Class and the US election… and gender and race… oh my! March 8, 2008
Posted by WorldbyStorm in US Politics.trackback
A great post over at Dublin Opinion on the class aspect of the Clinton/Obama campaign by Conor.
I think he’s right that US politics is, counterintuitively, more aware of the nuances of class analysis than Irish politics. Or rather, while there is a tendency to eschew ‘class war’ on the side of the right in particular, there is little fear about actually pointing to the class structure. It could be that this is a function of the traditionally wider divergences between classes in the US, or indeed their near-foundation myth based on the concept that anyone can drag ones way up… which of course necessitates a base to move from and a height to move to. In that instance the class structure becomes an exemplary element of the societal discourse because it permits betterment, progress, achievement. Again, note how ‘rags to riches’ is another aspect of US societal myth – and examples are lauded (note too the opprobium heaped on those who use that story and then are found to have been deceitful or to have, in some way, betrayed their class origin – that’s bad because it trashes the supposed truth of the dynamic). On the other hand one might also point to the parlous state of the US left and the seeming lack of any serious vehicle by which to drive that left to state power. I entirely share the lack of faith in the Democratic Party, while also acknowledging that short term it is the only game in town to achieve any sort of broadscale progressive changes.
Whereas in Ireland the impression is given that we are somehow now ‘beyond’ class. That, in the Irish situation, there is a tendency to pretend that class is irrelevant. And in this pretense there is also a sort of functional forgetting. If class is irrelevant then the corollary appears to be that therefore class distinctions have no meanings and we should not tie ourselves into class categories. And yet, as ever, this has weirdly paradoxical effects in practice. Note the way ‘working class’ is used in cultural terms as a legitimation. But not in political terms. Quite the opposite…except, consider Ahern’s popularity which is in part based on his projection of an image as an ‘ordinary’ man. And note too the attacks on his accent which are surely class based. Yet in this state we have at least two signficant parties (and possibly a third if one includes the Progressive Democrats) which have near class based analyses. And yet, the discourse from Labour, and indeed Sinn Féin as we saw at the weekend, is one which seems to be one which is blending with a broader societal aversion to such matters. And if the calculation is that such talk will put people off, well, I wonder. Part of the problem is that that debate is too often left to the margins, which are broadly speaking unable to effect change and thereby ghettoised. If the larger left formations (and okay, they’re not that large to begin with) were willing to be more proactive it might be interesting to see where this went. And I’m always struck by the success of the Workers’ Party at managing to achieve a balance between an explicit recognition of class as a profound dynamic within the society and yet also maintain a clearly pragmatic approach which did indeed garner votes, even during the first very faint wave of economic recovery (and somehow it also managed to balance the idea that a class aware left could be ‘modern’… a neat trick).
Still, one thing that has leaped out at me is the way in which both Obama and Clinton seem to be pulling in two different directions in class terms. Obama, to some extend, is pulling in ‘educated’ middle class voters. Hillary Clinton, by contrast, is getting less educated working class white men. Now, is it only me who finds this statistic utterly compelling as regards an election in 2008. I mean, it’s not just that the Democratic Party has a woman and a black man as candidate, but that the woman is appealing to working class white males and the black man is appealing to the ‘middle classes’, or – and this is telling – the college educated which is not quite the same thing, now is it?
Or as the Washington Post (which Conor linked to) opines:
Exit poll results from contested primary states so far show that she regularly scores better among working-class white voters — those without college degrees, and those with incomes under $50,000. Obama’s voters, by contrast, tend to be the more affluent, the college-educated and African Americans. Clinton has the beer drinkers; Obama has the wine connoisseurs.
Now it’s not entirely cut and dried, as the Post also continues:
But a random sampling of voters in beer-drinking Bayonne showed that many are lukewarm about her candidacy. And some of these hard-core Democrats seem to be willing to give Obama a serious look.
“I was brought up pure Democrat — my dad was in politics for many, many years,” said Brian Ahern, 40, who works for the local redevelopment authority and was enjoying an afternoon pint of beer at the Big Apple Sports Palace on Broadway Street, Bayonne’s main drag. “When [Sen. Edward] Kennedy came out and endorsed Obama, that made a big impression on me. . . . I’m leaning towards him only because of that.”
No one comes out and says that either race or gender are issues, and one can only presume that they are submerged currents in all this. If so, do they then represent deeper currents than class? I do not know. The evidence actually seems to point to them not, at least not so far. Yet, if we consider further quotes one wonders.
He [a voter] prefers Obama. “I don’t like Hillary,” he said. “She’s old school, and I don’t like her demeanor. I think we need fresh ideas, and I think [Obama] has fresh ideas.” He added: “A lot of my friends just don’t like Hillary. We voted for Bill, but we don’t like Hillary.”
It’s hard to pinpoint the reason Clinton is disliked here. Fitzgerald, when pressed, offered: “She flip-flops in her opinions too much. And I don’t like national health care.”
or alternatively:
Next to Fitzgerald at the bar, his friend Rich Wisolmerski isn’t convinced. “Obama will be eaten up by the rest of the world,” said Wisolmerski, 55, whose family has been in the soda and beer distribution business here for three generations. “Most likely the Democrats are going to win. Whoever wins this is going to be the president.”
“I don’t like Hillary,” he continued. “I don’t like Bill Clinton. But at least she’ll have a backup there to help her out. Obama will be eaten up.”
Still, I can’t help but wonder whether the final quote might herald a possible future…
Wisolmerski calls himself an independent, and he said that for the general election, “I think McCain is the man.”
On so many levels that last sentence sums up an alternative discourse which we will have every opportunity to see in action come the actual election.
I always laugh when I hear the Irish mainstream media talk about Ireland as “beyond” class. The issue of class is hotwired into the very dynamics of capitalist production. The only way to be “beyond” class is to be in a place that is “beyond” capitalist structures and a capitalist economy. And, is that Ireland today? A non-capitalist economy? An anarchist uyopia? Class analysis, at the end of the day, is a materialist analysis of a particular economic system. you cannot have a capitalist economy without division of labour, and you cannot have division of labour without creating classes.
I mean, it goes back to what we argue over on Irish Left Review – that the mainstream media have taken marketing concepts of consumer groups as if they somehow explain the division of labour within capitalist production. It´s apples and oranges, man.
For me, the problem is that the mainstream media gets class sturcutres within a capitalist economy mixed up with class consciousness.
The Irish working class may not have a strong class consciousness, but that´s a different thing to the amount of power and influence your job has in the way things get made, and the way profits are distributed.
With regard to America and class and race. The one thing about America is that race runs through almost fucking everything. and the working class is no exception.
now the American mainstream media are using working class to mean white – but at the same time they give quite definite parameters as to what makes you working class. For them, it´s education and income. (ok. they say, under $50,000 a year and non-college educated, oh, and WHITE!) But still, they are using the language of “working class”.
So. The Irish capitalist economy is somehow more advanced than the American model, as the Irish model has gone “beyond” class while the American capltalist model continues to struggle with it.
I would love the mainstream media guys and gals to show me where the division of labour in Ireland has melted away. I´m sure, Germany, France, Italy, Canada, Australia, etc, and, of course, America, would love to see how we´ve done it as well.
When these campaigns began Obama had the support of professional blacks, but not the black working class. Now thanks to Bill Clinton in S.Carlolina the black working class is also solidly for Obama.The Clintons played and continue to play the race card. Obama did pick up some support from the white working class in the South-they preferred a male (black) to a (white) woman. Obama, at least before Ohio, appeared to have picked up the majority of Edwards’ support.
There’s also an ‘age factor’ at work: older white women supporting Clinton, younger white women supporting Obama.
But neither candidate has an explicitly class-based platform, and will need support from the broad, Democratic base if McCain is to be defeated.
To disentangle the relative importance of race and class and gender is probably impossible, but to focus on any one and ignore the other two gives misleading answers.
And in the race for delegates, Obama is now in a better position before Hillary’s ‘come-back victories’ in Ohio and Texas.
So the really important question in the Democratic campaign has really little, if anything, to do with class: will the super-delegates support the candidate with the most pledged delegates? Will they deny Obama his victory in the primaries and caucuses? Unlikely.
and possibly a third if one includes the Progressive Democrats
Why would you think this?
I’m sort of being tongue in cheek. But, I think it’s fair to say that the PDs very nakedly set out to look after a certain class interest, however inchoate their understanding of class (although on some measures they were very very adept at protecting their own).
CL, you point to a split within the working class but one based on race. Would that be a fair assessment?
Incidentally, Conor I think you put your finger on it when you mention mainstream media. There is a narrative which completely pretends/ignores class relationships in this society, and even more so ignores that money still arbitrates delivery of optimal outcomes.
But, I think it’s fair to say that the PDs very nakedly set out to look after a certain class interest
Oh God yes, but they do go out of their way to completely refuse to accept it, don’t they? There’s no class like the metropolitan professional class for thinking that what suits them is good for everybody else, and for considering themselves above self-interest when they act to suit themselves.
Very true, which I think is why your comment on the other thread about the further left keeping the left honest is so true. Because someone has to think in class terms (indeed that would be my big criticism of the Green Party). Here (in the RoI) we simply don’t have that dynamic, in part because the left is so small and has a hard enough time even vaguely, slightly, fractionally influencing anyone at all themselves.
A blunt, plain-spoken confrontation of the race issue by Obama yesterday in Philiadelphia, Pennsylvania.
Since Reagan began his presidential campaign in Philadelphia, Mississippi, near where Goodman, Schwerner and Chaney were murdered, the race card has been a key component in the triumph of the neo-liberal counter-revolution.
Since the hyperbolic comments of Obama’s pastor, Jeremiah Wright, surfaced the right-wing fanatics have been like rabid dogs on Obama’s heels. Obama has withstood this test: Gingrich, Limbaugh and Hannity are whining in desperation. Obama did not repudiate Wright but rather put him in the context of black experience of racial oppression. Neither did he repudiate his white grandmother. If he can unite the white and black working classes around mutually-shared economic oppression he poses a real threat to power and privilege. Much remains to be seen…but perhaps a beginning has been made.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/18/us/politics/18text-obama.html?_r=1&oref=slogin
Good link CL. I’m not entirely sure how this is going to pan out now…
How the Irish fleeing oppression to the U.S. played a role in conservative reaction has never been adequately addressed.
Maureen Dowd in the NY Times:
“He was spot-on about my tribe of working-class Irish, the ones who have helped break his winning streak in New Hampshire and Ohio, and may do so in Pennsylvania.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/19/opinion/19dowd.html?_r=1&ref=opinion&oref=slogin
I know I’m cherry- picking, but passages like this make me doubt how much real change an Obama presidency would see; he condemns Wright for
a view that sees the conflicts in the Middle East as rooted primarily in the actions of stalwart allies like Israel, instead of emanating from the perverse and hateful ideologies of radical Islam