Cal
17th December 2004, 00:24
I've just finished a paper in eight parts on modern Britain and how it can adapt and the problems it faces, If anyone wants a copy I'll post the lot but I've summarized some of the issues andwould be interested in thoughts.
Remember these are SUMMARIES, and it's late!!!!
The largest problem which any left wing movement faces is one of public co-operation especially from the currently empowered middle classes. The issue revolves around where the class distinctions now lie; the industrial worker of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries has now been replaced by the service sector worker of the twenty first century, one who has a material reason to maintain the status quo.
What constitutes the working classes now is completely different, the property ladder phenomenon of the last few years has seen people from working class backgrounds get onto the private property market in order to make themselves money from the boom that has and continues to occur. This combined with wanting to leave an inheritance to the future generations has made the actual ‘working class’ a propertied class with an interest in maintaining the status quo. This has very large implications for the application of Marxist theory as the class required to carry out the tasks involved have become another obstacle, the capitalists have bought them off with long-term mortgages and branded clothing which although false and eventually self-deprecating has given those potential revolutionary sectors of society a monetary interest in the continuation of the present system.
It is in this way that the current bourgeoisie have ensured their continuing status as the dominant class, as they have elected to, instead of shutting everyone else out of power instead to offer them the carrot of joining their group without actually having to let them join. It is this use of the carrot rather than the stick that has ensured that the middle classes have been able to dominate for as long as they have .The move in fact has been so successful that a natural successor is difficult to pin point in the so called western world as the industrial workers no longer exist in any real numbers as there industries were methodically closed down by the ultimate incumbent of the middle class ethos, Thatcher.
Remember these are SUMMARIES, and it's late!!!!
The largest problem which any left wing movement faces is one of public co-operation especially from the currently empowered middle classes. The issue revolves around where the class distinctions now lie; the industrial worker of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries has now been replaced by the service sector worker of the twenty first century, one who has a material reason to maintain the status quo.
What constitutes the working classes now is completely different, the property ladder phenomenon of the last few years has seen people from working class backgrounds get onto the private property market in order to make themselves money from the boom that has and continues to occur. This combined with wanting to leave an inheritance to the future generations has made the actual ‘working class’ a propertied class with an interest in maintaining the status quo. This has very large implications for the application of Marxist theory as the class required to carry out the tasks involved have become another obstacle, the capitalists have bought them off with long-term mortgages and branded clothing which although false and eventually self-deprecating has given those potential revolutionary sectors of society a monetary interest in the continuation of the present system.
It is in this way that the current bourgeoisie have ensured their continuing status as the dominant class, as they have elected to, instead of shutting everyone else out of power instead to offer them the carrot of joining their group without actually having to let them join. It is this use of the carrot rather than the stick that has ensured that the middle classes have been able to dominate for as long as they have .The move in fact has been so successful that a natural successor is difficult to pin point in the so called western world as the industrial workers no longer exist in any real numbers as there industries were methodically closed down by the ultimate incumbent of the middle class ethos, Thatcher.