인종주의가 자본주의적 질서를 유지하는 필수적 도구로 기능하는 방식

[논둑길맨발로]

자본주의 경제시스템에서의 주기적 공황( 주류 경제학에서는 경기 순환이라 부름)은 불가피한 것이고, 아프리칸 아메리칸과 이민자를 주요 타켓으로 인종주의는 이들 소수 인종집단 ethnic group을 경기불황의 충격흡수기로 이용하면서 위기를 극복하고 질서를 유지해 간다는 주장.


JUNE 26, 2020

인종주의가 자본주의적 질서를 유지하는 필수적 도구로 기능하는 방식
How Racism is an Essential Tool for Maintaining the Capitalist Order

by RICHARD D. WOLFF

U.S. capitalism solved its instability problem by making cyclical downturns afflict chiefly a minority subpart of the whole working class. It positioned that minority to bear the brunt of each cycle and suffer its damages disproportionally. That minority was repeatedly drawn into and then thrown out of jobs as the cycle dictated. Any savings it might accumulate when working would be lost when unemployed. Repeated firings precluded such a minority from enjoying the benefits of job longevity (seniority, promotion, household stability, etc.). Poverty, disrupted households and families, unaffordable housing, education, and medical care would haunt such a minority. It would become capitalism’s “business cycle shock-absorber”—the last hired, first fired—across the four-to-seven year average duration of its cycles.

For capitalism, making such a minority absorb most of the costs of capitalism’s instability allowed the majority of the working class to be relatively exempted, relieved, freed from them. The majority could be less subject to cycles because the minority was made relatively much more subject. Capitalism promised the majority relatively secure jobs and incomes because it took those away from the minority. The majority could thus worry less about the next cycle, whereas the minority had to worry more and adjust their lives more. Racists could then attribute the resulting differences between minority and majority subparts of a population to inherent qualities of different “races” instead.

Other advanced capitalist countries found parallel solutions. Some condemned immigrants to play the role assigned to African Americans in the United States. Racism aimed at immigrants often followed. In cyclical upswings, immigrants would be brought in: North Africans into France, southern Italians into Switzerland, Turks into Germany, and so on. Then, cyclical downswings would return those immigrants to their home countries. Capitalisms would thus save on costs of unemployment insurance, welfare payments, etc., for the workers who had returned. While some capitalisms relied on domestic minorities to be shock-absorbers and others relied on immigrants, some countries relied on both. The United States used Central American immigrants alongside domestic African Americans, and it still does. Germany allowed some immigrants to settle and acquire German citizenship alongside Turkish and other immigrant “guest workers.”

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해결책

Fundamental injustice characterized the relationship between police and prisons, on the one hand, and the African American and other communities (Indigenous, people of color) condemned to play capitalism’s shock-absorber role, on the other. The solution was and is not better training or more funding; both have been tried repeatedly and both have likewise failed repeatedly. A real solution would provide a decently paid job to everyone who wants one as a matter of right. Unemployment would then be outlawed much like slavery, child abuse, etc. Taxes levied on capitalist enterprises would provide the funds needed to find jobs, private or public, for those laid off by an employer (much as such taxes help fund unemployment insurance now). Those funds would include wages or salaries paid for each worker’s time between being laid off and rehired. Minimum wages, applied universally, would cover reasonable housing, transport, health care and other living costs.

https://www.counterpunch.org/2020/06/26/how-racism-is-an-essential-tool-for-maintaining-the-capitalist-order/#gsc.tab=0