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Interface: a journal for and about social movements Response to Harvey

Volume 2 (1): 287 - 297 (May 2010) Shepard, It's all about organizing

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Responding to Harvey:
It's all about organizing
Benjamin Shepard

It is hard not to concur with a great deal David Harveys Organizing for the
Anti-Capitalist Transition, the notes for his new book The Enigma of Capital,
especially the essays implicit critique of neoliberalism. His basic point, of
course, is given the current financial crisis capitalism as we know it appears
headed down a one way superhighway toward oblivion. Yet what this
unsustainable future looks like - no one is quite sure. In the absence of a clear
movement leading the charge, Harvey identifies a few of the obstacles,
impediments, and limitations of current economic and organizational models.
Of course, most of these are born of capitalist social arrangements, which
increasingly separate the masses and classes. While effective theories of change
tend to take shape as an interplay between any number of practices and
theoretical assumptions, such programs only gain validity when they take shape
on the ground, as living and breathing modes of lived theory and engagement
(Duncombe 2003; Schram 2002). Some of the essay does this more than
others. This short response to Harvey considers some of the essays core
arguments and assumptions in terms of current activist practices taking shape
here in New York.

Obstacles
Probably the most compelling aspect of this essay is Harveys succinct analysis
of what has happened to capitalism since the 1970s. Much of this argument
builds on his work over the last 15 years, particularly his 2005 A Brief History of
Neoliberalism as well as his recent writings on the right to the city. Through
these works, the writer describes what has gone wrong and ways to addressing
these conditions from the perspective of social movement activity. For the last
decade, global justice activists around the world have declared another world is
possible the essay beings. The current crisis offers a window of opportunity to
reflect on what might be involved Harvey suggests, sounding very much like a
leader of the vanguard. Such movements could be well served by, defining how
another socialism or communism is possible and how the transition to these
alternatives is to be accomplished.
Much of the current crisis was born of the steps used to address the economic
crisis of the 1970s. These include: a) a well choreographed assault of the labor
movement and the business labor accord of the previous four decades, b) a
global concentration of corporate power, with resources moving from the
middle to the top tier of income distribution, c) an attack on the environment
and on environmental protections born out of the movements from the early
1970s, thus sparking de-industrialization in traditional core regions and new
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forms of (ultra-oppressive) industrialization and natural resource and
agricultural raw material extractions in emergent markets.
d) This environmental exploitation is followed by new forms of primitive
accumulation, or primitive globalization. This includes heightened reliance on
accumulation by dispossession as a means to augment capitalist class power.
Here, the poor are increasingly displaced from homes and communities, from
New Orleans to Chicago to Brazil. The new rounds of primitive accumulation
are augmented by asset losses of the lower classes. The sub-prime housing
market in the US which meant huge losses of assets for African American
populations was only the latest expression of this long term trend, born of red-
lining and predatory capitalist practices dating back decades. (For a detailed
review of the impact of red-lining on one community, see Wilder 2001).
e) The final ingredients include the growth of debt levels which were a
disincentive to creating viable government-supported, safety net provisions to
keep poor people from falling through the cracks. Reagans first budget director
famously noted that the long term budget deficit would be their administrations
gift to future administrations which would have to govern within an
environment of debt rather than in an environment in which there was cash to
create programs that would limit the damage of the administrations assault on
the gains of social movements from Civil Rights to the Environment. This
phenomenon extends around the world. f) Given current circumstances,
Harvey suggests that sustained 3% economic growth is no longer viable without
a little creative accounting, or in his words the construction of whole series of
asset market bubbles, all of which had a Ponzi character, culminating in the
property bubble that burst These asset bubbles drew upon finance capital and
were facilitated by extensive financial innovations such as derivatives and
collateralized debt obligations. One needs to look no further than the current
circumstances in Greece to find evidence in support of this claim (see Story et al.
2010).
Since the 1970s, these innovations have helped usher in a set of transitions
which had a distinctive class character and clothed themselves in the vestments
of a distinctive ideology called neoliberal. This political philosophy, rested
upon the idea that free markets, free trade, personal initiative and
entrepreneurialism were the best guarantors of individual liberty and freedom
and that the nanny state should be dismantled for the benefit of all. And the
role of the state shifted into a subservient role in the support a better business
climate. This impulse superseded human needs. The interests of the people
were secondary to the interests of capital and in the event of a conflict between
them, the interests of the people had to be sacrificedThe system that has been
created amounts to a veritable form of communism for the capitalist class.
Here, the private ingests the public be it hospitals, water, schools, and services
as the public sphere contracts and dwindles.
There are obvious limitations to this model. Capital can only accumulate so
much. There are only so many trees which can be chopped down, bluefin tuna
fished to extinction, or taxes to be cut. The polar ice caps are already melting
Interface: a journal for and about social movements Response to Harvey
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and weather events related to global warming are only becoming more and
more frequent. The last two recoveries failed to produce the jobs or wage
based products to actually drive economic activity. At times of crisis, the
irrationality of capitalism becomes plain for all to see. As neoliberalism
accelerates, it takes on increasingly an carcinogenic dynamic. The social body of
cities, people, and the environment feel these effects in immediate ways. After-
all, for this system to prevail, the people will have to surrender the fruits of
their labor to those in power, to surrender many of their rights and their hard-
won asset values, and to suffer environmental degradations galore. Under this
system working people are forced to cope with, serial reductions in their living
standards which means starvation for many of those already struggling to
survive at rock bottom.
All of that may require more than a little political repression, police violence
and militarized state control to stifle unrest, Harvey notes, acknowledging the
need for police forces maintain social order in an environment of exponential
income stratification. After all, since fiscal crisis of the 1970s, governments
have become increasingly tone deaf when it comes to responding to the sounds
of social movements. Instead, we have witnessed the creation of consent.
The mix of authoritarianism, monetary corruption of representative
democracy, surveillance, policing and militarization, media control and spin
suggests a world in which the control of discontent through disinformation,
fragmentations of oppositions and the shaping of oppositional cultures. Here,
the promotion of NGOs tends to prevail with plenty of coercive force to back it
up if necessary. Subsequently, [m]ost of the governmental moves to contain
the crisis in North America and Europe amount to the perpetuation of business
as usual which translates into support for the capitalist class.

What to Do
So, what is to be done, muses Harvey? What are movements for social change
to do? Writers, thinkers, and activists all seem to have different solutions. It is
hard to imagine a more coherent articulation of what is wrong than what Harvey
has spelled out. Yet for Harvey, the prescription for a solution becomes messier.
The uneven development of capitalist practices throughout the world has
produced, moreover, anti-capitalist movements all over the place, Harvey
writes acknowledging the [h]orizontally networked as opposed to hierarchically
commanded systems of coordination between autonomously organized and self-
governing collectives organized to respond and create do-it-yourself solutions
to a myriad of these challenges. But a global anti-capitalist movement is
unlikely to emerge without some animating vision of what is to be done and
why, argues Harvey.
Here in New York, he has linked a lifetime of writing, scholarship, and
participation in social movements with Henri Lefebvres call for a The Right to
the City helping organize the Right to the City Alliance
(www.righttothecity.org). Yet, the tension remains about how to connect such
Interface: a journal for and about social movements Response to Harvey
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analysis with movement action, especially when the writings of Henri Lefebvre
seem miles away from the lived experiences of many activists on the ground.
Just as Harvey diagnoses the problems with neoliberalism, he highlights the
limitations with movement organizing, suggesting current movements have
failed to advance effective alternative visions or solutions which in turn could
ignite movements for change. His critique of current movements is searing.
Here he suggests that current movements lack theoretical understanding or
incoherent message or program; they fail to respect technical or administrative
skills, instead relying on a compromised psychic prison like non-profit
organizations (although much of the critique of non-governmental
organizations is that they are over bureacratized, favoring administrative rather
than direct action based solutions).
These are all generally legitimate (if somewhat contradictory) claims, yet they
bring up the larger question of intellectuals and movements (see Duncombe
2003). Do movements need intellectual leaders or engaged practices, which
effect everyday life? I would argue the former. Foucault long ago said
movements do not need intellectuals to lead them. They do just fine by
themselves (Foucault and Deleuze 1977). It is hard to disagree. This is not to
suggest these are diametrically opposed points. They are not. You cannot swing
a dead cat without hitting a graduate student or sociologist at many of the
current global justice protests. Grassroots leadership collectively requires
many skills sets, and then more importantly the ability of participants to share
their skill sets with each other, argues San Francisco organizer James Tracey
(2010). So yes intellectuals need to be PART of the leadership of movements--
but only one of many parts. Tracey describes leadership based on the group as
a brain with multiple forms of intelligence and knowledge to be shared, not
monopolized.
While Harvey honors the work of organizers as organic intellectuals, he still
sees feels compelled to critique the collective intelligence of movement
practices. Herein lies the tension. The effectiveness of all these movements
(leaving aside their more violent fringes) is limited by their reluctance and
inability to scale up their activism into large-scale organizational forms capable
of confronting global problems, observes Harvey after dismissing the current
anti-corporate globalization movements near allergic aversion to negotiation
with state power. Again, it is certainly hard to disagree with this sentiment.
While the global justice movement has often been overly criticized for failing to
effectively paint a picture of what another world might look like, it has often
treated efforts to create alternative structures to the social welfare safety net
provisions or services as a lesser calling to street fighting, or Storming the
Bastille (see Davis 2002). Government can, in fact, support certain efforts
aimed at change. Conversely, it is less productive to condemn those who would
rather confront cops or dance in the street, to negotiating with the state.
Creating change is not a zero sum game. As Brooke Lehman, the founder of
New Yorks Direct Action Network, explains:
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I think there is value in having progressives in government and there is value in
having people doing street pageantry. What Im most against is people throwing
things out with the bath water constantly. When they find out something wasnt
the be-all and end-all, they want to throw out whatever they have been involved
in or the little others have been involved in. Im looking for the ways for those
different strategies to work together (Shepard, in press).
Many activists argue movements need as many tools as possible at our disposal;
these include a wide range of approaches to direct action, community building,
and even some play. Lehman explains:
I mean, I dont think that this movement is sustainable unless people have a
sense of humor. I think part of the strength of the playfulness has been to bring
joy into peoples experiences, but in countering the other extreme which is as
alluring, but not a useful way to do mass organizing, which is to create a
militant and even militaristic-seeming direct action organizing skills. I think
when you are looking for energy, those are sort of the two poles that people get
pulled into. And Id much rather get pulled into the silly, creative side, even if
its regarded as cheesy and sort of less serious. I think the more serious tends to
mimic what we are fighting against too much (Shepard, in press).
The point is, movements benefit from multiple approaches to social change. A
little flexibility could certainly yield a richer image of a true diversity of tactics.
Yet, if one wants to honor the work of organic intellectuals, such as Lehman,
involved in actually organizing as Harvey suggests he does, then their
organizing efforts must be respected and engaged. The day-to-day life of
movement organizing is anything but simple or smooth. It is not helpful when
intellectuals condemn or fail to acknowledge their complicated decisions or
challenges to organizing. Still Harvey suggests: The presumption that local
action is the only meaningful level of change and that anything that smacks of
hierarchy is anti-revolutionary is self-defeating when it comes to larger
questions. Yet, in a world of complicated messy conundrums, some of the most
vibrant organizing examples include the community gardens, syringe
exchanges, community development corporations (CDCs), bike repair shops,
free clinics, community banks, sustainable agriculture programs, land trusts,
and other examples of globally informed, yet neighborhood based organizing
efforts. [T]hese movements are unquestionably providing a widespread base
for experimentation with anti-capitalist politics, Harvey acknowledges.
A few words about the context of some of this organizing is instructive. In the
years before a community organizer was elected president of the United States,
countless observers suggested that community organizing was an obsolete
method. Yet for many people, such organizing remains a vital tool. Two decades
ago an organizer with the Chicago-based Developing Communities Project
contrasted electoral campaigns with community economic development. In my
view, neither approach offers lasting hope of real change for the inner city
unless undergirded by a systemic approach to community organization,
explained Barack Obama (1990). This is because the issues of the inner city are
more complex and deeply rooted than ever before. Blatant discrimination has
been replaced by institutional racism; problems like teen pregnancy, gang
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involvement, and drug abuse cannot be solved by money alone. To get to the
bottom of such issues, Obama called for grass-roots community organizing,
which builds on indigenous leadership and direct action. Many agreed with
this sentiment.
Throughout the last two decades, activists working on the ground have helped
articulate a practice based approach to organizing strategies for creating power.
Almost a decade ago, I interviewed Sara Schulman about her approach to
organizing (Shepard 2002). Ive always been interested in political movements
that have concrete political goals, that have issues for campaigns, that mobilize
people, that create countercultures--that stuff has attracted me, she explained,
describing her own activist praxis. The theory is not complex. You have to
have an idea that is winnable. You have to have a campaign that is viable. And
you have to follow every step of it. Its quite easy. Yet, Schulman cautions, If
your goal is not winnable then you are in trouble. And if you dont have an idea
of how to reach [your goal], youll never reach it. It sounds simple, but its very
hard to get people to follow it. While many movements face a struggle to
bridge a gap between political wanderlust and an effective program to create
change, there are any number of current struggles from environmental
organizing to queer/AIDS activism which work from the ethos Schulman
describes. In doing so, such community organizing remains a vital resource for
those with little other access to social and political power to create changes, both
large and small.
Take Jean Montrevil, a Haitian immigrant who lives in New York City.
Montrevil was detained for deportation to Haiti on the morning of December
30, 2009, at a routine check with the Immigration and Customs Enforcement
(ICE). This occurred despite the detail that Montrevil has been a legal
immigrant in the United States since 1986, the husband of a U.S. citizen, and
the father to four U.S. citizen children. The governments actions stemmed
from a 20-year old conviction, for which he had long since served his sentence.
Such actions are typical of current immigration policy in the US in the post 9/11
context (Sen 2008). These actions became the public face of the latest flare up
in a generations old controversy over the rightful role of immigrants and
outsiders in US life.
What the ICE agents did not count on when the detained Montrevil was how
connected Montrevil was. A long time community leader and activist, Montrevil
is well known. Mr. Montrevil is a leader in a variety of immigrant rights groups
including Families for Freedom and the NYC New Sanctuary Movement (NY
NSC) and Detention Watch Network. In his fight for justice on behalf of all
immigrants, Mr. Montrevil has gained the support of U.S. Reps. Jerrold Nadler
and Nydia Velasquez, NY State Senator Thomas K. Duane and NY State
Assemblywoman Deborah Glick.
On word of his detention, Montrevils family and friends and immigration
activists around the country busied themselves getting the word out about what
had happened, writing letters, leading sermons, and mobilizing supporters. In
other words, they started organizing. The NYC New Sanctuary Coalition
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immediately called for an emergency vigil at 6 p.m. outside the Varick Street
ICE Detention Center at Varick and Houston Streets, which ended with a
procession to Judson Memorial Church for a service where they demanded that
Mr. Montrevil be released and that ICE stop separating families and
communities. Mr. Montrevils wife and children as well as his many community
supporters were present at the service. Inside a detention center far from home,
Montrevil joined a hunger strike with other immigration detainees in York,
Pennsylvania in solidarity with the Fast for Our Families, a group of five
community members in South Florida who took their last meal on New Years
Eve. I am fasting side by side with nearly 60 other detainees to take a stand
against this horrific deportation and detention system that is tearing families
apart, Montrevil reported. The Fast for Our Families and Montrevil both
asked the Obama Administration to stop separating immigrants from their
American families. Churches around New York City helped get the word out
about the situation. Clergy and politicians demanded Montrevils immediate
release and called for reform to the immigration laws, organizing an action.
Throughout the week, the coalition speaking up about Montrevil expanded.
Prominent clergy and elected leaders called on the federal government to return
Montrevil to his wife Janay and their children. Jean represents all that is right
about our nation and wrong with the deportation system, argued Rev. Bob
Coleman, of the historic Riverside Church and a leader of New Yorks New
Sanctuary Movement, a faith-based coalition for immigration reform that
Montrevil himself co-founded in 2007. He made a mistake. He paid his time.
He represents a restored life. Who benefits by stripping him of his legal status?
Montrevil entered the U.S. from Haiti in 1986 as a legal permanent resident.
Homeland Security, on the other hand, was trying to deport him because of a
1989 drug conviction, for which Montrevil served 11 years. He has had an
exemplary record ever since. He became a national spokesperson for the Child
Citizen Protection Act, a bill moving through the House of Representatives that
would bring due process into the deportation system by allowing immigration
judges to consider the best interests of American children before deporting a
parent. The proposal is part of Representative Luis Gutierrezs recently
introduced bill, the Comprehensive Immigration Reform for America's Security
and Prosperity Act (H.R. 4321).
Following Montrevils detention on December 30, 2009 hundreds of supporters
from across the country called David Venturella, Acting Director of ICEs Office
of Detention and Removal Operations, urging Montrevils release and the
suspension of his deportation. Contrary to the claims of ICE leadership that the
agency will be transparent and accountable in its implementation of
immigration laws, it has not responded to Montrevil or his attorney Joshua
Bardavid," said Andrea Black, director of the Detention Watch Network. There
is no excuse for their silence.
Jean has been nothing less than an inspiration. His work on behalf of
immigrants being torn from their families across the country has been
prophetic, explained the Reverand Donna Schaper of Judson Memorial
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Church, where Montrevil worships. On Tuesday at 12:30 pm, I will join other
people of faith at 201 Varick Street, the detention center in New York, and
demand that ICE respond to us. We will no longer accept silence as an answer.
She was not alone.
January 5, 2010, at 12:30pm, clergy and parishioners from Jeans church
converged outside of New Yorks Varick Street Detention Center. Singer Dan
Zanes was on hand to add a little cultural resistance to the mix. Singing, We
Shall Not Be Moved as they blocked new detainees from entering the center,
eight clergy were arrested. Before the arrests began, Rev. Schaper stated: I am
being arrested because it is a moral outrage that our government would do this
to such a great man and father. These immigration laws that destroy families
contradict the values we should uphold as a society. They need to change now.
Throughout the day, local television showed a loop of the members of the
congregation speaking up about Montrevils situation (Edroso, 2010; NY1,
2010).
The following week the movement continued to escalate. The Fasters in Miami
are fighting to keep families together, my husband and me are fighting to keep
families together, so we will fight together! exclaimed Jani Montrevil, Jeans
wife. Our son keeps calling Jeans cell phone, hoping Daddy will pick up. He
asks me, 'Why are they pretending Daddy is bad, so he will go back to Haiti?'
Jean made mistakes before we started building a family together. Homeland
Security wants to turn me into a single mother.
The movement to keep families together was spreading across the country, with
solidarity actions taking place in Texas and New Hampshire. On January 14
th
,
the coalition held another rally, attended by elected representatives as well as
community leaders. Many carried signs declaring, We Will Not Forsake You
and Keep our Families Together. Rev. Michael Ellick, one of Mr. Montrevils
pastors at Judson Memorial Church, stated: It is outrageous that ICE is trying
to tear this good man from his children at this holiday season. We will not rest
until Jean is released and returned to his family and until immigration agents
stops tearing our families and communities apart. And that was just it,
everyone at the event seemed most distraught that so many families and
communities were being torn apart. The New York Times prominently covered
the event (Semple 2010).
Within a week, they had succeeded in getting Jean Montrevil out of detention.
Jean was back at Judson the following Sunday to sing and tell his story. When
he stood, the church gave him standing ovation. He expressed gratitude to
those who had spoken out for him; conversely, he voiced concern for earthquake
survivors in Haiti and the other twenty-six immigrants still detained in the
detention center in York Pennsylvania who lacked the support system he had. It
is hard to imagine ICE was aware of how well connected he was when they
sought to detain him.
Much of the work of Montrevil and his supporters highlights themes which help
pull together the kind of coordinated campaign Schulman describes. These
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include: 1) A clear demand Set Jean Free, Keep Families Together, 2)
Research on Jeans situation to frame the action, 3) A mobilization strategy
which began at the Judson Church with the news of Jeans arrest, and included
multiple meetings to bring together stakeholders from across the city, 4) Direct
action, including the civil disobedience on January 5
th
, 2010, 5) A media
strategy, which used the direct action mobilization story to propel Jeans story
from local news coverage onto the national stage, 6) A short and long term legal
strategy, linking Jeans release to a reform of the immigration laws, and 7)
finally a little fun, play, and culture, including Dan Zanes lament, as well as the
Freedom Songs such as We Shall Not Be Moved. Direct action does tend to get
results, yet none of the fast work of the campaign would have been possible if
Jean was not part of an expansive community.
Much of the challenge for todays organizers is about connecting individual
experiences and stories with broader social forces and networks as Montrevils
supporters were able to do. And certainly organizing efforts must do more than
manage poverty while leaving current oppressive structures in place. But, we
cannot overlook everyday injustices either. While the social worker in me wants
to address the bleeding, the organizer wants to support a paradigm shift toward
a more systemic approach. Community psychologist Bill Oswald suggests one
strategy for addressing the endemic inequalities Harvey describes. It involves
imagining a three legged stool, in which each leg represents an approach with
which to intervene: 1) remediation in which we fix what is immediately broken,
2) amelioration in which we address the root cause of what is going on, and
finally 3) capacity building in which we help strengthen networks of people and
communities. This is the shift from managing poverty to challenging the social
conditions which create the harm (Totten 2008). After, all, between now and
the anti-capitalist future Harvey anticipates, there is a great deal of work to be
done.
For Harvey, social change takes shape through the dialectical unfolding of
relations between seven moments within the body politic of capitalism viewed
as an ensemble or assemblage of activities and practices. These include: a)
technological and organizational forms of production, b) relations to nature,
c) social relations between people, d) mental conceptions of the world, e)
labor processes and production, f ) institutional, legal and governmental
arrangements, and g) the conduct of daily life that underpins social
reproduction. Many of these dynamics can be found within current
movements for change. Change arises, of course, out of an existing state of
affairs and it has to harness the possibilities immanent within an existing
situation, Harvey argues. The organizing around the Montrevils case is just
one of many such current situations in which organizers have taken an issue and
turned into this a broad campaign for change.
Like Marx before him, Harvey has done a striking job at describing what is
wrong; what seems to be missing is a link between his critique with a feasible
strategy toward action and a coherent approach toward capacity building. In
this, every organizer could do more. And much of this begins with organizing
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for power, to build networks which sustain those on fault lines such as
Montrevil and many others, and finally to support alternative models of mutual
aid and care. While Harvey concludes that Another Communism is Possible I
would argue we would be better served by looking at what activists and
organizers are building on the ground. What models have become outmoded?
What best practices can be expanded? Through such questions and
considerations, we get to where the real action is at in between theory and
activist practice.

I would like to thank Steve Duncombe, James Tracey, and Lesley Wood for
their thoughtful feedback and suggestions for this essay.

References
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Semple, Kirk. 2010. Demonstrators Press for Haitian Advocates Release. New
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If I Cant Dance, Its Not My Revolution. New York: Routledge.
Story, Louise et al. 2010. "Wall Street Helped To Mask Debts Shaking Europe,
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About the author
Benjamin Shepard, PhD, is an assistant professor at New York City College of
Technology/ City University of New York. He is the author/ editor of six books
including Queer Politics and Political Performance: Play, Pleasure and Social
Movement (Routledge 2010). His writing can be found at
http://www.benjaminheimshepard.com/

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