[Peace-discuss] Will I.P. elect McCain?

Sat Aug 2 17:08:05 CDT 2008

It is, as I say, at best a stop-gap, a temporary measure to correct some small
part of historic exploitation -- not to end the exploitation itself, which is
endemic to capitalism.  In fact, affirmative action accepts that exploitation in
principle while it tries to get a better deal for those "identified" by race,
gender, etc. (which is why it's generally been resented by the white working
class).

In the spring tide of American socialism, more than a century ago, one of the
leading US capitalists, Jay Gould, said, "I can always hire one half of the
American working class -- to kill the other half." That ruling class policy
accounts for the United States' having one of the bloodiest labor histories in
the world.  And affirmative action was the acceptable face of that policy.

There were those who said a generation ago -- only half in jest -- that when the
revolution finally came, the barricades of the old order would be defended by
those blacks and women who'd made it under affirmative action...

The history of identity politics in the US is pretty clear.  It was the position
to which soi-disant progressives retreated when the revolutionary and
transformative goals of "the sixties" (and well into the 1970s) were given up.

When the assault of neoliberalism began to look like winning, ca. 30 years ago,
and progressives gave up class-based politics in defeat, there was a rather
unseemly scramble on the Left as groups looked for other, non-class identities
as bases for progressive political action -- notably women, people of color,
ethnics, sexual minorities, etc. But the search was predicated on the conclusion
that no fundamental transformation of class relations was possible (or perhaps
even desirable).

By the 1990s there was a general condemnation on the Left of a trinity of
oppressions -- by gender, race and class -- but little recognition that they
were not alike.  In principle, the first two can be solved by reconciliation 
(affirmative action, if you like), however difficult that is in practice.  But
oppression by class cannot be solved that way.  Exploiter and exploited cannot
be reconciled -- their formal antagonism is what makes the system go. (Crudely,
owners must purchase labor as cheaply as possible while workers must sell it as
expensively as possible.)  Exploitation by class can be solved only by the
liquidation of the exploiter (the social role, not necessarily the person).

Staring into this abyss, the modern left has generally preferred to take the
sop-gap options offered, and it's only inconvenient people like Benn Michaels
(and three centuries of economists who tried to puzzle out how capitalism
worked) who point out that diversity offers a false vision of social justice --
by allowing us to neglect the difference that really matters, that between rich
and poor, and its source.  --CGE

Robert Naiman wrote:
> Now it seems like you're saying that actually, support of affirmative action
> *is* "the Left" position, but it shouldn't be. Just clarifying. So I didn't
> miss the meeting.
> 
> On Sat, Aug 2, 2008 at 7:11 AM, C. G. Estabrook <galliher at uiuc.edu> wrote:
>> Affirmative action is at best a stop-gap that risks substituting the
>> pursuit of diversity for the pursuit of equality. In the last generation
>> the American left, such as it is, has been bought off by tokenism to give
>> up its critique of class.
>> 
>> People of color managing state capitalism is a rather limited victory for 
>> the Left in the US -- especially when the price has been the Left's 
>> diminuendo of the critique of capitalism as it was a generation (or a 
>> century) ago.  The Left is much further Right than it was then -- and it
>> was done not with a meeting but in rather embarrassed silence.
>> 
>> 
>> Robert Naiman wrote:
>>> When was the meeting where it was decided that "the Left" doesn't support
>>> affirmative action? Was there a meeting notice? I must have missed it.
>>> 
>>> On Sat, Aug 2, 2008 at 5:56 AM, C. G. Estabrook <galliher at uiuc.edu>
>>> wrote:
>>>> "Affirmative action" is at best a stop-gap that risks substituting the 
>>>> pursuit of diversity for the pursuit of equality.  The latter is the
>>>> Left position. --CGE
>>>> 
>>>> Jenifer Cartwright wrote:
>>>>> The fact that a ban on affirmative action has never lost makes me 
>>>>> question the stats that say the electorate is to the left of the
>>>>> government. Terrible news, terrible for all of us if the prediction
>>>>> holds true. --Jenifer
>>>>> 
>>>>> --- On *Fri, 8/1/08, C. G. Estabrook /<galliher at uiuc.edu>/* wrote:
>>>>> 
>>>>> From: C. G. Estabrook <galliher at uiuc.edu> Subject: [Peace-discuss]
>>>>> Will I.P. elect McCain? To: "peace-discuss"
>>>>> <peace-discuss at anti-war.net> Date: Friday, August 1, 2008, 7:43 PM
>>>>> 
>>>>> "On Sunday, McCain came out in favor of an Arizona civil rights 
>>>>> initiative that    would outlaw any state discrimination either for
>>>>> or against folks, based on    race, gender or national origin. Obama
>>>>> said he was 'disappointed' with McCain    and told UNITY he favors
>>>>> affirmative action 'when properly structured.'
>>>>> 
>>>>> "The Arizona referendum banning preferential treatment based on race 
>>>>> is also on    the ballot in the swing state of Colorado. It won in 
>>>>> California in 1996, in    Washington in 2000 and in Michigan in the 
>>>>> great Democratic sweep of 2006. It has    never lost, and may just
>>>>> win McCain Colorado, and with it the nation."
>>>>> 
>>>>> There would be a certain paradox in McCain's becoming president as a 
>>>>> result of    identity politics -- which begins with the notion that
>>>>> the categories of gender,    race and class are fixed.
>>>>> 
>>>>> Self-described progressives in the last generation have replaced 
>>>>> campaigns    against economic inequality with campaigns against 
>>>>> discrimination within    economic groups -- as inequality increased. 
>>>>> Thus it was considered a victory to    get women into West Point or
>>>>> people of color onto the board of General Electric
>>>>> 
>>>>> (instead of abolishing those institutions).
>>>>> 
>>>>> The old Left goals were quietly abandoned with the onslaught of 
>>>>> Neoliberalism,    thirty years ago.  Redistribution was shelved in
>>>>> favor of "recognition." (It's    true that a few, like M.L. King,
>>>>> went the other way, but they were marginalized
>>>>> 
>>>>> -- with prejudice, in his case.)
>>>>> 
>>>>> Some people noticed what was going on: see, e.g., Walter Benn 
>>>>> Michaels' "The    Trouble with Diversity: How We Learned to Love
>>>>> Identity and Ignore Inequality"    (2006).  But a President McCain
>>>>> would be a rather large chicken come home to    roost.  --CGE
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> _______________________________________________ Peace-discuss mailing
>>>>> list Peace-discuss at lists.chambana.net 
>>>>> http://lists.chambana.net/cgi-bin/listinfo/peace-discuss
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>>>>> 
>>>>> 
>>>>> _______________________________________________ Peace-discuss mailing
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>>>> _______________________________________________ Peace-discuss mailing
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>>>> 
>>> 
>>> 
> 
> 
> 