Why Working Class Organizing Keeps Failing

TL;DR: Trump’s Executive Orders Are a Blueprint for White Rule

Welcome to TL;DR. Going forward I am planning to regularly break down key takeaways from my longer pieces—making the ideas easier to share, discuss, and apply.

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This week, I want to revisit the article I published last Sunday on Trump’s executive orders and what they reveal about how capitalism actually works.

We’ve been told for generations that capitalism will collapse under its own contradictions—and that class struggle will be the thing that ends it. But if that were true, wouldn’t we have seen a mass movement by now? Decades of attempts to organize the working class have failed to catch on at scale. Personally, I’m skeptical that the problem is that workers simply haven’t united or that more political education is needed. Perhaps, the problem is that capitalism was never just about class—it was built on racial hierarchy from the start.

Trump’s executive orders are not just a rollback of progressive policies. They are a long-term blueprint to entrench racial capitalism and white democracy into law, economy, and digital governance. These orders eliminate affirmative action, attack DEI initiatives, and redefine “merit” to ensure whiteness remains the default for hiring, wealth, and power. They reinforce the same racial exclusions that have structured capitalism for centuries—where Blackness became permanently tied to exploited labor, and whiteness was legally and economically protected. Today, that system is evolving: AI-driven hiring algorithms, predictive policing, and biometric surveillance are embedding racial hierarchy into digital governance, making oppression harder to detect and even harder to challenge.

This isn’t just about the U.S.—it’s about a global white solidarity project. Trump’s executive orders align with far-right movements worldwide, reinforcing racial control through economic policy, legal frameworks, and international coordination. From Europe’s anti-immigrant policies to Israel’s apartheid surveillance state to Hindu nationalist repression in India, these policies form a transnational strategy to sustain white rule. Racial capitalism adapts. And if resistance doesn’t evolve with it, it will fail. If we want to change the system, we have to be honest about what the system actually is.

Trump’s Executive Orders Are Even More Dangerous Than You Think—Here’s Why

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Recommended Resources:

These works provide deeper insight into the historical relationship between capitalism and race:

• Black Marxism: The Making of the Black Radical Tradition – Cedric Robinson

• The Abolition of White Democracy – Joel Olson

• The Wages of Whiteness – David Roediger

For understanding contemporary racial capitalism check out this podcast:

• Our Voice: Gargi Bhattacharyya on racial capitalism

Key resources on Trump’s executive orders:

• Executive Order 14173: Ending Illegal Discrimination and Restoring Merit-Based Opportunity (Targets affirmative action)

• Executive Order 14188: Additional Measures to Combat Anti-Semitism (Criminalizing Palestinian solidarity)

• Executive Order 14204: Addressing Egregious Actions of the Republic of South Africa (Prioritizing white South Africans as refugees)

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Lessons in Resistance

History tells us that capitalism doesn’t dissolve racial hierarchy—it depends on it. That means resistance must be strategic, structural, and global.

1. Building Alternative Economic Systems – The most effective resistance movements don’t just protest capitalism—they build economic systems that weaken its grip.
   Example: Fannie Lou Hamer’s Freedom Farms Cooperative (1969) provided food security and land ownership for Black farmers locked out of economic autonomy.

2. Global Solidarity & Cross-Border Resistance – White supremacy has never been confined to national borders, and neither can resistance.
   Example: The South African anti-apartheid movement used international economic pressure, legal challenges, and mass mobilization to dismantle a racial hierarchy sustained by global capital.

3. Cultural & Narrative Shifts – Controlling history and public perception has always been central to white supremacy.
   Example: The Harlem Renaissance was a counter-narrative to white supremacy that reshaped global perceptions of Black life and power.

Resistance works best when these strategies operate together—not when we argue over which one is “pure” enough.

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Final Thought:

We can’t afford to keep waiting for “class solidarity” to emerge on its own. If we want to change the system, we have to be clear about how it actually functions—and build strategies that take that reality into account.

What do you think? Has class based organizing failed simply because workers are divided by identity—or because capitalism developed in ways that make those divisions impossible to overcome?

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