Organize! Building from the Local for Global Justice

by Choudry, Aziz; Hanley, Jill; Shragge, Eric

• ISBN13: 9781604864335
• ISBN10: 1604864338
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2012-05-30
• Publisher: PM Press

Summary

Penned by a diverse range of activists, academics, lawyers, artists, and researchers, this book weaves a rich and varied tapestry of strategies for bringing about change in an era of unprecedented economic, social, and ecological crisis. From community-based labor-organizing strategies among immigrant workers to mobilizing psychiatric survivors, from arts and activism for Palestine to organizing in support of indigenous peoples, each essay in this work reflects critically on the tensions, problems, limits, and gains inherent in a range of organizing contexts and practices. The book also places these processes in historical perspective, encouraging us to use history to shed light on contemporary injustices and how they can be overcome.

Author Biography

Aziz Choudry is an assistant professor in international education at McGill University. He is the coeditor of Learning from the Ground Up. Jill Hanley is an assistant professor of social work at McGill University. She is the cofounder of Montreal’s Immigrant Workers Centre. Eric Shragge is a community and public affairs professor at Concordia University. He is the coauthor of Contesting Community. They are the coauthors of Fight Back: Workplace Justice for Immigrants. They all live in Montreal.

Table of Contents

Introduction: Organize! Looking Back, Thinking Ahead	p. 1
Activist Research: Mapping Power Relations, Informing Struggles	p. 23
Research Partnerships and Local Community Organizing: Reflections by Evelyn Calugay	p. 36
Fundraising: Politics and Strategies	p. 46
Some Comments on Law and Organizing	p. 56
Rights, Action, Change: Organize for What?	p. 71
Escape, Retreat, Revolt: Queer People of Color, Living in Montreal Using Photovoice as a Tool for Community Organizing	p. 82
Listen to the Music: Work the Music, Organize the Community	p. 96
Art for Palestine: "Renarrating" History and the Present	p. 111
Community Organizing: Maori Movement-Building	p. 123
Solidarity, Real and Imagined: Lessons from the 1991 Postal Strike	p. 132
Immigrant Worker Organizing in a Time of Crisis: Adapting to the New Realities of Class and Resistance	p. 144
Prefigurative Self-Governance and Self-Organization: The Influence of Antiauthoritarian (Pro)Feminist, Radical Queer, and Antiracist Networks in Quebec	p. 156
Making Our Space, Taking Our Place: Lessons From Migrant Women's Organizing in Montreal	p. 174
Mad Activism Enters Its Fifth Decade: Psychiatric Survivor Organizing in Toronto	p. 189
Organizing and the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) Strategy: The Turn to BDS in Palestine Solidarity Politics in Montreal	p. 202
Muhammad Ali and the Moon Migrants	p. 216
Solidarity Tourism and International Development Internships: Some Critical Reflections	p. 227
Moving Beyond a Politics of Solidarity toward a Practice of Decolonization	p. 240
Organizing in Solidarity with "Threats to National Security": The Campaign against Immigration "Security Certificates"	p. 254
Confessions of a Reluctant Food Activist	p. 266
Building Power Beyond the Grassroots: Acorn Matters	p. 278
Urban Neoliberalism and the Right to the City Alliance	p. 291
Book Contributors	p. 306
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