Did New Left activists have an opportunity to start a revolution that they simply could not bring off? Was their rejection of conventional forms of political organization a fatal flaw or were the apparent weaknesses of the movement -- the lack of central authority, the distrust of politics -- actually hidden strengths?Wini Breines traces the evolution of the New Left movement through the Free Speech Movement, Students for a Democratic Society (SDS), and SDS's community organization projects. For Breines, the movement's goal of participatory decision-making, even when it was not achieved, made up for its failure to take practical and direct action. By the late 1960s, antiwar activism contributed to the decline of the New Left, as the movement was flooded with new participants who did not share the founding generation's political experiences or values.Originally published in 1982, Wini Breines's classic work now includes a new preface in which she reassesses, and for the most part affirms, her initial views of the movement. She argues that the movement remains effective in the midst of radical changes in activist movements. Breines also summarizes and evaluates the new and growing scholarship on the 1960s. Her provocative analysis of the New Left remains important today.
Inhaltsverzeichnis
An Introduction to the New Left: A Critique of Some Critics
Emergence of the New Left
A Historical Sketch
The Old Left and the New Left
The Great Refusal
"The Issue Is Not the Issue"
The Free Speech Movement: Students-for-Themselves
"Actions"
Politics as Community
Prefigurative Politics
Means and Ends
Participatory Democracy
Politics as Organization
A Mass Movement
Movement versus Organization
Organizational Politics, 1964-1965
Decentralization
Economic Research and Action Project (ERAP)
December Conference and After
Internal Education
Politics Is about Power
Students as Agency
Agency as an Issue
The University: New Realities, Old Notions
Students as Agency
New Working Class Theory and Marxism
Reversals
Transition Years, 1967-1968
The Economic Research and Action Project
The Debate: Poor People or Students; Off-Campus vs. On-Campus Organizing
The Theory of Community Unions
Community Organizing: Organization as Community
Democracy
The Critique of Community Organizing
