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| how democratic is america howard zinn: The Zinn Reader Howard Zinn, 2011-01-04 No other radical historian has reached so many hearts and minds as Howard Zinn. It is rare that a historian of the Left has managed to retain as much credibility while refusing to let his academic mantle change his beautiful writing style from being anything but direct, forthright, and accessible. Whether his subject is war, race, politics, economic justice, or history itself, each of his works serves as a reminder that to embrace one's subjectivity can mean embracing one's humanity, that heart and mind can speak with one voice. Here, in six sections, is the historian's own choice of his shorter essays on some of the most critical problems facing America throughout its history, and today. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: A People's History of the United States Howard Zinn, 2003-04-01 Presents the history of the United States from the point of view of those who were exploited in the name of American progress. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: Disobedience and Democracy Howard Zinn, 2012-05-24 Howard Zinn's cogent defense of civil disobedience with a new introduction by the author. In this slim volume, Zinn lays out a clear and dynamic case for civil disobedience and protest, and challenges the dominant arguments against forms of protest that challenge the status quo. Zinn explores the politics of direct action, nonviolent civil disobedience, and strikes, and draws lessons for today. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: Politics Is for Power Eitan Hersh, 2020-06-30 A groundbreaking analysis of political hobbyism—treating politics like a spectator sport—and an urgent and timely call to arms for the many well-meaning, well-informed citizens who follow political news, but do not take political action. Do you consider yourself politically engaged? Probably, yes! But are you, really? The uncomfortable truth is that most of us have good intentions. We vote (sometimes) and occasionally sign a petition or attend a rally. But we mainly “engage” by consuming politics as if it’s entertainment or a hobby. We obsessively follow the news and complain about the opposition to our friends or spouse. We tweet and post and share. The hours we spend on politics are used mainly as pastime. Instead, political scientist and data analyst Eitan Hersh offers convincing evidence that we should be spending the same number of hours building political organizations, implementing a long-term vision for our local communities, and getting to know our neighbors, whose votes will be needed for solving hard problems. We could be accumulating power so that when there are opportunities to make a difference—to lobby, to advocate, to mobilize—we will be ready. Aided by cutting-edge social science as well as remarkable stories of ordinary citizens who got off their couches and took political power seriously, this book shows us how to channel our energy away from political hobbyism and toward empowering our values. In an age of political turmoil and as the 2020 election looms, Politics Is for Power is an inspiring, vital read that will make you hopeful for America’s democratic future. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: How Democratic Is the American Constitution? Robert A. Dahl, 2002-02-08 In this provocative book, an eminent political scientist poses the question: Why should we uphold our constitution? |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: Failure to Quit Howard Zinn, 2012-11 A selection of Howard Zinn's most popular and accessible essays on history and politics. In this lively collection of essays, now with a new afterword, Zinn discusses a wide range of historical and political topics, from the role of the Supreme Court in U.S. history to the nature of higher education today. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: Vietnam Howard Zinn, 2002 Zinn's compelling case against the Vietnam War, now with a new introduction. Of the many books that challenged the Vietnam War, Howard Zinn's stands out as one of the best--and most influential. It helped sparked national debate on the war. It includes a powerful speech written by Zinn that President Johnson should have given to lay out the case for ending the war. Includes a new introduction by the author. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: America's Democratic Republic Edward S. Greenberg, Benjamin I. Page, 2005 America's Democratic Republic is part of the highly popular Penguin Academic Series, which offers accessibly written, elegantly designed, and highly affordable trade-format books by pre-eminent scholars. Written with a lively, narrative style and constructed around a single “story line,” this text gets to the heart of American's frustrations with our government. Acknowledging that citizens' cynicism tends to make people withdraw from civic life, this text examines why our government can seem so unsatisfactory, identifying the heart of the American political system: strong democratic aspirations among the general public conflicting with the republican constitutional foundations on which the country is based. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: A People's History of American Empire Howard Zinn, Mike Konopacki, Paul Buhle, 2008-04-01 Adapted from the bestselling grassroots history of the United States, the story of America in the world, told in comics form Since its landmark publication in 1980, A People's History of the United States has had six new editions, sold more than 1.7 million copies, become required classroom reading throughout the country, and been turned into an acclaimed play. More than a successful book, A People's History triggered a revolution in the way history is told, displacing the official versions with their emphasis on great men in high places to chronicle events as they were lived, from the bottom up. Now Howard Zinn, historian Paul Buhle, and cartoonist Mike Konopacki have collaborated to retell, in vibrant comics form, a most immediate and relevant chapter of A People's History: the centuries-long story of America's actions in the world. Narrated by Zinn, this version opens with the events of 9/11 and then jumps back to explore the cycles of U.S. expansionism from Wounded Knee to Iraq, stopping along the way at World War I, Central America, Vietnam, and the Iranian revolution. The book also follows the story of Zinn, the son of poor Jewish immigrants, from his childhood in the Brooklyn slums to his role as one of America's leading historians. Shifting from world-shattering events to one family's small revolutions, A People's History of American Empire presents the classic ground-level history of America in a dazzling new form. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: America Beyond Capitalism Gar Alperovitz, 2011 America Beyond Capitalism is a book whose time has come. Gar Alperovitz's expert diagnosis of the long-term structural crisis of the American economic and political system is accompanied by detailed, practical answers to the problems we face as a society. Unlike many books that reserve a few pages of a concluding chapter to offer generalized, tentative solutions, Alperovitz marshals years of research into emerging new economy strategies to present a comprehensive picture of practical bottom-up efforts currently underway in thousands of communities across the United States. All democratize wealth and empower communities, not corporations: worker-ownership, cooperatives, community land trusts, social enterprises, along with many supporting municipal, state and longer term federal strategies as well. America Beyond Capitalism is a call to arms, an eminently practical roadmap for laying foundations to change a faltering system that increasingly fails to sustain the great American values of equality, liberty and meaningful democracy. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: Who Will Tell The People William Greider, 2010-05-11 Who Will Tell the People exposes the hidden power dynamics in American democracy and inspires citizens to reclaim their voice and reshape the system for the greater good. Who Will Tell the People is a passionate, eye-opening challenge to American democracy. Here is a tough-minded exploration of why we’re in trouble, starting with the basic issues of who gets heard, who gets ignored, and why. Greider shows us the realities of power in Washington today, uncovering the hidden relationships that link politicians with corporations and the rich, and that subvert the needs of ordinary citizens. How do we put meaning back into public life? Greider shares the stories of some citizens who have managed to crack Washington’s “Grand Bazaar” of influence peddling as he reveals the structures designed to thwart them. Without naiveté or cynicism, Greider shows us how the system can still be made to work for the people and delineates the lines of battle in the struggle to save democracy. By showing us the reality of how the political decisions that shape our lives are made, William Greider explains how we can begin to take control once more. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: Does American Democracy Still Work? Alan Wolfe, 2006-01-01 Why Americans should be concerned about recent changes in their democracy The past few decades have brought a shift in the nature of American democracy--an alarming shift that threatens such liberal democratic values as respect for pluralism, acceptance of the separation of powers, and recognition of the rights of opposition parties. In this insightful book, political scientist Alan Wolfe identifies the current political conditions that endanger the quality of our democracy. He describes how politics has changed, and he calls for a democracy protection movement designed to preserve our political traditions not unlike the environmental protection movement's efforts to safeguard the natural world. Voters who know little about issues, leaders who bend rules with little fear of reprisal, and political parties that are losing the ability to mobilize citizens have all contributed to a worrisome new politics of democracy, Wolfe argues. He offers a brilliant analysis of how religion and morality have replaced political and economic self-interest as guiding principles, and how a dangerous populism promotes a radical form of elitism. Without laying blame on one party or ideology and without claiming that matters will improve with one party or the other in office, Wolfe instead suggests that Americans need to understand the danger their own indifference poses and take political matters more seriously. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: Many Minds, One Heart Wesley C. Hogan, 2013-01-22 How did the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee break open the caste system in the American South between 1960 and 1965? In this innovative study, Wesley Hogan explores what SNCC accomplished and, more important, how it fostered significant social change in such a short time. She offers new insights into the internal dynamics of SNCC as well as the workings of the larger civil rights and Black Power movement of which it was a part. As Hogan chronicles, the members of SNCC created some of the civil rights movement's boldest experiments in freedom, including the sit-ins of 1960, the rejuvenated Freedom Rides of 1961, and grassroots democracy projects in Georgia and Mississippi. She highlights several key players--including Charles Sherrod, Bob Moses, and Fannie Lou Hamer--as innovators of grassroots activism and democratic practice. Breaking new ground, Hogan shows how SNCC laid the foundation for the emergence of the New Left and created new definitions of political leadership during the civil rights and Vietnam eras. She traces the ways other social movements--such as Black Power, women's liberation, and the antiwar movement--adapted practices developed within SNCC to apply to their particular causes. Many Minds, One Heart ultimately reframes the movement and asks us to look anew at where America stands on justice and equality today. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: The Future of American Democracy Glen Browder, 2002 Former congressman Browder is worried that the current trends of American democracy might result in a Union of Socialist States of America or worse. He suggests that we're suffering from a cumulative distemper in which we may be tiring of America's historic Great Experiment. He offers vague prescriptions about embarking on a National Democratic Renaissance and rediscovering the essence of our American nation. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: Land of Hope Wilfred M. McClay, 2020-09-22 A wonderfully written, sweeping narrative history of the United States that will help Americans discover the land they call home High School and College Age Students The Original Land of Hope Narrative in E-book Edition We have a glut of text and trade books on American history. But what we don't have is a compact, inexpensive, authoritative, and compulsively readable book that will offer to intelligent young Americans a coherent, persuasive, and inspiring narrative of their own country. Such an account will shape and deepen their sense of the land they inhabit, and by making them understand that land's roots, will equip them for the privileges and responsibilities of citizenship in American society, and provide them with a vivid and enduring sense of membership in one of the greatest enterprises in human history: the exciting, perilous, and immensely consequential story of their own country. The existing texts simply fail to tell that story with energy and conviction. They are more likely to reflect the skeptical outlook of specialized professional academic historians, an outlook that supports a fragmented and fractured view of modern American society, and that fails to convey to young people the greater arc of that history. Or they reflect the outlook of radical critics of American society, who seek to debunk the standard American narrative, and has an enormous, and largely negative, effect upon the teaching of American history in American high schools and colleges. This state of affairs cannot continue for long without producing serious consequences. A great nation needs and deserves a great and coherent narrative, as an expression of its own self-understanding: and it needs to convey that narrative to its young effectively. It perhaps goes without saying that such a narrative cannot be a fairy tale or a whitewash of the past; it will not be convincing if it is not truthful. But there is no necessary contradiction between an honest account and an inspiring one. This account seeks to provide both. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: Another Kind of Public Education Patricia Hill Collins, 2009-05-01 An ambitious book on how schools, race, and the media intertwine in the twenty-first century Sociologist Patricia Hill Collins opens this brilliant new book on race and education by describing how in her senior year at the Philadelphia High School for girls, near the end of a public school education that “had almost silenced me,” she was invited to deliver a graduation address on the meaning of the American flag. She refused to deliver the censored version her teacher demanded, and someone else took her place on stage. Another Kind of Public Education spins the threads of that story—the way education, race, and democracy are intertwined; the way racism and resistance work through a variety of unspoken means; what schools do to limit or to open up possibilities—into a call for “another kind of public education,” one that helps us “envision new democratic possibilities.” Collins begins, in a tour de force of social analysis with practical implications, by demystifying what she calls “racism as a system of power.” She argues that the generation coming of age at the turn of the twenty-first century—in a post-civil-rights society that publicly claims to be “color-blind”—needs a new language for analyzing the new “color-blind racism” of contemporary society that has stymied efforts to live up to the promise of American democracy. She shows us how racism as a system of power works in four distinct yet intertwined domains—structural, disciplinary, cultural, and interpersonal. Drawing examples from schools, politics, pop culture, personal experience, and more, she demonstrates in eye-opening ways how racial inequality is manufactured and reinforced, even as we publicly espouse an ideology of color-blind fairness. And she points, crucially, to what we can do about it. Noting that everyone is situated differently in the complex domains of power, she urges us to “think expansively about resistance,” to figure out in which domain we can have the most effect in resisting racism as a system of power, and how. She also discusses classrooms around the country, teaching as a subversive activity, “cultivating countersurveillance,” and the power of storytelling and media. Blending entertaining storytelling, social theory, and practical suggestions for changing institutions, including schools, Another Kind of Public Education is both a call for change and a reminder that public education—in every sense—is at the heart of American democratic possibilities. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: Howard Zinn Speaks Howard Zinn, 2012 Howard Zinn--there was no one like him. And to hear him speak was like listening to music that you loved--lyrical, uplifting, honest.--Michael Moore Zinn's speeches . . . are a joy and an inspiration.--Marisa Tomei Collected here for the first time, Howard's speeches come to us at the moment when we need them most: just as a global network of popular uprisings searches for what comes next.--Naomi Klein Howard Zinn was one of the great orators of the twentieth century and illuminated our history like no other historian. He rarely spoke from notes, and yet could weave rich historical narratives that inspired and captivated audiences. He could grab the attention of even the most jaded students and charm listeners with his sharp humor and personal, engaging style. Many of his speeches have never been published in book form. This first ever collection of his speeches will be an invaluable resource for new generations to continue to discover his work, as well as the millions he moved and informed in his lifetime. Howard Zinn wrote the classic A People's History of the United States. The book, which has sold more than two million copies, has been featured in the film Good Will Hunting, and has appeared multiple times on The New York Times best-seller list. Anthony Arnove wrote, directed, and produced The People Speak with Howard Zinn, Chris Moore, Josh Brolin, and Matt Damon, and co-edited, with Howard Zinn, Voices of a People's History of the United States. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: Gangs of America Ted Nace, 2005-09-11 'Gangs of America' traces the evolution of the corporation, one of the core institutions of the modern world. It ties political debates about multi-national trade agreements, financial scandals and scores of other specific issues into the narrative account. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: Report United States. Attorney General's Committee on Poverty and the Administration of Federal Criminal Justice, 1964 |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: Take Hold of Our History Harvey J. Kaye, 2019-10-25 The eighteen essays and speeches in Take Hold of Our History render a manifesto – a call to remember, redeem, and embrace the American radical story and tradition in favor of cultivating American historical memory and imagination and making America radical once again. For too long we have allowed the right to hijack the past and suppress, efface, lie about, and/or appropriate the essentially radical story of America from the struggles of the Revolution to those of the Age of Roosevelt and the 1960s. And no less tragically, we on the left, apparently haunted by the worst of our national experience, have turned our back on our own story and deferred to the tales of conservatives and reactionaries. Fleeing from the past, we merely compound the tragedies and ironies of American history, for we turn our backs on both the nation’s democratic creed and radical imperative, but also the struggles from the bottom up, the struggles in which working people and others have laid hold of America’s revolutionary promise and succeeded in making the United States freer, more equal and more democratic, at times, radically so. As Bill Moyers put it in 2008: “Here in the first decade of the twenty-first century the story that becomes America’s dominant narrative will shape our collective imagination and our politics for a long time.” The time has come for us to advance that narrative. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: Daring Democracy Frances Moore Lappé, Adam Eichen, 2017-09-26 An optimistic book for Americans who are asking, in the wake of Trump’s victory, What do we do now? The answer: We need to organize and fight to protect and expand our democracy. Americans are distraught as tightly held economic and political power drowns out their voices and values. Legendary Diet for a Small Planet author Frances Moore Lappé and organizer-scholar Adam Eichen offer a fresh, surprising response to this core crisis. This intergenerational duo opens with an essential truth: It’s not the magnitude of a challenge that crushes the human spirit. It’s feeling powerless—in this case, fearing that to stand up for democracy is futile. It’s not, Lappé and Eichen argue. With riveting stories and little-known evidence, they demystify how we got here, exposing the well-orchestrated effort that has robbed Americans of their rightful power. But at the heart of this unique book are solutions. Even in this divisive time, Americans are uniting across causes and ideologies to create a “canopy of hope” the authors call the Democracy Movement. In this invigorating “movement of movements,” millions of Americans are leaving despair behind as they push for and achieve historic change. The movement and democracy itself are vital to us as citizens and fulfill human needs—for power, meaning, and connection—essential to our thriving. In this timely and necessary book, Lappé and Eichen offer proof that courage is contagious in the daring fight for democracy. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: In Search of a Democratic America Martin S. Sheffer, 2000-01-01 The America Randolph Silliman Bourne searched for his entire life-but never found-was an America in which the institutions of democratic government remained responsive to the needs of all. A progressive in the age of progressivism, Bourne fully understood John Jay's dictum that the United States should be governed by the people who own it. The Atlantic Monthly, the New Republic, and the Dial were the forum for Bourne's social commentary during a brief career that lasted from 1912 to 1918. In Search of a Democratic America offers the best of Bourne's writings on politics, religion, education, philosophy, society, and youth. The readings, and commentary, reveal the literary radical and social critic in his true guise as a spokesman for liberal democracy, a democratic theorist who strove for a modern, industrial, multi-ethnic nation peopled by the intelligent, the caring, and the concerned. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: Convictions Sidney Hook, 1990 Challenges liberals and conservatives alike, as Hook pierces to the heart of momentous issues: human rights, racial equality, cultural freedom, and the separation of ethical behavior from religious belief. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: The Alienated Voter Murray Burton Levin, 1960 |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: One Person, No Vote Carol Anderson, 2018-09-11 As featured in the documentary All In: The Fight for Democracy Finalist for the PEN/John Kenneth Galbraith Award for Nonfiction Longlisted for the National Book Award in Nonfiction An NPR Politics Podcast Book Club Choice Named one of the Best Books of the Year by: Washington Post * Boston Globe * NPR* Bustle * BookRiot * New York Public Library From the award-winning, New York Times bestselling author of White Rage, the startling—and timely—history of voter suppression in America, with a foreword by Senator Dick Durbin. In her New York Times bestseller White Rage, Carol Anderson laid bare an insidious history of policies that have systematically impeded black progress in America, from 1865 to our combustible present. With One Person, No Vote, she chronicles a related history: the rollbacks to African American participation in the vote since the 2013 Supreme Court decision that eviscerated the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Known as the Shelby ruling, this decision effectively allowed districts with a demonstrated history of racial discrimination to change voting requirements without approval from the Department of Justice. Focusing on the aftermath of Shelby, Anderson follows the astonishing story of government-dictated racial discrimination unfolding before our very eyes as more and more states adopt voter suppression laws. In gripping, enlightening detail she explains how voter suppression works, from photo ID requirements to gerrymandering to poll closures. And with vivid characters, she explores the resistance: the organizing, activism, and court battles to restore the basic right to vote to all Americans. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: Building Red America Thomas B. Edsall, 2007-03-19 This powerful examination of the present and future of American politics, by one of America's most distinguished political journalists, reveals how the Republican Party has gained a long-term institutional advantage that allows it to shrug off apparent setbacks like the 2006 elections. Building Red America takes us deeper than any previous book into the operations of the power brokers and issues that galvanize voters. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: The Hidden History of American Oligarchy Thom Hartmann, 2021-02-01 The New York Times–bestselling author looks at the real history of the corrupting influence of oligarchy in America—and how we can fight back. Billionaire oligarchs want to own our republic, and they’re nearly there thanks to legislation and Supreme Court decisions that they have essentially bought. They put Trump and his political allies into office and support a vast network of think tanks, publications, and social media that every day push our nation closer and closer to police-state tyranny. The United States was born in a struggle against the oligarchs of the British aristocracy, and ever since then the history of America has been one of dynamic tension between democracy and oligarchy. And much like the shock of the 1929 crash woke America up to glaring inequality and the ongoing theft of democracy by that generation's oligarchs, the coronavirus pandemic of 2020 has laid bare how extensively oligarchs have looted our nation’s economic system, gutted governmental institutions, and stolen the wealth of the former middle class. Thom Hartmann, , the most popular progressive radio host in America and a bestselling author, traces the history of this struggle against oligarchy from America’s founding to the United States’ war with the feudal Confederacy to President Franklin Roosevelt’s struggle against “economic royalists,” who wanted to block the New Deal. In each of those cases, the oligarchs lost the battle. But with increasing right-wing control of the media, unlimited campaign contributions, and a conservative takeover of the judicial system, we're at a crisis point. Now is the time for action, before we flip into tyranny. We’ve beaten the oligarchs before, and we can do it again. Hartmann lays out practical measures we can take to break up media monopolies, limit the influence of money in politics, reclaim the wealth stolen over decades by the oligarchy, and build a movement that will return control of America to We the People. Praise forThe Hidden History of American Oligarchy “For every American interested in protecting our democracy, everyone puzzled about how America came to the brink of authoritarian rule, and for all who enjoy a being educated and entertained by enthralling, eye-opening, riveting journey in U.S. history, The Hidden History of Oligarchy is a must read!” —Don Siegelman, former Governor of Alabama, author of Stealing Our Democracy “Thom Hartmann is America’s history teacher, a national treasure laying it out scary and clear: tyranny can happen here. Oligarchy’s choking democracy.” —Mimi Kennedy, actress, board member, Progressive Democrats of America |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: The United States Carl Lotus Becker, 1920 |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: Taming Democracy Terry Bouton, 2007-07-12 Publisher description |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: A People's History of the United States Howard Zinn, 2014-10-23 As seen in the award-winning feature film, Lady Bird. A classic since its original landmark publication in 1980, Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States is the first scholarly work to tell America's story from the bottom up the point of view. There is an underside to every age about which history does not often speak, because history is written from records left by the privileged. Historian and social activist Howard Zinn relays history in the words of America's women, factory workers, African Americans, Native Americans, working poor, and immigrant labourers. From Columbus to the Revolution to slavery and the Civil War – from World War II to the election of George W. Bush and the War on Terror – A People's History of the United States is an important and necessary contribution to a complete and balanced understanding of American history. 'A brilliant and moving history of the American people from the point of view of those who have been exploited politically and economically and whose plight has been largely omitted from most histories.' – Library Journal |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: Midnight in Washington Adam Schiff, 2021-10-12 #1 NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • The “fascinating” (Rachel Maddow) inside account of American democracy in its darkest hour, from the rise of autocracy unleashed by Trump to the January 6 insurrection, and a warning that those forces remain as potent as ever—from the congressman who led the first impeachment of Donald J. Trump LOS ANGELES TIMES BOOK PRIZE WINNER: “Brilliant, sobering, and unforgettable.”—from the Current Interest Judges’ citation In the years leading up to the election of Donald Trump, Congressman Adam Schiff had already been sounding the alarm over the resurgence of autocracy around the world, and the threat this posed to the United States. But as he led the probe into Donald Trump’s Russia and Ukraine-related abuses of presidential power, Schiff came to the terrible conclusion that the principal threat to American democracy now came from within. In Midnight in Washington, Schiff argues that the Trump presidency has so weakened our institutions and compromised the Republican Party that the peril will last for years, requiring unprecedented vigilance against the growing and dangerous appeal of authoritarianism. The congressman chronicles step-by-step just how our democracy was put at such risk, and traces his own path to meeting the crisis—from serious prosecutor, to congressman with an expertise in national security and a reputation for bipartisanship, to liberal lightning rod, scourge of the right, and archenemy of a president. Schiff takes us inside his team of impeachment managers and their desperate defense of the Constitution amid the rise of a distinctly American brand of autocracy. Deepening our understanding of prominent public moments, Schiff reveals the private struggles, the internal conflicts, and the triumphs of courage that came with defending the republic against a lawless president—but also the slow surrender of people that he had worked with and admired to the dangerous immorality of a president engaged in an historic betrayal of his office. Schiff’s fight for democracy is one of the great dramas of our time, told by the man who became the president’s principal antagonist. It is a story that began with Trump but does not end with him, taking us through the disastrous culmination of the presidency and Schiff’s account of January 6, 2021, and how the antidemocratic forces Trump unleashed continue to define his party, making the future of democracy in America more uncertain than ever. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: Howard Zinn, Some Truths Are Not Self-Evident Richard Kreitner , 2014-12-15 Millions of Americans have read and been galvanized by A People's History of the United States. But many years before Howard Zinn published that epic saga of exploitation and resistance, he was organizing civil-rights protests and agitating for an end to the Vietnam War--and writing about those efforts in the pages of The Nation. From the Atlanta campus of Spelman College (where Zinn taught in the early 1960s) to North Vietnam (where he facilitated the release of American POWs), Zinn was not only an astute observer of history. As Frances Fox Piven writes in the introduction to Some Truths Are Not Self-Evident, These Nation essays remind us that for nearly fifty years Zinn himself was deeply involved in the major twentieth-century struggles for social justice in the United States. The book also includes later Zinn articles on George W. Bush's wars--on terror, in Iraq, against the poor--as well as a selection of Nation articles about Zinn, concluding with Eric Foner's 2010 obituary for the historian who was not afraid to speak out about the difference between right and wrong. Nowhere has Zinn's courage and commitment to speaking out been as evident as in Some Truths Are Not Self Evident: Essays in The Nation on Civil Rights, Vietnam and the War on Terror. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: America's Democracy Fred R. Harris, 1983 |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: Democracy’s Discontent Michael J. Sandel, 1998-02-06 In a searching account of current controversies over morality in politics, Michael Sandel discovers that we suffer from an impoverished vision of citizenship and community. Democracy's Discontent provides a new interpretation of the American political and constitutional tradition that offers hope of rejuvenating our civic life. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: Passionate Declarations Howard Zinn, 2009-12-22 “A shotgun blast of revisionism that aims to shatter all the comfortable myths of American political discourse.” — Los Angeles Times From the bestselling author of A People's History of the United States comes this selection of passionate, honest, and piercing essays looking at American political ideology. Howard Zinn brings to Passionate Declarations the same astringent style and provocative point of view that led more than a million people to buy his book A People's History of the United States. He directs his critique here to what he calls American orthodoxies —that set of beliefs guardians of our culture consider sacrosanct: justifications for war, cynicism about human nature and violence, pride in our economic system, certainty of our freedom of speech, romanticization of representative government, confidence in our system of justice. Those orthodoxies, he believes, have a chilling effect on our capacity to think independently and to become active citizens in the long struggle for peace and justice. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: Can Democracy Work? James Miller, 2018-09-18 “Of all the books on democracy in recent years [this is] one of the best . . . an intelligent journey through the turbulent past of this great human experiment.” —The Guardian Today, democracy is the world’s only broadly accepted political system, and yet it has become synonymous with disappointment and crisis. How did it come to this? In Can Democracy Work? James Miller, the author of the classic history of 1960s protest Democracy Is in the Streets, offers a lively, surprising, and urgent history of the democratic idea from its first stirrings to the present. As he shows, democracy has always been rife with inner tensions. The ancient Greeks preferred to choose leaders by lottery and regarded elections as inherently corrupt and undemocratic. The French revolutionaries sought to incarnate the popular will, but many of them came to see the people as the enemy. And in the United States, the franchise would be extended to some even as it was taken from others. Amid the wars and revolutions of the twentieth century, communists, liberals, and nationalists all sought to claim the ideals of democracy for themselves—even as they manifestly failed to realize them. Ranging from the theaters of Athens to the tents of Occupy Wall Street, Can Democracy Work? is an entertaining and insightful guide to our most cherished—and embattled—ideal. “Insightful context on how our own body politic will survive these turbulent times.” —The Christian Science Monitor “Miller shows that democracy’s ascent is best seen not as a gradual unfolding of a political principle driven by reason and moral destiny but rather as a grand roller coaster ride of struggle, revolution, and backlash. Today’s populist outbursts look quite ordinary alongside this history.” —Foreign Affairs |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: How the South Won the Civil War Heather Cox Richardson, 2020 In this provocative new work, Heather Cox Richardson argues that while the North won the Civil War, ending slavery, oligarchy, and giving the country a new birth of freedom, the victory was short-lived. Settlers from the East pushed into the West, where the seizure of Mexican lands at the end of the Mexican-American War and treatment of Native Americans cemented racial hierarchies. The Old South found a new home in the West. Both depended on extractive industries--cotton in the former and mining, cattle, and oil in the latter--giving rise to a white ruling elite, one that thrived despite the abolition of slavery, the assurances provided by the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments, and the economic opportunities afforded by Western expansion. How the South Won the Civil War traces the story of the American paradox, the competing claims of equality and white domination that were woven into the nation's fabric from the beginning. Who was the archetypal new American? At the nation's founding it was Eastern yeoman farmer, independent and freedom-loving, who had galvanized and symbolized the Revolution. After the Civil War the mantle was taken up by the cowboy, singlehandedly defending his land and his women against savages, and protecting his country from its own government. As new states entered the Union in the late nineteenth century, western and southern leaders found common ground. Resources, including massive amounts of federal money, and migrants continued to stream into the West during the New Deal and World War II. Movement Conservatives--starting with Barry Goldwater--claimed to embody cowboy individualism, working with Dixiecrats to renew the ideology of the Confederacy. The Southern strategy worked. The essence of the Old South never died and the fight for equality endures. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: The Shaping of America Page Smith, 1989 This in-depth narrative history, rich with firsthand views of the first half-century of America's independence, provides insightful accounts of the political, religious, artistic and educational developments of the times. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: I've Got the Light of Freedom Charles M. Payne, 1995 This momentous work offers a groundbreaking history of the early civil rights movement in the South. Using wide-ranging archival work and extensive interviews with movement participants, Charles Payne uncovers a chapter of American social history forged locally, in places like Greenwood, Mississippi, where countless unsung African Americans risked their lives for the freedom struggle. The leaders were ordinary women and men--sharecroppers, domestics, high school students, beauticians, independent farmers--committed to organizing the civil rights struggle house by house, block by block, relationship by relationship. Payne brilliantly brings to life the tradition of grassroots African American activism, long practiced yet poorly understood. Payne overturns familiar ideas about community activism in the 1960s. The young organizers who were the engines of change in the state were not following any charismatic national leader. Far from being a complete break with the past, their work was based directly on the work of an older generation of activists, people like Ella Baker, Septima Clark, Amzie Moore, Medgar Evers, Aaron Henry. These leaders set the standards of courage against which young organizers judged themselves; they served as models of activism that balanced humanism with militance. While historians have commonly portrayed the movement leadership as male, ministerial, and well-educated, Payne finds that organizers in Mississippi and elsewhere in the most dangerous parts of the South looked for leadership to working-class rural Blacks, and especially to women. Payne also finds that Black churches, typically portrayed as frontrunners in the civil rights struggle, were in fact late supporters of the movement. |
| how democratic is america howard zinn: The Decline of American Pluralism Henry S. Kariel, 1961-06 |
Democratic Party (United States) - Wikipedia
The Democratic Party is a center-left political party in the United States. One of the major parties of the U.S., it was founded in 1828, making it the world's oldest active political party. Its main …
We are the Democratic Party - Democrats
Democrats are fighting for a better, fairer, and brighter future for every American: rolling up our sleeves, empowering grassroots voters, and organizing everywhere to build a better America.
DEMOCRATIC Definition & Meaning - Merriam-Webster
The meaning of DEMOCRATIC is of, relating to, or constituting one of the two major political parties in the U.S. that is usually associated with government regulation of business, finance, …
Democratic Party | History, Definition, & Beliefs | Britannica
2 days ago · Democratic Party, one of the two major political parties, alongside the Republican Party, in the United States. The Democratic Party underwent a dramatic ideological change …
DEMOCRATIC | English meaning - Cambridge Dictionary
DEMOCRATIC definition: 1. based on the principles of democracy, a system of government in which power is held by elected…. Learn more.
Trump orders ICE officers to expand deportation efforts in Democratic …
17 hours ago · President Donald Trump called for Immigration and Customs Enforcement to expand deportation efforts in Democratic cities and “do all in their power” to achieve mass …
The Maryland Democratic Party
The official party website of the Maryland Democratic Party.
Trump directs ICE to prioritize deportations from Democratic-run …
1 day ago · WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump on Sunday directed federal immigration officials to prioritize deportations from Democratic-run cities, a move that comes …
Democratic Party - HISTORY
Apr 4, 2018 · After a major shift in the 20th century, today’s Democrats are known for their association with a strong federal government and support for minority, women’s and labor …
About the Democratic Party - Democrats
Since 1848, the Democratic National Committee (DNC) has been the heart of the Democratic Party, the oldest continuing political party in the United States. Today, we are millions of …
Democratic Party (United States) - Wikipedia
The Democratic Party is a center-left political party in the United States. One of the major parties of the U.S., it was founded in 1828, making it the world's oldest active political party. Its main …
We are the Democratic Party - Democrats
Democrats are fighting for a better, fairer, and brighter future for every American: rolling up our sleeves, empowering grassroots voters, and organizing everywhere to build a better America.
DEMOCRATIC Definition & Meaning - Merriam-Webster
The meaning of DEMOCRATIC is of, relating to, or constituting one of the two major political parties in the U.S. that is usually associated with government regulation of business, finance, …
Democratic Party | History, Definition, & Beliefs | Britannica
2 days ago · Democratic Party, one of the two major political parties, alongside the Republican Party, in the United States. The Democratic Party underwent a dramatic ideological change …
DEMOCRATIC | English meaning - Cambridge Dictionary
DEMOCRATIC definition: 1. based on the principles of democracy, a system of government in which power is held by elected…. Learn more.
Trump orders ICE officers to expand deportation efforts in Democratic …
17 hours ago · President Donald Trump called for Immigration and Customs Enforcement to expand deportation efforts in Democratic cities and “do all in their power” to achieve mass …
The Maryland Democratic Party
The official party website of the Maryland Democratic Party.
Trump directs ICE to prioritize deportations from Democratic-run …
1 day ago · WASHINGTON (AP) — President Donald Trump on Sunday directed federal immigration officials to prioritize deportations from Democratic-run cities, a move that comes …
Democratic Party - HISTORY
Apr 4, 2018 · After a major shift in the 20th century, today’s Democrats are known for their association with a strong federal government and support for minority, women’s and labor …
About the Democratic Party - Democrats
Since 1848, the Democratic National Committee (DNC) has been the heart of the Democratic Party, the oldest continuing political party in the United States. Today, we are millions of …
