Table-Flippers, Defenders, and Do-Gooders
Understanding the Psychology Behind Why Some Fight for Change, Others Resist It, and Many Just Want to Feel Good
Welcome back to an exploration of the forces driving nonprofit workers and social change movements. Last week, I wrote about how many nonprofit workers are seeking personal fulfillment in our work, and how a lifelong achievement-obsessed culture shapes everything we do. Today, I want to get into something that's been at the forefront since my first campaign in West Virginia: the three different mindsets that explain some of why social change stops short of where we hope it goes.
Go back with me to 2006. I'm in a tiny town called New Martinsville on the Ohio River, trying to organize an environmental campaign. It's me and a group of volunteers from West Virginia University talking with chemical plant workers who are terrified our campaign will lead to their plant shutting down.
The tension was real, and it got me thinking about how differently we were all seeing the world and politics. I boil it down to 3 different fundamental frameworks for understanding the world, all of which I'm calling a "consciousness" in a nod to Marx. There's revolutionary, reactionary, and relaxtionary consciousness. Depending on which one you hold, your approach to social change -- even your desire for it -- will be very different.
Revolutionary Consciousness: When You're Ready to Flip the Table
First up is revolutionary consciousness. This is when Marx talked about the working class waking up to their shared oppression. He observed laborers, including children, working seven days a week in hazardous conditions, owning nothing, while profits flowed disproportionately to the owners. At some point, the workers would say, "This whole system is rigged against me, and the only way forward is to build something new."
It's what emerges when people are denied basic freedoms, opportunities, and dignity for too long. I don't believe it's about just class anymore. Think about LGBTQ+ activists in countries where being themselves could get them killed, or indigenous folks defending their land from pipelines, or Black people fighting for liberty and equality in the Jim Crow south. They're all coming from this place of "the system as it exists cannot work for us."
The core of revolutionary consciousness is the awareness that the only path forward requires remaking the existing order.
Reactionary Consciousness: The Fear of Loss
Those plant workers I met in New Martinsville were coming from a different place. They had decent jobs, could pay their bills, owned homes – but they all felt like it could disappear in a heartbeat. That's what I am calling reactionary consciousness.
It's like when you've got something, but you're constantly looking over your shoulder. One layoff, one medical bill, one economic downturn, and poof – there goes everything you've worked for.
The sociologist Arlie Hochschild wrote in Strangers In Their Own Land about a woman who gestured around her living room and said, "This could all vanish tomorrow!" Can you imagine living with that kind of anxiety all the time?
When you're in this mindset, you don't want revolution – you want protection. You're not trying to change the system; you're trying to keep your place in it. Those plant workers weren't fighting for some grand ideological cause; they were fighting to keep putting food on the table.
And it gets worse when you add in cultural stuff. Imagine feeling economically insecure AND having people much better off than you mocking your lifestyle, your values, your faith, your community. This creates a perfect storm: economic precariousness combined with cultural marginalization.
Relaxtionary Consciousness: The Privilege of Purpose
Then there were my volunteers – mostly college students with safety nets and bright futures. They weren't revolutionary or reactionary; they were what I call "relaxtionary." They had their basic needs met and were mainly looking for meaning and purpose in life. (You know this is where I was coming from, too, as I shared in Part 1.)
Here, you're at the top of Maslow's hierarchy – you've got food, shelter, safety, love, and esteem, so now you're all about self-actualization. You're trying to "do what you love" and "make a difference" because you have the luxury to think beyond survival.
My team and I canvassed New Martinsville during the day, then spent our evenings eating ice cream and patting ourselves on the back for being such good people. Social change work was our path to feeling fulfilled and to proving we were living meaningful lives.
But when relaxtionary consciousness collided with reactionary consciousness, guess which one held stronger? Those plant workers were fighting for their actual livelihoods. We were fighting for... what? Abstract ideals? Personal growth? The warm fuzzies? When things got uncomfortable, a lot of my volunteers just found other ways to feel good about themselves.
Why Progress Grinds To A Halt
These three consciousnesses help explain why social change is so difficult. Revolutionary consciousness seeks to overturn systems, reactionary consciousness fights to preserve them, and relaxtionary consciousness seeks personal fulfillment through activism but usually retreats when confronted with real conflict.
The people in New Martinsville came at us with the intensity of folks protecting their way of life. Meanwhile, many of my volunteers just drifted away when things got tough. They had a million other options for finding meaning: volunteering elsewhere, traveling, taking up yoga, whatever.
Understanding these different mindsets has helped me make sense of why some movements gain traction while others fizzle out, and why so many well-intentioned nonprofit workers struggle to connect with the communities they're trying to serve.
Next time, I'll dig into why relaxtionary consciousness, despite all its good intentions, often falls flat when it comes to creating real movement. We'll talk about the limits of treating activism like a spiritual journey, and what it might take to actually change things.
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