American Literature

The fact that is often overlooked is that one of the most important themes explored in The Grapes of Wrath is the interplay of authority, legitimacy, and leadership. To focus on the political broadly interpreted in terms of the governments responsibility to its own people is tempting, and so is the discussion of the local authorities and landowners inability to lead and govern in the times of crisis. However, this paper will focus on the more conceptual issues pertaining to the complexities of social organization and self-organization. The situation of migrants on the road and after they have settled in camps in California represents a very interesting example of disintegration of traditional structures of authority and emergence of new types of leadership. The degree of this disintegration is so significant that the social conditions described in The Grapes of Wrath border on anarchy. In such a situation, when traditional authority turns out to be outdated and government and local authorities retreat leaving a governance deficit or vacuum, people start to organize themselves according to the principles they believe are fair, just and effective. The organization of workers camps in California is a  vivid example of this. However, leadership is a much more multifaceted and complex phenomenon, and leaders personalities and charismas sometimes play an even more important role than the degree to which they embody collective will.      

The feminist reading of the novel has traditionally emphasized the reversal of gender roles in the Joads family during their journey (how Ma overtakes Pa as the main decision maker and caretaker of the family). The disintegration of age-old family structures and waning of familial authority is illustrated by the relative ease with which some Joads abandon their relatives. However, thee main focus of this paper will be on Tom Joad and Casy. Both men are equally committed to the cause of promoting justice and defending peoples right to dignity and decent work. Starting with their attempt to organize a union while at Hooverville, Tom and Casy embark on the mission to organize migrants and other deprived working class representatives in order to resist oppression and harassment by the police and landowners. Perhaps the most surprising fact about the two is their enduring commitment to their cause and continuity of leadership each of them is ready to go to jail for another, knowing that whoever is left free would carry on with the task both perceive as important.
A close reading of one of the most intense episodes in the novel, the one followed by the murder of Casy, reveals a lot about Toms and Casys views on leadership. In the argument with the policemen, Casy expresses his strong belief in the rightfulness of his cause while he works to organize people so that they can protect their rights and receive a decent wage for their hard work, the police are only helping the government to bring families to the edge of starvation. It can come as a surprise to the reader that although many people have given up and given in to bitterness and depression (like Pa after witnessing so many misfortunes and seeing his influence and ability to provide for his family gradually erode), there are many others as high-spirited as Casy that organize strikes and other types of protest. At the same time, those strikers are always overreached by the government eventually, for instance, through the practice of hiring strike-breakers. In such a situation, people need leaders like Casy and Tom to keep on with their struggle.

Since strikers and other active migrant workers in the camps can be seen as a part of democratic protest movement, it is necessary to analyze what is the basis for solidarity among them and whether they can be seen as a functional body politic. Too often, their plight is seen merely as an instance of class struggle, as the conflict of poor vs. rich. While it is understandable that many migrants have held a grudge against wealthy landowners that only cared about monopolizing power and keeping people under their rule by all means, it is evident from the rhetoric of migrants and their leaders that they fully realize that only a society based on the principles of justice and access to meaningful work for all can be devoid of conflict. Thus, Casy and Tom are examples of democratic leadership, since their ultimate goal is an establishment of a fair and just system of sharing resources that would provide comparable opportunities for all. Although labeled as a communist by the police, Casy is indeed a leader representing the American people much better than any elected politician at that time.

The discussion of leadership and self-organization in The Grapes of Wrath reveals the depth of the crisis of representation in conventional politics in the wake of the Great Depression. The fact that Tom kills the policeman that crushes Casys skull can perhaps be seen as the culmination of this particular story line in a democratic state, the government (and its law enforcement agencies) is the only body with the monopoly on violence. However, governments also need to reflect the will of their entire populations and provide services to their citizens. When they fail to do so, individuals or non-state agents can seize the monopoly on violence and administration of justice, and a collapse of the entire social order becomes imminent. The implications of that can be very dangerous, from sporadic violence to outbreak of a full-scale civil war.

Leadership should confine itself to existing legal frameworks there are only few exceptional circumstances when revolutionary leadership aimed at overthrowing an ineffective or oppressive government can be necessary and justifiable. The question whether migrants and workers misery as described in The Grape of Wrath represents an example of such a situation remains contested.