How Would Working-Class Liberation Look If Led by Your Constituency?

In the October 2013 Present Time, Tim1 talked about the World Conference and Pre-World Conferences and, in particular, the goals. He said that in his estimation two of the new goals proposed—one about growth of the Communities and one about class—could not yet be useful or meaningful because we had not done enough work in those areas. I wrote him and asked him what he thought that work would look like and how I could help. He and I and others are moving forward on that.

Harvey’s2 vision was that if we could get our insights about discharge and re-evaluation into the hands of working-class people, it might be the thing that could really empower the working class “to lead all people to a rational, peaceful society” (from the RC Working-Class Commitment). In his essay “The World, the Working Class, and RC,”3 he said that workers in the basic industries were a key strategic element of the working class because they could shut down the means of production. Some of us took these words to heart4 and placed ourselves as workers in those industries to test out his ideas about RC and the working class.

I am pushing for a revisiting of Harvey’s vision. I am proposing that we take another look at it. What do we think about it? Agree? Disagree? What have we done to move it forward? Anything? A few things? Nothing? Do we think about it much? These are questions for the RC Community at large. But the question I have for you International Liberation Reference Persons is this: If you and your constituency were to take a strategic viewpoint about how to move working-class liberation forward, what would it look like?

I lead from a largely white U.S. Protestant heterosexual male working-class raised-poor perspective. What would working-class liberation look like if led from the perspective of your constituency? Would it look any different from what we have been doing? If so, how?

My question is not “What does working-class liberation for your constituency look like?” It is “What would working-class liberation for all people look like if it were led by your people?” Would it look different from what we see in the wide world and in RC? If so, how?

I know you are busy folks. Thoughts off the top of your head are fine.

Thank you for your thinking,

Dan Nickerson
International Liberation Reference
Person for Working-Class People
Freeport, Maine, USA


1 Tim Jackins
2 Harvey Jackins’
3 On pages 459 to 506 of The Benign Reality
4 “To heart” means very seriously.


Last modified: 2015-07-29 20:57:07+00