Closing with care
Ontario Coalition Against Poverty (OCAP) rally in downtown Toronto. Photo courtesy Global Labour Research Centre/York University. The Ontario Coalition Against Poverty (OCAP) has announced its formal end. On May 13,…
Chris Dixon
Orienting toward organizing
An activist holds an “Antifa” flag above a crowd of marchers, Berlin, June 27, 2009. Photo by Sam Chills/Flickr. The last few decades have seen regular debates on the left…
Without care, we lose
Ailén Possamay, “What they call love is unpaid labour,” Buenos Aires, 2019. “How many people around us have burnt out, are depressed or completely overwhelmed by our struggles and family…
Resisting sectarianism, growing the left
Today, in a time of overlapping crises and fast-paced social media cultures, sectarianism has taken on new and destructive forms, writes Chris Dixon. Photo by Karl Monaghan/Flickr. Sectarianism is one…
Researching the right
Members of the Proud Boys march in Washington, DC, December 12, 2020. Photo by Elvert Barnes/Flickr. The last few years have seen a sharp uptick in discussions on the North…
Building, not branding
Women’s Liberation group marches in support of the Black Panther Party, New Haven, 1969. Photo by David Fenton. People whose names we will never know propelled liberatory struggles of the…
Revitalizing Left Internationalism
Protesters demonstrate against selling arms to Saudi Arabia, September 2017. Photo by AlisdareHickson/Twitter. The COVID-19 pandemic is revealing a lot about the current capacities of social movements and communities in…
Bottom-Up Strategizing for Social Change
New Zealand children join a protest against nuclear power in 1982. Photo by John Miller/ABC News. Increasingly, activists and organizers are discussing the question, “What’s your theory of change?” For…
Twenty Years After Seattle: Dispensing with Myths
On November 30, 1999, protesters engaged police and delegates to the World Trade Organization (WTO) conference in Seattle, Washington. Photo courtest of Crimethink. This column is part of #ShutdownWTO20, a…
Humbly growing older on the Left
Photo courtesy 350.org (Twitter) I’ve recently returned to a something I wrote in my twenties. Back in 2005, I contributed a “Letter to older activists” to the book Letters From…
Training for movements
Photo by The Charlatan Many activist spaces these days spend time developing critical analysis through events, writing, and discussion. But as much as we might wish otherwise, sharp analysis doesn’t…
Learning from the past, fighting in the present
Photo by No One Is Illegal Ottawa “How do you avoid the feeling that you should be working ALL THE TIME given the urgency of the state of the world?”…