This "New Class" doesn't own the factories on paper—the state does. But because they control the state, they control the allocation of resources, housing, cars, and luxury goods. They are the Party officials, the secret police, the managers, and the technocrats.
"The ownership of capital is not the only, nor even the decisive, source of power and privilege. The new class acquires its power and privileges through political monopoly."
In the PDF version of the text, readers will encounter Djilas’s piercing analysis of how this class operates:
Critics on the left often point out that Djilas was bitter after losing a power struggle with Tito. Fair enough. But ad hominem attacks don't invalidate his observation. If anything, being inside the kitchen gave him the perfect view of where the filth was hidden. Milovan Djilas Nova Klasa.pdf
Djilas wrote with the authority of an insider. He described the psychological profile of the "New Class" member: a man who preaches asceticism while living in luxury, who speaks of freedom while enforcing censorship, and who claims to represent the masses while fearing them.
He was a true believer. In the immediate post-war years, he was a staunch Stalinist, advocating for the ruthless suppression of opposition and the collectivization of agriculture. However, the 1948 Tito-Stalin split was a watershed moment for Djilas. As Yugoslavia broke away from the Soviet bloc, Djilas was tasked with analyzing the conflict. In doing so, he began to see that the Soviet system was not a distortion of Marxism, but perhaps a logical conclusion of its centralized power structure.
Milovan Djilas's "The New Class" (1957) serves as a foundational critique of Communist systems, arguing that the political bureaucracy emerged as a privileged, controlling elite despite claiming to abolish class structures. The text highlights how this new class maintained power through total control of ideological and state apparatuses, transforming revolutionary ideals into authoritarian rule. For a deep dive into the text, you can access scholarly excerpts of Milovan Djilas: The New Class through resources provided by the University of California, Berkeley. This "New Class" doesn't own the factories on
The original Serbo-Croatian title is Nova Klasa , but the full English title is The New Class: An Analysis of the Communist System . The central thesis of the book is simple yet explosive: In communist regimes, the state does not belong to the workers. Instead, it belongs to the party bureaucrats.
This new class did not derive its power from private property deeds, but from "administrative monopoly." They controlled the state, the economy, the media, and the military.
Because the book was published in 1957, its copyright status varies by country. In the United States, works published before 1964 had to have their copyright renewed; many forgot to renew Djilas’ work, though Harcourt Brace (the first US publisher) retains rights in some jurisdictions. However, the text is widely available in the public domain via academic repositories. "The ownership of capital is not the only,
Djilas argued that the communist revolution did not abolish class; it replaced one ruling class with another. He defined the "New Class" as:
Unlike the capitalist bourgeoisie who owned factories, the "New Class" owns political control . They control nationalization, distribution, and the police. They use their political power to secure villas, cars, special food stores, and elite schools for their children—exactly the opposite of Marx's promise of a classless society.