The dream looks simple. A motivated citizen. A rising political star. A national leader chosen by the people. Many still believe in it. Some even teach it to children. Work hard. Play by the rules. Get involved in your party. Serve the public. One day, if you keep at it, you will reach the top. This idea is not a complete lie. But it misses almost everything that matters. It is all about elite circles.
In reality, politics is not built on speeches, handshakes, or plans. It is built on trust. Not the trust of voters. The trust of those who already rule. Those who own. Those who finance.
Without their green light, your climb is slow. Often impossible.
The ladder that does not reach the top
Every major party has its own ladder. You start low. Hand out flyers. Join local meetings. Build loyalty.
This path works well if you aim for minor offices. A town council. A regional board. Maybe a seat in parliament.
But when it comes to the real positions of power, things change. The ladder narrows. The rungs are guarded. The names that rise are not just loyal. They are familiar. Connected. Safe.
You may have ideas. You may have charisma. But without the right people backing you, it ends there.
You will lose before the public ever hears your name.
Eton is not a school, it is a gate
In Britain, many pretend this is not true. They point to free elections, party primaries, and open debates. But they rarely question where most prime ministers actually come from.
Eton College is not just prestigious because of tradition. It is a gate that leads directly to power. This elite boarding school has educated a remarkable number of British leaders, from prime ministers to cabinet members.
Yet it does not offer special classes in public policy. It does not teach statecraft better than any other institution. What it offers instead is access—access to a network so dense and so trusted that it shapes careers before they even begin.
When a student graduates from Eton, he enters a closed circle. That circle includes banking executives, media magnates, civil servants, and politicians. It forms an informal alliance built on shared identity, mutual protection, and long-term strategy. That is what matters. Not knowledge, not intelligence. Not even popularity.
Oxford, PPE, and the making of a political class
The Eton path often continues through Oxford. While other universities produce scientists, engineers, and economists, Oxford’s Philosophy, Politics, and Economics program produces Britain’s rulers.
The PPE degree has become the unofficial training ground for political elites. It introduces students to the language of governance. But more importantly, it brings them into contact with party recruiters, think tanks, and future journalists.
At Oxford, future MPs meet future donors. Student union campaigns teach them how to manipulate media narratives. Debates are not just exercises in persuasion—they are auditions.
And when these students graduate, they do not just apply for jobs. They are already whispered about in corridors of power. Their futures are planned long before they run for office.
Ivy League credentials and the American vetting process
Across the Atlantic, a similar pattern plays out. In the United States, elite political figures are overwhelmingly drawn from the Ivy League. Harvard, Yale, and Princeton dominate this space. Harvard alone has educated eight U.S. presidents.
These schools do not just teach policy. They provide exposure. At the Kennedy School of Government, future senators and mayors rub shoulders with retired diplomats and former CIA officers. The lectures matter less than the introductions.
The Ivy League acts as a trust filter. If you survive there, you have already passed a key test. You have learned how to speak their language. How to avoid certain ideas. How to win influence without sounding radical.
It is not an education system. It is a grooming system for future members of the elite.
ENA and France’s technocratic ruling class
In France, the story is more formalized. The École nationale d’administration was created after World War II with one goal—training the country’s top civil servants.
But in practice, it evolved into something else. ENA became the cradle of France’s political class. Presidents, prime ministers, and top bureaucrats almost always came from there.
Students at ENA do not just learn administration. They learn how to play the game. How to manage alliances. How to preserve power. The result is a professionalized elite that knows each other’s secrets before they ever face the public.
The French call this system the “énarchie.” It is no longer a democracy of citizens. It is a republic of technocrats.
Germany’s discreet network of power
Germany does not advertise its political grooming process as openly. There is no Eton. No ENA. No official ladder that leads to the Chancellery.
But the network still exists. It works quietly through foundations tied to political parties. The Konrad Adenauer Stiftung for conservatives. The Friedrich Ebert Stiftung for social democrats. These institutions fund research, select promising candidates, and introduce them to party insiders.
Beyond that, there are quiet alliances among legal scholars, economic advisors, and top-level journalists. If you do not enter one of these circles, your voice stays local. You may serve in the Bundestag. You may even lead a committee. But the real decisions will always be made elsewhere.
Why trust beats ideas in modern politics
At every level of politics, trust matters more than talent. That trust is not earned in debates. It is not gained through years of loyal service. It is built in specific places and under specific rules.
The super-rich, the powerful corporations, the entrenched media—they do not trust strangers. They trust people who share their background. Who understand the limits of political change. Who do not panic during crises or try to reinvent the system.
That is why elite circles matter. They are not just about privilege, they are mechanisms of control. And they ensure that politics remains predictable, manageable, and safe for the people who benefit most from the current system.
The silent architecture of lodges and secret circles
Mention Freemasonry or elite lodges, and people laugh. They imagine conspiracy theories and ancient symbols. But they miss the point.
These groups are real. They operate below the surface, but they are not supernatural. They are social structures, they organize loyalty, transmit influence, and offer protection.
In many countries, especially in Southern Europe and Latin America, Masonic lodges have played central roles in political recruitment. They hold private meetings, they mediate between rival factions. They fund campaigns. Not for ideology, but for long-term access.
Even in places where formal lodges are weak, their logic remains. Alumni societies, business roundtables, and elite clubs perform the same function. They create informal channels of communication that bypass democratic institutions.
Hand signs, discreet references, shared rituals—they are not jokes. They are signals. They say: I belong. I know the code. I will not betray the circle.
Can outsiders succeed in modern democracies?
Sometimes, yes. But not in the way people think. Outsiders must either build new elite circles or be absorbed into existing ones.
Donald Trump had no experience in governance, but he had something else—control of mass media, billions in wealth, and old ties to financial elites.
Emmanuel Macron positioned himself as an outsider but came from Rothschild & Co and graduated from ENA.
Real outsiders rarely make it. Those who do often transform themselves into insiders along the way. They hire consultants from elite firms, they align themselves with key financial actors. And they soften their rhetoric until they become “electable.”
Even populist movements need funding, legal support, and media reach. Without these tools, no message survives. No campaign breaks through. No politician rises.
The illusion of openness in democratic systems
Democracies speak the language of openness. They promise mobility, merit, and fairness. But their institutions are surrounded by invisible walls.
Those walls are not made of laws. They are made of relationships. An unknown teacher may be brilliant. A factory worker may have insight. But without a network, they are nothing.
You can build that network. But it takes time, wealth, and access. You must speak the language of the elite. You must convince them that you are not dangerous.
That is why prestigious circles matter. They do not just elevate careers. They decide who gets to play the game at all.
Networks: The real currency of politics is not votes
Votes come later. First comes selection. That selection does not happen in parliament. It happens in corridors, foundations, private rooms, and alumni gatherings.
There are exceptions. But even exceptions must walk near the gate. They must show they are responsible. That they understand boundaries. That they can work with the system.
The price of entry is not brilliance. It is familiarity. The right last name, the right school. The right jokes in the right company.
In the end, you can be a politician. You can serve your country. You can lead. But if you truly want to rise to the highest level, one thing becomes clear.
Eton suits you. Harvard opens doors. And the lodge already knows your name.
Top circles: Even Richard Dawkins could not see himself
Richard Dawkins once wondered how a nation as powerful as the United States could elect someone like George W. Bush. He asked why Americans could not find a better president. His tone suggested moral shock. As if the system had failed reason.
But that outrage hid a contradiction.
Dawkins himself did not rise purely on merit. He came from privilege. His education, his academic position, his publishing deals—all came through the very kinds of networks he criticizes in others. He benefited from the Oxford system, he thrived in elite circles that trusted him because he looked like them, spoke like them, and played by their rules.
He moved in the same type of closed ecosystem that elevates mediocre politicians to power. Yet he condemned the result while remaining blind to his own elevation.
He saw clientelism in Bush. He missed it in himself.
Dawkins built a career exposing irrational beliefs. But when it came to politics, he clung to one. He believed that democracy naturally selects the best. That voters just make mistakes. That better people exist somewhere, waiting to be found.
He could not admit the truth. That power is not about finding the best. It is about trusting the familiar. That is why Bush won. That is also why Dawkins became a global figure.
Both were chosen. Not for their uniqueness. But for their alignment with trusted networks.
My solution: Make them accountable and get rid of them
Clintelism is the worst things that can happen in politics. It clogs the entire political process. The best party – for the beginning – is that destroys clientelism.
Only 1% of the most moral, 1% of the most intelligent, and 1% of the most talented.
Newspapers and people owned secret agencies should discover patron-clintelism networks and check each other if they are not under the influence of it.
As I have told, even if politics is naked, people won’t do anything because they are stupid (in terms of IQ or in a broader sense) and mainly because they are programed to do politics in small hunter-gathering groups.
If the media tell them, lobbyists control everything, there is very clever system of interconnected banks that are owned by the super-rich families. Give them three months of brainwashing, and the same elites remain in power.
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