deeblackthorne's Full Review: Frances Fox Piven - Poor People's Movements: Why T...
I picked up a copy of Poor People's Movements a few months ago because of an interest in researching social movements. It also couldn't hurt to have some worthwhile reading material as my trip back home over Christmas holiday had several hours' worth of layover time. Ironically, I tried starting in on the book and made it through the first chapter. Midway through the second, my brain felt exhausted. (Perhaps I was a bit ambitious trying to read worthwhile material after cramming for finals and staying up way too late writing papers.)
I gave the Piven and Cloward text a second try during the Independence Day holiday. I had a week to chill at home with my parents, and they set up a small gazebo in the front yard. The netting kept away with the bugs, so I just kicked back to enjoy my book -- hopefully.
Poor People's Movements was published in 1979. Years before, Piven and Cloward joined up with George Wiley in working on welfare reform and community organization. Wiley eventually assumed the helm at the National Welfare Rights Organization (NWRO) and pushed for national change. It worked for a while. Preceding presidents and officials at Congress offered increases in the minimum wage and provided more access to welfare benefits for more members of the population. Unfortunately, this thwarted the vision of a sustained national council per the satisfaction of self-interests. That is to say, people were passionate about welfare rights until they secured their own benefits; the dues went away and so did the members. By the time Wiley got out of the movement, Nixon tightened restrictions all the more.
Despite ending on a sad note, Piven and Cloward introduce their definitions and ideas on protest and then discuss four significant poor people's movements: unemployment benefits during the Great Depression, the industrial workers' movement, the Civil Rights movement, and finally welfare rights. The authors situate protest as a necessary and useful obstruction to the "quiescence" of the status quo. Piven and Cloward talk wisely about welfare and worker benefits as if their existences thwart the valorized image of the self-made person. That if we were to ask for assistance or a fair wage or reasonable working conditions, that it denigrates our work and makes us look weak and helpless. This idea becomes particularly salient with regard to welfare rights. Welfare began as a charitable institution set up by churches and private industries. While some funding sources expressed benevolence toward those in need, plenty others shamed the recipients for getting help. Many more couldn't handle feeling pitied.
Piven and Cloward also include a central point about the nature of protest and resistance in American politics. The status quo feels very much like a gentle lull: Until hitting that critical mass of social unrest and pressure from systemic changes, people simply trod along and work and try to do the best they can with their lot in life. During times of economic struggle and sweeping change, however, the masses stage protest behavior to call for change. The ideal situation -- for politicians, that is -- is to offer as few concessions as possible in order to appease. Sometimes this works; but with the impact of the Great Depression and political disenfranchisement later on, it does not.
Thus, if appeasement does not satisfy the demands, poor people have the power to bring commerce and work to a grinding halt. Piven and Cloward provide many examples of this. When industries flourished, workers conducted strikes. When strikebreakers would interfere, they brought fists and fury. When welfare offices would cut or refuse benefits outright, people held the office hostage. When landlords would jack monthly rent rates and threaten with evictions, sympathetic others would storm those apartments and kick the movers out. When blacks were refused service at lunch counters, they refused to move. And when local leaders petitioned the government to federalize the National Guard, they withstood the attacks.
Unfortunately, as of 1979, Piven and Cloward were never truly able to tell that real story of how to effect long-lasting, political change. With local and federal government responding at their most positive levels to changes in welfare, work, and wage, organizations believed that the sensible response was to form bureaucracies in order to keep pressing the government. Despite effectiveness, militant protest options became denigrated, and organizations often split in two over such philosophy. Government remained very much painted into that antagonistic mold, luring these organizations, asking them to sit at the big boys' table. This proverbial spider's web made not of silk but of red tape slowly ground progressive action to a halt on a number of occasions.
The authors become personal in the last chapter. They stood there during welfare reform and saw the demise of progressive change when it became lumped into the bureaucracy. As sad as that tale goes, unfortunately, they offer no alternatives. Commanding quite a bit of authority on social movements, it is curious -- this shoulder-shrug at the end of the book.
In any event, even if the ending is a bit of a let-down, the authors do a good job tracing the history of some significant social movements in our country. I believe that this book is a helpful introduction into studying social movements. Considering that it is relatively affordable and available in a number of Internet book sites, it's worth picking up.
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