Backlash
★ REFUSING TO BE COOPTED: How activists can push the government, create reforms that serve their cause, and avoid the supposedly inevitable cooptation. (4/12/22)
NUTPICKING: An old practice of movement opponents is to single out the nuttiest nuts from a movement and depict them as typical. (4/3/22)
Causes of Activism
MIND THE GAPS: According to relative deprivation theory, people rebel not when their fortunes are declining but when they are improving. The reason? A growing gap between expectations and reality. A use in point: white grievance. (3/29/22)
ALL POLITICS IS PERSONAL: Discovering bleached coral on a diving adventure devastated Vidhi Bubna–and drove her to activism. “It’s like a graveyard down there,” she said. “It made me feel guilty.” (3/10/22)
CONNIE HOGARTH, RIP: “To obey one’s conscience — to do what one believes to be right — is, I believe, a primary obligation and should supersede the obligation to obey the law,” she said. (3/2/22)
Consequences of dissent
UNINTENDED CONSEQUENCES: When activists discover a viral symbol for their cause, it could undermine the overall cause. A case in point: concerns about straws. First, straws make up an infinitesimal share of trash. Second, the replacements were hardly better. (4/21/22)
Corporate and nonprofit activism
A VERBAL SHELLING: Shell shareholders meeting interrupted by climate crisis protesters. (5/24/22)
THINK DIFFERENT: Apple shareholders vote for an audit of the company’s civil rights record, against the wishes of management. (3/4/22)
ACTIVISM AS A VOCATION: The growth of the nonprofit sector and its impact on activism: pro or con? (3/4/22)
THE ETHICAL COMPANY: Companies embrace activist causes when the boss, employees, or consumers demand it. Get Z is ratting ups the pressure. (3/15/22)
Culture and the arts
SCHOLARS FOR UKRAINE: Universities have a unique contribution to offer the resistance in Ukraine: a seat at the seminar table. (4/3/22)
★ THE ART OF PROTEST: BLM, #MeToo and other modern movements have reshaped modern art. (4/24/22)
‘SHUT UP AND DRIBBLE’: No one on FOX has told Enes Kanter Freedom to shut up because he’s an activist athlete. But his activism against Erdogan and Xi has run into walls in the NBA. (3/24/22)
TO BE OR NOT TO BE? Answer: To be. Shakespeare offers exquisite expression of activist ideals. (3/21/22)
AD RESISTANCE: Activists have always slipped coded messages into art. Now they are using advertising to fortify the resistance in Russia. (3/4/22)
Demographics
FOREVER YOUNG: Change always requires activism by the young. (3/22/22)
Demonstrations
HOW CIVIL? Can protests against the overturn of Roe remain peaceful? (5/11/22)
PICKETING JUSTICES’ HOMES: The Philadelphia Inquirer’s Will Bunch says it’s appropriate given its peaceableness and the circumstances. Not so fast, says Marc Theissen of the Washington Post.
LEAVE THE SCOUNDRELS ALONE: That seems to be the conventional wisdom after peaceful protests in front of the homes of a few SCOTUS members. Someone tell that to the “life” people who scream at women seeking health care. (5/9/22)
Direct action
GO AHEAD, MAKE MY DAY: Scientist welcomes arrest as a way to pressure government and corporations to address the climate crisis. (5/26/22)
IS THERE A CORRECT WAY TO PROTEST? How far can activists go to break through the barriers and noise? (5/25/22)
DESPERATE TIMES: Does the climate crisis call for desperate measures? Despite the unchecked terrorism to the land, Edward Abbey’s old friend Jack Loeffler says no. (5/23/22)
RADICAL PROTEST WORKS: “It is better to die blowing up a pipeline than to burn impassively – but we shall hope, of course, that it never comes to this. If we resist fatalism, it might not.” (5/24/22)
Disobedience
★ CHRISTIANITY AND DISSENT: When is is right to disobey one law to affirm a higher law? “The New Testament doesn’t say that we, as believers, are always to obey government authority, but that we are to be subject to it.” (4/29/22)
WHEN OBEDIENCE IS SINFUL: “Obedience is always going to be a structure that begins with God and flows down through all of the legitimate authorities until it reaches the subject,” says the theologian Peter Kwasniewski. But it it doesn’t flow down from God? (4/1/22)
A BETTER WAY: War–which destroy countless lives and often ends in failure–is never the answer. Civil disobedience and dissent actually work better. (3/23/22)
Dissent
RASH OBEDIENCE: If obedience is the norm for legitimate regimes and disobedience is the rare expedient to eradicate evil within, what should we think about thoughtless rule-following? (5/12/22)
Divestment
DIVEST FOR WHAT? The crisis in Ukraine has prompted the greatest economic boycott in history. Might that be a model for the climate crisis? (3/21/22)
Elections
SERIOUSLY, NARAL? After raising $12 million the day after the leaked SCOTUS decision on abortion, the abortion-right group says to … wait … checks notes … wait till November and vote? What about (ahem) activism? (5/29/22)
Free speech
WHEN THE PRESS ISN’T FREE: Create coded systems for sharing ideas–just what Russian journalists are doing in state media.
CONFEDERATES YES, BLM NO: Students at Coosa High School in Georgia sue over restrictions over their protests against the Confederate flag. Meanwhile, the dress code bans BLM shirts. (5/17/22)
NOTHING TO SEE HERE: Florida bans discussion of social justice in K-12 schools. “The list of topics included under the CRT prohibition makes clear that Florida classrooms must not acknowledge that there is any lasting effect from slavery, Jim Crow, or other forms of oppression in American life.” (5/21/22)
Law
★ CRIMINALIZING DISSENT: Arizona, Iowa, and Tennessee make advocacy of Palestine a crime under anti-Holocaust statutes. (4/26/22) Also: In Wales, a new law against “noisy” protests.
Modernity and politics
ONE-DIMENSIONAL, INDEED: Herbert Marcuse warned us about the dangers of “technological order” and the alienation of the working class from reform movements. (12/27/21)
Money and Politics
★ ACTIVISM FOR ALTRUISM? A movement for altruism (yes, you read that right) is pumping $10 million into a congressional race in Oregon. Is that virtuous … or just a different form of influence peddling? (5/12/22)
Organization
★ MASS ACTION: A new online platform called Civil Voice Groups offers a system to coordinate volunteers, raise money, assess opinion, and more. Causes include civil rights, women’s rights, the environment, climate crisis, and more. (5/9/22) See the site itself here.
Psychology
★ ACTIVISM AND MENTAL HEALTH: Being part of the solution helps. “When you identify as a character in the story, it starts to feel pretty overwhelming if you don’t have a role to play, or if you just feel like a bit of a guilty bystander, or maybe even part of the problem.” (4/20/22)
BREATHE IN, BREATHE OUT …To overcome fear and doom-and-gloom, be present in the moment, look for leverage points, and act … one day at a time. (5/3/22)
THE CURE: To get past the depression and helplessness of the COVID period, become an activist. (3/11/22)
STRESSED OUT: Political polarization affects people’s mental health. Is there a better way to fight than demonizing the other side? (3/3/22)
ACTIVISTS NEED TO DO THIS: War games before the Russian invasion predicted the sequence of events we have seen in the first week of the war in Ukraine. (3/2/22)
The public square
THE TWITTER PROBLEM: The danger of one man in charge of the nation’s town square. (4/29/22)
GOOD & COMMON: A new website by and for activists.
Rhetoric and symbolism
PRO-WHOLE LIFE: Barney Frank once cracked that Ronald Reagan thought life began at conception and ended at birth. But the ”whole life” activists push for humanist policies from conception throughout life. (3/20/22)
WHERE WAS THE OUTRAGE? While supporting the global support for Ukraine, an Armenian reflects on the deadly silence during the genocide. (3/2/22)
Regime
★ THE NEOLIBERAL ORDER IS CRUMBLING: Or not. The question is whether activists can seize the moment. (4/13/22)
ACTIVISM AND TRUTH: The stakes of the Ukraine war back in the USSR Russia. (3/18/22)
NEOLIBERAL UNREASON: People are objects to be managed, not citizens to be engaged, says Wendy Brown. (3/23/22)
SAME AS IT EVER WAS: Reformers always move too slowly for activists. A case in point: Lydia Marie Child’s frustration with Abraham Lincoln. (3/28/22)
Reparations
LAND BACK: Should colonial powers return land stolen from indigenous peoples?
PARTIES AND PROTESTS: Bill Galston’s take on the dynamic. (3/29/22)
Sacrifice
★ THE POLITICS OF SELF-SACRIFICE: Is self-immolation for a cause activism or madness? The debate ensues after a man burns himself to death to protest climate crisis. (4/26/22) See also this.
Strategy and tactics
★ TOOLKIT FOR ACTIVISTS: A Hawaii activist, after learning the ropes in her own struggle for public access to the beach, creates an online guide for others who want to change the world. (5/23/22) Here’s the site.
BLOCKAGE: Climate activists who blockaded a coal train in 2019 avoid a jail sentence but are fined more than $10,000. (5/16/22)
★ THE SOLIDARITY STRATEGY: The strategy to protect the right to reproductive freedom has failed. Does labor offer a better way for effective activism? (5/12/22)
RACISM IS GLOBAL: So, then, must be activist movements and strategy. (3/14/22)
★ ANARCHISM AND DEMOCRACY: Anti-statism, activism, and the search for a sustainable, and equitable world. (4/18/22)
ALL OUT: The general strike can jolt the system, but it has its limits too. (3/28/22)
THE PEOPLE CAN WIN: Russian protests are getting bigger. They could end the war in Ukraine, says Erica Chenoweth of Harvard’s Kennedy School. (3/13/22)
DEEP ACTIVISM: When activists influence parties, they have a chance to make a difference–especially when the two parties are competitive. (3/28/22)
Training
SCHOOL FOR TROUBLEMAKING: The City College of New York and the CUNY School of Labor and Urban Studies are creating the Leadership for Democracy and Social Justice. The goal is to create early- and mid-career leaders in social justice movements. (5/9/22)
ACTIVISM AS THEATER: And the need to rehearse for the big moment. (3/2/22)
ACTIVISTS NEED TO DO THIS: War games before the Russian invasion predicted the sequence of events we have seen in the first week of the war in Ukraine. (3/2/22)