Reshaping the US Left

This is the first chronicle of the other side of the Reagan era: the surprising renaissance of the popular left across the United States. Challenging political conservatism and possessive individualism, a vigorous spectrum of community-based oppositions and insurgent subcultures has flourished.

This book puts the different experiences together in a common perspective. Participants recount the history of the radical struggles of our time: the Central America solidarity campaigns, the Sanctuary movement, the 'Freeze', the women's peace movement, the new eco-socialism, and more. Union activists analyze a trio of seminal community-supported labor struggles - P-9, Watsonville and GM Van Nuys - that have shown ways to resist concessions and plant closure. There is a fascinating comparison with the experience of Canadian labor against the New Right: Solidarity in British Columbia. A final section reconsiders the language of class in American history and offers fresh perspectives on racism and the representation of white working-class experience.

Together with previous volumes of The Year Left on socialists and the Democratic Party (volume 1) and the Rainbow Coalition and popular cultures of color (volume 2), this is intended to be a fundamental contribution to discussion of the future of the American left.