Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
yes. there was a shocking lack of nuance in your post, typical of the sloppy thinking so obvious in your oeuvre
Why do people from privileged class backgrounds often misidentify their origins as working class?
- Thread starter brogdale
- Start date
I don’t think the points that Brainaddict raises should be simply dismissed, they just need accommodating. The key is to review and reflect on the assumptions underlying the conclusion. If it is not the case that assets change your class position then what is that analysis either missing or taking for granted?
Thatcher, Major and Blair certainly threw some big rocks into the social pool. The “stakeholder society” concept was a very deliberate attempt to rewrite the rules of class and the solidarity that it implies. To nick Wikipedia’s bit about how social identity theory (SIT) interacts with collective action:
The point is that people will only collectively organise if they don’t think they can improve their personal position and they think that the way the groups are defined and operated are unfair. Giving individuals a theoretical exit from their working class position undermines their involvement in improving the lot of the working class. But so does undermining what it means to be working class, which is achieved by imputing the priorities and sense-making of the PMC onto the working class.
To put it another way, it isn’t just relationship to the means of production that matters for collectivity, it’s also perception of the relationship to the means of production. And it is that which is affected by asset ownership. Class interest may not be affected, but perception of class legitimacy is.
I’m just talking out loud here, really. I don’t have a coherent manifesto to wrap this up with. The social psychology of modern society is very different to that of the days of industrial capitalism, however, even if the structural analysis still makes sense. And you have to pay attention to the former as well as the latter.
Thatcher, Major and Blair certainly threw some big rocks into the social pool. The “stakeholder society” concept was a very deliberate attempt to rewrite the rules of class and the solidarity that it implies. To nick Wikipedia’s bit about how social identity theory (SIT) interacts with collective action:
The point is that people will only collectively organise if they don’t think they can improve their personal position and they think that the way the groups are defined and operated are unfair. Giving individuals a theoretical exit from their working class position undermines their involvement in improving the lot of the working class. But so does undermining what it means to be working class, which is achieved by imputing the priorities and sense-making of the PMC onto the working class.
To put it another way, it isn’t just relationship to the means of production that matters for collectivity, it’s also perception of the relationship to the means of production. And it is that which is affected by asset ownership. Class interest may not be affected, but perception of class legitimacy is.
I’m just talking out loud here, really. I don’t have a coherent manifesto to wrap this up with. The social psychology of modern society is very different to that of the days of industrial capitalism, however, even if the structural analysis still makes sense. And you have to pay attention to the former as well as the latter.
redsquirrel
This Machine Kills Progressives
I'm not sure he did but I'll let The39thStep speak for himself.
I want to be clear what are saying. are you calling for a break with socialism, for a new politics organised across-classes, based on something (I'm not clear what)?
Or are you following the 'true' socialists (whether from the 19th or 20th centuries) trying to recreate socialism, as a politics that is not based on the working class?
cesare
shady's dreams ♥
Where do they exist?
Brainaddict
slight system overdrive
“I pondered all these things, and how men fight and lose the battle, and the thing that they fought for comes about in spite of their defeat, and when it comes turns out not to be what they meant, and other men have to fight for what they meant under another name.”
redsquirrel
This Machine Kills Progressives
And how have these other attempts at fighting for "socialism" under another name worked? Where have people like Aaronovitch and Cohen ended up? Where did Laclau and Stedman Jones politics end up?
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
putting something in a larger font size and in bold doesn't impress anyone
littlebabyjesus
one of Maxwell's demons
Yes, this makes a lot of sense. Perhaps slogans such as Corbyn Labour's 'for the many not the few' or Occupy's 'we are the 99%' are more on the money in today's societies than certain older ways of sloganeering. Either of those includes within it many people who would not consider themselves or be widely considered working class. Some might even be spit professional managerial class. But we can all see the rich accelerating away from us and making our lives progressively harder as they do so, even those of us who perhaps aspire to being one of those disappearing into the distance.
The potential for harnessing political allegiances is surely there. It's clearly failing badly in many parts of the world, though, as people instead opt to side with the few in the form of Trump or Sunak or Orban, or Erdogan or Modi, etc. It's a long list. Why that idea, which seems pretty powerful to me, appears to fail so badly atm is a question I can't really answer.
seeformiles
Lost in the wood
Many down south have realised this and I hear more southern accents in the neighbourhoods in Leeds that have been specifically marketed to them (E.g. Horsforth, Chapel Allerton, Roundhay) which has made house prices go up massively as they flex their superior buying power having sold a half million rabbit hutch in the capital.
andysays
Love and solidarity
I still remain to be convinced that a local government pension is an asset in any meaningful way, not in the same way that income generating property which you can actually choose what to do with is.
It's not something over which many of the people paying into have any genuine control over.
My colleague who retired 6 months ago after 40+ years of service who has multiple health issues which eventually got so bad that he had to retire a couple of years after reaching pensionable age, after delaying because he would struggle financially without his salary certainly wouldn't agree.
Last I heard he was still struggling to get them to actually pay his pension.
This post should really be directed at Brainaddict, tbh, but can't be bo6to redo it now...
Brainaddict
slight system overdrive
Where has socialism under that name ended up? Doing well in some poor countries still, but stumbling from vain hope to vain hope in rich countries. It never dealt with the fundamental contradiction of the labour movement: that as workers win more for themselves under capitalism they feel more aligned with capitalism and less inclined to fight against it. Labour organising undoes itself through its success. Organisers have tried their hardest to politically educate people out of feeling this alignment but it turns out Marx was right: the relations to material resources win out
Cat Fan
Cats and stats
Identity is a hugely complicated thing. Both self identity and the identity projected to others
No wonder that in 49 pages it has not been settled and it never will be
In my generation no one talks about working class and middle class, but everyone talks about owners and renters
No wonder that in 49 pages it has not been settled and it never will be
In my generation no one talks about working class and middle class, but everyone talks about owners and renters
Serge Forward
Just enjoyin' my coffee.
No one?
friendofdorothy
Solidarity against neoliberalism!
no one I know does. And no one in the pub anymore, well not since my ex coal mining mate Commie B.... died, always used to be able to rely on him for a good discussion and and a quote or two from a revolutionary communist leader.
That's why I came here to urban to discuss all things leftie.
Serge Forward
Just enjoyin' my coffee.
Fair play. But then I do hang out with a bunch of commies. Oh, and my kids talk in terms of class but I did brainwash them
friendofdorothy
Solidarity against neoliberalism!
They are becoming a rarity around here. Gentrification.
redsquirrel
This Machine Kills Progressives
Again you seem to think this is some amazing new insight, the argument has been made by plenty of others.
I don't believe it is true - at least not in the crud form you have put it - there are plenty of examples of where workers victories and inspired them to take further action and push for even more.
But it does not matter if workers feel more aligned with capitalism, the sheer fact of the existence of the proletariate creates the contradictions that workers can (will) use to obtain wins.
If you'd bothered to even read a few posts on this thread you'd see that class, even the version of class Brainaddict is pushing, is not about identity.
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The39thStep
Urban critical thinker
If you had tagged me in I'd have answered this earlier. Actually what I said was that I couldn't think of one example of change where there was just one class involved. Which is a simple statement of fact not an endorsement for whatever cross class/progressive alliance gizmo that you seem to want to sell. Very simply change in society whilst it may be led by a class normally has supporters from other classes.
Whatever your definition of class , reform, change or even revolution led by those who know a binman or two rather than being led by a binman or two themselves have different demands and potentially different outcomes. I'm with the latter.
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It makes no logical sense, all classes are in relationship with each other, only exist in relation to other classes, it's not possible for only one class to be involved in any activity.
It's been a very long time since I read any Marx, but I'm pretty sure he wasn't very interested in class as something an individual belonged to, but more a dynamic force of some kind. The individual only counts so far as it might change the force, the energy, of the class, and the dynamic between them. I haven't thought of this before, but its likely isn't it that Marx was influenced by theories of energy, and the theory of class conflict is concerned with what the propelling force is at any time.
It's not about whether you like to go shopping using your credit card.
It's been a very long time since I read any Marx, but I'm pretty sure he wasn't very interested in class as something an individual belonged to, but more a dynamic force of some kind. The individual only counts so far as it might change the force, the energy, of the class, and the dynamic between them. I haven't thought of this before, but its likely isn't it that Marx was influenced by theories of energy, and the theory of class conflict is concerned with what the propelling force is at any time.
It's not about whether you like to go shopping using your credit card.
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
How do you think that winning is going atm in the UK and USA?Where has socialism under that name ended up? Doing well in some poor countries still, but stumbling from vain hope to vain hope in rich countries. It never dealt with the fundamental contradiction of the labour movement: that as workers win more for themselves under capitalism they feel more aligned with capitalism and less inclined to fight against it. Labour organising undoes itself through its success. Organisers have tried their hardest to politically educate people out of feeling this alignment but it turns out Marx was right: the relations to material resources win out
Brainaddict
slight system overdrive
I don't think it's new. And yes, that doesn't surprise me. A certain socialism-class-revolutionary perspective is essentially structured like religion and immune to criticism. You probably think I'm hinting towards Laclau and Mouffe type class-doesn't-matter nonsense, but I think better left critiques come from people like Castoriadis. I think a lot of what Castoriadis said was correct but it bounces off the hides of certain Marxists like criticism of Trump bounces off the hides of MAGA types. There basically is no critique of conventional socialism, however acute, that could convince them that the best hope isn't in a revolutionary proletariat (that consistently fails to appear). So I know I'm on a hiding to nothing with certain people in this thread but I suppose I hope others might be more open.
History & revolution: a revolutionary critique of historical materialism - Cornelius Castoriadis
Translation of a section from "Marxisme et Théorie Révolutionnaire" by Cornelius Castoriadis. Published as a pamphlet by Solidarity (London) in August 1971. Solidarity pamphlet no. 38.
To come back to this thread, it then follows that we might want some materialist analysis that is more modest in what it thinks it can achieve, and more attuned to the particularities of the present moment.
The39thStep
Urban critical thinker
I don't think it's new. And yes, that doesn't surprise me. A certain socialism-class-revolutionary perspective is essentially structured like religion and immune to criticism. You probably think I'm hinting towards Laclau and Mouffe type class-doesn't-matter nonsense, but I think better left critiques come from people like Castoriadis. I think a lot of what Castoriadis said was correct but it bounces off the hides of certain Marxists like criticism of Trump bounces off the hides of MAGA types. There basically is no critique of conventional socialism, however acute, that could convince them that the best hope isn't in a revolutionary proletariat (that consistently fails to appear). So I know I'm on a hiding to nothing with certain people in this thread but I suppose I hope others might be more open.
History & revolution: a revolutionary critique of historical materialism - Cornelius Castoriadis
Translation of a section from "Marxisme et Théorie Révolutionnaire" by Cornelius Castoriadis. Published as a pamphlet by Solidarity (London) in August 1971. Solidarity pamphlet no. 38.libcom.org
To come back to this thread, it then follows that we might want some materialist analysis that is more modest in what it thinks it can achieve, and more attuned to the particularities of the present moment.
Tempting ask what the two binmen you know thought of your modest suggestion of Castoriadis as being a better 'left' critique of Marx than Laclau and Mouffe. However, I am all ears to hear what you are proposing ie what it is that your materialist analysis, more attuned to the particularities of the present moment, thinks it can achieve.
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andysays
Love and solidarity
I was about to ask how many council binmen Castoriadis discussed his critique of Marx with, what their pension provision was like, and whether C believed their pensions counted as assets in the same way that income-generating property does.
Pickman's model
Starry Wisdom
do you have to?
mojo pixy
○-<{[°_°]}>-○
We've been here before though haven't we? I thought we'd established that a home isn't necessarily an 'asset' as such because in order to realise it you have to become homeless. So what we're really talking about is a pair of mindsets, one which sees a house as a place to live and another that sees it as a store of wealth. That the latter is more or less mainstream now, is a massive victory for thatcherism. Dismantle the welfare state and put people in a position where they have to just look after them and theirs because the state won't help. Sell social housing off so more families have to buy their own little safety net, then make that something to aspire to. Smash society and especially any manifestation of collectivism.
So I'm not a homeowner but I am lucky enough to live in a HA house. To me, rather than tell all homeowners (including the ones who have mortgages they struggle to pay, and the ones who never intended to sell the place they live because they live there) that they aren't proper working class (even if they work eg in a care home on minimum wage) the focus should be on giving everyone the security of a home via social housing and rent controls, alongside changes in the law that prohibit and/or seriously disincentivise landlordism and property hoarding. But I know, we can't really do that here so we do the other thing instead.
So I'm not a homeowner but I am lucky enough to live in a HA house. To me, rather than tell all homeowners (including the ones who have mortgages they struggle to pay, and the ones who never intended to sell the place they live because they live there) that they aren't proper working class (even if they work eg in a care home on minimum wage) the focus should be on giving everyone the security of a home via social housing and rent controls, alongside changes in the law that prohibit and/or seriously disincentivise landlordism and property hoarding. But I know, we can't really do that here so we do the other thing instead.
Smokeandsteam
Working Class First
Excellent post Mojo. I've noticed across social media a growing 'left' teleology obsessed with griping about the existing state of things - rather than organising around concrete demands to improve matters - that then leads into an arrogant, disdainful set of antagonisms normally aimed in entirely the wrong way and at the wrong people at the expense of practical unity of purpose over the right things.
You’ve raised some practical (and popular) ideas that could form the basis of an approach based around practical unity that everyone on our side would support. The New Statesman article I linked earlier contained other ideas from the liberal left – Council Tax capped at 0.5% of the value of a home (lowering taxes for those in the poorest areas and raising them on those living in the wealthiest areas), taxing unearned rentier wealth at the same rate as work is taxed, a wealth tax. To this could be added further demands around rent cap, taxes on multiple propery ownership, council house building funded by the additional receipts etc etc. Changing that mindset you mention is only going to happen by arguing for a set of credible and popular alternative ideas and the agglomeration of support for them, not castigating those who possess the mindset.
Debating the class position of those with mortgages, and wrongly concluding that the 60% plus of the population with one aren’t working class, is both dead end stuff and merely further embeds the fractures within our own side. As you say, we've been here on here before.
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redsquirrel
This Machine Kills Progressives
No I realise that you are not arguing for a left populism a la Laclau. But like him, like the ex-Eurocommunists your attempts to have a socialism divorced from the working class are - cannot be anything but - a retreat from socialism.
It is not a coincidence that Cohen, Aaronovitch and co ended up where they did, it is the logical outcome of the New Socialists rejection of class.
As for the dogmatic religious stuff - give us a break.
Let's be honest what you are actually advocating with your theory (as neatly illustrated by the bolded part) is the same liberal politics that you've argued for 20 years. Your posts are not based on some radical new insight that is revealing a new politics to you, they are a rationalisation of the soft left politics you've favoured.
Hell we are all a little guilty of that at times, but this last of free thinkers, not bound by Marx stuff, Bullshit.
And let's get to the key part - I'll ask again the question I've asked you numerous times before and you evade - what is the consequence of this new socialism of yours?
Cross-class alliances ok, what alliances? An alliance between what I would call capital and labour? An alliance between your 'working class' and non-working class homeowners? Or something else?
If the above is the case, if labour is a conservative force then what is the agent for change, and what change are you seeking?
One of the successful strategies of neoliberalism, though, has been to gradually (and even quickly) close defined benefit pension schemes. And then to create rules around pension drawdown and other ways of not having to crystallise your pension fund at retirement age. If you are in a local government pension scheme that simply pays you a fixed amount per year then no, that pension is not the kind of asset that fosters a PMC financialised subjectivity. But increasingly, that’s not where people are with their retirement planning and reality. Instead, they have a sum of money that (if they’re lucky) corresponds to 10 or 20 times their annual salary, which they are then expected to make sound financial decisions about. And that is a meaningful asset — the kind of asset that changes how your view your personal interests and changes what you see as your relationship to capital.
Brainaddict
slight system overdrive
I explicitly don't have a formulaic solution. I don't think we can model the world sufficiently to sit down, work out the solution to complex problems, then go and enact them. Instead I think we need an exploratory approach to politics, where we try out things for a while and abandon them if they're not working. In some sense I think the right wing is much better at this, and it's one of the reasons they're often winning (in addition to the resources on their side).
As for why the reassessments of class, I guess it's mostly about clearing the decks of dross so that you can actually experiment in open ways.
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