I'm approaching this from the perspective of democratic participation, not just political volatility or salience. The fact that identities are up for grabs may make them exploitable, but that doesn't mean they strengthen democracy.
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But that identities do or should strengthen democracy is a normative starting assumption I am not sure I share. it's meso-organisations that structure participation & strengthen democracy; collective identities contribute to democracy insofar they strengthen those organisations, not per se. 1/2
jul 23, 2025, 8:59 am • 1 0 • view
Per se, collective identities are problematic for democracies because they set boundaries between insiders & outsiders, modulate solidarity, and socialise individuals into confrontational politics. I'd argue that their positive role through meso organisations is the exception & not the rule.
jul 23, 2025, 8:59 am • 1 0 • view
I agree that identity alone doesn’t guarantee democratic outcomes. But I’d push back against the idea that collective identities are inherently corrosive. Structured conflict has often been a key engine of democratic expansion, not a threat to it.
jul 23, 2025, 9:08 am • 3 0 • view
The civil rights movement, labour struggles, feminist organising, these were identity-based counterpublics. They challenged exclusion through confrontation, but also through institution-building. For me, healthy counterpublics are essential for functional democracies.
jul 23, 2025, 9:09 am • 4 0 • view
Indeed, but these were (1) relatively minoritarian, (2) quite structured, and (3) qualitatively "liberal" (not in the political colour sense but in the sense that they aimed at expanding their rights; nonexclusive. Today's identities are usually framed as zero sum; content matters. 1/2.
jul 23, 2025, 9:20 am • 3 0 • view
2/2 moreover, the lack of structuring exposes them to top-down populist activation. And finally, even those 'positive' examples contained quite a bit of exclusionary politics in their more extreme fringes.
jul 23, 2025, 9:20 am • 2 0 • view
Yes, I’d say we’re describing different phases of the same story. Those earlier counterpublics were structured, expansive, and often deeply rooted in civic institutions. What we’ve lost is the capacity to sustain that kind of political identity today.
jul 23, 2025, 9:28 am • 5 0 • view
The shift toward zero-sum, reactive identity isn’t accidental. It emerges from a system that has eroded organising spaces, defunded civic infrastructure, and reduced politics to performance and perception. That’s the vacuum I’m focused on.
jul 23, 2025, 9:28 am • 71 8 • view
We agree on the relationship between organisation and identities. On the causes: I am not sure elsewhere, but in Italy it was a very specific choice citizens made when they massively and repeatedly voted for Berlusconi. People were fed up with the 'old' system and its contradictions..1/2
jul 23, 2025, 9:41 am • 1 0 • view
..and Berlusconi sold them a world where they could stop caring about public affairs & only care about private ones; a sort of perverted, scaled up Mandevillian dystopia. But fact is, people knew it and bought the dream gladly. No big neoliberal conspiracy, but a wrong choice freely made.
jul 23, 2025, 9:41 am • 2 0 • view
THIS ^ All of it, and: if the political establishment can stay focused on identity, identity can stand in for any analysis/discussion of class.
jul 23, 2025, 10:53 am • 0 0 • view
Among individuals this can become a sort of Narcissistic reflecting pool-encouraged by algorithmic social media-which looks extremely corrosive of the possibility of solidarity. It appears to me that especially in younger organizing spaces this often supplants discussion of material conditions.
jul 23, 2025, 11:18 am • 0 0 • view
So I don’t idealise collective identity per se, but I do argue that without structures to hold it, identity becomes polarising and manipulable.
jul 23, 2025, 9:29 am • 46 5 • view
“Mummy, I’m sick of calling people names - how can I have a mature debate online??” 👆
jul 23, 2025, 9:36 am • 2 0 • view
I would like we stop looking at the US to set the progressive agenda. They are not very good at fighting fascism to start with. In fact, they don't do much. And the US is not England, Sweden or Quebec.
jul 23, 2025, 12:00 pm • 0 0 • view
When identities are disembedded from institutions, they lose the structures that enable collective agency. They're more easily captured by political entrepreneurs precisely because they lack internal organisation, accountability, or deliberative grounding.
jul 23, 2025, 8:49 am • 19 1 • view
That volatility produces mobilisation, but often without direction, structure, and durable power. It's influence without empowerment and visibility without voice. That’s the democratic hollowing I’m describing.
jul 23, 2025, 8:50 am • 18 0 • view