THE PRECARIAT
Guy
Standing has written a book called "The precariat" where he
exposes his theory on this emerging new class which includes a
growing number of the population in what he calls a process of
precariatisation. There is the danger of moving into the solutions
proposed by the extreme right but there is also the counterbalance
of finding a way out through the progressive movements.He also calls
them the politics of paradise as he links them with the classical
utopia. But contrary to what it may first suggest, the utopia is not
something unatainable but the pedal which will operate the whole
process.
The
precariat is a class in the making. It still doesn't have a clear
vision of where to go but it is already finding a place in the
political arena. We have recently seen in Spain how movements such as PAH
or others have put pressure on the political class and also on the
judiciary. Guy talks about citizens being deprived of their citizen
rights and being turned into what he calls "denizens", an
old term which defines well a situation of instability, as
instability is the defining trait of this new growing group.
They
have made us think that this crisis is more than anything something
specific of the Mediterranian countries and that mainly affects those
few who just didn't do things right in the past. By doing this, they
are trying to descredit and to neutralise a response
which aims at undermining the system . This crisis is not a
Mediterranean or even a European one. We are in a global turmoil
that started back in the 8Os when Thatcher and Reagan, backed by the
neoliberal theories of the Chicago school, started to extend their
political views on destroying the group and fostering the individual.
Reversing this situation, bringing back the strength of the group
should be primal and the main goal.
If
there is something I have learnt by listening to Guy these last days
while driving back and forth is that what makes this emerging
movement stand out from the working class movements of the past is
that its goal is not just the control of the production, and thus go
back to their parent's working (or toiling) ideal, but getting a fair
share in time and space control, and, above all, in the making of a
new secure and stable global community.
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