Who is a PMC lib, who is working class? It's obviously not office/factory anymore, most people don't work in factories, right? Why was the focus in communist thought on factories and not, servants, drivers, nannies, maids, cooks and secretaries of the rich – they seem to be easy to radicalise because they see the shittiness and incompetence of the rich day to day, and more importantly are most needing of a union because of the likelihood of abuse by their bosses.
Was it because they don't exactly work together? Can't exactly chat and radicalise? Hard to strike? How do we bring gig economy workers together when the same barriers apply to radicalise them?
Excellent post, additionally the expectation to migrate for jobs prevents you from meaningfully investing in community.
Exactly.
And this all comes down to the neoliberal "globalisation" project. Dismantle industry and outsource it to the periphery, atomise the workers into endlessly job changing and migrating units to dismantle their capability to be community-oriented, to have naturally forming identities attached to their workplaces, to have long-term visions of their relationship with their workplace.
Countering this at a large scale requires an all-new approach. I am convinced that we must build identities for them to fill some of the gaps that have been created. If the "gig economy" is to be a vocally talked about thing then the "gig worker" needs to be an identity and those workers must see themselves as in gig work for at least several years before you will meaningfully get them to think of the work they do within their whole life's context.
The workers of the past era saw their work and workplaces within the context of their whole life. The workers of today see their work within the context of something they might be doing for the next 2-5 years. What happens after that? Who knows, we are encouraged not to plan that far ahead.
This whole group as I see it has been referred to as the "precariat" for a variety of reasons and I am on-board with the theory that you can radicalise members of the precariat via recognition that they have no future in sight. The precariety of people's conditions is where gains can be made without any work at all -- what is in your future? What is in that gig worker's future? How does he see himself working out of it? When?... When the members of the precariat are confronted with the feeling that they have no future they radicalise hard and really fucking fast, that or they jokerfy but I see jokerfication as a stepping stone into the left in the first place.
huh... I didn't expect decent class analysis from the guardian, even if the prescriptions/warnings are a little off
There's a few people they allow to write rare one-offs for them that are occasionally excellent. I pay attention to anything written by professors or communists. Ash Sarkar occasionally gets to write for them and is worth paying attention to despite being a trot, I always have time for Owen Jones too.
Obviously The Guardian as a whole is dogshit but here in the UK edition it does actually get used as a vessel for some good things... Nothing truly radical is allowed of course. But some good analysis and some good socdem (actually socdem properly left of Bernie) stuff that includes class.
Jesus that article is 9 years old... Thanks!
Yeaaaah I like to dig it out from time to time. It demonstrated exceptional foresight when it was written and showed how some people were clearly on the bleeding edge of thought. The writer (Guy Standing) is professor of oriental and african studies at the University of London. I don't know how good his politics are but this take was bang on. I wonder what his thoughts on China are given he obviously must cover them a lot in his work.
Found this one from 2014.
This guy definitely knows his stuff. From "fuck voting" to "fuck a return to normal". Also he's definitely calling for non-electoral revolution and shits on soc-dems so that's a plus.
Interesting. Yeah I think his analysis in these two pieces is spot on and he's a man worth listening to. Sounds like a good professor to have. I wonder what his students have to say about him.
This is what the bourgeois class just started talking about with their "great reset". Something he predicted 6 years ago. This man needs a channel through which to express his analysis more frequently, I need more of it.
Seems like he might be the one behind UBI at least the version we see today.
Edit: Yeah, that article isn't too great. It seems like most of Yang's platform came directly from this guy. Just with less class consciousness. His concept of means tested benefits being replaced with UBI being okay because people can work is ableist as fuck and does not deal with retirement at all.
Seems like it's the good form of UBI though. Socdem with a solution to fix the existing system without revolution.
I can dig it. It's not what I want of course but he's clearly further left than most and understands the class conflict itself. His solution might not be the radical full revolution we need but his analysis is clearly good, I guess he's working within the confines of the British situation where pretty much everyone believes socdem is the furthest left "viable" position in current British politics... I actually agree with that analysis despite the fact I'm pushing for much further left than that.
I think there's also one thing we haven't analysed and we should ask the question -- what does UBI do to class consciousness? What happens when you raise up the working class like that? What happens if we merge the poorest segment of the population into the liberal "middle class" that the liberals use as a means of splitting the working class between poor and middle. What happens when the class all becomes one unit? Where do our conversations and tactics go if/when a UBI like this essentially eliminates the poverty that we typically use as our base-line for argument?
I don't have an answer. But I think it's a worthwhile discussion. The elimination of the precariat not only entails the elimination of the contradiction that is currently threatening a capitalist crisis but it will also give way to a new contradiction between "the people" and "the ruling rich". They may find it far far harder to split the population under such conditions.
So yeah. It's not my goal but I'm not principally against it as a compromise position. Yang is garbage though.
His argument seems to be that UBI as he describes it would and should be brought about through the collective action of the precariat as a means to abolish itself. Not even a solution to class conflict or anything, just the only viable method by which to resolve that specific class contradiction and transition into a new phase. He also uses the term "Unconditional" instead of "Universal" which I think makes the concept a lot more sound as a method of eradication the contradiction of the precariat. An unconditional income would create a new class of proletarians that identifies with eachother through the shared experience of living off that basic income. Something that could never be taken away once granted as it would have immediate and profound positive effects on material conditions for nearly every individual who received it.
I can support that.
I agree with rebranding it "unconditional" to as opposed to "universal". It will be far far harder to co-opt the discussion on the topic and water it down as we have seen for UBI. I have seen 10 versions of UBI ranging from the very good (completely unconditional and covers ALL basic living costs) to the very bad (basically just a new name for welfare, even with means testing in some cases). Watering the phrase down has been a tactic of attacking it.
What interests me most about this is how it will affect revolutionary organising. One of the main barriers to revolutionary organising I have seen is that radicals must juggle working for a living and doing organising. A UBI would provide the means for a lot of people to become full-time revolutionaries. Same goes for salting groups.