GALWAY GRASS ROOTS GATHERING 7th to 9th NOV

by Colm - ISN (personal capacity) Tue Nov 04, 2003 17:35

In response to Niall, just because crude or simplistic defintions of class dont hold water does not mean that class has ceased to exist. Social class is undoubtedly a very complex phenomenom which relates to economic, social and cultural structures. But how do you account for social inequality in modern Ireland if you discount the very concept of class?

Greens wishing away the reality of social class are as unrealistic as dogmatic Marxists who refuse to recognise the complexity of the modern class structure.

Its easy to build a Marxist straw horse and blow it down, but anyone familiar with what Marx wrote will realise that he recognised the complexity of class and its relationship with politics (See 'The eighteenth Brumaire of Louis Napoleon' for example). While its easy to demolish the crude formulations of small sects, I would challenge anyone to dismiss the massive corpus of work by serious Marxist writers on class. There is a constant, lively and well informed debate amongst Marxist on this question.

This is not an academic debate since our understanding of and attitude towards this question has a fundamental effect on our activism. Which, I suspect, is why ISN and WSM activists find themselves on the opposite side to the Greens on the Bin Tax and some other issues.

Anyway, Im looking forward to an informed and vigorous debate at the Grassroots Gathering over the weekend.

by ec Tue Nov 04, 2003 17:30

Don't know the s road - but 200,000 k per year it's pretty obvious would have plenty of savings or no morg. on house and would survive for a good long while more than the limit I indicated on the strength of their property/savings/possible golden handshake.

25K single with no car morg. etc more difficult. If the dole for a year is by choice then Middle class. If single and can't get a job thru lack of skills for that length of time working class.

It's tricky - I like Chekov's awnser too.

by Janus Tue Nov 04, 2003 17:05

I think it will be an interesting discussion but like one of the other people who commented on the thread, I find it bizarre to a certain extent that it is happening. The efforts of people on the right and now, I am slightly disappointed to note from a party I would have seen as slightly left of centre, to pretend we have 'evolved' beyond class is nonsense.

Defining class can be difficult, though Chekov's got an appreciative smile out of me both for it's brevity and it's wit as well as its accuracy. It is possible to move class, to be born into a middle or upper class family and end up in the working class. Similarly it is possible for working class people to end up in the middle or upper class.

Such movement however, is uncommon, and typically the class you are born into is the class you're going to die in.

Not realising that class exists, that control of the means of production by one dominant class at the expense of another, deprives one of one of the best and most long lasting analyses of history and politics. I honestly don't believe an analysis of either which ignores class, whether it is a left wing analysis or not, is anything but idiocy of the highest order.

Marx might have got a lot of things wrong, but the history of the world is certainly the history of class struggle.

by John Squire Tue Nov 04, 2003 16:33

You say that your definition of working class is someone who cant pay their mortage & bills after 2 months of non work.

Does this apply to someone who earns, say, 200k a year and lives on the Sorrento Road?

I'm only playing devils advocate here (I agree with Chekov's points), just curious...

I think a lot of people (esp. those on the left) use the terms workin class and "bourgeois" without actually qualifyying them. Someone called me a middle class cunt before (a socialist) and when I asked him how much (or how little) I had to earn before becoming working class he wouldnt answer me.

For the record the last job I had payed me 25,000 euro a year (been unemployed for nearly a year now though..)

I had no mortgage and no major bills (refuse to buy a fucking car!). Did I used to be middle class?

Or if I was making 15k a year, was I working class? Or even 10k? or less?

Anyway I hope these issues will all be raised at the Grassroots discussion. Looking forward to the weekend.

by Chekov Tue Nov 04, 2003 15:53

The debate is between a member of the Green Party and a member of the Workers Solidarity Movement. The WSM speaker will, I'd expect, be putting forward the point of view that class does most certainly exist!

Personally I don't think that this is pointless at all. There are many people, even many from the working class, who don't understand the basic principles of class. The ideological onslaught of capitalism has obscured this most basic (and obvious to my mind) idea. In particular, people often confuse sociological definitions of class (based mainly on cultural factors) with the socialist idea of class (based on the relationship to the means of production). One way of looking at class: If you took all power and wealth and shared it out equally, those people who would be worse off than they are now are on one side of the class divide (ruling class), the rest on the other(working class).

by ec Tue Nov 04, 2003 15:36

Anyone who would be fucked (unable to pay rent/morg/car payments etc) without their wage after 2 months. Those who live by their work not property or savings/capital (or the property or capital of extended family).

This is my personal definition for today.

by mike Tue Nov 04, 2003 15:23

A pointless debate really. I thought that such notions about class not existing went out with the last boring postmodern academic. The excuse to be stupid that allowed wealthy individuals talk about class not existing etc. Class explains that deprivation is not just an unfortunate by product of a given situation but the inevitable result of the domination of one class over another.

If some trendy lefty or academic wants to pretend it doesn't exist, let them. For the marginalised in Irish society class exists as part of their daily lives regardless of how conscious they are of it.

by Niall ÓB Tue Nov 04, 2003 13:39

'A debate on class and the environment takes place as part of the Grassroots Gathering in Galway this weekend.'

This is news surely?

by silo Tue Nov 04, 2003 13:28

This is an interesting and necessary point to talk about. However, it's not news, and so it shouldn't be on the newswire. For the sake of consistent editing, it should really be removed, perhaps with links left to where the discussion can continue.

by pc Tue Nov 04, 2003 12:13

is someone who screw you for their own benefit just as much as any other economic class of person left or right

and should not be raised on a pedestil like so many socialist do what is more important is the class or qualtiy or ethics of a person

by Caoimhin ó Maolallaigh - Green Party Tue Nov 04, 2003 11:55

There will be a major conference on social, environmental, and community activism in NUI Galway on November 8/9. The event is partly organised by the University Ecology Society.

Grassroots Gathering Galway 8/9 November. Latest Update on the
Workshops:

Ecology and Community 1: Transport.
Speakers from the Galway Cycling Campaign, who successfully halted the construction of roundabouts on the Seamus Quirke road, from Hands Across the Corrib, who are opposing the Menlo by-pass which is planned to go through an area of great scenic beauty and historic importance, from the Save the Trees campaign which is opposing the concreting of Eyre Square, and West on Track who are agitating for a railway corridor down the long neglected west coast.
Ecology and Community 2: Our Countryside.
Speaker from the Local Action Group against the re-opening of Tynagh mines for the chemical industry, a speaker for the campaign organising against Coilte's ecologically unsound policies, hopefully someone to fill us in on the situation in regard to a motorway going through Tara.

Ecology and Community 3: The Corrib Gas Pipeline.
Speakers from the campaign organising against Shell's harmful exploitation of natural resources with no regard for local communities safety in both Nigeria and Mayo.

Resistance at Work:
Speaker who was involved in setting up a couriers group in Dublin, and an Easons shop steward.

Resistance in the Community:
Speakers from the Bin Charges campaign in Dublin, and from the Defend Free Speech and Assembly and Activity campaign in Galway which is opposing draconian by-laws.

Campaigns against specific institutions/companies – THE BOYCOTT
Speaker from the World Bank Boycott, who aim to get Trade Unions, universities, etc., to disinvest from the World Bank, a speaker from Foyle Ethical Investment Campaign who operate a creative resistance to Raytheon, the arms manufacturers in Derry, and from other boycott campaigns such as the people who banned Coca Cola from UCD.

Spaces: Autonomous Community Spaces – what to do with them?, how to organise them?, why do we want them? how do we get them? Speakers from Cork Autonomous Zone, Disco Disco, and Belfast Squat.

Street Art: Stencilling, Subvertising and Creative Resistance.

How to do it: Reclaim the Streets, Critical Mass, Food Not Bombs.

Bad Blood: a workshop on menstrual activism.

Alternative Media Workshop 1: Writing, putting out a magazine, dealing with the official media, getting published.

Alternative Media Workshop 2: Websites, a hands on guide, from anarchomedia.

Courtrooms: legal support and defending yourself in court.

Direct Action: The Campaign for Free Education experience. A year of blocking roads, occupying ministries and blockading politicians – practical lessons learned from the fight against fees.

Arrest and Interrogation: A Victim's Guide.

Plus planespotting, international solidarity, climbing, herbal remedies, and much more to be confirmed

by James Tue Nov 04, 2003 11:50

In the green corner and in the Black corner! The discussion is kicked off by Niall O'Brollchain of the Green Party and Andrew Flood, a filthy anarchist with the Workers Solidarity Movement.

The discussion is just one of many things happening at this Grassroots which runs from this friday evening until Sunday in NUI Galway.
Haven't seen an exact time or venue for this particluar debate yet.

related links: http://grassrootsgathering.freeservers.com

http://www.indymedia.ie/newswire.php?story_id=61864&type_id=all&search_text=Grassroots%20Gathering

http://www.anarchism.ws

by iosaf ipsiphi - shabby mongrel aristocratic class less class war anarchist. Tue Nov 04, 2003 11:43

as you might have noticed I consistently (rather comically perhaps) refer to real people and my fictional characters as "formerly middle class" or "formerly working class".
When I read that any forum/assembly/chinwag session begin to approach the other catagories: "newly corporative class", "formerly fiscal class" etc., I'll sue for breach of copyright!

by Niall ÓB Tue Nov 04, 2003 11:02 niallob at esatclear dot ie

The term 'Working Class' is used freely on the Indymedia website. Does this term apply to a large group of people in the Ireland of today or not?
What is the definition of class?
The 'working class', as defined by Marx, is the class of people who have to sell their labor to survive.
Does this really apply to many people in the Ireland of 2003?
If you are a 'working class' person, can you become a 'middle class' person or indeed an 'upper class' person simply by acquiring lots of money?
On the other hand, is class to do with breeding?

In my view class was something that derived from monarchic societies and does not really apply to the Ireland of today. Nor should we want it to.

What does exist is social deprivation and that is what needs to be seriously tackled. In other words we need a more equitable society and a better environment in which to live.

A debate on class and the environment takes place as part of the Grassroots Gathering in Galway this weekend.