So I've been asked why I think this is bollocks and I'm going to have a go at explaining. It's going to be a long ride that takes in hegemony, Laclau and Mouffe and will show the dangers on not updating an economic philosophy from the 19th Century. Ready? Let's go https://twitter.com/RaggedTP/status/1387399462755180546

So there are foundational flaws with classic Marxism, most notably that capitalism hasn't collapsed yet. Why? Well, this is where Gramsci comes in with his theory of hegemony: we accept the norms and values of the ruling class as common sense and so don't challenge them.

So far, so good. But there's a problem; the world has changed. Marx and Gramsci still see oppression as happening primarly in economic spheres; your relationship with your boss, landlord and so on. But the world is changing, getting more complex.

The 1960s and the counter culture sees more identities arise; black rights, gay rights, feminism, environmentalism and so on. And, of course, these inequalities are rooted in economics but its far more complex now. This isn't simply surplus value theory now.

And here's another problem; neoliberalism which challenges the advances of the post war years through an all encompasing hegemony focussing on the individual and free enterprise. It even enters our language. Words such as "entrepreneur" are "good" and "trade union" are bad"

So we have a full hegemony on one side of an antagonistic frontier which is able to fight off any challenge from the other side because we are disunited. And we are disunited because we do not say "your struggle is my struggle" We say "No, socialism is not about liberal rights"

But surely socialism is about fighting subordination. And if subordination exists in multiple identities then we all have multuple struggles that we have to unify. The struggles are all different but what unifies them is that they are against a common enemy: neoliberalism

Subordination is no longer limited to class, it is across so many identities. And so the subordination of a black middle class woman and a white working class man represent the same thing and, so, call for solidarity, unity and building a counter-hegemony.

If you are a class reductionist then you focus only on one subordination and ignore the rest. That might have worked in 1848 but it doesn't work now. Your cause is my cause, my cause is your cause. Let's work together and stop thinking class is the sine qua non of socialism.