<p><strong>Noun</strong></p><ul><li>Usually the bourgeoisie.</li><li>In Marxist theory, the powerful capitalist class that owns and is concerned with property, as contrasted with the wage-earning class, which must concern itself with survival.</li><li>The interests of the bourgeoisie are opposed to revolution and invested in the status quo.</li><li>According to Marx, the rise of the bourgeoisie split the whole of society into two enemy camps—the bourgeoisie and the proletariat.</li><li>Many postcolonial societies in the 21st century are hindered by greedy and repressive bourgeoisies.</li><li>The middle class, made up mainly of entrepreneurs, managers, professionals, and skilled office workers, and often characterized as having conventional tastes and values and prizing respectability.</li><li>A person with conventional or banal tastes and opinions believed to be determined mainly by a concern for respectability and material wealth.</li><li>A member of the middle class, especially as viewed in Marxist theory.</li><li>A shopkeeper or merchant.</li></ul>