The Social Closure of the Cultural Elite. The Case of Artists in Sweden, 1945–2004

Abstract

This chapter identifies and analyses elites in a social domain where formal positions of power are few and far between – using the fine arts as an example – by combining Weberian closure theory with Pierre Bourdieu’s concept of ‘fields’. Based on a database of more than 14,000 artists, active during the period of 1945–2008, an elite group of 627 is identified. When their social origins are analysed, a first main result of the inquiry is that this aesthetic elite is strikingly similar to other elites who are defined through formal positions of power: the elite are disproportionally drawn from the upper tiers of society. A second main result is that the recruitment to leading – informal – positions in the Swedish field of art displays a process of social closure. Over time, the elite are increasingly populated by individuals with origins in the ‘intellectual’ or ‘cultural’ fractions of the middle and upper classes.