Cindy Wiesner of the Grassroots Global Justice Alliance joins the show to share reflections on her 35 years of internationalist organizing on the US Left—from the global justice movement of the 1990s and early 2000s, through the antiwar movement of the 2000s, to the growing international climate justice movement of the 2000s–2010s. Throughout that journey, she has been working to build power from the grassroots in the US, and with allies across the globe, especially in the Americas. She shares her perspective on that trajectory, and where we find ourselves now.
Cindy Wiesner is the Executive Director of the Grassroots Global Justice Alliance (GGJ). She helped co-found the Climate Justice Alliance and the Rising Majority and has been a leader in many cross-border movement-building initiatives.
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This transcript was automatically generated and may contain errors.
[00:00:00] Sound on Tape: This podcast is presented by Convergence, a magazine for radical insights.
[00:00:07] Cindy Weisner: Again, we can’t be historical. It didn’t start with the, you know, the student encampments created and are not. It broke through the psychic break, you know, like Occupy created the psychic break. But there were years and years and years of organizing that had been happening to create that.
[00:00:24] And then how do we, in these moments, as the left, as the progressive movement, keep pushing?
[00:00:35] William Lawrence: This is the Hegemonic podcast where we are investigating the workings of power. What is power? How does it work? Who has it? What are they doing with it? How the heck do we get it? And other small questions like that. I’m your host, William Lawrence, and I’m an organizer from Lansing, Michigan. Currently I work with the Rent is two Damn High Coalition, an alliance of tenant unions and housing justice groups across the state of Michigan.
[00:01:04] Formerly I was a climate justice organizer for 10 years, including as a co-founder of Sunrise Movement, the youth organization that put the green New Deal on the political map. Just a quick note, uh, we recorded the interviews for this season between May and July. Now we’re releasing them in August and September.
[00:01:22] A lot has happened in the world, uh, in between those times such as Biden dropping out of the race. So if you hear us, uh, speaking with blissful ignorance of what was to come, well that’s what’s going on. But I think that the conversations are gonna hold up very well for our tasks of building an internationalist left in the months and years to come.
[00:01:57] Uh, I am very honored to be joined today by Cindy Weisner to continue our series on internationalism speaking today about grassroots internationalism from the bottom up. Um, Cindy is a 35 year veteran of the social justice movement in the United States and internationally. She is the executive director of the Grassroots Global Justice Alliance, or GGJ, and she helped to co-found the Climate Justice Alliance and the Rising Majority, and has been a leader in many, many other, uh, domestic and cross border movement building initiatives.
[00:02:32] Um, too many to name, but, uh, she’ll get into many of them in this conversation. Um, Cindy, I’m so glad to have you here. Welcome.
[00:02:40] Cindy Weisner: Hey, William. Good to see you. Good to hear you. Um, good to be reconnected again.
[00:02:47] William Lawrence: So you’ve been working hard to, uh, organize for grassroots internationalist power in the United States in solidarity and relationship with people abroad for decades.
[00:02:58] How about you start by just giving our listeners a little introduction to your organizing over the years and how it came to take on this internationalist emphasis.
[00:03:06] Cindy Weisner: Well, I, I, you know, I started like many, many folks as a young student organizer in the early nineties and quickly got very politicized, uh, both I think in the first Iraqi massacre in 1991 and then, um, and being part of mobilizations in the Bay Area that took over the bridge that really began to articulate, um.
[00:03:30] This notion about the war, connecting the war here in our communities and the war abroad and what the US government was doing to people, the Iraqi people, but also to people, primarily people of color here in the United States. It was also part of the Rodney King uprisings. I’m originally from Hollywood, the working class part of Hollywood.
[00:03:53] Mm-hmm. And I was part of the Rodney King uprisings. Um, and when that happened, it was a, a moment of massive radicalization for myself, but a whole generation that again, made the connections around state violence and the, um, you know, attacks. Um, particularly with the black community. I went on to become an organizer.
[00:04:15] I started off as a labor organizer, um, with, uh, when what was then called HERE, um, now unite here and then. Did a whole bunch of, uh, worker organizing, independent worker organizing that took me to Miami at the Miami Worker Center, and that’s through that process. I met Grassroots Global Justice Alliance through the social forum process.
[00:04:38] So I’ve been involved in a number of start helping start and helping doula many, um, code doula, many org movement organizations. And I’ve been just, you know, uh, somebody who has been very inspired and grounded by, um, international social movements. Um, my background is, my family is from El Salvador and Colombia, um, to countries, uh, completely impacted by US intervention, um, and, you know, uh, and civil war and, uh, revolutionary movements.
[00:05:13] And I think that for me, um, once I understood, I think my, my own experience growing up as a working class kid, um, you know, daughter to a domestic worker. You know, I feel like I, I tried to like think about like, how, how did this all happen to me and my family? And I think that what became clear was through, um, you know, getting politicized, getting grounded in, in history and also liberatory struggles from around the world that I began to understand our context and connecting that to then the organizing that I did, bringing those two together and having it be a way that I understood, um, what we needed to do.
[00:05:58] William Lawrence: Thank you. You mentioned this is a very timely conversation. You know, I’m doing these, this sequence right now because I think the whole left is really grappling with, um. What the role of internationalism in our broader work as the sort of, you know, racial and economic justice organizing. There was a big domestic emphasis in the Bernie years is now kind of washing ashore on in the Biden administration.
[00:06:23] And we have the return of foreign policy via Ukraine, via Gaza, via, uh, the rising tensions with China. Um, so I, I wonder if we could just begin by having you give us a review of kind of what you see as some key elements of the this present conjuncture, this present moment.
[00:06:44] Cindy Weisner: Mm-hmm. Yeah. I mean, we’re, we’re witnessing a massive, um, transition, right?
[00:06:50] Um, instability, uncertainty and crisis at every scale around the world, right? And I think that’s been one of the dominant qualities of this period. And, you know, economic inequality is at its highest, um, since before the Great Depression. And we are seeing people’s lives disrupted and displaced by, by conflict and the climate emergency, and, um, corporations exploiting these crises, right?
[00:07:16] Deploying disaster capitalism, accelerating, um, violent, um, resource extraction and exploitation of workers and communities and the police state perpetuating, you know, murder and mar mass incarceration of, of black lives. The militarization of borders and communities and rightwing, extremist and, and power, all of us responding to this threat of, of neo fascism.
[00:07:42] Right. Um, that has been, you know, entrenched historically in, in, in this territory, in this country around, you know, uh, white supremacy, hetero patriarchy, um, and xenophobia. And I think they’re, what they’re up to is really securing, um, you know, minority rule. Mm-hmm. And you know, and I think in this, in this moment of, of, um, you know, sort of the acceleration of the structural crisis of what we call racial and gendered capitalism, um, you know, we’re seeing that after decades of, um, deregulation.
[00:08:18] Financial speculation, um, austerity politics, and really kind of shrinking, um, the social state. And, and we’re seeing that, that the, that that’s one of the things that the right wings agenda, not just here in this country, but globally, is the dismantling the state as as we know it. I mean, I believe Steve Bannon’s quote, um, pre-Trump, um, you know, that that’s one of their, their efforts and part of that is that we are seeing.
[00:08:47] You know, sort of this economic contraction where, you know, the elites are trying to kind of run business as usual, but then as a result of the global pandemic, the sort of, you know, sort of the shortages of goods, the, the rising of global starvation, the stable destabilization of, and polarizing economies.
[00:09:07] Like we’re, we’re knowing that this, we’re at a point of where, you know, um, there is this kind of worldview battle happening. Right. And I think in a lot of ways, the way I like to think about it is that there’s really like these two competing, um, hegemonic views on one level about the future of the planet and the future of humanity.
[00:09:29] Um, which is really one that sort of prioritizes an economy of death. Um, that then is based on just, you know, profit. It’s based on extraction, it’s based on isolation, it’s based on individualism, it’s based on violence, you know, extreme violence in terms of what we’re seeing also in, in Gaza and around the world.
[00:09:50] Um, but also. It competes with this world alternative world vision, right? A different cosmo. I like to call it a cosmo vision, like indigenous folks talk about. That really is about an economy that puts people in nature and life kind of at the center. And part of that is when we are then in right relationship with each other, when we’re right relationship with nature, where we put kind of our values, right, our values of dignity and respect and um, equality and um, uh, cooperation and sovereignty.
[00:10:29] Um, and I think that that’s kind of like the moment that we’re in, in which, you know, in this moment of war violence, the rise of neo fascism, I think it’s become strikingly clear. About kind of these important choice points that we have to be making as a, as a, as a society, as a peoples, um, as, as a, at, at, at this, at, at this particular juncture.
[00:10:54] And,
[00:10:55] William Lawrence: and we’ll come back around to, uh, some of those choices that you think ought to be made. Uh, I want to kind of stay at the, at, at the big picture level, uh, for a minute and ask about, um. Over your career, what you’ve observed and also studied about the tendencies of the US American population when it comes to its attitudes towards, you know, call it internationalism, call it just awareness or consciousness of the rest of the world.
[00:11:29] Um, you know, I, I think it’s important to say that, you know, both. Uh, militar attitudes and anti militarist or anti-imperialist attitudes, uh, each have a, you know, multiracial heritage in the United States. That being said, you know, white people, I think it’s fair to say, have often been, uh, uh, among the most zealous in favor of US imperialism while the, um, black communities and communities of color in which you’ve based much of your organizing have often given root to, uh, you know, the most radical anti militarist movements in the United States.
[00:12:06] So, so what can you say about, you know, the, the US population, including the role of, uh, race and, uh, other identities and, uh, its role in shaping support or opposition to, um, US militarism and US imperialism?
[00:12:22] Cindy Weisner: You know, there’s a, a long, uh, lineage of struggle that has really talked about abolition, right? And I think it’s a lineage of struggle, uh, coming from the black, um, liberation movement.
[00:12:36] And I wanna start there because part of what abolition speaks to, right? It’s, it’s a multi-generational, multicultural black led plan to, to, to end how prisons, military, the caging of people, the violence that is enacted on people, the dominance of people is, is a plan to end that, right? Mm-hmm. And it’s, it’s not just about, you know, closing of prisons, of, um, enslavement, of police, of surveillance, of punishment.
[00:13:11] It’s really about the belief that those things, um, you know, um, the ways of the way we deal with things, you know mm-hmm. And deal with punishment or consequences there, that there needs to be an alternative. Right. And part of that, um, sort of demand, right, is that for us to really think about. You know, different systems of punishment and war, you know, that need to be invested in, in terms of wellbeing of communities and visions of healing and repair.
[00:13:43] And I start there because, you know, I, I think about, you know, sort of folks like, um, Brittany DeBarros, um, from about Face, who’s one of our leaders in GG J. She talks about, you know, sort of abolishing the deep cultural militarism and dismantling the military industrial complex, like will require a, a deep questioning and unlearning of that logic, right?
[00:14:09] That leads to lies at the heart of policing prisons, anti-immigration agencies and beyond. And that we need to be rejecting this common logic that tells us that violence somehow makes us safe. Mm-hmm. That cages somehow maintains security, that war somehow create peace, right? Mm-hmm. And I quote her, I, I kind of quoted her because I feel like she’s, you know, she and many folks organizing, you know, um, that’s against the war, people who’ve been, um, really, uh, at the, at the crosshairs of knowing what the damage that we do to each other, right.
[00:14:47] And not only in community, but also in the, on behalf of, of the United States. And, and, and the political project of the US is that it’s really dismantling, right? It’s dismantling that notion and, and part of it is almost, it’s like a counter hegemonic thinking. Mm-hmm. That needs to exist. Right. And I think that.
[00:15:07] In the name of, of safety and protection and wellbeing, we in the United States need to know that, you know, that that history was there from the very beginning, from the genocide that happened with native, uh, peoples, with indigenous people, original peoples, with the enslavement of people with the taking of land from other territories, um, from setting, setting up colonial settler territories, and then this, this manifest destiny.
[00:15:37] Mm-hmm. You know, the sort of this notion of, of expansion, of control, of being able to create, um, sort of dominance and, and being able to use that war. And many of us have bought into that, you know, in terms of like, oh yeah. Um, in order for patriotism and defense and our wellbeing. And I think that’s some of the stuff that we have to unlearn.
[00:15:59] We have to do some of that counter hegemonic work, that deep political education that, that. To, to know about, not in our name. Mm-hmm. You know, sort of to, to, to, to, to hold our government accountable for the historic harms, but also for what it currently does in the name of us imperialism and world domination.
[00:16:19] Mm-hmm.
[00:16:20] William Lawrence: I’m curious to just hear you say a bit more, you’re speaking about the counter hegemonic vision that has existed and needs to be further cultivated. I wonder if you could just like speak about the, the, the strength, the durable existence of the hegemonic ideology in the major segments of the US population.
[00:16:40] That in ways that are very popular, that poses challenges for the organizer who is seeking to, you know, bring people together around the alternative and, you know, fight the bad guys.
[00:16:52] Cindy Weisner: Yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No. Um, you know, sort of when we do organizing, we usually like are on the ground and fighting the, the righteous fight.
[00:17:00] And, um, and that’s important. But, um, and, you know, we usually talk about the need for also having, uh, a strategy and a plan to counter the ideas, right? Mm-hmm. To counter the dominant ideas that I think people have. You know, I, I started off as a, uh, as a welfare organizer and you know, what level, and that was in the mid nineties, and that’s when Bill Clinton was changing welfare as we know it.
[00:17:27] And there was so much, um, racism and sexism in sort of the articulation and the right wing, you know, um, Newt Gingrich and the right wing sort of going after, uh, particularly like working class black mothers, right? And you’re just like, wait a minute. You know, and when we were doing like the political education, so many of those women working class women just thought they were the, they fucked up.
[00:17:52] Mm-hmm. You know, that they had individually made bad choices and fucked up. And then when we were doing the political education and talking about actually the, the federal budget, and we were talking about sort of, uh, the corporate role, the role of government supporting corporations and all that, and what was the actual percentage of the welfare budget on the national level.
[00:18:14] People were like, oh, wow. The people really on welfare are these, are these companies, the people getting bailed out like consistently and not paying taxes. They’re like, we’re working, we’re doing reproductive labor and we’re also working. We’re domestic workers. We’re students. We’re, we’re recyclers. We’re trying to do all this stuff.
[00:18:34] And I think that that, to me. Was a huge sort of lesson, right? It’s going to the root causes, ’cause so much, so many of us internalize the dominant sort of hegemony, right? Mm-hmm. That actually, uh, is completely enlaced with, you know, all the, all the isms. And then we internalize it ourselves. And then therefore, in a lot of ways, it, it, it, it, it, it curves our ability to act.
[00:19:04] And then when people begin to understand the root causes and it awakens, it creates bigger space to then maneuver and then for us to be able to organize. And so many of those women that we organized and did that deep political education with over 25 years ago, 30 years ago, they’re still organizers.
[00:19:25] They went on to be organizers and leaders of the National Domestic Workers Alliance of the Right to City Alliance organizing in their communities. And you’re just like, oh, it’s that sort of critical consciousness that begins to to, to activate you. And I think that that’s part of the task of organizers is to really think about like.
[00:19:46] How are we connecting not just the bread and butter issues, but doing that deeper political critical consciousness to then awaken something, uh, a deeper understanding of the systems, um, that are at play?
[00:20:00] William Lawrence: Thanks for that. Um, you know, I, I think you’ve got about two decades on me in your, um, movement tenure.
[00:20:09] Uh, I arrived around 15 years ago and, um, you know, in, in the Obama years and, uh, occupy was the first big movement moment that, uh, I, you know, was super transformative. And, and that sort of set off a cycle through the 2010s that went through various other, uh, you know, street uprisings and, and then. Taking on this political character, uh, especially beginning in 2016 with the Bernie movement and then all that followed.
[00:20:37] Um, but before that, uh, you know, and most of that was really domestically, you know, focused. I think it’s fair to say we were fighting for racial justice, economic justice, um, you know, here in, in the United States of America. Um, but in the decades before that, there was, you know, really a, a 15 to 20 year, um, movement cycle in the, uh, 1990s and then in into the two thousands.
[00:21:03] Um, that was, um, I think much more internationalist in in its emphasis, um, than, um, many of us were in the, in the 2010s. And this. You know, it was often called the Global Justice Movement. It began in the, you know, mid 1990s is my understanding in, in my inherited memory. I wasn’t there. Uh, you know, some of the key moments in this, uh, in this cycle where the, the, the Zapatista uprising in 1994 and the broader fight against nafta, which was very much transnational, you know, the 1999 battle in Seattle and other demonstrations at trade summits, and then beginning in 2001, the World Social Forums, which were bringing together left wing social movement forces from around the world and my senses, especially from around the Americas.
[00:21:53] And so, uh, I wonder if you could take us through some of those years, um, with an eye towards, you know, the character of these struggles, but also specifically, you know, who are some of the constituencies and organizations here in the US who were participating in these, um, transnational uh, movements and mobilizations.
[00:22:14] Cindy Weisner: Sure you’re taking me way back. Will.
[00:22:17] William Lawrence: Yeah. Gotta do it. People don’t know.
[00:22:19] Cindy Weisner: Hey, hey, hey. This is, yeah. Challenge the, a historical nature of shit. So let me, you know, I think in the backdrop, I, I, you know, this was, was, this was the era when I was a young buck and getting politicized and I can’t step into the nineties without talking about the legacy of the anti-apartheid movement, you know, um, in, in solidarity and support with, um, South Africa.
[00:22:42] Also the, all of the anti intervention, um, work that happened, um, in solidarity, um, with Central America, particularly El Salvador and, and Nicaragua, um, and Guatemala and, and, and different folks. But I think in particular, those struggles that happened, right, because there was so much, uh, a deep, deep level of, of activism and organizing work that happened of deep solidarity, particularly from people in this country towards those struggles.
[00:23:14] But I also, when you, when you, when you started mentioning, you know, the battle in Seattle. First thing that came to mind was like Dan, the Direct Action Network. Mm-hmm. Right. And the convergence spaces and the anarchist movement and the kind of the heyday of, um, you know, the beginning of sort of what was being called the the Alter Globalization Movement, which we then called the Global Justice Movement and there was an article.
[00:23:41] That was written in, in the year 2000 by one of my comrad RA’s, uh, mentors, uh, beta Martinez. Um, and she wrote an article called, where was the Color in Seattle, looking for the reason why the Great Battle was so white.
[00:23:57] William Lawrence: Um,
[00:23:57] Cindy Weisner: and she talked about, you know, like so many people had talked about this like splendid victory of the WTO.
[00:24:05] Like a very impressive move of, uh, you know, over 50,000 people mobilizing in the streets of Seattle, battling out with the police, closing down sort of the ministerial meeting and really looking at. Why and how, um, did we understand the role of, of, of people of color and, and what it meant to like, name this new international movement against, um, imperialist, uh, sort of globalization.
[00:24:35] Right? And so part of that, um, in the article she talks about just the, the global. Delegation that was here, and that often, you know, gets Invis erased in history. And she talked about like people from Pakistan and Malaysia and Ghana and, and Mexico and, um, folks from the Caribbean and South Africa and India and China that were here to talk about the direct impacts of the W2.
[00:25:01] What would that have in terms of their, their country, um, and their context, but also naming the role of the people of color grassroots groups, right? Like folks like sne, right? Mm-hmm. The Southwest network for Environmental and Economic Justice that was based in Albuquerque and had actually had been born on the eve of the anti NAFTA fights, you know, and, and, and, um, had done a lot of cross border work between Mexico and the South and organizations in the, in the southwest.
[00:25:32] And, you know, and there was a lot of other, um, you know, there was like, you know, people talked about it as like the turtles and the teamsters, right? But within that, there was a lot of rank and file, um, folks of color, um, that were there. And I think this, the battle in Seattle, um, sort of happens at a moment where there was all these mass mobilizations, right?
[00:25:55] Wherever the WTO went, wherever the IMF went, there was mass popular cross-sectoral, uh, mobilizations. And it was in, I think it was a moment. Also where, um, the World’s Social Forum was born. Right? Which is, for those of you who may not know, um, there’s a annual meeting called the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
[00:26:19] And it’s, you know, where the capitalists gather, you know, not only government, but also corporations and sort of some level of civil society. And so the social forum comes at a moment where it basically begins to talk about a counter hegemonic globalization, right. That was needed and that it was at the same time, and to be able to then, and it was held in Puerto Allegre, Brazil.
[00:26:47] And the significance of Puerto Allegre was because the workers’ party, right, the PT in, in Brazil had actually had taken power and they were participate. They were, uh, doing deep work around participatory budgeting and decided to hold this. This World Social Forum. And it was a place where people, you know, they brought in all these organizations, all these, um, social movements, all these NGOs, and part of it as a space, right?
[00:27:16] This open space, plural, non-governmental nonpartisan space that tried, tried to bring people to share experiences, to share, uh, reflections, to have decentralized debates, and to really think about what would a more fair world like, you know, the, the, the slogan is another world is possible. Mm-hmm. And what is it that we needed to bring to create an alternative space to, to neoliberalism, right.
[00:27:45] And so part of that is that the world’s social forum, I think for all its beauty and its power. And you know, we ourselves also brought and helped do, do a social forum here in the United States, um, in 2007 in Atlanta, and in 2010 in Detroit, which were like amazing and awesome and powerful. But the problem with the social forum was that it was a, the, the beauty of it was a place of deep exchange relationship building and being able to, in a lot of ways meet our global counterparts, right?
[00:28:17] Mm-hmm. But what was the limitation of it was that the space was, um. Was not a place of, of formal statements on behalf of the participants. It was not a space of, of collective agreement. And it was not a space of, of high level of coordination. Right. And I think that it was sort of more on like the Occupy side, right?
[00:28:39] It’s like we’re just gonna organize and bring people together and in the hopes that something may come out of it. And part of what I think then a lot of social movements ended up thinking after a couple of years, um, is really saying we need something actually more binding. Mm-hmm. You know, we need something much more intentional.
[00:28:59] We need something, uh, we need to be able to hold, um, and do campaigns together. Because the assaults that we’re facing at that point was really squarely called neoliberalism, you know, and we saw the era of the FTAA, um, the free trade, um, agreement of the Americas where the US was trying to go, like Naft on steroids and do this agreement with all.
[00:29:22] The countries, um, in the Americas minus Cuba. And there was a concerted effort that then happened on behalf of not only the left governments, right? So like, not just like Ugo Chavez and Venezuela and Fidel and, and Lula from Brazil, but it was also social movements, right? It was social movements and a broad front of social movements from trade unionists to environmentalists, to faith community, to the feminist, to the left parties, to the left, uh, folks that then basically saw the impact of what this free, free trade agreement would have on the Americas and ended up having more than a decade long campaign.
[00:30:09] Against it. And everywhere the FTAA ministerial went to meet that was confronted with mass popular organizing on the outside. And then on the inside the left governments actually pushing, you know, pushing against, uh, the negotiations that the US was trying to do. And I think kind of this early nineties, two thousands, you know, really marks this like moment, um, in the continent that was like the US was trying to impose a neoliberal economy right.
[00:30:43] With structural adjustment, with, um, the IMF, you know, part of this like Washington consensus. And ultimately, you know, ultimately there was, um, unity and diversity. Mm-hmm. And there was a way that people were able to, after years, be able to finally bury it. Mm-hmm. And, and, and in the US. And Miami played a huge role.
[00:31:09] And we played a huge role. We played our part. We played our part, we took the assignment and played our part. And there was a big battle in Miami, right. That happened. And that was where the Miami Workers Center, power U, the Coalition of Immaculately workers, created a, uh, a coalition called the Root Cause Coalition.
[00:31:32] And the Root Cause Coalition decided to do a 34 mile march. It did, it decided to do a tribunal, and it had decided to invite other grassroots groups from around the country. Though some of those who had gone to the WTO, the battle in Seattle, some of those who had been doing economic justice work, environmental justice work, and actually all came together in Miami.
[00:31:55] Mm-hmm. Under this Root Cause coalition. And we did so much of the work. To connect what, what, what we were facing, like the, you know, to the black community in Liberty City. What did this, what did this ministerial and have to do? And then when we, when we did the deeper work, is that they were gonna do the secretariat there in Wynwood and in a community that was like Puerto Rican and black and working class.
[00:32:21] And that it was gonna completely change the, the whole contour of, of the city. Wow. And the, the black and Latinx community in Miami. And then when we started making the connections about what these policies meant for farm workers, for low income tenants, for folks across the country, we’re like, oh, we understand this connection and this thing being hosted here in Miami, what impact it was gonna have.
[00:32:47] And so we then went into like months and months of political education preparation, and then the mobilization happened and then, you know, history sort of plays this itself out. Right. And you know, this thing kind of, you know. Dies, and this was a global, I’m sorry, a hemispheric victory that I think was really significant in terms of challenging western dominance and imperialism, but a coordinated strategy across the continent that I think is, there’s so much lessons there learned because it was almost like a united front experience, right?
[00:33:22] Between a broad cross section of, of social movements and peoples. People from the center. Mm-hmm. Like even like business people that are, were against this, you know? Mm-hmm. To government, to left governments and left parties. And I think that to me, there’s something really important, um, in that example, especially in these moments when we’re thinking about Gaza and we’re thinking about the fight of the ascension of fascism.
[00:33:47] What is it that we need to be thinking about broad and wide and over time to then have a common target and to be able to know where it goes. Let it succeed. Right. Because we basically shut down the meeting. Right. And we’re able to, it, it could no longer be viable. Miami was no longer a viable location for the ministerial to be hosted.
[00:34:09] William Lawrence: Mm-hmm.
[00:34:10] Cindy Weisner: So I say that story because I think that gives the roots. Root cause then creates the basis for us forming grassroots global justice. So many of those people and many of those organizations that were part of Root cause were then founders of GGJ.
[00:34:28] William Lawrence: Could you just say a bit about what GGJ was then has become for, for our listeners?
[00:34:35] Cindy Weisner: Sure. Um, so Grassroots Global Justice is a, uh, national alliance of community-based, um, organizations and, um, regional and national networks and independent worker organizations. Um, that is, was founded in 2005 as a membership alliance. It is multi, it’s multi, multi, uh, it is multiracial, uh, multi, multi gendered, intergenerational, uh, multi-sectoral that comes together.
[00:35:08] Around the issues of, uh, climate justice and just transition envi, we, we, we come out of the environmental justice and climate justice movement, um, around the work around demilitarization, not only around demilitarization in our communities and the fights against the police, um, the INS, the military budget, but also around the wars and occupations around the world and around racial and gender justice.
[00:35:36] And so. Part of what we’ve been, um, also working on as an alliance is really reclaiming, um, grassroots feminisms. Mm-hmm. And really talking about, um, needing an alternative to this, you know, racial and gendered capitalism and imperialism. And that being our political, uh, project is, uh, helping build a feminist, anti-racist regenerative economy.
[00:36:01] And so, um, so yeah, so we, we believe in movement building and not only here in the US and the territories, but also internationally and serve as a, as a bridge to social movements, um, in the Americas in particular, but also globally. And so we’ve been part of, we were born out of the world’s social forum process.
[00:36:24] We were born out of this root, this battle in Seattle and root cause. Right. And we, um, you know, have then evolved and developed and helped play that role. Um. And movement building role.
[00:36:35] William Lawrence: And to this day, hey, I wanna ask one more question about the, um, you talked about the broad front, the kind of unity and diversity that was required to, you know, beat back the free trade area of the Americas.
[00:36:47] Um, and. I’m curious about, you know, how the state socialisms, you mentioned of, you know, Chavismo, Cuba, um, and then, you know, other states as part of the pink tide, the first pink tide in this era, how that was relating to these bottom up kind of grassroots social movement forces, um, that you in a, uh, alliances with and, and, and are part of.
[00:37:11] You know, this was a time, you know, after the fall of the Soviet Union, a kind of. Searching or, uh, recomposition of the left in the post-Soviet, um, post capital C Communist era. Um, and you know, I remember just growing up as an adolescent at this time, this was a time when, you know, capital C communism or capital S socialism as practiced by, you know, Venezuela or c Cuba were, you know, very much, uh, uh, demonized, uh, to, in a way that I think, uh, at least on the left these days, there’s a curiosity about some of those experiments.
[00:37:48] Um. I recall in my adolescence, maybe it’s just because I was an adolescent, but, uh, you know, uh, there was a, a, a greater anarchist, uh, anti-statist sort of tendency, which you also mentioned, which was, you know, I, I almost dare say mainstream within the left, the grassroots left in the United States at that time.
[00:38:08] And so, I guess I just wonder if you could, you know, how, how some of those, uh, dialogues played out between states and social movements between anarchists and socialists or communists, and how you navigated, uh, those, uh, those tensions in order to cohere a broad front against, um, you know, US led, um, financialized globalization.
[00:38:32] Cindy Weisner: Okay. Big question. You had a lot of things in there. I know, I know. Um, so, so I’m gonna, I’m gonna actually, I’m gonna answer it from, from this point, from my perspective now, and then go back. You know, I think that there has been, um, there has been some pretty intense pitched strategic and tactical, um, differences in the movement.
[00:38:54] Um, and I would say not just here in this country, but around the world. And a in a lot of ways, it’s, it’s based on, you know, an ideological worldview, you know, perspective. And then how do you, and then what’s your theory of change? And then what are, what’s your assessment of what needs to be done? And I think that there, there has, you know, there’s many movements that have competing assessments, right?
[00:39:19] Competing assessments of what, what is necessary, what is, what is what, what can we do? And there’s also, um, different movement history. You know, in different contexts. And, and, and I think that in, in our, in our, uh, more current history in the United States, like we have not, and, and I would say my generation too well, is that we have not experienced what it’s like to have, um, a a vibrant left party, you know, a a left party of, of the masses that is connected to our struggles that we, um, are then able to, um, you know, sort of coordinate at, at a, at a much deeper and broader level.
[00:40:02] And in the absence of that, I think we, there’s, there’s been a set of challenges, but in other countries, I’ll come back to that, but in other countries you’ve seen a much more, um, vibrant ecosystem. Mm-hmm. Right? Of not only social movement left, but you’ve also seen the role of, of revolutionary, um, or left parties, um, of, of, of, of, you know, the whole.
[00:40:27] Around the whole spectrum of, of the left. And you’ve also seen, um, different, um, formations, right? Much more articulated and developed formations, whether they’re, they’re anarchist formations, horizontalism, you know, horizontalism formations and different things. So I think in a lot of ways we in the US are still maturing
[00:40:49] William Lawrence: mm-hmm.
[00:40:49] Cindy Weisner: Those forms of organizations and maturing our, our, our perspective. But I would say that people in the, in the past and even now have, have had strong kind of lines, political lines. Um, and I’d like to talk about what this Chilean social movement framework that we’ve been using a lot at GGJ that’s really helped us is that there needs to be struggles.
[00:41:17] Um, within the state.
[00:41:19] William Lawrence: Mm-hmm.
[00:41:19] Cindy Weisner: And then there needs to be struggles against the state, and there needs to be struggles outside of the state. And that, that framework at different moments, those have been pitched battles, like I said, between different strategies and tactics. But I think at this moment, more than ever, we actually need to be practicing and thinking about those strategic orientations simultaneously.
[00:41:42] Right. Because there’s people who are like, and, and, and who are like, you know, we don’t wanna, we, we don’t think electorally, um, is, is the means, uh, to, to to win power. Mm-hmm. But many of those, um, those countries that you talked about, you know, Venezuela and, uh, Bolivia and um, and Ecuador and, uh, El Salvador, you go down the line once the revolutionary arm struggles were, were in a lot of ways.
[00:42:14] Put down. Mm-hmm. Um, for many reasons, mostly in US intervention and right-wing bourgeoisie and milit, the military in those countries. But people left us decided to take the electoral route and see if it was possible to win. Um, when, uh, change, and you, and you saw that happen with Chavez, you saw that happen time and time again.
[00:42:37] You, you see it happening right in, in this hemisphere, but also globally. And I think that the left has learned a lot of lessons about what it means to build power electorally, which I think the right is the, the, the, the fascist right. Is now taking that playbook mm-hmm. And using the electoral, um, arena as a way through populism and as a way to be able to also gain state power.
[00:43:05] But I think that the, the other side is that we have to, I think no matter what, and this is my politic, personal politic, no matter what I believe in permanent revolution, I’m not a trotskyist, but I believe in permanent revolution. And part of the permanent revolution is, is that even if we win, we never stop actually changing and transforming.
[00:43:29] And I think that some of the examples that we’ve seen, the socialist experiments that we’ve seen have made some pretty grave and very huge, um, errors and actually have, have, have gone ha, has been countered to the revolutionary ideals that I think many of us uphold and. I think that there’s something about once you get to power that you don’t sort of perpetuate.
[00:43:58] And I think we have to have, the movement overall has to have way more conversations about power. And we have to have much more conversations about how do you know, how do we then, from the very beginning, have, you know, intersectional analysis is not just like a thing about identity and representation.
[00:44:18] It’s actually, it helps you actually address questions at scale about what, what to do with land, what to do with water, right? What to think, how you think about feeding people. How do you think about sharing, uh, power in a very dramatically different way. And if you don’t, from the very beginning, put at the center an anti patriarchal, anti um, homophobic anti, uh, white supremacist.
[00:44:46] Anti, uh, ableist framework, you’re gonna answer in a very particular hegemonic way, right? Mm-hmm. The dominant way. And so I think some of that is what we saw, some of, some of the failures, some to be honest about our socialist experiments, right? And at the same time, I think there’s an opportunity where there is actually a lot of reevaluation, a lot of saying we need something dramatically different than racial and gendered capitalism and we need something completely different.
[00:45:21] Um, and we need to evolve the socialist experiments. There’s a lot of things that are really important, but there’s a lot of things that we have to reimagine. And one of those is the state. And I think that. Part of that is that we have to continue in this like, permanent transformation because that it never ends.
[00:45:40] And I think, you know, I hate the question. It’s like, what are you gonna do when the revolution, oh yeah, I wanna be a cook. You can be a cook. No, we have to continue being, we need to continue actually being in, in, in that transformation because it never ends. And the contradictions, and if we go back to our, our assessment of the crisis, we’re gonna keep being in crisis, right?
[00:46:03] If, if all of our projections around climate. Democracy and, uh, you know, empire continue. Like, I think that we’re gonna be in continued crisis. And so I think that’s the thing that we need to be prepared for over the long haul. It’s, it’s actually a never finishes. And then the last thing is the building of alternatives.
[00:46:21] So oftentimes it’s like, oh, okay, and then here are the, here are the horizontal list, or here are the, the collectives or the co-ops. That is absolutely necessary, but we gotta do it at scale. Mm-hmm. And we gotta do it in a more mass way because. Ultimately, those are the places where we train people on how to govern.
[00:46:42] William Lawrence: Right?
[00:46:42] Cindy Weisner: Right. So when you talk about union organizing and student, um, involvement in their schools and all this stuff, it’s like all of that, we have to think about it. As preparing to govern and preparing to practice democracy and a radical new democracy. And so all of that to say is that there is this framework that I think is really helpful, like against the state, within the state, outside of the state.
[00:47:08] And we need to be developing strategic orientations on those three levels simultaneously. And it’s about a division of labor and it’s about how they compliment each other. Because at this particular moment we can’t afford to be like hating on the folks who do electoral work or hating on the folks who just do mutual aid or, or not, or, or ignoring them or saying that, you know, you’re just all about action faction, right?
[00:47:35] It actually has to be a combination of all of that. So to answer your question is that I think that we as leftists have a critique of, you know, systemic oppression and exploitation and we need to. Apply that, uh, into really thinking about even in our most progressive, most revolutionary experiences, we need to be actually bringing all of our thinking and our practice there as well, you know?
[00:48:06] Yeah. And so I think that to me, I’m very convinced about, and I think that what we’re seeing in Cuba right now, you know, it’s like Cuba’s in crisis, economic crisis, political crisis. But there are Cubans in Cuba really trying to figure out what is our generation’s articulation of the revolution at this stage moving forward?
[00:48:25] What have we learned? And part of that is how do we reimagine things? And I think that’s the task of any conscious force, any revolutionary, is to constantly be assessing and then thinking about in collective, about what should we be up to and doing given the changing conditions.
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[00:49:45] William Lawrence: You know, and the other thing that you mentioned that, uh, I appreciate is this thing about after the revolution, your paradise that you’re gonna live in, or your bakery, you’re gonna operate, or your garden, you’re gonna tend after the revolution. You know, I think we should be tending gardens and, uh, having bakeries, you know, here before the revolution.
[00:50:04] But like, if what you’re looking for is, uh, you know, some sort of paradise basically with no suffering, where you just get pure enjoyment. I’m, I’m like, I’m sorry, what you’re looking for is heaven. This is a Christian concept and like, you don’t get it in this life. Maybe you get it in the next life if you believe that, but so I share that with you, that you know.
[00:50:22] Revolution is gonna be an ongoing process. It’s gonna be an ongoing process. That being said, I think the distinction between reform and revolution and what we can call truly revolutionary is another really interesting, uh, debate. A, a place where we could, uh, stand to achieve more clarity. Because these concepts about reform and revolution are so bandied around and become really intense fault lines at times in our movements.
[00:50:45] And I, I, I, I think we could do better to have, uh, some, some, uh, usable concepts of what we actually mean by revolution, what we mean by reform for that matter, than we’re currently working with. But I don’t think we’re gonna get to get into this today, but, um, uh, maybe on another episode, well, I wanna move us forward through the two thousands and then bring us back up to the present briefly now.
[00:51:09] You know, I had heard a story that, you know, September 11th, 2001 really was sort of a, you know, a big blow or took the wind out of the sails of the global justice movement due to the severe and. I think very popular in the United States, patriotic and militar reaction of the global war on terror. And it took, you know, uh, a year or more for, you know, any significant anti-war movement against the global war on terror to gain traction.
[00:51:39] And it really was Iraq. That was the thing that spurred the biggest mass movement. Now, I’m also aware that your, your free trade area of America’s big mobilization in Miami was in 2003, and then GG j got started in 2005. So you’re already complicating my, uh, periodization here. There was movement continuing through this period, you know, the first half of the, of, of, of the two thousands.
[00:52:03] Um, but take us a little bit back into the era, you know, right after nine 11 and then leading into the Iraq war, how the character of the movement, uh, did change as a result of this new, you know, militarist offensive on the part of the us.
[00:52:19] Cindy Weisner: Yeah. So, um, you know, I, I was coming back on a plane on September 10th, um, from Durban, South Africa.
[00:52:27] I was part of a woman of color, uh, delegation that went to the, um, world conference on, on against racism, known as, uh, Durban One, um, that, that, um, you know, was held, uh, from the 31st of August to September 8th, 2001. And I literally passed New York City. I came through New York City, um, the day before nine 11.
[00:52:52] And that conference is, was really, really important. And a lot, a lot of work had happened up until that point. And I think, um, history actually could, you know, it’s like the, the moment of nine 11 kind of changes history, the course of history, right. But I think if we would’ve followed what would’ve happened, what happened at the, uh.
[00:53:17] At the World Conference Against Racism was that there was two of the main issues, and it’s very relevant to today. Two of the main issues, the most controversial issues inside and outside the, the Yuan Conference was how to, how to, how reparations for, um, slavery and um, and then Palestine and Israel. And the Palestinians and like the Arab world was really trying to, um, underline that the actions being committed, uh, by Israel against Palestinians were racist.
[00:53:55] Right. And really talking about Zionism. Right. And there was a whole process of, of writing into the document, the draft document equating Zionism. With racism. And the final declaration of the program about action did not contain that text. ’cause the US and Israel completely objected. Um, and to that text and voted out the delegates, um, you know, um, for that.
[00:54:22] And then, you know, the US and Israel withdrew. Um, but I think that, um, there was an, a parallel mm-hmm. Conference like we always do the movements, um, when we’re not inside. Some of us are inside, but we turn the inside out. And so, uh, there was a, a parallel process where there was a declaration and a program on its own, um, in which, you know, it, it really did talk about.
[00:54:48] You know, both those things very clearly around, uh, equating Zionism as racism and the need for, for reparations, not just people in the continent, but people, the diaspora of African peoples, um, and, and the trans, um, Atlantic slave trade. So nine 11 happens and, uh, it was like, you know, three days after the conference and it really just, um, impacted the, not only the news, but also impacted international relations and politics.
[00:55:20] That I think was like a really important moment. That, you know, Bush, um, Bush, uh, was president, right? And, uh, completely, uh, you know, created, you know, the, the sort of the, the war on terror and then like the axis of evil. And I think a lot of the rollbacks, um, begin to actively happen at that moment, right?
[00:55:47] So it’s in a lot of ways this alter anti-globalization movement, the fight against racism, the fight against inter us intervention, the, the, the mobilizations. And uh, and, and in nine 11 happens and a complete reshift of the paradigm happens. You know, and I think that we need to understand that in the historical context to movements Got.
[00:56:14] Sort of completely attacked. And the criminalization of descent, the criminal is the, the Islamophobia that sort of caught fire and, and completely went after, uh, innocent people like, and Muslim comrades and, and, and whole countries and territories completely shift reshift, right? The global order. And I think that then we needed to learn.
[00:56:41] How to organize in under the Patriot Act. You know, we needed to learn how to organize under what it felt like the US as, as then, uh, a victim, you know, of, uh, an attack on US soil. You know, it’s like what we see, we see. Attacks on people, um, Palestine, like we see it on a daily basis around the world. But this was something that qualitative shifted, you know, with the, with uh, the loss, uh, uh, you know, the civilian life and loss of all those innocent people at the World Trade Center, you know, and I think, ’cause many of those were workers and regular folks and, you know, were innocent people in this moment.
[00:57:22] We had to really reshift how we understood what the organizing wa But I think we had to, it took us a while to understand the impact of what, nine 11 as we were living through it, what it would have, and then the, the US kind of administration’s role in that. And I think it took us a good decade. You know, I think there was, like, you saw the height of the anti-war mobilizations and all that stuff, but then.
[00:57:48] You also then began to see the fragmentation, you know, and the fragmentation like in the anti-war movement around, um, Palestine, you know, um, in particular around, um, you know, challenging, um, Islamophobia and being able to really then think about, um, you know, sort of, uh, against, you know, sort of what, what, what, what people’s, I hate to say this so rudely, but like what people’s were palatable mm-hmm.
[00:58:17] Palatable to defend or not, you know? And I think that that’s some of the, the ugly part of the left that we don’t talk about, right. Where people make choices around who they throw under the bus. And I think that at the end of the day, I think it took a, like a real, sort of a resetting of the new kind of condition about operating.
[00:58:39] In, you know, sort of like this much more highly surveilled, much more police state. And at the same time how the movement needed to talk about sort of the differences we had in a printable way. And I think there was just a lot of fracturing that ended up happening. And so I would say there was a lot of rebuilding that took place in the last mm-hmm.
[00:59:02] You know, 20 years that took us, that brings us to here. And you know, and I think that to me, this moment that we are in, particularly since October, um, seventh, you know, the anti-war movement, the anti militarization movement. Um, getting re-grounded in that historical past, you know, about us imperialism and us, uh, hegemony and dominance, but also like a new articulation.
[00:59:36] You know, I think a new articulation about what does it mean to, um, begin to consolidate a new demand, which I think has been around not just stopping and calling for permanent ceasefire and uh, ending the genocide, stopping the genocide, but it’s also about really where our priorities are as a people.
[00:59:59] You know, and it’s, and, and you’ve seen the popular, you know, many of us have been working, including you, you know, all of us have been working around divestment for years, you know, and investment, uh, for years, you know, from student divestment, from extractive industries and fossil fuels and divestment from, you know, uh, policing and divestment from the military budget.
[01:00:22] But now it is a popular demand where people are being clear about like, what kind of world do we wanna live in? Where, you know, you put more money into, you know, military aid versus like people’s, like healthcare and education and wellbeing, you know, and what does it mean to actually mm-hmm. Stop, you know, stop this madness, stop the genocide, stop the killing of innocent people.
[01:00:48] And, and I think, and um, I think that’s where we’re in this moment where. I think that people are getting, coming back to this question, the root causes, but also having a battle about where our priorities are. And I think that that’s a very important moment for us to not take for granted. There’s been a lot of rebuilding, slow rebuilding in the last two decades that have laid the groundwork for this ’cause that’s where, again, we can’t be historical.
[01:01:17] It didn’t start with the, you know, the student encampments created and are not, it broke through the psychic break, you know, like Occupy created the psychic break. But there were years and years and years of organizing that had been happening to create that. And then how do we, in these moments as the left, as the progressive movement, keep pushing, keep pushing, and then being able to say, this is we, how do we take it from this like kind of mass mobilization moment into organizing, into permanent, more durable change into policy into.
[01:01:52] Accumulating historical, like relationships and trust. That’s what that this moment is also sharing. And I think that’s what many of us learned since nine 11 about the importance of, of that interplay between these like mass mobilizations, these moments of crisis and then, and the ongoing durable organizing work.
[01:02:14] But then also how do we then contend and lead? Because I think at this point, this question of power, you know, we started talking about that this question of power is really fundamental, right? We have to dis we have to de patronize power, uh, but we also have to reclaim it. And we have to think about, um, you know, sort of how we think about what is, what does it actually mean?
[01:02:41] And I think that, you know, at the rising majority, we talk about it as building. You know, not only like social power, narrative power, economic power, but also governance and, and governance is just not electoral it. It means about like, how do we make collective decisions? Yeah. Around the priorities, you know?
[01:03:01] So taking it from the micro level onto this macro level, it’s like. Are we gonna keep funding Israel and, and the genocide of the peoples? Are we, or are we gonna actually turn that around and, and actually put the resources of what we have? You know, it’s not infinite, but it’s like what we have to a, a different use.
[01:03:22] William Lawrence: Right, right. So, so just, just to put a point on it, I’m, you know, uh, I heard you talk about how during the, uh, you know, largest expressions of, uh, anti-war movement against the Iraq war, um, there were still these fissure points, you know, especially around willingness to, uh, I think some people said that, you know, Afghanistan was the good war at that time.
[01:03:46] Iraq was the bad war. And then there’s also this fissure around Palestine in particular, uh, and people saying, well, we can have a anti-war movement in Iraq, but we, we, we can’t be, we can’t be pro-Palestine here and. Now after ten seven, there was an anti-war movement. There was pro-Palestinian that was prepared to emerge and has continued to emerge in new ways as things have gone on since ten seven.
[01:04:17] So you’re noting that as a, as a sign of advance and a sign of, uh, work that was done and relationships that were built, movement that was built among this broad grassroots, internationalist, anti-war movement, of which you’re a part of course, led in the Palestinian case by Palestinian organizers and the Palestinian diaspora.
[01:04:37] But now it’s prepared to take us into, you know, harder fights, you know, fighting, fighting the, uh, fighting the wars that the empire considers to be the, the good wars, the most necessary wars. So, mm-hmm. I need to keep that in mind because it seems very dark, but the fact that we have a Palestinian human rights movement, a pro-Palestinian ceasefire movement that can be a mass expression is not something at all that’s been to be taken for granted.
[01:05:05] And it’s been decades. Decades, you know, 75 years in the making really.
[01:05:11] Cindy Weisner: So, yeah, absolutely. No, absolutely. I think, I think for me, being able to see, yes, it’s, it’s the decades in the, in the making, it’s, it’s about, you know, a Palestinian, um, diverse, um, tendency movement that I think at different moments has dealt with several contradictions and historical junctures, um, in the past, you know, 70, 70 plus years.
[01:05:36] And that I think has been intergenerational, you know, has been intergenerational for the Palestinians and the Palestinian diaspora, you know? Yeah. I remember when I first, I, I got my, I got a kafi when I was. In 1991 was, was when I, I began to sort of understand I was, I was a young person and part of the anti-war mobilizations, and I began to really understand the role of, you know, settler colonialism, not only here in this country, but also around the world.
[01:06:08] And in particular learning about the Palestinian struggle for self-determination. You know, and I think that part of this moment is that it has become. Something. So never before have I seen, and many of the Palestinian compass say this, um, has it become such a global issue, you know, such a, such a, a reality for various sectors of society.
[01:06:37] You know, you have like doctors and teachers and, um, trade unionists and, you know, uh, different people of civil society that, you know, outside of like the traditional left that have come to the, the, the call for the stopping of, of the genocide, you know, for the freeing of all prisoners, you know, and all hostages, um, that have talked about ending the blank check, you know, to Israel.
[01:07:04] And I think that to me that is a, you know, that it, it’s potentially becoming a. Cornerstone issue for the election, our national elections. You know, I think it’s, it’s, it’s pretty profound and it’s been the decades of organizing and it’s also been that liberation struggle that has, has withstood time and that at this moment there’s almost like, um, a real heart connection.
[01:07:33] To the genocide. I mean, I think many of us, many of our generation has been desensitized to violence and to genocide because we have witnessed many genocides and, and many, many levels of deep violence, you know, from the Congo. I mean, you can go down the, from what’s happened in Haiti to the Congo, to different parts of, of the world.
[01:07:55] And, but there’s something about this moment that there was a collective awakening, um, that I think is, is, is kind of drawing the line. And my hope is that it goes beyond Palestine. You know, I think we are, we cannot, um, we could, we need to continue, you know, even if there’s a ceasefire we need to continue.
[01:08:13] And it has our moral and political responsibility to support the, the repair and the reparations. To palace the Palestinian people and for their self-determination. But I think that, I hope that this is a moment that whatever struggle happens, you know, whether it’s to indigenous communities, to the black community, to white working class communities, to whoever, that there is a, a political moment now that we need to be able to continue to build on.
[01:08:45] William Lawrence: It does feel that way as if this is one of those revelations that there’s, there’s no going back from the extent to which people were, have viewed, uh, the bombardment of Gaza for. Months and months and months on end. And so much of it in the early months was just streamed every single day and people were viewing it, which is why they want to ban TikTok.
[01:09:09] ’cause they don’t want you seeing that. And, and, and so I, I don’t think that there’s a going back for, um, organizers or people at large who have experienced the revelation. Oh, and this is also what has been happening. Oh, and this is also like the, uh, the, the, the fundamental, uh, nature of, of us power on a world stage is to enable this sort of thing.
[01:09:32] And it, and it has been. I right now we’re in a mass movement moment. There’s a lot of participation. It’s not a majority. I mean, you can find polling that will support a ceasefire, but do, uh, does, do, does the majority support, you know, uh, a, a position of full Palestinian self-determination? Probably not.
[01:09:53] There have been other times when you’ve, you know, uh, the groundwork has been laid and it’s been a very much a militarian sort of struggle of small numbers, trying to keep the flame alive, trying to do political development work, political education, build organization to allow for a moment like this as more of us, uh, kind of start to make anti militarism or anti imperialism a more central and durable.
[01:10:20] Political commitment, which I, I, I, I can say that’s something I am doing, uh, you know, a a as a result of everything I’ve seen in the last year. I wonder if you could, by way of conclusion, I know it’s another big question we have to wrap up. Say a word about kind of, uh, you know, scale majorities and minorities.
[01:10:41] Like, you know, the, this is the heart of the empire. This is a militaristic and imperialist nation, and a lot of people have deeply, deeply internalized the ideas, but also the interests of, of militarism. People in America, in the United States do, do benefit by American, uh, imperialism in a variety of ways.
[01:11:00] And so with this all in mind, should it be the task of anti-imperialist organizers in the US to pursue and achieve. Majorities social or political, or is this position kind of destined to remain a minority position and therefore organizers should, you know, seek to pursue the most effective arian strategies, not expecting to get, you know, 75% or, uh, of the US population on board.
[01:11:35] Cindy Weisner: Well, well, there is a organization that I helped, uh, co-found, uh, which is called The Rising Majority. And I think that part of the, the, the, the premise there, right, is that it’s not just a numeric, um, it’s just not a numeric sort of composition, but it is, it is about, um. What becomes more possible, um, when, um, we move together and in greater alignment.
[01:12:04] And part of that is, uh, aggregating, you know, I’m, uh, aggregating our power and part of that is coherence. And so the task that I think that is, is for all of us, and, and I take this very seriously, is, um, is really building, um, a coherent force within this kind of, um, broader front for, for, for change, right?
[01:12:29] And I think that part of that, um, coherence is that we have a, a level of, you know, it requires a high level of a alignment, but then it’s about shared interventions that we decide to make together. And the decision, um, to cohere is because we’re not gonna. Accomplish what we need to accomplish. Right?
[01:12:54] Whether it were majority Maori, like, you know, we can have a debate on numbers, but I think that the, the lesson that I think I, I I, I continuously learned from my own organizing work here in this country, but also from around the world. It is, it is that, um, coming together of different forces and cohering, we might not agree on everything.
[01:13:19] We’re not gonna agree on everything. In fact, and not everyone has to do everything, but we, and we should be open about those disagreements and how we hold those disagreements. But then we struggle. We struggle in a principled way, and that basically allows us to move in ways. Then I don’t think we, we’ve seen move in a long time.
[01:13:41] Right. And I think it becomes like if we’re strategically aligned, the hypothesis here is, is like if we have a higher level of strategic alignment, engage with each other principally, and then be in joint practice, that allows us to be able to flank each other. Provide political cover, but also create and those durable political vehicles to hold those commitments, right?
[01:14:06] To hold those commitments. And part of that I think is where, you know, things like the rising majority is being built. That’s why we’re building it, is because we don’t have a place of shared analysis, shared assessment, shared tools, curriculum, and then a place where we then say, let’s be in joint practice.
[01:14:23] Right? And how do we federate in a lot of ways our resources, but also have a political home. And so this thing about, you know, having a shared strategy. Is important. That’s not controversial, but it’s like the implications are right, and, and, and strategy is about making those hard choices. But I think to me in the end, it’s about acknowledging that we have to, um, I think we have to be able to continue to build that mass protagonism, you know, sort of that deep, deep work in building our basis and building the character of the left that, that I know I’m part of, which is, which is grassroots, which is of color, which is working class, which is queer, which is in internationalist and intergenerational and uh, and right promoting, being right in relation to nature.
[01:15:14] But I think that that’s part of. Yeah, not everyone holds that. We’re not hegemonic. We may never be, but I think that there is something about working in conjunction and then with others outside of ourselves. And I think this is where this broader question of the united front is so important. It’s like we may not see eye to eye with different forces, right?
[01:15:36] To the people, to, to even to people to the left of us or people to the center or right of us. But I think that where we can come to common agreement and common alignment and move, that’s important. And I think that that’s the task I think of, of conscious forces revolutionaries in this moment is to be very clear about our threats.
[01:16:00] You know, it’s like what are our threats? Know who our current opponent is, but really know what our threat is. And I think right now, in this moment, we’re facing, you know, the ascension. Of the fascist, you know? Right. And I think we have to do everything in our power. To stop it, not only here in this country, through the electoral means, but also ev everywhere else.
[01:16:24] And the reason, um, why that’s so important is because at the end, the end of the day, we have to protect space and create and go into pitch battles mm-hmm. Around our political projects of, you know, our, our just transition to that feminist, anti-racist, regenerative economy. You know, that place where we’re able to meet the needs of people where, where we live and Right.
[01:16:51] Uh, relationship, uh, with each other and nature. And I think that that is, um, place that we’re at. Like, you know, we have many struggles, but we have to have like that one movement for liberation and, you know, we have to really ground, um, in this moment of kind of continuing crisis. Like, it’s either gonna be like.
[01:17:11] Going towards like this, you know, sort of the, the what, coming back to like where you move and center death and profit. Mm-hmm. Or it becomes that simple, you know, and extraction or you, or you center, you know, EE codependence, interdependence and life. And I think that’s the choice point of where we’re at.
[01:17:34] William Lawrence: Cindy Weisner, thank you so much. This has been terrific. Uh, there’s, there’s about a dozen more questions I didn’t get to ask you, um, but, uh, uh, look forward to, uh, continuing the dialogue in various forums as we all continue with this work. Thank you.
[01:17:51] Cindy Weisner: All right. Thank you Will. Thanks
[01:17:54] William Lawrence: William Lawrence. Our producer is Josh Stro, and it is published by Convergence, a magazine for radical insights.
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[01:18:22] This has been the hegemonic icon. Thanks for listening, and let’s talk again soon.