This book explores the commonalities between the struggles of the last years around the Mediterranean and tries to find the cultural roots of this season of protests and activism against repression and a growing systemic crisis. Who are their main characters? How has mobility of ideas and persons contributed to it? Why has the Mediterranean become the cradle of civil resistance? And how can one make sure that what has begun bears fruit? The author discusses how a strategic action of social movements and activists from both Europe and the Arab world can build the basis for a grassroots project for integration between the two shores, where mobility is at the core: on the one hand, mobility of ideas, activists, men and women of culture and other key-players, and trans-national strategizing; on the other hand, challenging the paradigms of visa policies and striving for a space of safe human mobility as one of the steps of a grassroots Mediterranean citizens project. Providing argument to a new theory of social mobilization, this book will be of interest to scholars of European and Arab politics as well as to political activists in the region.

This book draws on case examples of contemporary black activism in South Manchester and contrasts them with events that surrounded C.L.R. James and his activism between 1935 and 1950. In doing so, the author considers what Brexit, the Labour Party and Theresa May's audit on racism in the UK have in common with the wartime decline of the British Empire, the rise and fall of the trade unions and the Italian invasion of Ethiopia. Clennon dialogues with James' theoretical frameworks around capitalism, neoliberalism and post-colonialism, and uses this creative interplay of ideas to help make sense of contemporary events and issues of social justice from a UK ethnic minority perspective. Using Fanon, Gordon, Marx and Chakrabarty amongst others, the study explores James' take on dialectical materialism and uses this as an ongoing analytical tool throughout the volume with which he weaves an uneasy path between post-colonial and post-Marxist theories. The Polemics of C.L.R. James and Contemporary Black Activism will be of interest to students and scholars across a range of social science disciplines, including sociology, cultural studies, education and black studies.

After more than twenty years of democracy in South Africa, the history of the liberation struggle is losing relevance in the national consciousness as the country grapples with the pressing challenges of poverty, inequality and unemployment. Nevertheless, the liberation struggle spawned many heroes and heroines, some whose contributions have been captured in autobiographies, biographies, book chapters, books and journal articles. There are many more heroes and heroines that are mere footnotes in the vast historiography of the liberation struggle - whose recollections and reflections are recorded in the words of the authors and their names acknowledged as sources in footnotes. The names of a larger number are not mentioned and do not feature even as footnotes in any publication on the history of the struggle. The book The other side of freedom: Stories of hope and loss in South African Liberation Struggle 1950-1994 presents a compilation of 26 profiles of a diverse selection of activists and leaders in the liberation struggle, framed between an introduction, a brief chronological account of the liberation struggle between 1950 and 1994, and a conclusive analysis of the autobiographical accounts as well as their legacy. The chapters present a better and fuller portrait of several unsung heroes and heroines of the South African liberation struggle by penetrating beyond the deeds, ideals, sacrifices, glory and greatness to examine individual human beings who are still living, and their recollections of others who have passed on.

Cyberprotest, available for the first time in paperback, is an exploration of contemporary radical internet activism in Britain. It investigates the context, tensions and outcomes of environmentalists' use of the internet. Examining a wide variety of groups - from radical direct action protesters to the political lobbying of Friends of the Earth - it allows activists to speak of their experiences, challenges and innovations, providing a unique insight into the workings of frontline activism. Internet use in all levels of activism - from long-running campaigns to short-term intense tactics - is analysed in the quest to determine the value of this much-hyped technology. The book documents the negotiations and achievements of environmentalists both in dealing with the tensions of using environmentally damaging technology and in avoiding surveillance and counter-strategies. It also examines how they use the internet in a participatory manner, to aid mobilisation and to add to their tactical repertoire. It reflects upon the implications of these uses for political campaigning and identifies emerging trends in the forms and processes of the environmental movement. This book will appeal to those interested in politics and the environment or who have a concern for the politics of the internet and activism. -- .

Creative Participation presents the theory and practice of new innovative forms of political participation. Examples covered in the book include consumers engaging in political shopping, capitalists building green developments, UK Muslim youth campaigning on the internet, Sicilian housewives taking on the Mafia, young evangelical ministers becoming concerned with social change and vegetarians making political statements. The authors show how in these new campaigns individuals swarm like honeybees around particular issues, causing those in power to sit up and take notice. This is the essential guide to the new politics of participation.

Politics is a field of mighty passions fueled by the identities of nation, religion, culture, gender, and class. Yet the study of politics is dominated by narrowly rationalist perspectives that see emotions as fleeting reactions and consider citizens primarily in terms of their individual interests. In this wide-ranging book, Paul Hoggett argues that human feelings and identities are constitutive of both personal and political life. Engaging with major debates in political theory, sociology, and psychoanalysis, he brings fresh insights to a range of issues: dynamics of political protest, intractable conflicts, fundamentalism and populism, the new political charismatics, the nature of forgiveness, and the relationship between anxiety and governance.The book is conceptually innovative and accessible, carefully introducing different theories of collective emotion and group identity and making extensive use of case studies from the U.S., England, and across the globe.

As an invitation to interrogate the secular modality of art, the book unsettles both the categories of 'art' and 'secular' in their theoretical and historical implications It questions the temporal, spatial, and cultural binaries between the 'sacred' and the 'secular' that have shaped art historical scholarship as well as artistic practice. Thinking from the south, all the essays here are anchored in a conception of a region – one fissured by histories of partition, state formations, and religious nationalisms but still offering a collective site from which to speak to the disciplines of art and the knowledge worlds in which they are embedded. The book asks: How do we complicate the religious designations of pre-modern art and architecture and the new forms of their resurgence in contemporary iconographies and monuments? How do we re-conceptualize the public and the political, as fiery contestations and new curatorial practices reconfigure the meaning of art in the proliferating spaces of museums, galleries, biennales and festivals? How do we understand South Asian art's deep entanglements with the politics of the present?

The autobiography of a courageous singer-songwriter, activist, and American icon. "Barbara Dane is someone who is willing to follow her conscience. She is, if the term must be used, a hero."-Bob Dylan A renowned folk, blues, and jazz singer who performed with some of the twentieth century's most celebrated musicians, from Louis Armstrong to Bob Dylan. A proud progressive who has tirelessly championed racial equality and economic justice in America, and who has traveled the world to sing out against war and tyranny. An organizer, a venue owner, a record label founder, and a woman who has charted her own creative and political path for more than ninety years. Barbara Dane has led an epic, trailblazing life in music and activism, and This Bell Still Rings tells her story in her own adventurous voice. Dane's memoir charts her trajectory from singing in union halls and at factory gates in World War II-era Detroit, to her rise as a respected blues and jazz singer, to her prominence as a folk musician frequently performing at and participating in civil rights and peace demonstrations across the US and abroad-from post-revolutionary Cuba to wartime Vietnam. This Bell Still Rings illuminates "one of the true unsung heroes of American music" (Boston Globe), and it offers a wealth of inspiration for artists, activists, and anyone seeking a life defined by courage and integrity.

On the stand with yippies, black panthers, and political activists at the conspiracy trial that defined the youth rebellion of the 1960s.
""Conspiracy? Hell, we couldn't agree on lunch.""--Abbie Hoffman
Michael Moore mocks George Bush and Al Franken ridicules Rush Limbaugh, but the mixing of play and politics today is polite and respectful compared to the carnival of contempt known as the Chicago Eight trial.
Opening at the end of 1969, the trial brought Yippies, antiwar activists, and Black Panthers to face conspiracy charges arising from the massive protests at the 1968 Democratic National Convention. The defendants openly lampooned the proceedings, with Abbie Hoffman blowing kisses to the jury and the defense bringing a Viet Cong flag into the courtroom. The judge ordered Bobby Seale of the Black Panthers bound and gagged for insisting on representing himself. And an array of celebrity witnesses appeared, including Timothy Leary, Norman Mailer, Arlo Guthrie, and Allen Ginsberg, who provoked the prosecution by chanting "Om" on the witness stand.
This book combines an abridged transcript of the trial with astute commentary by historian Jon Wiener. A foreword by defendant Tom Hayden examines the trial's relevance for protest today, and drawings by legendary cartoonist Jules Feiffer help re-create the electrifying atmosphere of the courtroom.

"A must-read ecological message of hope . . . Everyone with an interest in the future of this planet should read this book." --David Mitchell, The Guardian When climate activist Greta Thunberg was eleven, her parents Malena and Svante, and her little sister Beata, were facing a crisis in their own home. Greta had stopped eating and speaking, and her mother and father had reconfigured their lives to care for her. Desperate and searching for answers, her parents discovered what was at the heart of Greta's distress: her imperiled future on a rapidly heating planet. Steered by Greta's determination to understand the truth and generate change, they began to see the deep connections between their own suffering and the planet's. Written by a remarkable family and told through the voice of an iconoclastic mother, Our House Is on Fire is the story of how they fought their problems at home by taking global action. And it is the story of how Greta decided to go on strike from school, igniting a worldwide rebellion.

What would life be like if we had the courage to say, 'I want something different'? 'Elegant, thoughtful, vulnerable, and inspiring' Elizabeth Gilbert From a highly lauded modern voice in feminism and racial justice comes a deeply personal and insightful testament to the power of reimagining - the act of creating in our mind's eye that which does not but can and should exist We all experience breaking points, those moments when we realise that something must change. For activist, philanthropist, and CEO Rachel E. Cargle, reimagining - relationships, work, education, rest, faith and power - saw her through some of the most painful experiences and helped her to craft an authentic identity and become an incisive queer feminist voice of a generation. A Renaissance of Our Own offers a blueprint for how we can all use our imagination to live independent of oppressive structures and in alignment with our highest values - how we can all create a life that feels right. 'Dazzling - a loving, bold tale of imagination, bravery and radical action' Elle

Politics is a field of mighty passions fueled by the identities of nation, religion, culture, gender, and class. Yet the study of politics is dominated by narrowly rationalist perspectives that see emotions as fleeting reactions and consider citizens primarily in terms of their individual interests. In this wide-ranging book, Paul Hoggett argues that human feelings and identities are constitutive of both personal and political life. Engaging with major debates in political theory, sociology, and psychoanalysis, he brings fresh insights to a range of issues: dynamics of political protest, intractable conflicts, fundamentalism and populism, the new political charismatics, the nature of forgiveness, and the relationship between anxiety and governance.The book is conceptually innovative and accessible, carefully introducing different theories of collective emotion and group identity and making extensive use of case studies from the U.S., England, and across the globe.

If there was ever a time to stand up for your planet, for Mother Earth, this is the time. But what are the most pressing environmental issues affecting us today? And what actions can you, as an individual, take to combat them? If you want to know what you can do, then this is the book for you. Your Planet Needs You is the essential beginner's guide to understanding the environment and the threats to its wellbeing. From plastic waste to pesticides, food production and chemicals, global warming to species extinction, this book covers the topics that you need to know about. With practical and positive tips, this book will show how you can be part of the solution and help make a better world, whatever age you are. Includes sections on air pollution, environmental law, fast fashion and ethical living, as well as resources such as recommended reading and lists of groups and organisations that you can get involved with.

Throughout the world, from the United States to Tanzania, Chechnya, and Sri Lanka, everyday people are working together and taking actions to improve their lives, end inequality, and change global society. Action groups and movements see dialogue and learning as important ways to extend democracy and, with its inclusiveness, remake society. Long-term change often takes place in civil society and its institutions. By putting strategy with theory, local groups and movements are able to begin making changes in institutions that allow people to begin living in new ways. Inclusive, multicultural projects make dedicated efforts to end hierarchy and global injustice and reinvent culture, ideas, and social relations. Written for laypeople and students interested in change, these multidisciplinary essays take readers on a journey of discovery as they show how various groups have brought theory and action together to make urban, rural, and transnational change. These case studies and explanatory articles reveal how feminist, antiracist, ecological, and peace movements reinforce each other. This collection is an analytical organizing tool that demonstrates how people can initiate well-placed and enduring change. The writings also identify the inadequacies of academic change theories and highlight the contributions of intellectual activists across the world.

Throughout the world, from the United States to Tanzania, Chechnya, and Sri Lanka, everyday people are working together and taking actions to improve their lives, end inequality, and change global society. Action groups and movements see dialogue and learning as important ways to extend democracy and, with its inclusiveness, remake society. Long-term change often takes place in civil society and its institutions. By putting strategy with theory, local groups and movements are able to begin making changes in institutions that allow people to begin living in new ways. Inclusive, multicultural projects make dedicated efforts to end hierarchy and global injustice and reinvent culture, ideas, and social relations. Written for laypeople and students interested in change, these multidisciplinary essays take readers on a journey of discovery as they show how various groups have brought theory and action together to make urban, rural, and transnational change. These case studies and explanatory articles reveal how feminist, antiracist, ecological, and peace movements reinforce each other. This collection is an analytical organizing tool that demonstrates how people can initiate well-placed and enduring change. The writings also identify the inadequacies of academic change theories and highlight the contributions of intellectual activists across the world.

This book sets out to explore three conflict contexts in which religion is generally acknowledged to be at least a factor, although some minimize religion's role while others identify it as a major cause of violence. The book evaluates what role religion does play (or has played) in the Northern Ireland, Bosnian and Israel-Palestinian conflicts including the contribution of the women's movement in Ireland. It takes seriously the psychological tendency to demonise those who do not share our views and will argue that religion, although one factor among others, does all too easily lends itself in support of conflict. The author argues that stories of how religion has helped to solve conflict are rare, which is a major handicap when advocating that religion can play a peacemaking role. He argues that scriptures can be used to justify conflict and that an alternative interpretative paradigm is needed if this tendency is to be reversed. Given that, for religious people, the reduction of scriptures to totally human constructs is hugely problematical, the book will argue that the allegorical approach is more fruitful than the option of viewing all scriptures as human response to the divine. Drawing on post-modern theory, the book also argues that, though scriptures may be 'divine', interpretation is always human. However, post-modernity's maxim that there are no single or authoritative interpretations of any text, that all interpretations are equally valid, including those that justify violence, will be rejected on the basis that there is a higher moral ground on which humans should stand which values peace. Drawing on the philosophy of E. W Hocking, the book's conclusion suggests that peace will be best guaranteed when religions transcend their particularities and human individuals commune directly with the divine, without the necessity of organised religions as mediators. Intended as a course text, discussion questions are included but it is hoped that the book will also be of interest to a general readership.

This book sets out to explore three conflict contexts in which religion is generally acknowledged to be at least a factor, although some minimize religion's role while others identify it as a major cause of violence. The book evaluates what role religion does play (or has played) in the Northern Ireland, Bosnian and Israel-Palestinian conflicts including the contribution of the women's movement in Ireland. It takes seriously the psychological tendency to demonise those who do not share our views and will argue that religion, although one factor among others, does all too easily lends itself in support of conflict. The author argues that stories of how religion has helped to solve conflict are rare, which is a major handicap when advocating that religion can play a peacemaking role. He argues that scriptures can be used to justify conflict and that an alternative interpretative paradigm is needed if this tendency is to be reversed. Given that, for religious people, the reduction of scriptures to totally human constructs is hugely problematical, the book will argue that the allegorical approach is more fruitful than the option of viewing all scriptures as human response to the divine. Drawing on post-modern theory, the book also argues that, though scriptures may be 'divine', interpretation is always human. However, post-modernity's maxim that there are no single or authoritative interpretations of any text, that all interpretations are equally valid, including those that justify violence, will be rejected on the basis that there is a higher moral ground on which humans should stand which values peace. Drawing on the philosophy of E. W Hocking, the book's conclusion suggests that peacewill be best guaranteed when religions transcend their particularities and human individuals commune directly with the divine, without the necessity of organised religions as mediators. Intended as a course text, discussion questions are included but it is hoped that the book will also be of interest to a general readership.

An unconventional biography of an unconventional woman. Eglantyne Jebb, not particularly fond of children herself, nevertheless dedicated her life to establishing Save the Children and promoting her revolutionary concept of human rights. In this award-winning book, Clare Mulley brings to life this brilliant, charismatic, and passionate woman, whose work took her between drawing rooms and war zones, defying convention and breaking the law.

Eglantyne Jebb not only helped save millions of lives, she also permanently changed the way the world treats children.

In this remarkable, inspiring collection of essays, acclaimed writer and critic Olivia Laing makes a brilliant case for why art matters, especially in the turbulent political weather of the twenty-first century.

Funny Weather brings together a career's worth of Laing's writing about art and culture, examining their roles in our political and emotional lives. She profiles Jean-Michel Basquiat and Georgia O’Keeffe, interviews Hilary Mantel and Ali Smith, writes love letters to David Bowie and Freddie Mercury, and explores loneliness and technology, women and alcohol, sex and the body. With characteristic originality and compassion, she celebrates art as a force of resistance and repair, an antidote to a frightening political time.

We’re often told art can’t change anything. In Funny Weather, Laing argues that it can. It changes how we see the world, it exposes inequality, and it offers fertile new ways of living.

This volume provides an original and powerful contribution to debates about the civic purpose of higher education. It suggests that universities can best realize their civic mission by making it central to their policy and practice. Bringing together researchers from three continents, the book offers an international perspective based primarily upon first-hand pedagogical experience. A transatlantic overview of the purpose, place and practice of one such pedagogy (service learning) is provided and its potential as a foundation for civic engagement assessed.In its last section, the book moves from the theory of citizenship to practical considerations. In doing so, the book offers advice on establishing civic engagement to all those involved in teaching and learning within higher education.

The SASO/BPC trial which took place from October 1974 until December 21st 1974 played an intrinsic role in the surge of Black Consciousness thought. An ideology founded by Stephen Bantu Biko, which wished to relay the unspoken strength and spirit of the African people.

It was seen to be a way of thought developed for the African people to reclaim confidence within their skin tone. As the trail commenced in the year 1974, little was known about the ideology’s founder – Steve Biko, aside from his colleagues and followers of the movement, as his whereabouts and communication had been limited as the Apartheid government had ordered a ban on Biko; thereby restricting his movements and communication with individuals.

When Steve entered the Pretoria courtroom in Pretoria as a star witness to deliver his testimony on Black Consciousness, in the three-month trial; those who had heard of the myth of the man named Biko, got to witness him in court. This, gave traction and new-found understanding to the teachings of Black Consciousness. This book focuses solely on his testimony, as said in his words. The spoken words that ignited the momentum of resistance that could not be stopped.

In the early 1900s, Detroit's clubwomen successfully lobbied for issues like creating playgrounds for children, building public baths, raising the age for child workers, and reforming the school board and city charter. But when they won the vote in 1918, Detroit's clubwomen, both black and white, were eager to incite even greater change. In the 1920s, they fought to influence public policy at the municipal and state level, while contending with partisan politics, city politics, and the media, which often portrayed them as silly and incompetent. In this fascinating volume, author Jayne Morris-Crowther examines the unique civic engagement of these women who considered their commitment to the city of Detroit both a challenge and a promise. By the 1920s, there were eight African American clubs in the city (Willing Workers, Detroit Study Club, Lydian Association, In As Much Circle of Kings Daughters, Labor of Love Circle of Kings Daughters, West Side Art and Literary Club, Altar Society of the Second Baptist Church, and the Earnest Workers of the Second Baptist Church); in 1921, they joined together under the Detroit Association of Colored Women's Clubs. Nearly 15,000 mostly white clubwomen were represented by the Detroit Federation of Women's Clubs, which was formed in 1895 by the unification of the Detroit Review Club, Twentieth Century Club, Detroit Woman's Club, Woman's Historical Club, Clio Club, Wednesday History Club, Hypathia, and Zatema Club. Morris-Crowther begins by investigating the roots of the clubs in pre-suffrage Detroit and charts their growing power. She goes on to consider the women's work in three areas-Policies That Affect Women and Children, Protecting the Home against Enemies, and Home as Part of the Urban Environment-and considers the numerous challenges they faced in The Limits of Enfranchised Citizens. An appendix contains the 1926 Directory of the Detroit Federation of Women's Clubs. In the end, Morris-Crowther shows that Detroit's clubwomen pioneered new lobbying techniques like personal interviews, and used political education in savvy ways to bring politics to the community level. This volume will be interesting reading for enthusiasts of Detroit history and readers wanting to learn more about women and politics of the 1920s.

Amidst ongoing wars and insecurities, female fighters, politicians and activists of the Kurdish Freedom Movement are building a new political system that centres gender equality. Since the Rojava Revolution, the international focus has been especially on female fighters, a gaze that has often been essentialising and objectifying, brushing over a much more complex history of violence and resistance. Going beyond Orientalist tropes of the female freedom fighter, and the movement's own narrative of the 'free woman', Isabel Kaser looks at personal trajectories and everyday processes of becoming a militant in this movement. Based on in-depth ethnographic research in Turkey and Iraqi Kurdistan, with women politicians, martyr mothers and female fighters, she looks at how norms around gender and sexuality have been rewritten and how new meanings and practices have been assigned to women in the quest for Kurdish self-determination. Her book complicates prevailing notions of gender and war and creates a more nuanced understanding of the everyday embodied epistemologies of violence, conflict and resistance.