What Exactly Makes Police Bourgeois?

[Ilyich]

Back by popular demand, it's everyone's favorite thread about the class nature of the police! First, I want to point out that I have no illusions about the police. I know that it is inherent in their job to serve the capitalists' state, to protect private property, to keep minorities in line etc. I am in no way pro-police. I see what happens at protests, riots, and revolutions all over the world. Still, I have some questions about police.

1. What exactly makes police bourgeois? They serve the bourgeois state, of course, but in some sense almost all workers do. They produce commodities or perform services and the bourgeoisie profits from their labor. I suppose the difference between the police and exploited workers would be the fact that the bourgeoisie actually uses the service of the police while they don't necessarily use the services or commodities of the workers they exploit. Am I correct? This is not my main question, however. What is it that makes the police bourgeois (or petite-bourgeois) and not proletarians who have betrayed and suppress other proletarians? I was under the impression that to be bourgeois or petite-bourgeois, one had to own some means of production. Police generally don't own any means of production. They work for a wage. If they don't work, they die of starvation. In this way, aren't they wage slaves?

2. The notion of police as wage slaves brings another question to mind. If the police change their minds during the revolution and stop suppressing the revolution and become revolutionaries themselves (probably won't happen because of their own vested interests in the state) they can do that. What if, however, a police officer has a change of heart in the meantime? Can we really expect him to stop working as a police officer and starve along with his/her family? Police receive very good wages and benefits (as agents of the bourgeoisie, makes sense). Can we blame them for not leaving that if they have an accidental change of heart? By the way, if the second question sounds like its coming from a liberal, it is. I was talking with a liberal and these were the arguments she made.

[Lanky Wanker]

I don't think I've ever heard anyone actually call the police themselves bourgeois. Sure, they protect the interests of the bourgeoisie, but guarding a dragon egg doesn't make you a dragon egg. Sorry, I'm deprived of sleep again. Anyway, 'workers in uniform' might be a better term... I heard it in a Russian revolution documentary I think.

[Blanquist]

they uphold the bourgeois order

[Ilyich]

I don't think I've ever heard anyone actually call the police themselves bourgeois. Sure, they protect the interests of the bourgeoisie, but guarding a dragon egg doesn't make you a dragon egg. Sorry, I'm deprived of sleep again. Anyway, 'workers in uniform' might be a better term... I heard it in a Russian revolution documentary I think.

I've heard the term 'workers in uniform' before and I have been tempted to call them that in the past but there appears to be such a strong position that they are bourgeois. There must be a reason.


they uphold the bourgeois order

Yes, they do but how does that affect their relationship to the means of production? Are they bourgeois (the class enemy) or just proletarians with bourgeois interests (class traitor, still an enemy but of a different type)?

[Blanquist]

I've heard the term 'workers in uniform' before and I have been tempted to call them that in the past but there appears to be such a strong position that they are bourgeois. There must be a reason.



Yes, they do but how does that affect their relationship to the means of production? Are they bourgeois (the class enemy) or just proletarians with bourgeois interests (class traitor, still an enemy but of a different type)?

they guard capitalist property relations. not just the 'bourgeois' are the enemy, anyone who upholds or defends capitalist relations is an enemy.

[Anarcho-Brocialist]

I don't consider the police part of the bourgeois. I do, however, consider them bourgeoisie sympathizers. They're reactionary and side with the bourgeoisie and enforce their laws; making them an enemy of the working class.

If an officer decides to change his mind, he / she is expected to leave. To allow the cop to be exempt for the reason because they "make good salary and benefits" is nonsense.

[Ilyich]

they guard capitalist property relations. not just the 'bourgeois' are the enemy, anyone who upholds or defends capitalist relations is an enemy.

Yes, I know they're a class enemy because their interests are vested in the bourgeois state but my question isn't whether they're an enemy but whether they themselves are part of the bourgeoisie.

[Comrade Marxist Bro]

I know they're a class enemy because their interests are vested in the bourgeois state but my question isn't whether they're an enemy but whether they themselves are part of the bourgeoisie.

Does that make FBI agents like myself unwelcome here?

[Caj]

Does that make FBI agents like myself unwelcome here?

Yes.

[Luc]

Does that make FBI agents like myself unwelcome here?

haaaaa funny joke is funny


...

[Caj]

I wouldn't say cops are either bourgeois or proletarians.

[El Oso Rojo]

I wouldn't say cops are either bourgeois or proletarians.

We have an article on liberation news about whether the police are apart of the bourgeoise or the working class.

http://pslweb.org/liberationnews/news/are-police-part-99-percent-ows.html

[Misanthrope]

Their sole aim is to protect capital, property. That is their only reason for existence, as agents of the state.

[Comrade Marxist Bro]

Yes.

Sectarianism.

[Prometeo liberado]

We have an article on liberation news about whether the police are apart of the bourgeoise or the working class.

http://pslweb.org/liberationnews/news/are-police-part-99-percent-ows.html

I dont care what the PSL told you to think I care about what you can muster up in that head of yours as far as analyzing what the OP said.

Are they body guards for the monied class or what?

[Deicide]

No, they're not bourgeoisie. They are wage workers, but just like anyone else, they theoretically have the ability of becoming petty-bourgeois, or however unlikely, bourgeois (social mobility, however rare, exists in capitalism). The typical english bobby is a prole, but he is uniquely positioned within the structure of society which mystifies, or disconnects him from, his class interest. He's a prole upholding another class' interests.

[Os Cangaceiros]

They're the guardians of capital and must therefore be treated as enemies, full stop. Their class position doesn't matter, any moreso than the class position of a neo-nazi who stabs immigrants or a regime interrogator who tortures political dissidents.

Although I've heard interesting arguments related to many "third world" cops being lumpenproletarians, as they get paid very little and make most of their money through extortion and involvement with organized crime.

[Ocean Seal]

There is absolutely nothing that makes the police "bourgeois". This is something that some posters on this site like to say to justify standing against the police. The truth is that we don't need a justification, just historical experience. They beat the shit out of us at protests, strikes, etc. They're proud to be fully reactionary, and do so because their job calls for it. So do the bourgeoisie, but the pigs are not bourgeois.

[homegrown terror]

i say if they're ready to give their health and lives in the interest of the "social betters" then what right do i have to deny them their destiny?

[Peoples' War]

The police will have a choice come revolution:

Join with the rest of us, or continue to defend capital.

It won't matter if they are proletariat or not, but it will matter, as it does with the petty bourgeois, which side they take.

[Zav]

The Bourgeoisie is the economic class that controls the means of commodity production. Under Capitalism, the Bourgeoisie tend to have power over or be a part of the State. The Proletariat is the economic class that produces commodities. Under Capitalism, the Proletariat has little or no control over the State. Law enforcement is a social role, not an economic one, though it may be that an economic class makes the laws. Therefore a police officer may belong to either the Proletariat or the Bourgeoisie, however a Bourgeois fat cat is unlikely to also be involved in actual work.

[El Oso Rojo]

I dont care what the PSL told you to think I care about what you can muster up in that head of yours as far as analyzing what the OP said.

Are they body guards for the monied class or what?


I agree with the article, when it say they are neither working class or bourgeoise. They are in gray area. I didn´t even post this article for you. so stop being an asshole and stop speaking for everyone else. I don´t give a flying fuck if you don´t read the fucking article because you have beef with Ian, etc.

[KingoftheSwing]

I think the answer lies in the motivation of one for becoming a police officer. Most of them become a police officer because they like society as it is and want to protect it. OR they just love power. I'm pretty convinced there's no such thing as thé police officer. And the reason why most of them BECOME right-wingers is that they don't get a representative view of the community life. And the only way of solving issues they have learned at the police academy is the (non)solution of repression.

[DasFapital]

Well I agree that the police currently defend the interests of the ruling class I think that we on the revolutionary left would make more progress if we attempted to reach out to them to expose their situation instead of constantly demonizing and fighting against them. After all they are members of the working class. And yes I do agree that sometimes cops can be tyrants and instigators but I believe most are decent members of the proletariat who have been co opted by the capitalist elite.