Today sees the latest in a sustained run of demonstrations in the UK since Donald Trump was inaugurated President of the United States. For many progressives, his election has crystallised their anxieties.
They have watched, maybe even supported under the banners of New Labour, years of exclusionary conservative neoliberalism. That system reaped unequal rewards and ultimately unleashed widespread consequences. The austerity that was imposed to manage them has created an artificial scarcity.
Those actions, results and reactions have left some quarters of society - not few in number and faced on all sides by shortfalls and cutbacks in the name of 'scarce' resources - deprived, disregarded and ultimately disaffected. The political disconnect is tangible.
As wary progressives have worried, this fertile ground for fear and anger - prepared under the inattentive rule of those who were too busy enjoying the fruits of the good times to tend or care for it - is now being exploited.
The most virulent of the poisonous crop that has been sewn is xenophobia. That dangerous weed is being grown deliberately in some places and spreading all by itself in others - though it is perhaps reassuring that it must first be dressed up and sold only through distorting and distancing filters, that shows blatant hatred of outsiders, without an 'excuse', is not accepted.
But people are bringing it home. Making it part of their everyday. It would be a toxic mischief to allow the mistrust and hatred of outsiders to be normalised. The frontline against that threat is challenging the negative attitudes towards people seeking refuge or looking for a better life in a new land.
A major part of events will be the 'One Day Without Us' event, a 'labour boycott' by migrants, and those standing in solidarity with them, to demonstrate the value of migrants to our economy - an event months in the planning (Garcia, 2017; Taylor, 2017).
The day was chosen because it coincides with the United Nations World Day of Social Justice. It theme for 2017 is "Preventing conflict and sustaining peace through decent work":
"Social justice is an underlying principle for peaceful and prosperous coexistence within and among nations. We uphold the principles of social justice when we promote gender equality or the rights of indigenous peoples and migrants. We advance social justice when we remove barriers that people face because of gender, age, race, ethnicity, religion, culture or disability."
Therein lies the inclusive message that has so far run through the opposition to Trump. The exclusivity that the new President stands for is being opposed by a movement for a more egalitarian and inclusive society.
But to create such a society, equality and inclusivity needs to be achieved on an economic as well as social level - and the times seem to be making clear that you really cannot have one without the other.
The anger that stewed within those who felt discarded or ignored, even during the so called 'salad days' when the global economy was booming and Labour was in office, is now fueling a desperate turn inwards that public policy has frequently, if often unwittingly, aided.
Austerity, by slashing public spending, has imposed an artificial scarcity. That sense of a finite limit is being used to fan fears that were more easily assuaged during the years of plenty. Fears of shortage, of limited places and supplies, are forcing people into adopting a triage mentality.
While conservatives talk of austerity in terms of of doing things efficiently to save tax payers some money, myths are spreading, and being spread, about the skivers and the cheats that is feeding sectarian and segregationist mentalities.
These are lines being drawn - borders, classes, and talk of the deserving and the undeserving - and with the fear of scarcity at their backs, no one wants to be on the wrong side of those lines.
After years of exclusion from the gains of globalism, austerity has turned a economic setback into desperation and a society-wide scrambling retreat. Those gathering at today's protests must think carefully on how to reach out with their message, beyond the progressives who will gather around them.
The rise of xenophobia and the rising fear of scarcity have gone hand in hand. Progressives must poke through the propaganda that surrounds the supporters of their opponents and find the desperate people within that noxious cloud and let them know: the choice between aiding our kin and aiding a stranger is a false choice.
References
Francisco Garcia's 'Migrants plan day of action to celebrate role in British society: One Day Without Us set to include labour boycott to protest against rising post-Brexit xenophobia'; in The Independent; as of 19 February 2017.
Diane Taylor's 'Migrants plan day of action to highlight contribution to Britain: One Day Without Us will include labour boycott to protest against rising racism and xenophobia'; in The Guardian; as of 19 February 2017.
'2017 Theme: "Preventing conflict and sustaining peace through decent work”'; from the United Nations; as of 19 February 2017.
'Facts Illuminate: Trump can write his own story but it won't change the facts - he stood for exclusion, while his opponents march for a more egalitarian and inclusive America'; in The Alternative; January 2017.
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