Gordon Fletcher (!) wrote:
> "What are the _immediate_ interests of the (which?) working
> class as of December 21, 2001? And what do we mean by
> "interests", anyway -- what we think their interests are or
> what they think their interests are? "
Greg Schofield:
> Gordon this is nowhere as difficult as it is sometimes taken
> to be. Workers of the third and first world have for the most
> part identical immediate interests which include at the
> international level:
>
> 1) The restraint by the international community of unilateral
> military agression - especially that of the USA.
>
> 2) The universal reductioin and final elimination of weapons
> of mass destruction.
>
> At the national level:
> 1) Greater democractic reform of the state and by extension
> controls over the direction of economic development.
>
> 2) Massive improvements in the levels of health, education
> and other forms of social infrastructure.
>
> At the local level:
> 1) Better wages and conditions, especially for the poorest paid.
>
> 2) The creation of local community infrastructures and imporvements.
>
> Of course this skates across the surface - in fact the question
> of the immediate interests of the working class (as a whole)
> are embarrassingly numerous and in rich diversity rather than
> some narrow and hard to find recipe.
What you have written does not appear, to me, to be the interests of the working class as defined and uttered by most members of the working class, at least not the working class around where I live. For instance, most of them seem to support unilateral military aggression and the concomitant quasi-tribal fetishism of flag-waving, identification of "heroes", suppression of dissent and criticism, and so forth. Those abroad may resent the big American dog, but have big dogs of their own they seem to like.
I think what you've done is rewrite the interests of the working class as what you think their interests _really_ are. It is hard not to do so, since many of these interests appear to be contrary to reason and common sense. But in doing so you put yourself in the position of the elites who already do this, yet without their power. By contrast, as an anarchist, I respect the freedom of working-class people to utter and seek their interests, but I oppose many of those interests (war, imperialism, racism, police-state practices, conformity, voluntary ignorance, fetishism, and so on) and am indifferent to many others. I want to change their interests, or at least sabotage the progress of their current interests in the world if they can't be changed immediately.
> Gordon, may I as the reverse question? Where are the immediate
> interests of the working class not manifest in some realizable
> and immediate change for the better?
For which _better_? Any time people get what they want (that is, pursue their interests successfully) they think it is good, at least temporarily. Right now they are celebrating "victory" in Afghanistan. But this is not a change for the better from _my_ point of view.
> Who are the working class of December 21, 2001?
My answer is: Anyone who has to sell their labor power in order to get a livelihood, or who depends personally on those who do. I also construe those who suffer for and under the State, such as Welfare recipients and the homeless, and young people languishing in the vacuums of the suburbs, as laborers of a sort, since I believe liberalism and capitalism depend upon their suffering. But this is a construal for the purposes of analysis; there does not seem to be a self- conscious working class in the sense I define it, or in fact in much of any coherent sense anywhere. Almost all of those who are not still enclosed in conservative, traditional or reactionary ideologies appear to swallow the myths of liberalism whole without blinking. One must respect its hypnogogic power.
> ...
> Thge working class is more numerous more widespread than at
> anytime in its past history, but perhaps its interests are
> somewhat ill articulated by those who claim Socialism as their
> private preserve, and perhaps this political disability leads
> to the whole class being hidden away behind some fixed ideas
> that are no longer applicable?
>
> For the bulk of the class the interest is real and lived but
> not necessarily either said or thought spontaneously - then
> why should that be the case when organisation and political
> agitation wallows in apologetics and nostalgia.
I'm not sure what you're getting at here. I might agree with you, sort of. It might be useful to explore a case where the expressed interests of working-class people are clearly not pathological (in my opinion), like for instance affordable medical care in the United States. How has this desire been deflected by the liberal establishment to prevent any inconvenience for the ruling class? What have radicals articulated? I've noted previously that not only can't a politics of national health insurance be gotten off the ground, one can apparently not even organize local cooperative HMOs (except in Wisconsin). I think this is a very curious situation, since it's an area in which I would think even social democrats could do something useful without violating their affection for the established order.
-- Gordon