Kristian Williams - Our Enemies in Blue - Police and Power in America

274145 Braverman offers a clear description of the middk class: "[LJike the working class it possessesno economic or occupational independence, is employed by capital and its of [, hoots, possessesno access to the labor process or the means of production outside that employment, and Illustrenew its labors t')f capital incessantly in order to subsist. This portion of employment embracesthe engineering, technical, and scientific cadre, the lower ranks nf supervision and management,the considerable numbers of specialized and 'professional' employees occupied in marketi ng,financial and organizational administration, and the like, :" well as, outside of capitalist industrvproper, in hospitals, schools, government administration and so forth." Braverman, Labor, 403,146 Braverman, Labor, 405.147 "This 'new middle class' takes its characteristics from both sides. Not only does it receive its pettyshare in the prerogatives and rewards of capital, but it also bears the mark of the proletariancondition." Braverman, Labor, 407. Emphasis in original.148 Harring identifies several tools fo r dividing the police from the working cia", including: strat i­fication within the lower dasses, ethnic differences, the cops' organizational cultu re, disdpline,and the criminalization of working-class activities. Harring, Po/iring /1 CIllss So[il'ty, 144.14') I.evi, BurCtlucyatic Imurgl'l1CY, 51.1')0 Quoted in Fogelson, Big-City I'olice, 207.151 These limits arc significant, but they sadly do not distinguish police associations from properlobor unions. The American labor movement has often [llien fa r below the ideals of inter-unionsolidarity, rank-and-flle leadership, and direct action militancy.1')2 Think about it this way-if the slave patrollers had fo rmed a union, making demands aboutwages, hours, discipline, and so on, would conscientious supporters of workers' rights be obligedto support them in those demands? No. And why not? Because the nature of their work wasto repress and control part of the worki ng class-the slaves. This puts the slave patrollers, andnow the police, clearly on the side of the bosses, in roughly the same class position as an)" othermanager who does not own capital, but earns his keep by acting as the proxy fo r the ruling class.It should be noted that this is not intended as a legal argument abut the right of the police toorganize. I would not defer to the state the authority to decide who does or does not have thatright. But the demands of solidarity arc another matter entirely. It is these with which I amchiefly concerned.153 For a contrary position, see: Bruce C. Johnson, "Taking Care of Labor: The Police in AmericanI.ife," Theory and Society (Spring 1976): 89-1 17. Johnson argues that police sympathize withworkers (and vice vcrsa), but he never supports his strongest claim-that the police do actuallydefend the interests of workers (specifically White workers) /IS workers. To the degree that Whiteworkers have an interest in racist inequalities, it is obvious that the police defend their interestin that regard-which is to sa)', the police defend the privileges White workers enjoy tlI Whitepeoplt> in ::l r::l.i"t "orif'ty pprh:lr h ::'..!":!::: '::!d S ;-'l-':';.": p;vVl,..lly l;l!LJ. "'l'"aKiug Care orWhitey."154 Murra)", "Should the Police Unionize)," 532. In an ironic postscript to the infamous strike of1919, the Boston Police Patrolmen's Association was founded in 1965, and won a contract in1968. But when, that same year, the legislature lifted the prohibition on affiliation with otherunions, the BPI'A declined (0 attach itself to the AFL-CIO. Russell, City in Terror, 2.32.155 Levi, Bureaucratic Insurgency, 89.156 On February 27, 2003, a San Francisco grand jury stunned the city when it issued indictmentsagainst three officers involved in an off-duty beating and seven commanders who helped coverit up. Among those charged with conspiracy to obstruct justice: Police Chief Earl Sanders, AssistantChief Alex Fagan, Sr., Deputy Chief Greg Suhr, and Deputy Chief David Robinson. ChuckFinnie, "SFPD Indictments Shock the City," Stln Francisco Chronicle, March 1, 2003 [database:NewsBank Full-Text Newspapers, accessed March 4, 2003J .157 Stark, Police Riots, 203-204.158 Quoted in Levi, Bureaucratic !nsurgency, 20-2 1.159 Levi, Bureaucratic Insurgency, 145.160 Colin Crouch and Ronald Dore, "Whatever Happened to Corporatism?" in Corporatism and Accountability:Organized Interests in British Public Lifo, ed. Colin Crouch and Ronald Dore (Oxford:Clarendon Press, 1990), 3. Parentheses in original.161 Crouch and Dore, "Whatever Happened?" .3-4. Parentheses in original.162 Michael 1'. Florinsky, Filscism and National Socialism: A Study of the Economic and Social Policies ofthe Totalitarian State (New York: The Macmillan Company, 1936). For more on corporatism, see:Philippe C. Schmitter, "Still the Century of Corporatism?" The Review of Politics 36 (1974): 85-131.163 If this analysis is sound, then it suggests a particular picture of the state and the role of thepolice union in maintaining its power. Rather than standing as a unitary sovereign with varioussubordinate agencies at hand to enact its will, the state would consist of a cornplex networkcomprising these agencies, and dependent on their cooperation fo r its power. This idea will be