Heather Pool, Political Mourning: Identity and Responsibility in the Wake of Tragedy, (Philadelphia Temple University Press, 2021), 260 pages, PB $34.95.
Whom do we mourn collectively? How do some deaths become the subject of public attention? What are the consequences of this attention? Are there different types of mourning? These are questions Heather Pool raises as she examines 3 major examples of what she calls “political mourning” in this thought-provoking book. These three are in chronological order -- the 1911 Triangle Fire; Emmett Till’s 1955 murder, and the September 11, 2001, attacks by al-Qaeda.
Pool also discusses Black Lives Matter, contrasting it with All Lives Matter, and she comments on the ongoing Corona virus pandemic in an Afterword. She summarizes the book’s theme with the observation that “when put to work by political agents, mourning can help people see the status quo differently, which can plant the seeds for a changed subjective response to the objective conditions that surround us.” (87) That is, “people see the status quo differently” than they did before the event. Pool doesn’t mention the relevant Joe Hill call to “Don’t Mourn, Organize.”
Though her examples have different outcomes, they were chosen because each involves “contested identities, visibility, actors taking grief public and political change.” All have aspects of “race and belonging.” (42) Who do we include in our empathetic response to tragedies? Identity is one factor in a response to certain deaths: Do we see those who have died as like ourselves? The issue of responsibility only arises if a sizable number of people identify with the victims or victim. Once this happens it may become clearer what factors led to the tragedies and therefore what needs to be changed. Throughout, she notes that race and ethnicity play a role in creating a sense of who is “we” and who is not.
Pool clearly favors a heightened sense of responsibility. As she explains, when political mourning occurs “we may come to see these losses as unnecessary, as preventable, as unjust in ways that we simply did not before.” (13). Political mourning leads to political action. The deaths she focusses on need not and should not have occurred.
She identifies two types of political mourning, “sovereign” and “democratic.” Both are political and both lead to political actions. Sovereign mourning happens when the state feels threatened and attempts to preserve itself. The attacks of September 11th and the government’s response is her only example of sovereign mourning. Her other examples illustrate democratic mourning, which is based on the belief that “life chances should be roughly equal” (39). If they are not, then institutions should be changed.
In 1911, there was a horrific fire at the Triangle Shirtwaist factory in New York City. This chapter is subtitled “State responsibility for White Workers.” While others have analyzed the fire in terms of gender and class, Pool claims her contribution to the analysis of this event is the attention she pays to race. In all her examples, she notes how race and ethnicity play a role in creating a sense of who constitutes the “we” and who does not.
Many of the 146 dead, mostly Jewish and Italian young women, leapt from the burning building, while horrified onlookers watched. The victims at the time were seen as belonging to distinct inferior “races,” at a time when various nationalities and ethnic groups were ranked in terms of their social desirability. This ranking was a common practice of the era’s social scientists.
The International Ladies Garment Workers Union organized a dramatic silent march down Fifth Avenue with hundreds of thousands either marching or watching. The organizers stressed that the dead were all workers, downplaying their ethnicity. This, Pool thinks, helped extend the notion of “whiteness,” possibly creating a more class-based solidarity. A negative consequence, however, was to further marginalize African American workers, identified as a distinct lower racial category, less worthy of protections.
The fire helped create a new conception of the state as a protector of workers and broadened the idea of collective responsibility. Pool does not note other factors that contributed to these changes: the Progressive and socialist movements, which included “muckraking” journalism such as Upton Sinclair’s 1906 novel of meat-packing in Chicago, The Jungle, that described the working conditions in particular industries.
Pool doesn’t mention that while worker safety has improved, laborers in US-owned workplaces, and those working for US corporations abroad still face dangerous working conditions. Today, there is very little dramatic coverage of and public response to workplace accidents.
Pool’s next case is a clear-cut case of racism -- the 1955 Mississippi murder of 14-year-old Emmett Till. Accused of making advances to a white woman, Till was tortured and then killed. Mamie Till-Mobley, his mother, insisted on placing his mutilated corpse in an open casket so that the violence he suffered was made visible. Photographs published in Life and Jet magazines increased awareness of his suffering. Nonetheless, the killers were acquitted, by an all-white jury, to the cheers of courtroom spectators.
Outraged by the verdicts, African Americans deepened their support for the civil rights movement. Northern whites, in Pool ‘s view, were subsequently more likely to support African American claims for justice, while Southern whites were further motivated to oppose government intervention.
Although anti-lynching laws, have been introduced in Congress since the early 1900s (!), none have not been passed into law; this includes The Emmett Till Anti-Lynching Bill. Congress awarded the murdered boy a posthumous Congressional Medal of Honor. In January 2022, ABC television featured a 4-episode docudrama, Women of the Movement, focusing on Till’s murder and his mother’s search for justice. To date, the Justice Department has failed to bring charges in the case.
Racist killings continue to occur with both police officers and racist civilians as the murderers. George Floyd was murdered by police officer, Derek Chauvin. While jogging, Ahmaud Arbery was chased and shot by three white men. The killers were found guilty in these cases.
Pool discusses the racist aspects of the events of 9/11. In the aftermath, Muslims and Arabs came to be seen as enemy groups, domestic violence against persons identified as such increased, and predominately Muslim countries were invaded. Pool notes that white male Timothy McVeigh’s 1995 bombing in Oklahoma City led to heightened scrutiny of presumed Middle Easterners, not white militia members.
As valuable as her discussion of race is, her discussion of government would nevertheless benefit from a more thorough class analysis. The Marxist description of the state as “the executive committee for the bourgeoisie” [read capitalists] would help explain the military response to 9/11. This is likely more important than the hypermasculinity she mentions as an explanation for this militarism.
The attacks became the excuse for deadly and expensive wars, based on lies. Pool rightly notes that there is a context for the attacks on the World Trade center and the Pentagon, noting that attention should be paid to US foreign policy. However, in this book, little is said of the fact that key figures in the decision to go to war had ties to military industries. She does not consider why Afghanistan became a target but Saudi Arabia, the home of the attackers, did not.
Turning to the domestic scene, Pool stresses that Black Lives Matter has caused some attitudinal changes, but she also sees All Lives Matter as undercutting that. She labels the latter an example of a “democratic deficit.” She cites polling data that indicates that a little over a third of whites view BLM favorably. We could wish that number were higher, but it is not trivial.
Demonstrations against police killings, such as George Floyd’s have been large and multi-racial. That said, ‘Stand Your Ground’ laws, where whites can argue self-defense in questionable instances of the killing of African Americans, are being used to acquit white vigilantes and self-defense has been used successfully in some recent instances of police killings. While she notes that these laws have been encouraged by the wealthy Koch brothers funded American Legislative Executive Council, she does not draw any conclusions about the importance of elite interests in fostering this legislation.
Pool stresses that race is significant in who is identified as a victim but notes that sexual preference may also be involved. In this context, she mentions Matthew Shepard, the gay victim who was murdered in Montana in 1998. Transgender deaths and attacks are an issue now.
We should note that the role of the media is a factor in influencing responses to race and gender violence. Far more attention is given to the deaths of white women, compared to the deaths and disappearances of Native American and African American women.
Her examples show us how important progressive consciousness can be in extending solidarity with victims and their families. But reactionary consciousness can also be created in destructive and in undemocratic ways as Pool illustrates in her discussion of All Lives Matter. In this regard, there are also the current right-wing attacks on Critical Race Theory and even Holocaust studies.
The book was written before the Coronavirus Pandemic, but Pool is able to include some material on this, noting that it exposes inequalities and indicates the importance of a responsive government. The latter has been lacking in the U.S. and what is needed is a proper balance “between capitalism and democracy.” Unfortunately, how that could happen is not discussed. She does say those wanting to extend democracy should use the media but doesn’t say how this could happen.
There is much research that informs her writing as shown by the extensive endnotes and bibliography. Pool is a political scientist, and her work draws heavily upon her field, as well as on political philosophers and psychoanalysts. Very little other social science literature is used.
More explicit attention could be paid to social class, and to the role of elites in framing attention and response to the events she describes. Especially important would be giving more attention to the role of the mainstream media.
The book would benefit from a deeper analysis of how emotions become socially constructed. She makes it clear that emotions emanating from our individual psyches have social roots. Durkheim’s analysis of rituals that enhance group solidarity would be helpful. C. Wright Mills’s concept of the sociological imagination would direct our attention to how our biographies are impacted by history and social institutions.
More detailed timelines for the events she discusses could be useful in showing when public awareness develops and the consequences of this.
This book would be a useful addition to both political science and sociology classes. Political Mourning could be used to raise issues of how social class impacts a constructed awareness of suffering. How does the construction occur, when and why is it challenged, and with what consequences? A good book doesn’t necessarily answer all the questions it raises, but the raising of questions can itself be a valuable contribution to our understanding.
Barbara H. Chasin, PhD
Professor Emerita
Montclair State University
Montclair, NJ
