jerolmack, 2013).

However, while research on self-justification has shown how the current wealthy justify their own position at the top, we know less how they are developing political ideas in terms of self-justification. Some studies have suggested that the prevalence of meritocratic justification among rich Americans is connected to conservative political views (Suhay et al., 2021) and shown how the wealthy use philanthropy to justify political ends such as tax cuts (Beckert, 2022; Sklair & Glucksberg, 2021). Indeed, the wealthy are not merely rich and privileged individuals, but also constitutive of society’s upper classes and may serve as politically influential power elites (cf. Mills, 1956; Mizruchi, 2017). Thus, this study explores how the wealthiest stratum legitimises itself as an upper class with shared political views.

In particular, we pay attention to the increased contingency among the upper classes. Traditionally, the sociological perspective has emphasised the stability of the upper classes by describing a relatively coherent upper-class elite (cf. Mills, 1956; Scott, 1982). However, in recent decades, market liberalisation, new technologies and subsequent economic globalisation and financialisation have altered the economic sphere and brought a multitude of new possibilities for wealth creation. As Savage (2015) suggested, we are experiencing the rise of new wealth elites; that is, individuals who own substantial capital stocks or accumulate wealth through their analytic skills as managerial and financial professionals.

Due to these changes, the upper classes are also increasingly characterised by contingency and fluctuations. Thus, the wealthiest stratums have become increasingly globally mobile (Birtchnell & Caletrío, 2014) and business elites appear subject to increasing turnover and shorter careers (Ruostetsaari, 2021), shifting towards more flexible and semi-formal networking forums (Davis & Williams, 2017).

The current turbulence also affects the upper classes’ social constitution. While the accumulation of capital may enhance some family dynasties that inherited old money, the economic restructuring and new technologies have disrupted many businesses, opening up new possibilities for the nouveau riche, as self-made entrepreneurs and well-compensated executives in booming businesses join the wealthy (see Dew-Becker & Gordon, 2005; Kaplan & Rauh, 2010). To capture this tumult, we suggest that the wealthiest stratum should be understood not as a stiff upper class but rather as a flexible upper-class figuration that incorporates old and new money. In this study, we explore how this figuration formulates and circulates shared upper-class political understandings of how society should be run.

To develop this dynamic perspective on the upper classes, we theoretically employ Norbert Elias’s figurational sociology. According to Elias (1986/2009), since people are socially interdependent, they form dynamic figurations; that is, sets of individuals linked by social positions, rules, norms and values and kept together by jointly crafted symbolics that orientate those individuals’ actions. Therefore, we suggest that the wealthiest stratum forms a wealth elite figuration; that is, a dynamic constellation of networked individuals that incorporates both old and new money.

We suggest that this figuration is sustained symbolically by, as Elias (1994b) put it, establishment fantasies, which help the wealthy to orientate their political action. Studies of elite networks (Mills, 1956; Mitzruchi, 2017) and pathways (Ellesgaard et al., 2019; Wakeling & Savage, 2015) have traced how elites acquire and hold positions of power. We advance this research by showing how the wealthy upper classes devise shared symbolics as politically opinionated wealth elite establishment with views on how society and politics should be run. We suggest that they craft a fantasy that serves as a banner uniting the wealth elites and justifying their social standing and political interests.

Empirically, our investigation takes place in the context of the Nordic welfare society. We study the top 0.1% of earners in Finland and how the old and new money come together as a politically spirited upper class with an establishment fantasy that justifies their political ideas.

Earlier studies have accounted for how Nordic upper classes consecrate themselves morally (Holmqvist, 2017, 2020) or how cultural elites justify their position in an egalitarian society (Hjellbrekke et al., 2015; Jarness & Friedman, 2017; Ljunggren, 2017). Here, we focus on the political aspect of upper classes’ self-justification, which has been explored neither in the Nordics nor elsewhere.

The Nordics provide an interesting case study of political justification due to their embrace of equality, solidarity and public responsibility. These moral goods have materialised as welfare policies with universal public services, social benefits and relatively high taxation, making the Nordics among the world’s most equal countries. Yet, inequalities have also been rising across the Nordics, including Finland, as the wealthiest groups have pulled away from the others (Barth et al., 2021; Blomgren et al., 2014). We show how the increasingly affluent upper classes craft their political views as a strongly egalitarian society faces growing income disparities.

Elias on wealthy upper classes: Figurations with fantasies

Over the course of his work, Norbert Elias sought to grasp the processual and dynamic aspects of social life. This aim became particularly important as he developed comparative historical sociology to study the gradual long-term changes, the famous ‘civilizing process’, taking place across European societies (Elias, 1939/1994a; for an overview, see e.g. Dunning & Hughes, 2012; Gabriel & Mennell, 2011). In this context, many key concepts of post-war sociology – such as structure, society and system – appeared too static to capture the essence of human societies. To this end, Elias introduced the notion of ‘figuration’, referring to dynamic constellations and networks bonded by mutual dependencies (Elias, 1986/2009; for an overview, see Dunning & Hughes, 2012; Gabriel & Mennell, 2011).

Figurations abound in complex and stratified societies as social constellations that negotiate social positions, rules, norms and values to enable, guide and control the individuals involved within them (Elias, 1986/2009). With the notion of figuration, Elias sought to incorporate individuals into a social structure in a way that allowed space for individual action, yet also recognised social interdependencies and patterns. As Elias maintained, he introduced the notion to ‘loosen’ the antagonism between ‘the individual’ and ‘society’ that, to his mind, troubled sociology (Elias, 1978, p. 130). Figurations stabilise social action, yet they also facilitate social change: the people in figurations are like players in a game, each one relatively autonomous in terms of playing the game, though restricted by common rules. Thus, social change materialises in the changing patterns of the play created by the players (Elias, 1978, p. 130; Elias, 1986/2009). Subsequently, extant studies have deciphered how social groups as figurations cooperate, negotiate, separate, blur or even disappear over time (cf. Hogenstijn et al., 2008; May, 2004).

Also, the upper classes – a recurring subject of study for Elias – can be understood as figurations. In this study, we explore how the increasingly wealthy upper classes form wealth elite figurations: dynamic networks of upper-class people involving negotiations, alliances and struggles regarding shared norms and values. These wealth figurations are also characterised by continuous change as newcomers enter and are incorporated into the existing upper-class networks (cf. Elias, 1939/1994a, p. 403). Wealth elites are especially affected and shaped by economic upheavals and technological advances that give rise to new sources of wealth and supress old ones. The nouveau riche may enter the existing establishment or the old boys’ networks, while less successful individuals may simultaneously drop out (cf. Wouters, 2011). Thus, we examine how old and new money craft a symbolic understanding to sustain a politically oriented wealth elite figuration.

The shared symbolics of the wealth elite figuration help its members to orient their views and actions. Elias emphasised the great importance of symbolics in social life (Elias, 1989). Regarding upper classes, he traced how they – over the long course of history – abandoned violence and developed ‘civilized’ and, thus, also more symbolic ways to justify their social standing (Elias, 1939/1994a; Fletcher, 1997). Subsequently, Elias (1994b) also noted how the upper classes often distinguished themselves from the rest and developed idealised self-images, which he called establishment fantasies – as he claimed, ‘One can observe again and again that members of groups which are, in terms of power, stronger than other independent groups, think of themselves in human terms better than the others’ (Elias, 1994b, p. xv). Indeed, upper-class labels – such as aristocracy, nobility or elite – imply high human value, thereby justifying the idea that the people at the top are there due to their high personal value and standards as ‘people endowed with a kind of group charisma, with a specific virtue shared by all its members and lacked by the others’ (Elias, 1994b, p. xvi).

When attempting to capture the effectiveness of upper-class symbolics, Elias also maintained that these fantasies often have a powerful emotional grasp on people by way of suggesting an idealised collective identity of ‘us’, which may bind small tribes as well as large social units, such as nation states. Thus, an imagined collective of we-ness may become an object of identification and strong emotional attachment as a survival unit on which people depend on an attachment ‘as intense as their attachment to a person they love’ (Elias, 1978, p. 137; see also Kaspersen & Gabriel, 2008). This idealised we-ness equally binds small tribes and large social units, such as nation states, with a strong emotional attachment. Consequently, powerful groups may cultivate a notion of we-ness as a symbolic tool for regulating social life by defining who we are, what we present, and what is expected of us.

In addition, as a counterfeit of the idealised we, these fantasies often build emotional barriers with other groups (Elias, 1994b) through shaming and stigmatisation. The established groups exclude outsider groups by labelling them untrustworthy, undisciplined or lawless (Elias, 1994b; see also Dench et al., 2006; May, 2004). Indeed, Elias coined the term ‘establishment fantasy’ when studying the small British town of Winston Parva (Elias & Scotson, 1994), where old, established residents monopolised key positions in community life and – to support their dominant roles – developed a fantasy that granted them a place above newcomers, who were perceived as outsiders. Similar labelling has been done in various other groups, with labels such as ‘foreign’, ‘single mothers’, ‘asylum seekers’, ‘drug addicts’ or ‘benefit claimants’ (Swann & Hughes, 2016, p. 689).

Thus, in the following account, we employ Elias’s notions to study how the top 0.1% earners in Finland sustain a wealth elite figuration involving old and new money and craft a shared establishment fantasy to orient and advocate the interests of the wealthy upper classes.

Case study: Data and method of analysis

Studies on figurational processes often employ a variety of historically contextualised data on social groupings (Baur & Ernst, 2011). Here, we aim to study the wealthiest stratum in Finland. Earlier works have suggested that top executives; investment bankers and hedge, private equity and mutual fund investors; corporate lawyers; and entertainment celebrities and sports superstars are the key groups in the wealthiest stratum (Dew-Becker & Gordon 2005; Kaplan & Rauh, 2010). While these studies identified wealthy individuals by seeking data across business branches, we approached the wealthiest groups using public tax data.

To identify the 0.1% top earners in Finland, we began by compiling from public tax records the taxed earned and capital incomes of the top 10,000 earners each year between 2006 and 2015. From this, we took the top 5000 earners, ending up with those with the top 0.1% income in Finland. Since the tax records included only individuals’ names, we investigated each top earner’s wealth origin from public databases, including company websites, mass and social media and the national trade register. From this, we could identify 83% of the 5000 top earners. For the remaining 17%, in most cases, their names were too common to identify a specific person. Otherwise, we could not trace any systematic reason for the missing data.

Based on the main findings of the identification process, we then classified the top earners into the following six groups according to the source of their income: (1) top executives of large companies (31%); (2) inheritors of large family fortunes (16%); (3) other professionals, such as lawyers, doctors and consultants (16%); (4) entrepreneurs who had founded their own enterprises (13%); (5) pharmacists running government-licensed pharmacies (4%); and (6) finance professionals (3%).

We subsequently conducted 90 semi-structured interviews with the following three groups that were common and also represented distinct sources of wealth: (1) heirs of family firms (28 interviews), (2) self-made entrepreneurs (30 interviews) and (3) top executives (32 interviews). These groups also represented both the old and the new money among the upper classes. The first group, representing old money, consisted of members of the established upper classes whose families had typically amassed fortunes through large industrial firms founded during the twentieth or twenty-first century. The heirs’ current occupational positions varied, with some working in their family companies and others outside them, as entrepreneurs or salaried workers. Nevertheless, they had all inherited significant family wealth. The second group, consisting of founders of new companies, were newcomers among the wealthy upper class, and so represented new money. They came from working, middle-class or upper middle-class families (e.g. carpenters, farmers, teachers, nurses, engineers or shopkeepers), and their family wealth had not contributed to their own exceptional wealth. The third group, the top executives of large firms, was the most numerous group among the top 0.1%, with incomes that came mostly from salaries and compensation. While some of their parents had been business executives, they were professionals whose wealth had not been amassed from their inheritance.

Potential interviewees were contacted by email, and all those approached belonged to the upper half of the 0.1%. The aim here was to ensure that they were truly among the top-earning Finns. The interviewed group approximately corresponded to the top 0.1% – statistically, 84% of the top-earning 0.1% are men, 90% are over 44 years of age and 79% hold a degree. In selecting the interviewees, we also considered variation in terms of gender, location and businesses representing various sectors of the economy. The interviewees represented various sectors of the economy, including paper and pulp, telecommunications, information technology, health, medicine, agriculture, textile and food industries. A larger number of these companies – a few large, longstanding family firms and others established industrial or new technology enterprises – operate globally.

Approximately half of the individuals approached agreed to participate, which can be considered a good result in the context of a group often considered difficult to access. Those who declined mostly cited practical reasons, such as lack of time, but a number of those contacted did not respond in any manner. We did not identify any systematic biases regarding those who declined our invitation, but we believe that the anonymity offered to the interviewees guaranteed a balanced representation of different types of people in our data; however, it is of course impossible to fully know who declined the invitation. The most likely reasons for the decline included shortage of time, ignorance, timidity and mistrust towards researchers; however, it is also possible that those who hold strong opinions and felt like sharing them were slightly over-represented in our data, as numerous interviewees surprised us with their political outspokenness. In our case, however, this should not be a problem, as we were particularly interested in the politically active and opinionated individuals who can be considered part of the wealth elite figuration.

The semi-structured interviews focused on the top earners’ perspective of themselves and society to understand their experiences and motivations both in private and more public life (Small & Calarco, 2022). All the interviews included questions (1) on one’s personal family background, education and career, (2) on views concerning Finnish society and politics, and (3) on the lifestyles of the interviewees. Because of the semi-structured nature of the interviews, the questions varied slightly between interviews as the interviewers also asked follow-up questions. All questions remained neutral as far as possible (e.g. What are the biggest challenges facing Finland?)

Full anonymity was guaranteed to allow interviewees the freedom to express their views, including also potentially politically ‘incorrect’ views. All interviews were recorded and transcribed (except for one that was not, at the interviewee’s request). In the analyses, we use BE (as business executives), H (as heirs) and E (as entrepreneurs) to mark the interviewed groups.

In analysing the interviews, the first author conducted the analysis of the data in three rounds. The coding and analysis of the data largely corresponded with the method of flexible coding (Deterding & Waters, 2021). In the first round of the coding, the interviews were read and indexed by identifying passages that were mentioned in relation to political issues and policymaking. Overall, we wanted to understand the personal perspectives of these top earners (Small & Calarco, 2022). Throughout the analysis, the three groups – heirs, executives and entrepreneurs – were also ascribed distinct attributes to gain further understanding regarding each group. In the second round, after seeing the variety of views that were emerging in the data, the transcripts were systematically coded again into categories encompassing different views on political issues and policymaking. Simultaneously, the approving and disapproving views on the issues in each category were coded.

In the final round, views on politics and society were coded into four categories that formed the narrative of society and politics, like Elias’s (1994b) elite figuration with a shared fantasy.

Results: The establishment fantasies of the top 0.1% earners

Overall, the political parlance and views of the top earners were surprisingly homogeneous. Although recent research, particularly from the US, also found diversity among affluent individuals (e.g. Suhay et al., 2021), our Finnish population seemed to be relatively like-minded. There were no competing camps among those with different political views or between old and new money. If anything, it seemed that the top earners were divided somewhat by how keen they were on politics, between those who had defined political views and those for whom politics seemed distant and who did not have much to say on politics. Our analysis here focuses on the former group.

Overall, the political views focused largely on the Nordic welfare society. In the latter half of the twentieth century, the Nordics built welfare states which supported universal public services, such as education and healthcare as well as social benefits for the entire population, financed by progressive taxation (Morel & Palme, 2012). Consequently, the Nordics have often been considered as representative of equality and well-being (Dorling & Koljonen, 2020; Kenworthy, 2020); the prevalent welfare policies have been instrumental for this. Indeed, without income transfers and taxation, income differences in the Nordics would be almost as great as that in the United States, which is one of the countries with the greatest income inequality (Wang et al., 2012).

However, in recent decades, the Nordic model has been increasingly contested. Above all, ‘workfarist’ ideas of conditionality posing obligations in exchange for social benefits (Greve, 2020; Knotz, 2018) and ideas on tax cuts (Hope & Limberg, 2022; Morel & Palme, 2012) have questioned the traditional policies of the Nordic welfare model, while inequalities have been increasing (Barth et al., 2021; Blomgren et al., 2014).

In the data, the accounts of the Finnish top earners clearly focus on the developments of the Nordic welfare society. Again, perhaps somewhat surprisingly, the most notable feature was that the top earners endorsed both the old welfare model and the newer workfarist ideas, with the same individuals both praising and criticising the Nordic model. Thus, the top earners were not divided into two camps in that sense either.

In what follows, we describe these political views, suggesting they are akin to Elias’s upper-class establishment fantasy, seeking to justify their social and political standing by combining moral goods from various sources as well using we-ness to empower the fantasy with a sense of collectiveness. We describe the key features of this establishment fantasy from the data, focusing on the following four aspects: (1) praising the Nordic model, (2) demanding reforms of the Nordic model, (3) questioning universalism and (4) criticising taxation.

Praising Nordic egalitarianism: The we-ness of equals

When asked about the best aspects of Finnish society, the Finnish top earners highlighted safety, high levels of social trust, equality and cohesiveness, as well as universal public services of the Nordic model, above all free education and healthcare. They considered overall Finnish society to be constituted of equals who live in harmony, making it the best in the world (E22). To quote a well-known saying, ‘being born in Finland is like winning the lottery’ (H24).

Specifically, regarding the needs of the wealthy, everyday safety was an important feature. In particular, the heirs provided examples of safe and easy-going everyday life, such as being able to ‘jog on the street’ (H26) and ‘send kids to the kiosk’ (H14) safely and having ‘lost wallets returned’ (H17).

Moreover, equality was praised as a defining feature of the society, since many top earners did not recognise any inequalities in Finland (see also Kuusela, 2022). As one executive put it, both he and his repairman lived equal lives:

After all, the repairman who works for us can have an apartment of exactly the same size, the same car and a cottage in the same location. Thus, these differences are quite small in Finnish society. (BE29)

Equality of opportunity was highlighted as a central feature of a society in which one’s ‘birth background has no effect whatsoever’ (BE26) and ‘only one’s qualifications matter’ (H11). One entrepreneur claimed Finland to be ‘a club’ where everyone is a member and where the school system, army and civil society grant equal opportunities for all – for ‘gentlemen and fools alike’ (E15).

In praising the society, the top earners also often employed a collective we-ness (Elias, 1994b). One top executive from the paper industry summed up the central features of we-ness, which were repeated across the interviews. For example:

This is an extremely good country. We have stable, safe conditions. Yes, with globalisation and many other things, maybe that sense of security has decreased, but on a global scale, this is a safe bird’s nest. In our social security system, people get healthcare and education. [. . .] Our equality is top class. We will always have differences, but our social system is top class on a global scale. Let’s just keep it that way. (BE19)

In particular, the cohesive we-ness often centred on the universal public services of the Nordic welfare society (Dorling & Koljonen, 2020; Kenworthy, 2020). Many referred to public education, healthcare and daycare, and some also mentioned social security as key drivers of the exceptional Finnish success story. One executive praised the welfare model as ‘fantastic, cool stuff’, due to which Finland had risen ‘from a developing country in an unimaginable way to one of the best countries in the world in which to be and to live’. For him, equality of opportunity was at the heart of the model, saying:

All Finns can go to school and study, and those opportunities are the same for everyone, regardless of their family’s financial situation. That’s how I feel, that it is extremely important. It is also extremely important to make sure this continues in Finland in the future. (BE6)

One heir emphasised that the best thing about Finland was that ‘we take care of each other’, as evidenced by, for example, the healthcare system, in which everyone can receive treatment for heart attacks (H21). Another heir admired the hospital system and the fairness of the Nordic model, saying:

When you think about how much you can get with that tax money, if something happens, for example you get seriously ill, it’s absolutely incredible how high-quality healthcare can be obtained at a university hospital with that tax money. Yes, I feel that one strong factor in Finland, as in other Nordic countries, is the overall equality and knowing that if something happens to me, I will get help. When you’re in hospital, you won’t be asked how much tax you’ve paid. (H25)

Thus, overall, the top earners employed Eliasian we-ness to suggest an idealised community of equals and praised the key achievement of the Nordic welfare society for it being central to granting equal opportunities.

Reformers of the Nordic model: The call for new we-ness

Although the top earners praised Finnish society, they also worried about its current state. At the heart of the problems they mentioned were multiple setbacks to the economy, particularly the downfall of Nokia’s mobile phone business and problems in paper industries in the wake of the financial crisis of 2008, which had slowed down economic growth and increased unemployment and public debt. According to one heir, Finland’s situation was ‘very worrying and frankly bad’, adding that ‘the Finnish economy has many problems with our competitiveness, and we have relatively high unemployment. Finland has a lot of debt’ (H8).

Thus, parallel to the praise for the Nordic welfare society, a strong sense of crisis and alarm also emerged in the data, suggesting that the Nordic welfare model was in deep trouble. The main culprit was the public sector, which was perceived to be too large and thus in need of substantial cuts. Indeed, publicly financed universal healthcare, free education and social benefits make for a large public sector under the Nordic model. The top earners perceived it as bloated and inefficient. Thus, Finns should agree to ‘painful’ reforms and decisions because building the future ‘only requires people to better adapt to let go of the old, so that something new can be done’ (BE28).

Society was seen as rigid, stagnated, paralysed and incapable of implementing the inevitable and badly needed reforms. In contrast to the stagnating society, the top earners saw themselves as forces and voices of reason; they were reformers fighting alone against the reactionary forces of a society lacking in dynamism and courage and hampered by dissension.

Numerous top earners compared running the society to managing a firm, referring to their own experiences as executives. According to one, since ‘Finland Ltd is not doing well’, one needs to cut spending, adding:

We spend more than we earn, [. . .] and everyone is aware of it or admits it, but when something has to be changed, it inevitably means something will not be so nice for some people, who will get upset, but if they get their way, nothing will change. So, if this were a company, it would go bankrupt before long. (BE19)

One heir described that income and expenses should be balanced and lessons be learned, for example, from her family business. According to one: ‘Well, what do we do in companies if sales do not match expenses? Then, expenses have to be cut’ (H15). Another heir claimed that the overall state should be put into debt restructuring (H5), and a third advised policymakers to stop borrowing money because if ‘you just take on more debt, [. . .] you can manage for a while, but sometimes it ends. Often, the end is not very pleasant’ (H6).

The top earners also often employed the notion of we-ness by lamenting the lost unanimity of society and demanding the restoration of consensus to push through the necessary reforms. One executive stated that he was ‘deeply worried’ about the society, voicing his concerns by addressing society overall with a reference to we:

We have an inbuilt quality of believing in state-led control and regulation. It is not a question of ‘either or’, but still, the pendulum has moved sharply to the other side, which is the wrong one, and the pendulum should swing back somehow. (BE3)

Another executive, concerned over the society being stuck and divided, described it as being entrenched behind barricades and weak in team spirit, adding:

We really lack that kind of spirit and then the courage to invest in this renewal and wellbeing and growth. Finland has a huge amount of know-how, really good talent, a huge commitment to things. [. . .] I only hope it will change with the new generation. (BE14)

Questioning universalism: Targeting spoilers of we-ness

Universal healthcare, free education and social benefits make up the most substantial part of the public sector in the Nordic welfare model, implying that all citizens are granted equal services and benefits. In recent decades, this principle has been challenged by workfarist ideas, which suggest that everyone should work in return for their incomes and social benefits (Knotz, 2018). In their call for reform, the top earners clearly support ‘workfarist’ ideas, thereby suggesting that everyone should be earning their living and, therefore, social benefits may be harmful as they breed indolence and do not push people to work. Thus, an heir complained about the ‘terrible number’ of people in Finland who do nothing:

Yes, this welfare society has gone too far. It cannot be assumed that one part of the people supports a large part of the people who do nothing. [. . .] I don’t want to be so terribly harsh now, but somehow, it has gone too far that everything should be free and you don’t have to do anything. (H14)

Many interviewees suggested that social security hinders initiative and the willingness to work. One executive criticised social security for making people passive:

And again, I come back to the fact that, yes, I see that people should really take responsibility for their own lives. Sure, people have different capacities for that, but if one’s life is too secure, then the desire to try disappears. And, after all, that’s what keeps this world going. (BE7)

In the Nordic model, the poorest people have been seen as deserving of support; the top earners considered the problems of social policy in the following manner: ‘makes you lazy, level-headed’ (BE4), ‘gives wrong signals’ (E15) and ‘takes away initiative’ (E15). One heir, in charge of his family’s investment company (H7), castigated the ‘mindset’ that the welfare state creates, seeing it as the main problem. Thus, following Elias, the less advantageous groups were presented a counterfeit for the idealised we by labelling them as lazy and irresponsible (Elias, 1994b).

Furthermore, a few top earners went further in criticising the state-led welfare society by evoking an imagery of a spoiled we, thereby suggesting that the entire society is spoiled and turning into ‘a society of complaints’ troubled by a clingy dependency on the state:

When I speak about this society of complaints, we are developing the idea that [. . .] the state must take care of all people’s problems, that they are not the responsibility of the people themselves. Schools must take care of children’s education; it is not up to the parents. This kind of trend is that if something goes wrong with me, it’s the state’s fault and the state has to compensate me in some way, so that’s a funny idea. (BE19)

Further, another executive suggested that the welfare universalism may spoil the we-ness to the extent that the entire society is endangered: ‘There are people who really deserve social benefits’, yet ‘if we all come to hinge on social security, the whole system will collapse’ (BE19). Overall, considering the recipients of social benefits, the top earners cast aside traditional Nordic solidaristic ideals (Hall, 2017) and instead preferred a parlance of blaming the poor and propagating more Anglo-American ideas regarding welfare, which emphasise personal responsibility over universalism and solidarity that would extend to the society as a whole (Kenworthy, 2020).

Unreasonable taxation: Stepping out of we-ness

Finally, taxation has been an important constitutive element of the Nordic welfare society as it finances public services and alleviates inequalities by reducing income differences (Morel & Palme, 2012; Wang et al., 2012). Accordingly, taxation was a central theme for the top earners too. While the wealthy often have been seeking tax cuts (Hope & Limberg, 2022), some Finnish top earners did see the point of taxation. For example, a few executives indicated that extensive public services are received in return for taxes (BE29), such as long-term care for a family member (BE14) or counselling services (BE30). One executive also considered progressive taxation as justified: ‘In this social model of ours, I understand progressive taxation very well, that yes, I must pay more taxes. It’s quite clear’ (BE20).

A few entrepreneurs also considered Finnish taxation to be reasonable. One entrepreneur had lived in California, paying 41% of taxes and social security contributions there: ‘Indonesian taxation is 35% and you get absolutely nothing in return. In my opinion, the level of taxation in Finland is not shocking’ (E12). Even a few heirs understood taxes. One heir said that he is ‘a very proud taxpayer’ who ‘has paid a lot of tax to this country so gladly’, as Finland and the Nordic countries are ‘a great democracy project’ with an ‘overwhelming strength compared to all other systems in the world’ (H22). Moreover, a few top earners wanted to censure those who move out of Finland in pursuit of cheaper taxation and considered tax avoidance as morally reprehensible.

However, the few positive views on taxation were clearly in the minority among the top earners, being limited to singular dictums. In comparison, there was clearly a more critical stance on taxation, with detailed and multifaceted argumentation that was often stringent in tone. According to the executives, taxation was somewhat harsh (BE25), both indirect and direct taxes were ‘really high’ (BE3), the overall tax rate was ‘hugely high’ (BE6) and taxation was too high in Finland and lower everywhere else (BE11). The entrepreneurs were also critical, claiming that taxation was ‘absolutely dead’ (E30) or approaching ‘an absolutely unsustainable point’ (E10). Similarly, the heirs routinely judged taxation as having ‘gone to excesses’ (H14) or being ‘something completely incomprehensible’ (H2) or ‘absolutely terrible’ (H24). One heir summed it up as ‘Finland’s taxation, quite frankly, sucks’ (H24).

A few claimed that taxation is harmful from the perspective of incentives and contributes to the prevailing indolence by providing financial social benefits. According to a 40-year-old serial entrepreneur, ‘it can’t come from nowhere that we spend so much in taxes, and no one wants to work a lot anymore’ (E18).

Many also took up the problem of global tax competition and were afraid that the best people would be led out of the country, as the educated and wealthy will leave to go to places with lighter taxation. Simultaneously, many warned that the we-ness of society was losing its grip on people. As one executive warned, ‘We have to be able to compete for good surgeons, good athletes, good managers, good professionals and so on’ (BE26). Further, many were worried that companies will leave. An heir suggested,

Taxation is absolutely terrible in this country, and you can see that because a lot of companies move to Estonia. Our politicians can only blame themselves. The borders are open now. [. . .] I think we have crazy taxation. Since it is not in congruence with our neighbouring countries, the money is transferred to where it is most profitable in the long run. That’s just the way it is. (BE21)

In context, the top earners also understood tax flight. Quite a few executives saw nothing wrong with people leaving the country for ‘tax technical reasons’ to minimise their taxation. One executive stated, ‘It’s a personal decision’ (BE13), while another said, ‘if you want to transfer the money, and it’s legal, why wouldn’t you?’ (BE23). According to one entrepreneur, ‘there is nothing wrong with that. [. . .] If some society offers them a better alternative than Finland in that situation, I don’t see it as unpatriotic at all’ (E10). Thus, a few of them suggested that instead of judging those who left, the society should look in the mirror and ask itself what it has done wrong to drive the rich away.

Often tax avoidance was also framed as not a matter of we-ness, but rather an individual’s choice made outside of politics and regardless of the society. As an heir claimed, he was not moralising on those who leave, for example, for Portugal:

I rather think that, aha, well, people are like this. I think that it is important for them to have whatever they think – less taxes perhaps. If they think so, then those people have the freedom to leave. (H13)

One executive recalled how he had even pondered on the morality of tax avoidance with the archbishop, when the two of them happened to meet, yet he considered Finland as comparable to totalitarian East Germany:

The people who moved from East Germany to the West, yes, they worked illegally, but did they do something ethically wrong? [. . .] if you have a legal opportunity to escape from conditions that you find unreasonable – is that so wrong? (BE5)

Top earners were often also troubled by the particular taxes they face. Although all groups criticised the level of taxation on earned incomes, the executives, in particular, were annoyed by the progressive taxation of earned incomes. One executive laughingly recollected how he had to pay 70% of his bonuses in taxation and called it ‘practically ludicrous’ (BE24). Indeed, top-earning executives do pay higher taxes than other top earners, as entrepreneurs and heirs receive most of their income as lower-taxed capital income (Kuusela & Kantola, 2020).

The inheritance tax, which ranges from 7% to 36% and is maximum 19% within a family, particularly irritated top earners with large fortunes. Heirs called it ‘harsh’ (H18), ‘absurd’ (H12), ‘absolutely horrible, really bad’ (H14), ‘troublesome’ (H6), ‘idiotic and useless’ (H10) or ‘a tax of envy’ (H8). Similarly, one entrepreneur stated that inheritance tax ‘is perhaps the biggest problem here among wealthy people’ and should, therefore, be abolished (E20).

Many heirs and entrepreneurs expressed that family fortunes should be kept intact. One heir described inheritance tax as ‘a shocking problem’ as he ‘wants the future generation to have something to build on’ (H2). An entrepreneur suggested that a person should not be punished for dying: ‘I don’t know if they had a similar system in ancient Rome, but I don’t think that they went to the funerals to take away their money’ (E20). Another entrepreneur felt desperate, as he stated that his children will have to sell some property to pay the taxes on inheritances: ‘In my opinion, it is starting to approach some sort of communism and totalitarianism’ (E10).

Thus, regarding taxation, the top earners overall appeared to call for a substantially lower level of taxation for themselves, which would not be typical of the Nordic welfare model, would not show progressiveness, and would entail a reduction in inheritance tax. With these tax cuts, the top earners appeared to propose a welfare model that would deviate from the Nordic and Central European welfare models, which routinely rely on rather similar or even heavier taxation than that in Finland (Dorling & Koljonen, 2020; Eurostat, 2023; Kenworthy, 2020).

Summary of the results: The ambivalent fantasy

According to our analysis, the Finnish top 0.1% earners had developed a shared political reasoning akin to Elias’s establishment fantasy, which grants the top earners the role of a resolute vanguard and loads the fantasy with emotional power by speaking in the name of we-ness.

Reading the data, however, the fantasy was somewhat contradictory, as the top earners made use of both old and new policy ideas often considered in opposition to each other (cf. Greve, 2020; Hall, 2017; Kenworthy, 2020). Thus, the top earners both endorsed and questioned the traditional core policies of the Nordic model that had curtailed economic inequality (cf. Blomgren et al., 2014; Dorling & Koljonen, 2020; Kenworthy, 2020). Yet, while supportive of universal services and equality, they also propagated more Anglo-American ideas that blamed the poor and emphasised personal responsibility over solidarity (cf. Greve, 2020; Hall, 2017; Kenworthy, 2020). In our analysis, the top earners were supportive of both stances and thus seemed to suggest that it would be possible to save the Nordic welfare model by removing its central features. At the same time, they safeguarded their own material interests, above all, propagating tax cuts.

The Eliasian perspective describes how the top earners bring emotional power to their political ideas by employing collective we-ness. They praised ‘us’ as a community of equals while also castigating the poorest people living on social benefits as spoilers of we-ness. Furthermore, they criticised taxation, a key feature supportive of the Nordic model (Morel & Palme, 2012; Wang et al., 2012), and saw tax avoidance as not a moral violation of we-ness but a matter of freedom of choice.

Thus, from the perspective of elites’ self-justification (cf. Hecht, 2017; Melldahl, 2017), ambivalence resulted from their attempt to mobilise various moral goods to justify their political views. More than the often-used concepts of justification and consecration, Elias’s notion of fantasy captures well this internal ambivalence in such self-justification. Thus, upper classes, to justify their position above others, craft fantasies that can creatively combine moralities that come from various traditions – in this case, the ideas of the social democratic Nordic welfare model emphasising universalism, equality and solidarity (Hall, 2017; Kenworthy, 2020; Törnqvist, 2019) and the workfarist ideas emphasising work as a central obligation (Greve, 2020; Knotz, 2018). When combined into one fantasy, these various moral goods serve the upper classes’ self-justification effectively as a comprehensive justification narrative.

Conclusions

Recent research has emphasised how wealthy upper classes seek to justify their moral standing in society (cf. Hecht, 2017; Melldahl, 2017). Here, we advanced this by exploring how they employ moral goods to justify themselves when expressing their political views.

We suggested that Elias’s notions of figuration and establishment fantasy provide apt tools for understanding how the wealthy upper classes creatively combine various forms of moral justification to advocate for their political interests. Earlier studies of upper-class self-justification have focused on particular reasonings, such as consecration (Holmqvist, 2017, 2020; Khan, 2011; Khan & Jerolmack, 2013), ordinariness (Friedman & Laurison, 2019; Friedman & Reeves, 2020; Sherman, 2017) and meritocracy (Khan, 2012; Khan & Jerolmack, 2013; Mijs, 2021; Mijs & Savage, 2020; Törnqvist, 2019), as well as studied conservatism (Suhay et al., 2021) and philanthropy (Beckert, 2022; Sklair & Glucksberg, 2021) as forms of political justification. We contribute to these studies by suggesting that the wealthy, in their self-justification efforts, are sensitive to the particular social context. They inventively combine various moral goods with tailored establishment fantasies that employ the particular moral goods important in the underlying society, yet at the same time, they advance their own specific political interests. In this study, the wealthy created an establishment fantasy as a melange of moral goods to justify the upper classes’ political views in an egalitarian society: they applauded redistributive egalitarianism in a country where it is a highly valued moral good (Hall, 2017; Törnqvist, 2019), yet supported cuts to redistribution and taxation, which would most likely benefit themselves.

We also argued that the Eliasian figurational approach allows us to understand how the upper classes justify themselves politically in the current environment of rapid economic and technological change. We suggested that the current wealth elites form flexible upper-class figurations that incorporate the interests of old and new money by building a shared political establishment fantasy, which serves as a banner by inviting the wealthy stratum to join the shared upper-class political imaginary. Thus, today’s wealthy do not emerge politically as stable and immobile upper classes, but rather as flexible wealth elite establishments keenly interested in politics; they present themselves as reformers or even revolutionaries in an apt and self-assured vanguard with a clear grasp of how society should be reformed.

Since studies of upper-class justification have highlighted the prevalence of meritocratic reasoning, which emphasises one’s own efforts and capacities (Törnqvist, 2019, p. 563; see also Littler, 2018; Mijs, 2021; Mijs & Savage, 2020), we also suggest that the upper classes’ reformist calls may be one version of meritocratic justification. Vanguard fantasies are particularly fitting for the meritocratic elites of modern and constantly evolving societies because they may develop political self-identities as agile reformers, or even underdogs, in relation to the tardy or lagging society and the gawky and bloated state, in particular. Indeed, revolutionary change has been one of the key fantasies of modern societies and employed to countless ends. Thus, the established classes of current globalised capitalism may also employ such change to legitimise their position at the top (see also Kantola, 2009).

Our results highlight the need to study further the politics of the current upper classes. The wealthiest groups are politically successful in advancing their interests across advanced democracies (e.g. Gilens, 2012; Goss, 2016; Schakel et al., 2020), such as by enacting tax cuts for the rich (Hope & Limberg, 2022). Thus, it is important to also study the actual outcomes of policies identifying the differences between what is said and what is done (Khan & Jerolmack, 2013).

Moreover, we need to not only measure the political attitudes of the wealthy but also explore the narratives, myths and fantasies that are constructed inventively to advance the political interests of the wealthiest stratum (see Greve, 2020). Indeed, in political advocacy and public relations, the creation of coalitions that unite separate interests under a shared banner is a standard practice for lobbyists seeking wider support for their causes (see Junk, 2019). The wealthy have the means to develop and circulate strategic narratives to justify their political interests. In addition, we should understand not only how these ideas are propagated publicly, but also how the wealthy may strategically retreat from public life and employ other means of political influence (Kantola & Vesa, 2023). Thus, we need to explore the multiple forums in which political argumentation is crafted and study lobbying, think tanks, clubs, societies, elite networks and the media, asking how and where new reasoning and tactics are invented, marketed and circulated.

Furthermore, we could also compare elite imaginaries across societies (see also Friedman et al., 2023) to understand their societal roles in the wealthy stratum and ways of justifying themselves in particular contexts. While political justifications are deeply intertwined with society’s deeper cultural and moral values, as our study shows, it may well be so that political reasonings are circulated globally, appearing as political fashions across societies.