1800s: Martineau · Tocqueville · Marx · Spencer · Le Bon · Ward · Pareto · Tönnies · Veblen · Simmel · Durkheim · Addams · Mead · Weber · Du Bois · Mannheim · Elias In sociology, the ruling class of a society is the social class who set and decide the political and economic agenda of society.
In the 21st century, the worldwide political economy established by globalization has created a transnational capitalist class who are not native to any one country.
[4] To replace the capitalist mode of production in a society, Marxism seeks to void the political legitimacy of the ruling class to hold power of government.
[4] In the political economies of the former Marxist-Leninist states, the nomenklatura are the ruling class who control the means of production, allocate resources, etc for the society, per the directions of the party.
[5][page needed] In that vein, the sociologist C. Wright Mills identified and distinguished between the ruling class and the power élite who make the decisions for society.