2021, issue 2

Enough with the Caricatures: Now is the Time for Solidarity

Janneke Toonders

Marxism, Intersectioality, Capitalism, Activism,

Solidarity

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Attribution 4.0 License International License (CC

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Krisis 41 (2): 143-147.

Review of

Ashley J. Bohrer. 2019. Marxism and Intersectionality:

Race, Gender, Class and Sexuality under

Contemporary Capitalism. Bielefeld: transcript Verlag.

DOI

Keywords

10.21827/krisis.41.2.37197

1432021, issue 2

Enough with the Caricatures: Now is the Time for Solidarity

Janneke Toonders

In Marxism and Intersectionality: Race, Gender, Class and Sexuality under Contemporary

Capitalism Ashley J. Bohrer argues that the “work of changing this world will have to

be done in conversation with both of these theories” (27). The book is a monograph

dedicated to bringing Marxism and intersectionality into a – long overdue and very

welcome – conversation. Bohrer’s personal motivation stems from her dissatisfac-

tion with how these traditions usually approach one another; for, although both are

theories on “the structure of injustice in the world” (19), they tend to approach each

other with derision, resulting in caricaturist (mis)understandings. The book aims to

“move beyond this intra-left stalemate” (14), since a more active engagement between

Marxism and inter sectionality could create the basis for a “theoretical coalition between

perspectives” (23).

The main objective of the book is to understand how gender, race, sexuality,

and class are constituted under capitalism. Capitalism, in this sense, is understood as

“the grammar” of the world, insofar as it produces and maintains a whole range of

oppressive and exploitive practices (14). These practices are particularly structured by

the connections between race, class, gender, and sexuality. To be clear, Bohrer does not

argue that phenomena such as colonization, racism, or heteropatriarchy can be fully

accounted for in an analysis of capitalism. Nevertheless, she contends that such an

analysis is needed for challenging, and hopefully uprooting, contemporary systems of

exploitation and oppression.

Importantly, Bohrer does not believe in the rigid distinction between academia

and activism. Marxism and intersectionality are two intellectual projects that are ded-

icated to causing a radical intervention in the world (21). Noteworthy is the consid-

eration of the history of activism that is present in both Marxism and intersectionality

throughout the book. Thus, while the book is mainly a theoretical exploration of the

two tradi tions, a deliberate eort is made to consider actual struggles and movements.

Bohrer’s appeal to activism is also reected in her own account of a possible shared

future of the two traditions. Ultimately, the book works towards a “coalitional politics”

(253) grounded in a particular understanding of solidarity that will be able to mobilize

a true transformational power.

The desired theoretical coalition is built up in three stages: “Histories”, “Debates”,

and “Possibilities”. Since Bohrer must rst demonstrate how the two traditions can be

drawn together, the rst two parts of the book are mainly devoted to providing a survey

of both perspectives’ thinkers and their theoretical positions. It is important to keep in

mind that Bohrer treats both Marxism and intersectionality as internally heterogeneous

traditions. According to her this allows for a much broader scope, one which includes

thinkers who have contributed to, are in dialogue with, and have been inuenced by,

either Marxism or intersectionality.

The rst chapter especially – cleverly called “Chapter Zero” – lays the ground-

work for the book by giving a broad overview of dierent thinkers who had aliations

with both traditions. In doing so Bohrer wants to demonstrate in what sense there

1442021, issue 2

is a certain historical and theoretical overlap. The main focus of the rst chapter lies

on the period between the 1920s and the 1980s, where critical thinkers came into

contact through shared struggles (41). Bohrer traces the connections between the two

traditions in early twentieth century activism, where there was a “massive upsurge in

black partition in socialist, communist and Marxist organizations in the United States”

(42), to the late twentieth century, where new approaches such as the jeopardy approach

and standpoint theory were developed. Additionally, Bohrer considers the precursors

of intersectionality, since this was only fully developed during the 1980s. The positions

of thinkers such as Claudia Jones, W. E. B. Du Bois, Audre Lorde, bell hooks, and many

more, testify to a certain common ground between the two traditions.

Subsequently, the second chapter explores the full-blown theories of intersec-

tionality, by discussing several “positions shared by most if not all intersectional theo-

rists” despite “internal debates” (85). After discussing ve denitions of inter sectionality

(respectively oered by Kimberlé Crenshaw, Leslie McCall, Patricia Hill Collins, Ange

Marie Hancock, and Vivian May), Bohrer reconstructs “six postulates” that serve as

broad principles on which nearly all intersectional thinkers agree (84, 91). These pos-

tulates are also central to Bohrer’s own argument. Insights such as the “inseparability of

oppressions” (i.e. viewing oppressions as “mutually constitutive”; 91), or the claim that

“oppressions cannot be ranked” (i.e. the “rejection of primacy”; 92) are crucial for the

arguments she makes later on.

Demonstrating that Marxism and intersectionality are not “two completely

exogamous traditions” (78) allows Bohrer to engage more specically with why and

how these traditions diverge in contemporary debates. After all, despite their somewhat

shared history there have been numerous debates between the two traditions. Chapters

three through ve elaborate on these debates, and how they have been dominated by

mutual misunderstanding. Bohrer attempts to show how these misunderstandings are

grounded in certain caricatures rather than in accurate comprehension. She thoroughly

engages with the Marxist critiques of intersectionality which rely on the arguments that

the latter is a form of identity politics, that it is postmodern, and that it is liberal. This

is followed by her discussion on intersectionality’s critiques of Marxism, according to

which Marxism is class reductionist, essentially Eurocentric, and homogenizing of the

proletariat.

Surely these caricatures may be true for some Marxists and for some intersec-

tional thinkers, and as such, Bohrer’s point is not that these caricatures are completely

unfounded. Rather, she believes that the “best versions” of these two traditions have a

certain anity, while the caricatures are much closer to the worst versions (20). These

caricatures – as exacerbated tendencies existing within both traditions – should there-

fore be taken as a warning; in this sense, Bohrer argues, their mutual misunderstanding

could actually be quite informative.

While continuing to engage extensively with other thinkers, Bohrer explicates her

argument in the book’s third part. The general aim of this last part is to map new possi-

bilities for theory (academia) as well as for the organization of movements (activism) by

shifting beyond the supposed stalemate. In order to do this, Bohrer begins by examining

1452021, issue 2

the relation between oppression and exploitation for fully understanding the system of

contemporary capitalism. This is followed by a discussion of the method of dialectics as

a way of reading capitalism’s mechanisms and operations. Finally, in the last chapter, the

question of organization and the notion of solidarity is revisited.

In the sixth chapter, Bohrer rethinks the relation between exploitation and

oppression. On the one hand, structures of exploitation are usually understood as the

systematic taking advantage of workers’ labor and their products. On the other hand,

structures of oppression are seen as forms of systematic subjugation based on race, gender,

sexuality and so on. Generally – though there are certainly exceptions – Marxists have

seen oppression as a consequence of exploitation, while intersectional thinkers have

viewed exploitation as a form of oppression (187, 193). Inspired by intersectionality’s

rejection of hierarchizing oppressions, Bohrer proposes to render exploitation and

oppression as “equiprimordial” (196). From this perspective, capitalism is a system which

has both as its constitutive logics: “they are equally fundamental, equally deep-rooted,

and equally anchoring of the contemporary world” (198-199). Hence, no analysis of a

phenomenon will ever be complete without taking into account the interplay between

oppression and exploitation.

To demonstrate why we should understand oppression and exploitation as

equiprimordial, Bohrer oers the historical example of chattel slavery. Without doubt,

an analysis of chattel slavery must take into account the exploitation of the enslaved’s

labor; this analysis cannot be complete, however, without also considering the racist ide-

ologies that were equally fundamental in sustaining slavery. Chattel slavery was racial-

ized exploitation, but the capitalist prot motive cannot fully account for the structures

of racial oppression. Furthermore, the logics of oppression and exploitation distinc-

tive of chattel slavery were also permeated with gender and sexuality. Hence, Bohrer

asserts: “neither exploitation nor oppression can separately capture the phenomenon”

(200). An equiprimordial analysis can do justice to the multiple yet related shapes of

oppression and exploitation under chattel slavery (without reducing one to the other).

Considering both oppression and exploitation as co-constitutive logics of capitalism (in

all its historical formations), Bohrer thus paves the way for a non-reductive approach.

The following chapter elaborates on how we can understand capitalism’s com-

plexity, since its logics produce all sorts of real contradictions. For example, it “produces

both enormous wealth and abject poverty at one and the same time” (original emphasis;

209). According to Bohrer it is the dialectic method that is capable of navigating us

through capitalism’s muddied waters. First, however, dialectics is critically reconsidered

in order to arrive at the “dialectics of dierence” (225). Bohrer wants to get rid of

two misconceptions concerning the nature of dierence. According to her, both the

liberal tendency to entirely erase dierence, and the neoliberal notion to render us all

completely unique, are dangerous. Such one-sided approaches are incapable of recog-

nizing how capitalism dierentiates and homogenizes us at one and the same time. A

dialectic of dierence, however, can grasp how capitalism is “bringing us simultaneously,

sometimes painfully, closer together and farther apart” (226).

Capitalism’s tendency of concurrent homogenization and dierentiation is,

according to Bohrer, a crucial piece in the puzzle of organizing “political relationships

1462021, issue 2

of coalition” (232). The last chapter – “Solidarity in the House of Dierence” – turns

towards the question of solidarity, and how it can recognize both dierence and relation.

The title is a reference to Lorde’s assertion that connection and alliance is found in the

“house of dierence” (2018, 268). While elaborating on Lorde’s claim, Bohrer writes:

“we do not have to bridge our dierence; we already live together in the house of

dierence” (254). In the nal chapter, Bohrer starts by discussing the orthodox Marxist

idea that solidarity ultimately relies on a notion of “commensurability” (233). From this

perspective, however, solidarity is thought to be an articulation of a shared condition or

a unity. The issue with this is that a coalition would only become possible at the very

lowest level of commonality. As a result, moments of dierence or non-unity are either

thought to be secondary or completely irrelevant.

One of intersectionality’s substantial insights is that “solidarity does not have to

be based in commensurability” (249). Indeed, the non-commensurability of positions

is often central to intersectional thinking. As an example, Bohrer briey elaborates on

Crenshaw’s (1989) discussion of the momentous case of DeGraenreid v. General Motors

from 1976. After they were red, ve black women accused the automobile company

of specically discriminating against black women. However, because not all women

(i.e. white women) had been red, nor all black people (i.e. black men), the claim was

rejected. Hence, the court did not recognize the particular ways in which black women

were marginalized, and instead assumed that the “black women’s position is essentially

commensurable with black men and/or white women” (original emphasis; 250).

Not all experiences of oppression and exploitation are similar, shared, or

equally aecting everyone. The problem with a mobilization strategy that assumes a

certain minimum level of commonality, Bohrer claims, is that it can only recognize

“the ways oppression and exploitation aect all of ‘us’” (259). Understanding solidarity

as an expression of shared situation then quickly becomes what she calls a “politics

of the lowest common denominator” (251). Instead of a politics that only requires

action when ‘everyone’ is aected, Bohrer proposes a “coalitional politics” (253) where

solidarity is constructed through both dierence and relation. Arguably, one would not

need to form a coalition at all if everybody already shared the same position. The value

of a coalition lies in its capacity to relate to one another, despite certain dierences that

may exist between communities. A relational solidarity is therefore capable of truly

mobilizing a transformational power:

Capitalism thus links us together, in a tie that binds us, often painfully, in relation

to one another. This moment of relation is the true ground of solidarity. […]

Solidarity is thus the name for arming the dierences that exploitation and

oppression produce within and between us; it is also the name for recognizing

that every time I ght against anyone’s oppression or exploitation, I ght against

my own, I ght against everyone’s (259).

With this plea Bohrer concludes her inspiring book. To stand in solidarity means to rec-

ognize that there are dierent experiences of oppression and exploitation, of silencing and

marginalization. It is the realization that we are all aected by capitalist structures of dom-

ination, but in particular and distinct ways. Solidarity, Bohrer writes, is about “mobilizing

1472021, issue 2

the transformational power of dierential communities” (260). Understanding that various

groups and communities have dierent strengths can help us gain a more complex and

complete understanding of what might be possible. By putting Marxism and intersection-

ality into a conversation Bohrer begins a dialogue that might oer a deeper understanding

of capitalism’s structures of oppression and exploitation. In doing so she charts a creative and

exciting path for an anti-capitalist politics.

Marxism and Intersectionality provides an insightful and varied overview of texts, con-

cepts, and thinkers. Even though the reader is exposed to a sometimes overwhelming

amount of information, the book is incredibly easy to follow. Bohrer harnesses insights

from ‘both sides’ at every step of the way. She is therefore, while making her own argu-

ments, in dialogue with a tremendous range of thinkers and their positions. In general I

believe that Bohrer accurately examines the two traditions, and successfully undermines

a number of caricatures, which certainly invites further discussion. In doing so the book

succeeds in clearing a path that begins to move beyond the stalemate. Since Bohrer is

not interested in constructing an “uber-theory” (23), the relationship between Marxism

and intersectionality is one of (theoretical) coalition too.

The book makes an interesting case for why these two traditions should further

engage with each other, and hopefully this will be the start of a much longer and

stimulating conversation. The book is especially interesting for those academics and

activists who are concerned with thinking and articulating new opportunities for an

anti-capitalist politics. For those who are already well-acquainted with Marxist theory

or with intersectional thinking, or with both, the content of some sections in the rst

and second part might already be familiar; the third part, however, is unquestionably

appealing to anyone who wants to unsettle the structures of domination.

Lorde, Audre. 2018. Zami: A New Spelling of My

Name. London: Penguin Classics.

Crenshaw, Kimberlé. 1989. “Demarginalizing the

Intersection of Race and Sex: A Black Feminist

Critique of Antidiscrimination Doctrine,

Feminist Theory and Antiracist Politics.” The

University of Chicago Legal Forum (1989): 139-67.

References

Janneke Toonders is enrolled in the Research

Master in Philosophy at the Radboud University

in Nijmegen. She specializes in social and political

philosophy, with a focus on topics such as post-

Marxism, (symbolic) political representation and

solidarity.

Biography