Articles & Papers

The Elite and the Other: Thoughts on Classism

By Rosemary Radford Ruether and Karen L. Bloomquist
Originally published in Open Hands, Vol. 11, No. 2 (Fall 1995)

American Myth:
Class has no relevance to our struggles for justice in this society.

Concentrated Wealth: The Underlying Division
By Rosemary Radford Ruether

Attention to injustices based on race and gender is vital for a fuller vision of a just society, but I suspect we have swung too far in the direction of an "identity politics" that focuses primarily on race and gender group self-esteem in a way that fragments each group against the others. Perhaps it is time to look again at the overall class structure of American society as a way of recognizing the common framework in which these various divisions are interconnected in one social economic system, a system that uses all these distinctions to divide and conquer.

American society is more deeply divided economically than at any time since the era before the Depression. By 1987, about 32.5 million Americans lived below the poverty line, two-thirds of them white. Only 21 percent of them received welfare benefits. Most had one employed person in the family, some had two, but the pay level was too low to permit them to climb out of poverty. Gender and race are major determinants of income; however, this doesn't mean that most white males are doing well or that many white men are not found among the poor and the homeless.

The real issue is the group that owns or controls the commanding heights of the American economy. Andrew Winnick estimates that 90 percent of Americans own only 33 percent of the wealth, mostly in homes and cars, while the top 10 percent own 67 percent of the wealth in the form of businesses, stocks, bonds, and money market accounts. At the top of this elite group are the Forbes 400 wealthiest Americans who collectively own 40 percent of the fixed capital. This polarization of wealth and poverty is more extreme in the United States than in the nine top industrialized countries of Western Europe. 1

We need to look carefully at this richest 10 percent of our population who control the wealth and power that define the government, military, economy, and media of the whole society. We need to consider how to define a social vision that can unite the other 90 percent in a common struggle to make the system more just for the great majority. It is time to knit back together our various distinctions of gender and ethnic identity, important as those are, and to find common bonds and a common base of struggle around projects of economic and political democratization. "Identity politics" just plays into the hands of those who would divide and control us all.

Powerful Language: Elaborated Code
By Karen L. Bloomquist

The use of language is one pervasive way through which power is exercised over those of a lower class position. Those of a higher class position, and with higher levels of formal education, tend to use language that is different from the language of a lower class and/or educational level. It is more nuanced, reflective, analytical, abstract, and able to deal with ambiguities. In contrast to this "elaborated code," the language of working-class persons tends to be of a "restricted code." Statements are simple, direct, concrete, emotive, and often take the form of commands. "The way things are" is taken for granted without questioning why. There are unambiguous boundaries, especially in matters of morality. A given behavior is either right or wrong.

These class differences are evident in many discussions of homosexuality. The case for a greater acceptance of persons who are gay, lesbian, or bisexual typically is made using language of a more elaborated code. This often provokes reactions reflective of a more restricted code, as well as resentment toward these "higher-ups" who are perceived as telling them what they should believe or feel. By too quickly labeling such reactions simply as "homophobic"—without also examining dynamics of classism embedded in them—we may reinforce the domination of classism rather than searching for more effective ways to inter-connect with yet another struggle for justice.

Source

["Concentrated Wealth: The Underlying Division," by Rosemary Radford Ruether] is excerpted and adapted from "Beyond gender, race, U.S. divide is economic," National Catholic Reporter (March 25, 1994), p. 28. Used with permission of author.

Notes

1. Andrew J. Winnick, Toward Two Societies: The Changing Distribution of Income and Wealth in the United States since 1960 (New York: Praeger, 1989).

About the authors

Rosemary Radford Ruether, Ph.D., teaches theology at Garrett-Evangelical Theological Seminary in Evanston, Illinois. Her latest book is Gaia & God: An Ecofeminist Theology of Earth Healing.

Karen L. Bloomquist, Ph.D., an ordained clergywoman, is director for studies in the Evangelical Lutheran Church in America. In this capacity, she has staffed ELCA work on a sexuality statement. She is the author of The Dream Betrayed: Religious Challenge of the Working Class.

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