The Foreclosure Crisis, Gramscian Capital, and the Left

• In Event: 277 - Section on Collective Behavior and Social Movements Roundtable Session (one-hour).
  In Refereed Roundtable: Table 16. Culture and Movements 2

Abstract

THE FORECLOSURE CRISIS, GRAMSCIAN CAPITAL, AND THE LEFT
This paper investigates why there had been no major social movement to develop around the foreclosure crisis. The greatest crisis in the housing market and in the economy more generally since the Great Depression has failed to produce any significant social movement around foreclosures. Why? Initially, the answer to this question was thought to lie in the individualistic ideological beliefs held by those going through foreclosure. That is, it was hypothesized that self-blame and guilt would account for the lack of activism in the streets. Instead, this paper presents evidence from a community study that argues that an absence of what I call “Gramscian-capital” among progressive organizations was in part responsible for this lack of movement. More specifically I found that the absence of a progressive organization with organic social roots in the communities affected by foreclosure, the lack of resources to make foreclosure a public issue, and the failure to develop an ideology that could effectively frame this issue (the combination of which I will call Gramscian-capital) were involved in explaining the missing movement.

Author

• J. Gregg Robinson, Grossmont College