Introduction: The Dynamics and Terrains of Local Democracy and Corporate Power in the 21st Century

Authors

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.5195/jwsr.2019.919

Abstract

Particular to the struggles of today is a renewed and increasingly networked politics of local democracy in opposition to global corporate power. With the five urgent essays in this symposium we bring these politics into a world-systems space, considering specific community conflicts with corporations over water and petro-carbon as part of larger translocal struggles, and taking up broader strategies for asserting democratic control over economic life. The included essays feature two of four terrains of struggle —the translocalization of local resistance and contests over sovereignty – that we see as significant in the contemporary dynamics of local democracy and corporate power. We identify additional examples of contests on each these terrains of struggle, as well as those terrains involving contestation of the corporation itself and of alternative global constitutionalisms, in mapping the dimensions of the developing period of community-corporate struggle. Our purpose is to set in motion further collaborations between academic and community-based scholars, with the goal of equipping communities with knowledge useful in expanding and deepening democracy.

Author Biography

Jackie Smith, University of Pittsburgh

Professor, Department of Sociology

References

Barber, Benjamin. 2013. If Mayors Ruled the World: Dysfunctional Nations, Rising Cities. New Haven, CT: Yale University Press.

Barber, Benjamin. 2014. "Cities as Glocal Defenders of Rights." Pp. 17-22 in The Future of Human Rights in an Urban World: Exploring Opportunities, Threats and Challenges, edited by T. van Lindert and D. Lettinga. Amnesty International–Netherlands. At: http://www.amnesty.nl/sites/default/files/public/the_future_of_human_rights_in_an_urban_world_0.pdf

Bare, Michael, Leslie Zellers, Patricia A. Sullivan, Jennifer L. Pomeranz, and Mark Pertschuk. 2019. “Combatting and Preventing Preemption: A Strategic Action Model.” Journal of Public Health Management and Practice 25(2):101–3.

Caccia, Beppe. 2016. “A European Network of Rebel Cities?” OpenDemocracy. June 5. At: https://www.opendemocracy.net/en/can-europe-make-it/european-network-of-rebel-cities/.

CELDF. 2018. Rebelling Against the Corporate State: Forging a Community Rights Movement. Community Environmental Legal Defense Fund.

Coleridge, Greg, Richard Grossman, and Mary Zepernick. 2000. “Rumors of USA Democracy Discovered to Be Counterfeit.” By What Authority.

Evans, Peter, Editor. 2002. Livable Cities? Urban Struggles for Livelihood and Sustainability. Berkeley: University of California Press.

Flacks, Mickey and Richard Flacks. 2018. Making History / Making Blintzes: How Two Red Diaper Babies Found Each Other and Discovered America. New Brunswick, NJ: Rutgers University Press.

Foran, John. 2015. “Just Say ‘No’ to the Paris COP: A Possible Way to Win Something for Climate Justice.” Resilience.

Grossman, Richard L. and Frank Adams. 1993. Taking Care of Business: Citizenship and the Articles of Incorporation. S. Yarmouth, MA: Charter Ink (POCLAD).

Hanna, Thomas M. 2018. Our Common Wealth: The Return of Public Ownership in the United States. Manchester, UK: Manchester University Press.

Harvey, David. 2012. Rebel Cities: From the Right to the City to the Urban Revolution. New York: Verso.

Holston, James. 2009. "Insurgent Citizenship in an Era of Global Urban Peripheries." City and Society 21(2):245-67. doi: 10.1111/j.1548-744X.2009.01024.x.

Kostakis, Vasilis and Michel Bauwens. 2014. Network Society and Future Scenarios for a Collaborative Economy. London, UK: Palgrave Macmillan.

Lummis, D. Douglas. 1996. Radical Democracy. Ithaca, NY: Cornell University Press.

Manski, Ben. 2015. “The Democratic Turn of the Century: Learning from the U.S. Democracy Movement.” Socialism and Democracy 29(1):2–16.

Manski, Ben. 2019. “Methodological Approaches to Movement Waves and the Making of History.” in Palgrave Handbook of Social Movements, Revolution, and Social Transformation, edited by B. Berberoglu. New York, NY: Palgrave Macmillan.

Manski, Ben and Karen Dolan. 2009. “Unleash Democracy: Policies for a New Federalism.” Pp. 315–26 in Mandate for Change, C. W. Hartman, ed. Lanham, MD: Lexington Books.

Manski, Ben and John E. Peck. 2006. “Corporatization: An Internal Clash of Civilizations.” Pp. 159–69 in Beyond the Market: The Future of Public Services, edited by D. Chavez. Amsterdam, The Netherlands: Transnational Institute.

Manski, Ben and Jill Stein. 2014. “A People’s Climate Strike: Why We Can’t Wait.” TruthOut.

Manski, Sarah. 2017. “Building the Blockchain World: Technological Commonwealth or Just More of the Same?” Strategic Change 26(5).

McKeon, Nora. 2015. "La Via Campesina: The ‘Peasants’ Way’ to Changing the System, Not the Climate." Journal of World-Systems Research 21(2):241-49.

McMichael, Philip. 2008. "Peasants Make Their Own History, but Not Just as They Please." Pp. 37-60 in Transnational Agrarian Movements: Confronting Globalization, edited by S. M. Borras Jr., M. Edelman and C. Kay. Malden, MA: Wiley-Blackwell.

Oömen, Barbara, Martha F. Davis and Michele Grigolo, eds. 2016. Global Urban Justice: The Rise of Human Rights Cities. New York: Cambridge University Press.

Ortiz, Isabel, Sara Burke, Mohamed Berrada and Hernán Cortés. 2013. "World Protests 2006-2013." Initiative for Policy Dialogue and Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung New York Working Paper Series. Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung New York. At: http://www.fes-globalization.org/new_york/new-publication-world-protests-2006-2013/.

Ritz, Dean, ed. 2001. Defying Corporations, Defining Democracy: A Book of History & Strategies. New York, NY: Apex.

Smith, Jackie. 2014. "Counter-Hegemonic Networks and the Transformation of Global Climate Politics: Rethinking Movement-State Relations." Global Discourse: An Interdisciplinary Journal of Current Affairs and Applied Contemporary Thought 4(1):1-19.

Smith, Jackie and Caitlin Schroering. 2018. “Global Peasant Declaration Represents Huge Advance for Human Rights.” Common Dreams December 18. At: https://www.commondreams.org/views/2018/12/18/global-peasant-declaration-represents-huge-advance-human-rights.

Tokar, Brian. 2015. “Democracy, Localism, and The Future of The Climate Movement.” World Futures 71(3–4):65–75.

Downloads

Published

2019-03-25

How to Cite

Manski, B., & Smith, J. (2019). Introduction: The Dynamics and Terrains of Local Democracy and Corporate Power in the 21st Century. Journal of World-Systems Research, 25(1), 6–14. https://doi.org/10.5195/jwsr.2019.919

Issue

Section

Symposium: Corporate Power and Local Democracy