Practical Radicals PDF

P A R T I FOUNDATIONS: VISION, STRATEGY, AND POWER  1 Lineages of Change: Strategies for Underdogs The sun had not yet risen on May 13, 1862, when Robert Smalls navigated a steamboat through Confederate checkpoints. Smalls, bo...

P A R T I FOUNDATIONS: VISION, STRATEGY, AND POWER  1 Lineages of Change: Strategies for Underdogs The sun had not yet risen on May 13, 1862, when Robert Smalls navigated a steamboat through Confederate checkpoints. Smalls, born into slavery in 1839 in Beaufort, South Carolina, raised a white makeshift flag from the boat he and fifteen others had stolen, signaling that they were surrendering themselves to the Union fleet and were therefore free.' Some Americans have heard of Robert Smalls; a Navy ship was even recently renamed for him. But if they have, it's almost always as part of a superficial narrative of the abolition of slavery. They may learn about how the British Parliament abolished the slave trade in 1807, about Bleeding Kansas and the desperate battles of the Civil War, about the Emancipa- tion Proclamation and perhaps the Thirteenth Amendment, but they rarely learn about why these dramatic events happened. This take on history?a highlight reel of culminating events? can be compelling. But it obscures the real story-what these events were a culmination of. Smalls's escape, for example. It wasn't merely a daring adventure. It was part of a much broader strategy: a high-risk, loosely coordinated mass desertion by hundreds of thousands of enslaved people. This "general strike" (in the words of scholar and activist W.E.B. DuBois) played a crucial role  PRACTICAL RADICALS 4 LINEAGES OF CHANGE 5 in breaking the Confederacy during the Civil War? more than any of the Successful underdog movements exemplify two deep truths. First, trans- battles that fill our textbooks.? formational change isn't achieved just because it's morally right. It was And this strike was only one of the wide range of creative strategies that strategy, not merely righteousness, that ended slavery. One of the brilliant people, in an effort that spanned decades and continents, used to disrupt architects of the abolition movement, Frederick Douglass, said in 1857: the economic, ideological, and political foundations of slavery. The interna- "This struggle may be a moral one, or it may be a physical one, and it may be tional movement, with enslaved and formerly enslaved people at the heart, both moral and physical, but it must be a struggle. Power concedes nothing fought to pass laws, boycotted consumer products, rallied in mass meet- without a demand. It never did and it never will."* Douglass sought to dispel ings, petitioned legislatures, marched, engaged in mass public education, the illusion that exposing the evils of slavery would, by itself, overthrow a ran away, took up arms, operated underground railroads, and created a new system that formed the basis of society in the South, generated massive prof- common sense about the evils of slavery. Some of these strategies were legal, its for banks and merchants in the North, paid taxes to governments, and but many were not. Some were pursued in public, while others were neces- provided cheap products to consumers across the globe. sarily clandestine. But the disparate players came together into a movement Douglass's words resonate today. The failures of current systems, from cli- like jazz musicians come together in an ensemble. Many of the core strate- mate change to economic inequality, have been exposed again and again. But gies that organizers and campaigners use today have their origins in the critics and visionaries writing about alternatives often don't say much about multigenerational, multicontinental struggle to end slavery.3 how to achieve change. Vision, as Douglass argued, is never self-executing. Organizers need strategies that chart a path underdogs can travel, from the world as it is to the world as it could be. Why Underdogs Need Strategy Oppressed people need strategy because they lack the raw power of their opponents. We call their opponents the overdogs: those who hold power and maintain (or worsen) the status quo, preventing underdogs from win- ning their demands, whether they're big landlords kicking people out of their homes, state legislators denying voting rights, or corporations keep- ing workers in poverty.' Overdogs don't just have raw power; they also have strategy-and they need it because they are vastly outnumbered. In fact, most books about strategy-from Machiavelli's The Prince to Henry Kiss- inger's World Order-are written by and for overdogs so they can maintain and extend their rule. There are schools and industries devoted to training elites: business schools, military academies, union-busting firms, and mas- sive consulting companies like McKinsey and Boston Consulting Group. Underdogs have strategy as well, but the transmission of the diverse lin- Underdogs-those fighting for liberation of the oppressed-have changed eages of their wisdom has too often been interrupted or lost due to state the course of history in monumental ways. They did so not only by pro- repression and violent attacks (particularly against Black freedom move- claiming their critiques and visions-though that was important-but also ments), through moral panics like the Red Scare purges, and through the by organizing people to counter the power of wealth and repression. genocide of Indigenous people. Many in the U.S. Left have been skeptical  PRACTICAL RADICALS 6 LINEAGES OF CHANGE 7 of the need for reflection, study, and training. And just like we saw with the depend on each other for success. For example, disruptive, raucous move- Civil War, strategy can seem less interesting than culminating events, and ments in the 1960s weren't distractions from the "real" work of building the events are certainly easier to teach. Martin Luther King Jr's "I Have a mass organization as Alinsky argued ?they were essential fuel for the explo- Dream" speech is far more dramatic, and easier to explain, than the decades sive growth of racial justice and community organizations. This was also the of work that put him on that stage at that moment. As a result, many orga- case in the Great Depression of the 1930s, as mass movements of workers nizers arrive at this work animated with passion to correct injustice, but and unemployed people protested and spurred labor law reform and mas- with limited access to the immense library of experience that could help sive relief programs, while flooding old unions and founding new ones. And them respond to today's challenges. the reverse is true too: disruptive social movements that may seem to burst There are great underdog books available as more writers and organiz- on the scene spontaneously often arise out of patient organizing work over ers, like adrienne maree brown, Mark and Paul Engler, Lisa Fithian, Alicia many years. Garza, Steve Phillips, Jonathan Smucker, and others, have put their wisdom Ella Baker, a legendary organizer in the civil rights movement, famously into writing. But some of the classic books about organizing and strategy for challenged the NAACP's top-down approach to change and instead pro- underdogs are focused on only one tradition, and at times are contemptuous moted a strategy of base-building in the South. This turn toward commu- of the ways others go about making change. The iconic book about under- nity organizing was a consequential decision that laid the groundwork for dog strategy, Saul Alinsky's Rules for Radicals, was written over five decades vibrant movements to emerge in the late 1950s and 1960s. She spent decades ago. Alinsky urged social change practitioners to be pragmatic rather than identifying and training grassroots leaders in the South, long before national visionary: to avoid discussion of ideology, electoral politics, and coalitions. attention focused on civil rights in the 1960s. This behind-the-scenes work We respect Alinsky's contributions, which still have much to teach us. But isn't as exciting as mass mobilizations or strikes, and it isn't usually done by based on our decades of experience working in movements, we believe good the charismatic leaders we see on TV, but it's the lifeblood of social change. strategists will need to reject much of his rigid doctrine and borrow from Baker wrote regularly of this kind of work as she traveled the South in the a wide variety of other traditions. This goes against the grain of how social 1940s: "I must leave now for one of those small church night meetings which change is typically taught in the United States. By temperament or train- are usually more exhausting than the immediate returns warrant, but it's ing, many experienced activists tend to be devotees of particular schools of part of the spade work so let it be." There are cycles for social movements- thought and practice. And many of the younger organizers we meet have like the movements in a symphony or concerto, not everything can be a had mostly haphazard, ad hoc training that covers only narrow terrain. This crescendo. A lot happens in the quieter, slower parts of a piece of music that brings us to the second truth about how change happens: a combination of sets the stage for the climax. strategies is needed to win. The civil rights movement's breakthroughs depended on slow, patient organizing and dramatic actions, like the lunch counter sit-ins. It relied on working with legislators, registering voters, and sharing powerful images to It Takes Multiple, Aligned Strategies make moral claims. No single strategy alone would have worked. And dif- to Win Transformational Change ferent moments in history call for specific combinations of methods. Good There is no single best approach to strategy, and in fact transformational underdog strategists can sense when it's time to shift from spadework in the change requires a mixture of creative strategies, working together harmo- hard times to fanning the flames of disruption when conditions are ripe, as niously. But more than that, practitioners in different traditions actually Ella Baker did.  8 PRACTICAL RADICALS LINEAGES OF CHANGE 9 You need a variety of strategies to win social change, but what people do ment and less of that one? For instance, is there too much electoral work and to change the world for the better is not equally strategic at all times. Musi- not enough disruption? cians rely on a diversity of notes, tempos, dynamics, and timbres, but they Many successful movements and organizers intuitively learn to combine make choices-and so too must organizers. Organizers need methods to notes in novel ways in response to changing circumstances. But most people assess the relative strengths and weaknesses of different strategies in specific play instruments better with training. This book aims to give practitioners contexts. Strategy isn't just a matter of personal preference. Transformation- access to a broad repertoire so they can compose the right melodies and al change doesn't happen by accident. harmonies for movements- to construct and participate in "meta-strategy." Imagining the span of change across decades rather than campaign cycles means a shift of mindset. It requires a long-term vision, an analysis of the Seven Strategy Models historical moment (conjuncture), and a strategy that bridges them. Your for Transformational Change vision must be clear-you can't organize toward a world you can't imagine, or only against the current system. It requires soberly assessing the state of Underdogs can draw on seven lineages of strategy and combine them in new struggle between different social forces, the "common sense" of the times, ways based on their assessment of power and the moment. and where there are openings for change. Lastly, it requires creative strate- The first model we discuss in the book is base-building.' The idea is that gies that build a bridge from the world as it is to the world as it could be. to win anything, you need to organize people, often one by one, door by In this book, we describe seven strategy models that underdogs use as door, co-worker by co-worker, and to develop strong bonds and leadership bridges, based on patterns and rhythms we have identified that repeat across capacity. When people come together in mass organizations, they have the time and place. Each of the strategies depends on the power available to power of numbers and solidarity to win concessions from overdogs. We underdogs. We'll describe six forms of power and explain how they shape include two chapters about base-building, one focused on community orga- strategy. Each form of power can be thought of as an instrument, and each nizing and one on unions, because we believe that base-building is the key strategy model, a note on the musical scale. Musicians play melodies by note for all strategies for social change. Base-building by community groups stringing together multiple notes. When other musicians are added, the and unions is the dominant model used by U.S. underdogs, so it's crucial music becomes even more multidimensional and compelling. Strategies can to understand the strengths and limitations of the forms we've inherited be combined-harmonized-when organizers draw from different models, and how they must evolve to meet today's challenges. Chapters 6.1 and such as when Black public-sector workers unionized in the 1960s and 1970s 6.2 tell the stories of the community organization Make the Road NY and by drawing from both base-building labor organizing and the disruptive labor union St. Paul Federation of Educators and show how each used base- power of the civil rights movement. building to build powerful member-led organizations. The complexity of transformational change can be frustrating. The The second strategy model is disruptive movements. Disruption is not impulse to teach or practice a single strategy is understandable.® And usu- the same as noisy protests, which might not have an impact. Disruption is ally people do have to learn one craft before they can innovate and synthe- the ability to stop those in power from doing what they want to do and to size elements of others. But acknowledging the multiple, intersecting, and break up the status quo?in short, the "power to wound."! Unions strike (ideally) reinforcing paths to change can be liberating. Organizers can find and stop production; if the workers can't be replaced, the employer will ways to appreciate and synchronize different contributions and to ask, from eventually need to cave in order to start production again." Disruption can the perspective of a whole piece of music, do we need more of this instru- occur outside the workplace as people come together to block streets, stop  PRACTICAL RADICALS 10 LINEAGES OF CHANGE 11 key meetings from happening, fill jails, or push the system past capacity in example, labor unions and community groups can work together to pass other ways. In Chapter 7, we describe how working-class Black women used higher minimum wages in city and state legislatures, using inside relation- disruptive power to expand the welfare system in the 1960s. ships with supportive legislators as well as outside tactics, such as marches, A third strategy is ideological. Narrative shift is about winning hearts rallies, petitions, op-eds, and voter drives, to pressure legislators to pass the and minds and support for your vision. In this context, narrative means "a bill. Inside-outside campaigns rely on multiple forms of power and in this Big Story, rooted in shared values and common themes, that influences how way are a hybrid model that builds on other strategies. In Chapter 10 we audiences process information and make decisions."12 We focus on narra- describe how the Chicago Fight for $15 and a Union campaign was able to tive shift strategies that are grounded in organizing and that use popular win a major wage increase from an anti-union mayor. education, creative actions, periodicals, theory, literature, movies, music, Another hybrid is the momentum model, in which organizers combine and more to influence the ways in which people make sense of society. It's mass protest with narrative change. Momentum-driven campaigns seek to more than a savvy media campaign: narrative work must be based on peo- change the political weather-to expand what's possible to win by chang- ple's lived experiences, speak to their identity, and tell a story that explains ing the "common sense" on a particular issue. Organizers seek out polar- the past and provides a path to the future. Occupy Wall Street (Chapter 8) izing fights that attract a passionate minority of intense supporters and is an example of how large numbers of people were able to change the nar- build a majority of passive support for the cause among the mass public. The rative on inequality. internet and social media are crucial tools that allow momentum-driven A fourth strategy is electoral change. Organizations endorse candidates campaigns to grow quickly. Organizers build campaigns that can absorb or run their own, develop platforms, pursue get-out-the-vote efforts, and large numbers of new people and use mass training to frontload a shared attempt to win the power to govern. In many countries, Left political par- set of values, cultural norms, demands, and brands at the beginning of a ties that unite diverse movements have been a principal strategy for social campaign. The model features "distributed organizing"-action driven by change. While that has been less true in the United States, progressive insur- thousands of volunteers, supported but not controlled by a movement hub. gents have challenged the Democratic Party and devoted more attention to Campaigns win by undermining institutional pillars that hold up a social winning elections to prevent authoritarian Republicans from capturing consensus or by delegitimizing them, just as 350.org has done in its climate the government. We focus on a few organizations that are building power change work (Chapter 11). through year-round organizing using a variety of approaches, including Finally, we describe collective care as a strategy model. While care? the New Georgia Project, California Calls, and the Working Families Party meeting people's basic needs for food, health, emotional support, or (Chapter 9). community-is part of everyone's daily lives, we highlight how caring for While electoral strategies focus on winning the power to govern, an one another can be about more than survival; it can be strategic. When inside-outside campaign strategy allows organizations to win major policy organizations prioritize collective care, they enable people to take risks, pool reform by working "inside" in alliance with sympathetic legislators, but also resources, stick with a movement for the long term, and build the capacity to building "outside"pressure through grassroots organizing. "Inside-outside" organize. When systems are unresponsive and underdogs face urgent needs, can be a way to do a variety of things, such as take control of important collective care can be a powerful antidote to despair, change people's sense institutions, but in this context, we use it to mean campaigns to win and of their agency and identity, and lay the tracks for challenging those systems. enforce policy. If an organization is powerful enough, it can achieve policy When the AIDS epidemic emerged in the 1980s, the Gay Men's Health Cri- gains on its own, but usually underdogs have to build coalitions to win. For sis formed as a mutual aid network. While providing crucial care to those  12 PRACTICAL RADICALS LINEAGES OF CHANGE 13 with HIV/AIDS, it went beyond basic service-provision and became a hub for them to develop strategies that span years or even decades, and to have for activist strategy and a launching pad for other strategies, including the backup plans in case of failure. more well known, militant direct action group ACT UP (Chapter 12). In this book, we distinguish between strategies from above and strate- Our research led us to some counterintuitive conclusions about the limi- gies from below: between those that benefit from (and seek to protect) the tations, possibilities, and potential futures of each of the strategy models, status quo and those that challenge it. We use the terms Left or progressive and about how they can be combined to meet this historical moment, which to refer to those people and groups fighting to end systems of oppression we discuss in the conclusion. And we find that transformational change that keep underdogs down. We use them interchangeably in the book even requires all seven models. Robert Smalls used most of these strategies. After though in reality sometimes people make distinctions between them, par- escaping slavery, Smalls continued his work advocating on behalf of Black ticularly to distinguish a sharper critique of capitalism on the Left. We use equality. He went on a speaking tour to raise funds for the Union and he the term liberal to describe those who fight for incremental reform without petitioned the Secretary of War to allow Black soldiers and sailors to enlist challenging power relations in society. Conversely, we use Right to refer to and personally helped recruit over five thousand of the Black volunteers. those people and groups who hold conservative views that either uphold After the war, Smalls bought the plantation where he and his mother had systems of oppression or refuse to acknowledge that those systems exist. been enslaved for his family to live on as free people. He eventually became a Not all top-down strategies are Right-wing, and not all bottom-up strate- congressman and served until the end of Reconstruction. The arc of Smalls's gies are Left-wing. By strategies from above, we mean situations where a life shows how the abolition of slavery was won, with different strategies relatively small number of actors (say, the billionaire Koch brothers and emphasized at different times.* Today, most practitioners are trained in at their network of Right-wing funders) orchestrate big changes-by start- best a few approaches, without guidance on how they might be harmonized. ing new organizations to shape worldviews, elect politicians, or pass laws. Strategists need to learn from other traditions. As trumpeter Don Cherry By strategies from below, we mean decentralized efforts that engage thou- observed, "When people believe in boundaries, they become part of them."13 sands or even millions of people whose decisions contribute to an overall outcome, such as the decisions of enslaved people, workers, people of faith, and others to challenge slavery across continents. Most social change efforts Unfortunately, Overdogs Strategize Too don't fall neatly into either category. Most movements from below have Overdogs use strategy too. And their commitment to long-term strategy has leaders-people like Harriet Tubman, Toussaint L'Ouverture, Frederick helped them win a lot. But because they command vast armies, immense Douglass, and William Wilberforce (who was influential precisely because wealth, the machinery of the state, and most of the media-advantages he was wealthy and powerful). And they have organizations that direct underdogs lack-their strategies are different. And overdogs don't con- strategy, like the Quakers and the New England Anti-Slavery Society in the front daily emergencies arising from systems of oppression, so it's easier 1800s, or unions and community groups today, which include large num- bers of organized members, but also can be hierarchical in their internal * While many transformational movements have elements of violence, such as the armed structures and decision making. revolt in Haiti, our focus is on nonviolent strategies. There are other strategies underdogs And while it's easy-and not entirely wrong-to view Right-wing move- have used over the years that we've left out. For example, we cover ways in which cam- ments as fake or manufactured, Right-wing politics do have a genuine mass paigns have used legal and communications strategies and tactics, but we don't include efforts that are wholly legal or communications focused; instead, we focus on organizing constituency. The authoritarian movement supporting Donald Trump isn't people in large numbers. staged or managed from Mar-a-Lago. There are tens of thousands of people  14 PRACTICAL RADICALS LINEAGES OF CHANGE 15 who enthusiastically work to take over school boards, to pass policy against In general, overdogsgreater resources-and the nature of the authori- critical race theory, and to harass and threaten violence against election tarian personality-allow them to impose discipline and hierarchy, like officials. Similarly, successes in the anti-abortion movement relied at least conductors directing orchestras, which is both their strength and their in part on disruption, narrative change, and long-term grassroots mobili- weakness. By contrast, underdog movements are often more improvisation- zation by religious and other anti-abortion groups. Taking this grassroots al and less hierarchical, like jazz ensembles. Jazz demands intense dedica- component of Right-wing strategy seriously is crucial to understanding how tion and deep cooperation-if musicians all sharing the same space each to counter it. did their own thing, the result would be a painful cacophony. Instead, the We believe that multiple systems of oppression keep humans from reach- jazz musician listens to others and adapts. Each musician plays a role, but ing their full potential and liberation. These systems, which include racial, together they are more than the sum of their parts. While there is a role for gender, and class hierarchies, have existed since long before the country was conductors in underdog strategy, transformational democratic social justice founded. The goal of underdog movements is to end these systems. We use won't come from a single person or strategy, but rather from a variety of racial capitalism to describe the U.S. economic and political system, which players improvising strategies in harmony. is biased in favor of overdogs. But those biases don't mean that underdogs Practical radicals (see Chapter 2) should devote time and resources to can't fight and win. There are contradictions and cracks in the system, and training strategists to build a bridge between the world as it is and the world overdogs and underdogs have always fought to shape the character of the as it could be, with an emphasis on developing leadership roles for those system. In the 1930s, underdogs won important victories that led to a period on the front lines of systems of oppression. It will take a combination of of managed capitalism that shifted power in their favor. the seven strategy models, making use of different forms of power, to win Overdogs fought back, deploying intersecting strategies over decades to transformational change. Organizers should learn from unfamiliar under- bring about racial neoliberalism as the reigning economic and social para- dog traditions of strategy and find ways to harmonize with one another to digm. Racial neoliberalism is a specific form of racial capitalism based on meet the challenges of our time. the idea that governments should exist primarily to enforce social control and white supremacy and help employers and investors maximize profit. It Book Overview emphasizes individual responsibility, arguing that racism is simply a matter of individual attitudes.l5 We explore the case of racial neoliberalism as an Readers can pick and choose any order they'd like to follow in the book. example of overdog strategy in greater depth in Chapter 5, and we consider Part I focuses on the theory that grounds the seven models, including the six the distinctive elements of overdog strategy in business, politics, and the forms of power, and how strategy should start with an analysis of the world military-some of which we can learn from and apply?in Chapter 16. as it is and a vision of the future world as it should be. While they have developed sophisticated strategies, overdogs are not Part II presents the seven models of social change, including case studies invincible. They can be slow-moving and, convinced of their own invul. of each. We explore the roles of emotion, spirit, and identity in fueling social nerability, often fail to take the opposition seriously until it's too late. Their change in many of the models and consider how passion and commitment privileged vantage point can make it hard for them to see reality clearly. By can enable underdogs to overcome what seem to be insurmountable odds. contrast, oppressed people often must be sensitive to their surroundings just We end Part Il with a look at how underdogs used the seven models of strat- to survive. This can help them understand the psychology of their oppres- egy and six forms of power to end slavery in the eighteenth and nineteenth sors, a crucial asset. centuries.  16 PRACTICAL RADICALS In Part III, we explore sources of innovation and challenges for strategy development. We provide insights on how to diagnose and overcome inter- nal conflict in movements, and how underdogs can become better strate- gists. We explain common strategies used by overdogs, assess which of their methods underdogs can ethically use, and explore the crucial role of time in 2 transformational change. We end the book with reflections on the future of the seven models and You Can't Build What You Can't how to apply our framework to the work ahead. We aren't merely diagnos- Imagine: The Role of Vision in ing or chronicling. We share ideas for how to build more powerful, united, Transformational Change and effective movements at a crucial moment in history when the dominant paradigm of racial neoliberalism may be crumbling but what comes next is not yet decided. We offer discussion prompts and tools, like worksheets and exercises, at the end of most chapters. The tools are templates that can be adapted to any campaign or movement. Our students often find the tools to be their favor- ite part of our class. We hope that a deeper understanding of the diversity We ask our students to read two pieces that exemplify good strategy; they of methods and tools can help underdogs win some of the historic fights of come from opposite sides of the political spectrum. On the Right, future these times? for democracy, for justice, against authoritarianism, and for Supreme Court justice Lewis Powell wrote the infamous "Powell memoran- the future of humans on this planet. dum" as a call to arms for the U.S. Chamber of Commerce in 1971. He laid Isaiah Berlin, in his essay "The Hedgehog and the Fox," argued that some out a plan to capture key institutions such as the media and universities writers and thinkers repeat the same formula over and over, while others do to reverse the spread of radical ideas that challenged capitalism and white something radically different each time. As the saying goes: "A fox knows supremacy. On the Left, Marxist revolutionary V.I. Lenin wrote "Left-Wing many things, but a hedgehog knows one big thing."' We think the complex- Communism: An Infantile Disorder" in 1920. He argued for the necessity ity of the world we live in requires more foxes? practitioners who can range of alliances to achieve change and criticized purist colleagues who hoped across a large terrain, borrow from different traditions, and mash up old that they could will a socialist society into being without making political elements into new winning strategies. We still need hedgehogs, but this is a compromises along the way. book for crafty foxes. Powell and Lenin have nothing in common politically, but both are icy in their critique of sloppy thinking and are ruthless about winning. They weave three elements together that are usually handled separately: a sober analysis of the world as it is (what we and others call the conjuncture), a bold long-term vision for the world as it could be, and rigorous strategy to get from here to there. We've worked with organizers who dismiss long-range vision, arguing that the tasks at hand are too urgent to divert precious energy to fantasies.  18 PRACTICAL RADICALS YOU CAN'T BUILD WHAT YOU CAN'T IMAGINE 19 And we've been in gatherings where Leftists weren't willing to grapple hon- tunistically overestimate the danger posed by Hitler-fascism." The Social estly with the limits of our power, preferring to criticize others for any devi- Democrats had made equally disastrous calculations in the 1910s when they ation from a pure "line" rather than develop a strategy to win. Both of these decided to abandon an international worker's movement and align with tendencies-we call them pragmatism and utopianism - can be destructive, German employers in WWI. The Left's failure to soberly assess the threat cause brutal conflict among potential allies, and lead to failure. The follow- and make necessary alliances proved catastrophic. ing examples illustrate the perils of losing sight of vision or strategy. In this book, we highlight practical radicals who avoided the pitfalls of Given his roots in c o m - pragmatism and utopianism by combining rigorous analysis, broad social munity organizing, some vision, and sophisticated strategy.' Practical radicals embrace the inevitable progressives thought Barack tension between the hard realities of the world as it is and the dreams of Obama would be a movement liberation embodied in their vision of the world as it should be. This space is president. They were mistaken. where they do their finest work.* Below, we explore vision and the concept Obama often invoked move- of conjunctures. ments of the past-he cited "Seneca Falls, and Selma, and You Can't Build What You Can't Imagine: Stonewall" in his second inau- The Role of Vision gural address, for example. But UTOPIAN PRAGMATIC he took the status quo mostly The British cultural theorist Stuart Hall explains that vision should be as a given and didn't priori- grounded in what he calls root ideas. These are not only utopian dreams tize changing the rules of the game, such as voting rights and labor law or programmatic demands, but also basic understandings of how the world and immigration reform. His administration took the side of bankers in operates, and how humans should live, who we should love, and how we the foreclosure crisis that stripped working-class people, especially people should approach work and leisure. Root ideas also address the important of color, of wealth. Like many Democrats, he was a pragmatist who sought question: What do "the people" want? Based on these root ideas, movements incremental reforms that could be achieved without stepping on entrenched and political parties tell stories of the society we should build, of the villains interests' toes. The failures of the Obama era to deliver for people in the who block our progress, of our history and travails, and of who is legiti- wake of the Great Recession helped create the conditions for Donald Trump mately part of "the people." In recent decades, Right-wing forces have been and for an authoritarian movement to grow.' better than liberals and Leftists at casting a vision of the future that con- On the other hand, history is filled with stories of Leftists who failed to nects to lived experience. accurately assess their current conditions, rejecting a pragmatic path that Hall grappled with the rise of the Right and Margaret Thatcher's Conser- would have better enabled them to achieve strategic goals. An extreme vative Party in the United Kingdom in the 1970s and 1980s. He explained example was the German Communist Party (KPD) in the 1930s. Rath- how Thatcherism assembled ideas about law and order, the traditional fam- er than building an alliance with other parties to defeat Hitler, the KPD ily, personal responsibility, and British nationalism and identity that spoke identified the Social Democrats as their leading enemy because they alleg- to many British people. In contrast, the Labour Party offered detailed policy edly deceived workers with pseudo-socialist rhetoric. This led the head of plans, such as how to reform the National Health Service, without project- the KPD to declare: "Nothing could be more fatal for us than to oppor- ing a moral vision. This problem persists. In recent years, Right-wingers in  20 PRACTICAL RADICALS YOU CAN'T BUILD WHAT YOU CAN'T IMAGINE 21 the United States have combined white nationalism, nativism, patriarchy, Vision is not only about the future. It involves telling a story about the law and order, and a "you're on your own" ethic into a popular program past. Hall argued that the Labour Party had lost a sense of history and, as a that?in the absence of an alternative-has enabled them to assemble a for- result, could not provide people a coherent narrative about where the British midable coalition. Meanwhile, the Democratic Party proposed a laundry list people came from. Today's battles over school curricula are manifestations of policies without a story about the society they sought to build. There were of this struggle. The civil rights movement of the 1960s and 1970s achieved many disparate notes, but no coherent song. many victories, including new scholarship telling a more accurate story In 2021, Deepak discussed President Joe Biden's proposed American Res- of U.S. history, which was then incorporated into many school textbooks. cue Plan legislation (which included some shockingly big ideas) with the stu- Conservatives fought back-passing laws to exclude entire portions of his- dents in his social policy class. His students followed the news but couldn't tory from school curriculum-to challenge a history that threatened their make heads or tails of the bill. They were predisposed to think it was bet- distorted view of reality. If they aren't stopped, they will shape not only how ter than what Trump had done, but what was the core idea tying all these we talk about our history, but also how we dream of our future. policies together? Who were they in the story, and who were the villains? Root ideas also involve an articulation of the "we"; who is the imagined Similarly, his students met the arrival of child tax credit checks in their bank community that works together to reach the promised land? Hall argues accounts not with joy, relief, or gratitude, but with suspicion. It's not surpris- that the British Labour Party failed in part because it was stuck in an old ing that working-class people, especially people of color who've experienced conception of the working class that ignored the vibrancy of the women's, abuse at the hands of the government, asked: "What's the catch?" No one Black, immigrant, and LGBTQ+ movements. In contrast, Trump's politics had given them a story to make sense of the policy, so they interpreted it mobilized a clear sense of the "we." He invoked a besieged white popula- through the lens of their lived experience. tion that would be swamped by people of color in a "great replacement." It's not just the Democratic Party that gets lost in policy to the detri- His policies? the border wall, clamping down on immigration, attacks on ment of vision. Some parts of the progressive movement focus exclusively China-flowed from the vision. Progressives must develop a coherent and on single issues or policies, which makes it challenging to build support robust story of "we" that is broad enough to include all oppressed groups for transformational change. If they aspire to assemble a majority coalition, (which, in our current winner-take-all economy, is most of the population) Left political insurgencies must work across issues and speak to different without losing the specificity of their histories and needs. A new Left nar- constituencies. One vivid example is the Bernie Sanders presidential cam- rative will need to tell a story of the linked fate of this new multiracial "we," paign, which achieved improbable momentum in 2016 in part because of not only in opposition to the Right's white nationalism, but as protagonists great grassroots organizing, but also because Sanders offered more than a coming together to shape the future. laundry list of policies. He offered a critique that named the villains: corpo- rations and the billionaires and millionaires who were responsible for and Where Does Vision Come From? profited from the struggles of working people. The heroes in his story were everyday Americans who could create a better world by working together. Spirituality is a taproot for visions of a new society. Buen vivir derives from And he painted a picture of a society in which wealth is shared rather than Indigenous traditions that emphasize the interconnection and sacredness hoarded, in which people cooperate rather than compete. This contrasted of all life. And every religion has traditions that prioritize social justice. with Hillary Clinton's campaign, which was long on policy proposals and The Black church is a crucial source of power, inspiration, and vision for its short on vision. members. Quakers have been disproportionately involved in struggles for 22 PRACTICAL RADICALS YOU CAN'T BUILD WHAT YOU CAN'T IMAGINE 23 Box 2.1: Two Visions: adopted the "Mother Earth" law, a multipronged approach Black Liberation and Buen Vivir to climate change that looks to protect humans and nature. Researchers have developed new indicators to measure The long tradition of Black radical imagination contin- the health of a country. Rather than prioritizing growth rates ues today? Black freedom dreams of exodus during or stock market values, buen vivir considers measures of slavery and its aftermath "represented dreams of black good collective living, from democracy to biodiversity. This self-determination," writes scholar Robin D.G. Kelley.® not only guides a vision of a better world but helps inform k Freedom dreams, shared through stories, art, and theory, strategy by giving us better information about the world as provided a north star and connection to pathways for it is. action, such as the Underground Railroad, Decades later, the Black Panther Party's first point in its ten-point pro- gram of 1966 declared: "We want freedom."° The party put its vision into practice through collective-care initiatives social justice, including abolition and peace. And liberation theology has like the Free Breakfast program, which fed thousands of inspired people throughout Latin America. Tikkun Olam-"repairing the children around the country and represented Black self- world"? motivates activism in Jewish traditions, while a long progressive determination and community survival. lineage of thought and practice in Islam emphasizes the radical equality In the modern movement for abolition, organizer Mari- of all humans and their duty to stand for justice. But spirituality doesn't ame Kaba has inspired many to dream not only of a world have to come from organized religion to animate vision. Many people find without prisons, but also of an entirely different society. the sacred through a connection to nature-giving greater meaning to their She writes, "It's time for a jailbreak of the imagination in environmental activism. And even secular philosophies, like socialism or order to make the impossible possible."10 human rights, can be practiced with rituals that foster a sense of purpose Vision also plays an important role in the concept of and give struggles a transcendent meaning. For many, vision is rooted in buen vivir, or "living well," which has been growing in ties to community, place, and lineage. South America for the past few decades. Buen vivir is an Crucially, vision isn't an escape from reality. It's born of real-world strug- idea, vision, and ethical orientation based on Indigenous gle.12 The best organizers are constantly listening and observing, helping practice in the Andes and reflects how collective living can benefit people and the environment. Buen vivir puts people build imagination out of their daily struggles. Vision is developed human and ecological life at the center, rather than eco- by people who are working to change the world in conversation with each nomic development and profit. 11 other, their ancestors, and their descendants. The ethics of buen vivir have been put into practice in several places. Ecuador and Bolivia have included the North Stars and Freedom Dreams concept in their constitutions and require the state to The term north star has many origins, including among enslaved people, seek ecological balance in economic planning. Bolivia has who invoked it to signify the path to freedom. As our colleague Reverend Edwin Robinson says, "our enslaved ancestors weren't always clear about  "1. 24 PRACTICAL RADICALS YOU CAN'T BUILD WHAT YOU CAN'T IMAGINE 25 what freedom land looked like, but they knew it wasn't where they were, and and an opportunity: how to connect it all into a compelling vision of a new following the North Star would get them there."3 Today, proposals like the society. Green New Deal are north stars that lead us toward the vision of a sustain- able planet. With a north star, organizers can develop a long-term strategy Shared Values Guide Strategy and better prepare for hazards that may knock them off course. Political upheaval, natural disasters, and war can force detours on the path toward Many organizers approach vision by engaging people in discussions of val- liberation. It may be necessary to make temporary alliances and compro- ues. Shared values can act as connective tissue to bring people and ideas mises along the way. together. For example, in 2008, when Deepak was executive director of The vision for a different world doesn't have to be a blueprint describing Community Change, the organization convened the "Campaign for Com- every detail of an alternative future.* In fact, creating a blueprint might not munity Values," an unusual coalition of grassroots groups working with be possible without first developing new capabilities in a more just society. different constituencies and issues under the frame of "linked fate."? They Current society has socialized and trained people in harmful and destruc- believed that underneath all progressive issues lies a foundational value of tive behaviors that will need to be unlearned. The project of building a more interdependence, that we depend on cooperation rather than competition just society should include future generations, so we need to leave space for and on community instead of individual effort alone. The campaign con- their input too. This framework is exemplified by the Haudenosaunee prin- nected groups and leaders working on immigration, poverty, and racial jus- ciple that you should consider the impact your actions will have seven gen- tice, and it helped people see themselves in each other through the lens of erations into the future. IS shared values. The coalition organized a presidential debate in Iowa, during The north star and vision don't have to be a complete overhaul of racial a blizzard, with two thousand grassroots low-income leaders. All the major capitalism. It might be a smaller goal for a particular campaign. For exam- Democratic candidates for president came and took questions from the ple, in 2006, Stephanie helped her faculty and librarian union found the audience. Shared values changed how people spoke about their issues and Public Higher Education Network of Massachusetts (PHENOM) to push for the connections they made with others. Deepak was moved by how white a dramatic expansion in public higher education across the state, including rural farmers connected their own experience of struggle to that of undocu- demands for free and accessible higher education, fully staffed universities mented workers. Both were harmed by the same set of U.S. trade policies. and colleges, and democratic control of higher education. These demands These shared stories forged a new sense of "we." were the vision that organizers knew would take years to win. Working Conversations about values can be an organizing tool. People who might with a long-term vision of "free higher ed," PHENOM developed short-term not agree on specific policy, or who identify with particular political labels, north star demands of free community college, more faculty, smaller class may find common ground on values, such as solidarity or democracy. This sizes, and adjunct pay increases-and subsequently won notable gains. requires discussion and education, since not everyone shares the same We live in a golden age of freedom dreams. Movements have developed understanding of these concepts, and values can mean different things over new north stars over the last decade, as the system's grip on our imagina- time and place. Once you have agreement on values, you can avoid emp- tions has weakened. Proposals for reparations, a universal basic income, a ty labels and assumptions and have richer discussions and evaluations of jobs guarantee, a minimum wage that's a living wage, debt-free college, and future and current societies and institutions. universal childcare and home care could be the beginning of a "jailbreak During the pandemic, nursing home workers were made to work on the of the imagination."16 This proliferation of ideas creates both a challenge front lines with patients, often with little or no protective equipment. Rob  PRACTICAL RADICALS YOU CAN'T BUILD WHAT YOU CAN'T IMAGINE 27 26 Baril, president of Service Employees International Union (SEIU) 1199NE, State campaign to raise wages for home-care workers in 2022. She co-wrote a union that represents nursing home workers in Connecticut and Rhode a report for the campaign and participated in a day of lobbying and pro- Island, explains how his members' rage, fear, and frustration shifted the testing at the state Capitol in Albany. Many members of the campaign are union's focus. "We moved from demanding what we could win to what we people with disabilities who are wheelchair users, vision-impaired, or oth- deserved," he said. Most of the union's members are Black and Brown wom- erwise need care. The activists spent weeks in Albany pressuring the state en, a workforce without much traditional power. Nevertheless, they made legislature to pass a higher wage for home-care workers. "We had people a list of twelve bold demands, including "racial and economic justice for coming from all over the state who needed care just to be living with us at all workers" and "a clear, specific plan to address the racial disparities in the hotel, but even just to be in the Capitol they needed support to use the care for Black and Brown residents that COVID-19 has exposed."18 With bathroom. We had to help people eat," Ilana Berger, co-director of New York these long-term demands in place, the union bargained over shorter-term Caring Majority, told Stephanie afterward, reflecting on what she had expe- demands, such as safety equipment, wage increases, and paid sick days. rienced. The campaign hired aides and a driver with an accessible van. "We The union made significant gains in its contract but has not abandoned its had members say things like, 'this is the first time in sixteen months that I've long-term vision of racial and economic justice. Baril and 1199NE members gotten three meals a day, that I've been able to take a shower when I needed know that winning a strong contract is vital but is only one step toward their to in the morning, that I've been able to sleep in a bed.' So, we literally were vision for society. doing the prefigurative thing by providing care and support. By showing how well people could thrive if they actually had the care they need."20 The campaign's organizing prefigured its vision by centering the needs of both Making Space to Dream: The Power of Vision people with disabilities and low-wage home-care workers. Vision can sustain people's hope during difficult times in multiple ways. Third, vision keeps leaders and organizers fresh, inspiring, and inspired. Hope can motivate people to act. One of Stephanie's former students, Zack It's easy for organizers and leaders to focus solely on immediate tasks since Exley, was hired and trained by a union that discouraged organizers from most are urgent and important. This is understandable. But without tak- discussing long-term goals or strategy with workers. Exley broke from the ing time to dream big, their goals will become more and more narrow, less orthodoxy and found that workers were more interested in taking risks to and less liberatory. Elected leaders, whether on the city council or in union unionize when they saw their fight as part of something larger. Exley went office, may come in with lofty goals but quickly get sucked into figuring on to put these ideas into practice when he and his colleague Becky Bond out budgets, debating small policy changes, or defending prior gains. Union worked for Bernie Sanders's 2016 presidential campaign. They found tens of leaders will see only as far as the next contract unless they make time and thousands of people waiting to be asked to do something big, people who space for discussing long-term vision and strategy. Overworked organiz- were excited and motivated by the thought of transformational change, not ers will forget the connection between their day-to-day work and the larger small steps and small ideas. "You won't get a revolution if you don't ask for freedom struggle. one," Exley and Bond write.19 Fourth, vision reminds us of our potential-not just as individuals, but Vision can also develop skills and capacities that prepare organizers for an collectively, as humanity. In a paper on transformative organizing, Steve alternative world. Activists use the term prefigurative politics to describe the Williams argues that developing human capacity is vital to any liberation practice of living the values and types of relationships they want to see in the or justice movement. This should come with the "acknowledgement that future. Stephanie saw an element of prefigurative politics in the New York in addition to creating conditions of war, poverty, and climate catastrophe,  28 PRACTICAL RADICALS YOU CAN'T BUILD WHAT YOU CAN'T IMAGINE 29 the dominant systems stunt the full development of all people," Williams under attack from two sides. The Right seized the moment: the Tea Party writes. The system limits us, and then we believe we're limited. Vision is a emerged to blame Obama, big government, unions, and people of color. The reminder that growth is possible.21 Left, disoriented or waiting to follow Obama's lead, was slow to fight back. But eventually Occupy Wall Street, the Fight for $15 and a Union, and Sand- ers's campaign were all responses to this opening. Naming the Moment: The Conjuncture Your choices depend on your analysis of the conjuncture. For example, As important as it is, a bold vision alone is insufficient to achieve social in 2020 some Left groups thought Trump and Biden were similar enough in change. Movements need a shared analysis of the world as it is and a bridge their support of neoliberal policies that members of the Left should devote to get to the world as it could be. Hall pointed to the importance of conjunc- themselves to movement work outside of elections. But the vast majority of tural analysis? understanding the actual, specific, and concrete trends in Leftists, us included, believed Trump-and the white supremacist, authori- different spheres of society, including politics, culture, and economy, that tarian movement he represented-posed existential threats to underdog together create the current situation (the "historical conjuncture"). These movements and demanded that the Left join a broad electoral alliance with currents might contradict one another and give rise to new opportunities; other forces. together, they create a terrain of struggle. For example, while we've lived There's no simple template for analyzing the historical situation. We've under a system of racial capitalism for centuries, the dominant ideas, eco- created a conjunctural analysis worksheet for our students (Tool 3), which nomic arrangements, and political structures have changed. A system of requires a close study of the ways in which overdogs and underdogs use formal democracy where most people have a vote is different from a system ideological, economic, political, and military networks to maintain power; where whole categories of people are excluded by race or gender. A slave alliances and tensions within the ruling forces; cracks in the ideological nar- owner is different from a factory boss or a private equity fund. Even when a rative; forms of power available to liberation movements; strategies available long-term vision like Black liberation is constant, different historical situa- to movements based on those forms of power; and openings for new narra- tions demand different strategies. Conjunctural analysis is a tool that helps tives or a new common sense to explain the crisis. There are other tools such us identify openings for change and answer the question of under what con- as LeftRoots' Toolkit for Liberatory Strategy, SCOPE's Power Analysis (Tool ditions certain strategies might succeed. As Dolly Parton put it, "We cannot 33), and Bill Moyers's Movement Action Plan (MAP).23 direct the wind, but we can adjust the sails."22 Unlike pragmatists, practical radicals will not settle for the small There are times when a dominant set of ideas is questioned because it reforms that can be won by taking current power relationships as given. no longer represents people's experiences. Thatcherism was a political and But unlike utopians, practical radicals make strategic alliances with people ideological project to seize the opportunity during a rupture in the 1970s and groups with differing views. Lenin argued against dogmatic short-term when the Labour Party's ideas seemed to have failed. The country was in approaches-organizers must be flexible in their tactics while also firm in crisis, facing economic slowdown and rising prices. Unions launched big their commitment to the north star. Crucially, he argued, good leaders will strikes but failed to win gains for members. know when they have to accept a compromise, not because they sold out, The 2008 financial crisis created another rupture, this time a crisis of but because the compromise was "forced upon them by the necessity of the legitimacy for racial neoliberalism. The establishment in both political par- objective conditions and the balance of forces." In other words, unless ties was discredited. The shock of the crisis created an opening for a new you have enough power and the conditions are right, you will have to make popular morality about the economy. The racial neoliberal paradigm came compromises. 30 PRACTICAL RADICALS Conjunctural analysis leads us away from formulaicstrategies- everything depends on context. Over the centuries, overdogs and underdogs have devel- oped methods and frameworks-bridges?to help them move from the world as it is to the world as it could be. Those bridges are what we call strat- 3 egy models. We turn next to building blocks of strategy and seeing how the strategy models relate to vision and conjuncture. Treated separately, these three elements clash in harsh dissonance. When skillfully harmonized, they How Underdogs Win: Strategy power transformational social change. Fundamentals Tools To apply the concepts in this chapter, see the Tools section for the following: Tool 1 Shared Values Tool 2 Prompt: Envisioning a Future World Tool 3 Conjunctural Analysis Practical radicals know that ideas alone won't change the world. A vision of the future and an analysis of the present are necessary, but not sufficient, for transformational change. Strategy is the bridge. There are many definitions of strategy. For our purposes, we mean a plan to achieve a goal, under condi- tions of uncertainty, with limited resources, facing opposition. WORLD AS WORLD AS IT IS IT COULD BE RIGOROUS STRATEGY This definition assumes that you have a goal in the first place. This is why vision is so essential - strategy without vision is a bridge to nowhere. The definition also assumes that you don't have complete control of the situation. 32 PRACTICAL RADICALS HOW UNDERDOGS WIN 33 Unpredictability and the actions of other actors, including your opponents, Some strategies unfold over decades, like abolition and the campaign to matter. Military historian Lawrence Freedman says that strategy is about install racial neoliberalism. Others aim to seize a moment. Good strat- getting more out of a situation than might be expected given the starting egists are wizards of time? they may seek to compress time to force a balance of power. Strategy "is the art of creating power." confrontation when underdogs are at their strongest. Alternatively, in Regardless of whether it's being used in business, politics, war, or for slower periods they may engage in "spadework" developing grassroots social change, strategy has five common elements: leaders for opportunities in the future. EMPATHY Some common polarities define a strategy, as follows: ALLIANCES CAUSE & EFFECT TIME Attrition or annihilation? Does a strategy aim to get the opponent to the bargaining table for a negotiated solution, or does it seek to attain total power, or even to destroy the opponent? For example, a labor union doesn't want to destroy the opponent (the employer), because in our current system that would also destroy jobs. However, employers of- Choice: Strategy involves choosing to use scarce resources? people, time, ten seek to destroy unions, viewing them as an obstacle to maximum and money ?in a specific way. Every strategy involves a choice not to do profits. something else. Top-down or bottom-up?U.S. Empathy: Strategy depends on the ability to understand and share the history gives the credit for great feelings of another. When we use this term in class, some of our students strategies to individuals, of- find it jarring. You don't have to agree with someone to empathize with ten (because we live in a racist them. Strategy does require imagining how others might respond to and sexist society), a singular particular actions, assessing individuals and groups as potential oppo- white man. But in fact, strategy nents or allies, and understanding their motivations. Women, people of is often the product of group color, and other oppressed groups often develop a strong intuition for deliberation. It may be decided understanding others, including their oppressors.? through a top-down process, Alliances: All strategy involves forming temporary or lasting coalitions a democratic one that engages between individuals, groups, or countries. A crucial element of strategy many people in a community, is exploiting divisions within the opponent's coalition and weakening or a combination of the two. the alliances that hold them together. Underdogs often focus on build- Force or guile? Machiavelli fa- ing unity among oppressed people, but creating wedges among over- mously contrasted the approach dogs can be decisive. of the lion?relying on overwhelming strength and favoring direct Cause and Effect: As we'll explore, all strategy comes down to a theory attack-to that of the fox, who favors deception and surprise. of cause and effect? that Action A will produce Outcome B, directly or indirectly. Since a ruler... needs to know how to make good use of beastly Time: The strategy models in this book work on different time horizons. qualities, he should take as his models among the animals both 34 PRACTICAL RADICALS HOW UNDERDOGS WIN 35 the fox and the lion, for the lion does not know how to avoid as conditions change and assumptions are tested. This contrasts with the traps, and the fox is easily overpowered by the wolves. So you "master plan" approach to strategy, which some on the Left have wrongly must be a fox when it comes to suspecting a trap, and a lion when attributed to the Right and tried to copy. it comes to making the wolves turn tail. Those who simply act like a lion all the time do not understand their business.? Strategies and Tactics Variants of this polarity include an orientation to compulsion or persuasion, A famous dictum attributed to Sun Tzu, the famous Chinese military strate- strength or smarts, courage or imagination, and direct or indirect means. gist is "Strategy without tactics is the slowest route to victory. Tactics with- In general, overdogs tend to favor force, while underdogs specialize in guile, out strategy is the noise before defeat." Fundamentally, strategy involves but both elements are present in many strategies. identifying your group's form of power (Chapter 4) and then finding ways to Detailed plans or improvisation? All strategies involve some premedi- concentrate it to achieve your goals. Tactics are activities that mobilize a type tation and calculation. Some strategies map out a campaign from begin- of power, directed at a target, and intended to achieve a specific objective.? ning to end, including the sequencing of particular tactics. Others begin Midwest Academy, a national training institute, developed the Strategy with an analysis of the balance and forms of power and respond in a more Chart, which helps organizers choose appropriate tactics, but only after free-flowing way. clarifying long-term goals and analyzing organizational resources, oppo- Some military scholars have argued that it's not possible to develop strat- nents, allies, and targets. This is in contrast to the process activists often egy because "no plan survives contact with the enemy," as Prussian general take-choosing tactics, rather than developing them based on the conjunc- Helmuth von Moltke famously said.* Some scholars and generals have con- ture and power available. tinued to be skeptical of strategy. "Because strategy is necessary, however, The brilliant Birmingham campaign to end segregation illustrates the dif- does not mean that it is possible," writes war scholar Richard K. Betts. Yet ference between strategy and tactics. In 1963 Rev. Wyatt Tee Walker, execu- military leaders continue to strategize. To address the challenge of changing tive director of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC) and conditions, the U.S. Army developed a concept called Commander's Intent a close aide to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., and his colleagues created Project (CI), which is the idea of sharing the general goal of a mission, or what suc- Confrontation (Project C), which aimed to end segregation in one of the cess would look like. The Cl is the outcome, the vision. It's up to those on the most racist cities in the country. ground to determine the specific maneuvers to get to the outcome, depend- Walker explained the core of Project C's strategy: "I knew that two things ing on the conditions. This approach allows subordinates to carry out the would move Birmingham: Mess with the money and make it inconvenient vision of a top general. In social justice work, such hierarchies are less com- for the white community. That was the way to make change come." 0 Walk- mon, but the CI idea allows us to see a relationship between the end goal and er's strategy depended on using people power to disrupt the routines of strategy. The cross-organizational Fight for $15 and a Union campaign is an everyday life and the profitability of segregation. His analysis showed four example of how campaigns from various cities found different ways, based distinct factions in the white power structure-businessmen and industri- on local context and their opponent's response, to achieve the vision of a $15 alists, political elites (including the notorious Sheriff Bull Connor), white minimum wage. extremist groups like the Ku Klux Klan, and the white public (there was We believe the best strategy for underdogs unfolds in a process, developed considerable overlap among these groups). He concluded that if you could in struggle by people most-impacted and close to the ground and revised break the business faction away from the rest through a sustained boycott  36 PRACTICAL RADICALS HOW UNDERDOGS WIN 37 of white businesses, segregation could fall. Walker expressed the strategy as ground to a screeching halt, there was no way they could operate a matter of cold math: business. They couldn't open up because the movement was so powerful. They didn't talk to us on a moral ground. They wanted We know that in most businesses 6 percent is the margin of prof- to do business. And they had to solve the problem of how they it. Black folks made up 35-40 percent of the consumer popu- gonna do business and stop the demonstrations.!2 lation (in Birmingham]. So all we felt we had to do was get a 50 percent response from the black community. We didn't think Cause and Effect that all blacks would go along with it." Walker's theory was that Action A (a disciplined boycott together with dra- The strategy of dividing the white power structure depended on tactics matic noncooperation with segregation) would lead to Outcome B (crack- such as a boycott and demonstrations that disrupted business in downtown. ing the opposition coalition). Viewed this way, strategy is a series of logical Most accounts of the Birmingham campaign focus on the dramatic propositions and a process of developing and testing hypotheses. moments. For example, thousands of children and young people were At first glance, cause and effect may seem simple: A causes B. Many of the trained in civil disobedience to lead the Children's Crusade. In response, frameworks and tools we explore in this book, such as Silicon Valley's "lean police sprayed these children with powerful water hoses, hit them with startup,"assume that if you look hard enough, you'll find this simple rela- batons, menaced them with police dogs, and jailed them. tionship. Reverse engineering is a method that demands that you examine The dramatic tactics built on a foundation of years of unheralded orga- what conditions are necessary to achieve a desired outcome and what condi- nizing by groups like the Alabama Christian Movement for Human Rights, tions would be nice to have. By rigorously paring down the list, a group can led by Rev. Fred Shuttlesworth. The tactics succeeded because they grew out identify the essential success factors (Tool 4). Thinking this way is useful of a careful analysis of the situation. Walker carefully scoped out Birming- because it forces teams to consider choices. What are we not going to do so ham, even down to details like how many stools, tables, and chairs were in we can pour all our resources into the strategy we think will win? downtown stores, so that he knew how many protestors it would take to Yotam Marom, a core Occupy Wall Street activist, argues that Left groups have an impact-and developed a strategy that went right to the heart of often fail at strategy because they are unwilling to have hard, rigorous con- the opponent's vulnerability. He developed an "arc of escalation"? phases of versations and make difficult choices.!3 He quotes Richard Rumelt, a busi- the campaign that would intensify, leading to a crescendo and forcing a cri- ness theorist, who wrote: sis that would garner national attention and force a rupture in the overdog coalition. Without the tactics, the strategy would have been a dead letter. Having conflicting goals, dedicating resources to unconnect- Without the underlying strategy, the tactics would not have been so pre- ed targets, and accommodating incompatible interests are the cisely calculated. luxuries of the rich and powerful, but they make for bad strat- Walker was clear-eyed and specific in his calculus of how the struggle egy. Despite this, most organizations will not create focused would be won and had no illusions that mass demonstrations and the boy- strategies. Instead, they will generate laundry lists of desirable cott would change hearts and minds: outcomes and, at the same time, ignore the need for genuine competence in coordinating and focusing their resources. Good The [white] people there would never have talked to us were it strategy requires leaders who are willing and able to say no to not for the fact that our movement was so powerful that the city a wide variety of actions and interests. Strategy is at least as  PRACTICAL RADICALS HOW UNDERDOGS WIN 39 38 much about what an organization does not do as it is about what behind, or a three- or five- or a ten-point plan. What came next it does. 14 was sometimes very compelling and visionary. Other times- often times-it was reductionist, agreeing on the lowest com- There are, however, more holistic approaches to causation as well. Par- mon denominator, the least exciting thing, because it was the adigms as diverse as systems theory, cybernetics, complexity and chaos only place there was unity.!8 theory, and the Buddhist idea of interdependent origination deny that you can separate elements of a complex system. Everything affects everything In our class, we ask our students whether Marom's or brown's approach else, so changes in any one part of a complex system will have (often unpre- resonates more with them. Usually, students are equally divided. And we dictable) effects on the rest of the system. Mathematician and meteorolo- ask them to reflect on their own gifts: are they inclined toward the linear gist Edward Norton Lorenz described the "butterfly effect" ?how a small or the holistic approach to strategy? Our view is that both ways of looking perturbation (like a butterfly flapping its wings) could shape the timing at the world are essential because most winning strategies involve a holistic and path of a tornado weeks later.'S adrienne maree brown developed an view and linear logic. Practicing less-familiar approaches can expand your influential framework called "emergent strategy" that sees systems as inter- repertoire and stretch your strategic imagination. dependent, complex, and fractal (meaning that the same patterns recur at small and large levels). brown invites activists to consider how even small Box 3.1 Lineages of Strategy from Below shifts at a local level can reverberate and produce systemic change. I Theory U, developed by Otto Scharmer and others in business schools, invites prac- Most of the famous texts on strategy are written for over- titioners to let go of habitual patterns of understanding the world, take in dogs. But there are long lineages of underdog strategy. Some have been passed down orally, while others have been doc- the whole field of experience with fresh eyes, and find new ways of acting umented in training manuals and guides for activists, like that can disrupt dysfunctional systems.! These approaches are important Midwest Academy's Organizing for Social Change. Walker because they encourage us to look at the whole system, and at all the actors drew upon a "trickster" tradition of strategy that has been and interactions that sustain and threaten it. passed down orally in the Black community-Brer Rabbit brown describes an experience familiar to many people involved in pro- was a mythical figure who outsmarted stronger foes. Coyote gressive strategy: is a similar character in Indigenous cultures. These diverse traditions, spanning constituencies, eras, and ideologies, Creating more possibilities is my favorite part of emergent are underdogs' collective inheritance. strategy? this is where we shape tomorrow towards abundance. The United States has a rich tradition of community orga- Creating more possibilities counters the very foundational nizing. Faith-based groups were some of the first to fight to assumptions of strategy. The word "strategy" is a military term abolish slavery. Today's community- and faith-based organi- which means a plan of action towards a goal.... Reducing the zations work on issues ranging from housing to the environ- wild and wonderful world into one thing that we can grasp, ment, to immigrant rights and racial justice. Labor unions handle, hold onto, and advance.... I have been in countless also have a long and rich history. We draw moviolent socia meetings where there was a moment of creative abundance and energy, and then someone said we need to pick one thing to get  PRACTICAL RADICALS HOW UNDERDOGS WIN 41 40 movements now to achieve a multiracial future. However, an ecological per- movements, which have played a large role in U.S. politics. spective of movements suggests it could be possible to have some organiza- Some movement practitioners adhere to nonviolence on prin- tions with different structures in the same movement, such as organizations ciple, grounded in either religious or moral tradition, or in of largely white people within a larger multiracial movement, or hierarchi- a view that good ends cannot justify violent means. Others adopt nonviolence based on the belief that, if it comes to vio- cal institutions (like universities) within a larger democracy movement. lence, the underdogs simply don't have the firepower of the Your strategies may alter your vision-successful ones may expand your overdogs. vision of what is possible. Many people report that participating in actions Knowledge of these different lineages will help ensure that such as strikes or marches changes their political consciousness. Workers organizers don't talk past each other. Practitioners may use who go on strike, or activists in civil rights protests, deepen their commit- the same words-organizing or power, for example-but have ment to their cause and to its values, such as solidarity and justice. This totally different definitions for them. What looks like success might happen if a strike wins and they see the power of collective action. Or in one tradition may be a failure in another. For example, if a protest fails, participants may decide they need to deepen their political community organizing tends to emphasize scripted actions, commitment. Large protests and strikes can also shift public opinion in with a clear sense of how many people will show up and support of the movements.20 who will say and do what. The thinking is that you're more We've discussed how strategy is limited without vision. Vision with- likely to get a target to do what you want if people are acting out strategy is equally a dead end. The moral vision of the Black freedom in a disciplined way. Some of the more disruptive traditions movement was essential, but without strategists like Walker, who soberly favor wildness and unpredictability, under the theory that assessed power relationships and developed inventive strategies and tactics, overdogs will be unnerved by the threat of social disorder and make concessions to avoid it. the vision would not have been realized. Finally, strategy must be embedded in an analysis of the real-world situ- ation (the conjuncture). Strategy is a process that requires adapting to the context, just as a jazz musician improvising must listen carefully to the music The Relationship Between Vision, others are playing around them. As organizer Kevin Simowitz says, "Strat- Conjuncture, and Strategy egy happens in motion, not when Smart People write Strategy Memos."21 The process of combining a bold vision, an analysis of the current situation, Walker's strategy derived from his sophisticated analysis of the potential and rigorous strategy is neither sequential nor mechanical. All three ele- fissures in the white power structure in Birmingham, which appeared to ments influence each other simultaneously. In a given conjuncture, specific most observers to be a monolith, and also from his analysis of the failure of horizons of vision open up, like the Green New Deal as a response to climate a recent campaign in Albany, Georgia, to break segregation. The German change. Vision also shapes how we understand a conjuncture, like how the Communist Party's failure to see fascism as a dire and unique threat led to dream of Black liberation inspired hundreds of thousands of enslaved peo- the disastrous decision to target rather