Activism and Serendipity
I sometimes ask activists I know how they chose to get involved in a particular issue. Often the answer is serendipity. An activist had a friend who got them involved in an issue or were working for an organization that took a new issue. That is more or less how I got involved in public transit activism. SEPTA threatened to close the R8 train line, which is vital for West Mt. Airy and, at the time, I was the President of our civic organization, West Mt. Airy Neighbors. So I jumped into the frey not because I played with toy trains as a kid but because I had to do something to save the train line around which Mt. Airy grew.
Deliberate Activism: What is the slavery of Today?
Other activists are more deliberate. When I talk to them, I frequently here them give one rationale for taking on this or that project. These activists ask themselves, what is the slavery of today? That is, they ask themselves what issue or cause is of enormous importance and yet is being fundamentally ignored or put to one side as being too difficult to address, as slavery was among the Founders of America. They ask themselves, what issue or cause would we or our descendants be embarrassed for having ignored or neglected? What could we be doing today that might make a big difference, if only we could remove our blinders?
International Problems
There are lots of plausible contenders, especially in the international arena. A great deal of international poverty could be alleviated if the developed world and, in particular the United States, made some changes in our trade policies or supported strategic investments in the developing world. Sometimes I think that an activist has to have blinders not to focus primarily on the suffering of the poor in the developing world—and the all too frequent genocides in Africa and elsewhere.
Yet, I spend my time working on issues at home in the US and, especially, in Philadelphia. That comes, in part, because working on problems close to home gives me more sense of control over the results than working on problems far away. But my activism is focused on Philadelphia in part because I think the most important ignored problems we face in the United States are all found here.
The Shame of the Cities
The first problem is the decline of our cities. Perhaps because I grew up in the country, I love cities. I love the excitement, the density, and the diversity of city life. I love the give and take of democratic politics which from ancient Athens to 18th century Philadelphia, has always been a product of urban life. One reason I just loved campaigning for state representative in 2004 is that I can think of few things more fun to do than walking up and down city blocks talking to people about the problems before us.
It doesn’t take much walking in Philadelphia to see the consequences of fifty years of destructive public policies on one of the few great cities in America. (Of course, you can’t walk in the regions of our country that have grown—including so-called cities like Charlotte, Houston, and Phoenix—as our real cities have declined.) Make no mistake—the problems we face in Philadelphia are not just the result of changes in productive processes or the desires of people to move to the suburbs. That is part of the explanation. But our problems were made, or exacerbated by short-sighted and malignant public policy especially but not only at the federal and state levels of government.
Tales of Two Cities
The second problem is closely connected to the first. It is the dire poverty of so many people in Philadelphia and cities like it. It is a sin that so many people—and in particular, so many African Americans, are more or less excluded by unemployment and underemployment, by bad schools, by crime, and by impoverished neighborhoods from active participation in our political and economic life.
It is also a crime, one that plagues our cities. For, to a very large extent, the two problems that I am most passionate about are really one. We know that some sections of a city like Philadelphia can thrive and prosper to at least some degree even when twenty to thirty percent of the population is poor. All the beaming articles about the rise of Center City tell us that. But I am inclined to think—I am betting my political activism on the proposition that—ultimately, we are all going to rise or fall together. There is a limit to how much our economy can grow when so many of our citizens do not have the education and training or role models that enable them to fill the technical and administrative jobs and professional jobs generated by a modern economy. There is a limit to how many people will move here when too many neighborhoods are plagued by poverty, crime, poor schools and blighted commercial districts. And there is a limit to how good our schools and neighborhoods can be and how many businesses we can attract if we don’t consistently attack the racism that limits too many of our citizens from full inclusion in our community.
As this blog evolves, I will write about why I am optimistic that finally, after fifty years of decline, cities like Philadelphia can turn a corner. I may be wrong about that and may have my optimism shaken. But I can’t see anything that might change my mind about the importance of addressing urban decline and poverty. At least here in the US, it is the slavery of today.