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The purpose of this articleis to describe and analyze the characteristics of decision makers in an American and an English city. it has been repeatedly asserted that business men exert predominant influence in community decision making. This is the central hypothesis under test. Two cities with similar economic, demographic, and educational characteristics were selected for research, namely Pacific City in the Pacific Northwest, U.S., and English City in Southwestern England. Business men do exert a predominant influence in community decision making in Pacific City and Southern City. However, in English City the hypothesis is rejected. The key influentials come from a broad representation of the institutional sectors of community life. Two major factors seem to explain much of this difference. The first is the difference in occupational prestige values between the U. S. and England. In contrast to the U. S. the social status of industry in England, and so of its captains is low by comparison with the law, medicine, and the universities.

The article discusses the closed shop problem in the U.S. as of 1949. A survey of 50 businessmen in plants, stores and offices from Boston, Massachusetts to San Diego, California on their views about closed loop showed an attitude on the part of some businessmen that has not been widely publicized. An opinion by the American Federation of Labor on the closed shop is provided. For the union to survive it is felt to be necessary that the shop be closed and that the hiring be done through the union office so that the union can develop its apprenticeship training system to ensure competence.

The article presents crucial community variables in community influence systems. Authors of the article compared findings from recent research in six Southwestern communities in the U.S. and two Mexican communities with communities studied by sociologist Delbert C. Miller. The comparison was concerned primarily with the relative "contribution" of different institutional and occupational sectors to the group of "top decision-makers" in the community. Since the method of identifying those persons was primarily by reputation rather than by direct observation, authors refer to them as "influentials." According to the article the sector, which provides the largest number of top influentials was business. This was true not only for the seven cities in the U.S. but also for the two Mexican cities. In fact with the exception of San Diego, California, Tijuana, Mexico, had the largest proportion of businessmen among top influentials of the ten cities studied. Apparently the size of a city was not related to the proportion of businessmen found among top influentials of the community.