Bobos in Paradise

1. The New Elite: Bourgeois Bohemians (Bobos)

The members of the new information age elite are bourgeois bohemians.

Meritocracy replaces aristocracy. America's elite has shifted from a WASP establishment based on blood, breeding, and inherited wealth to a meritocracy based on education, talent, and accomplishment. This is evident in markers like prestigious college degrees, graduate degrees, and career paths, as seen on the New York Times weddings page. This new elite, often from upper-middle-class backgrounds, rose through academic and professional success.

Information age ascendance. The rise of the information age, where ideas and knowledge are key economic drivers, propelled this educated class. Highly educated individuals who can translate creativity into products thrive, merging the intangible world of information with the material world of money. This era rewards intellectual capital, leading to significant income growth for college graduates across diverse fields.

A new establishment. This educated elite, or Bobos, now forms a dominant establishment, setting cultural and social norms. They are found across various sectors, from technology and media to finance and academia. While seemingly diverse, they share a common ethos shaped by their educational backgrounds and professional success, influencing taste, moral codes, and social structure.

2. Bobos Blend Opposing Cultural Values

Defying expectations and maybe logic, people seemed to have combined the countercultural sixties and the achieving eighties into one social ethos.

Fusion of bourgeois and bohemian. Historically, bourgeois culture valued tradition, practicality, and material success, while bohemian culture championed creativity, rebellion, and anti-establishment ideals. The Bobos represent a hybrid, integrating elements of both. They are ambitious and worldly like the bourgeoisie but value self-expression and creativity like the bohemians.

Post-culture war synthesis. The cultural conflicts of the 1960s and 70s, where bohemian values challenged the bourgeois mainstream, led not to a victory for one side but a blurring and co-option. The educated class, influenced by both eras, created a third culture that reconciles these former rivals. This synthesis is evident in their lifestyles, consumption patterns, and professional lives.

Having it both ways. Bobos navigate the tension between their affluence and their anti-materialist ideals, their success and their desire to avoid "selling out." They seek ways to be affluent and rebellious simultaneously, finding careers that blend creativity and commerce, and lifestyles that mix upscale comfort with bohemian sensibilities. This reconciliation allows them to maintain self-respect while achieving worldly success.

3. Consumption Reflects New Status Codes

Cultivated people restrict their lavish spending to necessities.

Financial correctness emerges. A new set of unwritten rules governs Bobo consumption, replacing conspicuous consumption with "financial correctness." Spending lavishly on traditional luxuries is seen as vulgar, while investing heavily in items categorized as "necessities" or "tools" is virtuous. This allows Bobos to spend money without appearing crass or overly materialistic.

Virtuous spending examples:

• High-end kitchen appliances (seen as tools for a domestic necessity)
• Professional-quality outdoor gear (even if not used professionally)
• Organic food and artisanal products (seen as healthy necessities)
• Distressed or antique-looking furniture (evokes authenticity, not grandeur)

Perfectionism of small things. Bobos often focus obsessive attention on the details of everyday items, seeking out unique, well-designed, or "authentic" versions of mundane objects. This demonstrates their refined taste and intellectual capital, valuing craftsmanship and thoughtfulness over mere expense. This contrasts with the smooth, polished aesthetic of earlier elites.

4. Business Adopts Countercultural Ethos

The job of leadership today is not just to make money. It’s to make meaning.

From Organization Man to Creative Paradox. The old corporate ideal of the conformist, rule-following "Organization Man" has been replaced by a celebration of creativity, individuality, and rebellion. Companies now use the language of radicalism and social movements, emphasizing constant change, freedom, and innovation. This reflects the Bobo mindset entering the business world.

Work as self-expression. For Bobos, work is often seen as a vocation or a form of self-expression, not just a means to an end. They seek jobs that are spiritually fulfilling, intellectually stimulating, and personally enriching. This "higher selfishness" drives them to work harder and longer, blurring the lines between work and play.

Organic vs. Mechanical. Modern management theory, influenced by thinkers like Jane Jacobs, favors organic, decentralized, and flexible structures over rigid, mechanical bureaucracies. Companies strive to create environments that foster spontaneous interaction, collaboration, and creativity, valuing "metis" (practical, intuitive knowledge) over purely rational analysis.

5. Intellectual Life Becomes Entrepreneurial

Today the Bobo intellectual reconciles the quest for knowledge with the quest for the summer house.

Blending ideas and commerce. The traditional image of the intellectual as an aloof figure detached from society and commerce has faded. Information age economics has created numerous opportunities for those skilled in analysis, writing, and research outside academia. Intellectuals now navigate a "marketplace of ideas," seeking market niches and competing for attention.

Public-facing roles. Modern intellectuals are often public figures, appearing on television, writing op-eds, and speaking at conferences. They must be adept at marketing themselves and their ideas, often simplifying complex concepts for broader appeal. This contrasts with the high-seriousness and insularity of earlier intellectual circles.

Status-Income Disequilibrium (SID). While gaining social status and influence, many intellectuals face a gap between their prestige and their income compared to the financial elite. This creates anxiety and subtle social jockeying, as intellectuals navigate a world where their peers in other fields earn vastly more, despite sharing similar educational backgrounds and social circles.

6. Pleasure is Redefined as Purposeful

Bobos have constructed new social codes that characteristically synthesize bourgeois self-control and bohemian emancipation.

Utilitarian hedonism. Bobos approach pleasure with a focus on utility and self-improvement. Activities are valued if they are physically, spiritually, or intellectually enhancing, while those deemed counterproductive or dangerous are frowned upon. This leads to a focus on health, safety, and personal growth even in leisure time.

Examples of purposeful pleasure:

• Strenuous exercise (jogging, trekking)
• Eco-tourism and adventure travel (often involving hardship for spiritual/intellectual gain)
• Cultivated hobbies (gourmet cooking, artisanal crafts)
• Mindful or "responsible" sexuality (often framed in terms of self-discovery or health)

Discipline in leisure. This ethos replaces the Dionysian abandon of earlier bohemianism with a form of disciplined play. Health clubs and museums become central institutions, representing the pursuit of physical and mental cultivation. Even activities like parties become more work-oriented, focused on networking and moderate consumption.

7. Spiritual Life Seeks Roots Amidst Freedom

The Bobos are trying to build a house of obligation on a foundation of choice.

Longing for rootedness. Despite valuing individual freedom and pluralism, Bobos often express a longing for community, tradition, and deeper connections. This is seen in their attraction to places with a strong "sense of place," traditional rituals, and small-scale bonds, contrasting with the transience and endless choices of modern life.

Flexidoxy and spiritual pastiche. Bobo spirituality is characterized by "Flexidoxy," a hybrid approach that blends individual choice with a desire for structure. They may return to organized religion but often pick and choose doctrines, prioritizing tolerance and personal fulfillment over strict obedience to external authority. This results in a spiritual landscape of diverse, often improvised, beliefs and practices.

The cost of endless choice. While celebrating freedom and diversity, this approach can lead to spiritual confusion and a lack of deep, lasting commitment. The constant pursuit of new experiences and options can make it difficult to find a stable sense of belonging or surrender to something larger than the self, potentially resulting in a life that is broad but lacks profound depth.

8. The Bobo Ethos Reconciles Contradictions

When faced with a tension between competing values, they do what any smart privileged person bursting with cultural capital would do. They find a way to have both.

Synthesizing opposites. The core of the Bobo ethos is the ability to reconcile seemingly contradictory values. They blend ambition with anti-materialism, creativity with commerce, freedom with a desire for order, and individual expression with a search for community. This allows them to navigate the anxieties created by their privileged position and conflicting ideals.

Managing anxieties of abundance. Bobos are anxious about becoming like the old elite they displaced, fearing they might become self-satisfied or lose their anti-establishment edge. Their consumption patterns, business practices, and leisure activities are often subtle ways of signaling their values and demonstrating that they have not succumbed to crass materialism or conformity.

A moderate, pragmatic morality. Bobo morality is often small-scale, emphasizing decency, fairness, and tolerance over rigid dogma or heroic virtue. It is pragmatic and adaptable, drawing from various sources and prioritizing health, safety, and personal well-being. This approach fosters a civil society but may lack the fervor or certainty of more traditional moral frameworks.

9. A New Establishment Sets Norms

Today, America once again has a dominant class that defines the parameters of respectable opinion and taste—a class that determines conventional wisdom, that promulgates a code of good manners, that establishes a pecking order to give shape to society, that excludes those who violate its codes, that transmits its moral and etiquette codes down to its children, that imposes social discipline on the rest of society so as to improve the “quality of life,” to use the contemporary phrase.

Subtle exercise of power. Unlike the overt authority of the old WASP establishment, the Bobo establishment exercises influence more subtly, primarily through culture and ideas. They shape conventional wisdom, define what is considered respectable, and establish new codes of etiquette and morality. This influence is pervasive, extending across media, academia, and corporate life.

Boundary markers and exclusion. Like any elite, Bobos have boundary markers that define who belongs and who doesn't. Embracing glitzy materialism, overt snobbery, or anti-intellectualism can lead to exclusion from educated circles. This creates a new pecking order based on cultural capital, lifestyle choices, and adherence to Bobo norms.

Restoring social order. After a period of social breakdown in the 1960s and 70s, the Bobo establishment has, perhaps hesitantly, begun to re-impose a form of social discipline. This is seen in the emphasis on civility, political correctness codes, and a general trend towards moderation and responsibility, contributing to a decline in some social pathologies.

10. Status is Earned Through Accomplishment and Signaling

To calculate a person’s status, you take his net worth and multiply it by his antimaterialistic attitudes.

Accomplishment is key. Status in the Bobo world is primarily based on individual accomplishment, measured by educational attainment, professional success, and intellectual capital. This contrasts with the inherited status of the old elite. The "Résumé Gods" are celebrated for their achievements across various fields.

Antimaterialist signaling. High status is achieved not just through wealth but by demonstrating a detachment from it. The "best kind of money is incidental money," earned while pursuing a creative vision. Bobos engage in "one-downmanship," subtly downplaying their wealth and credentials while embracing rustic, authentic, or countercultural styles to signal their values and distinguish themselves from the merely rich.

Perpetual performance. Status in the Bobo world is not static; it requires constant performance and adherence to shifting norms. Individuals must continuously demonstrate their cultivation, intellectual prowess, and commitment to Bobo values. This creates a degree of anxiety but also ensures the elite remains dynamic and open to new talent that adopts its codes.

Last updated: June 4, 2025