ACORN Radio: Recent Episodes
ACORN Radio
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Radio for taking what's ours! Featuring:
• Chief Organizer Report: legendary community organizer Wade Rathke's regular updates.
• ACORN England and Wales Calling: in-depth interviews with members, leaders, and organizers of the UK's most dynamic community organization.
• Social Policy: audio versions of journal articles and book excerpts.
• ACORN Canada: Updates from the 130,000-member strong organization.
• Wade's World: Wade interviews "the most interesting people in the world."
ACORN UK organiser Sam Kidel talks to Bristol leaders Wesley and Fadumo about organising residents of Barton House in Bristol in the UK.
ACORN UK organiser Anna Windsor talks to ACORN Leeds chair Jodi about the branch's win against the local council, and their new campaign to get justice for ACORN members fighting for better employment conditions at a local care company.
ACORN UK's Ben Leonard talks to the ACORN Hackney committee about everything they've managed to achieve in their first year of organising.
ACORN UK organiser Louisa Olympios talks to Paula and Alison from the ACORN Manchester committee about their recent victory against Manchester City Council!
Because of their hard-fought campaign, Manchester City Council were forced to stop using bailiffs to collect debt from 50,000 vulnerable households across the city.
Farzard Khan interviews Tanya Burkhardt, who is the local leader of PLACORN, and the national spokesperson for the fight against financialized housing.
Wade interviews Tahira Rehmatullah on cannabis, specifically on its legalization and tie to racial justice.
ACORN Canada Radio interviews the mother daughter duo of Stephanie Hanyes and Elaine Bruce-Haynes who have organized the Panorama Court ACORN Tenant Union at their building in Calgary’s Beltline.
Wade interviews Professor Jane Spinak, who has been teaching and practicing Family Court for over 40 years. Why do we need to abolish the Family Court? Your questions answered!
Wade talks to Todd Vachon, who is a professor of labour studies and employment relations at Rutgers University. This episode looks into labour and climate; not two peas in a pod!
Annie Craig from Living Rent speaking at an Enough is Enough rally!
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Dan Edwards, member of the Board of Directors of ACORN in Wales, chats with Kat Wright and gives us a broad overview of Wales' unique position, working-class history, and how ACORN came on the scene. This is the first Welsh episode of ACORN Radio!
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Wade reflects on a thorny dilemma faced by some of the upstart organizations we encountered on our training tour of the US Northeast--can organizations be run and maintained by volunteers alone?
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Newly elected Ottawa board member Amanda Teske on what made her step up!
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Wade chats with Ahmed White about his groundbreaking new look at the legal repression inflicted on the Industrial Workers of the World during the union's heyday. Read more about the book and order it here: https://www.ucpress.edu/book/9780520382404/under-the-iron-heel
"In 1917, the Industrial Workers of the World was rapidly gaining strength and members. Within a decade, this radical union was effectively destroyed, the victim of the most remarkable campaign of legal repression and vigilantism in American history. Under the Iron Heel is the first comprehensive account of this campaign.
Founded in 1905, the IWW offered to the millions of workers aggrieved by industrial capitalism the promise of a better world. But its growth, coinciding with World War I and the Russian Revolution and driven by uncompromising militancy, was seen by powerful capitalists and government officials as an existential threat that had to be eliminated. In Under the Iron Heel, Ahmed White documents the torrent of legal persecution and extralegal, sometimes lethal violence that shattered the IWW. In so doing, he reveals the remarkable courage of those who faced this campaign, lays bare the origins of the profoundly unequal and conflicted nation we know today, and uncovers disturbing truths about the law, political repression, and the limits of free speech and association in class society."
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Organiser Naomi sits down with former ACORN Brighton's chair Kate to discuss how ACORN Brighton grew from 0 to 800 members, the challenges and opportunities of organising in a city badly affected by the housing crisis, the necessity of empowering women leaders, and more.
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This is a speech by Living Rent (ACORN's Scotland affiliate) member Elle Glenny at an event in Liverpool. Here they are talking about how we fought and won the rent freeze and what needs to come next!
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Heartening signs and portents talking with labor organizers on our trip through the Northeast U.S., including from Workers United, the Committee of Interns and Residents (SEIU), and the Amalgamated Transit Union.
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Ottawa leader Bader Abu-Zahra gives an overview of the housing struggles he's been involved in, why he joined ACORN, and what keeps him going in the work.
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Labor Jawn, Philadelphia's only locally grown locally focused working class history podcast, interviewed Wade ahead of his swing through the Northeast. They had a wide-ranging conversation about the history of ACORN, Wade's experiences organizing workers in Philly, and what kind of strategy is needed for the labor movement now. Give Labor Jawn a follow here: https://www.instagram.com/laborjawn/?hl=en
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After years of pressure from ACORN and other renters' organizations, the UK government has published its proposed Renters' Reform Bill. Several weeks back, ACORN members and others from the the Renters' Reform Coalition visited their parliamentary representatives to urge them to get behind urgently needed changes, like eliminating "no-fault" evictions that allow landlords to evict tenants for no reason. While there, they secured a commitment from the Housing Minister to do just that, and the introduced bill follows through on the commitment ACORN won.
Nathaniel, ACORN Oxford's organizer, interviews ACORN members from around England and Wales to give a thorough overview of the nationwide policy changes ACORN is fighting for.
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Music by Eliza Edens, check out her new album! https://www.eliza-edens.com/
Wade reflects on the meeting with organizers and activists in Boston and Western Mass. "Listening carefully, it’s exciting to hear the interest and see the deep commitments that people are making to their work in social change. At the same time, it often seems clearer what people are trying to change, than whether they have a clear vision of how to build the power to make the change."
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Amanda Teske talks about her work in a new chapter of Ottawa ACORN fighting what they call "renovictions" in Canada, where an owner pushes renters out with the justification that their property needs renovation.
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Tragic headlines and fears of alienation have made some Americans reticent to knock on their neighbors' doors. Do we have another choice?
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Misha and Khaseya talk about their campaign to get Darnall's streets ship-shape.
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Rizi Yasin and Mike Black talk with organizer Jamie about they used strength in numbers to win more than £40k in repairs as member defense.
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ACORN Canada's Marcia Bryan on some of the biggest fights ACORN Peel is engaged in.
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Wade sits down with Professor John Womack and former ILWU Organizing Director Peter Olney to discuss their new book, Labor Power and Strategy.
"What would it take to topple Amazon? To change how health care works in America? To break up the media monopolies that have taken hold of our information and imaginations? How is it possible to organize those without hope working on the margins? In Labor Power and Strategy, legendary strategist, historian, and labor organizer John Womack speaks directly to a new generation, providing rational, radical, experience-based perspectives that help target and run smart, strategic, effective campaigns in the working class.
In this sleek, practical, pocket inspiration, Womack lays out a timely plan for identifying chokepoints and taking advantage of supply chain issues in order to seize and build labor power and solidarity. In interviews by Peter Olney of the International Longshore and Warehouse Union, Womack’s lively, illuminating thoughts are built upon by ten labor organizers and educators, whose responses create a rich dialogue and open a space for joyful, achievable change. With inspiring stories of triumph, this back-pocket primer is an instant classic.
Contributors include: Gene Bruskin, Carey Dall, Dan DiMaggio, Katy Fox-Hodess, Bill Fletcher Jr., Jane McAlevey, Jack Metzgar, Joel Ochoa, Melissa Shetler, and Rand Wilson."
Get the book here: https://pmpress.org/index.php?l=product_detail&p=1298
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After a fatal fire late in 2022, residents got organised with @acorn_bristol to campaign for fire safety measures, and they won! Shaban, a leader of Bristol Towers United, chats with Bristol's head organizer about how £100m worth of fire safety measures will now be implemented across all of Bristol’s council tower blocks👊
Details👇
- £46m to remove potentially dangerous cladding
- £32.7m for sprinkler systems for all 62 tower blocks
- £12.4m for round the clock fire wardens at 38 blocks (until the cladding is removed or sprinklers installed)
- £8.7m for new fire alarm systems
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This is a special rebroadcast of Blueprints of Disruption's interview with Alejandra Ruiz Vargas. It's a great dialogue that covers how ACORN works and ACORN Canada's big campaigns against renovictions, for rent control, and others. Check out Blueprints of Disruption, a great show about Canadian politics that lifts up movement work, here: https://blueprints-of-disruption.captivate.fm/
From Blueprints' show notes: "An interview with Alejandra Ruiz Vargas, National Representative and East York Chapter Leader, for ACORN Canada. Alejandra is also a front line housing worker, longtime advocate and former political candidate.
She shares just how ACORN grows it membership and determines its priorities. Acorn is membership based, and almost entirely funded by those members. We explore the impact of their approach and the values that drive their work.
Alejandra shares some of the victories ACORN has experienced, recently and historically - and reminds us of the importance of celebrating gains we make."
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Wade reflects on his years visiting Delhi and Mumbai and notes a concerning new trend.
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It's a barnburner with ACORN Newcastle! Serious heart AND brains on display here: deep insights into research, direct action, campaign strategy, leadership development, tactics-- all hard won through struggles to reopen Newcastle's public toilets and force landlords to institute eviction moratoriums. These Geordies have tackled the cost of living crisis head on and have a lot to share from the experience. Enjoy Aidan's interview with Newcastle chair Andrew and secretary Cambeul, who joined the branch after having been a member of ACORN's Scotland affiliate Living Rent.
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Transition music by Eliza Edens, check her out here: https://www.eliza-edens.com/
Wade touches down in India and reflects on the changes since he was last there. Modi's government has laid out the red carpet for the G20, not so much for everyone else.
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Tucker Carlson-- do we have to keep hearing about him?? Unfortunately, yes. Most recently, he took a page from James O'Keefe's playbook and made a ridiculous distortion of the events of January 6th.
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In Swindon, the local council threatened to cut back on resources and help for seniors in sheltered housing--including slashing the number of on-site staff, or wardens, for each residence. The wardens there are essential supports, friends, and lifelines to older folks. When ACORN got wind of the plans, they united with the residents of the sheltered housing and, like ACORN does, raised hell to keep the quality of life they deserve.
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Check out Eliza Edens' tunes: https://www.eliza-edens.com/
Wade interviews playwright (and labor organizer) Gene Bruskin about his musical based on the Reconstruction and a meeting of the National Labor Union in 1870s. They also discuss the Smithfield union victory and the problems of organizing Amazon, as well as a coming musical about abolitionist John Brown.
Check out the musical here: https://www.themomentwasnow.com/
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National Organiser for ACORN the Union in England and Wales Dave Aldwinkle speaks with Alistair Driscoll. Alistair was recently elected to the position of membership officer for the Leeds branch. He gives insight to what the role is, how and why we engage our members, and his experience from standing for election to becoming a leader within ACORN Leeds.
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In England, a number of municipalities contract with bailiffs to do in your face debt collection on council taxes. It's a humiliating, often violent experience for the people on the receiving end of a bailiff's knock. ACORN members are campaigning in the North London borough of Haringey to put a stop to the practice of using them for council tax debts.
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Check out Eliza Edens' tunes: https://www.eliza-edens.com/
Wade interviews Professor Silvia Rodriguez Vega of University of California at Santa Barbara about recent studies she conducted on the impact on children in immigrant families who live in constant fear about personal or family deportation and their immigrant status. Professor Vega summarizes the results of those studies in her recent book Drawing Deportation: Art and Resistance among Immigrant Children.
Check out the book here: http://www.silviarodriguezvega.com/book/
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KABF 88.3: https://kabf.org/
The picture is looking a bit grimmer in 2023 than it did in 2022.
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In this episode we hear from ACORN Lockleaze members Adrian Andrew and Evelyne Ndikumwami. Lockleaze is a local group which is part of ACORN Bristol, the biggest branch of ACORN the Union in England and Wales. Adrian and Evelyne discuss why they joined, their campaign to reduce speeding and dangerous driving in the neighborhood, and their ambitions for ACORN in the future.
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Check out Eliza's tunes: https://www.eliza-edens.com/
With the Super Bowl behind us, Wade takes on the explosion of sports betting.
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Subscribe to Social Policy, the journal of contemporary movements for social change in the workplace, the community, and the world: https://socialpolicy.org/
Questions? Comments? E-mail research@acorninternational.org.
Ashley, Bader Abu-Zahra, and Eddy Roué talk about their work in Ottawa fighting the Conservative government's Bill 23.
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Subscribe to Social Policy, the journal of contemporary movements for social change in the workplace, the community, and the world: https://socialpolicy.org/
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Wade Rathke on the justified public distrust toward out of control police.
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Subscribe to Social Policy, the journal of contemporary movements for social change in the workplace, the community, and the world: https://socialpolicy.org/
Questions? Comments? E-mail research@acorninternational.org.
Putting your body on the line to stop the eviction of another member of your community is what ACORN's all about, but it's intense stuff. It takes training and trust to get ready.
This episode features Charlotte from Manchester about her experiences getting ready for an eviction defense, and we hear a bitfrom organizers around ACORN about how they approach training.
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Transitions music by the inestimable Eliza Edens: https://www.eliza-edens.com/
Questions? Comments? E-mail research@acorninternational.org.
When people take action together and win, it changes how they look at the world. Sabrina talks to leaders from ACORN Canada about their experiences waking up to their own power.
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Subscribe to Social Policy, the journal of contemporary movements for social change in the workplace, the community, and the world: https://socialpolicy.org/
Transitions music by the inestimable Eliza Edens: https://www.eliza-edens.com/
Questions? Comments? E-mail research@acorninternational.org.
Wade Rathke on Tyre Nichols, the latest of the endless victims of police killings in the US.
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Subscribe to Social Policy, the journal of contemporary movements for social change in the workplace, the community, and the world: https://socialpolicy.org/
Questions? Comments? E-mail research@acorninternational.org.
Rob in York discusses his journey as an ACORN leader with Channy, from getting evicted to recruiting and leading a branch committee.
"I think if we can build not just a union, but also a culture in York where people get together and discuss their problems and find out that a lot of people, a lot of their neighbors have the same problems as them, I think it builds a consciousness in people. It's built a consciousness in me and , not just consciousness, but also the power that comes with that. And that's what I want to happen in York because otherwise we're gonna get bowled over."
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Subscribe to Social Policy, the journal of contemporary movements for social change in the workplace, the community, and the world: https://socialpolicy.org/
Questions? Comments? E-mail research@acorninternational.org.
Jane Fonda may have made their work famous with her movie and Dolly Parton with her music, but Ellen is clear in her that the real accomplishment was collective action by women workers, not “leaning in”. In 1981, they affiliated much of their work with the Service Employees International Union, becoming District 925 and then Local 925, which continues, but their strongest legacy may be their role in leading the way to policy changes for women around equal pay, sexual harassment, and other issues.
Check out Ellen's book here! https://ellencassedy.com/
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Support ACORN's work around the world here: https://acorninternational.org/index.php/acorn-advocates/
Subscribe to Social Policy, the journal of contemporary movements for social change in the workplace, the community, and the world: https://socialpolicy.org/
Questions? Comments? E-mail research@acorninternational.org.
Short but sweet: Shelly Anne joined ACORN Canada after getting evicted and hasn't looked back.
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Support ACORN's work around the world here: https://acorninternational.org/index.php/acorn-advocates/
Subscribe to Social Policy, the journal of contemporary movements for social change in the workplace, the community, and the world: https://socialpolicy.org/
Questions? Comments? E-mail research@acorninternational.org.
Field Organizer Anna talks to member leaders Jayne and Chelsea about their experiences in leadership and the importance of women taking a leading role in the union movement.
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Support ACORN's work around the world here: https://acorninternational.org/index.php/acorn-advocates/
Subscribe to Social Policy, the journal of contemporary movements for social change in the workplace, the community, and the world: https://socialpolicy.org/
Questions? Comments? E-mail research@acorninternational.org.
Sabrina and Ria from Toronto ACORN talk about the role it's played in Ria's life for the last 12 years.
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Support ACORN's work around the world here: https://acorninternational.org/index.php/acorn-advocates/
Subscribe to Social Policy, the journal of contemporary movements for social change in the workplace, the community, and the world: https://socialpolicy.org/
Questions? Comments? E-mail research@acorninternational.org.
Kat Wright talks to Wade about how ACORN aggressively develops women leaders and organizers.
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Support ACORN's work around the world here: https://acorninternational.org/index.php/acorn-advocates/
Subscribe to Social Policy, the journal of contemporary movements for social change in the workplace, the community, and the world: https://socialpolicy.org/
Questions? Comments? E-mail research@acorninternational.org.
In Manchester, bailiffs can seize people's property if they owe council tax, which is a form of local tax in the UK. ACORN members, like Manchester Chair Viv, are fighting to stop this terrorizing form of enforcement. In this episode, Member Defence Organiser Louisa interviews Viv, who talks about the campaign and how joining ACORN has transformed her life for the better.
Read more about the bailiffs in Manchester here: https://www.manchestereveningnews.co.uk/news/greater-manchester-news/bailiffs-council-tax-manchester-council-25606001
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Support ACORN's work around the world here: https://acorninternational.org/index.php/acorn-advocates/
Subscribe to Social Policy, the journal of contemporary movements for social change in the workplace, the community, and the world: https://socialpolicy.org/
Questions? Comments? E-mail research@acorninternational.org.
Wade's take on Raphael Warnock's victory in Georgia's Senate run-off election.
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Support ACORN's work around the world here: https://acorninternational.org/index.php/acorn-advocates/
Subscribe to Social Policy, the journal of contemporary movements for social change in the workplace, the community, and the world: https://socialpolicy.org/
Questions? Comments? E-mail research@acorninternational.org.
ACORN International's French affiliate, Alliance Citoyenne, organizes ordinary people--disabled people, tenants, Muslim women--to take what's rightfully theirs.
Head Organizer Adrien Roux speaks with Wade about European campaigns around weatherization/retrofitting, the Muslim Women's Union victories, and more.
Check them out here: https://alliancecitoyenne.org/
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Support ACORN's work around the world here: https://acorninternational.org/index.php/acorn-advocates/
Subscribe to Social Policy, the journal of contemporary movements for social change in the workplace, the community, and the world: https://socialpolicy.org/
Questions? Comments? E-mail research@acorninternational.org.
Holly, ACORN UK's Senior Remote Organizer, interviews Dan, secretary of ACORN Falmouth and Penryn in Cornwall: what it was like to start a group from scratch, the power of collective action that ACORN harnesses, organizing during the pandemic, and more.
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Wade interviews Phil Allen, Jr. about the recently-published, “The Prophetic Lens: The Camera and Black Moral Agency From MLK to Darnella Frazier” and the way video and cameras are tools for social change.
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Questions? Comments? E-mail research@acorninternational.org.
Red Hot City is "an incisive examination of how growth-at-all-costs planning and policy have exacerbated inequality and racial division in Atlanta.
Atlanta, the capital of the American South, is at the red-hot core of expansion, inequality, and political relevance. In recent decades, central Atlanta has experienced heavily racialized gentrification while the suburbs have become more diverse, with many affluent suburbs trying to push back against this diversity. Exploring the city’s past and future, Red Hot City tracks these racial and economic shifts and the politics and policies that produced them.
Dan Immergluck documents the trends that are inverting Atlanta’s late-twentieth-century “poor-in-the-core” urban model. New emphasis on capital-driven growth has excluded low-income people and families of color from the city’s center, pushing them to distant suburbs far from mass transit, large public hospitals, and other essential services. Revealing critical lessons for leaders, activists, and residents in cities around the world, Immergluck considers how planners and policymakers can reverse recent trends to create more socially equitable cities.
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Subscribe to Social Policy, the journal of contemporary movements for social change in the workplace, the community, and the world.
Questions? Comments? E-mail research@acorninternational.org.
By Toby Terrar. Read it in the Fall 2022 edition of Social Policy.
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Parisa Kumgaur is a biomedical engineer with fascinating ideas about how to recycle plastic.
Wade interviews Professor Manny Teodoro about how the quality of water influences whether people trust and participate with local governments.
Wade's take on the 2022 Cost of Voting Report and its state rankings.
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Subscribe to Social Policy, the journal of contemporary movements for social change in the workplace, the community, and the world.
Questions? Comments? E-mail research@acorninternational.org.
Some great news for a change, poverty went down--thanks to the government putting money in the pockets of low-income families. Without means testing!
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Support ACORN's work around the world here.
Subscribe to Social Policy, the journal of contemporary movements for social change in the workplace, the community, and the world.
Questions? Comments? E-mail research@acorninternational.org.
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Support ACORN's work around the world here.
Subscribe to Social Policy, the journal of contemporary movements for social change in the workplace, the community, and the world.
Questions? Comments? E-mail research@acorninternational.org.
Celebrating 38 years of our KABF, Little Rock's community radio station!
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Subscribe to Social Policy, the journal of contemporary movements for social change in the workplace, the community, and the world.
Questions? Comments? E-mail research@acorninternational.org.
In Our Veterans, Suzanne Gordon, Steve Early, and Jasper Craven explore the physical, emotional, social, economic, and psychological impact of military service and the problems that veterans face when they return to civilian life. The authors critically examine the role of advocacy organizations, philanthropies, corporations, and politicians who purport to be “pro-veteran.” They describe the ongoing debate about the cost, quality, and effectiveness of healthcare provided or outsourced by the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA). They also examine generational divisions and political tensions among veterans, as revealed in the tumultuous events of 2020, from Black Lives Matter protests to the Trump-Biden presidential contest. Frank and revealing, Our Veterans proposes a new agenda for veterans affairs linking service provision to veterans to the quest for broader social programs benefiting all Americans.
Our report on co-op board's lack of diversity makes a splash, and we look at a couple of the undemocratic ways entrenched leaders keep themselves in control of co-ops.
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"Anthropocene Alliance (A2) has 125 member-communities in 35 U.S. states and territories. They are impacted by flooding, toxic waste, wildfires, and drought and heat — all compounded by reckless development and climate change. The consequence is broken lives and a ravaged environment.
The goal of A2 is to help communities fight back. We do that by providing them organizing support, scientific and technical guidance, and better access to foundation and government funding. Most of all, our work consists of listening to our frontline leaders. Their experience, research, and solidarity guide everything we do, and offer a path toward environmental and social justice.
Supported by outstanding partner organizations with expertise in engineering, hydrology, public health, planning, and the law, A2 leaders have successfully halted developments in climate-vulnerable areas; implemented nature-based hazard mitigation strategies; organized home buyouts; and pushed for clean-ups at superfund sites, toxic landfills, and petrochemical plants.
We support everyone we can, but our special priority is people who have suffered the worst environmental impacts for the longest time; that usually means low-income, Black, Latinx, Native American and other underserved communities."
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Our Rural Power Project just published findings about the shocking lack of diversity in the leadership of rural electric co-operatives. Read the report here.
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"Deeply personal, astutely political, Fighting Times: Organizing on the Front Lines of the Class War recounts the thirteen-year journey of Jonathan Melrod to harness working-class militancy and jump start a revolution on the shop floor of American Motors. Melrod faces termination, dodges the FBI, outwits collaborators in the UAW, and becomes the central figure in a lawsuit against the labor newsletter Fighting Times, as he strives to build a class-conscious workers’ movement from the bottom up.
A radical to the core, Melrod was a key part of campus insurrection at University of Wisconsin–Madison. He left campus for the factory in 1973, hired along with hundreds of youthful job seekers onto the mind-numbing assembly line. Fighting Times paints a portrait of these rebellious and alienated young hires, many of whom were Black Vietnam vets.
Containing dozens of archival photographs, Fighting Times captures the journey of a militant antiracist revolutionary who rose to the highest elected ranks of his UAW local without compromising his politics or his dedication to building a class-conscious workers’ movement. The book will arm and inspire a new generation of labor organizers with the skills and attitude to challenge the odds and fight the egregious abuses of the exploitative capitalist system."
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You live by the sword, James O'Keefe, you die by the sword.
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Check out the book here!
"An illuminating, in-depth look at competition in suburban high schools with growing numbers of Asian Americans, where white parents are determined to ensure that their children remain at the head of the class.
The American suburb conjures an image of picturesque privilege: manicured lawns, quiet streets, and—most important to parents—high-quality schools. These elite enclaves are also historically white, allowing many white Americans to safeguard their privileges by using public schools to help their children enter top colleges. That’s changing, however, as Asian American professionals increasingly move into wealthy suburban areas to give their kids that same leg up for their college applications and future careers.
As Natasha Warikoo shows in Race at the Top, white and Asian parents alike will do anything to help their children get to the top of the achievement pile. She takes us into the affluent suburban East Coast school she calls “Woodcrest High,” with a student body about one-half white and one-third Asian American. As increasing numbers of Woodcrest’s Asian American students earn star-pupil status, many whites feel displaced from the top of the academic hierarchy, and their frustrations grow. To maintain their children’s edge, some white parents complain to the school that schoolwork has become too rigorous. They also emphasize excellence in extracurriculars like sports and theater, which maintains their children’s advantage.
Warikoo reveals how, even when they are bested, white families in Woodcrest work to change the rules in their favor so they can remain the winners of the meritocracy game. Along the way, Warikoo explores urgent issues of racial and economic inequality that play out in affluent suburban American high schools. Caught in a race for power and privilege at the very top of society, what families in towns like Woodcrest fail to see is that everyone in their race is getting a medal—the children who actually lose are those living beyond their town’s boundaries."
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Dollar stores' business model is all about exploitation. And it's showing no signs of slowing down.
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"Medical doctor and epidemiologist John Wright recorded the dramatic life and death events as his hospital went into battle against Covid.
His 350-page diary tells how Bradford Royal Infirmary tore up the usual disinfection protocols and sterilised respirators with gin donated from distilleries and of how public health was hampered by the fake news that non-white patients would be left to die.
There are heart-wrenching accounts. On one occasion staff nurse Sophie Bryant-Miles asked the hospital chaplain to perform a marriage ceremony wearing full PPE knowing that the groom had only hours to live. The patient struggled to say the words because of his breathing, the bride because of tears.
Another critically ill patient – seven-month pregnant university graduate Mehpara Naqvi – bravely put her baby’s life first, demanding a C-section. “I just don’t think I am going to make it so I think you should save my baby.” She survived against the odds but only found out she was a mother seven days later after being brought out of a coma.
Harrowing rationing decisions had to be made in the early days in Bradford as elsewhere. John Wright noted: “We are used to people dying in hospital but we are not used to saying ‘you are going to die because I can’t give this ventilator because someone needs it more’.”
As a veteran of cholera, HIV and ebola epidemics in Africa, John Wright is well qualified to write about the difficulties that confronted the teams tackling the Covid pandemic in hard-pressed towns such as Bradford."
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Wade's thoughts on the Wall Street Journal's coverage of "non-profit" hospitals' dismal level of charity care.
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"This is the first book to lay out how climate change has become an economic issue above all and how that has changed everything from the business to politics to the outlook for the future. Bob Keefe, executive director of E2, a national, nonpartisan organization dedicated to providing business perspectives on environmental issues, shows readers how this new reality will impact their industries, businesses, jobs, and communities and transform our country’s economy. Climatenomics will be essential reading for anyone who cares about business, politics, or the future of our planet."
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How A Community Voice got it!
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Ok, who would replace Biden on the ticket? Let's get real!
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Branches from across England and Wales came together to assess ACORN UK's 8 years of progress and to plot the course ahead.
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The disturbingly low organizing goals of the AFL-CIO's new leadership are...not good!
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Check out the book here.
A pathbreaking work for the next stage of the #MeToo movement, showing how we can address sexual harms with fairness to both victims and the accused, and exposing the sexism that shapes today's contentious debates about due process
Over the past few years, a remarkable number of sexual harassment victims have come forward with their stories, demanding consequences for their assailants and broad societal change. Each prominent allegation, however, has also set off a wave of questions – some posed in good faith, some distinctly not – about the rights of the accused. The national conversation has grown polarized, inflamed by a public narrative that wrongly presents feminism and fair process as warring interests.
Sexual Justice is an intervention, pointing the way to common ground. Drawing on core principles of civil rights law, and the personal experiences of victims and the accused, Alexandra Brodsky details how schools, workplaces, and other institutions can – indeed, must – address sexual harms in ways fair to all. She shows why these allegations cannot be left to police and prosecutors alone, and outlines the key principles of fair proceedings outside the courts. Brodsky explains how contemporary debates continue the long, sexist history of “rape exceptionalism,” in which sexual allegations are treated as uniquely suspect. And she calls on readers to resist the anti-feminist backlash that hijacks the rhetoric of due process to protect male impunity.
Vivid and eye-opening, at once intellectually rigorous and profoundly empathetic, Sexual Justice clears up common misunderstandings about sexual harassment, traces the forgotten histories that underlie our current predicament, and illuminates the way to a more just world.
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Buying a home is increasingly out of reach. We need tenant rights.
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Jason Linkins' piece in New Republic was music to our ears. Let's get ACORN going again!
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How the shootings in Uvalde have impacted workers' demands for greater security, including for our sister labor union, Local 100.
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Updates on our French affiliate's fight for women's right to free expression. Check out Alliance Citoyenne here.
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Check out the book here, by Erica Smiley and Sarita Gupta.
The Future We Need positions the struggle to build collective bargaining power as a central element in the effort to build a healthy democracy. It offers new approaches to how we build worker power in a world in which the economy has dramatically changed over the last century—evolving collective bargaining as we know it to match the needs of modern people, not only to change their wages and working conditions, but to be able to govern over more aspects of their lives. It explores existing levers of power and new ones we must build for workers to have the ability to collectively negotiate their conditions in today and tomorrow’s context. Stories of working people weave throughout the book, humanizing the theoretical frameworks. Perhaps most importantly, these stories illustrate the necessity of centralizing the fight against white supremacy and gender discrimination, which is evidenced in nearly all case studies and stories throughout the book.
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The Supreme Court in FEC vs. Ted Cruz for Senate ruled that candidates can now reimburse any and every cent they 'lend' themselves to run for office with campaign funds...removing yet another barrier to all-out rule by the rich!
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Wade's contribution to the Working Class Perspectives blog. This is a rare opportunity for workers, and institutional labor needs to do everything it can to organize in this window. Our own contribution is the Workers Organizing and Support Center.
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A co-sign of Chloe Maxmin's urgent warning to Democrats. They need to get talking to rural people! We know a thing or two about that from our Rural Power Project.
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This is a match made in hell!
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Mark 'River' Peoples talks to Wade about the Big Muddy's estuaries and wildlife habitat and the Mississippi River Restoration and Resilience Initiative (MRRRI), which the Mississippi River Network is working to get passed.
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Leslie Samuelrich of GreenCentury talks to Wade about her effort to win a seat on the McDonald's board to get the company to change course on factory farming, especially its abysmal treatment of pigs.
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It's Trump Country, but Trump offers nothing to the people who live there.
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Wade's take on the dollar as the reserve currency when sanctions against Russia are stacking up.
Check out the book here.
Power grabs, partisan stand-offs, propaganda, and riots make for tantalizing fiction, but what do we do when that drama becomes a reality all around us? For a country founded as an escape from British tyranny, the United States seems to have devolved into a land where tyrants rise to power, sycophants blindly follow, and the entire nation suffers.
As ancient Greek philosophers warned us, chaotic tragedy unfolds in the absence of reason, and the only cure is a return to wisdom and virtue. America’s founding fathers knew this lesson all too well and dreamed of an enlightened citizenry guided by better-than-ideological dictators.
Using contemporary events to illuminate universal human weaknesses, Andrew Fiala charts the perennial history of tyrannical takeovers and the masses who support them and ultimately suffer under their rule. Ultimately, Fiala also points to a solution. Knowing the cyclical nature of tyranny, we can build safeguards against our worst inclinations and keep alive the freedoms our founding fathers envisioned for this nation.
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In which we go ahead with a press conference on our hospital price transparency report despite falling caterpillars and a tornado warning.
A senior editor at Mother Jonesdives into the lives of the extremely rich, showing the fascinating, otherworldly realm they inhabit—and the insidious ways this realm harms us all.
Check out the book here.
Have you ever fantasized about being ridiculously wealthy? Probably. Striking it rich is among the most resilient of American fantasies, surviving war and peace, expansions and recessions, economic meltdowns and global pandemics. We dream of the jackpot, the big exit, the life-altering payday, in whatever form that takes. (Americans spent $81 billion on lottery tickets in 2019, more than the GDPs of most nations.) We would escape “essential” day jobs and cramped living spaces, bury our debts, buy that sweet spread, and bail out struggling friends and relations. But rarely do we follow the fantasy to its conclusion—to ponder the social, psychological, and societal downsides of great affluence and the fact that so few possess it.
What is it actually like to be blessed with riches in an era of plagues, political rancor, and near-Dickensian economic differences? How mind-boggling are the opportunities and access, how problematic the downsides? Does the experience differ depending on whether the money is earned or unearned, where it comes from, and whether you are male or female, white or black? Finally, how does our collective lust for affluence, and our stubborn belief in social mobility, explain how we got to the point where forty percent of Americans have literally no wealth at all?
These are all questions that Jackpot sets out to explore. The result of deep reporting and dozens of interviews with fortunate citizens—company founders and executives, superstar coders, investors, inheritors, lottery winners, lobbyists, lawmakers, academics, sports agents, wealth and philanthropy professionals, concierges, luxury realtors, Bentley dealers, and even a woman who trains billionaires’ nannies in physical combat, Jackpot is a compassionate, character-rich, perversely humorous, and ultimately troubling journey into the American wealth fantasy and where it has taken us.
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Paul Ford at DS9 Capital takes us into the mind-bendingly complex world of health insurance and talks health equity with Wade.
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An interview about the 47 year old war in west Sahara with Stephen Zunes after the invasion of Morocco that is a timely reminder of how long it may take to block such activities, like the ones we see in Ukraine. Find the book here and more of Dr. Zunes' writings at his website.
Dr. Zunes is a Professor of Politics and International Studies at the University of San Francisco, where he serves as coordinator of the program in Middle Eastern Studies. Recognized as one the country’s leading scholars of U.S. Middle East policy and of strategic nonviolent action, Professor Zunes serves as a senior policy analyst for Foreign Policy in Focus project of the Institute for Policy Studies, an associate editor of Peace Review, and a contributing editor of Tikkun.
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Wade's take on the fight to make districts fair, and Republicans' fight to keep them unfair.
Tracking developments with the National Labor Relations Board and their pro-worker General Counsel, Jennifer Abruzzo.
Crystal leads the Food Research and Action Center's work on the child nutrition programs that serve school-age children. She analyzes policy to advocate for legislative and regulatory improvements to increase low-income children’s access to the nutrition programs; develops strategy and direct field efforts to achieve program improvements; provides technical assistance; conducts training; and develops materials for national, state, and local organizations. Crystal is the author or co-author of numerous publications, including FRAC’s annual participation reports on school breakfast, summer nutrition, afterschool suppers, and community eligibility. She frequently speaks at national and state conferences and meetings. Her previous work experience includes the Center for Community Change as a policy analyst on transportation issues and Housing Comes First, Missouri’s statewide low-income housing coalition, as Director of Tenant Organizing. She holds a B.A. in philosophy and sociology from Carroll College and an M.S.W. from Washington University.
Wade covers ACORN's report on hospital price transparency in Louisiana, Arkansas, and Texas. Long story short: it's bad.
New environmental studies show that redlining's legacy is alive and well, and is directly related to intra-urban air pollution levels.
What if the harbinger of our greener future was a small power plant set in the middle of nowhere in West Texas? Longtime renewable energy executive Andy Bowman’s book makes exactly this case, outlining what he suggests is a more sustainable future for American capitalism. The West Texas Power Plant that Saved the World takes the Barilla solar plant in Pecos County as a test case for the state of renewable energy in the twenty-first century United States.
For author Andy Bowman, this is a very personal story. Bowman grew up in Galveston and acutely remembers watching stormwater climb up seawalls and wreak havoc on his home. He weaves these memories into his coming of age over two decades in the renewable energy industry, beginning in the 1990s, and tracks the industry’s fits and starts that lead to the Barilla project. Barilla was the first solar project to be built “on spec,” without a pre-arranged contract in place, marking solar energy’s debut as power cheap enough to compete directly with traditional power plants. That trailblazing wager represents a tidal shift in the alternative energy industry.
In a clear voice, Bowman explains the climate science that necessitated this shift and makes business-based arguments for what the future should look like. The result is a book that tells a personal story of West Texan innovation, gumption, and vision, while also outlining how our society needs to equip itself to confront climate change.
In the last several years, much has been written about growing economic challenges, increasing income inequality, and political polarization in the United States. This book argues that lessons for addressing these national challenges are emerging from a new set of realities in America’s metropolitan regions: first, that inequity is, in fact, bad for economic growth; second, that bringing together the concerns of equity and growth requires concerted local action; and, third, that the fundamental building block for doing this is the creation of diverse and dynamic epistemic (or knowledge) communities, which help to overcome political polarization and help regions address the challenges of economic restructuring and social divides.
Chris Benner is the Dorothy E. Everett Chair in Global Information and Social Entrepreneurship, Director of the Everett Program for Digital Tools for Social Innovation, and Professor of Environmental Studies and Sociology at the University of California, Santa Cruz. His research examines the relationships between technological change, regional development, and structures of economic opportunity, including regional labor markets and restructuring of work and employment. His most recent book, coauthored with Manuel Pastor, is Just Growth: Inclusion and Prosperity in America’s Metropolitan Region. Other books include This Could Be the Start of Something Big: How Social Movements for Regional Equity Are Transforming Metropolitan America, and Work in the New Economy: Flexible Labor Markets in Silicon Valley.
Manuel Pastor is Professor of Sociology and American Studies and Ethnicity at the University of Southern California, where he also serves as Director of USC's Program for Environmental and Regional Equity (PERE) and Codirector of USC's Center for the Study of Immigrant Integration (CSII). His most recent book, coauthored with Chris Benner, is Just Growth: Inclusion and Prosperity in America’s Metropolitan Region. He is also the coauthor of Uncommon Common Ground: Race and America’s Future, and This Could Be the Start of Something Big: How Social Movements for Regional Equity Are Transforming Metropolitan America.
The inspiring and previously untold history of the women considered—but not selected—for the US Supreme Court
In 1981, Sandra Day O’Connor became the first female justice on the United States Supreme Court after centuries of male appointments, a watershed moment in the long struggle for gender equality. Yet few know about the remarkable women considered in the decades before her triumph.
Shortlisted tells the overlooked stories of nine extraordinary women—a cohort large enough to seat the entire Supreme Court—who appeared on presidential lists dating back to the 1930s. Florence Allen, the first female judge on the highest court in Ohio, was named repeatedly in those early years. Eight more followed, including Amalya Kearse, a federal appellate judge who was the first African American woman viewed as a potential Supreme Court nominee. Award-winning scholars Renee Knake Jefferson and Hannah Brenner Johnson cleverly weave together long-forgotten materials from presidential libraries and private archives to reveal the professional and personal lives of these accomplished women.
In addition to filling a notable historical gap, the book exposes the tragedy of the shortlist. Listing and bypassing qualified female candidates creates a false appearance of diversity that preserves the status quo, a fate all too familiar for women, especially minorities. Shortlisted offers a roadmap to combat enduring bias and discrimination. It is a must-read for those seeking positions of power as well as for the powerful who select them in the legal profession and beyond.
Author of Dangerous Medicine: Check out Sydney's work here or on Twitter.
Sydney is, as she puts it, an "author, historian, sociologist. Passionate about ethics & the politics of power in biomedicine."
Natasha N. Iskander, Professor of Urban Planning and Public Service, conducts research on the relationship between migration and economic development. She looks at the ways that immigration and the movement of people across borders can provide the basis for the creation of new knowledge and of new pathways for political change. She has published widely on these questions, looking specifically at immigration, skill, economic development, infrastructure, and worker rights, with more than 40 articles and book chapters on these topics. Her first book, Creative State: Forty Years of Migration and Development Policy in Morocco and Mexico (Cornell University Press, ILR imprint, 2010), looked at the ways that migrant workers transformed the economic development policies of their countries of origin. It received the International Studies Association – Distinguished Book Award in Ethnicity, Nationalism and Migration Track and was a Social Science Research Council—Featured Publication. Her most recent book, Does Skill Make Us Human?: Migrant Workers in 21st Century Qatar and Beyond (Princeton University Press, 2021), examines the use of skill categories to define political personhood, in ways that have become increasingly salient with the hardening borders and the pressures of climate change. It received the 2022 American Sociological Association — Sociology of Development Best Book Award and the 2022 American Sociological Association — Labor and Labor Movements Best Book Award.
Her current project focuses on concrete — the second most used substance on the planet (second only to water) and responsible for close to a tenth of all carbon dioxide emissions globally — as a material lens to examine at the relationship between climate change, migration, urbanization, and the future of work.
Dr. Iskander’s research has been supported by grants from the National Science Foundation, the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation, the MacArthur Foundation, the Social Science Research Council, the Qatar National Research Foundation, and others. She has held positions as a fellow-in-residence at the Zolberg Institute for Migration and Mobility at the New School for Social Research, at the Center for Advanced Studies of the Behavioral Sciences at Stanford University, and at the Global Research Institute at University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill. She is currently a 2022-2023 fellow at the Princeton Institute for Advanced Studies.
Dr. Iskander received her PhD in Management at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). She also holds a Masters in City Planning (MCP) from MIT, and a BA in Cultural Studies from Stanford University. In addition to her research, she engages in development and organizing work with partners ranging from the World Bank to unions and NGOs, internationally and in the United States, on issues of urban development, migration and development policy, and migrant worker rights.
Frank is the co-founder of two leading international non-governmental organizations fighting corruption — Transparency International and the Partnership for Transparency Fund (Frank is the Chair of the PTF Board). He teaches at Georgetown University, writes regular “blog” articles on corruption for theGlobalist.com and lectures extensively. Frank is also a specialist in international economics and finance with more than 50 years of experience in these fields – first as an international journalist, then as the Director of Information & Public Affairs at the World Bank official and, from 1990 to 2017, as the president and CEO of a consulting firm,Vogl Communications Inc.
The Ecology Democracy Network was started by Ken Pentel in 2008 to create a new pro-active way of doing politics that will care for our collective home, Earth. The network is young, but growing quickly - take a look around to see what you think, and get involved!