United States Social Movements and Systemic Social Change
Ruben Solis Garcia grulla@swunion.org
The election of the first African descendant for the Presidency of the United States was a radical historical step in the history of the first Republic of the Americas, the United States. The 2008 revolution marked the culmination of the movements of 1999, interrupted by the twin tower and Pentagon attacks and Patriot Act, reconsolidated by late 2003, and erupted in the ‘civic revolt’ of 2008. Whether we think President Obama has done well or badly during his administration is not part of this analysis.
The right wing Republican Party, the radical right Tea Party and racists militias while arguing for ‘States Rights’ have ‘consolidated’ their power base on the racist and anti-Obama campaign. Depicting the federal government as the tyrant and villain, they have mobilized their forces to ‘get ride of the Black President’ and the federalist government. The Koch brothers and other right wing ideologues are financing or getting financing to develop the ‘infra-structure’ of so called ‘Right wing Social Movements’.
The reason for the developing and financing of right wing social movements it to contest the power of the growing left social movement, forces whose power to mobilize and educate at the grassroots level got Obama elected.
These same, left social movements, threatens the very bases of the hate based racist social movements behind the Republican Party. As a pre-emptive strike, the right wing Republicans have launched an attack across-the-board of anything that looks or smells liberal including attacks on education, labor unions, gays, women, migrants, and they have targeted cutting the budgets of all these areas of social and cultural development. They have also targeted changing the Constitution to fit their national political and ideological platform including redistricting people of color and grassroots communities out of any majority vote, restrict voting through various means such as Voter ID.
The first test of the 2008 social ‘civic’ revolution will be in November 2012, as the elections are the ‘barometer’ of the populace and who will be holding the legal governmental right. To many left social forces It is not about Obama but to the right social forces it is all about Obama. The question is what is to be done in view of the Presidential elections coming up very soon. Should we let the right wing and racist forces win because we don’t believe in Obama?
Regardless of what happens to Obama, the neo-liberal agenda continues to move forward this first decade of the new century and at this time in order to create and bring about change a ‘mass movement building & mobilizing’ is necessary. The neo-liberal program has failed and has pulled the larger capitalist economy down with it. The economic crisis is not a ‘monetary’ crisis but a crisis of the capitalist system itself. It is a political crisis, and it is a governance crisis and a moment of ‘transformation’. Is the mass social movement capable of addressing the ‘construction’ of the new imagination of the new world being brought into life as the old one fails?
The mass movement grows, anchored in real infrastructural movement growth and expanding base of people, organizations, communications, relations and ‘decision-makers’ in the communities. After two US Social Forum, we see the impacts of social movements for change in Wisconsin, Indiana, Michigan, Arizona, Louisiana, and many other ‘front line’ states. A new day has dawned; What is to be done?
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