Yves here. This post describes some of the factors that pushed the Black Lives Matter protests past a tipping point. Recall that Black Lives Matter looked about to achieve a break-out into national consciousness after the killing of Eric Garner. “Die-ins” in high-profile places like Grand Central, which regularly had substantial non-black participation, were getting traction. Lambert was tracking Black Lives Matter intensely at the time and saw how Democratic party operatives moved quickly to try to assume leadership or at least influential positions and succeeded often enough to co-opt the movement. The tactically brilliant die-ins inexplicably stopped.

The reason for featuring this post is to look at an example of activism/movement building that made headway. But having said that, I am not enthusiastic about the author’s claims about the supposed effectiveness of the “defunding the police” demand. It was taken too literally by opponents as a push for no police at all, and some supporters even backed that idea. That demand has generated pushback from the Dems, with Biden promising to increase police budgets (and I don’t buy the idea that embedding social workers will produce more judicious policing; look at how embedding journalists in military forces is a deliberate strategy by governments to generate friendly accounts).

It would have been more persuasive to give concrete examples of what “defunding” would mean, like entirely reconstituting the police force, as was done successfully in Camden, NJ, or getting rid of the budget for military toys and related training. Note that the Pentagon recently confirmed that giving military equipment to local police forces was unproductive, save that some sold it for real money to other police units.

Although correlation is not causation, the transfer of military equipment to police parallels change in police training to a paramilitary approach. From a June Atlantic article:

To be sure, federal military-surplus transfers like those through the Defense Department’s 1033 Program do little good, and much harm: Police departments obtaining used Army filing cabinets at cost isn’t cause for concern, but there’s no earthly reason for small-town cops to wear military fatigues, ride around in mine-resistant Humvees, or carry bayonets. Studies suggest that police departments that receive such equipment see no measurable improvement in officer safety or crime rates, but greater quantities do seem to correlate with higher rates of officer-involved shootings and reduced public trust.

By Nara Roberta Silva, a sociologist with a Ph.D. from the State University of Campinas, Brazil. She is a Core Faculty Member at the Brooklyn Institute for Social Research, where she researches and teaches on social movements and democracy, global Marxism, post/anti-colonialism, and social theory. Originally published at openDemocracy

Grievances are commonly pointed out as great protest and movement sparkers. When protests erupted after George Floyd’s death, it was common to hear in news analyses and protesters’ testimonials that Floyd’s fate was “the last straw”. But while blatant racism certainly inspired the protests, it is crucial to consider other elements for a more accurate picture of their rise.

The “last straw” argument is based on two factors. First, Minneapolis diligently adopted the Obama-era reform playbook following other high-profile police killings, including Jamar Clark’s in 2015 and Philando Castile’s in 2016. For five years, the city has implemented a range of measures including training officers in de-escalation tactics, the hiring of more African-American cops and early-warning systems to identify problem officers. But none of that prevented a white officer with a record of complaints from placing his knee on Floyd’s neck for almost nine minutes.

Second, by late May, it was evident that the toll of the COVID-19 pandemic was distributed unequally. African Americans and Latinos are getting sick and dying at higher rates, even in areas where they make up a smaller portion of the population. In this context, the death of George Floyd was a strong symbolic representation of the scandalous disposal of racialised bodies in the current United States.

The current struggle for racial justice does not imply that racism has gotten worse – even in light of the atrocious state-of-affairs. Floyd’s murder and the disproportionate number of COVID-19 deaths among African Americans could be considered sparkers, but what made the spark become a fire?

Preexisting Networks

With the spread of the new virus, mutual-aid networks flourished across the country, especially in large cities and metropolitan areas. These networks offered immediate relief when lockdown measures and a surge in COVID-19 cases led to job losses, forced isolation, and, consequently, increased inability to provide for oneself.

A distinguishing feature of the early summer demonstrations was how diverse the locations they occurred in were – from small towns to large cities, rural to urban areas. This suggests a hyperlocal presence and connections – the result of months of community organising. By addressing communities’ needs, mutual aid networks facilitated the work needed for and during the protests. For example, they provided a targeted audience to invite to the demonstrations, resources to take to the streets (from microphones and bullhorns, to signs and banners), and potential in-street support (like first-aid and de-escalation teams).

When demonstrations broke, several Slack channels, social media groups, and email lists started to share information about safety guidelines, coordinate to gather and distribute supplies for protesters, spread the word about bail fund initiatives and have calls to provide shelter or bathroom stops for those on the streets.

The rapidness in putting a demonstration together is also inspirational. It is not a coincidence that numerous US teenage groups without protest experience or activist background have organized local actions independently. Furthermore, in places such as New York City, preexisting mutual aid networks helped overcome the challenges imposed by both the hesitation or inability to commute brought by the pandemic and the one-week curfew enacted when protests grew in numbers. Rather than concentrating in a few traditional locations, demonstrations turned to the neighborhoods and, in consequence, ignited impressive liveliness. By engaging with each neighborhood’s geographical references and identity, protests drew in even more people.

A Vision for the Future

A proper assessment of the current struggle for racial justice must consider not only what triggered the movement – but also why it has lasted. In other words, this movement has not only taken people to the streets but also opened paths for organisation. The most important contributor to the enhanced capacity to organise was the demand to defund the police – and its embracement by a larger number of movement participants and supporters.

Defunding the police has always been a central idea to contemporary abolitionist thinkers, circles, and organisations. But until now, this was a fringe proposal often sidelined by calls for police reform or broad criticism of racism. Police reforms’ constant failed promises of hindering racial disparities slowly undermined arguments for incremental change and paved the way for those who have repeatedly highlighted reformism’s weaknesses – or even naiveté.

But the mainstreaming of this demand should also be understood in light of the pandemic. With cities scrambling to guarantee proper equipment for medical personnel and fighting numerous simultaneous crises, the disproportionate sum allocated to police departments across the country appears even more unjust and irrational. That funding could be potentially diverted to services such as physical and mental healthcare, housing development and preservation, youth and workforce development.

Defunding the police means eroding the institution that has oppressed and killed people of colour regularly in the US – and, of course, in other countries – for centuries and has been extremely efficient as an arm of the prison industrial complex. And it offers a better position to contemplate restorative justice practices and deeply embrace abolitionism – a huge cultural shift.

What makes the recent protests unique is not merely their size, the number of participants, or the spread of supporters. What is novel is the emergence of a particular strategic path provided by calls to defund the police — a vision of the future that places organisers in a better position to plan their work, make decisions, and assess potential alliances. While the Movement for Black Lives has had a comprehensive policy agenda since 2016, the restructuring of the conversation around defunding finetunes the argument on racism’s structural, institutional dimension, solidifying a position that goes beyond the “bad apples” explanation.

A New Phase

The struggle for racial justice initiated early in the summer has entered a new phase after a right-wing counteroffensive. A fast reconfiguration of activist circles is unfolding as groups and organisations resettle and adjust their campaigns. The loosely assembled movement now has the ability to keep the pressure on by hybridising its organising models. This ability is crucial as elections approach, and the debate on social and political matters is likely to become narrower in scope and the issues related to racial justice reduced to misrepresentations of movement confrontational tactics (e.g. property destruction). In fact, the calls to defund the police have already been swiftly mobilised to promote “red scare” among voters and even fracture Black communities.

Public support or opposition to a certain demand does not follow a straight line and can increase or retract as the debate continues, policies are advanced (or stalled), and other issues get to the spotlight. But by having an eye toward the future, the movement can guarantee a smoother coordination of actions and bet on some meaningful transformation ahead.