i imagine rob's point might be put better this way: some of these theories are no different that nike ad campaigns which gloss over class, erase it, by displacing it onto other things. like that fucking commercial for some damn car, the one that goes something like this "are only the rich allowed to have comfortable rides and air conditioning?" or somesuch nonsense.
even in the work of someone like iris young who trying to stay within a marxist framework to some degree, the commitment to the insights of pomo/post-structuralism and deconstrunction render her incapable of elaborating a politics that takes class seriously. workers *are erased* how? read on and then you explain to me how a group can be understood as a class in this account? and it's not surprising that her "remedy" for class oppression is *only* about workplace reform.
from september:
iris young, too, wrote _justice and the politics of difference_ in which she argued for the absolute necessity of focusing on differences, of building a politics of difference [identity politics] based precisely on identity groups. she goes to great pains to explain precisely what a group is:
"I should allay sev'l possible misunderstandings of what this principle of group representation means and implies. First, the principle calls for specific representation of social groups, not interest groups or ideological groups. By an inter. group I mean any aggregate or association that seeks a particular goal, or desires the same policy, or are similarly situated with respect to some social effect--for example, they are all recipients of acid rain...." Social groups usually share some interests, but shared interests are not sufficient to constitute a social group. A social group is a collective of people who have affinity with one another b./c of a set of practices or way of life***; they differentiate themselves from or are differentiated by at least one other group according to these cultural forms.
By an ideological group I mean a collective of persons with shared political beliefs. Nazis, socialists, feminists.... The situation of social groups may foster the formation of ideological groups, and under some circumstances an ideological group may become a social group. Shared political or moral beliefs...however do not themselves constitute a social group [...] Second, it is important to remember that the principle calls for specific representation only of oppressed or disadvantaged groups."
and to buttress jim's original point, young does very much end up dismissing a marxist conception of class *exploitation* as a basis upon which to build a politics of difference. her policy proposals in that regard focus only on a reformist politics within the work place. and, i argue, this tendency to elide a serious engagement with the way in which capitalist exploitation is fundamental to 'groupness' and 'identity' results precisely from what she, herself, calls a postmodern critique of the logic of identity and the metaphysics of presence [she lumps together kristeva, adorn, irigaray, derrida. ]
kelley
At 11:00 AM 11/6/1999 -0500, Doug Henwood wrote:
>Rob Schaap wrote:
>
>>The workers get told they no longer exist
>
>I read this sort of thing and always wonder - do you really think
>that workers in First World countries don't think of themselves as
>proletarians because a bunch of French eggheads told them so? Isn't
>there anything in people's daily experiences - what they see, hear,
>feel, do - that shapes their understanding of themselves? Is Derrida
>really more influential than Nike's ad agencies?
>
>Doug
>
>
>