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This article explores the structure of the field of power in contemporary France and locates within that field what one can call, following C. Wright Mills, “the power elite.” Based on a biographical database elaborated using Who’s Who in France, it first shows that elites are affected by changes that have impacted society as a whole over the past forty years: women are better represented, celibacy or free union become common, the level of education has increased. The sectors eligible to join the elite have also changed. While the industry or the public sector have declined, business and finance have moved center stage. The contemporary field of power can be described using four main criteria: the integration into the economic order, the seniority of membership in the bourgeoisie, the proximity to the state and public visibility. Within this space, an elite can also be circumscribed. Its composition does not correspond with the two sources of legitimacy recognized in a liberal democracy: individual merit and elected office. France is characterized by the dominance of an oligarchy of businessmen, trained in the schools of power and keeping the State under their control.