The Diary of Ferran Camas

Notes on my legal research and cultural interests

"I have argued in this book that the premise common to both traditions is mistaken. The real source of social order in capitalism -of its stable reproduction over time- is not culture or ideology, it is the class structure itself. The structure ensures that individuals within the working class choose individualized forms of resistance over collective ones. They do so not because they fail to recognize their interests, as theories of false consciousness or cultural hegemony would have it, but because they accurately perceive the risk / cost matrix associated with collective action. Hence, they typically opt for individualized forms of advancement over collective ones. But to opt for an individualized strategy is nothing other than to accept the dominant position of the employer's -and of capitalist as a class. It leaves unchallenged the employer's structural power over the worker and seeks simply to maximize the worker's welfare within the latter's parameters. It is a tacit acceptance of the rules of the game, rather than an effror to transform or even challenge them."