Staughton Lynd (1929–2022)

I wanted to like this book so much, but things were damned from the very first page: there is a paragraph-long blurb by one of the most pretentious brats I have ever had the displeasure of sharing organizing space with. I seethed when I saw it and I wrinkled my nose when I read it. Anyone who has this book and knows me in an organizing context will know which asshole I am talking about...

There were several things that I appreciated about the book. For one, opening my eyes to Liberation Theology and Oscar Romero. His theory of accompaniment is one that I had, without knowing, started down the road of adopting in my current studies to be a nurse. I could have come across this by merely reading Oscar Romero's letters themselves, and I plan on it. But before reading this book, I never knew to. Which brings me to another plus:

Staughton Lynd rattles off books that I am interested in reading. It's great! The book is almost an annotated reading list, many of which sound utterly fascinating, including Staughton Lynd's books. But can I really justify recommending this book? Or should I just be recommending the books that this book recommends?

In addition, Lynd's dismisses some ideas without engaging them in a serious way. His understanding of the abolition of whiteness is based on a vulgar definition, one that isn't actually linked to moving white people away from the benefits given to them by white supremacy, and instead is based on crass dismissal of white people. He then burns up the straw man by pointing to scant historical anecdotes (which are quite inspirational) of the white working class working with the black working class together, when it suited their mutual interest. Unfortunately, he doesn't engage how often white working class movements refuse to engage with the black working class because their interests are meted out differently by a capitalist system that wishes to divide and conquer them. White abolition exists to undermine the difference between the working class' divergent interests based on race, not to dismiss white people offhand.

Staughton Lynd also extols too hard the virtues of himself working a professional class job as a lawyer that helps the working class navigate through the capitalist system as a basis for accompaniment. Lawyers and laws may be needed as a temporary fix to stave off the worst excesses of capitalism, but as a hero of mine once said, "The Master's tools will never dismantle the Master's house." Or, as another hero more forebodingly said, "Tyrants die from stab wounds, not articles of the legal code." Sure, you can buy your time with these temporary fixes, but the law exists to serve capital, and these temporary fixes will be rolled back at the whim of the class of people who control the means of production. Staughton dismisses Critical Legal Theory for being too cynical, but he doesn't address the criticism of the theory: that people use law and higher concepts only as positioning for their client to win their case.

The stories of the two movements mentioned in the title (the Industrial Workers of the World and the Zapatista Army of National Liberation) are stories I've already heard before, and more thoroughly elsewhere. Though I came away with some excitement about books I've never heard of before, I cannot think of a reason to go back to the book, now that I've finished it. I won't be quoting it, I won't be searching through the pages to reread favorite passages. I can't even say that I'd recommend it to many people, except as a sort of broad stroke survey of independent left movements in the US: all the right groups and people are mentioned, but none of this is gone into with any sort of satisfactory depth.

Available:
http://thepiratebay.org/torrent/4445460/Wobblies_and_Zapatistas__Conversations_o...… (mehr)