By Sundiata Keita Cha-Jua , The Black Scholar, August 26, 2014.
Can’t you feel it? Feel the temperature dropping? Feel the icy winds blowing? It’s winter in America. Spring and fall seem to have enveloped summer. The chill comes sooner and lasts longer. It’s winter in America. There’s a blizzard coming. The first frost has already fallen, in Ferguson, Missouri, of all places. Ferguson has ripped the veil off. It is now clear for the world to see how the U.S. plans to deal with its black internal colony.
It’s getting dark; it’s nearly midnight. Yes,...
The past several days have brought more police killing of black people, more unjust court rulings, and more cities and communities rising up in collective power to demand justice. Say their names:
For many years, Funders for a Just Economy (FJE) has held a yearly policy briefing to engage its members on specific policy issues that affect middle and low-income workers. In a fundamentally shifting political and power map, this year’s policy briefing updated members with our current understanding of the major forces and players that impact worker justice. FJE members engaged in strategic conversations about the decline of organized labor, economic discrimination based on migration status and gender, the future of work, emerging...
The current debates within progressive circles about the importance of “winning over” the white working class often fail to directly address the need for honest conversations about race, racism and xenophobia. It is tempting for many political strategists and funders to think that we can find and fund a short cut—better candidates, better field canvassing, better television ads, better framing etc... And, that these solutions will influence white, working class voters to (re)align with progressive candidates and causes.
These interventions are doomed from the start because they...
