Portside

Cities must empower historically marginalized communities to shape how public funds are spent.

What we need is a form of political leadership that frees democracy from liberalism through supporting citizens in asserting their popular sovereignty over the conditions of material daily life by getting organised as workers, as hospital users, as teachers, as students, as parents – and as citizens capable of mutual self-government.

A reflection on Participatory Budgeting in New York

The Movement for Black Lives is calling on cities to launch participatory budgeting processes to make public spending fairer.

Here in the states, we know what it means to see our democratic rights attacked. But do we have a vision of what an expansion of democracy and popular participation in government might look like?

Estela Hernandez is both a member of the national assembly and a leader in the transformational social movement, La Coordinadora of the Lower Lempa and the Bay of Jiquilisco in rural El Salvador. Here, Hernandez talks about a radical vision and practice of direct, participatory democracy by the citizens in the government of the Farabundo Martí National Liberation Front, or FMLN.

Land is concentrated in the hands of landowners who use it for large-scale mono-crop farming. So our aspiration is to start democratizing land so the communities will be the owners of the life resources