Karl Marx predicted a utopia without politics after the dissolution of capitalism. In the United States, an end to politics is looming — not from the decline of capitalism, but rather from its all-encompassing strength.
There have always been large swaths of the population who are either willingly or forcefully excluded from the political process, but a new overwhelming feeling of political apathy has struck much of the nation. What differentiates this new political age is a new archetype of political subject — individual actors who believe that social interactions constitute political action and abandon legitimate outlets for change. In other words, people redefine politics to include their back-and-forth arguments on social media to avoid the despair of realizing that political influence is overwhelmingly controlled by the wealthy and elite.
The end of mass politics is a genuine predicament. As cultural theorist Antonio Gramsci wrote in 1930, “The crisis consists precisely in the fact that the old is dying and the new cannot be born.” Although Gramsci was talking about the conservative dictatorship of Benito Mussolini, his words are applicable to 21st century American politics. America’s economic regime is on the decline, and its hegemony in the global cultural and political sphere is waning. Millennials earn less than their parents despite being higher-educated, and are left without a collective consciousness rising out of the old world’s ashes.
Americans are left unable to confront this dilemma. To deny our reality and prevent a sense of helpless anxiety, we look elsewhere for blame — whether it be Russia or Mexican migrants. Scapegoating in the United States is not new, but its widespread popularity as a method for immediate relief is a symptom of the disappearance of mass politics. Of course, there has always been virulent racism plaguing the United States, but there were also legitimate political outlets to challenge economic power structures.
The desperation and intuition of American decline cause restlessness that needs to be unleashed. Targets are put on the backs of other powerless subjects because of the mass inability to understand who is culpable for their predicament. Naturally, many cannot surrender themselves to their powerless positions and will seek out that euphoric feeling of power. When a person subconsciously realizes their anxiety has nowhere else to be released, Twitter arguments with @user71675326 are the end result (hey, they may even be lucky enough to score a response from Glenn Greenwald or Matt Yglesias). People log on and reply to their favorite and least favorite politicians, basically screaming into the void. In all, mass politics has become viral tweets, which accomplish nothing but personal satisfaction. This seems to be preferred over the isolation of our all-encompassing economic system.
Whereas the subjugated people of a political regime can point to an obvious political enemy, the victims of an economic regime, whose political forces are dissipating, have a much more difficult time. An example is the post-occupy left, which has often tried to put a rhetorical bullseye on the billionaire class. With class consciousness in the United States at pitifully low levels, economic equality mobilized a very vocal and committed group of American society, but only yielded mild electoral success.
Marx theorized about this form of alienation in his “Economic and Philosophic Manuscripts of 1844,” in a chapter titled “Estranged Labour” — “In estranging from man (1) nature, and (2) himself, his own active functions, his life activity, estranged labor estranges the species from man. It changes for him the life of the species into a means of individual life.” This explanation of work, involving objectifying human beings, is salient to our times. Our economy and culture revolve around self-interest, dividing the human race up into individuals rather than a collective species.
Although Marx could not have predicted the technological advancements made in the last few decades, his analysis was broad enough for contemporary application, such as with the rise of the service economy. Despite our economy relying on constant interaction with service workers, the relationship, tinged with individual alienation and estranged labor, is one that only reinforces economic and social inequality. It would seem that the rise of a service economy would decrease alienation as more interpersonal interactions occur, but the opposite is true. We begin to view these service workers as an “other” — someone disconnected from us, not as another human, but as a provider for our consumption. This is a major factor in the demise of mass politics — if political subjects are estranged from one another, there is no way for them to organize as political subjects.
Wide-scale workplace collectivism is the cure, but with labor power at a seemingly all-time low, people are continually losing their connection with each other. There is a disconnect between the ideology of workers, which is generally pro-union, and union membership trends, which are declining. Several high-profile union votes like Amazon.com Inc. and Starbucks Corporation have helped bring labor organizing back into the spotlight, but much more is needed to revitalize American labor politics.
An odd phenomenon is the attachment many working people have to the ultra-wealthy. If you read the replies to Elon Musk or Donald Trump on Twitter, you’ll find they’re filled with people vouching loyalty to them and defending their every action. They are seen by their followers as winners, and people attach themselves to perceived winners for that aforementioned sense of power. Cultural idolization of money is a roadblock to gaining class consciousness, and in turn, a roadblock to resurrecting mass politics.
It would be far better to view Twitter as a dumb website to simply share content with your friends and to use community events or union meetings to talk about substantive issues. Unless social media serves an irreplaceable, tactical purpose in a social movement, like it did with the Arab uprisings of the 2010s, log off when you want to get political and instead try to resurrect real politics in your community. The first step is recognizing the shared conditions that members of the American middle and working class have with one another and using these similarities to create alliances. This is much easier said than done, but without a retrieval of genuine political action, the political and labor environment in the U.S. will continue to grow darker and more alienating.
Nathan Sommer is a sophomore majoring in history.