Continues…
It might seem that in the abstract, you can simply appeal to a collective stake in good wages, decent health care, affordable housing and fair conditions of employment. The reality of segmentation and differentiation means, however, that “the abstract class structure does not determine the form working-class politics takes.” Workers may come to egalitarian politics through appeals to nonclass identities; they may be repelled by egalitarian politics by nonclass identities; they might see themselves as workers, but they may define this in nonclass terms.
There’s no ignoring that nonclass identities shape material interests. It is fashionable, in certain circles, to treat transgender rights as a supposedly woke distraction. But discrimination and exclusion are why transgender people are more likely to experience poverty and homelessness in their lives than most other Americans. You can’t attend to the interests of the working class if you aren’t attentive to the conditions of their lives, which are shaped as much by their identities and social positions as they are by their class status. As McCarthy writes, “Working-class people aren’t defined only by the burden of capitalists gaining more and more at their expense; a wide range of things matter to them, too, and some are specific to their sectors of the working class.”
A politician who hopes to build a coalition of working-class voters has no choice but to devise a message and appeal that speaks to the particular but connects to the general — that sees the many ways that working-class people organize themselves and tries to tie those movements and interests into something like a cohesive whole. A native-born store clerk has different needs from an immigrant slaughterhouse worker. But they have a shared interest in a world in which their lives are not shaped by the arbitrary power of their employer. The difficult trick is to connect the two people in ways that neither conflate the particulars of their situations nor obscure their common concerns.
McCarthy highlights Zohran Mamdani, the Democratic nominee for mayor of New York, as an example of a deft politician who has not sacrificed economic populism for identity politics or vice versa. “Though Mamdani leads with the cost of living and uses plain, sensible language, his platform also includes positions on particular sectors of the working class and the unique problems they face.” I’d like to highlight, as I often do, an older example: Jesse Jackson’s two campaigns for the Democratic presidential nomination in 1984 and 1988. In his speech at the 1988 Democratic National Convention, Jackson argued for a politics that takes class and identity seriously, that understands their relationship and interplay, that appeals to common identities and forges responsive solutions. “Politics can be a moral arena where people come together to find common ground,” he said, as he used the metaphor of the quilt to make his point plain.
When I was a child growing up in Greenville, S.C., my grandmama could not afford a blanket. She didn’t complain, and we did not freeze. Instead she took pieces of old cloth — patches, wool, silk, gabardine, crockersack — only patches, barely good enough to wipe off your shoes with. But they didn’t stay that way very long. With sturdy hands and a strong cord, she sewed them together into a quilt, a thing of beauty and power and culture. Now, Democrats, we must build such a quilt.
Farmers, you seek fair prices, and you are right, but you cannot stand alone. Your patch is not big enough. Workers, you fight for fair wages. You are right, but your patch of labor is not big enough.
Women, you seek comparable worth and pay equity. You are right, but your patch is not big enough. Women, mothers who seek Head Start and day care and prenatal care on the front side of life, relevant jail care and welfare on the back side of life, you are right, but your patch is not big enough.
Students, you seek scholarships. You are right, but your patch is not big enough. Blacks and Hispanics, when we fight for civil rights, we are right, but our patch is not big enough. Gays and lesbians, when you fight against discrimination and a cure for AIDS, you are right, but your patch is not big enough.
This isn’t a set of individual appeals; it’s a call for collective recognition that stresses the common thread without losing sight of the challenges facing each group. It does not put each group in a silo; it asks people to see one another in their own struggles — a translation of the theological notion of I and thou, tuned for a more democratic and egalitarian politics.
I could go on about Jackson’s campaigns, but I’ll leave it there and end with this: As we navigate this dark time in American politics, McCarthy has given us a reminder — a very useful reminder — that we need not ignore the particular in our fight to dispel the darkness of the present moment. We just can’t let it consume us.