[2024-09-29 note: This was previously posted on Cohost, on 2023-06-14 at https://cohost.org/ireneista/post/1684179-system but the irenes.space URL is the permanent one.]
Here's a thought we've shared privately, but it's taken time for us to get a formulation of it that doesn't ramble too much.
When people talk about working for change "within the system" vs. "outside the system", what system do they mean?
Answer: It depends! A thread.
People without a science background, or even people with that background who don't also pay attention to the humanities, may not realize that the word "system", in its modern sense, had to be invented. It wasn't a single moment, either, the idea was refined over many years.
Wikipedia has a page that's titled just "System", because it's a more interesting concept than you might realize.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/System#History
When we, or anyone, uses the word "system" in a sentence, it brings with it a rich set of affordances. You can talk about an "open system" or a "closed system". You can talk about systems containing each other - "super-system", "subsystem".
When we were part of founding the Trans At Google employee resource group a few years back, that was a form of working for change within the system. What system? Google, the company.
When we pushed for labor action, that was working for change outside the system. Same system: The company. We had reached a point where it became clear that anything the company gives us, it can take away later, so we had to stop relying on that.
When people urge you to vote, or otherwise worry about electoral politics, they are working for change within the system. What system? The United States, or whatever country they're part of.
When people take to the streets, that's working for change outside the system. It's not relying on law and order to save them. (Which is the right call, because it's not going to.)
It's important to be aware of which you're doing, at any given time.
For the 0.1% of our followers who have watched Revolutionary Girl Utena all the way to the end (spoiler warning), it brings this up. Utena is trying to leverage the power of the prince/princess social system ... to demolish itself. That can't work.
Similarly, an employee resource group can't do the things that a union can do. Because an ERG draws its power from the very corporation that it seeks to reform.
Here's an important point, though: The entire world is systems, of one sort or another. You can step outside any particular system, but you cannot step outside all systems.
Remember that we said systems contain each other? A corporation is a system, and it's contained within the larger system of capitalism.
If you've ever seen VC-funded startups trying to do labor stuff... that's a mistake. They're outside the megacorps they're trying to reform, but they're not outside capitalism. It's going to come back and bite them.
(We aren't referring to anyone specific! It's a common antipattern.)
Similarly, protestors are outside the current regime in the US, in the sense that they don't draw their power from it. Congress is not, so Congress's ability to fix what's broken is limited right now.
You may think that a 501(c)(3) non-profit sits outside capitalism... that's debatable, but even if so, it certainly sits inside the existing social order. That special tax status, and the rules and obligations that come with it, are a form of power, but they are a constraint too.
Our goal with this thread is not to make any specific point or show you any particular insight. It's to broaden the way you think about efforts to make change.
As an activist, you should always be aware of which systems you're drawing your strength from, and which ones you're fighting.
[TW ableist slur] As an example of how this comes up in practice: If you're a disability or mental health activist, don't make jokes calling people "crazy". Because stigma is a social system, and you don't want to make that system stronger.
Know where you're standing, system-wise. Know where you draw your strength from. Keeping that in mind will help you reason about which strategies to follow, and which to leave to somebody else.
It's also good to be aware of because, someday, there may come a day when you pick a fight with a system that's the ground beneath your feet. At that point, you should already have thought through how you're going to adjust your footing.
/fin
[Originally posted to Twitter in July 2020; we don't want to lose it. https://twitter.com/ireneista/status/1284635748113829888]