The elite’s fear of the “proletarianized youth”

The alarm raised by Peter Thiel, co-founder of PayPal and prominent voice in Silicon Valley, when declaring that the “proletarianization” of young people could lead them to communism — in the recent issue of the magazine Fortune — resonates less as an ideological prediction and more as a symptom of the elite’s fear of the collapse of a dream that will not be fulfilled for new generations. “This speech by the billionaire is a certain diagnosis of the crisis we are experiencing. And then he speaks with a certain fear”, comments Rafael Leal, president of the Union of Socialist Youth (UJS). The concern is not only economic, but above all political, because, by using the verb “proletarianize”, Thiel unintentionally recognizes the latent strength of those he fears: precarious workers, who historically hold the potential for organization and struggle.

The billionaire’s restlessness actually hides what can be seen as a mistake, especially when he admits that in New York “capitalism is not working”. By verbalizing his fear, he reveals that youth, pushed into a condition of impoverishment, gains a new collective potential, a stew of dissatisfaction that cannot be contained with speeches alone. The tycoon is one of the greatest organizers of the American right and was dubbed the “right-wing kingmaker” by the New York Times. After supporting Trump in 2016, he began to invest heavily in Republican candidates for Congress, even leaving Facebook’s board to dedicate himself to the mission. His strategies have already earned him criticism, including accusations of “deceiving” part of the traditional right.

The exhaustion of the neoliberal model

The fear of billionaires, according to the diagnosis of the economist and professor at UFRJ, Euzébio Jorge Silveira de Sousa, is a direct reflection of the legitimacy crisis of neoliberalism, a model that spread globally after the 1970s. According to Sousa, this system, by promising prosperity in exchange for inequality, had its bankruptcy marked by the 2008 crisis.

For Professor Euzébio, what generates the greatest discouragement and potential for change in youth is the perspective of the future. They look ahead and are faced with a horizon in which “they cannot see a horizon in which they will work with something that is fulfilling” or have access to full health and some type of pension, a situation that applies to both the United States and Brazil, even with different work relationships. The challenge, for him, is to overcome this rationalizing economy that uses artificial intelligence to dehumanize social relations, as “there is no shortage of people to work” but rather a political project that thinks about society in a systemic way, capable of mobilizing young people to solve major problems such as social exclusion and climate urgency. The absence of an inclusive project, which offers professional insertion that makes sense for them, is what drives the transformations.

Young people identify cynicism in the billionaire’s speech

Rafael Leal, president of the Socialist Youth Union (UJS), interprets the speech as a defensive movement by the elites. For him, the statement is a “cynical phrase” that serves the billionaires’ self-protection: “When revolt comes, they try to distribute some crumbs. But the core lies in the logic of the system itself, which in crises cuts even these crumbs”, he states, adding that the fear revealed by Thiel is a symptom of a youth that no longer accepts being excluded.

Leal recalls that New York, a symbol of financial capital, elected a socialist mayor for the first time. “Partly driven by the anti-Trump movement, partly by the situation of young people who do not find alternatives in the current model”, he adds.

In Brazil, youth are more protagonists of the resistance to Bolsonarism and more engaged in progressive solutions than in other countries on the continent, but it is still not possible to define whether the dissatisfaction will be on the left or the right. “Look at the Argentine youth who supported Milei. The same uncertainty occurs in the United States”, he says. But Leal recognizes that the precariousness of work and the increase in social inequality “will generate revolt among youth”.

For UJS, the way to tackle structural unemployment involves attacking the core of neoliberalism, which is profit maximization. The solution, according to Leal, is to invest in a National Development Project with strong investment in Science and Technology, in the sectors of the Fourth Industrial Revolution and in the green economy, which is capable of generating better quality jobs. In this logic, systemic models such as the Chinese one, which prioritized national development to lift its population out of poverty after the 1949 revolution, have become a growing reference, although Brazilian youth are still mostly Westernized.

The demand for dignity and future

For young socialists, what Peter Thiel tries to stigmatize as “socialism” is not yet the specter of a classical revolution haunting the United States, but the urgent demand for universal basic rights and the future “that capitalism does not deliver”, says Leal. The risk, for now, is the organic reaction of a frustrated generation that is discovering collective potential against a system that excludes it.