Friday, February 10, 2006
Much-Needed Definitions of “Solidarity”
Thanks to Wood’s Lot for referring us to an article by Christopher Hayes in In These Times discussing the nature of solidarity. The most important thing that this article does is provide much-needed definitions of "solidarity" at a time when most people seem to have forgotten what the word means. In particular, I like these paragraphs, which talk about both "mundane" and "sublime" solidarity:
In its mundane sense, solidarity means a robust feeling of togetherness, a "one-for-all, all-for-one-ness" that holds fast a group of people in a common activity. It is best summed up in Benjamin Franklin's exhortation to his co-conspirators that they must all hang together or surely they would hang separately. This kind of solidarity is morally neutral. Union members refusing to cross a picket line exemplify solidarity, but so do white homeowners in a Chicago neighborhood signing restrictive covenants to keep black families out.
Sublime solidarity, on the other hand, embodies a powerful moral aspiration to realize the fundamental fellowship of humankind. The human subject imbued with full solidarity would treat each person the same way she would treat the interests of her closest kin. My father, a community organizer and one-time Jesuit seminarian, explains why solidarity is his favorite word by sketching a continuum that ranges from pearl-clutching pity through sympathy and empathy to arrive finally at solidarity, wherein you are propelled to do something for your fellow human beings, to act as if their interests were your own.
One thing that Hayes does which I have been trying to do for sometime is clarify the distinction between solidarity and charity. Hayes comes to the same conclusion that I have (as does Thomas Frank, apparently), that many prominent contemporary activists and their organizations approach the problems of the world with the attitude of charity, while solidarity is very different from that. In the past, I have tried to articulate why I believe that the typical contemporary liberal attitude of charity does not have the power of solidarity in effecting major changes in our world, but on at least some occasions, my efforts have been met with either bafflement or anger. Hopefully, Hayes' method of explaining these differences is a little more clear and less irritating:
Right now, our politics are atomized and transactional: we send checks, we sign petitions, we forward articles. We buy sweat-free clothes, recycle and look for vocations that don't collude too egregiously with evil. But we've unconsciously circumscribed the boundaries of political action. What is MoveOn's equivalent of a strike? As union membership and urban ethnic machines decline and the "netroots," overwhelmingly white and affluent, comes to represent the progressive movement, the left is in danger of becoming, as Thomas Frank wrote in Le Monde Diplomatique in February 2004, "a charity operation." That is, "people in sympathy with the downtrodden, not the downtrodden themselves."
As the American right offers that redundant canard "moral values" as its lodestar, the left should offer solidarity. Not retrograde brotherhood, or faith-specific fellowship, but something more robust and difficult and rewarding. The uplift of collective enterprise.
Hayes does make one statment that I really don't agree with, i.e., "If we lose unions, we lose the concept of solidarity itself. And it's hard to imagine we won't become worse people for it."
Actually, the trade union as we know it has never been the only method through which workers could organize collective actions and build solidarity, and it definitely should not be considered the only method now. Naturally, people would expect me to respond that way since I have for sometime been far more interested in workers’ councils and other methods through which the working class goes well beyond conventional trade union methods of negotiation and limited top-down-organized strikes, in order to take direct collective control of the workplace, factory, community, etc. Some people in the U.S. (who think they know what they’re talking about) would dismiss these other methods as being antiquated and utopian, but actually, the movements throughout the world in which workers are making the greatest progress and the left is advancing most - such as in much of Latin America at the moment - have involved many such collective takeovers, with the establishment of workers' councils and people’s assemblies. These efforts often involve some trade unions, but they also involve efforts outside of the unions and sometimes in spite of them (especially in spite of the union leadership).
One thing that troubles me about a lot of the more conventional American leftists is that they are so depressed by the decline of the standard, "traditional" forms of leftist organization - such as the trade union - that they’ve lost hope in, or have lost sight of, the idea that we can pursue other methods of building collective action, whether we look for entirely new methods or revisit seemingly older ones. Even in the U.S., we’ve seen some good examples of this happening, with the recent revival of interest in direct action and networked affinity groups. Much of the direct action and creative civil disobedience that emerged in a big way during the peak of our "anti-globalization" movement went well beyond the "transactional." However, the weaknesses of that movement, and its quick decline here in U.S., probably had a lot to do with the fact that it was comprised of too many young people coming from a background of affluence, many of whom were influenced more by an idealistic sense of charity, at least in the end (i.e., by a drive to help the less "privileged" or more "oppressed") than by a deeper kind of solidarity (as in, feeling that their fate was actually tied up with that of the people whom they were ideally most out to help - who, then, wouldn't be people they were just out to help but, rather, people with whom they would be joining in one common struggle). So Hayes' point does apply to this movement, too, in ways that I myself have complained about - but not really in terms of tactics, which went well beyond signing petitions and buying non-sweatshop clothes.
Quibbles notwithstanding, Hayes does get it right enough with regard to the main topic, solidarity, to be worth quoting, especially if it will help me to explain some of those points more clearly and avoid unnecessarily pissing people off.
---
P.S. Curiously, "solidarity" never even seemed to catch on as a big word in the U.S. "anti-globalization" protests. I found the case to be very different when I went to the protest in Quebec City in 2001, when all those French Canadians were chanting "Solidarite!" Maybe it's just a language difference, because of those French cultural-linguistic roots. I’m not really sure...
In its mundane sense, solidarity means a robust feeling of togetherness, a "one-for-all, all-for-one-ness" that holds fast a group of people in a common activity. It is best summed up in Benjamin Franklin's exhortation to his co-conspirators that they must all hang together or surely they would hang separately. This kind of solidarity is morally neutral. Union members refusing to cross a picket line exemplify solidarity, but so do white homeowners in a Chicago neighborhood signing restrictive covenants to keep black families out.
Sublime solidarity, on the other hand, embodies a powerful moral aspiration to realize the fundamental fellowship of humankind. The human subject imbued with full solidarity would treat each person the same way she would treat the interests of her closest kin. My father, a community organizer and one-time Jesuit seminarian, explains why solidarity is his favorite word by sketching a continuum that ranges from pearl-clutching pity through sympathy and empathy to arrive finally at solidarity, wherein you are propelled to do something for your fellow human beings, to act as if their interests were your own.
One thing that Hayes does which I have been trying to do for sometime is clarify the distinction between solidarity and charity. Hayes comes to the same conclusion that I have (as does Thomas Frank, apparently), that many prominent contemporary activists and their organizations approach the problems of the world with the attitude of charity, while solidarity is very different from that. In the past, I have tried to articulate why I believe that the typical contemporary liberal attitude of charity does not have the power of solidarity in effecting major changes in our world, but on at least some occasions, my efforts have been met with either bafflement or anger. Hopefully, Hayes' method of explaining these differences is a little more clear and less irritating:
Right now, our politics are atomized and transactional: we send checks, we sign petitions, we forward articles. We buy sweat-free clothes, recycle and look for vocations that don't collude too egregiously with evil. But we've unconsciously circumscribed the boundaries of political action. What is MoveOn's equivalent of a strike? As union membership and urban ethnic machines decline and the "netroots," overwhelmingly white and affluent, comes to represent the progressive movement, the left is in danger of becoming, as Thomas Frank wrote in Le Monde Diplomatique in February 2004, "a charity operation." That is, "people in sympathy with the downtrodden, not the downtrodden themselves."
As the American right offers that redundant canard "moral values" as its lodestar, the left should offer solidarity. Not retrograde brotherhood, or faith-specific fellowship, but something more robust and difficult and rewarding. The uplift of collective enterprise.
Hayes does make one statment that I really don't agree with, i.e., "If we lose unions, we lose the concept of solidarity itself. And it's hard to imagine we won't become worse people for it."
Actually, the trade union as we know it has never been the only method through which workers could organize collective actions and build solidarity, and it definitely should not be considered the only method now. Naturally, people would expect me to respond that way since I have for sometime been far more interested in workers’ councils and other methods through which the working class goes well beyond conventional trade union methods of negotiation and limited top-down-organized strikes, in order to take direct collective control of the workplace, factory, community, etc. Some people in the U.S. (who think they know what they’re talking about) would dismiss these other methods as being antiquated and utopian, but actually, the movements throughout the world in which workers are making the greatest progress and the left is advancing most - such as in much of Latin America at the moment - have involved many such collective takeovers, with the establishment of workers' councils and people’s assemblies. These efforts often involve some trade unions, but they also involve efforts outside of the unions and sometimes in spite of them (especially in spite of the union leadership).
One thing that troubles me about a lot of the more conventional American leftists is that they are so depressed by the decline of the standard, "traditional" forms of leftist organization - such as the trade union - that they’ve lost hope in, or have lost sight of, the idea that we can pursue other methods of building collective action, whether we look for entirely new methods or revisit seemingly older ones. Even in the U.S., we’ve seen some good examples of this happening, with the recent revival of interest in direct action and networked affinity groups. Much of the direct action and creative civil disobedience that emerged in a big way during the peak of our "anti-globalization" movement went well beyond the "transactional." However, the weaknesses of that movement, and its quick decline here in U.S., probably had a lot to do with the fact that it was comprised of too many young people coming from a background of affluence, many of whom were influenced more by an idealistic sense of charity, at least in the end (i.e., by a drive to help the less "privileged" or more "oppressed") than by a deeper kind of solidarity (as in, feeling that their fate was actually tied up with that of the people whom they were ideally most out to help - who, then, wouldn't be people they were just out to help but, rather, people with whom they would be joining in one common struggle). So Hayes' point does apply to this movement, too, in ways that I myself have complained about - but not really in terms of tactics, which went well beyond signing petitions and buying non-sweatshop clothes.
Quibbles notwithstanding, Hayes does get it right enough with regard to the main topic, solidarity, to be worth quoting, especially if it will help me to explain some of those points more clearly and avoid unnecessarily pissing people off.
---
P.S. Curiously, "solidarity" never even seemed to catch on as a big word in the U.S. "anti-globalization" protests. I found the case to be very different when I went to the protest in Quebec City in 2001, when all those French Canadians were chanting "Solidarite!" Maybe it's just a language difference, because of those French cultural-linguistic roots. I’m not really sure...
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I would agree. In Canada the concept of solidarite / solidarity is all that binds anyone us to 'a movement'. As our numbers are dispersed across great spans of geography. The topic is debated and discussed very regularily, especially within each larger mobilization (eg: a g8 summit) where activists converge in greater numbers and tension arises surrounding very defering attitudes toward tactics (specifically). There is a strong assumption among activist communities here that 'collectivity' is not only part of every solution but a process of deliberation. The latter of which visitors/foreigners often find painfully grueling.
I can't help but to believe that this 'necessity' is partly due to our numbers and sparcity (you can travel anywhere from 12 hrs to two days to reach the next large urban centre, for eg).
I can't help but to believe that this 'necessity' is partly due to our numbers and sparcity (you can travel anywhere from 12 hrs to two days to reach the next large urban centre, for eg).
hi Richard,
Agreed, solidarity doesn't go away with the trade union. Have you ever read anything by Stan Weir? His observations about informal work groups seem relevant here... basically, I'd put it this way: the power that trade unions have/had is derived from relationships of solidarity (among other things), which the business union structure both depends on but at the same time must erode. I'd say the same of parties too. I like this metaphor for these: the business unions and the parties of the world are, at best, glass jars placed over candles which as small moments of heat in the class struggle. These jars can help keep those moments from being totally snuffed when the winds of reaction are blowing hard, but they also try to prevent those moments from linking up with the rest of the class when there's a big fire raging outside.
take care,
Nate
Agreed, solidarity doesn't go away with the trade union. Have you ever read anything by Stan Weir? His observations about informal work groups seem relevant here... basically, I'd put it this way: the power that trade unions have/had is derived from relationships of solidarity (among other things), which the business union structure both depends on but at the same time must erode. I'd say the same of parties too. I like this metaphor for these: the business unions and the parties of the world are, at best, glass jars placed over candles which as small moments of heat in the class struggle. These jars can help keep those moments from being totally snuffed when the winds of reaction are blowing hard, but they also try to prevent those moments from linking up with the rest of the class when there's a big fire raging outside.
take care,
Nate
# posted by 
: 1:27 AM
: 1:27 AM
Other great thoughts by Willful Disobedience.
sphinx
AGAINST CHARITY
In many cities in the United States, anarchists have organized "Food Not Bombs" feeds. The organizers of these projects will explain that food should be free, that no one should ever have to go hungry. Certainly, a fine sentiment... and one to which these anarchists respond in much the same way as Christians, hippies or left liberals-by starting a charity.
We will be told, however, that "Food Not Bombs" (FNB) is different. The decision-making process used by the organizers is non-hierarchical. They receive no government or corporate grants. In many cities, they serve their meals as an act of civil disobedience, risking arrest. Obviously, FNB is not a large-scale charitable bureaucracy; in fact, it is often a very slipshod effort... but it is a charity-and that is never questioned by its anarchist organizers. [FNB is not, in fact, anarchist in origin, but rather an activist project. However, most currently existing FNB feeds are operated by anarchists. A few also operate more as a meal shared among friends and acquaintances than as a charity, but almost all tend to remain dependent upon the charity of businesses to supply them with food.]
Charities are a necessary part of any economic social system. The scarcity imposed by the economy creates a situation in which some people are unable to meet even their most basic needs through the normal channels. Even in nations with highly developed social welfare programs, there are those who fall through the cracks in the system. Charities take up the slack where the state's welfare programs can't or won't help. Groups like FNB are, thus, a voluntary workforce helping to preserve the social order by reinforcing the dependence of the dispossessed on programs not of their own creation.
No matter how non-hierarchical the decision-making process used by the organizers may be, the charitable relationship is always authoritarian. The beneficiaries of a charity are at the mercy of the organizers of the program and so are not free to act on their own terms in this relationship. This can be seen in the humiliating way in which one must receive charity. Charity feeds like FNB require the beneficiaries to arrive at a time not of their choosing in order to stand in line to receive food not of their choosing in quantities doled out by some volunteer who wants to make sure that everyone gets a fair share. Of course, it's better than going hungry, but the humiliation is at least as great as that of waiting in line at the grocery store to pay for food one actually wants and can eat when one wants it. The numbness we develop to such humiliation-the numbness that is made evident by the ease with which certain anarchists will opt to eat at charity feeds every day in order to avoid paying for food, as though there were no other options-shows the extent to which our society is permeated with such humiliating interactions. Still one would think that anarchists would refuse such interactions insofar as lies within their power to do so and would seek to create interactions of a different sort in order to destroy the humiliation imposed by society. Instead many create programs that reinforce this humiliation.
But what of the empathy one may feel for another who is suffering from a poverty one knows all too well; what of the desire to share food with others? Programs like FNB do not generally express empathy, they express pity. Doling out food is not sharing; it is an impersonal, hierarchical relationship between social role "donor" and social role "beneficiary". Lack of imagination has led anarchists to deal with the question of hunger (which is an abstract question for most of them) in much the same way as christians and liberals, creating institutions which parallel those which already exist. As is to be expected, when anarchists attempt to do an inherently authoritarian task, they do a piss-poor job... Why not leave charity work to those who have no illusions about it? Anarchists would do better to find ways of sharing individually if they feel so moved, ways which encourage self-determination rather than dependence and affinity rather than pity.
There is nothing anarchist about FNB. Even the name is a demand being made to the authorities. This is why its organizers so frequently use civil disobedience-it is an attempt to appeal to the consciences of those in power, to get them to feed and house the poor. There is nothing in this program that encourages selfdetermination. There is nothing that would encourage the beneficiaries to refuse that role and begin to take what they want and need without following the rules. FNB, like every other charity, encourages its beneficiaries to remain passive recipients rather than becoming active creators of their own lives. Charity must be recognized for what it is: another aspect of the institutionalized humiliation inherent in our economized existence, which must be destroyed so that we can truly live.
sphinx
AGAINST CHARITY
In many cities in the United States, anarchists have organized "Food Not Bombs" feeds. The organizers of these projects will explain that food should be free, that no one should ever have to go hungry. Certainly, a fine sentiment... and one to which these anarchists respond in much the same way as Christians, hippies or left liberals-by starting a charity.
We will be told, however, that "Food Not Bombs" (FNB) is different. The decision-making process used by the organizers is non-hierarchical. They receive no government or corporate grants. In many cities, they serve their meals as an act of civil disobedience, risking arrest. Obviously, FNB is not a large-scale charitable bureaucracy; in fact, it is often a very slipshod effort... but it is a charity-and that is never questioned by its anarchist organizers. [FNB is not, in fact, anarchist in origin, but rather an activist project. However, most currently existing FNB feeds are operated by anarchists. A few also operate more as a meal shared among friends and acquaintances than as a charity, but almost all tend to remain dependent upon the charity of businesses to supply them with food.]
Charities are a necessary part of any economic social system. The scarcity imposed by the economy creates a situation in which some people are unable to meet even their most basic needs through the normal channels. Even in nations with highly developed social welfare programs, there are those who fall through the cracks in the system. Charities take up the slack where the state's welfare programs can't or won't help. Groups like FNB are, thus, a voluntary workforce helping to preserve the social order by reinforcing the dependence of the dispossessed on programs not of their own creation.
No matter how non-hierarchical the decision-making process used by the organizers may be, the charitable relationship is always authoritarian. The beneficiaries of a charity are at the mercy of the organizers of the program and so are not free to act on their own terms in this relationship. This can be seen in the humiliating way in which one must receive charity. Charity feeds like FNB require the beneficiaries to arrive at a time not of their choosing in order to stand in line to receive food not of their choosing in quantities doled out by some volunteer who wants to make sure that everyone gets a fair share. Of course, it's better than going hungry, but the humiliation is at least as great as that of waiting in line at the grocery store to pay for food one actually wants and can eat when one wants it. The numbness we develop to such humiliation-the numbness that is made evident by the ease with which certain anarchists will opt to eat at charity feeds every day in order to avoid paying for food, as though there were no other options-shows the extent to which our society is permeated with such humiliating interactions. Still one would think that anarchists would refuse such interactions insofar as lies within their power to do so and would seek to create interactions of a different sort in order to destroy the humiliation imposed by society. Instead many create programs that reinforce this humiliation.
But what of the empathy one may feel for another who is suffering from a poverty one knows all too well; what of the desire to share food with others? Programs like FNB do not generally express empathy, they express pity. Doling out food is not sharing; it is an impersonal, hierarchical relationship between social role "donor" and social role "beneficiary". Lack of imagination has led anarchists to deal with the question of hunger (which is an abstract question for most of them) in much the same way as christians and liberals, creating institutions which parallel those which already exist. As is to be expected, when anarchists attempt to do an inherently authoritarian task, they do a piss-poor job... Why not leave charity work to those who have no illusions about it? Anarchists would do better to find ways of sharing individually if they feel so moved, ways which encourage self-determination rather than dependence and affinity rather than pity.
There is nothing anarchist about FNB. Even the name is a demand being made to the authorities. This is why its organizers so frequently use civil disobedience-it is an attempt to appeal to the consciences of those in power, to get them to feed and house the poor. There is nothing in this program that encourages selfdetermination. There is nothing that would encourage the beneficiaries to refuse that role and begin to take what they want and need without following the rules. FNB, like every other charity, encourages its beneficiaries to remain passive recipients rather than becoming active creators of their own lives. Charity must be recognized for what it is: another aspect of the institutionalized humiliation inherent in our economized existence, which must be destroyed so that we can truly live.
# posted by : 4:53 PM
: 4:53 PM
I would agree with this whole heartedly.
As one of the colonized, a black woman, an immigrant woman who came here (to north america, canada to be more specific) as a child, as a working class woman who grew up poor and sometimes starving...
As a post secondary educated woman, I come to logger heads with white and/middle class activists all the time who don't want to share power with someone who actually understands the underpinnings of what they're doing. I don't want their charity, their work on my behalf, their strategizing on my behalf.
I have my own clearly stated agendas, my own ideas about how I will liberate mySELF. As a result, the activists I know, give me a wide berth. There is no solidarity with the agendas I have articulated, there is no interest to participate in my struggles, because my struggles have not been defined as part of their cause...which is to "help" me and mine.
I am a frankenstein creature come awake with self knowledge, power and tenacity. There is no request for aid issuing from these lips.
There is only a search for solidarity across lines of power and privilege...which are something activists who are privileged with class (this patronizing dominance is also a problem among middle class "children" of the (new) third world bourgeousie living and organizing in north america) and/or with white skin refuse to hear, refuse to respond to.
I've actually got folks working to make sure that I'm isolated in real time and in the blogosphere, because they don't know what to do with a real live oppressed person who in some cases is more politically savvy and articulate than they are.
My inability and unwillingness to lie down and play helpless and brain dead so they can shine and feel superior sort'a messes with the image of "helping" and being undercover charitable, now doesn't it? :)
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As one of the colonized, a black woman, an immigrant woman who came here (to north america, canada to be more specific) as a child, as a working class woman who grew up poor and sometimes starving...
As a post secondary educated woman, I come to logger heads with white and/middle class activists all the time who don't want to share power with someone who actually understands the underpinnings of what they're doing. I don't want their charity, their work on my behalf, their strategizing on my behalf.
I have my own clearly stated agendas, my own ideas about how I will liberate mySELF. As a result, the activists I know, give me a wide berth. There is no solidarity with the agendas I have articulated, there is no interest to participate in my struggles, because my struggles have not been defined as part of their cause...which is to "help" me and mine.
I am a frankenstein creature come awake with self knowledge, power and tenacity. There is no request for aid issuing from these lips.
There is only a search for solidarity across lines of power and privilege...which are something activists who are privileged with class (this patronizing dominance is also a problem among middle class "children" of the (new) third world bourgeousie living and organizing in north america) and/or with white skin refuse to hear, refuse to respond to.
I've actually got folks working to make sure that I'm isolated in real time and in the blogosphere, because they don't know what to do with a real live oppressed person who in some cases is more politically savvy and articulate than they are.
My inability and unwillingness to lie down and play helpless and brain dead so they can shine and feel superior sort'a messes with the image of "helping" and being undercover charitable, now doesn't it? :)
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