The remainder of this book is divided into four parts comprising seventeen chapters. Part One, entitled “In equality Regimes in History,” consists of five chapters. Chapter 1 is a general introduction to what I call ternary (or trifunc
tional) socie ties, that is, socie ties comprising three functional groups (clergy, nobility, and third estate). Chapter 2 is devoted to Eu ro pean “socie ties of orders,” based on an equilibrium between intellectual and warrior elites and on specific forms of owner ship and power relations. Chapter 3 looks at the ad
vent of owner ship society, especially in the symbolic rupture of the French Revolution, which attempted to establish a radical division between property rights (theoretically open to all) and regalian rights (henceforth the mono poly of the state) but which came to grief over the issue of per sis tent in equality of wealth. Chapter 4 examines the development of a hyper inegalitarian form of owner ship society in nineteenth century France (up to the eve of World War I). Chapter 5 studies Eu ro pean variants of the transition from trifunctional to proprietarian logics, focusing on the British and Swedish cases. This will illus
trate the variety of pos si ble trajectories as well as the importance of collective mobilizations and help us to understand the influence of po liti cal and ideo
logical differences on the transformation of in equality regimes.
Part Two, entitled “Slave and Colonial Socie ties,” consists of four chapters.
Chapter 6 looks at slave society, the most extreme type of in equality regime. I focus particularly on the abolition of slavery in the nineteenth century and on the types of compensation offered to slave owners. This will help us to appre
ciate the power of the quasi sacred owner ship regime that existed in this pe
riod, which has left its stamp on the world we live in today. Chapter 7 looks at
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the structure of in equality in postslavery colonial socie ties, which, though less extreme than the slave socie ties they supplanted, nevertheless also profoundly influenced the structure of today’s in equality, both between and within coun
tries. Chapters 8 and 9 examine the way in which non European trifunctional socie ties were affected by contact with Eu ro pean colonial and proprietarian powers. I focus first on the case of India (where ancient status divisions proved unusually tenacious, partly because of their rigid codification by the British col
onizers). I then take a broader Eurasian perspective, looking at China, Japan, and Iran.
Part Three, entitled “The Great Transformation of the Twentieth Century,”
has four chapters. Chapter 10 analyzes the collapse of owner ship society in the wake of two world wars, the Great Depression, the communist challenge, and decolonization, combined with popu lar and ideological mobilizations (in
cluding the rise of trade unions and social democracy) that had been brewing since the late nineteenth century. The result was a type of society less unequal than the owner ship society that preceded it. Chapter 11 looks at the achieve
ments and limitations of postwar social democracy. Among social democra
cy’s shortcomings were its failure to develop a more just idea of property, its inability to confront the challenge of in equality in higher education, and its lack of a theory of transnational re distribution. Chapter 12 considers the com
munist and postcommunist socie ties of Rus sia, China, and Eastern Eu rope, in
cluding the postcommunist contribution to the recent rise of in equality and turn to identity politics. Chapter 13 views the current global hypercapitalist in equality regime in historical perspective, with an emphasis on its inability to respond adequately to the two crises that are undermining it: the crisis of in equality and the environmental crisis.
Part Four, entitled “Rethinking the Dimensions of Po liti cal Conflict,” con
sists of four chapters, in which I study the changing social structure of party electorates and po liti cal movements since the mid twentieth century and spec
ulate about changes yet to come. Chapter 14 looks at the historical conditions under which an egalitarian co ali tion first developed and later fell apart. In France the redistributive program of social democracy was convincing enough to draw support from working class people of diff er ent backgrounds. Chapter 15 considers the disaggregation, gentrification, and “Brahminization” of postwar social democracy in the United States and United Kingdom and finds common structural causes in both countries. Chapter 16 extends the analy sis to other Western democracies as well as to Eastern Eu rope, India, and Brazil. I also con
sider the emergence of a social nativist trap in the first two de cades of the
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—+1 twenty first century. Today’s identity politics is fueled, I argue, by the lack of a
persuasive internationalist egalitarian platform—in other words, by the absence of a truly credible social federalism. Chapter 17 derives lessons from the his
torical experiences recounted in the previous chapters and envisions a partici
patory form of socialism for the pre sent century. In par tic u lar, I consider a pos
si ble basis for a just property regime resting on two main pillars: first, au then tic power sharing and voting rights within firms as steps beyond co management and self management and toward true social owner ship, and second, a strongly progressive tax on property, the proceeds of which would finance capital grants to every young adult, thereby instituting a system of provisional owner ship and permanent circulation of wealth. I also look into how educational and fiscal justice might be guaranteed by citizen oversight. Fi nally, I investigate what is necessary to ensure a just democracy and a just border system. The key issue here is how to reor ga nize the global economy along social federalist lines so as to allow the emergence of new forms of fiscal, social, and environmental soli
darity, with the ultimate goal of substituting true global governance for the trea
ties that today mandate free movement of goods and capital.
Hurried readers might be tempted to turn directly to the final chapter and conclusion. Although I cannot stop them, I warn them that they may find it difficult to follow the argument without at least glancing at Parts One through Four. Others may feel that the material presented in Parts One and Two deals with such ancient history that they fail to grasp its relevance and therefore prefer to focus on Parts Three and Four. I have tried to begin each section and chapter with enough recapitulations and references to allow the book to be read in more than one way. Each reader is thus free to choose a path, even though the most logical sequence is to read the chapters in the order they are presented.
Only the principal sources and references are cited in the text and footnotes.
Readers seeking more detailed information about the historical sources, bib
liographic references, and methods used in this book are invited to consult the online technical appendix at http:// piketty . pse . ens . fr / ideology . 17
17. All statistical series, graphs, and tables in this book are also available online at http:// piketty . pse . ens . fr / ideology.
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