The Positive Background of Hindu Sociology c7.s16.t4.1

c7.s16.t4.1

Here the facts of Hindu culture and politics find themselves in general agreement with the doctrines of the Italian sosiologist, Pareto, in *Les Systèmes Socialistes* (1902) and *Trattato di Sociologia Generale* (1916). No society has ever existed without dominant classes, the “*élites*,” says he. The distinction between the upper and the lower socio-economic orders furnishes the fundamental basis of all societal organizations. But the *élites*, says Pareto, have a tendency to degenerate, decay and disappear. The dissolution of the upper classes is not only moral but physical as well. They are ultimately replaced by new dominant classes such as emerge out of the people. Sociologically, Pareto never detects the government of societies in a democratic manner. The course is from aristocracy to aristocracy. Only, the aristocracies rise, have their day, cease to be, and give place to new aristocracies. In his doctrine of the “circulation of the *élites*” there is much that Indian history as the history of other countries can offer as corroborative data.