My colleague Eric de Place has done a great job of laying out the history of the term “war on cars.” I won’t attempt a similarly comprehensive exegesis of the term “class war” or “class warfare.” But I will say that I don’t like the term, nor do I like the efforts in some quarters of the progressive community to suggest that we ought to vilify rich people, drawing out class differences in order to persuade the middle class to embrace big policy changes. I’d argue that the class war narrative won’t work because it is divisive and superficial, and I suspect it will backfire for progressives.
The narrative of class warfare serves politicians better than it does a progressive agenda because it divides people. If there is an enemy out there—an “us against them” proposition—politicians can play on that to motivate people to vote in whatever way will neutralize that enemy, regardless of the facts.
Plus, the idea of declaring a class war on the rich on behalf of the poor is superficial. Suggesting that the rich are really out to get us dumbs down the Marxist term—Class Struggle—which is the origin of the term class war. The Marxist expression was an analysis of systemic problem with capitalism that leads to a maldistribution of resources resulting in poverty. Marxists had hoped to end class struggle by fundamentally transforming the system. Class war language is an attempt to assign blame, rather than fix the system.
The late William Safire, my travel guide for bushwhacking through the undergrowth of the English language, said it well when he wrote that class warfare:
applies political demography to outdated sociology. The divisive Marxist concept of class is social as well as economic, and Americans should never accept its confines. Class is not determined by income alone; richies can be low-class slobs and the genteel down-at-the-heels can be high-class povertarians.
That’s my final beef with the class war meme: class war tries to attach the world’s problems to a group of people, which is very dangerous. First, blaming a group of people leads to all sorts of insane conspiracy theories— about the banking system for example—that are bizarre even when they are harmless, but that at their worst can become racist.The French Revolution attacked the aristocracy, the Russian Revolution went after groups that were “counter-revolutionary,” and the list of bad outcomes goes on.
While it might be tempting to vilify the rich or the “banksters” who are crushing us with debt and schemes to securitize mortgages, I think that road ultimately leads to disaster. In fact, fears about public debt being fanned by Republicans are leading to real pain among the poor. When government is paralyzed by those who want to limit debt on the fear that bankers will get rich, we end up with a class war—“us against them.” But it doesn’t help us. It hurts. Instead we need to see our system as a vast interconnected economic web in which we are all dependent on one another. It’s a viewpoint that’s not as black-and-white, but I think it’s a story that can win hearts, minds, and voters, and lead to real solutions.
Photo credit: “The Storming of the Bastille,” painting by Jean-Pierre Houël (1735-1813), from Wikipedia Commons.
philippe
I completely disagree with this completely naive presentation. The reality is a growing income gap between the superrich and most of the rest of the population. Will the privileged class limits its privilege willingly? I don’t think it ever happened. This is a completely blind assessment of the present situation: are you trying to make people believe that someone who “makes” $ 1 million a year (or much more) is just like us and should not be taxed much more?
Jim Wavada
Nonsense. Look at the numbers. Class warfare is an accurate description of the deliberate redistribution of wealth from the blue collar and working “class” to the capitalists who derive most of their incomes from investment and property ownership. And this warfare is exactly what is ruining our economy and devastating our social contract. And yes, fighting back is a necessary pre-requisite to securing any kind of sustainable future.There is nothing in the least ambiguous about this dynamic of wealth redistribution to the top two percent, and its very real destructive effect on America’s potential to survive as a beacon of opportunity. The destruction is real. It’s documented with hard numbers. And the devastation already clutters the American sociological landscape. The American working class (yes, it is definable) has been pushed out onto the economic battlefield like so much canon fodder. We need to defect. We need to reject the global concentration of wealth that we’ve been conditioned by 30 years of supply side propaganda to accept as inevitable.We need to recognize that we are being attacked and understand how to defend ourselves. Then perhaps we can unite as a people and embrace localism and sustainability as valid alternatives to globalization and concentration of resources at the top of the economic food chain.Sophists nonsense that somehow calling a spade a spade sets working people against each other is just nonsense. Class warfare is real. Working stiffs just haven’t been fighting back.
civiletti
Superficial?There is no more relevant issue to the human condition than the effort of the ruling class to augment their power and privilege. This has been going on for millennia and shows no sign of abatement. William Safire did well for himself as a lap dog for these folks, so his perspective on the issue is no surprise. The excesses of the French and Russian revolutions are lamentable, but easy to understand as venting of the justified rage of peasants after centuries of inhuman exploitation.The lifestyles of the rich provide an excellent model of unsustainability. The desire to emulate it feeds rampant conspicuous consumption by the masses and delegitimazes the concept of sustainable living. Indeed, any economy close to sustainability will mean sharing wealth so that billions are not forced into permanent life-shortening poverty.Perhaps Valdez foresees some sort of feudal sustainability, where consumption is limited by serfdom. If that is the chosen way forward, we peasants will be sharpening guillotine blades before too long.
Dana Walker
We have experienced the most massive ‘redistribution of wealth’ in all human history over the last 30 years, all from bottom to top, and look what it has gotten us. It is, in fact, destroying our country. There is class warfare whether or not this writer ‘approves’ of the term, and the upper class is winning – which means everyone else is losing.
Curtis
I expected to see at least one comment here that supported Roger’s position, but this will not be one of them. I’m reading a book (Death of the Liberal Class by Chris Hedges) that makes a good case that ignoring the effects of the redistribution of wealth and concentration of power, which is what I believe “Class Warfare” is the antithesis of, will result in maintenance of the status quo. Climate change seems to be a reasonable case in point. Corporate control of politics and the media, particularly by the handful of large petroleum corporations, has effectively stifled any action in this country in the face of mounting scientific evidence and reasonable solutions that might steer our energy economy away from petroleum. I’ve come to believe that change won’t happen until we address income inequality and challenge corporate power. I think that means not ignoring or dismissing Class Warfare. Great, work to “fix the system”, but keep in mind that the deck is heavily stacked at the moment against changes that challenge the status quo.
Roger
I’ve been feeling the need to respond to the comments but I have been trying to avoid the response being “I think you missed my point.” But, I think you missed my point. I didn’t say that there is not a class war going on. This post was about whether declaring a class war is conducive to achieving the things we generally want to achieve. Using the rhetoric of class war and class warfare won’t work, it will simply further divide the country and won’t actually address the underlying issues that undermine sustainability. I think banks and bankers serve an important purpose. Wealthy people make their wealth by investing it projects that employ people and meet the demands of the market place. And frankly, wealthy people keep people like me employed through their contributions to non-profit organizations. I am often reminded in this context of the “bank run” scene in It’s a Wonderful Life. The depositor’s at the Building and Loan are scared and want cash. They want it now. But George Bailey explains how banks—and by extension, the financial system—work: <blockquote>You’re thinking of this place all wrong. As if I had the money back in a safe. The money’s not here. Your money’s in Joe’s house…right next to yours. And in the Kennedy house, and Mrs. Macklin’s house, and a hundred others. Why, you’re lending them the money to build, and then, they’re going to pay it back to you as best they can. Now what are you going to do? Foreclose on them?…Now wait…now listen…now listen to me. I beg of you not to do this thing. If Potter gets hold of this Building and Loan they’ll never be another decent house built in this town. He’s already got charge of the bank. He’s got the bus line. He’s got the department stores. And now he’s after us. Why? Well, it’s very simple. Because we’re cutting in on his business, that’s why. And because he wants to keep you living in his slums and paying the kind of rent he decides. Joe, you lived in one of his houses, didn’t you? Well, have you forgotten? Have you forgotten what he charged you for that broken-down shack? Here, Ed. You know, you remember last year when things weren’t going so well, and you couldn’t make your payments. You didn’t lose your house, did you? Do you think Potter would have let you keep it? Can’t you understand what’s happening here? Don’t you see what’s happening? Potter isn’t selling. Potter’s buying! And why? Because we’re panicky and he’s not. That’s why. He’s picking up some bargains. Now, we can get through this thing all right. We’ve got to stick together, though. We’ve got to have faith in each other.</blockquote>.The money isn’t back in a safe. Windmills in Oregon and affordable housing in Seattle are often funded and supported by people with money looking for tax shelter through tax credits. Bonds fund all kinds of infrastructure with money borrowed by people with lots of money to invest. Investors with cash, often motivated by tax code changes, put money into risky projects using alternative energy with hopes of getting a pay back. All of these things are made possible by people trying to make money either by increasing their payback or by reducing their costs. Are some of them greedy? Maybe. But what problems does bashing the rich solve? Does my being angry that Mr. Potter owns X percent of the wealth change anything? Will worrying about whether someone, somewhere is making money simply because they already have money going to fix climate change, poverty, or energy inequality.Does exploiting people’s anger and frustration and being unemployed somehow help them get a job? I don’t think so. But we can write laws to limit and prevent abuse. We can encourage certain kinds of investments and we can more effectively control our economy to maximize opportunity and minimize pain and extreme inequity. Understanding how our financial system works and accepting the fact that we can’t shut down the banks or burn down the stock market is an important step. Mad? Sure we’re mad. But what do I do with that anger? We can spend it on the airwaves talking about how upset we are about the gross inequities in our economy. Or we can figure out how to make the system work in our favor, the way George Bailey did with his Building and Loan. Yes there are Mr. Potter’s out there. But we can get through this thing all right. We’ve got to stick together, though. We’ve got to have faith in each other. We ought to resist the urge to bash the rich and focus on solving our systemic problems. That was my point.
civiletti
“We ought to resist the urge to bash the rich and focus on solving our systemic problems.” Ah, but the inordinate political and economic power of the rich IS a systemic problem. The solution is not hating the wealthy, but working to curtail their power.Also, if wealth is moved from the super-rich to the masses and the commons, then we will not need to depend on sustainable investment by the super-rich.
civiletti
“And frankly, wealthy people keep people like me employed through their contributions to non-profit organizations.”This is the crux of the matter. In 2006 I worked on the campaign to pass Measures 46 & 47 in Oregon. These were to limit large political contributions and increase reporting requirements by PACs and candidates. Almost all non-profits [Sierra Club and OSPIRG were exceptions] opposed the measures. They did so because their political fundraising from rich individuals would have been reduced.We demonstrated very well, I believe, that the political balance would shift toward progressive causes, simply because most large political contributions favor non-progressive interests, while progressive issues are generally able to attract more small contributions from many individuals. Realize that these measures only effected political contributions. There was no effect on non-profits’ ability to accept contributions on any size for projects, education, or organizational costs. Still, opposition to reform was close to unanimous.I believe the political directors of Oregon non-profits acted from the same motivation that led Roger Valdez to suggest we pay no to attention the man behind the curtain. He admits as much above.The lesson for progressives is this:The interests of those who work for organizations who champion our issues do not always coincide well with our positions on those issues. We need to keep our attention on the crucial issues and not defer to those who work on the issues professionally.I do not mean this as personal criticism of Roger Valdez. His self-interest is not exceptional, but normal. His honesty in admitting his motivation is exceptional. In all matters human, follow the money.
Doug Nielson
If you want support for your opinion you should have posted your piece on the Seattle Times. Apparently, the right wing robots haven’t discovered it yet.