The Blind Spot

An urgent and shocking examination of how the ultra-rich dominate democracies, hoard political power, and maintain inequality—and how we might chart another path.
The wealthy and powerful few have dominated the masses throughout most of human history. This is starkly visible now more than ever—a time when the gulf between oligarchs and the average citizen is larger than any gap that existed during European serfdom or the slave society of Imperial Rome. We have arrived at the most blatant version of oligarchy that the United States has endured, with politicians bought and paid for across the political spectrum. One thing is clear: the world is heading even deeper into a state of inequality that oligarchs and elites of past eras could only have dreamed of.
In The Blind Spot, political scientist Jeffrey A. Winters delivers an urgent, incisive account of how we reached this era of in-your-face oligarchy, exposing how the ultra-rich have wielded power to preserve wealth and prevent democracies from threatening their advantages. By tracing the evolution of oligarchy across the globe and through modern history, we see how the rule of the wealthy isn’t just a flaw in our democracy, it has been built into its very foundations. From the Founders to the present, the rules of the political process have been designed to allow the wealthy to set the agenda and determine the outcomes, dominating the marketplace of ideas and rewiring the law to defend, hide, and increase their money and power. Now, we exist in a state of “participatory inequality,” a world in which the 99.99% of us participate openly and freely—democratically, even—in our own ongoing exclusion and disenfranchisement. When looked at carefully, Winters shows, it is clear that today’s global crisis is earned and, if anything, long overdue.
But powerful change begins when we have a clear understanding of where we are and know the action we must take to get us where we deserve to be. The Blind Spot exposes just how bad our political reality has become and introduces bold ideas for how we might shift the balance of power. While the rich and powerful do not cede power quietly, this period of shocking inequality is an opportunity for change.

Jeffrey A. Winters is a professor of political science at Northwestern University and the Director of the Equality Development and Globalization Studies Program at Northwestern’s Buffett Institute for Global Affairs. Renowned for his groundbreaking work on oligarchs and elites, Winters wrote the influential book Oligarchy, which reintroduced the term to modern audiences and won the 2012 Luebbert Prize for the best book in comparative politics. His insights have been featured in major media outlets including The New York Times, The Washington Post, and NPR.