Radical Politics in the Age of American Authoritarianism: Connecting the Dots

[Jefferson23]

To make an effective social movement against authoritarianism, the discourse of all social issues in a political setting must be taught.

By Henry Giroux | April 18, 2016



The United States stands at the endpoint of a long series of attacks on democracy, and the choices faced by many in the US today point to the divide between those who are, and those who are not, willing to commit to democracy. Debates over whether Donald Trump is a fascist are a tactical diversion because the real issue is what it will take to prevent the United States from sliding further into a distinctive form of authoritarianism.

The willingness of contemporary politicians and pundits to use totalitarian themes echoes alarmingly fascist and totalitarian elements of the past. This willingness also prefigures the emergence of a distinctive mode of authoritarianism that threatens to further foreclose venues for social justice and civil rights. The need for resistance has become urgent. The struggle is not over specific institutions such as higher education or so-called democratic procedures such as elections but over what it means to get to the root of the problems facing the United States and to draw more people into subversive actions modeled after both historical struggles from the days of the underground railroad and contemporary movements for economic, social and environmental justice.


If progressives are to join in the fight against authoritarianism in the United States, we all need to connect issues.

Yet, such struggles will only succeed if more progressives embrace an expansive understanding of politics, not fixating singularly on elections or any other issue but rather emphasizing the connections among diverse social movements. An expansive understanding such as this necessarily links the calls for a living wage and environment justice to calls for access to quality health care and the elimination of the conditions fostering assaults by the state against black people, immigrants, workers and women. The movement against mass incarceration and capital punishment cannot be separated from a movement for racial justice, full employment, free, quality health care and housing. Such analyses also suggest the merging of labor unions and social movements and the development of progressive cultural apparatuses such as alternative media, think tanks and social services for those marginalized by race, class and ethnicity. These alternative apparatuses must also embrace those who are angry with existing political parties and casino capitalism but who lack a critical frame of reference for understanding the conditions for their anger.

What is imperative in rethinking the space of the political is the need to reach across specific identities and stop mobilizing exclusively around single-issue movements and their specific agendas. As the Fifteenth Street Manifesto Group expressed in its 2008 piece, “Left Turn: An Open Letter to US Radicals,” many groups on the left would grow stronger if they were to “perceive and refocus their struggles as part of a larger movement for social transformation.” Our political agenda must merge the pedagogical and the political by employing a language and mode of analysis that resonates with people’s needs while making social change a crucial element of the political and public imagination. At the same time, any politics that is going to take real change seriously must be highly critical of any reformist politics that does not include both a change of consciousness and structural change.

in full: http://billmoyers.com/story/radical-politics-in-the-age-of-american-authoritarianism-connecting-the-dots/

[ChisolmTrailDem]

1. There will be no change with Hillary as president, the Empire will endure...

vimeo.com/163178551

[Jefferson23]

2. That is up to her, should she win...a third party may be viable should her leadership

be dismal. I believe her when she says, don't expect much, be "realistic"..as she counts
her money from WS and other special interests..and as she looks to foreign policy.

We'll see, it ain't over yet.

[Hortensis]

9. Nay[sayers don't change anything. You might want to reconsider

redirecting your negativism.

[ChisolmTrailDem]

10. Did you watch the video? nt

[Hortensis]

13. Did you? You seem a little busy for videos.

[merrily]

3. This is not radical, ffs. Radical is blowing up stuff, overthowing the govt 1776

style, not demonstrating for equal rights or a decent minimum wage.

They keep moving the bar for what is "far left" and what is radical to the right. Don't get brainwashed.

[Jefferson23]

4. You feel the author is attempting brainwashing?

If so, not my take on his position..which seems more in line with advocating
for a long term all encompassing approach to reform.

[merrily]

5. Irrelevant. What is radical about what is happening?

Making a personal attack on the author (or anyone) was not my goal. I was trying to make a point.

[Jefferson23]

6. Radical in the sense Americans are standing up against the status quo in record numbers.

Not radical in what they want...the demands are reasonable, health care a right, education
without endless debt etc. Civil rights, a right to feel you won't be tazed to death...all of that
and more.

[merrily]

7. Again, that is not radical.Those are rights established by the constitution in 1789, with the

idea that those rights would be exercised.

[Jefferson23]

8. I think you misunderstand me, the issues are not radical..the means by which people are

pushing back is pretty darn radical. From the perspective of Clinton's campaign run,
I think you would agree she never felt Bernie could pose a threat to her...that he
could rally such opposition...that is the radical part, in that people are saying, enough.

The author is suggesting, I think..build coalitions with broad support, which speaks
to the political movement Sanders has been talking about.

[merrily]

11. Which means are radical? Running for President is not radical. Voting for

a New Deal Democrat is not radical.

[Jefferson23]

12. It is radical to go against the status quo..could you say that word is

dramatizing it a bit? Maybe. But not so if you feel as I do, that Bernie is not
fighting primarily Hillary. His obstacles are an entire system run by the elite,
for the most part...Hillary and many in the DNC being their representatives but
not exclusively. Lots of groups want Bernie to lose, not just WS.