Research Essay
Abandonment of the 'Working Class' by the Left
Disclaimer: This was a research essay done for a class called ‘Introduction to Cultural Studies’ at The University of South Australia, when i was still undertaking my Arts degree. Many of my political and economic understandings have dramatically altered since the writing of this essay e.g. i would critique some of the more socialist sympathies within the essay. However, i believe the analysis regarding the evolution of the left from unionist/working class politics to identity politics is still very accurate, as well as how many of these traditional demographics have moved ‘right’.
Politics is seemingly becoming more polarised and divisive than ever, with the assistance from the mainstream media, but are these polar sides that politically different from each other? The purpose of this study is to examine how the abandonment of the working class by the traditional "LEFT" parties led to events like BREXIT and Trumpism. In this essay, a more nuanced perspective will be taken on these issues, compared to the often one sided and demeaning stances taken by people and the "opposing” medias. Instead of looking at events and movements such as Brexit and Trumpism as random and the cause of “idiots”, it may be more useful to examine what was not being catered for in the political world that made these events so appealing to so many people. This essay will cover topics, such as analysing the state of politics before Trump, and if people’s needs were being successfully catered for. Secondly, it will be examined how the left has evolved over the years, and how currently the centre-left parties have pursued more symbolic identity politics over the traditional class politics it was founded upon. Thirdly, the medias impact in polarising people’s perspectives on politics and the exaggeration in differences between the dominant political parties will be discussed. The essay will finally examine the fundamental differences between predominant left and right parties, and is there a lack of a significant alternative?
The State of Politics before Trump was becoming increasingly superficial regarding policy and the dialogue concerning that policy, as well as addressing the public. When looking at the state of politics before Trump, a significant figure of Barrack Obama and his time in office needs to be analysed. Obama, within mainstream media is often hailed as one of the great leaders and is held as a benchmark of modern contemporary politics. However, Dr. Cornel West helps explain that Obama was not the revolutionary leader he was often depicted to be, actually very far from it. West evidences this through citing numerous war crimes of Obama in the middle east (West, 2017)1. One of the major issues that Cornel links with Obama, is his failings to address poverty. This is evidenced in how Obama cited the working class less than any modern president aside from George H.W. Bush (Roediger, 2020)6. As Cornel indicates, when you do not address poverty and people’s genuine struggles you leave that space open for right wing parties to claim, which was demonstrated in Trump’s large following of white rural and urban working-class followers. Obama’s journey to power harnessed a spirit not too dissimilar to trump, yet not as obviously controversial and erratic. However, not long after Obama was elected, he became responsible for one of the biggest transfers of wealth upwards in recorded history during the fall out of the 2008 Global Financial Crisis (Murphey, 2012)2. The Obama administration failed to arrest or even prosecute any senior wall street banker for the systematic fraud that precipitated the GFC (Greenwald, 2013)3. This was while millions of people were financially struggling from the actions of wall street and the elites. These actions were in no way in accordance with narratives Obama was promoting leading up to the 2008 election where he stated his intentions to seriously reform wall street (Allen, 2008)4. “I am running for President of the United States because the dreams of the American people must not be endangered any more. It’s time to put an end to a broken system in Washington that is breaking the American economy. It’s time for change that makes a real difference in your lives (Barack Obama: Confronting an Economic Crisis, 2008)5.” Unfortunately, many people bought these aspirations from the then future president which resulted in a record voter turnout for his victory. Glen Greenwald detailed how Wall Street never bought Obama’s progressive agenda and actually heavily financed and supported his election campaign (Greenwald, 2013)3.
In David R. Roediger’s book ‘The Sinking Middle Class’ he demonstrates how major western parties on both sides aggressively pursue the idea of fighting for and protecting the middle class. The reasoning for this, is a good portion of people would like to consider themselves middle class. This unfortunately is not the Truth, within the book it is revealed that the term ‘working-class’ is often absent from the choices offered in important surveys, thus artificially inflates those identifying within the middle-class bracket. However, in surveys where there is a working-class option on offer, the number of people identifying with the middle class drops by more than half (Roediger, 2020)6. The Centre on Applied Research at Georgetown University undertook a Study in 2013 analysing and contrasting the language used by the last ten presidents of the United States in public statements involving social class. The Study indicated that Obama referred to the ‘middle Class’ in over half of said statements leading the way, while Clinton only referred to the ‘middle-class’ half as much in second. With regards to referencing the “poor” and “poverty” Obama took last place, only expressing these terms in 26% of statements, significantly lower than next lowest President George H.W Bush who was synonymous with traditional conservative politics regarding class.
Many traditional “Left” parties such as the British and Australian Labor parties, and the Democrats have increasingly pursued some form of identity politics, over the traditional class politics they were founded upon. A plausible reason for this is it allows the parties to seem superficially progressive without having to challenge the corporate interests and profits these parties are embedded with. When examining the impact and electoral importance of social class, it is evident that there is a growing phenomenon of members from the Working class voting for Right-wing parties. This was already being identified in 2009 in the book ‘Farewell to the Leftist Working Class’ which attributed the phenomenon to a rise of ‘cultural voting’ (Stubager, 2009)7. The Article of the book, details how this behaviour is in contradiction to traditional class theory, which assumes that members of the working class will vote for Leftist parties because of their ideas of economic redistribution. The reason for this shift from class voting to more cultural voting, could be partly attributed to the current rapid era of Globalisation. In the book ‘What’s Left of the Left: democrats and Social Democrats in Challenging Times’ it articulates how all sides of politics in the Unites States, specifically since the 1990’s have driven towards further trade liberalisation whilst restrictions have been minimal. The aim of these restrictions are predominantly to diminish the increasing power of China and not to significantly improve the job prospects for struggling citizens (Cronin, Shoch and Ross, 2011)8. Due to Capitalism being an inherently globalising force of economics, jobs were always bound to be lost to regions where production is significantly cheaper (Harvey, 2006)9. The force of Globalisation is too powerful to alter without radical economic changes and socialist restrictions. The Left realising this, underwent a political and ideological shift to adopt new forms or progressive voters. The left assuming the abandoned working class would have no choice but to keeps its allegiance, as the economic policies of the conservative parties were still more detrimental (Moloney, 2021)10. In retrospect this was a massive oversight by these ‘Leftist’ parties, as political figures such as Donald Trump and the Brexit movement represented by Boris Johnson, road the waves of a highly disgruntled and alienated ‘working class’ support base. This shift was also evidenced in the increasing amount of money donated to Leftist parties from corporations and industries (Moskowitz, 2008)11.
As Articulated throughout the essay there has been a shift in the ideals of Left and Right parties. In recent years the various forms of media coverage on both sides of politics has become increasingly polarising, and figures like trump and his use of language have capitalised off this (The Conversation, 2020)12. The media uses its power to highlight and exaggerate the cultural differences of the parties and hence ignore the frightening economic similarities (McLaughlin, 2018)13. Jamie Settle in his book argues that social media, specifically Facebook uniquely facilitates psychological polarisation. Settle illustrates how the features of Facebook linked with human tendencies, support biases of political identity and promote political judgements off insufficient information (Reidl, 2019)14.
With further analysis of these parties, it becomes evident that there is an insignificant difference in economic policy and a lack of new ideas that can help progress society. This lack of difference is resulting in a population of people grasping for genuine change. With this starvation even emerging in movements as volatile and destructive as Trumpism. In ‘Throwing the rascals out? Problems of accountability in two-party systems’, it analyses the many problems that can arise from two-party systems, especially when both these parties operate on such a narrow bandwidth of policy. The article raises two main points, one of which being the issue that arises when parties allude to running on a non-centrist platform however, once elected convert back to the centre. When this happens, it limits the options and power voters have in the democracy. An example of this is, a voter may be frustrated with the direction of the Australian Labor Party, but feel voting for a party such as the Greens may swing the majority vote towards the Liberal party, which is even less ideal. This results in a lack of accountability with the dominant parties and growing dissatisfaction within the public (QUINN, 2015)15. Another problem with dominant-two party systems, is with the lack of accountability and concentration of power, as it allows greed to become a central force within politics. This is characterised by the high levels of corporate influence over both ‘right’ and ‘left’ parties. In situations where the power is so concentrated, there are many subjects where both parties agree. This results in a lack of discourse on certain topics. This lack of discourse can be assisted through the political establishments relationship with the media as evidenced.
In a conversation with Russell Brand, Marianne Williamson articulated how she was naively surprised on the viciousness within the democratic party, the alarming relationship between the media and political establishment and the unethical nature of various journalists. In This conversation, Marianne also alarmingly described that many people within the democratic party would have preferred Trump to go another term then to have Bernie Sanders be the candidate. Despite witnessing the corrupt nature within the political system, Marianne also spoke optimistically to the intelligence, decency and openness of the voters. These voters were more willing to learn and be open to new perspectives than the democratic party were (Politics Is CORRUPT – Former Presidential Candidate Explains Why, 2021)16.
The Koch article demonstrates how the lack of significant difference in political parties, impacts many communities and how people’s situation do not improve greatly regardless of election results. The Koch article describes how there is a distrust and loss of faith in formal politics within the UK’s impoverished communities. This is not helped by the fact that unfortunately, working-class movements often fail in their endeavours. It is still commonplace for residents to engage more with local political representatives when trying to cultivate collective action (Koch, 2016)17. However, this generally falls short as the political left has been largely dismantled, resulting in significant political movements struggling to progress from grass root initiatives to national collective action. From the article’s findings it reinforces that there is a need for alternative democratic options and narratives to address the disgruntled spirit and lived realities of the working and lower class people. This appetite for new political options is captured in a survey undertaken on people’s political appetites and their opinion on the representation of the working class in politics. When asked “Do you trust politicians”, people overwhelmingly stated no or sometimes, with only 4.8% answering yes. When asked “Do you think Politicians have the majority of people's best interests in mind when making decisions?” over half of people responded yes and 33.3% of people saying ‘maybe’. One of most overwhelming answers of the survey was “Do you think Politicians Lie for their own and party’s agenda”, with 85.7% saying yes and the other 14.3% stating maybe. This sample data further illustrates how little trust the public have with our politicians and the role they play in society. On the topic of public representation within political systems, a staggering 95.2% of people responded no to the question “Do you think politics is truly representative of all people”. Regarding the system of politics 71.4% of people responded yes to “Do you think new forms of politics need to emerge”. Within the appendix there are more significant examples of peoples distrust within politics as well as opinions on class.
This essay has demonstrated how a vast growing number of people are dissatisfied with the current political climate and how many working-class people feel abandoned by the system and the “Left” parties who use to represent their needs. This abandonment spurred many right-wing phenomena’s including ‘Trumpism’ and Brexit, despite going against the traditional class perspective of the ‘Left’ and ‘Right’. The essay explained how this was a result of; the state of politics becoming overly superficial, the ‘Left’ adopting a more progressive identify politics and subsequently deserting strong class politics, the media’s influence in polarising perspectives on cultural differences yet ignoring economic similarities and finally the lack of significant difference and new ideas in political parties. This Politically polarising time in modern history, can not be sustained as the cultural divide is becoming more violent and aggressive, while increasing numbers of people in the ‘West’ and across the Globe are suffering from poverty. From this research, it is evident new systems or politics, and significant wealth re-distribution is required.
References
1 West, C., 2017. The Trump Era: Hope in a time of escalating despair. Transition, [online] (122), p.22. Available at: <https://www.jstor.org/stable/10.2979/transition.122.1.27#metadata_info_tab_contents> [Accessed 28 May 2021].
2 Murphey, D.D. 2012, "Bailout: An Inside Account of How Washington Abandoned Main Street While Rescuing Wall Street", The Journal of Social, Political, and Economic Studies, vol. 37, no. 3, pp. 367-375.
3 Greenwald, G., 2013. The Untouchables: How the Obama administration protected Wall Street from prosecutions | Glenn Greenwald. [online] the Guardian. Available at: <https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/jan/23/untouchables-wall-street-prosecutions-obama>.
4 Allen, M., 2008. Obama calls for Wall Street crackdown. [online] POLITICO. Available at: <https://www.politico.com/story/2008/09/obama-calls-for-wall-street-crackdown-013498> [Accessed 28 May 2021].
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7 Stubager, R., 2009. Farewell to the leftist working class. Acta Politica, [online] 44(3), pp.342-345. Available at: <https://link.springer.com/article/10.1057/ap.2009.5>.
8 Cronin, J., Shoch, J. and Ross, G., 2011. What's Left of the Left?: Democrats and Social Democrats in Challenging Times. Duke University Press, pp.210-230.
9 Harvey, D 2006, Spaces of global capitalism / David Harvey., Verso, London.
10 Moloney, W., 2021. Leftist political parties abandoned the working class for globalization. [online] TheHill. Available at: <https://thehill.com/opinion/finance/539988-leftist-political-parties-abandoned-the-working-class-for-globalization?rl=1> [Accessed 1 June 2021].
11 Moskowitz, D.B. (2008) 'The pharmaceutical industry's lobbying expenditures soared last year, and for the first time, Democrats received more of the money than Republicans', Drug Benefit Trends, 20(8), 309, available: https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/A187625020/ITOF?u=unisa&sid=bookmark-ITOF&xid=2a8611e0 [accessed 10 Jun 2021].
12 The Conversation. 2020. A field guide to Trump's dangerous rhetoric. [online] Available at: <https://theconversation.com/a-field-guide-to-trumps-dangerous-rhetoric-139531> [Accessed 30 March 2021].
13 McLaughlin, B., 2018. Commitment to the Team: Perceived Conflict and Political Polarisation. Journal of Media Psychology, [online] 30(1), pp.41-51. Available at: <https://ovidsp.dc1.ovid.com/ovid-b/ovidweb.cgi?ID=shib%3Adc1%3A0xa7e212c564b3465f8dbedefd811e6611&PASSWORD=0xa7e212c564b3465f8dbedefd811e6611&CSC=Y&checkipval=yes&T=JS&D=ovft&SEARCH=%221864-1105%22.is+and+%2230%22.vo+and+%221%22.ip+and+%2241%22.pg&NEWS=N&MODE=ovid&PAGE=fulltext&entityID=https%3A%2F%2Fidp.unisa.edu.au%2Fopenathens>.
14 Riedl, M., 2019. Frenemies: How Social Media Polarizes America by Jaime E. Settle. Mass Communication and Society, [online] 22(4), pp.562-564. Available at: <https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/15205436.2019.1574115>.
15 QUINN, T., 2015. Throwing the rascals out? Problems of accountability in two-party systems. European Journal of Political Research, [online] 55(1), pp.120-137. Available at: <https://ejpr.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/1475-6765.12118>.
16 2021. Politics Is CORRUPT – Former Presidential Candidate Explains Why. [video] Available at: <
17 Koch, Insa 2016, ‘Bread‐and‐butter politics: Democratic disenchantment and everyday politics on an English council estate’, American Ethnologist, vol. 43, no. 2, pp. 282–294