It is easy to believe that the middle-class working individual, whether he or she is white collar or blue collar, exercises little political power, except during an election. It is also easy to think that we don’t have true democracy; political representation elected by the people, for the people, and controlled by these people. This is an ideology that is often worn out. Instead, these elected representatives are controlled by political elites: high-ranking political "gladiators", the media, lobbyists, and, though it may not seem evident, big business. It is, in essence, commonly believed by most. Some reasons why political elites at times dominate government groups will be examined in this essay. Also, there will be an analysis of those who were political elites in Canada over the past centuries. Also, some new discoveries may be turned up that help us have a better understanding of this elitism. Finally, we will discuss if interest groups and minorities have real political power, or perhaps they are just given token compensation. Hopefully, by the end of this essay, there will be a better understanding of who really has political power in Canada. Though this paper is an analysis of elitism, we must also dissect the concept of democracy. Needless to say, without democracy in a political system, elitism would not exist. Democracy was a concept developed by the Greeks and the Romans during the classical period. It comes from the Greek word "demos", which means "the people"; and "kratien", which means "to rule". In essence, democracy is a nation’s people rule themselves through elected representatives. Funk and Wagnalls Encyclopedia remind us of an important point though. Though the words "democracy" and "republic" are used together universally, they are definitely not the same thing. For instance, Canada is defined as a constitutional monarchy. It is not a republic; yet, we use a democratic system. Another is China, whose ...
