Base and Superstructure

Alienation, autonomy, and ideology

Category: Class (Page 24 of 25)

A Leftist Take on Universal Basic Income (UBI)

October 8, 2018 /
Universal Basic Income

Source: Ron Mader. https://www.flickr.com/photos/planeta/30873329263

Universal Basic Income (UBI) is a curious idea with a curious history. It enjoys strong support from some parts of the political right, some parts of the political left, and a fair share of the tech sector (the ‘Silicon Valley‘ crowd). It’s entering the mainstream from multiple directions.

On the right, Milton Friedman supported it. In his book Capitalism and Freedom, he advocated for a negative income tax that would establish an income floor.

On the center-left, Guy Standing advocates for it. He’s best known for his 2011 book The Precariat: The New Dangerous Class. For Standing, a universal basic income is the best way to bring stability to the lives of temporary and/or part-time workers.

On the left, David Graeber defends it as a short-term measure. His motivations come from some general themes he lays out in two books, The Utopia of Rules: On Technology, Stupidity, and the Secret Joys of Bureaucracy and Bullshit Jobs: A Theory. Graeber thinks a universal basic income will simplify bureaucratic structures and enable people to leave pointless jobs they hate.

But what is UBI, and can it do all these things? Should the left support it, or should leftists be suspicious that so many right-wingers support it?

I’ll take a crack at answering these questions.

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capitalism and racism

Capitalism and Racism: Which is Prior?

September 24, 2018 /

Marxists, other leftists, and/or antiracists have argued for decades about the relative importance of capitalism and racism. They’ve framed the issue in different ways. Some people discuss which system exerts the greatest force on society. Others discuss which system offers the more fundamental social explanation. Some people talk about which one came first, historically. And still others ask which we should address first in our leftist movements.

Not only that, but approaches aren’t even mutually exclusive.

You might ask: what’s the difference between these frames? If so, that’s unfortunate, because they are different. It’s possible to argue, for example, that racism (or capitalism) came first historically, but that capitalism (or racism) explains more or should be addressed first.

And so, I’m going to sort out some of these issues in this post. I’ll use Ibram X. Kendi’s book Stamped from the Beginning: The Definitive History of Racist Ideas in America as a reference point.

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Why is Labor Day in September?

September 3, 2018 /
labor day

Source: https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/blog/2010/09/06/president-obama-labor-day-fight-americas-workers-continues

Let’s say you don’t live in the United States or Canada. You’re probably confused that we celebrate Labor Day in September. Even Americans might not know this is unusual.

Most countries celebrate International Workers’ Day on May 1. And for most people, this is a holiday of the radical left. By contrast, most people see Labor Day as a holiday for center-left labor movements. International Workers’ Day is broadly international, while Labor Day is mostly American and Canadian.

That’s close, though not exactly right. For one, both holidays come from the US. Specifically, from the US in the 1880s. We know the September Labor Day date came first, but there’s disagreement over the details. What we know pretty well is that someone from the Knights of Labor established it in 1882. And the US made it a federal holiday in 1894.

But International Workers’ Day originated in the US as well. Likely because of the pre-existing folk holiday May Day. A bit later, the Second International set May 1 as a day of labor in 1891. However, in addition to May Day, the May 1 date refers to the Haymarket affair in Chicago.

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ta-nehisi coates

Between Ta-Nehisi Coates and Touré Reed

August 23, 2018 /

Ta-Nehisi Coates is a compelling writer.

He works at the crowded left-liberal intersection, where we can find so much phooey. But Coates’s work isn’t phooey, which vaults him to the upper ranks of this crowd. He brings something new, I think particularly (though not exclusively) to white audiences.

I recently read We Were Eight Years in Power. It’s a collection of Coates’s essays from The Atlantic, placed into a common narrative. The common theme of Coates’s essays is black power and white backlash. This post is about his book, and I’ll include some page numbers in case anyone’s interested in following along.

But it’s not just about Coates’s book. I think it’s worth reading Ta-Nehisi Coates alongside one of his hardest-hitting critics internal to black political debate.

Coates is probably familiar to anyone in intellectual or political circles. But who’s Touré Reed?

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mistaken identity

Mistaken Identity

July 2, 2018 /

There’s a big market out there for hot takes and sober literature challenging ‘identity politics.’

Many an ill-conceived book and article has been written on the topic.

I addressed some of this in one of my opening posts by drawing a distinction between identity politics and identitarianism. I still think this is very useful.

But I’ll admit to being a little crotchety on these issues. I’ve never had a high tolerance for nonsense, and whatever tolerance I’ve had in the past is declining. So this isn’t going to be a post about Mark Lilla’s Once and Future Liberal (it’s likely he never was). It isn’t going to be a post about “We are the Left” (they’re mostly a group of liberal or centrist Democrats, not leftists).

This is a post about Mistaken Identity, a book by Asad Haider!

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