Workerism Guide, Meaning , Facts, Information and Description
Workerism is a term used in left-wing movements, specifically anarchism and Marxism. However, the term has been used with different meanings at different times.
Workerism is a belief that the working class can emancipate themselves only through being organised as workers. It is usually used critically, to describe an approach which excludes support for broader social movements, such as the feminist or anti-war movements.
Some workerists approach social movements by recognising that most people active in broader social movements are workers, and seeks to inject forms of organisation based on workplace organising into these social movements. The notable attempt by the Autonomist organisation Lotta Continua in Italy failed, and the organisation dissolved itself into the broader workers and social movements as an Autonomist movement.
This use of the term was the most common Italian language use during the twentieth century.
More broadly, workerism can imply the idolisation of workers, especially manual workers, working class culture and manual labour in general. See Socialist realism for an example.
The charge of workerism is often levelled at syndicalists. Traditional communist parties are also thought to be workerist, because of their glorification of male manual workers to the exclusion of white collar workers and women workers.
This use of the term was the most common English language use during the twentieth century.
VI Lenin charged a number of Russian socialists with being workerist for opportunistically following the political or cultural movements of the working class, instead of holding a separate Marxist political position.Workerism as a doctrine of revolution
Workerism as a negative cultural phenomena
Workerism as a charge by VI Lenin