Modern and ancient elite: Fighter jet flying over the PyramidsWhat should an elite do to gain popular support while still maintaining a more comfortable lifestyle than commoners? Kleptocrats throughout the ages have resorted to a mixture of four solutions:
1. Disarm the populace, and arm the elite. That's much easier in these days of high-tech weaponry, produced only in industrial plants and easily monopolized by an elite, than in ancient times of spears and clubs easily made at home.
Jared Diamond [Guns, Germs, and Steel: The Fates of Human Societies, 1997]
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