I am reading many books. Which is no big surprise….lol. I am reading one that has been on my reading list for a long time. It is entitled Masters of the Universe: Hayek, Friedman and the Birth of Neoliberal Politics by Stedman Jones. I have always contended that one of the best ways to understand all of the disparate elements of our social is to understand is to view it from within a historical materialist hermeneutical ‘lens’. I am aware that in vulgar language this puts me in the Marxist ‘camp’. This is a title I no longer try to run from nor frankly care to dispute. My experience with people that speak in these crude analytical terms are not really worth engaging. I know that this sounds profoundly dismissive but frankly these are some of the same people who believe that Mark Levin author of American Marxism is an actual ‘critique of Marxist theory! Ugh!
I have in some of my writings referred to the larger narrative (sometimes awkwardly called a Master Narrative) in which we find ourselves as Empire (or Empire Logic). In my thinking I feel like this is a larger more wholistic way of containing the various elements of reality. In my dissertation I spoke of the way to understand reality as being compose of various distinct, autonomous (but not arbitrary) Dimensions. However, I also always begin with the Economic element of human reality. Here I would say that I mean Economic in the way that is best expressed by Enrique Dussel. He speaks of his Philosophy as always being a Philosophy of Life. In that sense what constitutes reality is a desire for Life. This will always include all elements of Life, including those that we might at first perceive as death! It is not by accident that I am writing this on Holy Saturday the day in which Jesus is DEAD! Yet we know that this is not the end of the story. I am reminded of the magnificent meditation that is the song Thank U by Alanis Morissette which goes in part:
“How ’bout no longer being masochistic/ How ’bout remembering your divinity/How ’bout unabashedly bawling your eyes out/How ’bout not equating death with stopping” [Bold type and italics added]
But why I think it is so important to retrieve the Historical Materialist Dialectical tradition is precisely because of something that the Jones book points out. The rise of Neoliberal politics is/was profoundly powerful because it has ‘naturalized’ entire explanations of human existence. It has brought to bear the incredible forces of the owning class onto our consciousness. This is something that the Italian Marxist spoke of in his writing. He along with the Hungarian philosopher George Lukacs in his magisterial work History and Class Consciousness spoke about how the ruling class, who always ‘owned the means of production’ (a very Marxist way of understanding Class) could now create consciousness by owning the means of ‘mental production’. Others have spoken about this with much greater clarity (and frankly in a more ‘popular’ tone!). This includes Noam Chomsky, Matt Taibbi, Arundhati Roy etc..
The creators of the social order sometimes referred to as Neoliberalism were deeply aware that they had to win ‘the battle of ideas’. This has recently been ‘packaged’ as winning the ‘hearts and minds’ of those countries we (The Empire) occupy. This includes, incredibly enough, not even seeing our presence there as an ‘occupying force’! While many progressives have done an admiral job of citing and applying the work of these great thinkers. Particularly the wonderful work of Gramsci, what seems to be lacking from the actual application (and understanding) of contemporary folks who use these two thinkers is their adherence to their Marxist origins and ongoing commitment to the Marxist vision and some of its foundational (not dogmatic) tenants. This includes understanding the all-encompassing logic of Capital accumulation which they believed to be a bedrock of all social reality grounded in Capital logic. This would not change because they spoke of something as ephemeral as Consciousness. Precisely because they believed this, they would demand that all talk of ‘consciousness’ be understood within the framework of historical materialism in general. It would also be inseparable from understanding that the final ‘telos’ of Capitalist derived ‘consciousness’ is the continued accumulation of (and maintenance of) Capital. What this means is that the way to undermine ‘false consciousness’ for both Gramsci and Lukacs was not merely to ‘change’ the ‘consciousness’ of the people but to actually change the material (historical/social) conditions under which they existed. Because they (Gramsci, Lukacs) were from what is broadly called the historical dialectical materialist school they would never submit to a crude cause and effect logic in dealing with any problem. Because they were dialecticians of the first order we should not get into a crude ‘which came first the chicken or the egg’ debate.
In many ways, I see that many progressives, liberal, leftist etc. have inadvertently bought into the distorted vision offered by Neoliberalism. This includes saying such things as “perception is reality” (It’s actually not!) or a ‘symbolic gesture’ is identical with actual historical movement. Simply put, having a few more ‘diverse looking’ billionaires will not change the nature of how exploitation is an absolute prerequisite for certain levels of wealth to be attained. The exploitation is the sin, not who is doing the exploitation, or what they look like, or even how they ‘identify’. The unpacking of this will require a completely different entry but simply put this is one of the reasons that I am against using the term ‘Class’ in the same way that I use Race, Gender or Orientation. This for me is key, you see that diversity in Racial identification may (or may not) include the destruction of a certain Racial identity, this is true for Gender etc. But what seems to be the case is that the existence of a certain community (identified as a Class) to exist by Exploitation (specifically identified as those who now garnish unwillingly the ‘fruit’ of another person’s Labor) can only be resolved by the destruction of this exploitive relationship. That exploiter community would cease to exist…qua community (as a Class). What is also true for me is that the incredible level of marginalization that must be part of any system to continue to ‘exploit’ leads me to always fight in Solidarity with those communities that are marginalized. But for me this is predicated precisely on their commitment to also end exploitation. It is not predicated on their being members of a marginalized community. In a White Supremacists system that is part of our current condition I will always be ‘marginalized’. That being said, I have no ‘monopoly’ on anything which might be good for the ending of exploitation of others (including Madre Earth!) so my agenda, strategy, ideas, motives, perspective has to constantly be questioned, interrogated by myself and others. I have to be part of an ongoing community of people moving towards a larger vision that cannot ever be fully encompassed (or realized, seen etc.) by any one marginalized perspective.
This means, ultimately, that there will be some degree of surrendering absolute assurance that ‘my way’ is the ‘right way’ (it will certainly never be the ‘only way’). But the solution to this conundrum is not to surrender the understanding that there is a ‘there, there‘ or an actual Way. We must always be willing to surrender to larger visions, insights always knowing that while our struggles are provisional, they are not ‘arbitrary’. We continue to move…. with deep Love, Wonder, and (to paraphrase Abraham Joshua Heschel) Radical Amazement.
Prophetic Ruminations 