File spoon-archives/marxism-general.archive/marxism-general_1997/97-01-04.073, message 65


Date: Fri, 3 Jan 1997 22:32:15 -0500
From: Furuhashi.1-AT-osu.edu (Yoshie Furuhashi)
Subject: M-G: The Problem of Limited Solidarity


Sally:

The study you cite is interesting, but it only points to another problem.
If the study is right about the US manual workers' attitudes--I am not sure
that it is,  because a sociologist can usually find the attitudes he is
looking for in his subjects--the question to be asked is: why are so many
workers' concepts of solidarity limited by the boundaries of gender, race,
sexual orientation, and nationality? Why haven't marxists been able to make
a more expansive concept of solidarity hegemonic? Why can't straight
workers include GLB workers in the circle of solidarity? Why can't more
white workers see workers of color as simply "fellow workers"? What should
we be doing to change the current sorry state of affairs?

yoshie
>
>So, though US manual workers sometimes easily get labeled "reactionary",
>"backward", "narrow-minded", etc., he offers an alternative
>explanation--one that centers around the concept of solidarity. Manual
>laborers, for historical and class reasons have had to depend on community
>and other social ties in dealing with each other. Therefore these  groups
>are more threatened by individuality and non-conventional behavior. On the
>other hand, behavior that enhances this solidarity, i.e. threatening those
>that refuse to join a strike, reinforce these collective norms.
>
>The whole point is not, of course, that bigotry against homosexuality is
>ever acceptable. All workers need to realize, for example, that the
>hard-fought struggles won by the lesbian and gay communities have benefited
>them as well. But to label and dismiss those that hold those views is not
>helpful if there is a goal to build bridges in order to overcome
>differences in attitudes. Sokolowski suggests left-wing intellectuals
>(often in the academy where individualism is valued) are so out of touch
>with working-class values they completely misinterpret them, putting up
>barriers to cooperation.
>
>Sally
>
>
>
>
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