Denning argues that the Popular Front failed, but the cultural front succeeded in the long run by democratizing American culture and institutionalizing the idea of American social democracy as a benchmark for a progressive understanding of American historical development. He argues that the social movement artists and intellectuals were the cultural partners of the new union and state bureaucracy and the growing cultural industry. By ignoring the actual class struggle of the period, he is able to cover up the reactionary role of this new middle class and social democratic capitalist regime.

Denning argues that the “forces of the American Century,” that is Cold War anti-Communism and “corporate control” of the state, defeated the Popular Front vision of social democratic America, but the cultural front was nevertheless able to outlive it. However, in reality, both the Pouplar Front and the cultural front partially succeeded. The cultural front gave a progressive guise to the division of mental and manual labor and the incorporation of labor peace and multiculturalism (although this latter part was not completely fulfilled until the 1960s) into the state as part of the ideology of official society. The new American ruling class emerged from the Second World War in a position to manage a new form of capitalism and American Exceptionalism that justified existing social relations. Official society now identified America as a unique and participatory society that was a progressive advance over other nations, confirming the necessity of U.S. imperialism.

Thus the Popular Front social movement (as he terms it) and the cultural front created a loyal opposition to capitalism, white supremacy and imperialism that critiqued pre-war state policy and capitalist relations, but justified their necessary transformation rather than destruction. The cultural front created representations of this participatory society that were to help justify its existence. Today, American official society claims its mandate to centralize all economic and political life in its own hands by promoting the freedom of culture and the identity of ordinary Americans in its ideology.

Culture and Social Unionism

Moe Foner’s fascinating memoir of Hospital Workers Union Local 1199 in New York City, Not For Bread Alone, is an important window into key aspects and dilemmas of social unionism. Social unionism—usually contrasted with business unionism—can be defined by its desire to go beyond using union organization solely as a means to establish and enforce a labor contract with an employer, in order to make the union a vehicle to form coalitions with political forces that are fighting for social justice issues more broadly. These may include issues of infrastructure, services or civil rights. Together these coalitions advocate a “participatory” or a “democratized” society and they lobby or demonstrate for the state to change its policies. In social unionism, participation is an ideal by which to reform—but not abolish—an unaccountable union bureaucracy. Cultural work inside the union becomes an important means to encourage participation in union life as a community and give expression to the concerns of wider social transformation.

Foner began his union work as educational director of Department Store Local 1250, an independent department store union in New York, in the late 1940s. Inspired by the Popular Front era mixture of politics and popular culture, Foner envisioned 1250 supporting plays and musicals that were of high quality, but that also drew on the talents and participation of the union’s membership and local artists. He was instrumental in bringing to life “Thursdays ‘Til Nine”, a musical about working in the department store. “Unfortunately”, writes Foner, “Local 1250 wasn’t able to follow through on ‘Thursdays’ and build a vigorous cultural program” (25). A combination of its small size and defensive existence against raids from larger unions did not allow for such sustained ambitious production.

When 1250 was absorbed into District 65, Foner took over cultural programming there. District 65 predominately represented people in the wholesale and warehouse industries, and had a reputation for progressive unionism. The union was distinguished as a center of leftwing union social activity and its cultural programs were extensive and varied. However, District 65 was ripped apart as the state, through the use of the Taft-Hartley Act of 1947, began to criminalize leftwing union activity and to encourage its replacement with the forces that would eventually become Cold War liberalism in the union bureaucracy. It was during this time that Leon Davis, founder of 1199, asked Foner to join his union staff. As the educational director of 1199, Foner became a recognized innovator and leader of cultural programming,creating a model for other progressive-minded unions.

The ideals of social unionism account for much of the history of 1199. From its origins as the Retail Drug Employees Union in 1932 it focused on cutting across job stratification and fighting racism in hiring practices. This prepared 1199 to unionize New York City hospitals in viciously fought campaigns through the 1950s and 60s. Unions ignored this low-paid, predominately women of color and immigrant workforce. Local 1199 gained a reputation for its commitment to the ideals of internal democracy and a reliance on rank-and-file leaders. The union officially opposed the Vietnam War and was close to many in the civil rights movement, including Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

In 1968 the union began a national organizing strategy, coming into Charleston, South Carolina to help a unionization campaign in local hospitals. White workers refused to strike and it quickly became a battle against the white supremacist establishment. Local 1199 worked in coalition with Ralph Abernathy and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference. This coalition became increasingly nervous as city bosses imposed a curfew and the activity of Black Power militants became apparent. Foner contacted Nixon aide Daniel Patrick Moynihan and Labor Secretary George Schultz who applied pressure for a settlement that barred union recognition, but reinstated fired workers and provided a raise. Local 1199 claimed a victory, but the organization left in place fell apart shortly after. Local 1199 experienced bitter leadership struggles in the 1980s and its locals were variously absorbed into AFSCME and SEIU.

The 1199 cultural program in the 1950s grew with the direction of Ossie Davis and Ruby Dee, whom Foner met through a mutual friend. Through their efforts 1199 sponsored high quality plays and musicals on issues of the civil rights movement that included such performers as Sidney Poitier and Harry Belafonte. They also began producing an annual show called “Salute to Freedom”, in which well-known performers and political leaders would participate. Local 1199 held discussion forums, film series and comedy shows, in which everyone from Eleanor Roosevelt and Adam Clayton Powell to Norman Thomas would participate.

In 1978, Foner began the “Bread and Roses Cultural Project”. Foner proposed the project at a fortunate time. As he says,“This was during the Carter administration when federal endowments like the NEA were looking for a labor project to support…The phrase comes from a slogan used in the sixty-three-day textile strike of 1912 in Lawrence, Massachusetts, in which exploited immigrant women carried a banner reading, ‘We Want Bread and Roses Too.’ That says it all. You couldn’t make up anything better. It captured what I envisioned for 1199ers: economic gains to meet their material needs and cultural programs to enrich their lives” (86). Dozens of artists and hundreds of rank-and-file volunteers used an expanding grant base from the government, foundations and even some corporations to fund elaborate cultural organizing that included everything from street fairs and concerts to photographic exhibits. Foner notes, “I wanted our programs to reinforce members’ feelings that their lives have value, their work is important, their hardships and joys noticed and respected” (88).

The goal behind this was perhaps best summed up in the production of a musical called “Take Care” that was eventually shown in 45 hospitals in New York City. Based on dozens of workshops in which union members talked about their jobs, it got them to talk about the problems they faced everyday such as constant disrespect and racism. In this way everyday peoples’ voices could be shared with each other. Indeed, “Bread and Roses grew out of a tradition in which culture was often used as a tool in articulating and working toward the vision of a fairer, more human world” (98). Foner acknowledges that many criticized the Bread and Roses project for relying too much on professional artists. He correctly defends the idea that not only do people want to see high-quality production and artistic vision, but also the project still contained membership-based artistic and educational projects.

The role of culture and cultural organizing in social unionism is central to its overall conception of politics. The willingness to undercut the pure economism and open authoritarianism of business unionism is, nevertheless, rooted in a vision of workplace and community movements subject to the control and leadership of a progressive union bureaucracy and the leftwing of the Democratic Party. The goal of this control is to humanize existing social relations, but not fundamentally change them. It must be remembered that the periodic rise and fall of a progressive union bureaucracy and the Democratic Party is directly linked to the formation of mass movements and the self-activity of everyday people and the need for the state to control this. Similar to the case of Denning, the culture of labor promoted by a progressive union education program becomes an ideological justification for capitalist development. The representation of labor substitutes for real workplace and political control.

Conclusion

Such experiments in culture and cultural politics are ultimately invalidated because of their origins in statist philosophies. However, this does not mean that the experiments and debates do not contain insights that can be influential for a vision of a new culture rooted in a perspective of peoples’ self-management and self-government. Such richly detailed statist ideas of the intersection of culture and politics stand as a challenge to imagine alternative ideals. Meanwhile, the historical example of the Wobblies and others to imagine a human culture devoid of the divisions between mental and manual labor stand as noble efforts to be defended and ultimately expanded. The dilemmas and achievements of these cultural experiments can, regardless of their historical failures, provide invaluable lessons for a vision of culture that expresses not the “voices” of the governed, but the activity and self-conceptions of those who would govern.

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