Author: Jeffrey Stout Publisher: Princeton University Press ISBN: 0691156654 Category : Political Science Languages : en Pages : 368
Book Description
How ordinary citizens band together to bring about real change In an America where the rich and fortunate have free rein to do as they please, can the ideal of liberty and justice for all be anything but an empty slogan? Many Americans are doubtful, and have withdrawn into apathy and cynicism. But thousands of others are not ready to give up on democracy just yet. Working outside the notice of the national media, ordinary citizens across the nation are meeting in living rooms, church basements, synagogues, and schools to identify shared concerns, select and cultivate leaders, and take action. Their goal is to hold big government and big business accountable. In this important new book, Jeffrey Stout bears witness to the successes and failures of progressive grassroots organizing, and the daunting forces now arrayed against it. Stout tells vivid stories of people fighting entrenched economic and political interests around the country. From parents and teachers striving to overcome gang violence in South Central Los Angeles, to a Latino priest north of the Rio Grande who brings his parish into a citizens' organization, to the New Orleans residents who get out the vote by taking a jazz band through streets devastated by Hurricane Katrina, Stout describes how these ordinary people conceive of citizenship, how they acquire and exercise power, and how religious ideas and institutions contribute to their successes. The most important book on organizing and grassroots democracy in a generation, Blessed Are the Organized is a passionate and hopeful account of how our endangered democratic principles can be put into action.
Author: Emily Dufton Publisher: Basic Books ISBN: 0465096174 Category : History Languages : en Pages : 333
Book Description
How earnest hippies, frightened parents, suffering patients, and other ordinary Americans went to war over marijuana In the last five years, eight states have legalized recreational marijuana. To many, continued progress seems certain. But pot was on a similar trajectory forty years ago, only to encounter a fierce backlash. In Grass Roots, historian Emily Dufton tells the remarkable story of marijuana's crooked path from acceptance to demonization and back again, and of the thousands of grassroots activists who made changing marijuana laws their life's work. During the 1970s, pro-pot campaigners with roots in the counterculture secured the drug's decriminalization in a dozen states. Soon, though, concerned parents began to mobilize; finding a champion in Nancy Reagan, they transformed pot into a national scourge and helped to pave the way for an aggressive war on drugs. Chastened marijuana advocates retooled their message, promoting pot as a medical necessity and eventually declaring legalization a matter of racial justice. For the moment, these activists are succeeding -- but marijuana's history suggests how swiftly another counterrevolution could unfold.
Author: Marcela Vásquez-Léon Publisher: University of Arizona Press ISBN: 0816534748 Category : Business & Economics Languages : en Pages : 265
Book Description
"Provides a cross-country comparison of smallholder agricultural cooperatives in Paraguay, Brazil and Colombia, revealing immense opportunities and challenges for community development, empowerment, and social change"--Provided by publisher.
Author: Laura Grattan Publisher: Oxford University Press ISBN: 0190277645 Category : Political Science Languages : en Pages : 305
Book Description
Uprisings such as the Tea Party and Occupy Wall Street signal a resurgence of populist politics in America, pitting the people against the establishment in a struggle over control of democracy. In the wake of its conservative capture during the Nixon and Reagan eras, and given its increasing ubiquity as a mainstream buzzword of politicians and pundits, democratic theorists and activists have been eager to abandon populism to right-wing demagogues and mega-media spin-doctors. Decades of liberal scholarship have reinforced this shift, turning the term "populism" into a pejorative in academic and public discourse. At best, they conclude that populism encourages an "empty" wish to express a unified popular will beyond the mediating institutions of government; at worst, it has been described as an antidemocratic temperament prone to fomenting backlash against elites and marginalized groups. Populism's Power argues that such routine dismissals of populism reinforce liberalism as the end of democracy. Yet, as long as democracy remains true to its meaning, that is, "rule by the people," democratic theorists and activists must be able to give an account of the people as collective actors. Without such an account of the people's power, democracy's future seems fixed by the institutions of today's neoliberal, managerial states, and not by the always changing demographics of those who live within and across their borders. Laura Grattan looks at how populism cultivates the aspirations of ordinary people to exercise power over their everyday lives and their collective fate. In evaluating competing theories of populism she looks at a range of populist moments, from cultural phenomena such as the Chevrolet ad campaign for "Our Country, Our Truck," to the music of Leonard Cohen, and historical and contemporary populist movements, including nineteenth-century Populism, the Tea Party, broad-based community organizing, and Occupy Wall Street. While she ultimately expresses ambivalence about both populism and democracy, she reopens the idea that grassroots movements--like the insurgent farmers and laborers, New Deal agitators, and Civil Rights and New Left actors of US history--can play a key role in democratizing power and politics in America.
Author: Teishan A. Latner Publisher: UNC Press Books ISBN: 146963547X Category : History Languages : en Pages : 368
Book Description
Cuba's grassroots revolution prevailed on America's doorstep in 1959, fueling intense interest within the multiracial American Left even as it provoked a backlash from the U.S. political establishment. In this groundbreaking book, historian Teishan A. Latner contends that in the era of decolonization, the Vietnam War, and Black Power, socialist Cuba claimed center stage for a generation of Americans who looked to the insurgent Third World for inspiration and political theory. As Americans studied the island's achievements in education, health care, and economic redistribution, Cubans in turn looked to U.S. leftists as collaborators in the global battle against inequality and allies in the nation's Cold War struggle with Washington. By forging ties with organizations such as the Venceremos Brigade, the Black Panther Party, and the Cuban American students of the Antonio Maceo Brigade, and by providing political asylum to activists such as Assata Shakur, Cuba became a durable global influence on the U.S. Left. Drawing from extensive archival and oral history research and declassified FBI and CIA documents, this is the first multidecade examination of the encounter between the Cuban Revolution and the U.S. Left after 1959. By analyzing Cuba's multifaceted impact on American radicalism, Latner contributes to a growing body of scholarship that has globalized the study of U.S. social justice movements.
Author: Barbara Ferman Publisher: Education Politics and Policy ISBN: 9781682530955 Category : Education Languages : en Pages : 0
Book Description
This book investigates new developments in community organizing around education - the reconfiguration of historical alliances, the mobilization of new organizations, and the potential for new coalitions--Provided by publisher.
Author: Scott Hennen Publisher: Simon and Schuster ISBN: 1451608969 Category : Political Science Languages : en Pages : 402
Book Description
Would you like to do your part in saving America? Grass Roots is a no-nonsense instruction manual that explains exactly what you can do. Scott Hennen—host and founder of the innovative Common Sense Club radio program—shows how everyday Americans just like you are making a difference for our country’s future. This down-to-earth handbook gives you clear, practical, effective actions you can take to preserve the American dream for your children and grandchildren. President Ronald Reagan once said, “All great change in America begins at the dinner table.” Today, most Americans struggle just to keep food on the dinner table. We are staggering under a crushing burden of big government, out-of-control spending, and towering federal debt. We have become tax slaves—and the people we sent to Washington to represent us are the very ones who sold us there. We’re angry—and rightly so. But ruling-class politicians have shrugged off our grassroots anger, calling it “Astroturf.” We’re tired of being ignored, patronized, and lied to by the very people who are supposed to be our “public servants.” Not since the original Boston Tea Party of 1773 have so many everyday Americans participated in such a significant display of righteous indignation and freedom-loving patriotism. For the first time in generations, ordinary hardworking, church-going Americans are carrying signs, gathering in large numbers, and making their voices heard. Big government, beware. A sleeping giant has awakened. Scott Hennen has drawn up a practical blueprint for change, a handbook for all of us who are ready to roll up our sleeves and do our part to restore America’s goodness—and greatness. Grass Roots is a political manifesto for every American who loves liberty and cares enough to get involved.
Author: Jeffrey Stout
Author: Phillip W. McMullin
Author: Emily Dufton
Author: Marcela Vásquez-Léon
Author: Laura Grattan
Author: Albert Goldman
Author: Teishan A. Latner
Author: Robert Alan Goldberg
Author: Barbara Ferman
Author: Scott Hennen