Blue Collars and Hard Hats: The Working Class and the Future of American Politics (Vintage Political Science and Social Criticism V-798)

We offer here not a statement of policy for a political party but a series of suggestions around which a program might be created that would appeal to the largest mass of American - the poor, minorities, blue - and white - collar workers, students, war protesters and enlightened members of the middle class. Such a program cannot be based on introspection or concern only for one's own family and friends. Our society is being torn apart because, while serving no one well, it fails to deal with the problems of the overwhelming majority. Large numbers of middle Americans will continue to resent the poor, the black, the Mexican American, the Puerto Ricans, as long as they fear for their own security and feel that others are getting unjust shares of the rewards. Political programs that ignore this fact will further divide progressive sentiment in the country.