The Social Justice and Progressive Politics Divide

This is a rough articulation of a problem I’m grappling with, and its quickly shaping up to be its own chapter in my book (though it wasn’t part of my original outline). I need a lot of help teasing this out, so comments are very much appreciated.

As I’ve been considering the place of - or more frequently total lack of - organizations whose mission it is to reach out to, engage, and elevate young people of color in our politics, I’ve started to think a lot lately about the divide between two major progressive constituencies: those who understand political activity through the vocabulary and history of social justice movements, vs. those who consider themselves to be part of a new progressive movement.

This new progressive movement seeks to work within and transform the system. It is party-based and electoral. During interviews for my book, a couple people pointed out to me that a lot of political terminology and basic concepts that we in this movement take for granted - including the term progressive - are either alienating or just nonstarters among a lot of young people of color. Instead, young people of color understand politics through a language based in community organizing, human rights, civil rights, and social justice. That is a language the progressive movement rarely embraces. Worse, its a language that the Democratic Party - our chosen vehicle of change - almost never embraces.

For the most part, it’s a racial divide (though not exclusively so). In the past, the civil rights movement offered a common mission and language. But identity politics is reaching its limits as a vehicle for accomplishing change, and we can’t remain siloed anymore. At the same time, asking people to drop identity politics altogether is totally unacceptable. That model developed for a reason - to address structural and outright biases in our system. These problems persist, and you can’t deny that a rightful place in our political conversation.

So, in the words of Led Zeppelin, “Where’s the bridge?” This is a problem for the progressive movement in general, but, as the most diverse generation in modern American history, it has particular relevance to any discussion of Millennial politics.

In the last 15 years, the share of white voters 18-29 has decreased from 84% to 71%. African American and Latino youth now make up almost 25% of the youth vote (18-29). These new voters are breaking heavily Democratic (African Americans by almost 4-1, Latinos by more than 2-1), and demonstrating high rates of turnout. Young African Americans are more likely than their white counterparts to participate in a variety of electoral activities including voting, donating money, displaying signs/buttons, and volunteering for political organizations.

What does it mean to be the most diverse generation in modern American history if we can’t effectively talk to each other and organize together for political change? This divide is something that we as a generation are going to need to tackle if we are to create a coherent movement.

Young People For and some other groups are making a concerted effort to reach out to young people of color, but outreach is difficult when you lack a basic, common vocabulary or theory of change. Broadcast politics orgs like Vote or Die and ground game orgs like ACORN do a good job GOTVing and turning out young people of color - but neither offer a sustainable model of longterm engagement, and neither do more than provide basic entry into a common vehicle for change. This is one of the reasons I was so angry about the League losing some of their funding. They’re one of the few groups I’ve seen bridging this divide and committed to operating 24/7/365.

I’ve talked about a “.org Youth Boom” in 2003/2004 - a boom that continues today. Groups arise and blaze a trail, some fall, some scale up, new groups arise to build on the best practices that emerge. But in that cycle, there are very, very few groups that engage people of color. And those that do seem to be some of the first to die off once the election ended and the movement wasn’t fishing for votes anymore …

To be sure, lack of resources is an aggravating factor here. You can’t bridge these gaps if no one as the resources to even try. Many people in these communities don’t have access to the funding networks, social, or even professional connections that can help them bootstrap something. Because of the alienation from even a vocabulary that recognizes the electoral process and partisan politics as a vehicle for change, progressive politics isn’t even on the radar in some of these communities when it comes time to thinking about how to get involved and effect change.

I’ve seen some interesting work from groups like Color of Change … maybe that’s a way forward. But this seems to be the nadir of the progressive youth movement - the one spot where things aren’t bumping and shaking with entrepreneurial activity.

I don’t know what the answer to this problem is, but it’s pretty obvious there is a problem.