On 2010-02-04, at 1:21 PM, Doug Henwood wrote:
>
> On Feb 4, 2010, at 1:08 PM, Carrol Cox wrote:
>
>> Density was not always equtable with politics. I had a great uncle who
>> organized sheepherders in Idaho and Montana for the IWW -- and Henry
>> Wallace's running mate in 1948 was a DP Senator from Idaho. The SP at
>> one time had good vote counts in Odlahoma.
>
> Very true. See Roxanne Dunbar-Ortiz's excellent Red Dirt: Growing Up Okie for an account of the multiracial rebels of Oklahoma.
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Yes, good point, but we shouldn't overlook that the IWW's strength - though it made inroads among migrant "hoboes" and agricultural workers such as those Carrol's great uncle organized - was in highly concentrated mine, mill, and textile factory towns, industrial pockets in rural states and regions where farmers and small shopkeepers predominated. These latter were attracted to the IWW and the Socialist Party when the labour and socialist movement was dynamic and on the rise. Today, following the disappearance of that great historic movement in the developed capitalist world, protest activity by small propertyholders opposed to the banks is apt to get channeled in a right wing direction.
Intellectuals, another "intermediate" layer, also require the existence of a strong and promising working class movement in order to get drawn into political activity in any sizeable or meaningful way. They're not able to act effectively as an independent force outside of one - Carrol's romantic attachment to 60's student radicalism notwithstanding - nor, unfortunately, can such a movement be conjured out of thin air by penning left wing manifestoes or by describing it's culture and conditions, however laudable these efforts.