Intersectional Class Struggle: Theory and Practice

by Michael Beyea Reagan

"This rich and vivid exploration of many forms of popular struggle, based on an intersectional understanding of class and consciousness, teaches the lesson that 'liberation is infectious,' and inspires us to join in carrying it forward." —Noam Chomsky

"Michael Reagan’s account of class reaffirms for us the centrality of race and gender in the formation of the global working class. Carefully documenting voices of people of color and women in struggle, this book is a work of history in the making, rather than history rendered static in textbooks about Great White Men." —Tithi Bhattacharya, coauthor of Feminism for the 99%

"Intersectional Class Struggle is an immensely useful text for our times. It accessibly guides readers new to anti-capitalist struggle and intersectionality through the key debates, and also offers seasoned activists and scholars a concise, thoughtful analysis of pivotal questions about resistance and liberation. Throughout the book, Reagan uses compelling examples of solidarity in practice to bring intersectional class struggle to life for readers and to show what it can win." —Dean Spade, author of Mutual Aid: Building Solidarity During This Crisis

This innovative study, explores the relevance of class as a theoretical category in our world today, arguing that leading traditions of class analysis have missed major elements of what class is and how it operates. It combines instersectional theory and materialism to show that culture, economics, ideology, and consciousness are all factors that go into making “class” meaningful. Using a historical lens, it studies the experiences of working class peoples, from migrant farm workers in California’s central valley, to the “factory girls” of New England, and black workers in the South to explore the variety of working-class experiences. It investigates how the concepts of racial capitalism and black feminist thought, when applied to class studies and popular movements, allow us to walk and chew gum at the same time—to recognize that our movements can be diverse and particularistic as well as have elements of the universal experience shared by all workers. Ultimately, it argues that class is made up of all of us, it is of ourselves, in all our contradiction and complexity.

Genres: Nonfiction, Social Justice, Politics, Philosophy

190 pages, Paperback

Published June 15, 2021

Reviews

[Corvus · Rating 3 out of 5]

Michael Beyea Reagan's Intersectional Class Struggle: Theory and Practice seems to me to be a thesis modified to become book form. The structure, length, and writing style suggests this but I could be mistaken. Also, I am not sure if they are typos from the original, but there are many "we" statements in expressions of goals and outlines for the text even though there is only one author on the cover. Reagan's book is an academic text that sets out to explore and expand the understandings of intersectionality and class. This book is difficult for me to review because it seems to be a matter of personal taste and previous knowledge that affects my opinion of it. I found the text a bit dry and boring at times, but that doesn't mean it is objectively dry or boring. I have read a lot about these topics over time and thus, I was not introduced to much new information. That said, I think this book could be a great introductory text for anyone who is purposefully or accidentally class reductionist in their worldview. It diverges from the common trend- in discussions of class struggle found in the words of more mainstream politicians like Bernie Sanders and further left thinkers and activists- that labels any mention of race, gender, etc as divisive and distracting from "class." I use quotes there because race, gender, ability, etc and completely intertwined in class as Reagan explains in this text.

I found the book to be sort of split into (unlabeled) thirds in terms of content where the first and third fit in well with the title and goals of the book and the middle section seems out of place. The introductory sections and end piece focusing on intersectionality are a decent overview of how class and intersectionality are inseparable. But, I felt a bit confused by the center. Reagan devotes the middle of the book to a drawn out description and analysis of a bunch of (ironically) mostly white male anarchist, communist, and socialist thinkers. I believe the intention was to pull together the theories therein with wider intersectionality and its precursors as a whole, but I didn't see many intersections aside from stray sentences here and there until Stuart Hall is discussed at the very end. It runs the counterproductive risk of portraying these men as the original people discussing class and Black liberation, anti-racist, intersectional feminist, lgbtq etc as far newer entities birthed by the civil rights movement, neither of which is true. Reagan also suggests that thinkers like Kimberle Crenshaw lacked a class analysis which left me scratching my head. From what I recall, class was always a big part of her analysis. What didn't work for me, but what also can make this a good introductory text, is what a reductive view we got of certain schools of thought and movements outside the center section. A disproportionate amount of time was spent discussing theorists who did not focus on intersectional politics vs the small cameos many others received. I believe that the latter is likely because Reagan wanted to include as many people as possible, but why not write a longer book so they get the amount of attention that would match the stated goals of the text.

The last section was most informative for me because it introduced me to some people I had not previously known about. It also becomes clear in these highlights how class, race, gender, and sometimes sexuality were all connected according to the people discussed. I found how little LGBTQ issues were mentioned to be disappointing and the lack of discussion of disability while talking about the value of labor labor labor work work work was a missed opportunity. There is a small section on climate change, but this could have been more thorough as well and expanded to include other animals. I would have preferred if the author explored these specifics more instead of giving a drawn out analysis of Marxist materialism for instance.

All of that said, I do see what the author was trying to accomplish: A general (and perhaps unintentionally introductory) knitting together different schools of thought by highlighting the works of key figures in history who clearly state and show that class is indivisible from race and gender. While this book was not really for me, I can envision a number of people it would be good for. I also found the book to be very well organized which allows for a wider audience because the reader can skip around if they choose and still be able to grasp Reagan's thesis.

This was also posted to my blog.

[Rhys · Rating 3 out of 5]

Michael Beyea Reagan provides a solid overview of intersectionality with a class perspective. I enjoyed his use of some anarchist writers to support his thesis - many, like Rudolf Rocker, who are too important to allow to fade from our collective memory. I look forward to future books and hope the author will move these insights more towards praxis: that is, how can these dynamic elements be coordinated under the auspices of class?

"The class war is simultaneously a race war in the furtherance of white supremacy; a generated was to support patriarchy, “traditional families,” and binary understandings of gender and sexuality; a war against the environment; a war in the interests of state violence and increased militarism at home and abroad. Until we start thinking about the complex dynamics between these elements, on their own and in intersectional relationships, our ability to fight back against any one of them suffers" (p.30).

[Niklas Pivic · Rating 3 out of 5]

You can find my entire review here.

From the start of my review:

I liked this book from the start, in how it simply put things together:

At the end of working on *Intersectional Class Struggle*, I found myself writing during the combined impacts of the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic and the unprecedented movement power of Black Lives Matter in 2020. Albeit powerful, attempting to look strictly at “class” factors to explain this moment gets us in trouble. For example, the COVID-19 crisis has exacerbated the already gross wealth inequality in the United States; the richest and most powerful tech corporations have ballooning stock valuations and profitability propped up by government spending and guarantees for the rich. A study by the Institute for Policy Studies found, in the first three months of the crisis in the United States, the nation’s billionaires increased their wealth by over $600 billion, bringing their total assets to $3.5 trillion, more than the total wealth for the entire U.S. Latinx population. In the same period, more than 44 million people had to file for unemployment relief because they lost their jobs and, by mid-2020, 40 million were facing eviction, all disproportionately affecting people of color. Amazon’s stock valuation soared during the crisis to $1.5 trillion, doubling its profit during the pandemic and bringing in a record $5.2 billion in revenue. Jeff Bezos, Amazon’s chief executive officer (CEO) and already the richest person in the world, gained $13 billion in one day on a stock surge, his personal value up $70 billion on the year to roughly $180 billion while the real economy suffered. Meanwhile, Amazon workers who make that profit possible were being called in to work, getting infected with COVID-19, and dying. By May, there were eight known deaths. When workers protested those conditions, they were fired.

So, what *is* intersectional class struggle? To quote the author from a passage about Clarence Coe:

Coe is expressing the tenets of intersectional class struggle, the idea that, despite significant differences, most of us are “in the same boat” and can come to recognize it. White workers can’t make it without Black liberation.

Race, gender, class, all of these bits matter in breaking all of us out of our chains. Reagan, unlike Marx, includes more factors than the material when describing the fundamental relationship of class.

[∃Ⓐ∀ · Rating 5 out of 5]

A great introduction to intersectionality from an anti-authoritarian and modern anarchist perspective, and a very inspiring book that provides a very much-needed perspective for understanding class formation. The author identifies flaws in-class analysis from philosophers like Marx, references movements that view the class from an intersectional perspective, and examines how we can use those concepts to build liberation movements.

[Ryan · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is awesome. Dense at times, simple at others, Intersectional Class Struggle takes concepts we talk about all the time and makes them concise and understandable. A book that presents a problem, gives us a few different ways of looking at it, and then offers a reasonable solution!

[Sarah]

Thank you to the publisher and Goodreads for the free copy!