3rd in three-part posting on Steelworkers Fightback reform movement in the 1970s. Brown documents issues and personalities that drove the movement of relevance today in understanding and appreciating reform movements underway today.
Resolving the conflict between being visionary and being pragmatic is critical for those who want to transform society. Can we be both visionary and strategic?
How can electeds use their positions to bring marginalized communities into decision-making; to support our allies after the election? Sumathy Kumar, one of two co-chairs of the New York City DSA, talks with Stephanie Luce about what DSA has learned
Most Americans still think positively of capitalism, but that’s beginning to change among young adults...If capitalism has begun to lose its shine, what solutions do people prefer? Socialism, for one.
Progressives often applaud the idea of “speaking truth to power.” But this concept is hazardous. If taken literally and deployed as a single-minded strategy, it can divert attention from the crucial need to take power away from those who abuse it.
Brexit has come to the United States. For thirty years now, in Europe and the United States, a bipartisan neoliberal consensus has embraced the benefits of globalization and the rise of the "knowledge economy." If only workers would go back to school, retrain, and send their children to college, the good jobs that disappeared would somehow return. But those good jobs did not arrive, and voters have opted for a faux populism that promises to reverse globalization.
With the far right now soon to command government, ongoing movements are also growing to challenge corporate domination, white supremacy, environmental degradation, union busting and organize workers in low-paid industries. Written before the November election, Sarah Jaffe's book chronicles these and other struggles, letting the activists--many new to politics-speak, and suggesting the fight for social and economic justice is ongoing, no matter which party reigns.
A convention fight this summer in Philadelphia offers Sanders the opportunity to make significant reforms to the Democratic Party. He should continue fighting to mobilize every last voter and delegate behind his agenda of guaranteed universal rights to healthcare, education, and dignified conditions - and continue impressing the necessity for ongoing mass agitation (what he calls the "political revolution") to accomplish the same.
Changes are happening. Despite the challenges, more unionists are taking on the job of reform, pushed by the desire to save their unions and keep employers from implementing their unfettered agenda. In the process they are bucking the conventional wisdom that workers should live with less than previous generations.
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