Preparing For Power

by Caroline Hodges Persell, Peter W. Cookson Jr.

Why do private boarding schools produce such a disproportionate number of leaders in business, government, and the arts? In the most comprehensive study of its kind to date, two sociologists describe the complex ways in which elite schools prepare students for success and power, and they also provide a lively behind-the-scenes look at prep–school life and underlife.

270 pages, Hardcover

First published December 12, 1985

Reviews

[Joel Everett · Rating 3 out of 5]

Though this book is from the mid-1980s, I found it highly interesting. The question of socialization is not whether one is socialized; we are all socialized, but how, with whom, and for what end are we socialized is the question, and there is a vast difference - at least at the time of this book - between how socialization occurs in the public school and socialization occurs at an elite boarding school.

Confidence, Contacts, Character, and a dash of Charisma (formed by the first three) is the intended outcome of the socialization that occurs at the "Select 16" which feeds into the Ivy League universities which feeds into the upper political, business, and legal class of society.

It would be most interesting for a follow up study to be done in the 21st century now.