The conventional perception of the white-collar or suburban class as an unlikely agent of revolution in the United States belies the intricate dynamics and contradictions that underpin this social group. It also overlooks the history of revolutions and precisely who is needed for a revolution to be successful. I want to utilize the insights of prominent thinkers such as Wendy Brown, Nancy Fraser, Catherine Liu, Chris Hedges, Byung-Chul Han, and Bernard Harcourt into a compelling argument that will become increasingly important in the future.
The suburban experience can serve as a powerful catalyst for revolution. This blog post explores how the suburban class, through its contradictory position within neoliberal capitalism, the crisis of reproduction, experiences of alienation and disillusionment, the unraveling of the American Dream, and the potential for solidarity and alliance-building, can contribute to transformative and necessary revolutionary change in the United States.
Contradictions within the Suburban Class
I often refer to suburbia as a site for “privileged deprivation.” I use this term to highlight the ways suburban life is contradictory. Take the average single-family home, for example, which serves as the top site for wealth accumulation while often also serving as the most significant source of household debt. Debt management is one of the central practices of suburban life. Moreover, according to Lazzarato (2013) and others, debt is always already a relation of power that places the future productivity of the indebted subject at the whims of the financialized creditor apparatus. Banks come to control the future activity of the subject, and debt defines what future activities the indebted subject is allowed to do. A debt, therefore, is a relationship whereby one forgoes certain future autonomy and freedom to serve the profit of their creditor. Speaking about debt as a relation of power that mortgages future freedom is critical to raising awareness of various unfreedoms of suburban life.
Wendy Brown’s (2015, 2018) analyses highlight the tensions within the suburban class, caught between the comforts of material stability and the conformity demanded by neoliberal capitalism. The suburban class unwittingly reinforces the logic of individualism and consumerism that underpins the neoliberal order, perpetuating a “hollowed-out” democracy. At the same time, some of the best-organized movements can come from the localized efforts of suburbia. For example, suburbanites excel at preventing unwanted developments, ensuring the quality of local schools, and organizing anti-crime efforts. Suburbanites excel at laterally surveilling their environments (Reeves, 2013), and the NIMBY-ism of suburbia is legion. Imagine if that effort were utilized to demand a more just, equitable, and sustainable future for all Americans.
These contradictions can sow the seeds of revolution, as discontent arises from the realization that pursuing material comfort comes at the cost of genuine democratic participation and social justice on a broader scale. These contradictions illuminate how suburbanites are misled into demanding their class interests at the expense of others. Finally, these contradictions can highlight the disempowering position when the debt-based veneer of suburban affluence is exposed for what it is – servitude to capital.
Crises of Reproduction and the Feminization of Labor
Nancy Fraser’s various exploration of the reproduction crisis uncovers the burdens of suburban women, who face intensified demands for care work and emotional labor. The suburban class, particularly women, experience the contradictions of the capitalist system firsthand, juggling domestic responsibilities while striving to maintain the stability and social reproduction that underpin suburban life. The exhaustion and discontent arising from these gendered expectations can fuel revolutionary consciousness as the desire for a more equitable and just society takes root.
Not only is the age-old gender-based disempowerment alive and well in suburban life, but the expected reproduction of a docile suburban class through the institution of suburban families and schools should be questioned. Are there no higher aspirations for today’s children than for them to have a suburban future? Is the best future for suburban kids a future where they commute, work, take on debt, wear office attire, and mow their lawns on the weekends? A serious question is avoided when suburban families reproduce the suburban class generation after generation as if suburban life is the zenith of progress when clearly it is not.
Finally, the discontentment of women in suburbia is directly related to the feminization of labor that taxes femininity and motherhood, effectively punishing women for taking up compensated labor in the workforce. This is part of a larger conservative project to punish women in the post-counterculture for demanding equity (Cooper, 2012).
Under this penal arrangement, poverty is feminized, traditionally feminine roles are paid less, and efforts are made across the country to take away the most liberatory feature of modern femininity – the ability to control one’s reproduction. Conservatives know that if you can strip a woman of control over her fertility, you can effectively remove her from the sphere of compensated labor, relegating feminine roles to domestic spheres. Women’s liberation and control over their bodies go hand in hand. This effort to disempower various facts of feminine power has significant implications in the suburbs for the nuclear family, the Western heteropatriarchal establishment, and the reproduction of a class that will intergenerationally promote inequality toward women as a continuity of suburban life.
Alienation and Disillusionment of Precarious Professionals
Catherine Liu’s (2019) analysis focuses on the experiences of precarious professionals within the suburban class, revealing a sense of alienation and disillusionment despite relative privilege. The demands of the corporate world, combined with the erosion of worker protections and the relentless pursuit of profit, engender powerlessness and frustration. This disaffection can spark political awaken among white-collar workers, as they recognize their exploitation within the neoliberal order and seek avenues for collective resistance.
For this to occur, the white-collar class must recognize that their position serves to promote and reinforce the mandate of the corporate state. Consider, for example, how policies, infrastructure, and methods for controlling the working class, the poor, and marginalized communities are primarily invented, perfected, and put to work by the white-collar managerial class. The white collar class writes the codes for the surveillance state and serves as journalists towing the corporate state line. The white-collar class is the social worker who runs welfare-to-work programs and writes “balanced” housing policies that enrich capital at the expense of the public. The white-collar class is the academic technician of policy and law that distance and controls the lower class “other.”
The critical component, however, is to demonstrate to this class how the banality of their white-collar labor is ultimately marshaled in service of the dominant few of capital. Furthermore, it highlights how the corporate state offers air-conditioned white-collar positions of comfort in society in exchange for acquiescence to the ruling class.
Unraveling of the American Dream and Populist Rage
Chris Hedges delves into unraveling the American Dream within the suburban class, attributing it to economic inequality, corporate greed, and political corruption. The erosion of upward mobility and the prevalence of financial precarity sow disillusionment and fuel populist rage. When harnessed and directed toward a transformative vision, this simmering anger has the potential to ignite revolutionary movements that challenge the prevailing economic and political structures.
“Members of labor unions, and unorganized unskilled workers, will sooner or later realize that their government is not even trying to prevent wages from sinking or to prevent jobs from being exported. Around the same time, they will realize that suburban white-collar workers — themselves desperately afraid of being downsized — are not going to let themselves be taxed to provide social benefits for anyone else.
At that point, something will crack. The nonsuburban electorate will decide that the system has failed and start looking for a strongman to vote for — someone willing to assure them that, once he is elected, the smug bureaucrats, tricky lawyers, overpaid bond salesmen, and postmodernist professors will no longer be calling the shots.”
– (Rorty, 1998)
Potential for Solidarity and Grassroots Activism
Byung-Chul Han’s perspective on neoliberal society emphasizes the importance of solidarity in times of crisis. Moments of shared exhaustion and alienation within the collective suburban class experience can foster political awakening and resistance if and when they are given the proper awareness and political language to describe their own experience. The suburban class, with its relative resources and access to education, can contribute significantly to grassroots activism by supporting and amplifying the voices of marginalized communities.
Historically, one must remember that the impoverished masses do not generally lead to revolutions. According to Hedges and others, the organization, tactics, strategies, and overall implementation of revolutionary efforts come through the intelligentsia of the middle class and even the disaffected elites who have rejected the status quo. Consider how many revolutionaries of the past came from privileged families, only to reject that privilege and lead the workers to organize and rise up. Thus, speaking about revolutionary ideals within the seemingly tranquil surroundings of suburbia may seem ironic, even indulgent, but demanding the politics of the establishment liberal ideology take up revolutionary causes will be essential.
Bernard Harcourt’s analysis further reinforces the significance of grassroots activism. He highlights the importance of challenging oppressive systems from the grassroots level to dismantle established power structures. By aligning with and supporting marginalized groups, the suburban class can contribute to transformative social movements that strive for a more just and equitable society. As Harcourt notes, violence and civility are often weaponized against the middle class or suburban sensibility, who then draw the line at outright property destruction, riots, and political violence.
The suburbanite is disciplined to accept a politically inert position that “speaks” out but never acts out. The result is that the suburban class disciplines the frustrated lower class, admonishing their physical outbursts against the yoke of capitalism and power. The suburban mind is disciplined to believe that a broken window during a march for social justice somehow delegitimizes the point of the march. As if such things as police brutality can only be responded to in nonviolent ways when, in fact, people’s lives are in danger, and “speaking” about that danger is doing nothing to change the conditions. The example he uses is the burning down of the long-troubled Minneapolis precinct police station after the police murdered George Floyd. While the actors in that instance have faced legal consequences, the act sparked a populist referendum on local police, which opened the door for the individual to have a say in whether or not the police force should be dissolved. Thus, the result was an opportunity for direct democracy. Moreover, while the people ultimately voted not to dismantle their police department, the fact that they created an opportunity to do so, even if it involved violence and property destruction, demonstrates that desperate times may require self-defense, political violence, and property destruction – not as an end, but rather, as one possible means to establishing a democratic end.
Conclusion
It is time to put the suburban middle class and their experience into play in the revolutionary politics discussion. Furthermore, it is time to question the existing political and material limitations which keep the suburban class inert in the face of ever-increasing crises facing the American people. The contradictions, crisis of reproduction, experiences of alienation and disillusionment, the unraveling of the American Dream, and the impotence of suburban politics all position the suburban subject in a way that compels and negates their political activity. At the same time, due to their relative resources and class power, the suburban class can easily throw off the delimiting shroud, which keeps them from not only acting on their own behalf but segregating them from the larger political struggle of oppressed people in the US. Their solidarity with revolutionary ideals must come from the awareness of their instabilities and how they are marshaled to act against their self-interests and serve as a controlling buffer that protects the ruling class from the discontented masses.
Social Science & Our Critical Times 