We’re ending the year strong, but with mixed feelings. We’re somehow in the post-pandemic, but also now in the pre-recession. In the USA, we survived the midterm elections, barely with a split decision, but we’re worried about the fate of democracy and the progressive movement everywhere. Where is the world going, and how can we get it moving in the right direction? That’s the question, and in this issue, we have tried some new twists and features, but some of it is also bittersweet, as we celebrate lives in our community and at the same time mourn them passing. It’s been that kind of year!
I’m often scratching my head when I read about this newish thing called “autofiction.” What is that exactly? Part autobiography and part fiction, right? We lead this issue with something that I’m calling docufiction. It’s a short story, but so close to many organizers’ experiences that it seems almost nonfiction, but if there is such thing as docudrama, Richard Wise’s “Taking on the Landlord: Organizing 101”, must qualify. Next, Moshe be Asher writes this time the need for conflict and confrontation in organizing that has to also include more accountability. His piece is followed by Bruce Boccardy’s take on the midterms.
Our first excerpt is very timely, given the World Cup, as Professor Gregory Mitchell shares his research findings from Panic without Borders that might surprise some readers inundated by the frequent media barrage about sex trafficking before major sports and tourism events: there’s no there, there. I’ll be hearing this drumbeat with Mardi Gras on the calendar ahead. Ellen Cassedy, one of the founding organizers of 9-to-5, shares one of the many organizing stories from her new book, Working 9 to 5, which is not docufiction, but the real deal when secretaries started organizing in Boston.
Who knows if there is something about things coming in threes, but as we prepared to go to press, we realized that we had to remember some of our friends and peoples’ warriors. John Russo reflects on Staughton Lynd’s long career in the struggle and the importance to him of “accompaniment”, a lesson for us all. Drummond Pike shares memories of Emmett Aluli, the great native Hawaiian activist and path breaking doctor, who was not only our longtime friend and comrade, but played one of the pivotal roles in stopping the Navy’s bombing of the island of Kaho’olawe. Randy Shaw underlines the great contributions of Fred Ross, Jr., following in his father’s footsteps, over a seminal 50-year organizing career. Presente! They are already missed.
James Mumm continues to go deep on the Democrats, looking at three new books that point the way that they should go, if only they will. Mike Miller examines the career and advocacy of an old friend, Marion Nestle, and reminds us all that there are politics in food as well.
Our columnists don’t’ let up. Phil Mattera bristles a bit at the federal intervention in the railway strike. Drummond Pike details some of the history and importance of ESG investing. Gregory Squires reminds of how much is at stake in the Supreme Court’s review of affirmative action and racial guidelines in education. John Anderson offers some good news from Canada on ACORN victories on rent control. I finish in Backstory sharing an interesting and novel analysis of organizing in the Civil Rights Movement when compared to military tactics, strategy, and history
Hopefully, this issue will help get you through 2022 and charge your batteries for what has to be done in 2023. Onward!
A couple of footnotes: World Cup fans, we have a special feature on our website which is another excerpt from Williams Professor Mitchell on his look at Qatar and the trafficking that was so critical there. Pod people on the go, we’re now narrating some Social Policy features as podcasts that you find on any of the platforms where you subscribe to podcasts.
Moesha’s apartment building was located on Boston’s Boylston Street, just on the fringe of Jamaica Plain but still within the borders of Flynt’s Project. It was large a nineteenth-century, brick townhouse that had been broken up into rental units. The outside looked ok, but the inside was another story. The door lock was broken and the big entrance door yawned open into a dark hallway—unlit and dank, reeking with the sharp odor of urine.
Read more: Taking On The Slumlord: Organizing 101 - a docu-fiction
Midterm Machinations
The midterm elections are over. The Democrats will retain power in the Senate and the Republicans won the House.
Read more: Midterm Mayhem and the Economy for Working People
“Secretaries Unite!”
Excerpted from Working 9 to 5: A women’s movement, a labor union, and the iconic movie, by Ellen Cassedy (Chicago Review Press, foreword by Jane Fonda).
The stories we heard from women who worked at Boston’s banks and insurance companies were the worst of all. Most workers in finance were women, and more than three-quarters of them held clerical jobs. Full-time bank employees didn’t make enough to qualify for a mortgage or a car loan. Some earned so little that they were eligible for food stamps. We heard from insurance workers who couldn’t afford to get sick. A full-time office worker at the John Hancock insurance company told us she’d been forced to give up custody of her child when a judge ruled that her salary was too low.
Banks and insurance companies had the assets, the expanding workforce, and the influence to take the lead in implementing enlightened employment policies. They weren’t doing so. The problems were as clear as day. The solutions were obvious. The question was how to make it happen.
Read more: EXCERPT - Working 9 to 5: A women’s movement, a labor union, and the iconic movie
The Supreme Court has struck down the Federal guarantee for abortion rights, gutted key parts of the Voting Rights Act, facilitated racial gerrymandering – and is about to weaken the nation’s commitment to equal education opportunity. In the twin cases of Students for Fair Admissions v. President and Fellows of Harvard College and Students for Fair Admissions v. University of North Carolina, the Court has chosen to hear challenges to admissions programs designed to enhance the diversity of the student body and the educational experience of all students at the nation’s oldest public and private colleges – Harvard and the University of North Carolina (UNC).
Read more: COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT CORNER - Equal Education Next Target for the Supreme Court
ACORN is fighting for rent control measures across Canada with notable success. Here’s an update:
Nova Scotia ACORN won a temporary rent cap of 2% in late 2020 after a popular and boisterous campaign, and it’s since been extended (a couple times) until the end of 2023. Word on the street is that the NS Progressive Conservative government has already decided to extend it beyond 2023 and is biding its time on the announcement.
Read more: NORTHERN LIGHTS - Cross the Border and It’s Rent Control Country!
